In 2008, around 80 percent of BT Global Services’ £8bn revenue came from just 20 percent of its accounts. Pareto’s law in full effect and a board that demanded evidence that marketing had a focus on it.
Neil Blakesley, the CMO, was under serious pressure. He needed something up and running quickly that would protect and grow share of wallet in those top accounts and, just as importantly, prove that marketing was delivering real commercial value.
Around that time, I started getting phone calls and voicemails from Nina Lees (nee Walker) asking whether I would leave my role leading marketing for the professional services sector and join her on an exciting, as yet unnamed, special project for Neil. At first, I hesitated. I was still early in my career and it felt like a big decision.
But Nina kept calling. Eventually she called in the big guns. I started getting calls from Neil himself and the Head of Sales too, plus a few BBMs for good measure (WhatsApp did not exist back then). I was not so much backed into a corner as firmly told this was a good move for me and an opportunity to shine.
They were right.
What I did not know at the time was that this decision would eventually lead to me keynoting an ITSMA event on ABM in Boston, meeting my wife there and eventually being named a global CMO at the age of 27. Serendipity.
I cannot promise ABM will be that life changing for you. Not everyone will be starting an ABM program inside a massive corporate like BT GS. But I do have plenty of scars, grey hairs and lessons that might help you.
Executive buy in matters more than anything
The biggest advantage I had was simple. ABM had a mandate from the very top. Most b2b marketers are not that lucky. Without senior backing, ABM becomes an uphill battle very quickly.
Budget follows belief
Because ABM was the CMO’s baby, budget was made available. It was not abundant. Headcount was being cut and everyone was under pressure. But whatever unallocated activity budget existed was pointed firmly in our direction. This is why executive buy in is not a nice to have. It is the difference between an idea and a programme.
Start as small as you can
BT GS had something called the T-400, the top 400 accounts globally. Far too many. We started ABM with the top 20 on a one to one basis. In hindsight, that was still too many and we probably should have tested a one to many approach first.
No amount of reading or conferences prepares you for reality. You will be building the plane whilst flying it. The fewer accounts you start with, the more you can do with limited budget and the faster you will learn what actually works in your organisation.
Account selection can make or break you
This one is critical. Pick the wrong accounts with the wrong account teams and your programme will stall immediately. Pick the right accounts with the right sales leadership and a willingness to work with marketing and you at least have a fighting chance.
In the early months, work with the people who want to work with you and want the program to succeed. Momentum matters more than perfection.
Selling ABM to sales should not be hard
Once you know which accounts you want to work on, ABM should sell itself. You are offering focused marketing support to help sales hit their targets and get paid. Most sales people will say yes instantly.
Some will not. If it feels like a hassle to them, move on. ABM does not work when it is forced.
Agencies can help you move faster
There is no shortage of agencies that specialise in ABM and they love it. The right partner brings pattern recognition, ideas from other companies and speed. They help marketing deliver visible things that sales teams and clients can actually see and feel.
From a resourcing point of view, they also let you scale quickly, often far quicker than you could internally. I benefited greatly from two agencies - one in the UK to help us design and manage the program and its platform and one in India to provide us the resources to execute it. It is far easier, and faster, to build teams using agencies than building an internal team, especially during a pilot.
Give sales real reasons to call
One of the biggest breakthroughs for us was uncovering genuine reasons to call our top accounts. My favourite example came from a conference in Brazil where a member of a client’s IT team casually mentioned, in Portuguese, on stage that he had decided to outsource part of his team.
Our ABM programme captured the session, transcribed it, translated it and triggered an alert to the sales team. That alert included supporting marketing materials, contact details and an offer to personalise further if needed.
Sales acted on it, gained traction, created an opportunity in CRM and told everyone about it. Suddenly, sales teams were proactively asking when they would be included in ABM. A perfect problem to communicate upwards.
Prove it works
For every ABM initiated or supported conversation, sales tagged the ABM campaign code. That discipline mattered. It allowed us to show that ABM accounts were creating more pipeline than non-ABM accounts and that velocity had increased.
Sales cycles were long, so revenue took time to land, but when it did, the correlation was undeniable.
Market ABM internally
In large organisations, momentum dies quickly if you do not actively promote what you are doing. Explain what ABM is, why it matters and how other teams can support it. As often as you can.
Data, insight, content, events and PR already exist around you. Use them. It makes your programme stronger and much harder to kill.
Align outside marketing
For me, alignment came through sales operations and their Account Development Plans. These were single truth documents covering where an account was today, where it wanted to go and how it would get there.
We embedded ABM into those plans, into the workshops and into the assessment criteria. Once ABM lives there, it becomes part of how the business plans growth.
Take creative risks
ABM gives you permission to be creative. You are influencing specific accounts, not anonymous audiences. With sales leadership on side, you can take risks.
We sent personalised video brochures to new clients. At the time, that felt futuristic. On the morning of a major pitch, we advertised BT GS along the client CIO’s commute, in the tube station, at the bus stop outside his office, on a billboard opposite and even in their internal magazine.
Did it directly win us the deal? No idea. But she noticed and we did win. On the biggest deals, marginal gains are worth chasing.
Use your clients to help you sell
If you have happy clients, involve them. In one case, we wanted to win a cyber security contract with company X. We introduced them to an existing cyber security client and arranged for the two CIOs to have dinner together without us in the room.
When our advocate debriefed us, he was honest. He did not tell the prospect that we were perfect. He talked about what we did well, where we could improve and, crucially, told them that when things went wrong, the BT GS team genuinely cared and went all in to fix it.
That mattered more than any slide deck or white paper.
After a year, ABM was materially contributing to pipeline; over $3bn of sales qualified pipeline with 32 percent converting, and sales were openly praising it, so budget stopped being a problem. We eventually rolled ABM out across the full Top 400 via developing different flavours across categories of accounts.
Then I got a call asking if I would be interested in becoming a global CMO.
At 27.
Shit.
I owe a huge amount to BT GS and to ABM. And these are just some of the lessons I learned along the way. I will share more in future, but if there is anything specific you would like me to go deeper on, just get in touch. If you would like an intro to the agencies that I would recommend you talk to today, just drop me a line.