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Only 13% of B2B marketers rate their ability to measure and analyze marketing performance as above-average, while 40% believe their measurement ability needs improvement, new research reveals. Another 33% rate that ability as average and 14% call it poor or inadequate, according to research from Demand Gen Report.
Most survey respondents (82%) believe enhancing their reporting abilities is a growing priority, due to the increased desire to show marketing’s impact on pipeline and revenue, and to obtain actionable insights on buyer interests.
More marketers hope to improve their measurement and help boost sales with account-based marketing (ABM). B2B marketers place a growing priority on conducting separate measurement and attribution for ABM. While 32% now measure ABM separately, another 45% said they plan to do so in the next 12 months. More than half (66%) want to apply deeper ABM metrics in the next 12-18 months.
An Emphasis on High-Value Accounts
In ABM, businesses stress marketing and selling to high-value accounts rather than casting a wide net for leads. They avoid time and resources chasing low-value leads that are a poor fit. The process requires transparency and alignment between sales and marketing to identify high-value accounts and create personalized buying experiences, explains Kristen Baker, marketing manager at HubSpot.
“In terms of account-based marketing, this transparency and alignment will ensure your marketing and sales teams are focused on the same goals, stick to the mutually-agreed-upon budget, and understand the specific roles of each internal stakeholder,” Baker says.
Effective ABM requires a customer relationship management system, and content that’s personalized and deliverers a consistent experience throughout a long B2B sales journey.
“With account-based marketing, you can easily measure return on investment (ROI) for each account you invest your resources and time into,” Baker says. “This is beneficial because you can confirm whether certain accounts you invested in were ideal for your business.”
You can nurture those accounts over the long term and identify and target similar accounts in the future. If ROI proves your ABM tactics worked, use those results to guide your strategy forward and improve your bottom line.
ABM Challenges
Marketers face numerous challenges, according to the Demand Gen Report. Specifically, the top challenges for measuring ABM include:
- Messy CRM data (37%);
- Integrating data across platforms (35%);
- Tying anonymous account engagement to known stakeholders (32%);
- Tying ABM initiatives to closed/won business and revenue (32%); and
- Mapping leads to their corresponding accounts (31%).
Marketers have traditionally emphasized tracking leads found and forwarded to sales. Those metrics still remain most popular, but marketers have expanded their scope to pay greater attention to engagement metrics, such as form completions and social engagement, the survey reveals.
With social distancing currently in place and teams having to pivot to digital-only strategies, it has become clear that marketers are looking for deeper insights into buyer activity, the report states.
Bottom Line: Many marketers plan to track metrics for account-based marketing measurement. By focusing on high-value accounts, ABM can produce better results. However, the process requires top-notch customer relationship management systems, and close cooperation between marketing and sales. Some marketers may be hampered by lack of organized data and difficulties in integrating data across platforms.
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Michael Kling is manager of public relations, marketing and social media at Glean.info, a media monitoring and measurement service that provides customized media monitoring and PR analytics solutions.
