blog post
author

Mia Tayam

November 20, 2024
time

~2 min

How to Use Intent Data Effectively for Your Account-Based Marketing Campaigns

Have you ever wished you could reach the right buyers at exactly when they are ready to purchase or nearing that stage?

Who wouldn’t? It’s every company’s dream. But let’s face it—without the right data, this dream can quickly turn into a guessing game, or worse, a nightmare.

Even if you have data like demographics or firmographics, it’s simply not enough.

Modern Account-Based Marketing (ABM) requires intent data to identify who’s actively searching for solutions like yours. This helps your team to deliver highly personalized, timely, and relevant outreach—turning insights into action and ensuring your outreach resonates, drives engagement, and accelerates sales cycles.

What is intent data? 

Intent data is information collected about a user’s online behavior, signaling their interest or intent to purchase a specific product or service. This data goes beyond basic demographics or firmographics and delves into the behavior, interests, and actions of potential buyers. By analyzing this data, marketers can identify which companies or individuals are actively researching solutions in their industry, allowing them to target those accounts with a much higher level of precision.

Types of Intent Data

Intent data typically falls into two categories, each providing unique insights that can guide ABM strategies:

1. First-Party Intent Data

This type of data is collected directly from your website or other digital properties. It’s safe to assume that these individuals are already familiar with your offerings and are actively showing interest in your brand. This data includes tracking activities such as page visits, content downloads, webinar registrations, and form submissions.

2. Third-Party Intent Data

Third-party data is collected from external sources, such as industry websites, forums, or review sites. This data shows intent signals from potential buyers even before they interact directly with your brand. Third-party intent data can reveal accounts that are researching relevant topics, comparing solutions, or showing a general interest in your industry.

Why is intent data important for the ABM approach? 

In ABM, where the focus is on engaging high-value accounts through highly targeted strategies, integrating intent data into your ABM workflow plays an important role in completing the 360-degree view of your target accounts. It helps you not only identify your ideal customers but also understand which accounts are actively searching for solutions, which specific topics resonate with them and where they are in the buyer journey.

Here are some of the reasons why intent data is valuable for your ABM strategy:

1. Enhances Targeting

Intent data offers insights into the actions, behaviors, and interests of target accounts, allowing teams to refine their list of high-priority accounts—- accounts that exhibit strong buying signals, indicating they are already in the research or consideration phase. This will help save resources and increase the likelihood of engagement since it narrows the focus to accounts that are most likely to convert.

2. Enables Hyper-Personalization

ABM’s success relies on delivering the right message at the right time. Intent data reveals what topics, pain points, or features your target accounts are interested in, enabling your team to craft hyper-personalized messages. By aligning messaging with specific intent signals, such as recent searches or content consumption trends, you can deliver content that speaks directly to each account’s needs, making your outreach far more relevant and effective.

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3. Increases Sales Efficiency

Intent data helps align marketing and sales efforts, allowing both teams to focus on accounts that are actively showing interest. By providing sales teams with a list of warm leads identified through intent data, they can prioritize high-intent accounts, making outreach efforts more efficient and fruitful. This shortens the sales cycle and improves the quality of interactions, as sales representatives can address directly the interests and concerns of their account.

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4. Optimizes Timing for Outreach

Reaching out to a prospect at the right time—when they’re actively researching or considering solutions like yours—greatly increases the chances of engagement. Intent data provides real-time insights into buyer behavior, allowing marketers to time their outreach when accounts are most likely to respond positively. This timely engagement means you’re entering the conversation at the optimal moment, making a strong impression and advancing the account in their buyer journey.

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5. Improves Content Strategy

With intent data, ABM teams gain a deeper understanding of what content types and topics resonate with their target accounts. For example, if intent data shows that multiple accounts are researching “cybersecurity compliance,” the marketing team can prioritize content such as compliance guides, case studies, or webinars. By creating and sharing content that directly addresses the specific needs indicated by intent signals, your team can nurture accounts more effectively and build a stronger relationship with potential buyers.

6. Accelerates the Sales Cycle

Remove guesswork from the ABM process for a more direct path from awareness to conversion. By targeting accounts that have shown clear interest and delivering highly relevant messaging, you can guide prospects through the sales funnel faster. Accounts that receive timely, personalized outreach are more likely to engage, respond to offers, and ultimately make a purchase decision sooner, accelerating the entire sales cycle.

7. Strengthens Account Retention and Upsell Opportunities

Intent data isn’t just valuable for attracting new accounts; it also plays a role in customer retention and upselling. By monitoring the behavior of existing customers, intent data can reveal when they’re exploring new solutions or researching competitors, which may indicate readiness for an upsell or renewal conversation. 

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This image showcases account engagement analytics utilized by the Customer Success team to monitor interactions. The engagements prior to October reflect upsells with the same account, amounting to a total of 110K over six months. The notable spike in engagement during October aligns with a significant 500K opportunity in the pipeline, coinciding with a proposal review. This heightened activity signals strong intent and interest from the account during this period.

Use Cases of Intent Data for ABM Success

In the  “State Of Intent Data” study by N.Rich and Driving Demand, featuring insights from over 50 industry experts, provides a comprehensive view of how intent data is shaping ABM strategies. This collaboration highlights key trends and actionable use cases that amplify ABM success by unlocking the potential of real-time intent signals.

Key findings include:

1. Prioritizing High-Value Accounts (69%): Focus resources on accounts with strong buying intent.

2. Improving Outreach Efficiency (48%): Craft targeted, meaningful outreach based on buyer behavior.

3. Boosting Campaign Performance (40%): Deliver messages at optimal moments for maximum impact.

4. Enhancing Content Personalization (17%): Tailor content to align with buyer interests and intent signals.

5. Accelerating Sales Cycles with Audience Insights (15%): Identify prospects that match your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) to close deals faster.

6. Aligning Marketing and Sales (10%): Synchronize efforts with shared insights for seamless handoffs.

7. Increasing Customer Success (4%): Drive retention, cross-sell, and upsell opportunities by monitoring existing accounts’ intent signals.

How Tools Like N.Rich Can Streamline Your Intent-Based ABM Approach

Tools like N.Rich can help you simplify and streamline the process, allowing you to scale and optimize your intent-based ABM approach. This data can be integrated with your CRM to ensure that all teams are up to date and can track the engagements of your accounts and if they are nearing the decision stage.

1. Identify High-Intent Accounts

Generate intent reports on your Ideal Customer Profiles (ICPs) to pinpoint those actively searching for keywords relevant to your offerings. Assign engagement scores to track when these accounts reach critical thresholds in content consumption and engagement, indicating they are primed for outreach and likely closer to making a purchase decision.

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2. Automate Workflows

Manual workflows can slow your ABM efforts, particularly when managing multiple accounts. N.Rich offers automated workflows to streamline lead nurturing and engagement. This will ensure prospects receive the right message at the right time and help you scale your intent-based strategy seamlessly.

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3. Deliver Personalized Messaging at Scale

Create segments based on intent signals and behavioral data. These segments enable hyper-personalized messaging tailored to the needs of specific industries, account tiers, or even individual prospects. 

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4. Streamline Cross-Channel Campaign Management

Engaging prospects across multiple platforms is essential for consistent messaging. N.Rich’s cross-channel capabilities allow you to manage programmatic ads, social media campaigns, and email outreach from a single platform. This unified approach ensures that your campaigns are cohesive, targeted, and impactful, no matter where your prospects are in their journey.

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5. Align Marketing and Sales with Unified Intent Data Insights

Intent data aligns team efforts by identifying the optimal timing and approach for engaging with leads, ensuring seamless and effective interactions across all stages of the buying journey.

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6. Real-time Alerts

Timing is everything in intent-based ABM. N.Rich provides automated alerts (e.g., Slack notifications) that notify your team when key accounts show increased activity. This ensures that your outreach happens at the moment prospects are most engaged, improving the likelihood of a successful connection.

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7. Measure, Analyze, and Optimize Campaigns Continuously

Check analytics to gain in-depth insights into campaign performance, helping you track KPIs, evaluate account engagement, and refine your approach. With data-driven optimization, you can ensure your ABM efforts remain effective and ROI-focused.

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Key Takeaways for B2B Companies Utilizing Intent Data in ABM

Intent data in ABM helps B2B companies to:

  1. Prioritize High-Value Accounts 
  2. Improve Outreach Efficiency 
  3. Boost Marketing Campaign Effectiveness
  4. Personalize Outreach Based on Intent 
  5. Gain Deep Insights into Audience Behavior 
  6. Align Marketing and Sales Teams 
  7. Enhance Customer Success: Drive Retention, Cross-Sell, and Upsell Opportunities 

 

Get a free ungated copy of the State of Intent Data here.

 

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Author avatar

Mia Tayam

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Mia is Content Specialist at N.Rich and has over a decade of experience in traditional and digital marketing. She owned and managed an Events and Advertising agency and is an accomplished writer, with works published in multiple magazines and newspapers.

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