A Strategic Guide to ABM and Personalization with 6sense

Leveraging 6sense for Account-Based Marketing (ABM) transforms how revenue teams engage high-value accounts. By combining powerful intent data with firmographic targeting, you can identify companies actively researching your solutions and build precise, dynamic audience segments. Syncing these segments directly to ad platforms like LinkedIn and Google Ads enables highly personalized, full-funnel campaigns. This strategic approach focuses on engaging the right accounts at the right time, moving beyond traditional lead-based metrics to measure success through account engagement, pipeline velocity, and influenced revenue.

How can we leverage 6sense to identify companies that are actively researching our solutions?

6sense is used to identify companies showing active buying signals by creating audiences based on their online research behavior. This is accomplished by defining and bucketing keywords related to your products and services, such as "cyber drills" or "MDR providers." The platform then detects accounts that are researching these specific topics across the web. These intent-driven audiences can be segmented by funnel stage—top, middle, or bottom—to align campaign messaging with their position in the buying journey.

What is the best way to build a target account list for our ABM campaigns in 6sense?

The most effective way to build a target account list is to combine firmographic data with real-time intent signals. First, define your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) using firmographics such as company revenue (e.g., $1 billion and above) and employee count (e.g., 5,000+). Then, layer on intent data to pinpoint which of these accounts are actively researching your solutions or related keywords. You can create multiple dynamic segments based on different criteria, such as industry (e.g., a dedicated list for financial services) or product interest (e.g., accounts showing intent for "cyber drills"). This hybrid approach ensures you are targeting accounts that are not only a good fit but are also currently in-market.

How do we sync our 6sense audiences to LinkedIn and Google Ads for more precise targeting?

6sense features a native integration that allows for the direct synchronization of audience segments to platforms like LinkedIn and Google Ads. The process involves creating a dynamic audience segment within 6sense based on your desired firmographic and intent criteria. Once the segment is defined, it can be synced to your LinkedIn Campaign Manager or Google Ads account, where it appears as a targetable audience list. This eliminates the need for manual list uploads and ensures that your ad campaigns are always targeting the most current list of in-market accounts. The sync can take 24-48 hours to fully populate and become ready in the ad platform.

Are there limitations on the number of audiences we can sync from 6sense to our ad platforms?

While 6sense itself does not appear to impose a hard limit on the number of segments you can sync, there are practical limitations related to audience size required by the ad platforms. Both Google Ads and LinkedIn require a minimum audience size to run a campaign effectively. For example, a synced audience must be large enough for a Google Ads campaign to populate and begin serving impressions. Similarly, on LinkedIn, hyper-segmenting into very small audiences can result in a list that is insufficient to run a campaign. Therefore, the key constraint is ensuring each synced segment meets the threshold of the destination platform, which is a concern when creating highly niche or granular audiences.

What are the best practices for personalizing ad copy for different 6sense segments?

Personalizing ad copy is crucial for engaging different 6sense segments effectively. Best practices include:

• Dynamic Personalization: Utilize features like LinkedIn's ad personalization beta to dynamically insert a prospect's job title or company name into the ad copy, making it feel more direct and relevant.
• Segment-Specific Messaging: Tailor the message to the segment's context. For an upsell campaign targeting existing customers, use copy like, "You're using one part of the Immersive platform, but there's so much more to unlock." For an industry-specific segment, reference a relevant threat, such as, "Companies like yours are being targeted by Scattered Spider. Are you ready?"
• Customized Calls-to-Action (CTAs): The CTA should match the audience's relationship with you. For existing customers, a CTA like "Talk to your CSM" is more effective than a generic "Book a Demo." For prospects, a lead magnet like a buyer's guide or an ebook can be used to capture their information.
• Visuals and Format: For complex concepts like a platform overview, video ads are more effective for storytelling than static images. However, for event promotion with a short timeline, a proven approach is an image ad paired with a LinkedIn Lead Gen Form.

Can we use 6sense to identify lookalike accounts that match our best customers?

The provided context does not explicitly state that 6sense is used for creating lookalike audiences. The strategy discussions focus on using 6sense to identify accounts based on firmographics (ICP) and, most importantly, intent signals from their research behavior. However, the concept of lookalike modeling is a familiar strategy, as evidenced by the suggestion to create a lookalike audience in LinkedIn based on a list of past webinar registrants. While 6sense's platform includes predictive modeling to find accounts similar to past wins, the term 'lookalike audience' in the context of syncing to ad platforms is not detailed in the source material.

How do we measure the success of an ABM campaign powered by 6sense?

Measuring the success of a 6sense-powered ABM campaign requires a shift from traditional lead-based KPIs to account-centric metrics. Key measurement areas include:

• Account Engagement: Track if you are reaching the right people within your target accounts and how they are engaging. This includes metrics like target account coverage, buying group engagement, and increases in account engagement scores.
• Pipeline and Revenue Impact: The primary goal is to connect marketing efforts to revenue. Measure the number of Marketing Qualified Accounts (MQAs), the value of the pipeline generated from target accounts, and the final influenced revenue from closed-won deals. Connecting your CRM to the ad platforms can provide a clear view of influenced opportunities.
• Sales Cycle Velocity: Monitor how quickly target accounts move through the sales funnel, from initial engagement to a closed deal. Effective ABM campaigns often shorten the sales cycle.
• Sales Engagement Lift: Measure the impact of ad exposure on sales outreach. One key finding is a 21% increase in sales engagement (e.g., InMail responses) with prospects who were exposed to ads beforehand.
• Micro-conversions: For campaigns with long sales cycles, track secondary actions like visits to key pages or content downloads as indicators of interest, even if a demo isn't requested immediately.

What is the difference between targeting by 'intent' versus targeting by 'firmographics' in 6sense?

Targeting by 'firmographics' and 'intent' are two distinct but complementary approaches within 6sense.

• Firmographic Targeting focuses on who a company is. It uses static attributes to define your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), such as industry, company revenue (e.g., over $1 billion), and employee size (e.g., 5,000+). This ensures you are focusing on accounts that are a good structural fit for your business.
• Intent-Based Targeting focuses on what a company is doing right now. It identifies accounts that are actively researching specific keywords, topics, or competitors related to your solutions. This allows you to prioritize accounts that are demonstrating buying behavior and are currently in-market.

The most effective strategy combines both. You start by defining your ICP with firmographics and then use 6sense's intent data to identify which of those accounts are showing active purchase intent, ensuring your marketing efforts are both relevant and timely.