Stop Wasting Your Marketing Budget and Make Results Really Count

If the last few years have taught CFOs anything, it’s that the world economy is unpredictable. While the conversation around economic uncertainty may change month to month, one thing is sure: B2B CFOs can help recession-proof their organization by making sure every marketing dollar counts. Paul Gibson, Vice President, EMEA, Demandbase, talks about how CFOs can avoid common marketing investment strategy mistakes.

As most CFOs know, nothing in life is guaranteed besides the proverbial death and taxes. We can’t even be sure about the much-anticipated recession. Until very recently, the market was buzzing with news of the upcoming economic slump, but on Jan 6th, 2023, White House economist Heather Boushey told ReutersOpens a new window the U.S. economy appears headed for a softer landing than expected. Whether or not we end up experiencing a downturn, supporting an account-based experience (ABX) approach can help your company avoid these common mistakes and recession-proof your marketing strategy. 

Mistake 1: The Advertising Anomaly

Marketing isn’t a one-size-fits-all exercise. Too many B2B companies still use B2C tools and tactics never designed for B2B. This results in them spending money on the wrong targets. For example, a B2C company selling boots needs to raise awareness of its product among as many people as possible, leading it to advertise everywhere and to everyone. The aim is to get plenty of traffic to its site because any one of the visitors could become a customer. 

This philosophy doesn’t apply in B2B. Most organizations have specific groups of companies they can sell to based on their location, industry, company size, number of employees, and budget. It makes no sense to market to businesses that aren’t on their list. If your company can’t sell goods and services to plumbers, for instance, why would you allow marketing to waste money advertising to the plumbing trade? 

Basing your marketing team’s success on the number of anonymous click-throughs they get isn’t evidence of a successful B2B campaign. Unless they know precisely who clicked on a link, they can’t determine whether they are prospective customers. And without that information, they’ve wasted your ad spend. Don’t permit marketing to squander your time and budget by targeting, engaging, and trying to close companies that aren’t in the market for your company’s offering. 

See More: 3 Strategies to Successfully Market Technology in Healthcare

Mistake 2: The Sales Stalemate

Every. Single. Lead. is a potential sale in B2C, so filling your sales funnel with high quantities of leads makes perfect sense. However, that’s not the case in B2B marketing, and going after “everybody” generates a bunch of poor leads your sales team has little hope of closing. 

This either results in pitiable closing rates or—even worse—they close deals with a low Average Order Value (AOV). Stalemate!

Both of these scenarios could be bad for your business for several reasons: 

• The company wastes even more resources trying to make your product or service work in a less-than-ideal environment.
• The customer’s experience ends up being low quality because they are a poor fit for your product from the outset.
• The renewal chances are low, increasing churn and reducing down your customer retention statistics. 

Even if these challenges take time to bubble up to the surface, your sales team will immediately be unhappy because they have to work harder to bring deals to fruition. They’ll complain about the quality of the leads, and your company could lose its top sales talent to competitors. 

The Solution: Adopting a Data-Driven Approach

A data-driven, account-based marketing (ABM) approach is the solution. By identifying high-value, best-fit prospects in advance and “weeding out” companies that aren’t good potential clients, your marketing team can avoid wasting your resources by promoting to the wrong targets. 

Instead, fill your pipeline with accounts ready to buy so that sales can focus 100% of their time on the right opportunities. They’ll be able to close deals faster, achieve a higher AOV and better conversion rates, and increase the chances of renewals down the line.

The company will save time by approaching only prospects that can really make use of your product and jumping right into educating them on how you can help. You’ll save money by investing the marketing budget in delivering the right messages to the right people at the right time. And you’ll avoid customer and employee churn and the financial hardships that accompany both issues. 

The Win: Recession-Proof your Marketing with Effective Targeting

Targeting the correct accounts matters now more than ever before, and CFOs carry a heavy responsibility to help ride out a possible recession. Don’t let your company drown in choppy economic waters; make sure every cent of your 2023 B2B marketing budget is used effectively and delivers maximum ROI. 

With the right marketing strategies and technologies in play, CFOs can accurately determine where every dollar is going. By accounting transparently for all marketing and sales dollars, questions no longer exist about where the money goes, and you will have effectively helped to recession-proof your marketing. 

See More: Five Proven Strategies for Marketing During Challenging Times

Next Steps

1. Get evidence of the right accounts: Before you sign off on another marketing budget, ask to see proof that the previous budget was used to target accounts matching your ideal client profile. Don’t settle for an anonymous click-through rate (CTR)—it proves nothing other than that a person clicked. It offers no accurate indication that the visitor was a potential customer and not a competitor or irrelevant visitor. 
2. Build in success metrics: Next, insist your marketing team builds success metrics into their business plan for the new year to demonstrate that the money is being used to target suitable prospects. Request regular updates on leads in the pipeline to ensure it’s filled with relevant, in-market opportunities, and introduce the requirement to track spending on (and engagement with) each prospect the company targets. 
3. Implement strict financial controls: Unless you implement strict financial controls, you’re signing away a chunk of your marketing budget to fund activities that will do nothing for your business. It’s time to take the waste out of budgeting and deliver results that make a difference to your business.

Make Your Marketing Budget Count

Nobody can accurately predict what will happen to the economy this year. With so many intelligent economists all offering competing theories, it’s difficult to calculate which could be right. One thing is certain, however; regardless of the economic circumstances, wasting money marketing to the wrong target audience is a no-win situation. Take steps now to recession-proof your organization by making every marketing dollar count. 

Image Source: Shutterstock

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