• At SiriusDecisions Summit 2019, two organizations that exemplify best-in-class account-based marketing were recognized
  • This blog post follows one winner, JLL, from recognizing its challenges to finding effective solutions
  • Through implementing best practices, JLL saw tangible results, including $7 million in pipeline created or supported

Interconnectedness refers to the state of having different parts or elements of something connected or related to each other. True interconnectedness results in the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. When I had the pleasure of having a fireside chat with two SiriusDecisions Program of the Year (POY) award winners at SiriusDecisions Summit 2019, I realized that both winning organizations deeply understood and acted upon the concept of interconnectedness.

This post focuses on Jones Lang LaSalle Incorporated (JLL), one of those award winners.

JLL – Background

JLL is a leading global professional services and investment management firm specializing in real estate. Headquartered in Chicago, the company has expert teams that provide integrated services to clients seeking increased value by owning, occupying, developing or investing in real estate. JLL is a Fortune 500 company with annual revenue of $16.3 billion, operations in more than 80 countries and a global workforce of more than 91,000 employees.

Challenge

JLL’s history spans more than 200 years. In recent years, JLL’s growth had been propelled by sales, with the organization maintaining a small and slow-changing marketing organization. By 2016, it was clear that a more modern marketing approach was needed, and a new head of marketing was brought in to undertake a significant transformation. A key tenet was close alignment with sales, especially given that JLL had only 300 target accounts in the Americas – each with potential whitespace opportunity in the millions. As part of this transformation, Katie Fisher, Senior Director of Americas Marketing, was tapped to launch an innovative account-based marketing (ABM) pilot effort.

Solution

With help and support from SiriusDecisions, JLL focused the ABM pilot on 13 strategic accounts within the U.S. Mid-Atlantic and Southeast region. The team’s conservative goals for the pilot were to identify and research at least two new buying centers per account (26 total), gain engagement in 20 percent (five) of the identified buying centers, and source two new qualified opportunities for sales.

To get started, JLL examined the specifics within each account more closely, homing in on parts of the business containing the most white space for JLL to penetrate. JLL used SiriusDecisions’ research on building demand maps to select the most important buying centers to focus on, and then identify and quantify opportunities. Fisher and her team collaborated with sales to find 62 total sales opportunities, representing more than $21 million of opportunity.

The demand mapping research also helped JLL determine the key personas that would be making buying decisions, as well as match the right solutions, messaging and content to deliver. With mapping completed, the team then tackled the challenge of incomplete contact data. They pulled from various data sources, including account plans for current accounts, win/loss data, sales sheets, client satisfaction scores and the marketing automation platform. Nearly 150 new contacts in these 13 accounts were identified, which enabled the development of comprehensive relationship/contact maps for the target buying centers.

Finally, with a deeper understanding of buying center pain points and key contacts, JLL developed an omnichannel approach, delivered jointly through marketing and sales. Through this initiative, JLL exemplified the following best practices:

  • Aligned with sales on an end-to-end strategy. This included selecting and prioritizing accounts, creating a joint understanding of the landscape and goals for each account, and customizing execution.
  • Used demand mapping to call out the best opportunities. This included what solutions should be sold, the value of the opportunities, and which buying group members need to be reached.
  • Delivered a multi-touch strategy. This included account-based digital display advertising, emails customized by sales representatives, landing pages personalized for both the account and buying centers, a dimensional direct mail to a hand-picked set of executives, and telesales followup.
  • Tracked and measured engagement activity. This included working with decision-makers and influencers that mattered in key buying groups.

By leveraging these best practices, JLL achieved the following results:

  • Engagement. Successfully engaged 33% of the decision-makers and influencers, with 53% of the buying groups having at least one key individual engaged.
  • Opportunities. Identified four qualified opportunities worth $7.4 million.
  • Expansion. JLL is expanding the program to 67 new accounts, with a more comprehensive set of tactics.

Congratulations to Katie and the entire team at JLL for creating great alignment, collaboration and communication – and for being selected as a 2019 ABM Program of the Year Winner!