Blackbaud engages key decision makers on LinkedIn with RollWorks’ ABM Solution

Challenge

• Blackbaud is the world’s leading cloud software company powering social good. The company recognized that it was having trouble identifying and isolating the most relevant audience for their ABM strategy because of the sheer number of buyer personas and the various stages in their sales process.

• “Depending on who specifically we’re trying to reach or where in the customer journey the person is, we could be going after the buying committee at a non-profit organization, or we could be going after the day-to-day users, making sure that they are empowered and have the tools that they need to be successful with our products,” said Sam Kuehnle, Digital Marketing Team Lead at Blackbaud.

• Blackbaud recognized LinkedIn as the most effective platform for their efforts, but struggled to map them directly to LinkedIn audiences for campaigns as well as prioritize and segment them for efficient ROI.

Solution

• To target members of the complex buying committee for its various products more effectively, the company turned to RollWorks, an account-based marketing platform and LinkedIn marketing partner, to institute an account-focused approach on LinkedIn. This would ensure their messaging was showing up in front of the right people at the right time, getting the most ROI from their marketing dollars.

• “We thought if we can identify the accounts that we want to get in front of and then layer in all of the data that RollWorks and LinkedIn have to get in front of specific job titles, job functions, and everything else, we can reach those people that we haven’t been able to get to,” says Kuehnle.

• RollWorks used intent signals, demographics, and firmographics to identify LinkedIn accounts at various stages in the marketing funnel, guiding Blackbaud to present ads and other content when and where the users were most likely to engage with it.

Results

• Thanks to RollWorks’s integration with LinkedIn, Blackbaud was able to significantly increase engagement with new contacts across target accounts in a new vertical, adding over 1,000 followers from those accounts in just three months after launching a showcase page.

• “We’re getting in front of the people that we want to, and not only are they consuming the content, but they choose to follow us,” says Kuehnle. “That was definitely a win-win — not only being able to get in front of those eyes but also them saying, ‘Hey, we see value in this and we want to learn more.’”

More precise targeting and greater ROI

• By accurately identifying accounts at every stage of the marketing funnel, RollWorks helped Blackbaud optimize their marketing dollars and efforts. With the ability to sift through employers, job titles, functions, and other data on LinkedIn at scale, the tool was able to identify and target leads that weren’t on Blackbaud’s radar.

• “When you’re only able to reach 150 people, it’s hard to get your message out because oftentimes those might not even be the ideal 150 that you want to reach,” said Kuehnle. “The integration of LinkedIn and RollWorks has completely eliminated that issue.”

Engaging prospects at all stages of the marketing funnel

Continued refinement

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