Latest / The Prompt / Ep. 547 | ABM without the buzzwords: A real-world GTM playbook
Transcript
- 0:01This is on base your one stop shop for solving your most
- 0:04pressing B2B go to market challenges.
- 0:07Each week, host Chris Moody and Paul Gibson talk to sales and
- 0:09marketing leaders to get you in depth insights and creative
- 0:12strategies to set your revenue teams up for success.
- 0:18Hey, everyone, welcome back to the Home Based podcast.
- 0:20I'm your host, Chris Moody and today I'm very excited to be
- 0:23joined by Angie Bruns Hurley to talk about crafting ABM strategy
- 0:29from the ground up. Angie, thanks for joining us
- 0:32today and welcome to the show. Thank.
- 0:33You for having me? Well, it's a pleasure.
- 0:35We were just talking before you hit record.
- 0:37We've had some intersecting points in our journeys, but
- 0:40that's where we like to start. What led you to what you're
- 0:43doing today? So I'm going to go way back.
- 0:47So people are always very interested in this, but I grew
- 0:49up in South Dakota and I was a competitive gymnast.
- 0:51That's where I learned early on the value of focus, grit and
- 0:54consistency, and those traits have stayed with me throughout
- 0:57my career. I went to College in Denver and
- 0:59later earned my MBA at Syracuse University, and that's where my
- 1:02journey to business really began.
- 1:05My career technically began in market research, but I quickly
- 1:08transitioned into what was known then as database marketing.
- 1:12One of my earliest formative roles was at a company called
- 1:15Laser Spine Institute and from there I really had hands on
- 1:18various marketing animation platforms including Par Dots and
- 1:21then later on Eloqua. I use those platforms to develop
- 1:25highly segmented nurture campaigns, automated direct mail
- 1:28campaigns, integrated lead scoring and tracking into the
- 1:31sales floor CRM and that was well before revenue marketing
- 1:34was a standard function. Eventually, I transitioned into
- 1:37a new role that was cross functional under the IT and
- 1:41development team and I LED a successful Salesforce
- 1:44implementation. I managed a team of developers
- 1:46and business analysts and drove operational efficiency across
- 1:50multiple departments. I then made a pivotal career
- 1:53move to Gartner, joining a newly formed division called Gartner
- 1:56Digital Markets. I was focused on scaling
- 1:59reviewer acquisition and review expansion for Kaptara Get Off
- 2:03and Software Advice. It was there that I transitioned
- 2:06from B to C to B to B, shifting my focus from individual
- 2:10consumers to professionals inside companies.
- 2:13That change had a real profound impact on my long term
- 2:16trajectory. I started out at Gartner as an
- 2:19individual contributor. I focused on automating and
- 2:22optimizing offers for reviewers. Over time, I expanded my role to
- 2:26lead demand Gen. across paid social, web development, events
- 2:30and analytics while overseeing the strategy for campaign
- 2:33execution. It was during this time that I
- 2:37worked alongside many former startup employees from the
- 2:40companies that Gartner had acquired, and that experience
- 2:43sparked my next professional goal.
- 2:45I really wanted to join a startup on the path to
- 2:48acquisition or an IPO. That goal became a reality when
- 2:52I joined Double Verify. I was drawn to the company's
- 2:55momentum and the opportunity to build the from ground up again.
- 2:59I came in as an individual contributor and have since grown
- 3:01my team to a multidisciplinary group.
- 3:04In 2021, I achieved a career milestone at Double Verify
- 3:08because they went public, and over the last five years I built
- 3:12full stack operations function covering market animation,
- 3:15analytics, campaign and program management, lead management,
- 3:18website and social, digital strategy, and now ABM.
- 3:22Across each chapter of my career, I followed a pattern
- 3:25where I start as an individual contributor, I build from
- 3:28scratch, I scale teams, and I leave the function stronger than
- 3:31I found it. That's awesome.
- 3:33I I love the the competitiveness that started in gymnastics too.
- 3:38I I was kind of sensing that like individual contributor to
- 3:41building a team like you set your mind on something and then
- 3:44barreling down there for the vault or or whatever event it
- 3:47is. Our nieces and gymnastics.
- 3:49It's very competitive, very young, so it.
- 3:52Is and it teaches us skills too. It's because you want to be
- 3:54successful as an individual, but then you also have like the team
- 3:58aspect of it too, where you want yourself and everybody on the
- 4:00team to perform well. So it's just it shifts mindsets.
- 4:03So where you can? Do you know player coach type
- 4:05roles? I love that.
- 4:06I love that. I was basketball on baseball.
- 4:09So almost everyone in B to B, it seems, has some competitive St.
- 4:13kid. And whether it's gaming or what,
- 4:16it doesn't matter. But you know, I'm curious, when
- 4:19you're thinking about account based strategy, why should
- 4:23organizations prioritize addressing their internal
- 4:26challenges when they're moving to an account based strategy?
- 4:29Yeah, Adm has a way of surfacing every operational misalignment
- 4:34and organization has been able to tolerate.
- 4:37If sales and marketing aren't aligned, or if your data is
- 4:40fragmented, your tech stack is disjointed, or accountability is
- 4:44unclear, those cracks will become immediately visible the
- 4:47moment you start discussions around AVM strategy.
- 4:51What I've learned is that ABM doesn't just require operational
- 4:54alignment, it truly forces it. And that's a good thing.
- 4:57If you take the time to address those internal challenges
- 5:00upfront, the impact goes way beyond marketing.
- 5:03You end up creating a more coordinated go to market motion,
- 5:06better visibility into account progression, and shared
- 5:09accountability for outcomes. That alignment accelerates
- 5:13everything from deal velocity to customer expansion because
- 5:16everyone's finally rowing in the same direction.
- 5:19Addressing internal challenges upfront like process clarity,
- 5:23data ownership, and defining what success actually looks like
- 5:27will completely change how you operate.
- 5:29It will help you move faster, target smarter, and drive more
- 5:32meaningful engagement with the right accounts.
- 5:36I also had to reposition ABM internally for a lot of teens
- 5:39and I become sort of a catch all term used to describe a
- 5:42campaign, list of accounts or even a shiny new tech
- 5:46initiative. I had to reframe what it
- 5:48actually is, which is a strategy.
- 5:50It's a strategy that requires alignment across teams, a clear
- 5:53operational backbone and shared accountability for outcomes.
- 5:57Yeah, I love the the reframing and when you said catch all, if
- 6:01you saw me smile, I was going to.
- 6:02That's really good because a lot of times this goes back to my
- 6:06analyst days too. A lot of times with account
- 6:09based, you see one of two things.
- 6:11You see folks who focus primarily on one to one and
- 6:15they're running very personalized, individualized
- 6:17campaigns. And then you see people on the
- 6:19opposite end of the spectrum where they're doing slightly
- 6:22better demand generation, but they're calling it ABM.
- 6:26So it becomes this term that's not very clear and what it
- 6:30means. So I'd love to hear about that
- 6:33reframing and into making account based a broader ongoing
- 6:37strategic approach. What were some of the biggest
- 6:40lessons you learned? I mean, I'll even admit like
- 6:42when I first got into ABMI saw it primarily as highly
- 6:46personalized 1 to 1 campaigns for a few top tier accounts.
- 6:50And while those efforts they will make an impact, they're
- 6:53often difficult to scale and it can feel really disconnected
- 6:57from the broader go to market motion if it's treated as a one
- 7:00off initiative. The biggest shift came when we
- 7:03stopped thinking of ABM as a set of campaigns and started
- 7:05thinking of it as actual strategic framework that
- 7:08supports the entire account life cycle.
- 7:10And that meant building a tiered approach SO1TO11 to few and one
- 7:15to many. And we did that based on account
- 7:17potential, engagement signals and sales priorities.
- 7:20Once we made that shift, ABM became more than just a
- 7:23marketing tactic. It became a driver of growth
- 7:27across the business. So we align more effectively
- 7:30with sales, we prioritize resources more strategically,
- 7:33and we set up the foundation for success in terms of account
- 7:36progression, not just campaign metrics.
- 7:39Relevance and consistency took priority over one off
- 7:42personalization and that's when we really start to see momentum.
- 7:45Love it. All right.
- 7:46Let's pick on the journey going from Gartner to start up.
- 7:50So Gartner for those who have not worked there is very well
- 7:55run internally. So it's a perfect example of
- 7:58running an organization effectively at scale and almost
- 8:01everyone who's worked there will attest to that.
- 8:03So Gene has done a great job at building process and
- 8:07efficiencies and a lot of those things.
- 8:09We know that every company has data challenges and fragmented
- 8:13data and data in all different silos.
- 8:15Every company has their own version of tech debt, but going
- 8:19from a more established company to a startup, there's usually a
- 8:22lot more limits on the resources you have, whether that's
- 8:27technical, budgetary, anything there.
- 8:29So I'd, I'd love to hear about how you navigated all of those
- 8:33hurdles with data fragmentation and tech debt and limited
- 8:37resources to build a functioning ABM framework.
- 8:41Yeah. I mean, honestly, we just have
- 8:42to get scrappy. I mean, a lot of companies, they
- 8:46have fragmented data across multiple systems, whether that's
- 8:49your CRM, your marketing animation platform, or even in
- 8:53spreadsheets on someone's desktop.
- 8:55None of it is talking to each other cleanly.
- 8:57And then there'd be no single source of truth.
- 9:00So for this, we started thinking about what we could trust.
- 9:03So we mapped out where key account and engagement data
- 9:06lived, clean what we could manually, and created a
- 9:09centralized view in Google Sheets and dashboards.
- 9:12It's not perfect, but it gives us a shared source of truth
- 9:16across sales and marketing. And from there, we built
- 9:19lightweight processes like fast tracking and auto assigning
- 9:22records to specific sales reps based on accounts, tracking
- 9:25buying group engagement, and flagging intense signals
- 9:29triggering alerts to be sent to sales.
- 9:31This allowed us to act strategically, so key was not
- 9:34trying to solve every single tech problem at once.
- 9:37We prioritize just enough integration and structure to
- 9:40keep moving while building credibility and momentum.
- 9:44Awesome. Well, let's pull the thread or
- 9:46go deeper on the sales alerts. So when we think about
- 9:50alignment, I'd love to know what specific strategies you found
- 9:54effective in aligning marketing and commercial teams around
- 9:57shared priorities and success metrics.
- 9:59Yeah. So the first strategy I focus on
- 10:02is bringing sales into the process.
- 10:05And it's not just to bring them in to inform them of like the
- 10:08campaign themes that we've decided that we're going to go
- 10:10with, but rather to collaborate on account selection, messaging
- 10:14strategy and defining what success actually looks like for
- 10:17both of us. And then from there, we can move
- 10:19on to shared success metrics, focusing on account level
- 10:23signals, engagement, meeting creation, pipeline progression,
- 10:27and deal velocity. All of those indicators both
- 10:31teams can influence and they help keep the focus on
- 10:35meaningful progress and not just vanity metrics.
- 10:37We're also building out shared visibility frameworks like
- 10:41dashboards, Salesforce campaigns, engagement trackers,
- 10:44so sales and marketing can see the same data in the same format
- 10:47at the same time. That transparency has been
- 10:49really crucial. It prevents misalignment and
- 10:52gives both sides a way to course correct together when
- 10:57something's not working. But at the end of the day,
- 10:59alignment isn't just a one time exercise, it's a practice.
- 11:03And it works best when you treat marketing and sales as Co owners
- 11:07of the same revenue outcomes from the very beginning.
- 11:10Yes, absolutely a revenue outcomes.
- 11:12There's another topic we can dive into there.
- 11:16One of the common traps in embracing an account based
- 11:20approach is often times we have long sell cycles that can take a
- 11:24a long time, years in cases to get to revenue and many view
- 11:30success as revenues. So what are the ways that you
- 11:34ensure your team stays focused on meaningful account based
- 11:37metrics knowing that it might take a long time to get to the
- 11:41revenue attribution? Oh, definitely.
- 11:43I mean, it really starts with setting the expectation that
- 11:46revenue is a laggy indicator. If we only measure success by
- 11:50closed deals, then we're missing months of meaningful signals
- 11:53along the way. So we focus on leading
- 11:56indicators, so things like buying group engagement, moving
- 11:59through deal stages, meetings created from target accounts,
- 12:03and pipeline influence. We also use visuals like
- 12:06progression dashboards to show momentum, so even if the deal
- 12:09isn't closed, we can see if we're deepening relationships or
- 12:12influencing progressing the opportunity.
- 12:15We're giving the team visibility into those early signals to help
- 12:18them stay motivated and confident in the strategy.
- 12:21And it also builds credibility with sales and leadership
- 12:23because we can speak to progress before the revenue actually
- 12:27shows up on a report. Awesome.
- 12:29Let's dive into buy in a little bit more.
- 12:32So you talked about redefining account based early on.
- 12:36I think many of us in the industry have always despised
- 12:39might be too strong, but the term ABM has marketing at the
- 12:44end, which I've I've found in many instances Atopo and at
- 12:48Gartner just being called account based marketing was
- 12:52almost insulting to sales because a lot of sellers had
- 12:55done approaches like this before.
- 12:57It just wasn't called ABM at the time.
- 13:00So how do you approach redefining the value of ABM
- 13:04internally to make sure that you have buy in from teams who may
- 13:08interpret the roles that they have or the benefits of ABM
- 13:11differently? Definitely.
- 13:13I think it's really just meeting people where they are.
- 13:16As mentioned, different teams here ABM and think different
- 13:19things. Sales might expect highly
- 13:21personalized outreach while leadership might expect a fast
- 13:24pipeline. So I've stripped out the jargon
- 13:26and really reframed Adm as a strategy focused on deepening
- 13:30relationships with the accounts that matter most.
- 13:32So I use real life examples like targeting existing clients that
- 13:36have an open up sell opportunity for a specific product or
- 13:40targeting individuals at high value accounts when renewals
- 13:43typically occur. These are proof points and that
- 13:45can really help people connect the dots between ABM and a
- 13:48tangible outcome. And I always tie back to their
- 13:50goals, right? So it's either pipeline
- 13:52acceleration for sales, influence metrics for leadership
- 13:55and clear targeting for marketing.
- 13:57And then over time, ABM starts to feel less like just a
- 14:00marketing experiment and more like a business wide growth
- 14:03strategy. And once people see that, I
- 14:05think buying becomes a lot easier.
- 14:07I've also heard people calling A/B MABX, which I really like.
- 14:12I haven't rebranded that yet at the company.
- 14:14But to your point, when it has marketing at the end, it just
- 14:18seems like it is a very marketing focused strategy only.
- 14:22Yes, absolutely. I mean, you know, here at demand
- 14:25base, we've, we've gone ABM, ABX, we sometimes just say
- 14:29account based. And now with the rise of buying
- 14:31groups, you know, we're toying around, does the term completely
- 14:34change? And, and look, we're, we're
- 14:36talking about terms and, and ownable things, but at its
- 14:40heart, it's exactly what you said.
- 14:42It's just redefining what it means for everyone.
- 14:44So I think that's a really smart approach.
- 14:47We've always talked about right message, right time, right
- 14:51place, right person, all all the things.
- 14:53So we know that the time element is extremely important.
- 14:57With the increasing importance of real time data and as fast as
- 15:01things are happening in our industry, how are you balancing
- 15:04speed and accuracy and optimizing all of your
- 15:06campaigns? Yeah, this is something I've had
- 15:10to evolve in my own approach over the years because early on
- 15:13I was very focused on speeds like refreshing dashboards,
- 15:16constantly reacting to performance shifts in real time
- 15:19and making quick changes based on just surface level engagement
- 15:22data. And while that kind of
- 15:24responsiveness it can be useful in some cases, especially paid
- 15:27or e-mail channels, I quickly learned that reacting too fast
- 15:30can backfire, especially for more complex multi touch
- 15:34programs where you're influencing a long sales cycle
- 15:36and you have multiple decision makers.
- 15:38So now I've learned to treat real time data as more of an
- 15:41early signal, not an immediate directive.
- 15:44It's like we look at things like e-mail engagement, website
- 15:46activity, intense signals, and campaign performance daily, but
- 15:50we resist the urge to optimize based on just one metric or
- 15:55short term fluctuation. Instead, we want to use those
- 15:57real time signals to flag areas for deeper investigation.
- 16:01And then we paired that with qualitative input from the sales
- 16:03team and longer term performance data like pipeline with velocity
- 16:07or deal progression. But I mean, ultimately it comes
- 16:10down to discipline. You want your team to be
- 16:12responsive, but also grounded in the bigger picture.
- 16:15Real data is only powerful if you're clear on what you're
- 16:19solving for. Otherwise you just end up
- 16:21chasing short term wins at the expense of long term strategy.
- 16:25Absolutely. OK, This next question, I'm
- 16:28going to limit you to one thing and it's going to be it could
- 16:31potentially be tricky. So what do you think is the
- 16:34single biggest challenge in B to B marketing today?
- 16:40I would say it is probably just adopting account based marketing
- 16:45and not because it's a new concept but because it requires
- 16:48A fundamental shift in how teams operate.
- 16:51Because AB Ms. not just a tactic, it's a cross functional
- 16:53strategy that touches sales OPS content leadership.
- 16:57The challenge isn't understanding what ABM is, but
- 16:59it's aligning people, systems and processes to actually
- 17:03execute it well. Perfect, great answer.
- 17:06That wasn't tough for you at all.
- 17:07In my head I was thinking, oh, you're going to have a hard
- 17:09time. There's so many challenges.
- 17:11OK, we're shifting into the the lightning round here.
- 17:14We have a few quick hitters that we like to ask every single
- 17:17episode. So the first what are your
- 17:19favorite tools or technology that you're using today?
- 17:22This might be a little more long winded than you're expecting,
- 17:24but before recommending any tech, I always say tools are
- 17:27just tools, right? They're not a strategy, and they
- 17:29definitely don't fix foundational problems.
- 17:32So without the right people, processes, and ownership and
- 17:35accountability in place, even the best technology will sit
- 17:39unused, or worse, create even more confusion.
- 17:41I've seen companies invest in platforms that never got adopted
- 17:44because nobody owned the rollout, expectations weren't
- 17:47aligned, or there was just no accountability to actually use
- 17:49the tool. And that's why my recommendation
- 17:51is to focus on your operating model first.
- 17:53Hire an OPS person or empower somebody internally to get the
- 17:56framework right. Until that foundation is in
- 17:59place, just be scrappy. Use what you have, and then when
- 18:01you're ready to scale, you'll actually get value out of
- 18:04whatever tools you bring in. However, I must say that with AI
- 18:07at the forefront of everything, I would recommend ChatGPT,
- 18:11Perplexity, and Claude. And I also have to say that I
- 18:14really admire HubSpot and how quickly they've been able to
- 18:16scale and expand their product offerings.
- 18:19Awesome, great answers there. What about good reads?
- 18:23Now we expand this. It could be book, blog,
- 18:25newsletter, podcast, video, any type of format.
- 18:29But what are some of the stand out things for you?
- 18:31Yeah, I'm more of a podcaster, so there's a couple I listen to
- 18:351's called Talking Shop by Kelly Hopping.
- 18:38It's a go to. She brings in GTM leaders and
- 18:41gets into the real world challenges of marketing and
- 18:46revenue alignment. And it's very relevant for
- 18:48anybody doing ABM or building a modern, modern marketing org.
- 18:52And then I also really like the Prof G Pod by Scott Galloway.
- 18:57It's sharp, often contrarian take on business, tech and
- 19:01leadership, and it really forces you to think beyond the
- 19:04marketing silo and speak the language of the C-Suite.
- 19:07And then my favorite newsletter is The Market Tunist by Tom
- 19:12Fishburne. You might see his illustrations
- 19:15on LinkedIn. People really like to share
- 19:17them. I really enjoy it.
- 19:18He uses humor to spotlight the absurdities and real tensions
- 19:22and marketing. It's insightful and funny, and
- 19:25it's surprisingly useful for aligning teams around what not
- 19:28to do. Yes, I love a lot of those
- 19:31cartoons. I see them in slide decks
- 19:33everywhere and smart approach that he's taking.
- 19:35You can license individual images too, which I think is
- 19:38brilliant. What about the folks who inspire
- 19:41you? Who are some of the most
- 19:42inspirational for folks for you, especially being in B to B?
- 19:46Yeah, definitely. So there's a lot of people that
- 19:48inspire me, but I want to keep it personal to people I actually
- 19:52know and that I've worked with. So 1st I'm going to give a shout
- 19:55out to is Ashley Mcalpin. She's currently the Head of
- 19:58Marketing at Rocker Box. She's a seasoned B2B marketing
- 20:01executive. She's known for leading high
- 20:03growth teams at multiple companies with one successful
- 20:06exit and bringing deep expertise in digital marketing, paid media
- 20:10and data-driven measurements. I worked with Ashley when we
- 20:14worked at later Spine Institute, so like a decade ago.
- 20:17And then Fast forward to now, the company that I'm with now
- 20:20just acquired her company. So now we are technically Co
- 20:24workers again, but she's absolutely brilliant and
- 20:27somebody to to look out for. Another person that really
- 20:30inspires me is Anthony Tong. He's the VP of Marketing
- 20:33Technology and Operations at Gartner Digital Markets.
- 20:36He is absolutely brilliant. I was his manager and we worked
- 20:39together at Gartner and he's just continued to grow
- 20:40professionally. He really blends strategic
- 20:43leadership with hands on technical expertise across a
- 20:46wide range of platforms. And his background, it really
- 20:49spans from B to C&B to B. And he's known for building,
- 20:52building scalable frameworks that connect data platforms and
- 20:55performance. Like I said, he's just brilliant
- 20:57and somebody that I highly recommend.
- 21:00And then last, it's going to be Kelly hopping.
- 21:02So I realized that she's the CMO at demand base now, but she and
- 21:06I also crossed paths at Gardner Digital Markets when she was the
- 21:10CMO there. She's very inspiring.
- 21:12She's a a best selling author, she's a Forbes contributor, she
- 21:16has a podcast, she's a Ford member.
- 21:18She just has a lot of deep experience in B to B SAS
- 21:21marketing, strategic GTM alignment and operational
- 21:23leadership. She's very active on LinkedIn
- 21:26and definitely somebody I enjoy keeping up with.
- 21:29Awesome, great folks there and I'm fortunate I get to have one
- 21:33on ones with Kelly every week, so Kelly's my boss.
- 21:35So boom, that's a good one to have there.
- 21:37And then the last question, most important of all, how can
- 21:41everyone get in touch with you after this episode, Angie?
- 21:44Yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn, so Angie Bruns
- 21:47Hurliki, or you could send me an e-mail, so it's just my last
- 21:51name, hurliki.angie@gmail.com. Awesome.
- 21:56Well, thank you so much for joining us today.
- 21:57You crushed it. Thank you for having me, really
- 21:59appreciate it. Thanks for joining us for On
- 22:03Base. If you enjoyed this episode,
- 22:05please be sure to share, rate, review and subscribe on Spotify,
- 22:08Apple, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- 22:12The show is brought to you by Demand Base, the only account
- 22:14based experience platform built for sales and marketing
- 22:17alignment.