Accelerating account-based experiences with Adobe and Marketo

A B2B sale is not an overnight process and identifying the most appropriate accounts to guide efforts is only the first step. In addition to identifying accounts, each of these companies has a decision-maker that we must reach and bring to a single conclusion: my service/product is the best in the market.

But this process requires the right strategies and tools. It may sound simple, but for others, time is a significant obstacle, as you need to find those people within companies who can buy the service/product, but their day-to-day tasks don't allow it. We know that delivering truly customer-driven experiences presents an inevitable challenge for even sophisticated marketing organizations. However, success is not negotiable.

It would help if you also considered that ABM requires high collaboration between sales and marketing teams and a platform capable of carrying out the strategy. Marketo is an excellent choice, intelligently combining sales and marketing applications data, helping marketers find high-value accounts, and targeting specific individuals with personalized and relevant content.

The ABM process becomes much more straightforward with Marketo Engage and its integration of artificial intelligence (AI) tools. This functionality allows companies to create better experiences, better understand the buyer's journey and the time it takes them to go through it, and have the necessary technology to provide the best experience at the touchpoints they have with their Buyer Persona. This process should start with immediate informational testing but map out a test journey, objectives, and next steps forward.

First, ask yourself, 'What am I testing for, why am I testing, what will I do with the results,'" he said. And don't forget to ask yourself what, if anything, you will do differently due to the data you are collecting. Too often, he said, marketers test by test without changing course based on the results, which means you're likely not delivering an optimal customer experience.






Read more: Main Advantages of Marketo

Attribute and align success

Once you have done the roadmap, you need to understand how to attribute and synchronize success with the different specific touchpoints you found. So how do I know if the strategies I am implementing deliver results? The first thing is to measure the marketing impact, overcome the divide between sales and marketing teams, and align revenue with marketing or sales. It is false that opportunities are 100% marketing or 100% sales, and it is tough to assume that a deal was closed only because of one of the departments. However, marketers can measure the risks they take and the innovations they introduce, learning and evolving as they grow by effectively tracking attribution.

Link marketing to revenue

Now, an ongoing struggle for marketing departments in revenue attribution. At the Summit held by Adobe in 2019, Brewster Stanislaw, Adobe's head of product and strategy, and Jordan Con, Adobe's product marketing manager, spoke about measurement obstacles, citing that nearly 50% of marketing decision-makers lack adequate capabilities to measure success. In addition, about 47% of marketers lack defined metrics to measure success.

To overcome this, you need to have proper attribution models in place. One way to achieve this with Adobe is with the Bizible Discover app. Teams can easily track ROI and other revenue-centric metrics, from how much is spent to drive revenue to what it costs to convert a customer to what the pipeline looks like that. This app makes recommendations based on machine learning, analyzes past closed businesses, understands what actions or engagements helped close, and finally customizes them for future use.

Understanding that and creating a strategy based on what they do and not on what your customers say will help you deliver experiences and interact with your customers in a transformative way. That is precisely what Adobe's Cloud Experience's primary focus is.

Read: Marketo engage main features and when to use it