What firmographics can be gathered from IP address data

Within ABM and other B2B inbound strategies, researching and identifying high value accounts is a top priority. Interestingly, nearly every company has anonymous website visitors who leave a trail of firmographic insights.  

But what if some of this tedious market research was automated for these teams? A little behind the scenes digging by IP address providers is one way to pinpoint firmographics… simply by leveraging the site traffic data you already have.

1. Geolocation

IP addresses leave lots of geolocation data behind. Not only can marketers learn what country their site visitors live in, but they can also gather insights about their specific city. Here are specific firmographics marketers can gather from geolocation data:

• Country
• City
• Region or state
• Zip code
• Time zone

This data also reveals more important information such as what language these viewers speak, what culture they come from, and what other values they may share. Try our “My IP Address” tool to view the datasets you can gather from IP addresses.

2. Company

Anonymous traffic isn’t as anonymous when you start looking at IP addresses. Our IP to Company API reveals what businesses are represented by website traffic.

For instance, type in 173.241.154.255 into our free search tool, and here’s what you’ll learn:

This address belongs to a business, specifically Overstock.com. From that information, you can also learn that this company has historically focused on B2C and B2B. But within the last year, they (along with Amazon.com) have also expanded to include a U.S. government contract, saving federal employees time and conserving taxpayers’ dollars.

In other words, if this is a market segment you’re trying to reach and this IP address anonymously visits your website, this data can help you conduct targeted research. The result? Account-based marketing teams can leverage anonymous traffic even more effectively.

3. Industry

In the above example, the company name also revealed a lot about specific industries that may need the content, services, or products your company offers. Overstock.com is an online retailer with a focus on furniture.

This information can point you toward other companies in the online furniture retail industry or help you take note of similar leads visiting your site. For instance, if Overstock.com is your ideal buyer, then Wayfair.com or Burrow may also be high-value accounts worth targeting, especially if they’ve visited your site.

The point is this, by gathering data about industry segments that frequent your site, you can pinpoint the best high value accounts and then cater your messaging to personally answer their specific pain points.

Especially in complex industries with multiple decision makers, such as healthcare or tech, these insights can also help marketing teams create content that speaks specifically to the pressures faced by shareholders, product managers, developers, and so on and so forth.

4. Domain name

Additionally, IP to Company data shows the domain name of the website visitor. This data is often easier to use as the main field for data enrichment. For example, even if several companies have the same name, they won’t have the same domain name.

Host.io is another way to enrich company domain data, including metadata that might show the industry or product. Using the Overstock.com example, the graphic below shows a few insights that can be gathered from a domain name.

For marketing teams, this information helps narrow down more details about specific companies to target. In short, these IP address insights allow marketing teams to turn IP addresses into better segmented audiences.

5. Type of company

If you visit the IP to Company page on our site, you can try our free search tool. This will show you what types of companies tend to frequent your website. Here are the most common:

• ISP
• Business
• Hosting

This data is useful for traffic classification. Specifically, it helps marketing teams delineate between IP addresses that can be used for lead enrichment and those that can’t.

For instance, if the company data points to an ISP, marketing teams know that this IP address can’t be used for lead enrichment. On the other hand, if it points to a specific business, marketing teams know to pursue the IP address data further. IPinfo can also do custom classification upon request, allowing users to see edu., gov., and others for further insights.

How to to use IP firmographics for ABM

As 3rd party cookies disappear, ABM and Sales Intel will need more ways to leverage anonymous site visitors. Here are a few ways IP to Company data can help.

Market segmentation

This data helps marketing teams segment their buyers based on similar characteristics. For instance, before developing ideal customer profiles (ICPs), marketing teams need this data to create an accurate snapshot of the buyers they’re targeting.

From there, marketing teams can begin to pinpoint the correct accounts to target. And while there are plenty of tools out there to help develop ICPs, companies need to get behind their anonymous website traffic to get the whole picture.

Web personalization

One study found that website personalization increases marketing ROI anywhere from 10 to 30 percent. Even basic personalization efforts, such as pre-filled forms or correct currency, can increase sales up to 8 percent. Using data such as geolocation and company data, for instance, B2B marketing teams can customize their website to reach the right high value accounts.

Automation

One of the top challenges for ABM strategy is making the process scalable. IP address providers, however, specialize in data mining so that marketing teams don’t have to do all the digging. By revealing anonymous traffic, providers such as IPinfo help teams automate website personalization, ad targeting, email outreach, and much more.

In a world flooded by marketing speak, personalization is a microphone people can hear. IP data is one way ABM can automate, segment, and pinpoint the best accounts and leads who need the products or services you offer.

Learn more about gathering firmographics with IP address data. Connect with a data expert today!