Healthcare companies are using Account-Based Marketing (ABM) to tailor their marketing strategies to meet the needs of specifically targeted consumers rather than casting a wide net and seeing what they catch.
Since its development in the early 1990s, ABM has become an increasingly popular B2B marketing strategy. What was once an untested theory about marketing has proven itself over the last 30 years. Today, ignoring the ABM framework means you’re stuck doing more and harder work for lesser returns.
Every day, American healthcare companies’ marketing and sales teams use ABM to communicate with key decision-makers at hospitals, medical groups, and insurance providers. This approach allows you to tailor your messaging, content, and engagement to the specific needs and interests of priority accounts.
Whether you need to implement Account-Based Marketing at your company or improve how it is currently being used, you must have a firm grasp of the basics.
Account-Based Marketing in Healthcare: The Basics
ABM is a combined effort between a marketing and a sales department focusing on establishing a set of high-value accounts.
The goal, then, is to pursue a specific prospect through highly personalized outreach and engagement. To do this, the sales and marketing teams must work together to identify and select prospects that represent the greatest potential value to your company.
You will gain insights by researching things like:
- Organizational structure
- Company and industry profile
- Department goals and initiatives
- Challenges and pain points
- Budget
- Current solutions
- Buying process
- Culture and values
When your targeted marketing focuses on the information gleaned from this research, you dramatically increase your success rates of building a relationship. After that relationship is formed, you continue to hybridize your marketing and sales efforts to ensure a long-lasting and profitable collaboration.
All of this means that you are not putting together a broad, generic marketing campaign that might or might not appeal to your ideal customer. Instead, you are learning about the relevance and value you offer each target account.
Common ABM Tactics
So how do you do it? How do you build these relationships with other healthcare businesses? There is no such thing as a fully comprehensive list of strategies because new ABM tactics are developed and implemented every day.
For B2B healthcare companies, some common ABM tactics include:
- Tailored email campaigns (focus on an account’s pain points, needs, or culture)
- Tailored direct mail (including gifts and items with high perceived and real value)
- Customized 1:1 outreach
- Targeted ads on social media that are only visible to specific contacts
- Personalized digital content (ebooks, case studies, and blog posts)
- Private website portals
- Executive briefing events (dinners, facility tours, recognition meals, conference events)
These strategies allow you to break through the “noise” that your prospects hear from everyone else marketing broadly and announcing the strength of their products. Unlike competitors who fail to use ABM tactics (or who use them poorly), you can speak directly to the needs and interests of each account.
Do You Need an Account-Based Marketing Audit?
Unless you are winning accounts without any effort, your healthcare company could benefit from an ABM audit.
An ABM audit is a thorough investigation into your current marketing and sales strategies and how you can use ABM methods to more effectively target high-value accounts.
Undergoing the audit process is a guaranteed way to learn more about what is working – and what you need to change. Your audit team will:
- Identify gaps and inconsistencies in your current strategies
- Benchmark your current performance to see where you measure up against other healthcare industry leaders
- Pinpoint problematic areas that are damaging your ABM effectiveness
- Improve your processes
- Provide expert guidance and answers to your questions
- Support your alignment between multiple teams, such as sales and marketing
Reach Out to Cogo & Co to Set Up a Consultation
At Cogo & Co, we help our clients sustain a high-quality pipeline by supporting their development of an effective account-based marketing plan in healthcare.
Ready to elevate your sales and marketing game? Take the Growth Readiness Scorecard now to assess your current approach and receive a personalized score highlighting areas for rapid improvement. Our customized results will guide you through quick and easy enhancements to supercharge your results.
Take charge of your growth journey and schedule a free consultation today to learn more. Let's transform your sales and marketing landscape together.
