Most marketing campaigns tend to be one-dimensional, following the playbook to the bone. What can help add the missing nuance? ABM intent data can help.

Data-driven strategies are driven by logic and well-thought-out roadmaps. It’s thrown around as if it all boils down to numbers at the end of your campaigns. Those also matter.

But truly effective data-driven campaigns leverage intent data with a clear purpose.

It’s about connecting the spend, strategy, execution, and ROI in a closed loop. From spending even a single extra penny to selecting some channels over others, every decision made must be highly informed. Simply? The ROI should account for the marketing spend.

There’s no disconnect or confusion regarding how. Your time, finances, resources, and efforts are justified.

ABM intent data operates as an engine to achieve this. To ensure there’s a genuine buyer purpose behind your strategies.

Why did you choose to list account A as opposed to account B in your TAL?

Intent data answers this. But only when aligned with your campaign’s objective. In the same way, heaps of data can prove to be irrelevant without contextual relevance.

Simply having data isn’t enough.

You have an entire database of your ICP. With marketing sending a generic email blast, there might be 100 accounts in the awareness stage and another 100 in the consideration stage. This way, your TAL receives a load of irrelevant information that lacks relevance for them. The same happens with sales cold calls.

In short?

Marketers must adopt the maturity to understand intent data and how it can contribute to their ABM campaigns.

Intent data’s place across ABM campaigns.

Intent data, when leveraged in ABM campaigns, offers a comprehensive and real-time picture of accounts and their interests.

Most use this understanding to proactively engage with the targeted accounts and connect with “buyers earlier” to shape their narrative from the get-go. And sway buyers towards the desired actions.

But this is a gross oversimplification of the modern marketing landscape.

The modern B2B buyer-vendor relationship has evolved from a transaction to a symbiotic relationship.

Using intent data isn’t limited to targeting the relevant accounts and at the “right” time. And neither is it about persuading the buyers. It’s about building a relationship and being the top-of-mind choice.

And at the base of this is a personalized communications strategy that moves beyond content. So, how?

The truth is, some of your target accounts regularly consume content. Whether it’s to expand their knowledge base or conduct market research, these isolated events can’t be pinpointed as intent.

Time takes precedence in this scenario.

There have been enough research solutions to engage the 15% in-market accounts, or the small window of interactions prospects attribute to sales conversations. And the solution has narrowed down to a single aspect: the correct timeline.

But most often, marketers mistake this to mean either getting ahead or catching decision-makers at the right moment. This isn’t precisely what is meant by right timing.

Timing is about marketing and sales streamlining their siloed efforts.

And synchronizing their strategic roadmaps with the buyer’s journey.

It starts with comparing the engagement with your brand with their relative baseline activity. And analyze their activity over time- how frequently do they interact with your brand, when, and what’s the intensity of these interactions?

Your B2B buyer accounts are active, but they aren’t merely on your brand site.

So, it’s about gauging which accounts are highly active on your site and interested. Downloading your whitepaper may or may not always work out for your marketing teams.

But intent data isn’t a monolithic term. Brands often confuse all the different types as the same and fail to gauge their maximum potential:

1. What exactly is the information and value each type of intent data offers?
2. What does the data say about the customer and the market?
3. Will it help you segment and prioritize particular buying groups?

Understanding these complexities is imperative.

How else do you know it’s worth for your marketing efforts?

ABM intent data shifts the spotlight. You aren’t chasing random accounts.

The real focus is on gauging interest levels and using them to guide prospects down the funnel. In B2B, you are catering to another business. The underlying logic remains the same.

However, what they are truly looking for is the correct methodology that leaves a positive influence on their conversion rates. ABM campaigns tick all the boxes to attain this.

But as established beforehand, ABM isn’t just about targeting the relevant accounts. It’s about curating forward-thinking insights that accelerate your pipeline conversion. Because rather than waiting for the accounts to reach just the right moment, you’re meeting them in the right sweet spot. One that aligns with their journey and also leads them to your solutions.

You’re orchestrating their journey for them. And treating it not just as an account of 6 to 10 decision markers, but as a unique market in itself. This 1:1 approach demands strategic personalization and targeted comms strategy, something that only the use of intent data can offer.

But here’s the million-dollar question: how?

Instilling intent data in your ABM campaigns: The how.

1. Developing the TAL and prioritizing the relevant accounts.

Most B2B marketers find it challenging to find authentic and up-to-date account information. Of course, first-party data is a golden grove, but collating the correct details is equally taxing. This is where most marketers falter in attempting to develop effective ABM campaigns.

This is where fit data and context data play a crucial role in supporting the highlighted intent data.

1. Fit data illustrates who is undertaking the action- whether they’re the right fit for your brand. It could comprise broad information such as company, job title, or industry. These data sets help you outline your ICP, based on which you identify the right-fit accounts.
2. Context data signifies why the individual is taking this action. Buyers are regularly consuming content. They aren’t just “buyers,” but leaders and creators. So, they might be researching or actually be interested in your solutions.

These two data types support intent data.

Intent data spotlights account behavior and pinpoints those that indicate a readiness to buy, i.e., demonstrate real buying signals.

And at the sweet spot where all these data intersect are your target accounts out of your total addressable market (TAM). The target accounts with conversion potential don’t just fit into your ICP, but also showcase their own interest in your brand.

That’s the sweet spot.

The foundational blocks of selecting the relevant high-value accounts boil down to the breadcrumbs that demonstrate the account’s intent to make a purchase (if not now, then down the line) or learn more about the brand. This means keeping tabs on every online relevant activity, i.e., tracking intent topics and keyword searches.

However, intent data shouldn’t work as a qualifier. It should function as a supporting act for your other lead qualification processes.

2. Personalizing marketing messages and broader comms strategy.

Personalization has become a treasure trove for marketers.

But few actually understand that it’s not just mentioning the company’s name or the contact person’s name. Even templated messages can feel personalized from afar.

So, customer knowledge to inculcate intimacy in your communications is the need of the hour.

But taking a personalized approach to your comms strategy is to dive deep into the emotional and business nuances of why it’s crucial in the first place. Even when you’re sending your customers or prospects follow-ups, it might amount to nothing if they feel as if they’re part of a campaign. Or that you’re following up because that’s how it must be done.

Clients seek out personalized communications because they want to feel singularly important. And that you’re attributing your time and effort toward this sale as they are into the purchase. It’s the only reason the same generic and templated approach doesn’t prove effective anymore.

With intent data, you’re getting closer to the why: why is this account in-market and active? This should make up the crux of your initial conversation. Not that they fit your brand’s ICP, but their pain points and interests drew you towards them.

Personalization isn’t as one-dimensional as marketers assume it to be.

As mentioned before, a synchronized timeline should take precedence in ABM campaigns. And not just between different departments, but between them and the customers.

Personalization is also that. When done right, it can change how your prospects perceive your campaigns and how they respond to them. Because, while buyers want to be singled out, they care less about personalization and more about the derived value.

Buyers interact with brands across multiple devices and touchpoints. Most brands personalize these touchpoints and call it a day. But there’s no coherence between how it comes together. There’s an inherent lack of coordination. This is because businesses might lack the maturity to implement the right personalization capabilities.

This is where intent data swoops in as a saving grace to help avoid over-personalization or personalization that lacks context. It offers insights into buying committees and how each decision-maker within that community is behaving online.

In ABM campaigns, and specifically the 1:1 tier, it’s about what personalization means to your high-engaging accounts. And how to deliver it. It could be as basic as continuously tailoring the funnel experience using first-party and third-party data.

Personalization in ABM campaigns isn’t just about matching the algorithm, whether it’s about creatives or pricing models. It’s genuinely about aligning the algorithm with the perceived value- for both your customers and your brand.

3. Real-time orchestration of marketing and sales.

Oftentimes, businesses think that marketing and sales alignment means underscoring shared goals and strategies. But it is also about understanding the nitty-gritty of the buyer’s journey.

And even from different funnel stages, both these teams should entail a consistent and shared perspective. It’s about collaborating on the strategic and theoretical level. Often, a fundamental knowledge gap creates a misconstrued perception of who high-quality leads are or whether they’ll convert. It’s now an age-old shenanigan.

But what the two teams are failing to notice is the common denominator: the buyers themselves.

The truth? It boils down to trust and functionality between the two teams. It’s not marketing’s fault that the accounts they hand over don’t end up converting, even though the blame is on them.

It’s because there’s a significant disjuncture in what qualified accounts mean to both teams. Due to a fundamental lack of faith and complexities, marketing and sales require tangible proof or rationale. Especially, to present the “why” behind the lack of trust- why didn’t sales follow up on the MQAs, and why is marketing passing on low-quality leads that’re going nowhere?

The fix is quite simple. They must gauge where the accounts fall on the spectrum of opportunities to establish their readiness and their respective interest levels.

But this is the latter part of the process.

1. The primary one is gauging whether the intent insights are applied within the correct context, i.e., used to target relevant accounts. Combining fit data and intent data here intuitively offers diverse perspectives into whether your TAL or ICP needs any changes.
2. And then, making data available and accessible to both marketing and sales. It facilitates data collaboration, so both teams can actively leverage the same insights. This way, there’s no disconnect from the knowledge base itself.

With access to the same information stack and data, the siloes are broken down.

This helps marketing and sales achieve a clearer view of the starting point for each of their strategies. And the direction they are heading towards.

The result? More effective nurture tracks and strategic lead validation.

And in the end, informed decision-making and roadmap curation leading to a seamless and satisfied customer experience.

4. Tie your campaigns to the right strategies.

The thing is, your ABM campaigns will result in some outcome, if not what you expected.

But there are some KPIs, such as ROI, that stakeholders really care about. Because they want to gauge whether your ABM campaigns are actually bearing fruit. Without a glimpse into these, your campaigns seem like random bouts of experiments that fail to pass the test.

Stakeholders want guarantees and proof, not guesswork. They don’t want to witness depleted budget reservoirs and low ROI at the end of a campaign. And if there are tangible numbers- where were they derived from?

Intent data ascertains that direction and purpose drive your ABM campaigns.

For example, CLV or Customer Lifetime Value is an essential metric for your stakeholders. It not only spotlights your customer retention techniques but also the churn. And pulls the focus over the overall customer experience you offer.

CLV is where all your marketing spend can falter to show up.

So, if you’re introducing a new ABM campaign for client acquisition, focus on accounts that have the right revenue potential and the solution’s best fit. There’s no compromise here.

Targeting these specific accounts and ensuring that the dynamic duo of ABM and intent data works its magic will improve your CLV. They stay longer because they don’t just fit your ICP, but also help gauge their buying signal.

Intent data ascribes logic to the how, when, and why of your ABM campaigns.

Intent data isn’t just a small aspect of your ABM strategy, but its engine.

It gives shape to your roadmaps. There’s no guesswork, but strategic thinking that unfurls what your buyers are here for and how you must interact with them. You have a comprehensive and molecular insight into who your potential customers are.

And a similarly in-depth understanding of what’s lacking in your frameworks. Intent data functions as the support system and the lens into the missed opportunities for you and the hidden potentialities.

It’s this truth that has rendered traditional marketing playbooks obsolete.

With AI and aggressively data-driven tactics, there’s a mechanical front to every marketing function. You know what makes your marketing strategies stick and what’s not worth the effort.

And that’s the new rulebook that would add to your marketing operations.