Account-Based Marketing (ABM) is not just about leveraging existing internal information refined by the sophisticated software, sourced from existing CRM and company databases. It is not a simple replacement of the traditional funnel based approach that otherwise used to get all the business. A key component about any ABM program is about knowing your target accounts better so that you can treat each and every different account as a different person and deal with them in a highly personalised fashion.
According to Forrester Research, the primary question you should be asking before venturing into ABM is What new data will I need to make ABM successful? Obtaining refined, up-to-date data that is stored in a structured manner would answer the most important question you should be asking before diving into ABM.
Simple desk research which you can do with just a computer and an internet connection can reveal deep insight about your target accounts. All the little nuggets of insight can make the difference between success and failure of your ABM program. Below are a few sites where you can source actionable insight from:
Company Website
Sounds very simple but you surely know how much of information is available on large SME and enterprise level companies’ websites. It is up to you to turn all the valuable information found in Company Website into deep, actionable insight for your ABM campaign.
Annual and Quarterly Filings
Annual and Quarterly Filings reveal financial and strategic information about your enterprise-level accounts. Past as well current annual and quarterly filings assist you in understanding the business structure of your enterprise accounts. If you can find some additional time to go through the transcripts too, you’ll be able to understand a lot more, from the horses’ mouth i.e. from those who are steering your target account’s business
Investor Presentations
Investor Presentations assist you to understand the challenges and the dynamics of the industry that your target accounts operate in. Since, it’s a presentation built for investors, it most commonly reveals information about what areas are of strategic importance to the company.
Executive Interviews
There are a set of decision makers and decision influencers who would surely have been interviewed by media. The outlook from executives about their company would highlight their business priorities and sometimes key challenges that they’re facing.
Press Releases
There is a lot of information in the press releases. Just go through at least the last 2-3 years. Of course you don’t have to build an encyclopedia out of that one. But, you will be able to connect the dots, and see a direction the company is headed towards.
Social Media Sites
Arguably the most important social media site for B2B Sales and Marketing, LinkedIn is a free platform where you can gather profile information. If you sell B2B, have adopted ABM and do not use LinkedIn, you must be living under a rock!
Another important social media site for gathering insight is Twitter. Through glances at their Twitter profiles you can learn about all the people that you are chasing after: their likes, their dislikes and their professional/personal interests.
I was able to tell one of my clients, a global network service provider, that CIO of their key ABM target account used to play golf at the same golf course, almost every Sunday through their Facebook profile. Voila! That was a game-changer, and my client actually did win a deal with them. And, the conversation did start from the Golf Course.
Conclusion
There is no doubt about the abundance of relevant information available to you at the comfort of your office chair. Creating a structured process in place to gather the relevant information and to turn the abundance into insight would be invaluable for any organisation adopting an Account Based approach to Sales and Marketing. Data is critical for success of any ABM program and a desk based research process in place would indefinitely satisfy that critical requirement.