Account-Based Marketing For Dummies

Chapter 3

Aligning Sales and Marketing

IN THIS CHAPTER

Changing the B2B game for the better

Identifying the right metrics for your goals

Driving revenue collaboration with “smarketing”

When you’ve bought into the idea of launching account-based marketing for your B2B organization, it’s time to move forward. As a marketer, I understand how important it is to give salespeople what they need immediately to be successful, whether it’s a new piece of content or a new process for delivering qualified accounts.

For years, most companies have relied on the funnel to measure the number of new leads that came in each quarter, and monitored their progress through the funnel to become revenue opportunities and (eventually) closed deals. Marketing focused on generating more leads. Often, marketers don’t ask their salespeople what they need because they’re so focused on feeding leads into the funnel. Those days are over.

Account-based marketing (ABM) can breathe new life into your organization. ABM is all about flipping the traditional lead generation funnel on its head. No longer will marketing worry about reaching as many people as possible, increasing website traffic, or any other erroneous metrics.

Alas, you can’t flip a switch and immediately make the transition from traditional lead generation to ABM: it is a process. Your current marketing and sales processes can’t come to a complete halt, especially if they’re currently generating revenue for your company. Ultimately, you will align ...