In the podcast below, Julija Noskova shares the ABM lessons she learned from working as a VP of Marketing for Medallia, SoftChoice and other companies.
Recap of the Lessons That Julija Noskova Learned:
- ABM requires change management across the organization, otherwise, you’re just doing marketing as usual, just more targeted. This includes changes in mindset, measurement/KPIs, how we go to market, the content we create, the interactions teams are having, and the experiences that are delivered.
- Alignment is not enough – ABM requires greater integration across the marketing organization and across GTM teams. We need to work together to win, protect and expand accounts as 1 team as ABM should start and end with revenue. Demand gen fixes pipeline issues. ABM fixes issues across the buyer’s journey and customer lifecycle to impact ARR, GRR and NRR.
- ABM content must be driven by account intelligence and not just focus on industry and persona pain points. Because most ABM content that is pushed out by GTM teams is not driven by account intelligence, it’s not aligned with where customers are. It doesn’t reframe prospects’ thoughts or ideas. It doesn’t make an emotional connection. It doesn’t build a business case. It doesn’t teach for differentiation. It doesn’t help with sales conversations, including taking risk off the table to overcome indecisiveness as a result, most content that organizations push out does not support sales conversations nor the conversations that are happening behind closed doors.
- Defining your ICP requires more than technographic and firmographic information. Your ICP should be your most ideal customer where you can get the greatest revenue growth, the strongest margins, and the greatest impact. It’s the ones where you have the best differentiation and the best stories, so you do not have to worry about others winning on price. But most ICPs are too broad, they do not start with revenue and there isn’t organization-wide alignment on what the ICP is.
- You cannot treat all ICP accounts the same. You need processes for selecting, segmenting and prioritizing key accounts. Unfortunately, 2/3 of ABM organizations only do 1: few and 1: many programs vs. having a balanced ABM program. This is why 2/3 of ABM programs underperform when it comes to revenue growth.
- Field marketing roles need to evolve. As field marketing and ABM should closely align since both should be focused on accelerating high-value accounts to revenue, Julija transitioned her field marketing team to strategic account marketers.
- ABM requires a middle enablement layer between sales, marketing and customer success teams. Sales enablement is not enough, as teams need it at the account level.
- While ABM supports a small portion of the accounts that sales and marketing target, the impact is far-reaching. As ABM requires change management and a stronger focus on interactions and experiences vs. campaigns, teams should be gaining lessons that can be applied across all sales, marketing, customer success and GTM motions.
Additional Relevant ABM Resources
For more information on the change management that needs to happen with ABM, check out our ABM Readiness and ABM Acceleration programs. Also, listen to this podcast with Jeff Pedowitz – CEO of The Pedowitz Group:
For more information on going beyond alignment, listen to this podcast on how Revegy is winning, protecting and expanding accounts as 1 team: For more information on how ABM content does not support ABM, watch this video:For more information on how teams do not effectively select, segment and prioritize accounts, watch this video:
For more information on account-based enablement, read this article on how sales enablement is not enough. Also, check out our account-based enablement program.
