As momentum for this new, Opportunity-centric, go-to-market motion grows, one of the most common questions we hear is, “What’s the process for adopting a buying group motion?”
Where do you start?
For B2B organizations using account-based marketing (ABM), a Buying Group motion is a natural evolution of ABM. The focus simply shifts from the Account object to the Opportunity object, providing more detail into how the Account is truly performing.
Because at its core, a B2B Buying Group motion is about revenue, not routing. But first, you need to understand why you want to make this change.
Why Adopt a Buying Group Motion?
When your buyer is a group of individuals and stakeholders making a purchase decision, traditional lead-centric processes often break down:
- Opportunities are mainly Closed-Lost or recycled.
- Lead-to-Opportunity conversion rates are low.
- Marketing dollars are wasted on leads that don’t convert.
- Opportunities have only one Contact when there are obviously more people on the buying team.
- The Sales team has no visibility into the interactions of the full buying committee
- SDR, BDR, and Marketing teams are chasing after high lead volumes that don’t convert
One purpose of a Buying Group motion is to improve marketing and sales efficiency. This means Marketing is no longer throwing MQLs over the fence to be worked by Sales. Rather, sales is shifting from working Leads to fully qualified Opportunities.
This new handoff point is not only more efficient, but also creates the potential for a continuous, iterative cycle of Sales and Marketing feedback.
Questions to Consider Around a Buying Group Motion
Before an organization makes the shift to a Buying Group motion, there are some initial questions to consider:
- Are you an Opportunity-centric organization?
- How are your buying groups defined? By solution, or product, or segmentation?
- Who is creating the Opportunities within your organization? Is it still Sales, or has it transitioned to Marketing?
Ultimately, the most important question is: How effectively do your leads or MQLs convert into revenue today?
A Buying Group motion is all about delivering:
- Increased win rates
- Bigger deals
- Uncovered opportunities
- Faster sales cycles
So, if you’re ready to move forward, we recommend a four-phased approach.
Four Phases of Adopting a Buying Group Motion
Because of the organizational change involved in adopting a Buying Group Motion, we recommend a phased approach. The timeline is highly variable, depending on your organization’s readiness and motivation.
We’ve seen LeanData customers set up a Buying Group motion in less than 90 days while for larger companies, the transition took up to 12 months.
Phase #1 Align
The first phase in adopting a buying group motion is all about gaining organizational alignment. There must be a logical rationale for making this change and a clear explanation of its financial impact.
Here’s where alignment begins:
- Determine if there’s a need to solve your demand gen and ABM challenges by augmenting those processes with a Buying Group motion.
- Identify an executive sponsor (CSO/CRO) as well as an internal champion responsible for a phase rollout of your buying group motion.
Data Alignment
During the alignment phase, data must be normalized. This means Marketing Sales, IT, and Operations teams come to an agreement on a data governance and data management strategy. This is the time to get your data house in order and establish CRM data alignment between teams.
Analyze Historic Patterns
Last, perform a “look back” exercise. Analyze past opportunities, wins, and losses to understand who are the key roles and personas that helped to drive those opportunities forward? At what stage were they added to the opportunity? This exercise will help you know who to target in your buying groups.
Step #2 Build
In the build phase, processes and technology are set up to capture buying signals, prioritize them, and move existing opportunities forward.
- As Leads engage with your organization, they are auto-converted and assigned as Contact Roles on Opportunities. These are your Buying Group members, now attached to a sales cycle.
- Using technology, configure your CRM to automatically capture all signals about each Buying Group member: who they are, how they’ve engaged, and other relevant signals.
- Regularly review Buying Group members on your open Opportunities. Track member engagement throughout the sales cycle and be ready to act when a member needs more, or less, touches.
- Organize the data and establish processes to build the Buying Group container around the Opportunity object.
Step #3 Orchestrate
The steps and responsibilities in the Orchestrate phrase are best outlined by team.
Marketing Team
During the Orchestrate phase, the Marketing team will:
- Develop and optimize campaigns to attract and engage with members of the Buying Groups.
- Using technology, the members are automatically associated with the Opportunity.
BDR/SDR Team
Organizations implementing a Buying Group motion typically have a team of BDRs or SDRs who contact Leads in efforts to schedule a meeting with and Account Executive (AE).
In a Buying Group motion, the BDR/SDR role often transitions to identifying roles and interests of Buying Group members, developing personalized outreach.
Sales and Marketing Collaboration
The Orchestrate phase demonstrates how a Buying Group motion brings true alignment between Marketing and Sales. These two teams will collaborate throughout the entire Opportunity cycle to ensure a cohesive approach to engagement.
As sales cycles come to an end, Sales and Marketing will take an iterative approach to measure performance and the revenue impact of selling into Buying Groups.
Step #4 Measure
As your organization gathers and builds more data around your Buying Group motion, it’s important to create reports and dashboards to support the economic business case.
In the Measure phase, evaluate the products, departments, and post-sales customer experience that would benefit from a Buying Group expansion.
Technology Capabilities
If you plan to orchestrate a Buying Group motion across multiple business units, divisions, or product groups, consider expanding your technology capabilities by deploying a multi-graph system to support individual motions.
This allows different areas of the business to create processes unique to their Buying Group members.
Debrief
Allow your Buying Group motion experiences to inform the next phase of data inputs and integrations. What worked and what didn’t? A Buying Group motion, like its Lead-centric and ABM predecessors, is an iterative process.
It’s How the Business Buys
Buying groups are not new. For years, organizations have known that for high-consideration products and services, purchase decisions are made by a buying committee.
Transitioning to an opportunity-centric motion based in buying groups is the ultimate GTM sweet spot. It delivers a more accurate account-level view because in the end, the health of an account is calculated by opportunities under that account.
The good news is: you can execute a Buying Group motion today. All you need to get started is your CRM and LeanData.
Kim Peterson
Kim Peterson is the Manager of Content Strategy at LeanData where she digs deep into all aspects of the revenue process and shares her findings across multiple content channels. Kim's writing experiences span tech companies, stunt blogging, education, and the real estate industry. Connect with Kim on LinkedIn.
