The marketing game is all about the relationship you build with customers to secure a big sale. Your goal is to work to build a repertoire with your clients until they want to do business with you.
Account based marketing takes the core principles of marketing to their logical conclusion. You focus on that relationship and build a strong connection with one client at a time.
With a razor focus on each client, you can snag those massive sales with ease.
Read on to find out more about the power of account based marketing.
Working with Account Based Marketing
Account based marketing has taken the business world by storm.
In case you hadn’t heard, the idea behind account based marketing is to focus on specific companies and businesses that fit the kind of customers you excel at working with.
Account based marketing is often shorted as ABM. It has a very different mindset than traditional marketing. You look for quality over quantity, finding the best customers that can give you the most return for your strengths.
ABM requires a constant update to your ideas and frequent research to ensure you are up to date on what you need.
Real Life Tactics
If you want to give ABM a try, here are some of the most powerful tactics in securing the sales you need.
#1. Target Your Mark
ABM is all about fine-tuning your marketing towards a specific target. You need to pick your target markets with care, as such a high focus on one company takes more time and energy.
You want to personalize every action you do around the customer you want to get. No email should be generic. Every correspondence should focus on them as a customer.
Find the issues they work with and focus each response to how you can solve those issues.
#2. Make Great First Impressions
First impressions are an obvious part of any business relationship. With account based marketing, everything takes that extra mile.
One easy way to make a mark is to structure an immediate sale offer. Not to buy anything, but to offer something to them.
A lot of these offers amount to a free assessment on technology, security, or whatever else your company may do.
You want to show the idea that you will go out of your way to ensure your customer feels catered to.
#3. The Right Person for the Job
No one person can do everything. Specialization is common in the business world. Recognizing that is a big part of ABM.
When you have found a company you want to focus on, you need to find the person that can target that company best. They might have a history with the target company. They could also be familiar with the company’s products.
The idea is that among your employees should be a wide variety of people with a large set of skills. Among these people is a person, or multiple people, that fit what you need.
Any random salesperson may get lucky with the job. You don’t want to rely on luck.
In account based marketing, every account is important because you chose it for a specific reason. Don’t ruin a good chance because you picked the wrong person for the job.
#4. Direct Mail
This is a rather simple tactic, but many forget about it. CEOs and businesses get thousands of emails a day. If you are going after one big customer, they need to notice you.
Using direct mail, you can send them a message that they can’t help but notice. In this digital age, not many people use direct mail as a form of contact. It’s eye-catching to get such a personal package.
The big name executives don’t go to webinars and read emails from people they don’t know. They don’t have the time to bother.
What to put in this direct mail? Keep it simple, and focus on the offer you want to extend.
Give them only a taste of what you can offer and make them come to you to get it. It’s a confident move, and confident moves catch people’s attention.
#5. Know What They Want
This is where you need to keep your research up and active.
Companies change often. What a certain prospect may desire could be different from one day to the next.
You must keep up with these changes. Monitor the prospect’s public information. Look at their social media and see what they are aiming for.
Every bit of information can be helpful. Take it all in and plan your offers and sales around what your prospect is looking for and wanting.
#6. Keep Focused Tools
All of these tactics can very well work in any traditional marketing medium.
With that, there are many programs that are fine-tuned for account based marketing. These programs structure themselves on such a heavy marketing focus.
What you need is a solid ABM platform. It gives you a positive focus on the information you collect so that you can make your marketing decisions right the first time.
#7. Understand Their Structure
If you target a company big enough, you’ll need to know how they operate. Not what they do and how they do it, but how the structure of the company works.
You can look up anyone’s official title in a company. Do you know what that title does? Do you understand their position?
If you can understand what each person does in a business, then you know where to target. It is good to know who has the power in the company besides the obvious leaders. When you know who makes the decisions and what connections does each person has, you can fine-tune your search for the right person to contact.
#8. Peer Focused
Keep in mind that not everyone good at making sales has to work in sales.
Does someone in your own IT department have good information on the target company? Does someone in finances have a friendship with a major player in the target company?
Hyper-focusing on your prospects does not mean not focusing on the little details that surround you.
Making the Business Plan Work
So, you have the tools to create a powerful account based marketing plan. Where do you go from here?
Follow what account based marketing has taught you and focus on the specifics! You have tools for marketing, how about a better guide to email marketing? Try it, and other handy tips, today.
