๐ต๐ปโโ๏ธ Account-Based Engagement Playbook
How we work with sales teams to create awareness in target accounts and engage the buying committee
In 2024, the #1 complaint from sales I heard was a lack of awareness among strategic accounts. But it's not only a marketing job.
To receive responses to your outreach, you must invest time in engaging and building relationships with the buying committee.
At the same time, as a sales rep, you should work with marketing on account-specific activities and content to generate pipeline.
*Read our new ultimate guide to account-based content strategy: https://fullfunnel.io/abm-content/
In this issue weโll cover:
Account engagement playbook we run with sales teams in the ABM programs
Enterprise sales rep playbook example
KPIs for account-based sales reps, and what you can expect
Sign up for our 6th Virtual Full-Funnel Marketing Summit [FREE to attend]
This year we have slightly changed the format, having two days of exclusive keynotes and one day of roundtables with ABM practitioners who run ABM in the trenches.
Join our 6th Virtual Full-Funnel Summit to learn from top-notch B2B practitioners:
Leanne Chescoe (Demandbase), Trinity Nguyen (UserGems ), Emir Atli (HockeyStack), Jon Miller, Gal Aga (Aligned), Sam O'Brien (Dealfront), Natalie Marcotullio (Navattic), Robert Kaminski (FletchPMM), Darrell Alfonso (Indeed), Daniel Rรฉnyi (Klear), Mason Cosby and ABM practitioners, Briana Manrique (BenchPrep), Joseph Threlfall (Customs4trade), Amy Leyh Loesch (Chief Outsiders), P.T. Vineburgh (CHARLESGATE), Samuel Adu-Febiri (Certn).
ACCOUNT ENGAGEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT PLAYBOOK
If you want to get a detailed playbook and step-by-step implementation plan for your team, check our on-demand course: https://fullfunnel.io/abm-on-linkedin-course/
This is an account engagement and development playbook we deploy with sales in every ABM campaign to drive pipeline.
1. ๐๐ก๐จ๐ฎ๐ ๐ก๐ญ ๐ฅ๐๐๐๐๐ซ๐ฌ๐ก๐ข๐ฉ.
Why:
Generating demand for your product.
Proving niche expertise.
Position yourself as a trusted advisor.
Nurturing target accounts.
*Tune into my recent interview with Ghalib Hassam, Founder Baghi, where I share how organic thought leadership influences the buyer journey and helps generate enterprise sales opportunities.
2. ๐๐ก๐จ๐ฎ๐ ๐ก๐ญ๐๐ฎ๐ฅ ๐๐จ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐๐ง๐ญ๐ข๐ง๐ .
Why:
Create awareness & attract attention.
Show your expertise.
Repurpose comments into posts.
3. ๐๐ง๐ ๐๐ ๐ข๐ง๐ ๐ฐ๐ข๐ญ๐ก a ๐ง๐๐ญ๐ฐ๐จ๐ซ๐ค ๐จ๐ ๐ญ๐๐ซ๐ ๐๐ญ ๐๐๐๐จ๐ฎ๐ง๐ญ๐ฌ (๐๐ข๐ง๐ค๐๐๐๐ง ๐๐๐จ๐ฌ๐ฒ๐ฌ๐ญ๐๐ฆ).
Why:
Regularly appearing in the newsfeeds of the target accounts.
Build a strong brand and a real relationship with the target audience.
Generate and capture the demand.
Educate and nurture the target market
4. ๐๐๐ซ๐ฌ๐จ๐ง๐๐ฅ๐ข๐ณ๐๐ ๐๐จ๐ง๐ง๐๐๐ญ๐ข๐จ๐ง ๐ซ๐๐ช๐ฎ๐๐ฌ๐ญ๐ฌ.
Why:
Higher acceptance rate
Opportunity to build a real relationship
5. ๐๐จ๐ง-๐ฌ๐๐ฅ๐๐ฌ ๐ญ๐จ๐ฎ๐๐ก๐๐ฌ.
Why:
Stay top of the mind and nurture target buyers
Progressive profiling and account research
6. ๐๐ง๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ฆ๐๐ง๐ญ-๐๐๐ฌ๐๐ ๐จ๐ฎ๐ญ๐ซ๐๐๐๐ก.
Why:
Higher response rate.
Opportunity to get customer insights and see if there is a fit.
Build a relationship.
Capture the demand and generate a sales opportunity.
The first reaction from the majority of sales teams: too much manual work.
Thatโs why most B2B companies will never run it. In the AI era, they are likely to accelerate the same lead generation playbooks:
Send 1000 spammy inmails -> get 1 meeting booked.
But this is good news for you.
It provides your team a tremendous opportunity to stand out and build long-term relationship and pipeline with enterprise accounts.
Below, Iโll share two case studies and examples of how to roll out this playbook.
Drive pipeline THIS quarter with full-funnel ABM programs.
If any of these challenges sound familiar:
You are aligned in theory with sales but donโt do anything in practice aside from receiving wish lists from sales and sharing with them your marketing plan. In reality, you work in silos and miss the revenue targets and are being pressured by your executives.
You understand that your marketing and sales playbook is broken (mqls, gated content) but despite many attempts you donโt know how to fix it
Your outbound, paid ads and organic pipeline drastically decreased while CAC increased mostly because most of your market is problem unaware and not buying.
You lack brand awareness among target accounts and sales canโt get even a reply.
You clearly see that you're already behind your revenue targets
We can help.
We'll develop a custom full-funnel ABM strategy aligned with your resources, budget and stack and execute it together to drive results THIS quarter.
Enterprise sales rep playbook example
Here is an enterprise account-based sales playbook we ran with Magali Finet-Perdu from Crossknowledge to engage 35 of 130 target enterprise accounts ($100k+ deals) in 3 months.
If you want to get a detailed playbook and step-by-step implementation plan for your team, check our on-demand course: https://fullfunnel.io/abm-on-linkedin-course/
1. IDENTIFIED TWO CIRCLES IN EACH ACCOUNT.
A wider circle: 8โ10 people who can amplify your visibility and trust within the account.
A core circle: 2โ3 key decision makers at HQ and subsidiaries.
2. CREATED VISIBILITY IN THESE MICRO-COMMUNITIES.
Instead of mass outreach, she focused on:
Identifying what channels and communities our target buyers use for education
Map out who they follow and engage with
Consistently show up where they hang out with value-added engagement
3. BUILT CREDIBILITY WITH THOUGHTFUL ENGAGEMENT.
Magali's activities included:
Commenting on posts related to their business challenges and priorities
Sharing relevant insights from similar customer success stories
Publishing 3โ5 content pieces per week focused on the industry's pain points
Running industry podcasts with their peers to tap into existing trust
4. FOCUSED ON BUYER INTERESTS.
"We value their knowledge and expertise," she explained, "Naturally, they want to know what their peers and competitors are doing."
All conversations focus on what they care about:
Jobs-to-be-done and daily challenges of the target buyer persona
KPIs they need to hit and associated challenges
Strategic business goals and priorities
5. FOCUSED ENGAGEMENT.
Magali targeted 7โ10 accounts (engaging director-level, avoiding individual contributors) per two-month period. If there was no engagement, she kept them on the radar but switched focus.
As she said:
"If there is no immediate buying signal, I don't give up completely. I keep them on my radar. I want them to still see me."
WHAT'S DIFFERENT FROM A CONVENTIONAL ABM PLAYBOOK?
No automated cold outreach and follow-ups.
No mass targeting, small batches of 7โ10 priority accounts.
No product content, only peer insights and case studies.
No one-off follow-ups; consistent two-month engagement campaigns.
Key mantra:
Building lasting relationships with target buyers that continue even if they are not ready to buy.
You can't push B2B buyers to make six-figure buying decisions.But you can stay top of their minds, consistently engaging with what they care about, and earn the right to be considered when they're ready to buy.
*Listen to the whole interview with Magali below.
GET ACCESS TO A NEW FULL-FUNNEL ABM 2.0 COURSE
What's included with the course access:
12 modules covering step-by-step ABM strategy development: goal decomposition, ICP, account list building, ABM team, warm-up and activation playbooks, reporting, scaling ABM and building a cohesive ABM & demand gen function.
Short explanation videos and "how to" examples. We believe it's better one time to see a practical example then listen to the theory hundreds of times.
5 orchestrated and ready-to-use ABM playbooks and a detailed explanation
Report dashboard for 4 types of ABM programs: new revenue, pipeline acceleration, expansion and churn prevention
Live case studies and examples of the campaigns we implemented with the clients of Fullfunnel.io in the past few years
17 templates to simplify your ABM strategy launch: ICP, revenue analysis, intent data tracking, account warm-up cadence, customer research, account scoring and prioritization, ABM budget planning and forecasting, account planning, reports, personalized offers, and many more.
Planning & Presenting a Pilot ABM Program to Execs and Sales Framework
Minimal viable stack recommendation and guidelines on how to use it to avoid ramping up budget and being pressured to show ROI for the purchased $50k software
KPIs for account-based sales reps, and what you can expect
The first question that we usually hear from sales teams:
How can we measure the results and what can we expect?
Unfortunately, I canโt reveal more details about Magaliโs performance, so I made a screenshot of the recent pilot program we finished with another client.
Here is a breakdown.
Vertical - Enterprise SaaS (US & Canada)
Buyer persona - Senior HR leaders.
Sales Rep Performance Before Pilot:
Motion: Standard cold outreach (asking right away for the demo)
Results: 0 replies and engagement (90 days before the pilot)
Time allocation: outbound -20% of time, 80% - inbound sales.
After pilot playbook implementation:
Motion: Account-based marketing
Results: 41 engaged & researched account (vendor aware + some level of relationship with a member of the buying committee group).
Time allocation: outbound - 0% of time, ABM - 20%, 80% - inbound sales.
What made the difference?
Our Account-Based Sales Representative (ABSR to make it shorter ๐) worked closely with marketing and SMEs on account list building, qualification, scoring, and prioritization.
We segmented all accounts into three lists.
*Learn more about this segmentation here:
https://fullfunnel.substack.com/p/selecting-accounts-for-the-abm-program
1/ CLUSTER ICP.
List criteria:
Accounts fit ICP, but are not vendor aware (no or minimal "unknown" engagement) and we don't know their need and if they are in the market.
Goals: create awareness, connect and engage with the buying committee.
KPI: # of accounts that hit vendor awareness/engagement threshold.
2/ FUTURE PIPELINE.
List criteria:
Accounts that fit ICP and hit engagement threshold we don't know their need and if they are in the market. On a company level, everybody accepts that these accounts are not sales-ready. Hence the main KPI is account engagement and relationship with the buying committee.
Goals:
Run in-depth account research to validate the need and buyer journey stage.
Engage the buying committee with ABM playbooks
Progressive profiling
Goals and KPIs: # of researched & engaged accounts + account penetration
ABSRs actively work on account awareness and create a future pipeline for themselves.
3/ ACTIVE FOCUS.
List criteria:
Accounts that fit ICP + there is a relationship with the buying committee (good connection) + the need is validated.
Goals:
- Account research and buying committee mapping
- Connecting and engaging with everyone
- Posting cluster-based (aligned with the account challenge) nurturing content and distributing it to target accounts
Create with marketing and SME personalized offers and activation playbooks
KPI: pipeline / new sales opportunities.
Listen to Full-Funnel Live - Four ABM programs that generated $7mln pipeline.
*If you want to attend the next live episode, sign up here to receive an invite. Usually, we host them every Wednesday at 4 pm CET (Central Europe) - 10 am ET (Eastern Time).
In this episode of Fullfunnel Live, we covered the 4 pillars of the successful ABM programs.
In This Episode, Youโll Learn:
How to adapt your strategy to conservative markets with buyers not active on social vs crowded markets with an oversupply of content, where buyers are exposed to huge amounts of outreach.
General vs niche-specific sources of data you can use to identify accounts that are more likely to become sales deals
How to run ABM and nurture buyers in a market with very long cycles (>2 years)
The ideal vs realistic ABM team structure, and how to solve common team bottlenecks
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