Twitter Chat Recap: Thoughts On ABM And SDSummit With SiriusDecisions

Ally Motz, President of Sirius Decisions Canada, joined our very own Jen Evans, CEO of B2B News Network for a Twitter Chat yesterday on all things B2B in Canada. If you missed it, we’ve got you covered.

He has been leading Sirius Decisions in Canada since inception, and led Gartner Canada before that. Congratulations to Ally and Sirius Decisions on over a decade of tremendous success!

You’ve been leading the Canadian operations since inception. Why this year for the first Canadian summit?

The inaugural SiriusDecisions Summit Canada – to be held March 1 at Hyatt Regency Toronto – offers an agenda that addresses the unique challenges and opportunities for b-to-b sales, marketing and product leaders in Canada. This year marks the 13^th anniversary of Summit US in addition to Summits held in London and for the first time in Singapore last November.

Clients have been requesting a high quality, local, B2B focused event in Canada for some time now and we are glad to be hosting a vibrant B2B community and becoming the latest addition to the growing family of #SDSummit events globally.

Will people who have been to the US summits get a different experience here? How is the content tailored to Canada?

The content of our #SDSummit Canada is directly relevant to the priorities of B2B leaders in Canada – that is, driving alignment to optimize growth. Alignment is key! Our research shows that companies who align sales, marketing and product functions experience 19% higher growth rates than their peers and 15% higher profitability.

Those are some impressive numbers. Do you see a big difference between the US and Canadian markets? How have startups changed the dynamic?

Yes, impressive but proven and feasible! Canadian business is generally pretty risk averse – in a positive way J Organizations wantn to make sure any investments made in their growth strategies will have sufficient payoff and ROI.

As everyone knows, Canada’s GDP is much smaller than the US, so the market size/opportunity for resources is also smaller. Organizations are more cautious in how they spend their money because they have to optimize every investment to drive productivity and impact.

We definitely have to make our marketing dollars go far in Canadian B2B! Next is a trend question. Has ABM been a game changer?

The most recent benchmark data in the SiriusDecisions Command Center^TMshows that 93% of respondents consider AB extremely important or very important to their overall organizational success.

That is a huge rate of adoption in a very short time period.

What started out as ABM pilots in pockets of organizations has now been woven into the fabric of high-performing b-to-b organizations.

We see successful ABM leaders focused on five key priorities to drive success:

ABM strategy and goal alignment
ABM infrastructure
ABM program planning and execution
ABM measurement
ABM team design and skill development

In your career have you seen anything in B2B marketing gain adoption faster than ABM?

Great question! As with ABM we’ve seen other approaches being adopted quickly eg. CRM (a lifetime ago!), marketing automation, customer advocacy, predictive lead scoring, analytics etc. The question is not adoption but operationalizing and optimizing these approaches.

Are your customers moving to just ABM and giving up traditional leader generation, or is it more complicated than that?

That typically depends on the growth strategy of the organization – a focus on new buyers, new markets, new products, acquisitions or being more productive – can impact the degree to which ABM approaches are deployed.

Tell us a bit about what attendees should expect at Summit Canada.

This is a full day of data-driven best practices research, unveiling of new innovations across the B2B space and networking with an elite community of sales, marketing and product leaders.

In addition, sessions are directly applicable to improving operational processes and driving revenue in the year ahead.

Finally, delegates will be able to drive better alignment with their regional stakeholders and corporate teams, and operationalize their company’s growth strategy in today’s diverse and fast evolving market.

You’ve been doing this kind of work since you headed up Gartner Canada, what motivates you? Is it a love of technology? Watching the B2B space’s incredible evolution?

I truly enjoy working with B2B leaders and witnessing the impact SiriusDecisions has on the growth of their companies.

I also enjoy seeing how these leaders are able to transform their organizations and be recognized personally and professionally by their peers inside and outside of their companies. We have tremendous B2B leaders in Canada!

The team at SiriusDecisions deserves a lot of credit for seeing the shift to sales and strategic marketing alignment early and pushing the industry to change. What do you see as the next big wave?

Thanks Jen – we try! If there is one thing every B2B organization has in common, it is the desire to grow. Desire isn’t enough, however, as every year organizations fail to meet their growth aspirations due to two facts…

First, their leaders do not choose the growth path(s) with the most opportunity, and second, the sale, marketing, and product functions are not properly optimized and aligned to capitalize on opportunity that exists.

B2B leaders need to pinpoint sources of growth, and understand the requirements for achieving growth opportunities. The five primary growth sources are: New Markets, New Buying Centres, New Products, Acquisition(s) and Productivity.

Depending on the size of an organization, more than one of these pillars can be pursued. However, organizations that spread themselves too thinly often get into trouble, as the amount of change required to support multiple ways to grow can quickly become overwhelming.

Blockchain, IOT, big data – so many macro trends in b2b. What do you think has the most potential?

Great way to wrap up! Artificial Intelligence (AI) is topping the charts as a hot topic for this year, and its fan base is growing.

Embedded in the sales and marketing technology stack, the AI capability is continuously learning about buyer preferences, context and intent, and using that knowledge to make predictions and decisions that help drive conversions and pipeline.

Other trends we are seeing include: