ABM: What metrics are you tracking?

Let’s get this out of the way, if you have aggressive lead gen goals, don’t put all your eggs in an account-based marketing (ABM) strategy.

ABM is a long game focused on engagement with the buying committee from a select group of high-value prospects. The end is not about getting as many new leads into your funnel as possible but engaging with the best leads.

In theory, most marketers get this. But in practice? How does quality engagement translate into metrics and KPIs that show ROI?

Account-based marketing metrics to track ROI

Here’s a list of the top ABM metrics to measure how well your campaign is performing:

• Activity totals by target account
• Target accounts by page views
• Session totals by target account
• New contacts created at target accounts*
• Buying role by target account
• Contact lifecycle stage by target account

Beyond engagement, here are the ROI metrics to measure conversions:

• Deal stage by target accounts
• Target accounts by active deal amount

Pro-tip: if you’ve segmented your ideal customer profile by tiers, make sure to measure which tier yields the most engagement and conversions.

*Don’t forget to assign those new contacts to the appropriate buying committee role to make sure you’re sending them the right content.

ABM benchmarks

Based on our experience running ABM campaigns, here are two goals to aim for:

• 20% of target accounts engage within the first six months
• 15-20% of the engaged target accounts request a demo within the first year

Further, ABM programs can help your organization increase average deal size and velocity. Accounts targeted in an ABM campaign also have higher close rates.

Therefore, you should also benchmark your ABM program deals against your company’s existing metrics related to:

• Average deal size
• Average length of sales cycle
• Close percentage

Marketing automation reports

The good news for marketers is that most marketing automation systems already have ABM reporting capabilities built-in.

For example, HubSpot users can access a Target Accounts dashboard to view existing activity:

You can also create a custom reporting dashboard to track the engagement metrics most relevant to your campaigns.

Remember, ABM is about focusing your marketing efforts on a select group of high-value accounts, not casting a wide net to see who you catch. If quality over quantity is part of your marketing strategy, you may be ready to launch an ABM program.