How To Get Ahead Of Account-Based Marketing’s Impact On Agencies

These days, marketing is all about getting personal. With the rise of account-based marketing, business leaders have begun to realize that the more authentically they can personalize every interaction they have with their best prospects and key client accounts, the further ahead it will put their companies.

The increase in ABM is influencing not only the work agencies do for clients, but also their own marketing efforts and internal operations. Below, the members of Forbes Agency Council discuss how they expect ABM to affect their work this year and the best ways to get ahead of the impact.

1. Focus Less On Salesy, Pushy Messaging

Bring it on! ABM is hyper-focused on personalization, understanding your audience fully and creating messaging that is engaging and conversational. If you are focusing on salesy, pushy messaging, you need to begin to pivot in order to understand the best way to engage your audience, which for some can be a larger challenge than it seems. – Christopher Tompkins, The Go! Agency

2. Invest In A Business Intelligence Solution

We’ve invested heavily in a business intelligence solution to better identify prospects and the key decision makers, and that provides clues about the interests behind what their company is researching online. This will help us better prioritize our business development and marketing efforts. – Douglas Karr, Highbridge

3. Increase Collaboration Between Sales And Marketing

With ABM on the horizon, increasing collaboration between our sales and marketing teams is the top priority. We’ll stop focusing on deal sizes and close rates—shifting our attention instead to engagement metrics around target accounts. Our trajectory will be toward sales enablement with the goal of creating more personalized interactions and content for high-priority prospects. – Candice Georgiadis, Digital Agency, Inc

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4. Approach Each Client Strategically

We have already adopted an account-based marketing framework across our book of clients. Approaching every client strategically allows us to provide far better results than attempting to treat every account like a checklist that can be done in an afternoon (it can’t.) The only way it might affect us is if our competition can’t keep up with the shift. We are always happy to welcome new clientele. – Bernard May, National Positions

5. Leverage Quality CRM Software

Account-based marketing relies heavily upon deep and reliable data, so your first step into ABM should be leveraging quality customer relationship management software. Craft a detailed target-company persona and devise an account selection process focusing on high-value clients most likely to convert. During the outreach process, make sure to establish personal and proactive communication with your target company. – Dejan Popovic, PopArt Studio

6. Speak To Humans, Not Companies

If you believe, as we do, that it’s important to look for the smallest viable audience to speak to and use data insights to be relevant to them, then you are ahead of the game. Account-based marketing is a great way to really understand the companies you want to do business with and what is important to the people who work there. Speak to humans, not companies, and engage them at a personal level. – Megan Devine, d.trio marketing group

7. Build Awareness With A Broad Audience

Instead of starting with a one-to-one conversation, which takes a lot of time and energy, imagine ABM as the bottom of the sales funnel. Start big and build awareness with a broad audience, then retarget elements of that audience with your lead-generation assets to pluck out individual needs. Once you have that locked in, you can start your one-to-one conversations efficiently and more effectively. – Justin Buckley, ATTN Agency

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Author: Expert Panel®, Forbes Councils Member