Launching demand generation and account-based marketing without change management is the fastest way to waste budget and get fired. Here is why. 1. Cohesive demand generation and ABM model requires full-funnel strategy. This strategy includes understanding and alignment on several key points: 1. Explicitly share existing challenges like: - Your product is unknown and nobody wants to buy it - Prospects don’t understand product value - Sales don’t understand buyer’s journey and needs, etc. Both senior leadership, sales and marketing should accept them and create programs to solve the challenges. 2. Realistic goals. Just because your company raised doesn’t mean you can set up unrealistic goals. Having more budget ≠ generating more revenue if the challenges from the previous step were not solved and your company doesn’t have proven marketing frameworks. 3. Demand gen campaigns shouldn’t be measured by leads only. You’ll have a set of campaigns with the primary goal of creating awareness and educating target buyers. Hence, demand gen campaigns should have their own set of leading metrics that are aligned with a consolidated revenue report. 4. ABM is not a fancier synonym for display ads and lead generation or a tactic that can magically turn a wish list of accounts into customers. ABM requires: - Account engagement and intent, qualification and disqualification process - In-depth account & buying committee research to identify potential needs you can fullfill with your product - Mapping out personalized solutions on account and individual buyer level - Aligned work of marketing and sales on warming up and activating the same accounts Just because it’s called ABM, it doesn’t mean you can create a wish list of Fortune 500 companies and ask marketing & sales to generate opportunities with them. 5. Daily operations producing long-term results instead of one-off campaigns with short-term outcomes. 6. Time, commitment, and patience are the keys to success. Everybody wants to get results fast, hence lots of B2B companies are looking for shortcuts. Examples: ABM: display ads for 1000+ accounts → Sales outreach to all who clicked the ad Demand gen: Ads promoting gated Ebook or webinar → Transferring contacts who downloaded it to sales Another extreme example of this problem - impatience. Too many B2B companies when launching demand gen do several efforts and give up after 2 weeks just because they don’t generate opportunities. They feel it’s a burden and return to a convenient lead gen that they’ve done for years. No CMO, consultant, or agency will help you to get results from ABM or demand generation if the company is not willing to change and accept the existing problems. ---- Set up realistic goals. Develop a full-funnel strategy to create awareness, generate and capture demand, and activate target accounts. Give it enough time and resources. There are no shortcuts to growing a B2B company. #b2bmarketing #revenue #b2b
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