ABM on a Shoestring: No Previous Experience Required

Recent research from Gitnux shows 75% of B2B marketers use Account Based Marketing (ABM) up from 38% in 2020. But what of the 25% that don’t have ABM programmes yet? What are their reasons for not joining in? And how can they overcome them?

Maybe They Doubt Its Growth Impact?

That’s unlikely. The case for ABM as a growth driver is overwhelming. Such as recent research conducted by the ABM Leadership Alliance and ITSMA, which found that 76% of marketers saw higher ROI with ABM than any other marketing strategy. We’ve been swamped with similar stats and research findings for a while now and trust me, there's a good reason for this. It works. 

It’s Down to a Lack of the Right People and Enough Cash

One key factor is the lack of ABM capability, with 40% citing internal expertise shortage (coupled with budget concerns around acquiring them) as their primary hurdle in implementing an ABM strategy, according to a Statista survey. 

The Gitnux findings also show that for a significant portion of marketers, roughly 37%, getting the necessary budget and resources for ABM is just too big an ask. Concerns around spiralling martech costs are of particular concern and with global martech spend projected to surpass $215 billion annually by 2027, according to Forrester, it’s easy to understand why. 

So for non-participants, it appears ABM’s high perceived price tag and lack of expertise to implement it keeps it firmly off limits. After all, it’s not possible to execute ABM without the experts and pricey martech right? Or is it?

ABM on a Shoestring: No Previous Experience Required

It is possible to start from the ground up, with a tiny budget and a close-knit team who are new to ABM. Starting small is also a great way to test and learn, laying solid foundations for scaling up later on. 

Your roadmap to ABM success:

• Give yourself a realistic timeline of six to eight months to get your ABM programme off the ground.

• Use accessible learning platforms such as LinkedIn Learning to train yourself and your marketing and sales teams on the basics of ABM.

• Collaborate and align with sales to identify the companies you want to target with the highest potential for conversion. Keep the target numbers low, even if that’s just 25 accounts to start.

• Use low cost AI tools such as ChatGPT to quickly scrape data on your targets from their LinkedIn profiles and company websites to highlight their pain points and challenges to help you develop personalised content for your target customers.

• Use your existing tools, such as your current email marketing platform to send out automated emails with personalised content to your target accounts.

• Manage your ABM list on your existing CRM, making sure accounts and contacts are tagged appropriately in order to keep track of your ABM campaigns and messaging.

• Use your existing tech to gather as much data as possible to measure your ABM efforts to help you optimise your campaigns.

By maximising existing tools and people, B2B companies can launch ABM without the big price tag. And the great thing about starting small is that it focuses attention on what you could do with more, putting you in a better place to justify additional resources further down the line as your ABM programme begins to bear fruit. So if you’ve had your finger firmly on the ABM pause button because of cost and expertise concerns, it may be time to think again. 

Ready to get started on ABM? If you are, I'd love to hear from you.