Episode 55

full
Published on:

3rd Dec 2024

Why ABM Doesn’t Work (and How to Fix It) - Andrei Zinkevich

At a recent event with about 300 attendees, today's guest polled the audience and asked how they felt about their ABM performance.

98.5% said they weren't satisfied.

If you've ever built an ABM program, this statistic may not surprise you. My observation is that there are few motions where the hype and the reality are so far apart.

Why is that? What are people getting wrong about ABM? And how do you make it work?

Andrei Zinkevich provides some very concrete and detailed answers to these questions in today's episode.

You'll learn why ABM is more than the typical "display ad + email" recipe that many companies use, why true ABM really doesn't scale in a conventional sense, why you don't need expensive software, and why the most important personalization data comes from the company's own buyers.

Thanks to Our Sponsor

Many thanks to the sponsor of this episode - Knak.

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About Today's Guest

Andrei Zinkevich is co-founder at Fullfunnel.io, an agency that transforms B2B tech and service-based companies from siloed sales and marketing to full-funnel account-based marketing and demand generation.

He's also co-host of the Full-Funnel B2B Marketing Podcast.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/azinkevich/

Key Topics

  • [00:00] - Introduction
  • [01:43] - Core mistakes of most ABM motions
  • [13:47] - The pillars of ABM
  • [29:09] - Creating awareness within target accounts
  • [36:11] - Moving from awareness to sales discussions

Thanks to Our Sponsor

Big thanks goes out UserGems for sponsoring today’s episode. 

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Transcript
Speaker:

justin-norris_1_09-10-2024_101231:

Welcome to Rev Ops FM.

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If we think about the core idea of

account based marketing, essentially

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focusing your efforts on a small

group of high fit accounts, it's

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not really anything radically new.

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But if we look at it as a trend in B2B

marketing as a kind of branded term, The

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hype cycle around ABM really started,

at least for me, in the mid:

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This is when we had the whole

Flip My Funnel thing going on.

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We had John Miller launch Engageo

with this idea of fishing with

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spears as opposed to nets.

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That was 2016.

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And on we go.

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And all of a sudden, ABM was the

answer to everyone's problem.

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Lead generation was

kind of lame and passe.

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And of course, an expensive ABM

platform was this must have, and

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everyone's Martech stack after that.

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Now, here we are nine or 10 years later,

and what I want to understand is how

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is ABM actually working out for us?

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What's the state of things today?

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What's needed to truly

make an ABM program?

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And to answer that today, we're

joined by Andre Zinkevich, who is

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co founder of full funnel IO, a B2B

marketing consultancy for companies

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with complex and long sales cycles.

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And they have a ton of experience

putting ABM into practice.

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You may recognize Andre and his

co founder Vlad from LinkedIn, but

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they're regularly sharing really in

depth resources on ABM and demand gen.

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So go

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andrei-zinkevich_1_09-10-2024_161231:

Yeah, I appreciate the intro

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and happy to chat with you.

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You pretty nailed down all the modern

problems of account based marketing.

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So happy to dive

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deeper.

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justin-norris_1_09-10-2024_101231:

Well, that really just tees

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us up for the first question.

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I was curious from your point

of view, you know, it's been,

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like I said, about 10 years.

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what's the state of things today?

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Because I speak to a lot of

teams that have adopted ABM.

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So they sunk all this money into

these expensive platforms, haven't

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seen the success they've hoped for.

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Where do you see most

companies going wrong?

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Putting this motion into practice?

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andrei-zinkevich_1_09-10-2024_161231:

probably six, seven months ago,

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uh, we hosted an ABM webinar and

there were like 300 plus people.

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B2B marketers attending that webinar.

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And we just ran a poll asking, how are

you satisfied with your ABM performance?

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And guess what?

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98.

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5 percent told they're not satisfied.

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out of this 98.

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5%, 49 told they are frustrated.

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They failed the programs, right?

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That's the reality.

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That says a lot.

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And there are multiple reasons.

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Why this is happening.

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I would just share the core reason

and then we can, uh, dive into details

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because with flood we did, since the

beginning of our journey at full final,

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we hosted 50 plus audits of ABM programs

and we discovered 11 root reasons why

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the programs are failing, but the core

one is thinking that ABM is just a

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new fancy title for lead generation,

which in reality means that Teams,

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they create wish lists, basically

marketing gets a wish list from sales.

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sales don't have appropriate territory

planning, their territory planning

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is just based on volume, on product.

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ICP, they send a wish list

of accounts to marketing.

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And usually this list

contains hundreds of logos.

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And then when marketing receives a

list of hundreds of logos, right?

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What they are supposed to do?

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They can just run programmatic

display ads, right?

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And in best case, put discounts

in their dimension layer.

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So in reality, most ABM programs

are just programmatic display

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ads plus outbound at scale.

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That's it, right?

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In essence, in nutshell, account

based marketing means that you

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run personalization, right?

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you adjust your offering to the

needs of specific account, and

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then You adjust it to the needs of

the buying committee group, right?

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Because different people inside

might have different needs,

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different jobs to be done, et cetera.

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So that's ABM in a nutshell.

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In reality, that never happens, right?

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And if I look at the most common reasons,

you asked why the programs are failing.

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I would say, one of them I have already

mentioned, And especially starting

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the pilot program for thousands of

accounts or for hundreds of accounts.

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The truth is, if you are not an

enterprise organization with hundreds

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of SDRs, right, and big marketing team,

you simply won't be able to create a,

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personalized program for that cluster

of accounts, So everybody purses the

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volume, focuses on volume just to get out.

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Some conversions.

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one of the programs that we have

audited earlier this year, a company

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hired an agency that was supposed

to help with ABM, and they did

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exactly what you have mentioned.

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They invested in them.

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One ABM platform, I obviously don't

want to mention which one, but I believe

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a lot of people know this vendor.

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So the total investment

was 180k in that program.

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And then they invested almost 200k

into display ads, PDFs that were

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promoted through that platform, right?

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Through programmatic display ads.

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So in total, out of that

program, they generated 70k.

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for sales opportunities, not

sales accepted, but they called

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it for sales opportunities.

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Zero close one.

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So if you'll calculate total

costs to run that program, right?

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You quickly understand that the total

cost was about half a million, right?

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And that's the modern reality.

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Now, if I'll dive deeper, so that's, the

second mistake that I just touched, right?

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Purchase an expensive stack

instead of building the processes.

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In reality, the technology

is not the process.

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Technology can help you to accelerate some

processes, but sometimes people ask, do we

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really need to purchase this technology?

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No, you can start at ABM just with

your CRM, sit down with sales and

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focus on expansion playbooks, right?

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Just defining accounts with

expansion potential and that's it.

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And then start thinking, okay,

how can we, how can we, how can we

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Create cross selling or up selling

opportunities with these accounts, right?

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And you don't need any

technology for this.

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So just, make it really simple.

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But in a nutshell, for example, always

recommend to keep, lean pilots in mind.

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stack that just will help

you to create your program.

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And in most cases you need LinkedIn sales

navigator, one source of intent data,

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and there are providers that cost 100,

200 per month, and that would be enough.

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Right.

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And that's it.

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In most cases, teams already have

some marketing automation, some

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software, if they want to embed.

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virtual events into that playbook.

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Usually they have zoom or any other

platform, and that's it, right?

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The key point is that you don't

invest into motion that is not

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proven, Otherwise, You create a

pressure for yourself, for your team.

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It's just a question of months when

CFO will reach out and ask to justify

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the investment, or CO if you are

working for a smaller organization.

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And obviously, the more money you

request for the program, The faster

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the results would be expected, right?

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So if you need that money, we want to

ensure that there is a solid ROI, And

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obviously, without having a former

ABM background and just thinking

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from the lead generation perspective,

expectations would be set too high.

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Targeting a wish list, another most

common mistake is just like, okay,

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in most cases, companies, you know,

reach out and say, Hey, we want to

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sell to the biggest North American

banks, JP Morgan, you name this, right?

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Now, I'm just simply asking,

are these accounts aware of you?

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Are you sure that they have

a need in your product?

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No, we don't know, but we

just want to have these logos.

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if they don't have a need in your

product, it's not really possible to sell.

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you can think about it as a litmus test.

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If you were going to bet your compensation

on a list of specific accounts, what

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criteria these accounts should meet?

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Meet, right?

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As simple as that.

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So then you stop wish thinking approach

and start thinking, okay, what accounts

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I really need to focus on, right?

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Which means basically that these

companies don't have a real account

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qualification criteria, right?

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What accounts we should focus on?

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That's one of the most

important Common mistakes.

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Another one that I have seen, not very

often, but sometimes that happens.

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when sales apply abroad territory

planning, and they have called accounts

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that are not replying, or they have some

lost deals, and they basically send this

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graveyard to marketing and say, Hey,

This is how a target list go and activate

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it, but ABM is not the magic, right?

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and no technology, no marketing guru will

help you to reactivate these accounts.

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another one which is associated with

the ABM workflows, Is lack of account

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research, as we just discussed.

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ABM in a nutshell is personalization,

which means that you need to dive

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deeper into account research.

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This is really time consuming process.

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A lot of teams think that it's

just enough, you know, nowadays

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everybody is talking about clay.

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So, okay, so let's put all

accounts in clay and we'll just see

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company's mission, et cetera, but

that's not the account research.

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Account research means What are absolutely

must questions or information we need

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to know about these accounts to be

able to create a personalized offer,

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And this is what not, you can get with

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ChatGPT or any AI, right?

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Unfortunately, you need to dive deeper.

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And in most cases, you need to know.

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to engage and get this information

from the buying committee members,

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which means that you need to build

relationship with them, So these

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are the most common things, right?

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I'm just consequently

sharing one by one, right?

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And you can see where it fails, right?

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A lot of teams, they simply

don't want to engage.

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Everybody says, but it's not scalable.

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Yeah, but if you want to generate

enterprise deals, if you want to

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generate seven figure deals, you

need to invest in the relationship.

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Unfortunately, on that level,

B2B is purely relationship based.

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It's not transactional based.

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As simple as that.

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If you are selling Netflix subscription,

I would say absolutely run ads.

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Do some mass outbound, you know, 5

product and all your value proposition

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is just, cut your costs and get the

same product, but for a cheaper price.

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Do a mass outbound.

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That's absolutely fine, right?

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But The world where we operate

is simply not possible.

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But teams, just because they

have a volume, they ignore this.

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they don't do account research, they

don't do engagement with these accounts.

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And lastly, lack of leading indicators.

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How are we going to track the progress

of our program and how do we know we

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are heading in the right direction.

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it's absolutely normal, there

is a delay between the program

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launch and the first results.

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And especially if you are doing the pilot

program, if you are doing this for the

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first time, Sometimes I'm hearing the

question, so what is an adequate timeline

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to measure the efficiency of our program?

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And I'm always saying it's the

length of your sales cycle.

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If your sale cycle is 12 months, then

this is the time It's not only limited

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by ABM, whatever you're going to do,

demand generation, parent awareness, any

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program that you are going to launch.

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You need to give the same timeline as

you are given to other motions, right?

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You are getting this information

probably from paid, from outbounds.

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the emotions that you're

running for years.

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Same as here.

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So when you launch the pilot program,

right, you need to define what

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are the leading indicators, the

metrics that are under our control.

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We are going to hit to make sure

that we want to achieve some results.

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And also what should be

our expectations, right?

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If, okay, we have never done this before.

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we struggle, we want to go upmarket, we

want to sell to enterprises, but we don't

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really have enough enterprise customers.

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We don't have credibility

in the enterprise segment.

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Would it be realistic to immediately

set up revenue targets, or?

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Pipeline targets in reality,

no, just because these

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companies are not aware of you.

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In most cases, the goal for the

pilot campaign would be creating

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a list of engaged accounts.

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In our case, and we can dive deeper if

you want, we call this future pipeline

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accounts that are aware of you, but they

are not buying now, and we are not sure

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what is their current priority, right?

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And how our product fits that priority.

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But that means that with a

certain level of relationship.

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We become top of the

mind of these accounts.

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So when the business trigger

happens, we become one of

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the vendors they think about.

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And that's the modern truth

of B2B buying process.

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Probably everybody has heard about this.

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Enterprise buyers, not only

enterprise, but also scale ups, etc.

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Mid size buyers from mid size

organizations, before talking to a

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vendor, they make a vendor vetted vendor

list, They prioritize you way before

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you know they have done it, right?

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And way before they are

reaching out to you.

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Hence the goal to get into that list, get

into consideration, And in most cases, for

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many companies, that should be the right

target and expectations for the pilot.

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justin-norris_1_09-10-2024_101231:

You know, if I take a step back and

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kind of distill a central theme that

I'm hearing and everything that you're

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saying, it's companies just not prepared

to take the necessary steps to put the

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necessary work in to go deep enough.

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and also that fundamentally

by design kind of inherently,

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it's not a scalable process.

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And so this notion of

scalable IBM almost becomes.

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An oxymoron.

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Maybe it would be useful to kind of almost

walk step by step through what doing this

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properly looks like, and with that in

mind, like, what's the starting point?

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Is it defining the target accounts?

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Is that where you start?

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andrei-zinkevich_1_09-10-2024_161231:

so let's, divide it into

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several categories, right?

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First of all, I would love to address

scalability question, Companies how

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they do they think about scalability.

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It means I put more dollars in,

I get more dollars out, and I

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don't do anything here, right?

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This comes from, legendary SaaS stories.

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you think about Airbnb, Dropbox,

and all the unicorns, right?

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That we have, have heard as I said,

this is not transactional world, right?

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You don't have this.

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Channels where you can put more

money into ads and expect that

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more money would come out, right?

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Or you can hire more SDRs and expect

that they will get the same outcome.

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Now, how do you scale ABM?

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You scale it by creating a centralized

playbook and then creating micro ABM

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teams, which means that normally you

have one marketer, one sales rep.

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These are cross functional teams that

work together on one specific goal.

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By applying acceleration on

new pipeline logos, right?

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And then this teams usually with

structure quarter seems right.

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They could focus on one specific

cluster or one specific vertical,

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one specific market, right?

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When they feel that market of

vertical is saturated, they

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could move to another one, right?

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And this is how you scale it.

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Now, the key point when it comes

to scalability is revenue, right?

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And unit economics, we want

to make sure that it pays off.

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So.

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There is a funny question.

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Once I posted on LinkedIn and said

that, ABM program, we generated

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just four sales opportunities.

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And people said, yes, four

opportunities in three months.

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That absolutely makes no sense.

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And then I'm saying, so from

this four sales opportunities,

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we generated 2 million dollars.

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Is it worth it or no?

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So, in our space, a lot of companies

just think about only the volume game.

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How many leads do we need to have?

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Sales qualified leads,

sales opportunities, etc.

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While in ABM, you think about revenue.

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In ABM, we always prioritize accounts

with the highest revenue potential.

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So when you close the deal, It means

that all that investment, including all

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manual efforts, will pay off, right?

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And that can significantly

boost your revenue.

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So that's the difference, right?

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Comparing to other motions.

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And if we look, from the perspective

of how to structure the program.

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So I would love to, share two things here.

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The first one is the essential pillars

of ABM program or ABM strategy,

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And then the playbook that you can

use to create the, the program.

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So when it comes to ABM strategy pillars,

eight pillars that you need to focus on.

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The first one is the goals and the

motion, What do we want to achieve and

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how it's aligned with our strategic goals?

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Because for example, if I'm

missing revenue targets.

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Our goal might be expansion if we

have a lot of accounts, right, that

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have expansion potential and we know

that the sales cycle will be shorter.

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Or, for example, we have a dry

pipeline and we need to focus

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on pipeline generation, but

this is more long term activity.

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So all the goals that we set up

for the program should be aligned

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with this centralized goal.

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from the scaling perspective,

when you have a full motion, you

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always focus on these four areas.

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You need to run these

programs in parallel.

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New pipeline generation, pipeline

acceleration, expansion, and renewals

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or churn prevention, Making sure

that these key accounts that generate

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millions won't churn one time.

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So, the second step is,

the ideal customer profile.

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So for ICP, we already touched the point

that it, shouldn't be wish list based.

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There shouldn't be a broad target, right?

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For every market vertical or cluster

that you select, you need to have

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ICP that includes, basically it

replicates your fastest deals.

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in that region or in that vertical

and your highest deals, right?

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You just look at the patterns

that these accounts have, not only

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firmographics and technographics, but

detailed buying committee structure,

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who are the exact buyers, who are the

power users, who are the champions,

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who are the decision makers, right?

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Then you review the deal history and

the buyer journey of these accounts.

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Ideally, if you have never done customer

research and if you don't have insights

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from customers, I highly recommend

Take a call with these clients and

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learn from them what triggered their

buyer journey, how they were evaluating

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you and comparing to other vendors,

what resonated with them, right?

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There are typical jobs to be done, etc.

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Because this information

is a central element.

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piece of your ABM program.

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You literally, the key goal

is to adjust your program to

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how your customers are buying.

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I remember one of our clients once

said when we finished audit, she's

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the peer of marketing and she said,

You know what I learned from this?

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What we were doing before is

literally, we tried to set to

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the market what we want to say.

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But it doesn't necessarily mean

that our buyers are interested

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in learning what we want to say.

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And now I'm clearly seeing the

misalignment that we need to

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talk about what they need, not

what we want to talk about.

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So that's, the second nutshell, right?

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Uh, then other pillars is account

qualification criteria, what

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makes account a good fit, and

account disqualification criteria.

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This is something that you can learn

from analysis of lost deals, right?

351

:

And, Quite often, there could be

certain patterns that you'll see.

352

:

You can apply these disqualification

criteria and narrow down your focus.

353

:

Next one is account list building.

354

:

How are we going to select accounts

that are likely to become sales

355

:

opportunities, or If we are

thinking about expansion, right?

356

:

in what accounts we can easily

upsell, Where can we utilize,

357

:

leverage the relationship with the

current team, with champions, right?

358

:

That puts, maybe they have a strong

voice inside the organization and

359

:

they have can help us to get into

other departments or business units.

360

:

So, I will just give an example for the

new pipeline, creation, in most cases

361

:

when it comes to ABM, people just think

in terms of, new logos, New pipeline.

362

:

So we always prioritize

accounts by four criteria.

363

:

And to get sales buy in, you can start

with, uh, With their list, but then you

364

:

can just suggest to segment this list with

the question that I already shared, right?

365

:

On what accounts we are going to bet our

compensation and apply four criteria.

366

:

First of all, revenue potential.

367

:

We obviously want to prioritize accounts

with the higher revenue potential, right?

368

:

We just need to be sure that these

accounts have a decent potential.

369

:

The second criteria is a

level of vendor awareness.

370

:

Do they know us?

371

:

And for many companies, this

could mean different things.

372

:

You just need to agree with sales,

what does it mean to call a specific

373

:

account vendor aware, right?

374

:

That could be a certain level of

engagement, signing up for your

375

:

events, maybe signals from intent

data, whatever, that they're

376

:

visiting your high intent pages.

377

:

So you agree with them.

378

:

Right.

379

:

What does it mean?

380

:

Then the level of relationship, we just

spoke, right, that if it was enough

381

:

to send one cold email or do cold call

and expect, seven figure opportunity

382

:

lending in your CRM, then every

company could easily become a unicorn.

383

:

Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way.

384

:

So, think about that.

385

:

What level of relationship you need

to establish and with whom, that's

386

:

the third level of prioritization.

387

:

And the last one is, buying signals.

388

:

Or we call it slightly

differently, product need evidence.

389

:

What tells us that this

account has or might have a

390

:

potential need in our product?

391

:

And sometimes it could be

legacy technology, hiring

392

:

for certain positions, right?

393

:

It obviously depends on your product.

394

:

You just need to sit down with sales

and nail down this categorization.

395

:

Now, I remember one of the questions

you asked in the beginning, where ABM

396

:

falls down from this decade, right?

397

:

One of the things is that in the

past, when ABM program was presented,

398

:

or ABM motion was presented, right?

399

:

That was like a theory that you

have one to one motion for just

400

:

a small group of accounts, and

you do a full personalization.

401

:

In most cases, it's expansion and just

a few proportions of new logos, right?

402

:

Then you have one to few programs.

403

:

Where you do more or less

job personalization, or

404

:

segment personalization.

405

:

And then you have one to many,

which is like a product ABM.

406

:

I firmly believe that one

to many ABM doesn't exist.

407

:

It's just a lazy excuse for not

doing appropriate demand generation.

408

:

That it absolutely doesn't make

any sense for ABM team with all

409

:

this efforts to focus on ABM.

410

:

Low revenue potential accounts, that

should come from the main generation side.

411

:

Now, that's the first thing, Now, the

second one is, If you think that way,

412

:

it means that you create a static

list, and then you run your program

413

:

for 90 days, or for, I don't know,

three months, six months, whatever.

414

:

But in reality, what we do,

we have three lists, right?

415

:

First of all is our cluster

ICP, all accounts that fit

416

:

this qualification criteria.

417

:

But these accounts, they don't know

us and we don't know their challenge.

418

:

Hence the first goal is

making them vendor aware.

419

:

When they become vendor aware, they

are moved to the second list, which

420

:

we call future pipeline, right?

421

:

They know us, but we don't know their

product needs or their challenges,

422

:

right, where our product might help.

423

:

Hence, our goal is to

identify these challenges.

424

:

And lastly, we have active focus.

425

:

Accounts that fit all four

criteria that I mentioned.

426

:

Vendor awareness, revenue potential,

level of relationship, and product

427

:

need evidence or buying signals.

428

:

And this is where we spend 80 percent

of our time as ABM team trying

429

:

to generate sales opportunities,

creating this personalized experience.

430

:

Because these accounts are

likely to buy from you, right?

431

:

Opportunity, likelihood is very high.

432

:

So that's the key.

433

:

And if you look at this list, The

key metric here is account velocity.

434

:

How fast we can move from

one list to another, right?

435

:

How quickly we can make them vendor

aware, how quickly we can research,

436

:

engage with them, build that relationship

and understand their needs, and how

437

:

quickly we can create the personalized

offer to be able to create a sales

438

:

opportunity with these accounts, right?

439

:

Which means by default, your

programs are dynamic, right?

440

:

These accounts are moved

from one list to another.

441

:

And when they land interactive focus,

you always do one to one ABM, you always

442

:

do a full personalization because you

collected this insights and you know that

443

:

the revenue potential is significant that

always recommend for marketing and sales.

444

:

When they move accounts to active focus,

think about what is the opportunity

445

:

value of this accounts, right?

446

:

Because when sales see the numbers,

They totally understand why it makes

447

:

sense to invest time into it, right?

448

:

Into doing this full personalization.

449

:

That's the key.

450

:

as well, while you are running

your programs, there would be

451

:

a certain list of accounts that

start demonstrating this vendor

452

:

awareness, which means you move them.

453

:

There could be newly identified accounts.

454

:

And I'm always saying, imagine if,

There is a count that, for example,

455

:

you are running a field event.

456

:

They are signing up for your field event.

457

:

Then, in two weeks, there are repetitive

visits from the buying committee members.

458

:

They are checking your integrations,

price, and book a demo, etc.

459

:

But they were not in your initial list.

460

:

A question is, should we prioritize

this account or just stick to obsolete

461

:

theory because they were not on our list?

462

:

Let's forget about that.

463

:

Obviously, we should prioritize

engagement with that account, right?

464

:

which means, what I have

described is very simple.

465

:

similar to scrum methodology that

IT teams are using, that's the key.

466

:

So this is the prep.

467

:

We spoke about the

pillars for ABM programs.

468

:

I just wanted to give you that

distinction, basically that's

469

:

process, how we create account list.

470

:

So that was pillar number four,

how do we select these accounts?

471

:

Then based on our process, We define

what technology we might need for this.

472

:

If we define that's to call a counter

vendor where we need to look at this

473

:

intent signals, then we need obviously

some software for this, but never

474

:

ever invest into something expensive.

475

:

Always start with a product

that is not super costly, right?

476

:

So you basically won't create a

problem for your team, And something

477

:

that you can use later, obviously,

when you have a robust team.

478

:

ABM motion.

479

:

You can upgrade your stack.

480

:

That's absolutely fine.

481

:

But definitely not in the beginning.

482

:

And lastly, when you finish this pillars,

there are three core important elements.

483

:

One, how we're going to create that

awareness, what specific activities

484

:

we are going to run to make this

accounts vendor aware, right?

485

:

And that's why I mentioned

customer research customer

486

:

insights in the beginning.

487

:

Next activation.

488

:

What activities should we do to it?

489

:

Create the opportunities

with this accounts, right?

490

:

Sometimes they might be hearing

about you, but they simply don't

491

:

understand how your product can

help with the existing challenges.

492

:

So they don't associate your

product with their challenges.

493

:

Or they might understand this,

but they don't see how it fits

494

:

into their current workflows.

495

:

Or maybe they don't see how it

Helps with their specific challenge.

496

:

Right.

497

:

So you always need to think from the

buyers perspective And then there

498

:

could be multiple activities that

you can install from individual

499

:

workshops with these clients, right?

500

:

Sometimes for example We do strategy

sessions reviewing the programs on mini

501

:

audit sessions reviewing the programs

and explaining what could be done better

502

:

Right and how that could be done better.

503

:

So it's Kind of what we call breach

activities between your ABM programs

504

:

and sales opportunity creation.

505

:

When they see a clear path to the value,

right, then the sales opportunity occurs.

506

:

So, and the lastly is how we're

going to measure our program, right?

507

:

What should be our

expectations for the program?

508

:

What should be the leading

indicators that we should track?

509

:

And one of the most

important things, regular.

510

:

weekly pipeline review meetings where you

just go through the list of activities

511

:

you have done You cross share the

collected insights about target accounts

512

:

and you plan together next actions

513

:

justin-norris_1_09-10-2024_101231:

So just to dig into a few of those

514

:

things, and that makes perfect sense

in terms of like, the structure

515

:

and the series of activities.

516

:

starting maybe just with awareness,

like if you determine there's a list

517

:

of accounts that would be a good fit,

but they're not vendor aware, are

518

:

you just running kind of the standard

programmatic ad playbook at that point?

519

:

Or what do you do to bring those

accounts into a state of awareness?

520

:

andrei-zinkevich_1_09-10-2024_161231:

ads always come later So think

521

:

about ads as a distribution channel

with guaranteed reach, right?

522

:

That's the key but ads themselves

don't create awareness.

523

:

sometimes people don't believe me,

but you can talk to your colleagues

524

:

and ask when was the last time you

clicked the banner and booked a

525

:

discovery call with sales rep, right?

526

:

So basically how you can create awareness,

think B2B buyers are buying, right?

527

:

if you look at any given B2B market,

most companies are not buying.

528

:

So people are simply looking if they

come, for example, to social, right?

529

:

And you want to run ads, for example,

or you want to run programmatic

530

:

ads on specific platforms, right?

531

:

Maybe industry website.

532

:

where they might be reading news.

533

:

Think about their intent.

534

:

They come there to read,

to learn something new.

535

:

Hence, their buying intent is very low.

536

:

There is a demand for content, They

might be learning how to run their jobs

537

:

to be done better, how to be better at

their work, and just stay updated on

538

:

the industry trends and news, right?

539

:

That's the key.

540

:

How can we attract their awareness?

541

:

How can we align with their

current buying intent?

542

:

Right?

543

:

What topics might resonate with them?

544

:

Keep in mind that On this level,

there is a limited opportunity

545

:

to present your product.

546

:

If you look at our content, right,

we never say, hey, full funnel is the

547

:

best ABM agency, go and hire us, right?

548

:

So we always talk about the jobs

to be done of our target buyers.

549

:

And we learn this from

the customer interviews.

550

:

So we have a lot of discovery calls.

551

:

We've worked with, in the last five

years, we've worked with many B2B teams.

552

:

So, uh, very well aware of the

jobs to be done and challenges

553

:

of our ICP buyers, right?

554

:

So our top of the funnel

content is aligned with this.

555

:

But always prioritize content sharing.

556

:

It's the easiest way.

557

:

And sometimes, let's say, if you are

marketing to conservative buyers,

558

:

let's say IT teams, cyber security,

et cetera, that are not super active.

559

:

I'm linked to them, right?

560

:

That becomes super hard to

make, to create that awareness.

561

:

So you need to start thinking

where you can hang out what you

562

:

can do to attract the attention.

563

:

So that could be engaging

with specific communities.

564

:

You might be sponsoring this communities

and you might bring your subject matter

565

:

expert to give a webinar in the beginning

that could be sponsored at webinar.

566

:

It's absolutely fine, but you

pay a community to make sure that

567

:

your target audience will come

because they trust their peers.

568

:

And this is how you

start raising awareness.

569

:

You can co create, for example, run a

market research with that community.

570

:

Sometimes, depends because I will give

you an idea, sometimes you can just start

571

:

collaboration with an industry leader.

572

:

You can invite this person for the

podcast, or even what we have done with

573

:

some customers, arrange a field event.

574

:

Pay a gig and then invite your

target accounts in one place.

575

:

And the previous, the thought

leader that there would be a mini

576

:

workshop or presentation and then

somebody from your team would

577

:

run another presentation, right?

578

:

And that's the way how

you create that awareness.

579

:

So just think about what

would be the right channels.

580

:

In most cases, let's say for the

broader audience, in most cases, you

581

:

can leverage linkedin and you can

start linkedin and start leadership

582

:

program, more or less replicated

what we are doing at full fun, right?

583

:

That's not a silver bullet,

obviously, but I'm just sharing.

584

:

Think about Where and

how you can create it.

585

:

Then when a specific post, a specific

topic resonates with people, you

586

:

can use ads to boost the reach.

587

:

You can now with the same content, you

can start targeting this accounts, right?

588

:

And, many cases we always prioritize,

this is my philosophy, killing

589

:

two birds with one stone, right?

590

:

So we're always.

591

:

Try to co create content with

the target accounts, right?

592

:

Again, just because they

trust their peers more.

593

:

So we say, okay, for example, one

of the posts I published recently

594

:

was I interviewed VPs of sales, of

our target accounts and just ask

595

:

one question, what is the number

one thing you guys wish to achieve?

596

:

Marketing team will help you with

and I got a bunch of answers, right?

597

:

Sometimes they ask to keep

this anonymous, right?

598

:

So I'm just saying, okay, I

spoke to a person from company

599

:

X from that industry, right?

600

:

not naming the person that not

naming the company, but when the

601

:

post is live, I am sharing it and

you have the relationship they see.

602

:

And this is kind of the starting point.

603

:

Sometimes they're eager to collaborate

and cross share, and then you can use it.

604

:

And.

605

:

you can embed it into your marketing play,

because then you can, for example, reach

606

:

out to a marketing team or communication

team and say, Hey, I just interviewed

607

:

your VP of IT or whoever, right?

608

:

And this is the piece of content

that's came out from that engagement.

609

:

So you might be interested.

610

:

And you know that the KPI of

this team It's kind of PR, right?

611

:

They always love when somebody

talks about their team,

612

:

somebody promotes that content.

613

:

In most cases, maybe in ideal

world, they would share that

614

:

post on LinkedIn, on their, maybe

share on their corporate page.

615

:

But, what you aim for and what they,

in most cases, will do, they will

616

:

promote it in their Microsoft Teams,

Slack, their communication channel.

617

:

Hey, our John Doe was interviewed.

618

:

Take a look.

619

:

What you're achieving with this,

you create account awareness, right?

620

:

You stimulate that so called dark social.

621

:

So inside target accounts, people

start talking about you, right?

622

:

That's fantastic.

623

:

And then if you are able to engage with

this bias, you can pick up that piece

624

:

of content and simply reach out, say,

for example, just to make it practical,

625

:

you are talking to me right now.

626

:

Tomorrow you might reach out to Vlad

saying hey, I just, spoke to Andrej, here

627

:

is a video clip, very interesting insight,

not sure if you have seen it, but might be

628

:

worth, looking especially at this point.

629

:

So, just a simple, it's a very

simple example, but this is what

630

:

Sales team can utilize, right?

631

:

And you can immediately start a building

relationship by being credible, using

632

:

the name of the colleagues, right?

633

:

And, deliver on value upfront.

634

:

So these are the best ways.

635

:

And again, as I'm saying, you'll see here,

we speak a lot about manual engagement.

636

:

This is how you build the relationship

and this is how you create awareness.

637

:

And later, for example, went

through this video clip, right?

638

:

And if you ever do an ABM,

you can pick up that story.

639

:

For example, one part of this conversation

and then upload to LinkedIn to the

640

:

list of your and boosted to the list of

the target accounts and then manually

641

:

reaching out, let's say, from the sales

perspective, and that's, that's the

642

:

key, this is how you create awareness.

643

:

You see where I put ads,

644

:

right?

645

:

It comes

646

:

justin-norris_1_09-10-2024_101231:

And so moving from like awareness to,

647

:

and this is probably the last question

we'll have time for, but, actually

648

:

getting that sales discussion started.

649

:

how do you bridge that gap?

650

:

Cause that seems to be the chasm where a

lot of people fall short in particular.

651

:

andrei-zinkevich_1_09-10-2024_161231:

Yeah, absolutely.

652

:

As I said, One of the key things is to

figure out if this account ha are they

653

:

in the buy and mode, and if there is a

strong product, need evidence, right?

654

:

If there is no strong product

need evidence, accept the reality,

655

:

you won't be able to help.

656

:

To help to sell to them, right?

657

:

If you are sure that they have a

challenge or they have a need, right?

658

:

Specific need that your

product can help with.

659

:

Next step is create and

personalized offer, right?

660

:

And that could be delivered in many cases.

661

:

Like I said, sometimes that could

be delivered through the workshops,

662

:

through the strategy sessions.

663

:

Sometimes it could be

just one pager, right?

664

:

It could be as simple as that.

665

:

Hey, Justin, we had a lot of engagement.

666

:

And I recently saw a few news

about your company, right?

667

:

And you guys mentioned this and

that, And I just, for example, I did

668

:

that analysis and saw a few things.

669

:

Where, for example, your

workflows could be done better.

670

:

In most cases, in your account research,

you need to embed profiling questions.

671

:

Remember what we just

spoke in the beginning?

672

:

have discussed this.

673

:

What we must know about

these accounts, right?

674

:

When you collect it, and it

doesn't mean that you need to

675

:

have, you know, like, 50 questions.

676

:

No, no, wait.

677

:

Three, four strategic questions, right?

678

:

And then you have three to

four bullet points, right?

679

:

We saw this and that.

680

:

For example, if you can't.

681

:

quantify this data.

682

:

You can say from what we have seen with

similar accounts, it can cost you whatever

683

:

of not of continue doing it that way.

684

:

For example, missing the revenue

targets by X percent, right?

685

:

Whatever.

686

:

So you try to quantify

it to present the value.

687

:

So if you are, I would invite you and

then you define, it could be a call.

688

:

It could be as I said, strategy session to

review their workflows first, because what

689

:

we have seen in the past, a lot of teams.

690

:

They have broken processes.

691

:

So before selling software becomes

a centralized part of that process.

692

:

But before selling that software,

you need to help them to improve

693

:

their processes so they can see

how to feed that software, right?

694

:

So if teams are using.

695

:

Excel spreadsheets, right?

696

:

First of all, you need to explain

where it falls down and how to

697

:

substitute this process quickly

without losing the data, right?

698

:

And making sure that people will adapt.

699

:

So these are the most common frustrations

and just sharing a practical example.

700

:

So that's the key.

701

:

And then you define in

what format to deliver.

702

:

why it works?

703

:

You have already built a

relationship with these people.

704

:

So, there was some, you had

some discussions before, you

705

:

had some engagement, now you

come up with personalized help.

706

:

So, I'm always thinking about

sales process as a help, right?

707

:

It's not about that you just,

you know, Try to pitch it.

708

:

So it's not the wolf from

the Wall Street movie, right?

709

:

Where you call thousands

of people and try to sell.

710

:

I think about, that process

as the process of help.

711

:

You know that these people have

need, you came up, you did your

712

:

homework, You come up with an offer

that you know will help these people.

713

:

That's the key.

714

:

if you run it that way,

then there is no problem.

715

:

In the worst case, you at least will

hear a polite no with the reason why.

716

:

Right?

717

:

So, for example, it's not the

current priority just because we are

718

:

focusing on this and that, but that

could be a priority in five months.

719

:

And that's a fantastic answer, right?

720

:

And that's a honest answer.

721

:

This is not something, Hey, I'm not

interested in the And then what?

722

:

or it's just in majority of cases,

it would be just, target buyers

723

:

will simply ignore their reply.

724

:

That's the key.

725

:

So, because you are asking now about

the bottom of the funnel, To make sure

726

:

that here you will be getting replies

and generating opportunities, you need

727

:

to do all the prior work to ensure that

you have enough level of vendor awareness

728

:

and relationship with these accounts.

729

:

justin-norris_1_09-10-2024_101231:

It's really different than

730

:

just ads and outbound at scale.

731

:

I think that's, you know, my biggest

takeaway from this discussion.

732

:

There's a lot that goes into it.

733

:

I think you have a lot of good

resources on your website as

734

:

well that talks about this.

735

:

We'll get some of those from you

and put those in the show notes.

736

:

Andre, thank you so much

for chatting with me.

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It's just super interesting.

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andrei-zinkevich_1_09-10-2024_161231:

Thanks for inviting me, great

739

:

questions, great prep, so hope it

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was valuable.

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About the Podcast

RevOps FM
Thinking out loud about RevOps and go-to-market strategy.
This podcast is your weekly masterclass on becoming a better revenue operator. We challenge conventional wisdom and dig into what actually works for building predictable revenue at scale.

For show notes and extra resources, visit https://revops.fm/show

Key topics include: marketing technology, sales technology, marketing operations, sales operations, process optimization, team structure, planning, reporting, forecasting, workflow automation, and GTM strategy.

About your host

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Justin Norris

Justin has over 15 years as a marketing, operations, and GTM professional.

He's worked almost exclusively at startups, including a successful exit. As an operations consultant, he's been a trusted partner to numerous SaaS "unicorns" and Fortune 500s.