Dear Trenchers,

It's no secret that many B2B companies face challenges when it comes to LinkedIn ABM.

Generally, here's what they think LinkedIn lead gen looks like: 

• Send 500-1000 spammy inmails - get 1-5 meetings booked.

• Display ads routing to a landing page - get 1 demo request.

Understandably, this can be frustrating.

In this newsletter, we'll share with you some proven tactics that can help you improve your LinkedIn ABM results.

How do most B2B companies do ABM on LinkedIn? 

Generally, they create a huge list of accounts only based on firmographic data (descriptive attributes that are used to segment target accounts: the niche, the size of the company, the structure and status, the number of customers, the geographic location, and the likes.)

Then they start warming up these accounts with gated content (ebooks, whitepapers, templates, webinars, checklists, etc.) with the aim of getting additional information that will be passed to the sales team. 

But let’s face it. More often than not, these contacts have no buying intent. 

If somebody downloads an ebook or signs up for a webinar about a given topic, the only thing it says is that they’re interested in learning more about that specific topic. Not that they are ready to buy. 

So, your #1 goal should be to make sure you deliver your promises.

Put another way, you should make sure your content is worth it. It should be as insightful as you said it is. It should serve the purpose of educating the person who downloaded it. Because at the end of the day, giving away value-packed content is one of the surefire ways to showcase your expertise and create demand.

How to do ABM on LinkedIn instead?

The strategy we use to generate tremendous results on LinkedIn is the 20/80 framework. 

Experimentation works, GRANTED. But if you are in a “Less traffic, More qualified prospects” type of scheme, then you should consider spending 80% of your time on 20% of the activities that generate 80% of your results. 

Here are those: 

1. 𝐓𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩: share content that demonstrates you have expertise in a given domain, field, or topic.

Why:

• Generating demand for your product.

• Proving niche expertise.

• Positioning yourself as a trusted advisor.

• Nurturing target accounts.

2. 𝐓𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐟𝐮𝐥 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 on other niche experts posts

Why:

• Create awareness & attract attention.

• Show your expertise.

• Repurpose comments into posts.

3. 𝐄𝐧𝐠𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐚 𝐧𝐞𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐭 𝐚𝐜𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐬 (𝐋𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐞𝐝𝐈𝐧 𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐬𝐲𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐦).

Why:  

• Regular appearance in the newsfeed of your target accounts ;

• Building a strong brand & a real relationship with the target audience ;

• Generating and capturing demand ;

• Educating & nurturing your target market

4. 𝐏𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐳𝐞𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐫𝐞𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐬.

Why:

• A higher acceptance rate ;

• An opportunity to build a real relationship

5. 𝐍𝐨𝐧-𝐬𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐨𝐮𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐬.

Why:

• Stay top of their mind & nurture the audience ;

• Capture demand.

6. 𝐀𝐝𝐬 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐮𝐝𝐢𝐞𝐬/𝐁𝐎𝐅𝐔 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐜𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐬.

Why:

• Generate demand ;

• Generate inbound opportunities.

7. 𝐄𝐧𝐠𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭-𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡.

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.

RECAP 

We leveraged the 80/20 framework to grow Fullfunnel.io, and so can you

Here’s how.

1. Define 20% of the market segment that generate 80% of your revenue and then adapt your marketing strategy to these segments. 

This includes: 

• leveraging the channels where the buyers from these segments hang out and run their research ;

• tailoring your marketing message & content to resonate with the needs and goals of these segments 

2. Not all customers were created equal. 

Spend 80% of the time marketing to a few Tier 1 accounts with highly-personalized campaigns (ABM) that can drastically increase your revenue while focusing on demand gen to nurture 80% of your market and create awareness and demand.

You can leverage insights from customer interviews to refine your marketing and sales.

3. Spend 80% of your time on 20% of activities that generate 80% of results. 

Define leading indicators and the timeline for an experiment, then spend no more than 20% of your time, budget, and resources (team members) on it. When it gets traction, add it to your core marketing plan.

4. 20% of channels and demand gen campaigns generate 80% of results.

Instead of blindly following the GareeVee framework and trying to do everything and be everywhere, double down on a few channels and activities where you can leverage the compound interest.

5. You don't need more content. You need less, but higher quality content that showcases your expertise and covers in detail the questions your target audience is genuinely interested in.

For high ACV B2B, keyword volume is useless. Instead, focus on a few hot questions and challenges that bother your target buyers and cover them in-depth to create demand for your product.

E.g. instead of writing one more article on "What is ABM", focus on detailed and practical ABM case studies.

Less traffic, but more qualified prospects.

6.) 20% of partnerships will drive 80% of results. 

Few smaller partners might be more engaged than bigger clients that don't really care about the partnership.

Too long, so you didn’t read? Here are the main takeaways:

• You don't need more marketing activities, you need a few of them that actually drive pipeline.

• You don't need more marketers, you need fewer but more skilled people who can generate revenue.

• You don't need more leads, you need more clients and revenue.

80/20 is everywhere. If we successfully leveraged that same strategy to grow Fullfunnel.io, then you can too.

Upcoming community events

How to create awareness in the channels you can’t target directly

Not everyone has a target audience that hangs out on social media every day and is easy to reach and prospect.

Whether we like it or not, there are many conservative markets where you can only educate and nurture target buyers through communities, associations, and forums.

Join us today for a new webinar hosted by our co-founder Andrei Zinkevich and Arthur Castillo from Chili Piper to learn:

• How Chili Piper drives awareness through Slack communities: program examples;

• How to measure the success of your community engagement strategy

• How to define engaged accounts and carry out maintenance and activation.

Time: 4:00 PM - 5:30 PM UTC+1

Best shares from Trenches Community

• 80-90% of people on LinkedIn don't post. When you translate that info to followers, it means that 80-90% of the people your followers follow don't post.

NOTE: If you found this content interesting and insightful, chances are you have 1 or 2 colleagues (well, maybe 03) who’d enjoy it as much as you do. Help them by sharing it.

See you in Trenches 😉

Adechina D. ODJO