Various aspects work together to give a business the success it deserves. The matter of fact is that every aspect is trivial, and companies cannot afford to keep any individual part behind the veil of ignorance. One such part is B2B account scoring. B2B account scoring is an important area that will facilitate lead generation, lead nurturing, and marketing automation lead scoring. This article will highlight every crucial factor that makes the B2B account score a success. Nevertheless, before we get into the detailed B2B account scoring guide, let us understand what B2B account scoring is.
WHAT IS B2B ACCOUNT SCORING?
Account scoring refers to a process where customers’ names are in a line depending on their value in descending order- more to less value. An account receives its value depending on the value of the customer profile; an ideal customer gets the maximum value out of your offering.
One of the simplest ways to do account scoring is by building an excel and manually weighing the different criteria. The usage of artificial intelligence and internal, behavioral, and open data of the company features among the advanced methods of account scoring. You can reduce your workload by hiring companies like LeadsProspex who work on email list building and CRM data appending services that help in data verification, email verification, and email validation.
FOREWORD ON ACCOUNT SCORING:
A few selected people in your life bond very well with you and share all your concerns with them. You spend your leisure time with them discussing a wide range of aspects that you both share or have an idea about. It helps both of you understand things better and form opinions that might help make any particular decision.
Similarly, in B2B business sales, good bonding and friendly chemistry help make flamboyant deals. Your business friend plays his part to propel your business by buying your products and making you happy. It might so be that the product might be of no or minimal use to the customer and his organization, but he makes sure to keep the relationship between you two to stay at an all-time high. Remember, here we are not talking about any intra-business friendships. The person has to be from an organization working in some other field. It ensures a long-lasting business on both sides, where you will also have to play your part by purchasing things from his company.
THE BASICS OF ACCOUNT SCORING:
It is impossible to create a service that is fit for every section of the population; at least, it has not happened. Similarly, in human relationships, everyone does not receive the same amount of love and affection. There are a few kinds of people who receive the most value as customers for every distinct service. Various B2B/B2C companies rely on a framework named Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) to determine the prospective customers who are a perfect fit and add to the business’s success. This particular idea helps the companies formulate their marketing strategies and indulge in Predictive marketing.
When you utilize the information through an ideal customer profile, the prospect of acquiring new customers increases manifold, thus making it a win-win situation. Transacting a business with an ICP- fit organization is way easier and rapid to execute. An ICP-fit organization ensures that they will receive more value from your business relationship and, in all probability, one of your longest customers. They have a better Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) compared to the normal customer organizations. Moreover, having such a distinguished customer is a bonus for you, as they will help advocate your business to other prospective ones.
Also Read: How to Create an Ideal Customer Profile for Your B2B Business
While you are creating a group of ICP- listed customers, you can easily remove the other non-relevant and side companies to make the list compact. Various websites like bizprospex help you with their CRM email appending services that help you formulate a compact list of ICP customers as a priority, leaving out the other customers.
Your list sorts and modifies itself in descending order, with the priority companies at the beginning and the unfitting ones at the end. It facilitates you with the ability to use your resources very carefully, where business chances are more.
Let’s make it more transparent with an example; assign 0 to the customer who can get the least value out of your company and assign 10 to the best customers. A 10-rating shows that it is a perfect ICP-fit and is best for your business.
Some of the important things you need to keep in mind while working on this aspect;
- Some customers hold more value than others.
- Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) shows the most valuable customers for your business.
- You need to use ICP for building a proper account scoring system.
- Account scoring lines up your list of customers depending on their value.
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO USE ACCOUNT SCORING?
Account scoring will help in establishing a proper Ideal Customer Profile. It will help you determine whether your prospective company is from a similar background or a different one. The proximity enables you to assign more value to a customer organization to conduct better business deals.
SHOULD YOU TRY TO BUILD SOMETHING LIKE ACCOUNT SCORING?
Many of us might suspect whether the market complexities would allow for a single ICP and allow score accounts to work along with a singular idea. Moreover, one can argue that an existing lot of customers might not be the best fit along the lines of a perfect customer defined by ICP. Well, we have a few solutions to the above concerns;
- Creating multiple Ideal customer profiles and running every customer through all the profiles. It will help us understand which particular profile suits which particular customer organization.
- Build your account scoring model, not based on your existing customers, but what you desire to get in your future business ventures.
But if you think that it is an easy job to do, you are under a delusion. It is impossible to build a perfect account scoring mechanism since there are numerous kinds of different variables worldwide. Considering every variable is a difficult job. Why should a company build account scoring if it does not give legit answers to all the existing issues?
A completely perfect account scoring model might be an imaginary venture. Still, an existing scoring account system can help you deal with the probabilities and find out better solutions to the problems. Therefore account scoring is worth the try, provided someone is ready to put the necessary time and effort into making this thing a workable reality.
Moreover, if you look into the positives of this mechanism, it will prevent you from wasting time on unworthy and less providing customers and their organization. Such a system will also encourage the salespeople to invest their time and energy into making better and faster progress than normal.
KEY POINTS YOU NEED TO KEEP IN MIND DURING THIS STAGE:
- A flawless scoring account does not exist since the world is a chaotic place with multiple offers.
- A well-built account scoring mechanism works into making your work efficient but not completely perfect.
- Using these kinds of mechanisms acts as a major boost to the morales of the salesperson, as they find new energy to work, owing to increasing productivity.
DISTINCTION BETWEEN LEAD SCORING AND ACCOUNT SCORING:
The basic distinction that comes at the beginning between these two is that lead scoring focuses on individual contacts on their chances of becoming a customer. In contrast, account scoring focuses on listing organizations based on their chances of becoming a customer. When we look at the overall intricacies of both the scoring, we might find account scoring to be a smarter one compared to lead scoring.
Individual people scarcely make a decision all by themselves. Considering the current company scenario, we need to consider the stakeholder option, technologies in use, the financial situation of the company, and future events down the line. Therefore, as the company demand is rising, account scoring is a better option than sales because it facilitates sales and marketing to practically spend resources.
However, lead scoring and account scoring have an underlying connection because each affects the other. A variable that you need to use an account scoring will affect lead scoring, and on the other hand, variables of lead scoring can affect account scoring. Let us make this clear with the help of an example;
The multiple numbers of individual contacts from a particular account or the last recorded visit from a company’s account are variables in account scoring, even though an individual might be operating it. Similarly, the number of employees who used the customer relationship management, revenue, and locational facilities might act as variables of the lead scoring. Nevertheless, they have a connection with an organization.
Also Read: Demand Generation: The best way to score B2B leads
IMPORTANT POINTS TO KEEP IN MIND AT THIS STAGE:
- Account scoring includes the ranking of organizations as a customer.
- Lead scoring takes into consideration individuals as customers.
- Both lead scoring and account scoring can affect each other.
- Following lead scoring might be foolish as it consists of an enthusiastic individual, whereas the company might not want to proceed.
GUIDE TO CREATING AN ACCOUNT SCORING TEMPLATE:
Account scoring template can consist of a google sheets document which you can fill manually. It does not require any technical prowess; instead, it is very simple to do. The main challenge is to identify the variables which will work towards acquiring the account as a customer. There are various companies that can help you with their B2B lead generation services to make this a smoother action to perform.
Following is a five-step guide to making an account scoring template;
1. Define an ideal customer and find out the ten ratings:
As we found out earlier, account scoring begins with finding out what an Ideal Customer Profile is. This activity will determine the success of the venture. Because you formulate your ideal customer profile along the wrong lines, the account scoring will work in the wrong direction. Therefore, a perfect 10-rating will be symbolizing an ICP.
2. Figure out the essential elements of the ICP:
The ICP might be a defined concept, but there is no stability concerning which component will positively affect the customer’s value. Searching for the elements might be a dull area to deal with, but it is one of the most important aspects in making a positive ICP. Only then it will lead to successful account scoring.
3. Find out the weight of the components:
Every component of the account scoring scheme will have a different weight. A particular element can have a larger impact on the prospect compared to another element. Moreover, a specific element doesn’t need to have the highest value for all the customer organizations. Therefore, if you apply the same component everywhere, it might be fatal for your business. Judging an element based on the respective customer is a necessity.
4. Creating an account scoring template in excel.
Creating an account scoring template is one of the easiest ways out there. You need not have expertise in technology and software management. Moreover, it does not require much time to do it.
5. Usage and evaluation:
Now that you have an account scoring template for your credit run it for use. Start dealing with various companies, fix your variables and start working. Based on the responses, you should evaluate your account scoring template and make changes if necessary.
After reading through the above guide, you will have a thorough idea concerning the relevance of an account scoring template and how you need to use it. The current competition demands experts to handle this job, and you have multiple options like http://bizprospex.com/ who can help you achieve your business goals. Also get in touch with us today to kickstart your B2B telemarketing database maintenance, PEP Lists, Aml sanctions lists, global sanctions database or lead generation needs.