Zero waste marketing and the evolution of sales

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The Sales and Marketing landscape has evolved as traditional marketing methods have given way to strategies such as Account Based Marketing (ABM).

And, we live in a digital world where the customer is more knowledgeable and can research independently. In fact, Pardot reported that 72% of B2B buyers within the awareness stage consult Google for help.

This had led to changes in the B2B sales process, whereby sales teams need to engage and delight leads to convert them into customers.

Personalisation

Traditional marketing such as cold calls are falling out of favour because many people find them disruptive and untrustworthy. This has led to the adoption of ABM by many businesses, a strategy built on high levels of personalisation.

Over the years we’ve seen an influx of technology from predictive, automation, leading scoring and now artificial intelligence (AI), all of which allows us to understand the buyer and their behaviour on a whole new level. To truly understand our customers, we need to understand their behaviour so we can tailor the personalised experiences that they crave.

Whilst technology helps us to understand the buyer, ABM also relies heavily on human touchpoints that build trust.

Human interaction and building rapport

As you push tailored content, human to human interaction is important to nurture leads through the awareness, consideration and decision stages.

Executing personalised campaigns should land you accounts, but the interaction shouldn’t stop there. Continue developing and improving the relationship so that it not only leads to lifetime value, which is the biggest driver of revenue, but also relationships that may come through referrals as a result.

Digital marketing channels

According to a Digital Marketing Plans study, B2B marketers find these seven digital channels to be most effective:

• Websites and blogs
• Email
• Social media
• Organic search
• Paid media
• Mobile ads
• Display ads

Growth stacks

To achieve the business objectives set out in an ABM strategy, a growth stack is essential. A growth stack is a set of tools that work together to generate leads and revenue.

Sales teams aren’t prepared for the extent to which sales has changed, but they must begin to evolve and align with marketing as the customer now has the upper hand.

A growth stack enables sales and marketing alignment as they can use software to share customer data and improve lead handoff, marketers can focus on generating and nurturing leads and sales can rest assured they aren’t missing conversion opportunities.

At Origin, we’ve developed a growth stack which is all about finding and creating the best solution for your business when it comes to sales and growth, you can read more about our approach here. What’s more, we work closely with your sales team to give them the support and training they need so they can cut through the noise.