There is a spectrum of selling from “brains for hire” to “commodity product”. “Brains for hire” requires the “seller-doer” model where the selling professional has both subject matter expertise and services delivery expertise. A typical example of this is the consulting partner at a management consulting firm. Solution selling is in the middle of this spectrum and requires consultative selling, yet not necessarily a “seller-doer” model. In this post, we explore 10 attributes of services and solution selling.
Account based marketing focuses top down on accounts rather than only lead generation.
The promise of Account Based Marketing (ABM) is to increase sales success by coordinating marketing and sales efforts for target accounts. The ABM concept is a departure from mass marketing that casts wide nets with generic messages. Instead, with ABM, marketing tailors messages to each targeted prospect account, making marketing activities more efficient to help sales close more business. More tailored experiences mean relevant information for each account and a greater likelihood that potential buyers find the information they’re looking for, speed through the initial stages of the buying cycle, and become ready to be contacted,nurtured, and converted.
To ‘Feed the Content Beast’ seems to be a constant struggle for B2B marketers and businesses selling high consideration products/services and oftentimes a lengthy buying cycle.
Yet it’s essential to educate and enable prospects to self-sell at their own pace. Moreover firms, with content resources and associated campaigns enabled by an integrated technology stack, can capture, track and nurture those interested prospects to marketing qualified or sales accepted leads and hand off to sales for 1:1 selling. The rub: quality content assets and tools are required throughout the buyer journey as well as the customer journey and building a comprehensive content program can be daunting.
Account Based Marketing and the Closed Loop Marketing Architecture
Account-Based Marketing, B2B Marketing and Sales, Closed-loop Marketing, Content Marketing, CRM, Inbound Marketing, Marketing Automation, Newsletter, Revenue Architecture, Revenue Growth, Revenue Marketing, Revenue Systems, Technology & WebsitesThe focus on Account Based Marketing and it’s requirements has ignited a range of discussions and specialized B2B and ABM technologies and processes. For companies that are selling to accounts, the strategies associated with ABM are well understood, yet the technologies are still evolving. At first blush, you might think that a closed-loop marketing architecture doesn’t apply to B2B and account-based marketing. Closed Loop Marketing is data and insight-driven. It clearly works for B2C and high-volume campaigns. Yet, how does CLM apply to a highly relationship-centric account-based marketing focus?
Actually, closed-loop marketing is a core foundation for effective Account Based Marketing / ABM.
Account based marketing (ABM) is a B2B marketing and sales process that begins with a focus on accounts rather than only ‘leads’ or people. Rather than primarily using the conventional method of casting a wide net to reach potential leads, ABM “flips the funnel” and focuses on specific target companies or accounts, the “business”, instead of only the “lead” or person.
Beyond Inbound… Long Live Closed Loop Marketing
Account-Based Marketing, Closed-loop Marketing, Content Marketing, CRM, Inbound Marketing, Marketing Automation, Measurement and Analytics, Newsletter, Revenue Architecture, Revenue Growth, Revenue Marketing, Revenue Programs, Revenue Systems, Technology & WebsitesInbound is great, but it has had it’s day…. and even with inbound strategies, the bulk of activity and spend is actually outbound. The reality? Businesses need both inbound and outbound. For B2B and Account Based Marketing, this should be managed across a single revenue (marketing-sales) value chain. We call this integrated program approach a Closed Loop Marketing Architecture … and it works!
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