Dissecting & Optimising The Best-In-Class TOFU B2B Media Mix (April 2023 stats)

What are B2B marketers doing to drive their Top of Funnel (TOFU) marketing mix in 2023? According to the latest research from Insider intelligence, it's squarely into the world of social media. As you can see on the below graphic, according to B2B marketers in the USA, as of April 2023, 50% felt that social contributes the most to their TOFU goals. The traditional go-to channels of search, SEO and content have fallen down the pecking order, all of which got me thinking. What are the most effective top of funnel tactics in mid-2023?

At FunnelFuel, we're pretty ambivalent to the source of paid media and cary no bias - indeed we measure the performance of the full funnel across a diverse range of B2B clients, giving us a level of insight which is largely unmatched. We help clients measure a LOT of social media marketing, alongside plenty of the other big channels - paid search, programmatic, SEO, television, audio, Digital out of Home (DooH) and many more.

My personal view is that the B2B marketers are missing a trick with their skewed mix. I note that the 22% who answered ABM are going to fall into the below wheelhouse, as indeed can the slightly vague 'video' 30%, but essentially targeted display advertising outside of social doesn't feature in the list. However, a well-executed programmatic advertising approach, leveraging Account-Based Marketing (ABM) and contextual targeting, has emerged as a highly effective and impactful tactic for inserting a brand into the research journey of B2B buyers. Now my honest absolute best guess on the above data, is that the TOFU goals have not been tightly defined enough, and without knowing the direction of the TOFU goals, it is hard to determine how good any tactic is versus another, but when you have the chance to use a tactic which 'jumps the gun' by getting in front of prospects at the very start. of their research journey, in a sector which has very long sales cycles, then it cannot be overlooked.

Lets delve into the evidence supporting the notion that programmatic advertising can be one of the most efficient top-of-funnel tactic for B2B marketers.

  1. B2B Marketers' Allocation of Resources: According to research conducted by Insider Intelligence, B2B marketers are increasingly investing in upper-funnel programmatic marketing tactics to drive brand awareness and engage potential buyers. This includes allocating a significant portion of their budgets to social media advertising, content marketing, influencer marketing, and display advertising.
  2. The Rise of Programmatic Advertising: Programmatic advertising has gained immense popularity in recent years, transforming the way B2B marketers approach paid media campaigns. With programmatic, marketers can leverage data-driven automation to reach highly targeted audiences at scale, optimising ad placements and budgets in real-time.
  3. Account-Based Marketing (ABM) Approach: ABM has revolutionised B2B marketing strategies by focusing efforts on specific high-value accounts. By aligning programmatic advertising with ABM tactics, B2B marketers can target decision-makers and key stakeholders within their target accounts. This approach ensures that marketing efforts are directed towards the most relevant and influential audience, enhancing the effectiveness of top-of-funnel campaigns.
  4. Contextual Targeting: Contextual targeting allows advertisers to deliver relevant ads based on the content and context of the websites being visited by potential buyers. By aligning programmatic campaigns with contextual targeting, B2B marketers can insert their brand into the research journey of their target audience, reaching them at the right moment with personalised messages. This strategy enhances brand visibility, establishes credibility, and increases the likelihood of driving engagement and conversions.
  5. Supporting Evidence and Industry Reports: Several industry reports and studies support the effectiveness of programmatic advertising in driving top-of-funnel campaigns:
    1. According to a study by eMarketer (source: [2]), programmatic display advertising spending in the B2B sector is projected to reach significant heights in the coming years, indicating the growing confidence and success of this approach.
    2. A report by Dun & Bradstreet reveals that B2B marketers employing ABM strategies have experienced higher levels of customer engagement, improved lead quality, and increased marketing ROI.
    3. A study by Demandbase highlights that ABM-focused programmatic advertising generates higher click-through rates and greater engagement, leading to increased conversions and revenue.

SO what could a best in class Top of Funnel B2B paid media mix look like?

Besides what we saw in the above graphic, I'd venture that these 5 tactics have a lot to offer B2B marketers:

  1. Harnessing the Power of Targeted Programmatic Advertising: Targeted programmatic advertising, powered by advanced data-driven automation, has revolutionised the way B2B brands reach and engage their audiences. By utilising programmatic technology, brands can leverage comprehensive data insights to deliver personalised messages at scale, optimising ad placements and maximising campaign performance.
  2. Strategic Account-Based Marketing (ABM): ABM has emerged as a game-changing approach for B2B marketers. By aligning programmatic advertising with ABM strategies, leading brands can target high-value accounts and key decision-makers. This targeted approach ensures that ad placements are precisely tailored to reach the most influential stakeholders in the research journey, enhancing brand visibility and generating higher-quality leads.
  3. Contextual Targeting and Content Alignment: Contextual targeting allows B2B brands to deliver relevant ads based on the content and context of websites visited by their target audience. By aligning programmatic campaigns with contextual targeting and content alignment, brands can interject their messaging seamlessly into the research journey. This strategy enables them to position themselves as thought leaders and provide valuable insights to potential buyers at critical decision-making stages.
  4. Leveraging First-Party Data: Leading B2B brands understand the value of first-party data and use it to fuel their programmatic advertising campaigns. By utilising their own customer data and behavior insights, brands can precisely target prospects who align with their ideal customer profiles. This personalized approach helps increase relevancy, engagement, and conversion rates.
  5. Account-Based Retargeting: Account-based retargeting is an advanced tactic that further enhances the effectiveness of programmatic advertising. By tailoring ad content specifically for target accounts, brands can re-engage and nurture prospects who have already shown interest. This personalised retargeting strategy helps keep the brand top-of-mind during the research journey, driving higher conversion rates. Yes this may be associated with lower funnel activity, but it doesn't take much lateral thinking to slot in at the top of funnel either.
  6. Advanced Measurement, segmentation and Analytics: To optimise top-of-funnel paid media strategies, B2B brands rely on advanced measurement and analytics tools. By monitoring key metrics, such as impressions, click-through rates, lands, on-site goals and conversions, brands gain valuable insights into the effectiveness of their campaigns. This data-driven approach allows for continuous optimisation and ensures that resources are allocated to the most impactful channels and messages

Conclusion: As B2B marketers strive to maximise the impact of their top-of-funnel campaigns, programmatic advertising, coupled with ABM and contextual targeting, emerges as a powerful strategy. By leveraging programmatic technology, B2B marketers can efficiently insert their brand into the research journey of potential buyers, capturing their attention and establishing meaningful connections. The evidence and industry reports discussed in this blog post demonstrate the effectiveness of programmatic advertising as the most efficient top-of-funnel tactic for B2B marketers. By adopting this approach, businesses can drive brand awareness, engage their target audience, and ultimately accelerate their growth in the dynamic B2B marketplace.

 

 

Beat Google by 2 years and embrace a cookieless B2B future, today

A new ‘deadline’ for deprecating third-party tracking cookies has been set at two and a half years later than it was originally planned – H2 of 2024 – since Google announced their latest delay. Further timelines regarding Privacy Sandbox were also shared by Google, as the company feels that more time is needed to test and launch its features fully. This is all very understandable considering the very real challenges that face our industry in 'getting off' the cookie, but here at FunnelFuel, we believe the future - at least when it comes to cookies - can begin today. We're approaching this challenge by;

As we move towards a privacy-conscious future, cookieless measurement is one of the most challenging aspects for marketers as we move towards it. That is not a surprise to those in the online advertising industry. The programmatic industry is highly fragmented due to all of its media channels, formats, ad exchanges, ad servers, and demand versus demand platforms. Among the many differences between supply-side platforms and the open web, there are several different types of data, measurement, and analytics that are available to companies in walled gardens versus those outside the walled gardens.

In the present day, teams of savvy data scientists use a common identifier - namely a tracking cookie - in order to rank these combinations based on the expected return on investment. Connecting these solutions, even with third-party tracking cookies, is extremely challenging.

The cookie issue doesn’t look like it’s going to fade away anytime soon, so advertisers might stay the course with existing cookie-based campaign strategies for some time to come. However, there is more to cookieless than just Google. It’s estimated that only 30 – 45% of internet traffic relies on cookies.

Those are the two major browsers that have blocked third-party cookies for the past three years. If you find that truth shocking, let me explain it. Chrome has been the only major player to not block third-party cookies, as it holds a roughly 50% share of browsing activity globally. Cookie availability continues to be squeezed as stricter consumer privacy regulations are increasingly being enacted across the globe, which makes it even more difficult to access cookies.

The percentage of people who use ad blocking tools or go incognito is estimated to be between 7% and 40% on mobile devices – and everyone else in between. It is important to understand that cookie-based strategies over-index to only 30% of the open web, so if you are following along with your calculator, that means cookies only over-index 30% of the open web.

Funnelfuel is transitioning to a privacy-first programmatic approach, regardless of cookie availability and any further changes made by Google. For us, the future starts today

A cookie-based approach to programmatic advertising is just scratching the surface when it comes to its scale. You can easily plan, target, and optimise your programmatic campaigns without having to resort to cookies. The focus of FunnelFuel continues to be on rapidly transitioning to a privacy-first programmatic approach, regardless of cookie availability and any further changes made by Google to the deadline – not only will it be better for consumers, but it will also be more efficient as a result.

By the end of 2023, we are on target to deliver 85% of our campaigns without cookies globally. To achieve connected and accurate measurement across channels, we combine data from a multitude of our partners to create FunnelFuel Journey, a unique profile that combines multiple signals into a single profile. By focussing on running programmatic media against privacy aware solutions which don't need cookie IDs, like our unique approach to ABM, contextual targeting and the usage of first party data to inform live creative and targeting decisioning, our reliance on out-dated tactics like 'retargeting' is next to non-existent.

In spite of the fact that the cookie deprecation timeline has yet again been extended, we believe that it is even more important that we take the time to rewrite the rules of digital advertising and to develop adequate alternatives that are right for your brand, while also prioritising consumer privacy and choice.

If you want to learn more about how we approach programmatic advertising for Business to Business clients, get in touch today to book your free of charge exploratory session 

Exploring the Benefits of AI and Machine Learning for B2B Marketing Campaigns

AI and machine learning have become increasingly popular tools for B2B marketing campaigns. With the power of AI, marketers are able to quickly and accurately analyze customer data, target the right audiences, and measure the success of marketing campaigns. In this blog post, we'll explore the many benefits of AI and machine learning in B2B marketing campaigns.

 

What is AI and Machine Learning?

AI and Machine Learning are both terms used to describe the use of computers to perform tasks which require intelligence when done by humans. As AI technology evolves, B2B marketers are leveraging its capabilities to develop more sophisticated strategies. AI can help with segmentation, personalization and creating interactive experiences. It also allows marketers to automate mundane tasks and use analytics to drive better decision making. By using AI for B2B marketing, companies can improve lead generation, increase customer engagement and accelerate sales cycles. In fact, a recent survey showed that companies using AI for their B2B marketing reported higher returns on investment than those who did not.

By leveraging AI and Machine Learning technology, businesses can gain insights into consumer behavior and gain an edge in the competitive B2B marketing landscape. AI for B2B marketing can be used to anticipate customer needs, learn customer preferences, and detect patterns in consumer behavior. Through predictive analytics and natural language processing, businesses are able to customize their marketing strategies and reach their target audience in a more efficient manner. Additionally, AI-based technologies can also automate processes such as email segmentation and campaign testing, freeing up time for marketers to focus on tasks that require a human touch. In this way,AI is an invaluable tool for businesses looking to stay ahead of the competition in B2B marketing.

With AI and Machine Learning, businesses can automate mundane tasks and uncover valuable customer data that can lead to more effective marketing strategies Similarly, AI and Machine Learning have revolutionized B2B marketing, helping businesses automatically carry out mundane tasks and access data-driven insights. AI b2b makes it possible for marketers to be more informed about their target audience and create marketing strategies that are tailored to each customer segment. AI and Machine Learning can help business create more engaging content, gain valuable customer insights, and strategize more efficiently. AI is the key to unlocking better B2B marketing in the present digital age.

The Role of AI in B2B Marketing Campaigns

AI is playing an increasingly important role in B2B marketing campaigns, from increasing the accuracy of customer segmentation to optimizing marketing strategies. AI allows businesses to optimize their advertising strategies in a more targeted manner, allowing them to focus their resources on specific consumer groups at the right times. AI can help automate marketing processes and track key metrics such as customer journeys, enabling businesses to better understand consumer needs and preferences. AI can also help companies reduce marketing costs through AI-driven initiatives such as automated ad placement optimization and AI-powered analytics. By leveraging AI technology, B2B businesses can develop detailed consumer profiles and accurately target consumers using AI-driven marketing strategies. This can help businesses to maximize the impact of their advertising campaigns and ensure that they are getting the best return on their investments.

AI-generated insights can help marketers develop more targeted and efficient marketing campaigns in order to better engage potential customers, and in turn maximize ROI Besides AI-generated insights, AI is also extremely helpful in automating manual tasks, such as customer segmentation and content management. AI can also quickly analyze customer behavior and interests, allowing marketing professionals to develop more targeted campaigns to reach their target audiences. AI is becoming an integral part of the B2B marketing industry, as it enables companies to gain a competitive edge by efficiently leveraging AI-generated insights to maximize ROI. With AI's continuous evolution and increasing adoption rate among B2B organizations, AI is set to revolutionize the B2B marketing landscape in the near future.

Benefits of Using AI in B2B Marketing

AI can provide a much more targeted and effective marketing experience for B2B customers - it can interpret data more quickly, identify current trends and customize campaigns to fit the customer's needs. AI for B2Bs allows organizations to automate marketing operations and create personalized customer experiences by using data-driven insights to identify customer interests, preferences and behavior patterns. AI can make more informed decisions about how, when and where to target customers with the right message at the right time. Furthermore, AI can also be used to develop more effective lead nurturing strategies that can help drive conversions and increase sales. In summary, AI is changing the way B2Bs approach marketing by allowing them to develop more tailored campaigns that deliver better results.

AI can help to automate some of the more mundane tasks associated with marketing, allowing marketers to focus on generating leads and increasing sales. Additionally, AI can help to increase productivity by streamlining processes and minimizing manual labor. B2Bs have started to realize the potential of AI in their marketing efforts and are leveraging the technology to optimize existing strategies, capture new opportunities, and provide more personalized experiences to customers. AI-driven data analysis is used to adjust marketing campaigns according to customer needs and preferences. AI also incorporates analytics into its process by providing valuable insights into consumer behavior. AI for B2Bs helps marketers better understand their target audience, allows them to identify opportunities for optimization, and provides actionable intelligence for increasing ROI. By using AI for B2Bs, organizations can gain a greater understanding of their marketing strategies and yield better results in higher returns.

By utilizing AI in B2B marketing, companies are able to optimize their campaigns for better ROI and make strategic decisions faster - allowing them to remain competitive in the marketplace while also improving customer experience Similarly, AI advertising optimisation has enabled companies to leverage AI-powered B2Bs marketing strategies to achieve a higher return on investment and make quicker, more informed decisions. AI in B2Bs marketing also helps to create an improved customer experience by allowing businesses to capitalise on their resources in an efficient and effective manner. AI has thus become a powerful tool for companies to differentiate themselves in the marketplace and remain competitive against their competitors.

Best Practices for Leveraging AI in B2B Marketing

AI technology can be used to effectively identify the best prospects and target them with personalized messaging. This helps to optimize conversions, as well as form better relationships with potential customers. AI-driven B2B marketing has enabled businesses to better understand their prospects, target them with relevant content, improve customer experience, and increase conversions. AI has become an important part of the B2B marketing strategy as it is able to deliver up-to-date customer insights, automate repetitive tasks, and increase ROI. AI can also help businesses to better segment their target audience and deliver more personalized messages and offers that are tailored to their needs. AI-driven B2B marketing helps businesses to build relationships with potential customers, create greater engagement and drive more conversions.

Once identified, AI-driven analytics can be used to gather data on the performance of campaigns and marketing strategies, allowing for more accurate predictions and more effective targeting. It is important to use these analytics tools to develop an understanding of customer preferences and behaviors in order to maximize success in B2B marketing efforts Furthermore, AI-driven analytics can play a critical role in optimising advertising and marketing campaigns in B2B settings. AI can help identify customer preferences and behaviours more accurately, allowing for improved targeting and more accurate predictions. By accessing AI-driven analytics tools to gain an understanding of customer tastes and behaviours, companies can make AI-driven decisions that help drive success in their B2B marketing efforts.

 

Wrapping up

In conclusion, AI and machine learning are two powerful tools that B2B marketers can use to optimize their marketing campaigns. AI can provide deep insights into customer data, allowing marketers to target the right audiences and measure the success of their campaigns. With the help of AI, B2B marketers can determine the best strategies for their campaigns and ensure that they are successful in achieving their desired outcomes.

In A Nutshell: What is Account Based Marketing

Account based marketing (ABM) is a strategic approach to business marketing in which an organisation focuses its efforts on a clearly defined set of target accounts. It is a methodology that has been gaining popularity in recent years, especially among B2B companies.

With account based marketing, the goal is to develop targeted campaigns that are specifically tailored to each individual account. This approach differs from traditional marketing strategies, which tend to be more generalised and less focused on specific accounts.

ABM requires a high level of coordination between sales and marketing teams, as both departments must work together closely to identify and target key accounts. Once target accounts have been identified, the sales and marketing teams need to develop custom strategies for engaging with these accounts.

The 5 main benefits of ABM

There are several benefits that can be gained from using an account based marketing strategy.

First, ABM can help improve the efficiency of your marketing efforts. By targeting specific accounts, you can ensure that your campaigns are more likely to reach their intended audience and have a greater impact. This can save your company time and money by reducing the need for mass advertising campaigns that have little chance of success.

Second, ABM can improve your company’s relationships with its customers. By taking a personalised approach to each account, you can build stronger relationships with your customers and improve customer satisfaction. This level of personalisation is key to performance in 2022, driving higher ad engagement rates and general customer response.

Third, ABM can help you generate more qualified leads. By targeting specific accounts that are more likely to be interested in your products or services, you can generate leads that are more likely to convert into customers. By building a target audience list (TAL) that matches the buyer persona of your product or service, we can ensure that we’re only investing in marketing to prospects who match your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)

Fourth, and maybe most importantly, ABM can help you close more deals. By tailoring your sales pitch to each individual account, you can increase the likelihood of closing a deal.

Finally, ABM can help you better understand your customers’ needs and wants. By engaging with customers on a personal level, you can gain insights into their pain points and needs. This information can be used to improve your products or services and make them more appealing to potential customers.

Conclusion:

Account based marketing is a strategic approach to business marketing in which an organisation focuses its efforts on a clearly defined set of target accounts. This methodology has been gaining popularity in recent years due to the numerous benefits it offers businesses, especially those in the B2B space. If you’re looking for a way to improve the efficiency of your marketing efforts and generate more qualified leads, then account based marketing may be the right solution for you.

ABM In 2022; 5 Pro Tips To Identify, Target, Engage & Convert Key Accounts Using ABM

Over the last half a decade, ABM has emerged as B2B marketers 'Go-To' tactic to drive measurable ROI, but even now in Q4 2022, there remains much confusion around the entire topic of Account Based marketing. Having directly helped dozens of companies to implement, action and succeed with ABM activity, here at FunnelFuel, we think we're fairly well placed to share some direct feedback.

What is clear is that ABM done right works. Almost 85% of B2B marketers who measure ROI state that account-based marketing is demonstrably out-yielding all other forms of marketing, with half of those marketers citing significantly higher returns. There also seems to be a synergy between organisations who are implementing ABM, and those who have generally succeeding in the oft-illusive task of synergising their marketing channels. A Bizible, study found that "marketers doing ABM are about 40% more likely to report alignment with their sales team compared to marketers not doing ABM.” So not only does the fact that an organisation is leveraging ABM typically mean they are out competing their peers, it also indicates more generally that these organisations have generally got highly functioning B2B marketing functions, making these companies the ones to benchmark yourself against.

So how are the top achievers leveraging ABM in their marketing functions? ABM should be used throughout the funnel, to brand, demand and expand. This is not a silo'd tactic; its an all-encompassing marketing approach which scientifically identifies targets, from the earliest prospects to the longest standing customer segments, and then uses the best in class marketing automation technology to understand how B2B decisions are made, what pain points are researched and how best to engage each named account.

ABM also recognises one of the keenest distinctions between B2C marketing and B2B marketing. Corporate decisions are signed off on by a consensus of stakeholders, who collectively represent a 'decision making universe'. According to the Harvard Business Journal story, CEB found that the usual number in this decision making universe is close to 5.4 decision-makers. This is 5.4 stakeholders on each account, each representing their organisations whims and wants from diametrically different perspectives; what engages a CMO can be markedly different to a CTO. So corporate decisions are defined by a decision making universe which represent specialist stakeholders with individual responsibilities, with timelines which align at different moments in the year. Compare this to your average B2C decision maker, signing off a whimsical purchase based on an Instagram advert, driven by emotion and able to transact with one tap of the screen, and without having to win over 4.4 colleagues with different priorities. In this light, the long sales cycle makes more sense. ABM campaigns, with laser targeted messaging that addresses different functions and pain points in the target organisation, leveraging advanced analytics to understand sales cycle stage, has demonstrably been shown to shorten sales cycles, and ABM's ability to keep re-engaging these accounts as they mature as a customer, is a key reason why ABM is succeeding for our clients.

So having run hundreds of ABM campaigns across dozens of advertisers, what are FunnelFuel's key takeaways for turning this buzzword into a cornerstone of your B2B marketing?

Your ABM Strategy Needs Buy-In From Your Whole Organisation 

We already know that companies who 'do ABM' typically have more synergised marketing functions. But is this a byproduct of ABM or more of a reflection that the best marketers have ABM in that toolbox? Irrespective of the answer, its MBA 101 to state that Sales and marketing functions need to be closely aligned—a fact backed by research by MarketingProfs. They found that companies with aligned marketing and sales departments on average generate 208% more revenue for their marketing efforts. But alignment is essential in more than just those two groups. Buy-in from the C-suite is also necessary for setting the expectations and advantages of ABM across functional groups. CS teams need input to help ensure existing clients are nurtured through digital activity. Advertising and biddable media teams need to be optimising to the right metrics, sales teams need to be using the realtime data availability to engage prospects in the moment, content teams need to be delivering messaging that supports the funnel stages. The list goes on.

Build Your Tactics Scientifically 

Data and insights are buzzwords thrown around the marketing world with abandon yet it is objectively true to state that data is at the centre of a productive and maximised ABM strategy. But what do we mean by data? Successful ABM activity relies heavily on a data feedback loop of accurate, high-value data about target accounts. However, many companies find that is an area that’s ripe for improvement. In fact, 64% of B2B organizations cite improving data quality is their most challenging obstacle. But there are ways to bridge that data gap with the right technology, which is why here at FunnelFuel, we built an enterprise class of B2B analytics specifically to collect this data.

Target & Personalize, But Don't Obsess Over Job Role & Remember The Decision Making Universe Of 5.4

ABM strategies are by definition highly targeted, and as a result of advances in digital technology, they encourage B2B marketers to focus on strategic accounts and the decision makers within them, rather than a broader and more holistic approach. Marketers can customize their ABM programs to find specific account attributes tailored to their company’s differentiation points and value proposition. Once the account is targeted, B2B marketers can set out to develop the right content for the right decision maker at the right time. That presents a great opportunity to create the most impact; however, as pointed out earlier, each account often has more than one or two decision makers. The pain points that each represents, and their criteria for making a decision are typically highly varied. However just because they have a very siloed viewpoint doesn't mean they can't think laterally. A CFO doesn't only care for the cheapest solution, CFO's are capably of thinking widely about the solution and their companies needs. A mix of precision but also broader messaging can often work better in our experience, not least because we don't always know each targets internal decision making universe, so leveraging tactics which target the wider organisation almost always works better then just targeting named individuals/roles. With the right platform, marketers can easily target and segment audiences based on customer profile or industry.

Have The Right Technology - A True B2B Specialist

The Mar-tech industry is dominated by platforms and technologies which were invented for B2C use cases. These technologies are built for scale (think about Coca Cola or Ford's addressable market) and not for precision. The act of buying an advert may work the same (technicallY) but in almost every other way, these technologies are not fit for the B2B purpose. B2C needs scale, we need precision.

Ensuring the accuracy of organisation data sets requires the selection of a top-tier B2B contact database provider that can give comprehensive, live and fully up to date information. A lasting legacy of the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020-22, was a new found hybrid working culture meaning that data needs to include knowledge of organisations private VPNs as well as office based data.

The ability to take the genesis of a targeting account list, and to model it against rafts of firmographic data across all territories of interest for the client is also key. This form of lookalike modelling helps cure the ills of incomplete client data, whilst ensuring the full addressable market is understood and met.

This needs to be combined with the right on site analytics which can actually understand which target accounts have been online, what they have been doing, and give all stakeholders the chance to actually observe what these accounts were doing. Once again, B2B is precision where B2C is scale.

Finally the right media buying technology is needed, with the ability to leverage this unique data to target named accounts, bringing LinkedIn like targeting to the rest of the internet. Clients who only do ABM on LinkedIn have to work with limited data sets and sky high prices; ITDM's exist outside of LinkedIn, often reading the content produced by the Worlds best subject-specific publishers as part of their research. The best marketing automation platforms like FunnelFuel can recognise the context of what they are reading, aligning the right message with the right moment of research to turbocharge performance.

It Starts By Measuring. It Ends With More Measuring!

ABM is not a set-it-and-forget-it strategy. It’s crucial to establish metrics for each account, measure the content and tactics for effectiveness against those metrics, and then reshape and adjust them as needed. B2B specific web analytics are few and far between (we didn't build a B2B enterprise set of analytics for the fun of it!). Measuring has to be account specific, and it needs to be combined with realtime feedback loops (so sales can get on to that prospect when they're actively researching you) and automated, synergising channels like email, retargeting and direct outreach to deliver moment marketing.

Marketing teams can measure engagement and other critical success factors through methods such as account scoring, which give them keen insight into account health. Changing direction quickly and refining future campaigns based on these types of data will allow for the highest level of ABM success.

ABM encourages B2B marketers to focus on quality over quantity—that is, better leads and overall account health over number of leads and accounts. The industry has been filled with low quality generic lead generation for eons, but these leads do not typically move the needle for the organisation buying them. Having full company buy-in, robust and largely unavailable [to rivals] data signals, the right technology, a scientifically constructed targeted account list, and effective metrics will set the path towards success. Enacting an impactful ABM strategy will take time, thought, and targeted efforts, but the revenue and overall efficiency improvements make it well worth the work.

Ready to implement an account-based marketing strategy into your current marketing plans? Book your sales call with FunnelFuel today to get started