🕵🏻‍♂️ ABM on LinkedIn: 9 results you can’t ignore

Account-based marketing (ABM) has emerged as a game-changer in the B2B space, enabling businesses to target and engage their most valuable prospects with laser-like precision. When implemented on LinkedIn, ABM offers a host of benefits and tangible results that every modern marketer needs to consider.

In this newsletter, we will present you with a comprehensive overview of the 09 remarkable results you can expect from implementing ABM on LinkedIn.

Let’s delve straight into the heart of the matter.

Result 1. Warm opportunities with highly targeted accounts

When you’re selling high-value enterprise deals, you don’t need a lot of customers, but you need the right customers. Since closing a large deal takes lots of time and resources, most companies cannot afford to waste 9–12 months on a deal with a 10% chance to win.

For example, for their pilot ABM on a LinkedIn program, Postindustria included only 11 best-fit accounts from the AdTech vertical, matching account qualification criteria identified based on an extensive analysis of won and lost deals.

Result 2. Targeted brand awareness (even for unknown brands, or new markets)

Unless you’re a category leader, your brand might not be very well known by your ideal target accounts. LinkedIn marketing framework uses targeted distribution of expertise content and engagement techniques (such as thoughtful commenting), to educate buyers at target accounts, and position your brand as a go-to expert in your industry.

Example #1. We started FullFunnel.io as an unknown brand back in 2020. Since then, we grew our following beyond 50k, generated 200+ five-figure opportunities, landed speaking gigs at dozens of leading events and podcasts, and positioned our brand as a go-to brand when it comes to ABM and full-funnel marketing. The major driver was the consistent application of the “ABM on LinkedIn” framework.

Example #2. After growing organically, mainly through referrals, Wings4U decided to implement the “ABM on LinkedIn” framework as a way to enter the highly competitive US market. They started off with no visibility in the target market. After six months of running the ABM on LinkedIn program, they became a well-recognized brand in the customer advocacy industry, and have landed five qualified deals in the US. Here is the recount of their experience with the “ABM on LinkedIn” framework:

Result 3: “Dark social” and awareness in the whole buying committee

Vlad went on to say, “I recently closed a deal, having to speak to 5+ people from the buying committee. I was surprised when I discovered they all seem to know me, and what FullFunnel was all about. This was surprising because I’ve never seen them on LinkedIn, in our B2B marketing community, at events etc. What I learned later is that one of their colleagues was sharing our LinkedIn posts on the company Slack. It was one of the easiest deals to close.”

See, the truth is that the most important conversations happen outside your funnel. People ask for recommendations (and share information) from colleagues, via private chats on Slack or WhatsApp, and discover solutions from industry influencers.

Result 4. Nurturing the buyers with a complex buying process

We’ve analyzed our won and lost deals recently, and came to the following conclusions:

1. About two-thirds of our clients mentioned they have heard about us from LinkedIn.

2. Almost all Tier-1 clients were engaged with our LinkedIn content.

3. Most of them say they saw our content in the newsfeed because somebody from their network engaged with it.

4. Only one Tier-1 client came through a referral by an industry influencer (who referred us because he knew us through LinkedIn and our LinkedIn content).
   Note that the above stats prove you need to build relationships not only with your target accounts and buyers, but also with industry thought leaders, peers, communities, and industry media (more on that in the section about the LinkedIn Ecosystem below).

5. Personalized non-sales nurture touches (like asking about feedback or inviting them to the webinars) helped to stay on top of their minds and remind them about us in an unobtrusive way.

6. Timely outreach after noticing they had passed through our target engagement threshold on the website or content hub helped to accelerate the sales cycle with every second client.

7. Our LinkedIn content, case studies, and webinars were shared on internal Slack or Teams chats, which created awareness across the entire buying committee.

8. All inbound opportunities that came directly from Google search were either Tier-3 (lowest revenue potential) or were disqualified.

This all simply means that people buy from people they know, like, and trust. And that’s exactly why continuous nurturing via LinkedIn was crucial for our success.

Result 5. Inbound pipeline and revenue

While it doesn’t happen quickly, after a consistent application of the ABM on LinkedIn framework, you will start to get inbound inquiries and opportunities with target accounts.

For example, about two-thirds of our inbound pipeline mentioned they have heard about us from LinkedIn.

Result 6. Increased outreach efficiency with engagement-based triggers

The two biggest problems with cold outreach are:

1. You don’t know them (you don’t really know if the recipient of your message is looking for the solution you’re offering)

2. They don’t know you (people buy from people they know, like, and trust).

Engagement-based outreach solves both of these problems. Engagement-based outreach means to reach out based on an engagement trigger (e.g. someone engaging with a piece of content). Here is an example:

Using this approach, we regularly get acceptance rates of up to 80% and 40%+ response rates.

Result 7. Free PR and media requests

In two years after starting as an unknown brand, we were invited to speak at more than two dozen events and podcasts (including leading events like Ad World Conference and podcasts like B2B Growth). Our articles have been published by top brands in our niche, including Sales Hacker, CXL, Terminus, and MarketingProfs.

Most of the invites came through LinkedIn.

Even after only four weeks, a couple of participants of the first ABM on LinkedIn Bootcamp got invites to speak at local niche media.

That’s not all.

Result 8. Influencer Marketing Opportunities

Content collaborations are a secret weapon of fast-growing brands. Co-creating content with people and brands your buyers follow and trust is one of the fastest ways to grow your own audience and trust. Here are three examples:

1. Identify key GTM regions and cities, and run events with local influencers (e.g. we ran ABM Days in Boston with Goldcast, Nick Bennett, Samantha Stone, and Louis Blaut).

2. Turn a podcast into a community event. While everyone records podcasts, we give our community an opportunity to interact with industry leaders live or get advice (e.g. live messaging teardowns by Peep Laja).

3. Invite your best podcast guests as speakers on a virtual summit. We run a 5000+ subscriber summit every year, and our client used a summit as an ABM tactic to drive 34 qualified sales opportunities, closing five right off the bat.
   

   

That is why an essential part of the “ABM on LinkedIn” framework is building relationships not only with your target buyers but also with partner brands and industry influencers (more about that in the LinkedIn Ecosystem section).

Result 9. Warm referrals by industry influencers

Warm referrals tend to have up to five times higher win rates, and 84% of B2B buyers begin the buyer’s journey with a referral. And the more trusted the person referring the vendor, the better the results are.

That is why, after building a relationship with industry influencers, they might refer you to new businesses. This can be especially helpful if you are entering a new market where you’re still building credibility.

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BEST SHARES FROM THE TRENCHES COMMUNITY

• Full-funnel B2B marketing explained through blended demand gen & ABM (Andrei Zinkevich)

• The new game of B2B marketing (Vladimir Blagojevic)

QUESTIONS FROM FELLOW TRENCHERS

• Hello everyone! In a B2B environment, what’s the best way to nurture leads to those who have opted in for email communications and to those who haven’t. Thanks!

• Hey folks, can you share your pick of LIVE webinar platform? (this is for a B2B audience)

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See you in Trenches 😉

Adechina D. ODJO