Johnny wants to open a lemonade stand in his small suburban town. After seeing where the most people in his town hang around (and being that he has about $14 to his name)Johnny resorts to guerilla marketing tactics such as handing out flyers in the local grocery store, library, and park, and posting a video on his town’s Facebook page. Johnny wants to get the most exposure for his lemonade stand before he hits the market, in hopes that he’ll have lines wrapping around the block when opening day comes.However, when the opening day comes, he gets a whole two customers, bringing in $2 for that day. Johnny, like any other child, becomes upset, and thinks to himself, “maybe I handed out flyers to the wrong people.”
“Johnny wants to get the most exposure for his lemonade stand before he hits the market”
Turns out Johnny was right, he did, in fact, market to the wrong crowd. If he had just gone to the school instead of the park, or if he put his advertisements on YouTube instead of Facebook, he would have gotten those long lines he wished so dearly for. Unfortunately, he didn’t do his research and just threw out ads infront of the most people he could. If we upscale this problem a bit, you know, marketing to the wrong people, we could see it apply to so many different companies, in so many different industries…maybe even yours.
Traditional lead generation approach is wonderful in so many ways, and works “sometimes” (79% of marketing leads never convert into sales; Marketo, n.d.). However, there’s always a risk of getting unqualified leads that just end in heartache. If there was only a way to make sure that the leads you’re going to get are qualified before you actually begin marketing to them. Alas, there is, and it’s called an account-based marketing approach.
Through account-based marketing, qualified leads are chosen before the marketing actually begins. As I mentioned in a previous post, it’s more like switching out your fishing net for a spear, where accuracy and choice are paramount. But why are these qualified leads so important to your account-based (or any) campaign? Well the simple answer is saving yourself some money, but there are a few other reasons as well.
“Switching out your fishing net for a spear, where accuracy and choice are paramount”
Besides an almost instant return on investment, qualified leads can slash your pipeline velocity by taking out unproductive leads before they even enter; every lead going through your sales pipeline will be productive. This goes hand-in-hand with shortening your sales cycle, leaving you with more closed won accounts at the end.
Nevertheless, this is a brief introduction to how an account-based approach to marketing yields you qualified leads…and how qualified leads are so essential for any campaign. If you have any other ways that qualified leads benefit you, leave a comment below. If you want to speak directly to me, drop a line from our contacts page. As always, Netrocon Digital can help you with all your ABM needs. I’ll be in touch.