The pros of a digital-first world? Target accounts are more accessible, and it’s easier than ever to generate intent and engagement data on prospects. The cons? Everyone knows it — and everyone is trying to capitalize on it.
ProfitWell, a revenue automation platform, was one of the many companies running account-based marketing (ABM) strategies. While its ABM wheels were turning, it wasn’t going far. The business intelligence platform, which brings together subscription-based organizations’ financial, usage and attribution data together in one place, had more than 8,000 companies using it to track, understand and optimize billions of dollars in recurring revenue.
However, the company struggled to create content that stood out to buyers in the face of an over-crowded B2B marketplace.
The Challenge: Audience Awareness In An Oversaturated Marketplace
ProfitWell realized it needed to revamp its ABM program to successfully target and convert more accounts, but it was difficult as its competitors were operating with similar goals. With content the primary aspect of its ABM campaigns, Ngo explained that the company was having trouble getting its information in front of targets due to the abundance of information available in the marketplace.
“Email marketing and advertising are very saturated,” said Stephen Ngo, Head of Growth at ProfitWell. “Our biggest motivation behind revamping the ABM program is that we needed to establish principles and a set of tactics to really stand out in each of the channels we have today. We wanted to produce content and messaging that actually resonated with the audience, given the saturation in channels.”
The Solution: Leveraging Humanization Within Content
The organization turned to Influ2 and its people-based approach to marketing to create content that stood out to viewers and provided what competitors didn’t.
“I’ve learned that companies don’t make buying decisions, people do, and that’s what Influ2 focuses on,” said Ngo. “We really wanted to target people at the seniority level who focus on retention and pricing strategies, and that turns out to be a lot more specialized than targeting marketers as a whole. Influ2 allowed us to really put the individual at the center of our marketing, and they’ve also been very responsive to us around support and taking our product feature requests into account.”
Through the partnership, Influ2 helped the organization create two video series — “Boxed Out” and “Pricing Page Teardown” — to analyze target accounts’ strategies. To produce the first season of “Pricing Teardown,” all ProfitWell needed was a new TV monitor and wood paneling, and then it just used the pricing data analysis it uses in its products.
The two series demonstrated ProfitWell’s domain authority, promoted reciprocity by giving away actionable value to targets before they even become customers and put approachable, human faces behind the brand. The content was distributed in various additional forms, including blog posts and printable case studies.
Additionally, Profitwell showcased its internal research and product frameworks in its webinars and events to educate buyers on how to improve their strategies. This helped position the company as a partner, not a vendor, built confidence in its solutions and engendered trust in its way of working.
“When it comes to our content forms, we make a big point of showing our playbook and talking about the framework for understanding the problem we’re trying to solve,” explained Ngo. “We also discuss what the data shows, and provide a lot of prescriptive takeaways in terms of what organizations can do to improve their retention strategy.”
In terms of the tech stack that made the programs possible, it was grounded in an ABM approach. Specifics companies involved in the tech stack included:
- ZoomInfo and Clearbit to help with account selection;
- Salesforce as the CRM;
- Terminus, Influ2 and LinkedIn to generate awareness;
- HubSpot, Wistia and Transistor for consideration; and
- Outreach and Drift for conversion.
The Results: 67% Conversation Rate For Target Accounts
Through its partnership with Influ2, ProfitWell leveraged humanized messaging and ungated assets to see even more success in its campaigns. Specific results include:
- 70% increase in E-commerce industry leads;
- 67% conversion rate for target accounts;
- 111% lift in enterprise deals won;
- 40% growth in buying group engagement; and
- 23% boost in banner clickthrough rates.
“We’ve really found that humanized messaging gets much higher response and open rates,” explained Ngo. “The whole point was to give away ungated actionable insights, and then have our products take those insights to the next level. Our prospects were excited about the free content we provided, and that excitement only grew when they realized the value they’d received when they paid for our products. It’s all about providing value to the prospect as opposed to talking about yourself.”
