Account based marketing, traces its roots in 1990’s, when B2B and B2C companies started noticing the need for personalized marketing. Back then too, customers were craving for personalized buying experience. Looking at the need, the era began with its implementation.
The evergreen mantra for personalized marketing is ‘advertising’. But today, with the help of technology and tools the marketing is way more channelized and shows some sophistication. This was not the case before.
Must Read: Account based marketing framework
#The Past Phase Of Account Based Marketing
Earlier, big agencies required big accounts to persist because they were the only Gods who were able to pay agency price. But, protecting and courting these accounts was a very intricate task. Content team, art directors, and account executives cluster in small meetings to sketch the roadmap of each Account. The proposals were meticulously crafted for many days or even for weeks. There was lacking professionalism and sophistication. The only thing focused upon was, keeping the accounts extremely happy.
This was how an Account Based Marketing was carried out in early 80’s, 90’s. Luckily the ABM these days has experienced dramatic change. Later, Account Based Marketing made the first appearance on google trends in 2013 and marketing experts and analysts took this marketing style to another level.
Now-a-days, inbound marketing and peculiarly content marketing are the darlings of the B2B and B2C marketing planet. These types of marketing are so pervasive, still, many marketers are oblivious about what it mean.
Must Read: Demand Generation using ABM
Let’s quickly review the Inbound, Outbound and Content Marketing:
- Inbound marketing– When your potential customers find your company, you are doing the inbound marketing correctly. It uses many types of pull marketing tactics- blogs, Events SEO, social Media posts etc.
- Outbound marketing – It is also known as disruptive/interruptive marketing, is presented in front of leads to proceed them through the final few stages of the buyer funnel.
- Content marketing – This is a subset of Inbound marketing. It refers particularly to the content created for inbound marketing. Focuses upon content creating, publishing and distributing it to the targeted audience.
Must Read: The Importance of Account-Based Marketing: Past, Present, and Future
Then comes the account-based marketing (ABM), the subject of our blog.
What is Account Based Marketing?
Account-based marketing is a concentrated approach of B2B marketing wherein sales and marketing teams work together to target right-fit accounts and convert them into customers. In the era of information, technology and data abundance, marketers are continuously striving for attention of potential customers.
By nature, productive ABM is perfectly used by B2B marketers. In Account-based marketing, marketers are very specific about their products, services and sell them to the specific clients. There are obvious benefits to this—not only it is easier to narrow down the marketing field and personalize campaigns, but also easier to inline marketing with sales and measure ROI.
Must Read: Measuring the ROI of Your Account based marketing Strategy : Key Metrics to Track for Success
#The Present Phase Of Account Based Marketing
The account based marketing currently is the same process as earlier one, still the ABM is centered upon picking the big whale, and pursuing them via outbound marketing tactics. But now a days ABM utilizes more aligned and filtered approach. In the present phase of ABM, we can have categorized them into 3 parts, say it as IMM structure of ABM:
- Identify
- Market
- Measure
Identify – This process includes the identification of accounts. Which accounts you want to sell or gain as client. This is a very first step.
Market – Once you identify the accounts you want to target, then next step is to market them by creating a marketing campaigns and material targeted at your account and this will attract and move them down the funnel.
Measure–Calculating and measuring the attainment of your account-based marketing campaigns demands analyzing different benchmarks than those you would for conventional advertising and marketing activities.
Before days, they can focus upon a handful of accounts without marketing automation. However, the trends for ABM is changing with the help of technology. Now, marketing automation took pace that enables marketers to pursue a meld of ABM strategies. Owing to the in hand accounts, marketers can engage an extensive tail of targeted accounts.
Must Read: Account based marketing strategies in 2023
#The Future Phase Of Account Based Marketing
As we are already in the turning phase of ABM, in future we can observe the improvisation in the marketing automation. There will be a persistent and coordinated engagement of the strategic accounts between marketing and the sales.
The predicted future of ABM is, Artificial intelligence. AI is the future phase of ABM. It is foreseen that AI will positively impact the ABM market. The ABM is a sturdy engine and data is the propellant. We know the online space is drastically growing, so the data is abundant. AI will identify the data, analyze the pattern and predict the future decision of accounts. We will observe the deep and strategic impact of AI throughout businesses, especially in marketing. AI will give more power to the marketers and sales team to decide the further step precisely. Take a look at these different ABM Types.
Conclusion:
The conventional way of account based marketing had entered many filters and funnels. Now the future phase is all about marketing automation enabled by Artificial intelligence. AI has the ability to execute tasks for humans that includes visual and speech recognition, decision-making, and language translation. The Account based marketing will be leveraged if AI is implemented in every segment of Sales and marketing process.
Must Read: 5 ABM Mistakes You Cannot Afford to Commit
An engineer turned writer and marketer, my aim is to present a sales and marketing world with the technical perspective.
