How Palo Alto Networks Achieved Greater Marketing Efficiency with Buying Groups

Palo Alto Networks, a global cybersecurity leader, implemented a Buying Groups approach into their Account-Based Marketing (ABM) strategy to solve pain points in marketing spend efficiency, pipeline creation, and conversion rates. By reaching the right decision-makers and influencers within buying groups, Palo Alto Networks was able to better align sales and marketing efforts, leading to remarkable growth in deal velocity, pipeline outcomes, and overall ROI.

The challenge: Reaching the right decision makers

Palo Alto Networks faced challenges in efficiently addressing the right stakeholders involved in buying decisions. Their existing approaches—targeting accounts (too broad) or individual leads and contacts (too narrow)—left gaps in accurately identifying and reaching ideal buyers.

The company realized they needed to move beyond traditional ABM methods to optimize their strategy. They sought a solution that could help them precisely identify and reach buying group members, reduce costs, and accelerate conversions.

The solution: Buying groups

Palo Alto Networks realized that focus on Buying Groups was the perfect way to tackle their challenges. Instead of targeting entire accounts, which was too broad, or individual leads, which was too narrow, focusing on Buying Groups struck the right balance. By aiming at all the decision-makers within these groups, they could maximize their impact and reduce wasted efforts.

To make this strategy work, Palo Alto Networks integrated several advanced tools into their workflow:

• Demandbase: Key to their advertising and outreach efforts, Demandbase was used for display advertising, third-party social media campaigns, and BDR outreach. Additionally, they leveraged Demandbase’s buying group functionality to create ideal buying group profiles. Using the ideal buying group selector, they targeted specific buyer roles with constraints to ensure precision.
• LeanData: Enabled the identification and addition of more Buying Group members to existing opportunities.
• Outreach for personalized sales follow-ups.

Aligning workflows for buying groups

Palo Alto Networks set up a new workflow to effectively leverage Buying Groups using their chosen tools:

• Audience Targeting: Palo Alto Networks started by using Demandbase Orchestration to send carefully selected Buying Group audiences to third-party social channels and display ads.
• Social and Display Ads: Within Demandbase’s advertising dashboard, they prioritized Buying Group members by bidding higher. This ensured their ads reached the right people who are most likely to influence decisions.
• BDR Automations: Leads that met specific criteria—such as having a high pipeline predict score, aligning with the Ideal Buying Group, and showing recent marketing engagement—were sent to Palo Alto Networks’ BDR team for personalized follow-ups through Outreach.
• Automation Integration: Buying Group-based segments were then synced to Outreach to create tailored and timely outreach efforts.

Results

Before using Buying Groups, Palo Alto Networks addresses stakeholders based on broad personas. Switching to Buying Groups, they honed in on specific decision-makers and influencers, boosting accuracy, efficiency, and ROI.

Buying Group Pilot Outcomes (Q4):

• Increased Buying Group Engagement: 2x increase in % of opportunities with buying groups (YoY).
• Stronger Pipeline Progression: Opportunities with buying groups progressed to forecasted pipeline 8x more often.
• Higher Win Rates: Closed-won rate improved by 17%.
• Larger Deal Sizes: Average deal sizes were 2.6x higher.
• Faster Stage Movement: Opportunities moved to the deal stage twice as fast.

Campaign-Specific Results:

• The initial pilot using Buying Groups in display ads led to a 33% increase in click-through rates (CTR) compared to campaigns without Buying Groups.
• A targeted campaign launched drove a 23% increase in CTR in one quarter, showing the ongoing success of precise audience targeting.

Key takeaways for ABM teams

Palo Alto Networks’ experience offers valuable lessons for account-based marketing teams looking to incorporate Buying Groups into their strategies:

• Precision Targeting is Crucial: Reaching the right buying group members allows for more relevant outreach, reducing wasted efforts and budget.
• Technology Integration is Key: Leveraging tools like Demandbase, LeanData, and Outreach ensures seamless orchestration of campaigns and follow-up.
• Measure and Optimize: Track metrics such as CTR and conversion rates to continually refine and improve campaign performance.
• Enhanced Collaboration: By uniting sales and marketing around buying groups, teams can work more cohesively toward shared goals.

Palo Alto Networks set a benchmark for how enterprise organizations can utilize Buying Groups to achieve measurable improvements in marketing efficiency, deal velocity, and pipeline creation. Their success illustrates the importance of aligning tools, strategy, and people for maximum impact.