February 14, 2019 ON24
Below is a recap of our recent webinar on ‘The Webinerd’s Guide to Account-Based Marketing’, based on our account-based marketing guide of the same name. Sign up for the session on-demand to hear more.
Technology is making it possible to reach more people than ever before. However, with this greater reach comes greater challenges.
While technology is changing the way marketers market, it is also changing the way B2B buyers are buying. Their buying cycle takes longer to complete and they are doing much of their own research, only reaching out to a salesperson when they are close to making a purchase. Lastly, the average size of the B2B buying group has grown, making it necessary to impress a lot more people than before.
Is there a solution that addresses these? The answer is yes. Account-Based Marketing (ABM) strategies – aided by the use of webinars – takes the impersonal out of the equation and lets B2B businesses reach the customers that matter.
Drive Engagement, Not Just Leads
One of the key attributes to a good ABM programme is personalized engagement. Forrester’s Laura Romas points out that instead of account-based marketing, we should talk about account-based engagement. Strategy and execution should not be looked at as just tactics. Instead, they are opportunities to engage in a conversation with a real person.
Webinars are a great way to engage your target prospects because they provide a two-way conversation and, by their nature, encourage engagement.
Start Small with Your ABM Efforts
ABM can seem a bit daunting, especially if you’re already using a demand generation strategy. It doesn’t have to be. By taking small steps and continuing to build on those steps, businesses can begin to integrate ABM into their existing strategies gradually. “The Webinerd’s Guide to Account-Based Marketing” provides you with six steps that will set your foundations for ABM.
Key points to remember:
- Measure for quality, not quantity.
- Don’t reinvent the wheel — use the content you already have and curate it to your individual buyer’s needs.
- Webinars deliver high-quality leads
In the live session, the majority (86 percent) of webinar participants reported providing false information on a lead generation form at some point. Some even confessed to using old email addresses and one even revealed that he had created a fake persona for use in lead generation forms.
With webinars, the quality of leads goes up just by the nature of the webinar process. The leads are coming to you both through any signup form, but also through interactions within the webinar itself. These actions can help tell you where your prospects are in the buying cycle.
Focus on a High-Value Offer
To be successful with ABM, you need to focus on a high-value offer. This involves identifying your target audience and then figuring out how to appeal to that audience. Remember that ABM is about the audience so you have to know what that audience is looking for and how they consume content.
The good news is, you don’t have a create specialized content for each target. Instead, try using a more vertical piece of content, but then personalize the interactivity within that content for the target.
If you’d like to hear more about how to make your ABM program scalable using webinars, you can listen to the webinar on-demand.