ABM for Acquisition and Expansion: Jumio’s Dual Strategy for Growth

Dean Nicolls, Vice President, Growth Marketing at Jumio Corporation
Account Based Marketing (ABM), AI and Automation, Lead Gen / Lead Mgmt, Sales and Marketing Orchestration, Strategy and Trends

In just a few years, Jumio’s marketing team went from contributing 10% of the sales pipeline to driving 60-70%. Their secret? A sophisticated ABM approach that works for both customer acquisition and expansion.

We interviewed Dean Nicolls, Vice President of Growth Marketing at Jumio, and we’re honored to bring you his thoughts on how his team uses account-based marketing (ABM) strategies for both new customer acquisition and expanding relationships with existing clients.

Check out the full interview with Dean, where he breaks down how applying ABM principles to both acquisition and expansion became the playbook for driving serious pipeline growth. He shares how aligning sales and marketing, using intent data the right way, and creating customer-first content helped boost marketing’s sales pipeline contribution from 10% to over 60-70%.

The evolution of marketing’s role at Jumio

Dean Nicolls has seen a remarkable transformation in how Jumio’s sales team perceives marketing. When he first joined the company, marketing was almost an afterthought.

“When I first started at Jumio, marketing was viewed as, oh, you guys just do PR and events. That’s all you do. Right. And when you looked at the pipeline being generated by marketing, it might’ve been 10% back in the day,” Dean explains. “Now marketing is responsible for 60, 70% of a salesperson’s pipeline.”

This dramatic shift didn’t happen overnight. It resulted from a strategic approach to marketing that focuses on providing real value to both prospects and the sales team. Dean’s team doesn’t just generate leads—they identify the right contacts, develop personalized outreach sequences, and create relevant content that speaks directly to prospects’ needs.

Marketing’s evolution at Jumio:

— Marketing contribution to pipeline increased from 10% to 60-70%
— Marketing is now seen as a strategic partner to sales
—The focus shifted from just PR and events to driving qualified opportunities

Account-based marketing for new customer acquisition

Jumio’s approach to new customer acquisition is highly targeted. Rather than using a spray and pray approach to reach as many potential customers as possible, they’re focusing on specific accounts.

“Increasingly we’re adopting account-based marketing,” Dean shares. “We’re essentially going from a shotgun to a rifle approach where we’re hand picking the accounts globally that we want to go after.”

This focused strategy involves several key components:

1. Intent signals to identify in-market accounts

Jumio uses a platform called Qualified to tap into intent signals, which indicates when target accounts are researching topics related to identity verification or compliance standards.

These signals come in two forms:

— Research intent: When prospects are researching relevant topics, even if they’re not on Jumio’s website
— Website visits: When people from target accounts visit Jumio’s website

“If Bank ABC is on our website, we know it in real time,” Dean explains. “Now, what we don’t know is who are the people at ABC that we probably should care about?”

2. Finding the right contacts within target accounts

Once Jumio identifies a company showing interest, the next step is determining who the key stakeholders are within that organization.

“We would then leverage something like LinkedIn Sales Navigator… to help us find the key titles of people at Bank ABC. And then from there we can find the email address,” says Dean. “But it’s not exactly a cold email because… we at least know their organization is interested in the topic that we care about.”

Dean’s ABM acquisition strategy at Jumio:

— Uses intent signals to identify accounts researching relevant topics
— Leverages LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Lead IQ to find key contacts
— Combines intent data with contact information for more effective outreach
— Achieves higher response rates by targeting accounts with demonstrated interest

3. Educational content as the cornerstone of outreach

When reaching out to prospects, Jumio focuses on providing educational content rather than sales pitches. This approach helps them avoid being blocked or marked as spam, which would end any chance of building a relationship with the target account.

“Unless you’re providing value, they’re going to essentially block you forever,” Dean emphasizes. “A lot of these larger companies that we’re targeting already have systems in place to block potential spammers that they don’t recognize. And so you’ve got to get past that front door, which is the hardest part of our job.”

Jumio’s approach to content is very specific and personalized.

“We’re showing first of all that we’ve researched how they actually onboard new customers and we’re providing them with some practical insights for maybe how they can improve the process, whether they use us or not,” explains Dean.

Dean also emphasizes the importance of making emails look personal and conversational: “Having bullets in your email and having the email look too polished is the death of that email. If it is very personal… and it’s literally no more than two or three sentences that you can read on your phone… you’re way less likely to get blocked.”

Jumio’s content approach:

— Focuses on providing real value and education rather than sales pitches
— Researches prospects’ current processes to offer relevant insights
— Keeps initial outreach brief, conversational, and genuinely helpful
— Aims to establish credibility before attempting to sell

4. Integrated team approach to ABM

One of the most distinctive aspects of Jumio’s ABM strategy is how they’ve built a unified team approach, instead of everybody working in silos.

“One of the things we put a lot of effort into is making sure that, between the field marketing team, the BDRs, and the AEs, we’re operating as one team,” Dean says.

This integrated approach creates tremendous value for account executives (AEs). Business development representatives (BDRs) identify multiple contacts at target accounts, develop personalized email sequences, and leverage marketing content—all before an account executive gets involved.

“The BDRs are going to try to identify eight or nine people in the company that we think are probably a good fit. That’s something that you don’t have to do as an AE. They love that,” explains Dean.

“The BDRs even craft the initial… sequence of emails. And so when they’re coming to the AE, they’re saying, ‘This account has been on our website. I’ve identified these five key roles that I think are the right people that we probably want to target. And here’s six emails… that I think make sense in light of their persona.'”

This support allows account executives to focus on what they do best—selling—while marketing handles the initial research and outreach.

Jumio’s integrated team approach:

— Field marketing, BDRs, and AEs work as a unified team
— BDRs identify multiple relevant contacts at target accounts
— Marketing prepares personalized email sequences for each persona
— AEs can focus on selling rather than prospecting activities

Account-based marketing for expansion

Jumio applies the same strategic ABM approach to expanding relationships with existing customers using the “land and expand” strategy.

“That’s increasingly becoming a big focus and it’s a major focus for us this year in 2025,” Dean shares. “We’re creating what we call the pod accounts. The pod accounts are typically our big anchor accounts.”

1. Finding new use cases within existing accounts

The expansion strategy begins with identifying new use cases for Jumio’s solutions within current customer organizations. Dean uses the example of a bank that might purchase Jumio for customer onboarding and identity verification: “A bank might have originally signed up… for the initial onboarding of customers using identity verification. And that’s a very specific use case. But there’s another use case which is called authentication,” explains Dean.

“That use case is often handled by a different part of the bank. So how can we get into that other division? That’s exactly what we’re trying to do.”

2. Using ABM tactics for existing customers

Jumio uses many of the same ABM tactics for expansion that they use for acquisition. They research the organization to identify relevant divisions and roles, look for internal champions who might provide introductions, and develop targeted content for each persona.

“The same approach that we’re taking to account-based marketing, we’re taking to… these pod accounts,” Dean explains.

One key expansion tactic is their “Expert Series” webinars designed specifically for existing customers:

“Last year we started a whole [webinar] series called the “Expert Series” that we invite our customers to. And it’s all about… how can you get the most out of the product? Or at least introducing them to new elements of what we offer that they may not be using or taking advantage of.”

3. The cost-effective nature of expansion

Dean emphasizes that expanding relationships with existing customers is far more cost-effective than acquiring new ones: “How hard is it to land a new customer? How much does it cost you to land a new customer versus trying to expand your use cases with your existing customers where you already have a relationship? I mean, the second is infinitely easier than the first and far more cost effective.”

Jumio’s expansion strategy:

— Focuses on “pod accounts” (anchor customers) for expansion
— Identifies new use cases in different departments within existing customers
— Uses the same ABM tactics for expansion as for acquisition
— Conducts “Expert Series” webinars to educate customers on additional capabilities Recognizes the cost-effectiveness of expansion versus new acquisition

Conclusion

Jumio’s dual ABM strategy—applying the same principles to both acquisition and expansion—demonstrates a sophisticated approach to B2B marketing. By using intent data, researching accounts thoroughly, providing educational content, and integrating marketing and sales functions, they’ve created a system that works effectively across the entire customer lifecycle.

The results speak for themselves: marketing’s contribution to the sales pipeline has increased from roughly 10% to 60-70%. This transformation has elevated marketing from a support function to a strategic driver of business growth.

For B2B marketers looking to improve both customer acquisition and expansion, Jumio’s integrated strategy offers valuable lessons in how to leverage technology, content, and cross-functional collaboration to create an ABM program that delivers results.