SAS Software: “As marketers, it’s crucial to embrace new and innovative digital tactics”

An interview with the winner of two categories in the 2023 Engage B2B Awards

SAS Software earned two awards – Best Example of Marketing Engagement and Best Use of ABM – at our Awards Ceremony in December 2023. The organisation was recognised for creating exclusive ABM hubs for two of their banking accounts. In an interview, the winners have now revealed how they made the pages account-specific, how they marketed them, and what lessons they learned during their development.

CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR DOUBLE WIN AT THE 2023 AWARDS! WHAT DOES WINNING IN TWO CATEGORIES MEAN TO YOUR ORGANISATION?

We are very proud of our double win at the 2023 Engage B2B Awards. The other finalists in both the categories we entered showed that it was no easy victory for us but indeed a testament to the strong work that has been done through our ABM programme, showcasing its scalable and innovative approach using digital tactics to help offer true account-based experience to our biggest customers. The programme is also a shining example of true cross-geo, cross-team collaboration. From go-to-market, digital marketing, web and email teams, content & creative and marketing science teams, there are over 50+ marketers associated with this programme.

YOU WERE RECOGNISED FOR CREATING EXCLUSIVE ABM HUBS FOR YOUR TWO BANKING ACCOUNTS. HOW DID YOU MAKE THE PAGES ACCOUNT-SPECIFIC?

We develop several banking/customer-specific eBooks and whitepapers every year that are then used in marketing campaigns. In addition to these, we also have learning resources, enablement portals and customer days for our biggest customers. The knowledge hub is our version of an exclusive marketing page bringing all of these under one roof. We update these knowledge hubs every quarter and communicate the updates with our customers via email alerts. These account-specific knowledge hubs are also our primary asset that we use to maximise engagement and truly deliver an account-based experience.

HOW DID YOU MARKET THE HUBS, CONSIDERING THAT THEY ARE NEITHER LINKED FROM THE WEBSITE NAVIGATION NOR INDEXABLE ON SEARCH ENGINES?

We primarily used paid media digital channels such as paid social and one-to-one content syndication to promote the knowledge hubs. Any advertising that was set up would be fully personalised (i.e., from the ad messaging to the creatives used, all digital touchpoints would mention the name of the customer, have the tone-of-voice, and look-and-feel that they are used to). This helps to increase engagement and stand out from traditional one-to-few or one-to-many digital advertising. In addition to the paid channels, we also set up our in-house nurture email streams and one-to-one emails from our accounts teams to promote these knowledge hubs.

FINALLY, WHAT LESSONS DID YOU LEARN DURING THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE TWO HUBS?

As marketers, it’s crucial to embrace new and innovative digital tactics to cut through the clutter in today’s crowded advertising marketplaces. With the cost of B2B customer acquisition constantly rising, the need for a fully personalised user journey is vital to stand out from the crowd, maximise engagement and deliver an effective digital ABM campaign. The knowledge hub is a step in the right direction to broaden and deepen current and new relationships with our biggest customers.