Five Mistakes That Marketers Commit When Using the ABM System For Account Acquisition

Account-based marketing or ABM is gaining momentum within the marketing industry in the past few years. It is a more centralized marketing strategy. The ABM system works by targeting specific accounts within a chosen market. This marketing strategy utilized customized campaigns that are solely designed for the individuality of each account. The marketing message is focused on the needs of the target client and the special attributes of that particular account.

ABM has a holistic outlook when it comes to marketing and goes beyond lead generation. It also aims to promote a service or product to the existing accounts by encouraging any cross-selling and up-selling. In this way, the business will get the best value out of the current accounts they are handling.

ABM refers to the treatment of each account as its own market. Other marketing tracks consider the industry where a business is included. Examples of industries are construction, transportation, and e-commerce. The ABM system does not treat their marketing approach by focusing on the industry. Instead, an ABM strategy focuses on treating each target client account as its own market, in its own right. Basically, ABM takes personalization and customization into a whole new level.

Just like any other form of marketing, account-based marketing can be difficult and risky. Spending time and investment while focusing on a target account but failing to get the contract would be a failure. In order to reduce the probability of risks and failures, thorough planning is needed. The Marketing Insider Group stated that a comprehensive plan can result in more effective development and procurement of the appropriate ABM tools. A scientific collection of the data needed will be useful when using ABM as a strategic approach to client acquisition.

Mistakes That ABM Marketers Commit

Not Utilizing SEO and Content Marketing Alongside ABM Strategies

In the most basic definitions, search engine optimization or SEO is a marketing strategy that aims to raise a website’s visibility in the search engines. It aims to drive high-quality traffic to the website that can be later converted into paying customers. SEO can do this through various methods such as backlinking, optimizing metadata, ensuring the website has a seamless user-experience through the website’s technicality, and content creation. Content marketing is only effective if combined with SEO. No one is going to see the content unless it is optimized. Create content that is useful to the searcher’s query to ensure that the traffic that will go to the website are people who are already interested in that market or industry.

There are ABM marketers that may forget the use of SEO and content marketing. The most common misconception is because ABM is an outbound marketing strategy while SEO and content marketing is inbound strategies. However, SEO can also stand for search experience optimization. It is about optimizing the website for the people that the business is targeting. Since ABM is about targeting key accounts, SEO is very helpful in this area. Moreover, it helps to show up in places for the brand and content where it could possibly appear. Additionally, if the website shows up in the top results of search engines it is good proof to the target account that the business is a trusted brand.

Starting Without Any Sufficient Planning

Many businesses and marketers get too excited when reading about the success stories of ABM. Some people who dive right into ABM, start too soon without any proper planning on the road ahead. It is alright to feel enthusiastic with ABM but it must be properly arranged to ensure readiness on the incoming tasks.

ABM is very intensive when it comes to resources. An ABM marketer has to be realistic on the time-frame that the team must dedicate to a certain account. Key performance indicators must be realized at the beginning in order for the team to know what goals and outputs do they need to deliver.

ABM marketers must set realistic expectations before engaging the stakeholders of the account that they are targeting. ABM is not a quick marketing type of strategy and needs long-term dedication instead of short term activity.

Overselling and Giving Unrealistic Marketing Promises to the Target Client

Some marketers might get too impatient when persuading a target account that they might start giving unrealistic promises. If the target account signs up and realizes that the marketed promise cannot be fulfilled, it can be a setback to the business. The ABM team must be committed but must not make any promises that will be impossible to keep. Getting the target account might be the easier part compared to what must be done in servicing the account. Always keep the promises real and grounded while letting the target accounts see the benefits of the offered services to their businesses.

Persuading and Working on Too Many Accounts

ABM marketers can be pressured to meet KPIs that can lead them to think that working on all the accounts would be the principle of “the more, the merrier”. They can be burdened into attempting to get many results as soon as possible. Since ABM is resource-intensive, other accounts might receive a lackluster campaign. In the ABM system, it is important that the marketer must prioritize accounts while trying to work personalizing the campaigns. Work on four to seven accounts or work on the accounts in clusters of two. Once the ABM program has been established on those accounts, that is when scaling can be done on more accounts.

Using Generic Content

An important factor for ABM is to customize the approach to address the target account’s specific needs. When dealing with ABM accounts, some marketers can fall back into generic marketing instead of personalizing the content to every account. This is why research is highly important in ABM so that the marketer will be able to understand the challenges that the target client faces. In this way, the decision-makers of the target account will fully see the potential of the offered services as it is tailored to their needs.