Raffaele Apostoliti, president & CEO of Expandi Group, on leading EMEA B2B marketing

How B2B will change over the next decade

Raffaele Apostoliti predicts that most of the trends that have emerged so far will likely last for the next three to five years, maybe even ten. It’s harder to project beyond that as things change so swiftly in this industry.

The key trends according to Raffaele Apostoliti are:

• Content development is one of the biggest areas that agencies should get into
• Data, analytics and platforms are the top three areas that will grow
• Artificial Intelligence is also worth looking into as it’s a huge development, and almost no online marketing can be done without tapping into this kind of structure
• An increased level of requests to link fees of agencies to their clients’ KPIs and overall performance
• The outsourcing of marketing and people to agencies

Most trends show that big data is increasing, and in order for companies to feed into this, content needs to be produced every day.

Creative idea vs data

Some people wonder if it’s the big creative idea, or the data side that’s most important in Account-Based Marketing (ABM). Raffaele Apostoliti believes that ultimately, it’s hard to say.

Data and analytics are important if you want to reach the right person at the right time. However, if you need to address individual accounts such as the fortune 5000, then personalising the messaging and designing creative content becomes more important. Additionally, ensuring you have multiple touchpoints for the many decision makers, and the high-value deals underway, will help you deliver the best customer experience during an ABM campaign.

Delivering Account-Based Marketing campaigns

ABM is all about getting a well-optimised message in front of the right people within your target company, based on where they are in the buyer journey. Raffaele Apostoliti says that using analytics is a great way to ensure highly personalised communication is delivered to target accounts in many formats, including emails. Using paid media can be very targeted, especially if you have good analytics. At the end of the day, the need is for companies to stay relevant.

How to serve seamless digital experiences

There is not one channel that works for all marketing. Paid media campaigns and telemarketing campaigns both give data, which will lead to results. A final take away from Raffaele Apostoliti is that one of the areas that many companies need to work on is that they cannot expect qualified leads to come in without human touch.

To learn more about Account-Based Marketing, and to book a demo with us, get in touch.

Listen to our other Account Based Marketing Podcasts for more useful industry insights:

• Natalia Chaban – Digital Performance & Technology Director at MediaCom
• Philip Gosney – Head of Global Marketing at Maersk Drilling
• Christopher Engman – Author & Managing Partner at Megadeals Advisory
• Jem Lloyd-Williams – CEO at Mindshare UK
• Chris Hirst – Global CEO at Havas Creative
• Riaz Kanani – CEO & Founder at Radiate B2B
• John Harris – President & CEO at Worldwide Partners
• Ricky Abbott – President of Americas for Transmission
• Michel Juvillier – Founder of The Societies Media
• Judith Niederschelp – CEO at Demand Studio
• Paul Frampton – President at Control v Exposed
• Luke Bozeat – COO at MediaCom UK
• Matthew Jantjies-Green – Head of Agency Partnerships at AccountInsight