B2B Marketing’s Global ABM Conference: What The Radishes Loved Most

This year’s Global ABM Conference has been one of our favourite events of the year so far. Whether you sat front row or streamed it from the comfort of your sofa, there was no shortage of inspiring sessions – from diving into the neuroscience of engagement or ways to recession-proof our ABM strategies.

Digital Radish were there of course – not only as attendees, but as speakers. We gave a talk with our client Applaud on how we created meaningful moments during our award-nominated ABM campaign (there’s more on that here). 

In the spirit of sharing, we asked the Radishes to reveal their favourite moments from the conference and the insights they’ll be taking with them as they plan their next projects. 

1. Showcasing our metaverse-magic 

It turns out that B2B marketers are still as competitive as ever. We loved seeing our clients, colleagues and peers take part in our MetaMaze challenge at the Digital Radish stand. It was a highlight for our creative director Matty who had a great time watching masters of marketing immerse themselves in a brand new world.  

“I loved watching everyone get stuck into the metaverse. I know that some marketers have been sceptical about it, but I’d say 99% of people who put on a headset (and even those who saw it in full form on their computer too) realised just how impactful and immersive it can be. Hopefully it’s sparked some new ideas for people on how it can be used.”

As you can see from our scoreboard, there were some metaverse whizzes and some metaverse novices in the crowd on Thursday. If you’re up for a challenge and think you can beat Benita’s 45 seconds, try your luck by taking out MetaMaze here and let us know your time!

2. Understanding the science behind engagement

Carmen Simon, Chief Science Officer at Corporate Visions, gave a keynote speech that proved a huge hit with our team. It was the perfect balance between inspirational and practical like a Ted Talk session, and gave us some great advice on how to better engage our prospects.  

If you attended our session with Applaud, you’ll know that we’re passionate about creating powerful moments throughout our ABM campaigns. So Carmen’s talk really resonated with us when she reminded the audience that B2B relationships are human ones too, and that we can all do more to create meaningful engagement for our internal and external audiences. 

Especially with Cheryl Randall, our Group Account Director. “The highlight of the conference for me was the neuroscience of engagement session. It was really thought provoking and certainly gave me something to think about for the next campaign I’m working on… how do we create something that is truly memorable, and achieve the right balance between keeping the human brain engaged by challenging it without confusing it.”

3. Preparing for a downturn: collective resilience

There was no avoiding the elephant in the room – that 2023 is going to be a turbulent year for all of us. Whether it’s down to the looming recession, the ongoing talent shortage or wider socio-political volatility – we can all expect to see our clients tightening budgets and our teams needing more support from their agencies. 

However, there was a sense of optimism and calm from many of the speakers yesterday. Knowing what’s on the horizon means we can start to optimise our current processes and identify which gaps need to be filled. For example, some speakers recommended that agencies evaluate their current martech stack and look for efficiencies there, whilst some reiterated how ABM is essential for survival even though it’s not always the fast path to growth. 

This sense of community and collective resilience really came through at the conference, something our animator and metaverse demi-god, Daria, really valued. “There were lots of interesting discussions around the current trends, issues and next steps forward, not only on the individual level, but also as a collective. Getting to see what other people think from different agencies and roles was really valuable, especially for me coming from the creative department.”

4. The value of account insight and strategy

It wouldn’t be an ABM conference without some lively discussion around strategy! There was a whole stream dedicated to sales enablement and alignment, with speakers talking about the best way to leverage insight for long-term growth. What resonated with us was the discussions around strategic precision, and the importance of collecting and interpreting account data – it’s these that lay a strong foundation for ABM campaigns. 

We were all interested in the results of the 2022 ABM Census and intrigued to hear that the absence of a shared strategy and poor account insight were the top challenges when it came to campaign delivery. Our strategist Charlie Boon wasn’t totally surprised by this though. 

“When clients want to see results straight away, it can be challenging to sell them on the value of doing deep-dive research and discovery into accounts. As Jon Miller, Demandbase’s CMO said during the conference, ‘Indent data is cool, but it’s just one signal.’ There’s still work to do to convince clients that this long-term investment in monitoring and researching accounts is worth it, but we’re heading in the right direction.”

So there you have it, a snapshot of our time at the Global ABM Conference and our top takeaways. If you’re interested in finding out more about our MetaMaze or Applaud campaign, do drop us an email at hello@digitalradish.co.uk. Otherwise, we hope to see you again at the B2B Marketing Awards in a few weeks.