In the universe of Stranger Things, a widely beloved sci-fi horror series that debuted its third season on Netflix last month, avoiding the Upside Down is paramount. This dark and mysterious alternate dimension is filled with predatory creatures and unknown terrors of all sorts.

In the universe of account-based marketing (ABM), there is an equivalent to the Upside Down – according to Engagio’s Sandra Freeman, who gave a spirited Stranger Things-flavored REVTalk on Monday afternoon at the B2B Sales and Marketing Exchange (B2BSMX) in Boston.

“Our Upside Down is not knowing how our accounts are doing, and our sales reps not knowing what’s happening with our ABM program,” she said. “It’s that lack of visibility.”

When Andrew Gaffney, president of G3 Communications, took the stage on Monday morning to kick off B2B Sales and Marketing Exchange (B2BSMX) in Boston, he shared a fact that is more or less evident in the conference’s overall agenda: account-based marketing (ABM) is approaching ubiquity in the world of B2B organizations. 

“What I’m hearing in talks with CMOs is that ABM is really just becoming B2B marketing,” Andrew said.

It was a fitting setup for the opening keynote that followed courtesy of Sangram Vajre, titled “ABM Is B2B: Why B2B Marketing And Sales Is Broken And How To Fix It.” 

Without question, Sangram is a foremost authority on this topic. He hosts the ABM-focused #FlipMyFunnel podcast and is cofounder of Terminus, which offers a pioneering end-to-end ABM platform. In 2016 he published the seminal book Account-Based Marketing For Dummies.