~2 min
LinkedIn has become a crucial tool for ABM strategists. For B2B companies, it’s a pot of gold overflowing with potential leads. Knowing exactly how to effectively integrate LinkedIn into your ABM strategy will help you:
- Identify potentially promising target accounts
- Reach them with account-based advertising campaigns
- Establish relationships and stay top of mind of your target accounts with organic content
- Contribute to client retention by turning clients into brand advocates
Here’s a step-by-step guide on integrating LinkedIn into your ABM efforts.
Use LinkedIn to define your target accounts
Your first step when using LinkedIn as part of an ABM strategy is to define your target accounts. Since you’re reading this, you’re probably no newcomer to ABM - and you could even be implementing a strategy on how to build a target account list that is similar to ours. LinkedIn is handing you access to a vast network of companies and professionals in all industries and this network can be leveraged to identify potential target accounts.
As an account-based marketer, one of the key components to success is defining your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). Understanding your ICP means developing a comprehensive understanding of the characteristics and attributes of the companies and individuals that are most likely to purchase your product or service.
To create an effective ICP, it's important to start by analyzing your existing customer base to identify patterns and trends. Look at factors such as:
- company size
- industry
- job title
- buying behavior
This will allow you to identify the common characteristics of your most valuable customers. When identifying target accounts you can use LinkedIn’s advanced search features to find companies with a specific number of employees, in a specific location, and operating in a specific industry.
Pick out the decision makers
The main benefit of ABM is the opportunity to target your most valuable accounts with tailored marketing campaigns. Now that you have used LinkedIn to define your target accounts, it turns out you’re also in the ideal place to target decision-makers.
Similarly to how we used LinkedIn’s advanced search for businesses, it also offers powerful targeting capabilities that allow businesses to reach decision-makers.
Those small hacks will make your search more efficient:
1. Work around LinkedIn profile search limits. You can buy a premium version, use the Sales Navigator, or simply use several accounts to expand your search limits.
2. Utilize the “Skills & Endorsements” section
3. Check “People Also Viewed” recommendations
4. Use Boolean searches
See more tips in this guide: 7 best LinkedIn search hacks.
One of the easiest ways to identify decision-makers on LinkedIn is to search by job title. Start by searching for the job titles that typically hold decision-making authority within a company, such as CEO, CMO, CFO, or Director of Sales.
Besides the search function itself, company pages themselves provide a wealth of information about a company, including its employees and their job titles.
And when all else fails, just ask! If you have existing connections within a company, there’s really no harm in asking them for referrals to decision-makers. This can actually be one of the most effective ways to expand your network and connect with the right people because the referral is coming from someone the decision-maker already knows and trusts.
The internet is also full of tools that can help you find out more about your audience. Tools like SparkToro can help you gain insight on what your audience is talking about and where to find them.
Specify the LinkedIn page you want to analyze:
And see the interests of people following this page:
Improve sales results by integrating LinkedIn with your CRM
We’ve defined our target accounts, picked out the decision-makers, they’re eating up our targeted content and then what?
Well, we’re starting to build a bit of a story with these accounts, you could even say we have a bit of history together now. Your leads and prospects are all sitting comfortably in your CRM and you’re hopping back and forth between your CRM and LinkedIn every time you find a new lead. To automate this, you can use a tool like Surfe to:
- Add LinkedIn contacts to your CRM
- Track deals
- Sync your LinkedIn messages with your CRM
and much more without ever actually having to leave LinkedIn.
Surfe also provides a browser extension that allows you to manage your contacts, deals, and all the data in between without ever having to leave LinkedIn. It’s all there synced in your CRM and all you did was click one button! It’s really how you take your ABM strategy to the next level, saving you hours every week and improving your data accuracy by removing the need for manual data entry.
Integrate your ABM tool with LinkedIn
If ABM advertising is part of your account-based strategy and you’re using a dedicated tool to run ABM ads, make sure that it provides a LinkedIn integration. Here’s why:
- Audience expansion. ABM display tools boast a huge reach across thousands of websites, but aren’t able to push ads directly to social networks, like LinkedIn or Facebook. Luckily, many of them are able to push account segments as social audiences, which allows you to create retargeting campaigns and show highly-relevant ads in their social feed.
- Lower cost per lead. ABM display tools allow generating awareness with display ads at a much cheaper cost compared to LinkedIn. This strategy used by Powell Software, an N.Rich client, helped them save money on cold layer ads and use LinkedIn only for retargeting purposes, ultimately lowering cost per lead and per opportunity.
Turn clients into brand advocates
Retaining an existing client is always easier than attracting a new one - however, too many marketers keep ignoring existing clients and still concentrate on new logo acquisition.
If this is not the case for you and you’re actively doing customer marketing, then LinkedIn should be one of the key platforms for your post-sale communications. Make sure you’re connected with your clients and they see your product-related posts in their feed. With dozens of tools every B2B company is using in their work process, it’s important to stay top of your client’s mind with actionable use cases for your tool.
Because the worst thing that can happen before the renewal is to hear your client asking: what exactly are we using your tool for?
Along with regular CS calls and product newsletters, LinkedIn is the right place to appear in front of your end users and share practical ideas on how to integrate your solution into their daily work.
Are you using all LinkedIn capabilities for your ABM strategy?
Let's sum it up. Here's how LinkedIn can help you boost your ABM efforts:
1. Define your ICP parameters
2. Build target account lists
3. Identify decision makers at your target companies
4. Push engagement and company data to your CRM
5. Expand your advertising reach
6. Stay top of mind with your existing clients (which means higher LTV and more chances to upsell!)
