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In our little world, there’s no hotter topic than account-based marketing. There’s also no more misunderstood topic. That’s a problem – and an opportunity, if you’re willing to do things the right way.
(The right way, unfortunately, is the hard way.)
Definitions first: ABM is a strategic focus on driving engagement with specific key accounts, rather than casting a broad net in the industry. It’s meant to include both marketing and sales, with the teams working together toward hyper-specific goals. I want a conversation with that guy at that company; let’s make it happen together.
Great promise, right? Agreed! Plenty of broad-based tactics have become so accessible as to be almost useless. The world doesn’t need more generic content tied to vague personas, and set-it-and-forget-it PPC hardly ever drives positive ROAS.
That promise is also the problem. ABM sounds great, and it’s an easy sell to sales and to leadership. That’s led to the term itself becoming effectively meaningless. The human tendency to want the easy path – we all do it! – has turned the concept (which is sound) into any number of get-rich-quick tools. This, in turn, has diluted the practice, and created wildly different working definitions. In the market, everything from company-focused DSPs to outsourced cold calling to emails “personalized” by AI in a spreadsheet is being called “ABM.”
If the concept is going to survive, we need to change that. And the concept should survive.
So what are we really saying when we say “ABM”? What does “a strategic focus on driving engagement with specific key accounts” really look like?
I’d propose the IRE framework. That’s I for “identify,” R for “research,” and E for “engage.” It’s a multi-step, integrated process designed to gather and use as much information as possible on specific companies and individuals, not just slightly more targeted spamming.
“Identify” starts with being honest about your real targets. Everybody can – and has – targeted the biggest companies in their sector because the biggest companies in their sector have money. That doesn’t mean they have a need, and it certainly doesn’t mean they’re listening. Herding toward the Tier 1s is only a recipe for being lost in the crowd.
Rather, we need to be thinking about who really needs what we’re selling, and why. There is a comical amount of information available online, even before touching proprietary sources. Trade media, job postings, new hire announcements, earnings calls, FDA releases – they all offer clues to what your targets are thinking. Yes, it takes time and effort. But that’s what ABM needs to be about. True personalization at scale doesn’t exist; it’s about 1-to-1 intelligence.
(Rule of thumb: If you can’t write your ABM targets from memory on a single whiteboard, your list is too big.)
“Research” is about diving deep into your target companies and relevant individuals. LinkedIn is a good start, but it’s only a start. I joke that I want to know their dog’s name, but it’s barely a joke. Every piece of information – backgrounds, charitable organizations, hobbies, degrees, publications – can prove valuable. It’s impossible to say exactly how, but this is detective work. You’re building a case to make your case. A particularly sharp chimpanzee could build an email that includes their undergrad’s mascot. In IRE ABM, you’re putting the pieces together in ways that others can’t or won’t.
“Engage” is where things get creative. You’ve got your target list. You’ve got enough information about them that you could write the Wikipedia article. At this stage, you’re using that to make your own luck. Are they on a nonprofit board? They’ll probably be at the gala – and you should be, too. Do they run a tight-knit, in-person office? Sounds like their team might like lunch. Did they just publish a paper? You’d better have read it, and be able to tie your communications directly to their work.
There’s no playbook for the engagement stage, because there can’t be a playbook for the engagement stage. Every company is different, and every person is different. That’s the point of ABM, and thinking of it any other way is cheapening the concept. If it was easy, everybody with a 6sense account would be rolling in it. They’re not, and they’re losing faith in the concept as a result. That’s too bad, because ABM can be sound. It just needs to be approached the right way.
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