Hey girl hey. How's it going? Tell me aaaaall the gossip. Now, do you want to buy this product and/or service? I'll tell you about what happened with Bob and Megan at the office Christmas Party...
Decision makers have increasingly been searching for a conversational buying experience. The bog-standard, one-size-fits-all approach just doesn't work; buyers want a personalised, B2C-style experience every step on the way.
So, that's where conversational Account-Based Marketing comes in. This technique instantly connects your sales team with a target account, as soon as they step foot on your website. It turns a fleeting visit into a full sales conversation. And it gets you on the good side of your most valuable prospects.
Let's delve a little deeper. All this is about identifying and proactively engaging with your target accounts, in real time, using highly tailored and personalised communications.
After you've put in the hard graft of selecting your target accounts, driving traffic to your site, and personalising the experience, there's no point giving up after this point.
So, conversational ABM makes sure your potential clients can get answers to their questions as soon as they need them, in their own time, at their own convenience.
So, making sure your live-chats are laced with personalisation makes this so much more impactful.
Basically if you combine ABM and conversational marketing, you get conversational ABM.
This means using ABM is only half the battle.
To make sure you get those lucrative enterprise deals to close, you have to engage and follow-up with these accounts, until they're ready to move down the funnel.
87% of marketers say that ABM delivers a higher ROI than any other type of marketing. So, how do you add elements to help aid this success?
Well, introducing conversational ABM into your campaigns means your prospects account owners will receive personalised greetings from step one.
So, it might be a simple "Welcome back, Let me know if you have any questions you might have!" message. Or even mentioning the name of their company when interacting for the first time. This will make your prospect aware that you have considered them, and their company's needs, from the get-go.
You could even name a few competitors, or other companies in the industry, that are using your product already.
Basically, all this is the equivalent of walking into a coffee shop and being recognised, greeted, and offered your usual.
But, on top of this, the barista lets you take your time, peruse the menu, and make a decision at your own pace. Double shot white chocolate mocha with peppermint, hold the ice, triple the cream. Perfect - would you like to add on a scone? Yes please and thank you.
Compare this to walking into a Starbucks, being ignored, the barista gives you the same cup of black coffee everyone else is being served.
But let's consider one of the most important elements of this process: the function of live chat.
Customers want to talk to people in real time. In fact, 90% of consumers would prefer to chat with businesses directly, in real-time. But only 45% of customers use live chat. So, the next step is introducing live chat more readily for ABM.
Adding a live chat feature makes it easier for your clients to interact with your site, whilst providing an elevated sense of personalisation over your competitors.
Like we've said before, B2B buyers want answers. They want to find the information they're looking for effortlessly and instantly. 76% of B2B buyers said that when they're researching a product or service, they would prefer to speak to a customer service specialist or sales person early on. Plus, the same survey found that the number one complaint from buyers was slow response times.
Though customers at the beginning of the funnel might not be ready to talk to a sales person or make a purchase yet, they may still have questions.
So, giving the option of a relaxed, no-pressure live chat makes the customer feel as if they're in control. But really, this primes the customer with associating your brand with positive feelings, and also giving them the attention they need.
All this also removes any friction. Live chat makes sure the customer is guided every step of the way, without being overbearing. The last thing you want to do is abandon your customer when they're unsure of what to do when they've clicked onto your personalised ABM ad. So, this is a vital step in making sure you're making specific and meaningful steps with specific and meaningful customers.
Site visitors who use web chat are 2.8X more likely to convert than those who don't. This is because live chat provides a better experience, and starts your customer down the sales funnel. They're getting instant gratification, instant engagement, and instant information.
Right, there's a few steps you can take to implement this strategy:
Like we've mentioned above, it's important to be proactive at all points, and this isn't always feasible for your human team.
So, instead of doing this manually, you can consider automating this. This way, you can converse with, and engage, all the leads in your pipeline without increasing team headcount, or being completely manual.
Though ABM provides the data and insights to provide a great, personalised experience, it can't always be scaled up.
Conversational AI, then, is good for delivering consistency and scale, alongside data-driven insights.