What Roofing Agencies Should Budget for Account Based Marketing

No published study prices roofing account-based marketing directly, so this page builds the budget from B2B-wide ABM benchmark data and names the actual commercial accounts a roofing company can target. The unit of analysis is the ABM line item inside a roofing marketing budget, not a residential lead.

Key Takeaways

• ABM already takes 30% of the average B2B marketing budget.
• 66% of programs planned to increase that spend again in 2024.
• ABM was the number one B2B marketing priority for a third straight year in the 2023 survey.
• 81% of marketers rate ABM ROI higher than other marketing.
• Only 52% actually measure ABM ROI at all.
• 75% of ABM programs run a one-to-one model for top accounts.
• 68% run one-to-many, and 61% run one-to-few at the same time.
• AGC counts 6,500-plus leading general contractors among its 27,000-plus member firms.
• BOMA represents 16,500-plus members managing over 10.5 billion square feet.
• 80%-plus of prime U.S. office space sits inside BOMA's member portfolio.
• 64% of BOMA conference attendees spend USD 1 million-plus a year on building products and services.
• IFMA counts 25,000-plus facility management members in 140-plus countries.
• A mid-size account program starts near USD 5,000 a month on published platform pricing.
• Larger account lists run USD 7,000 to 15,000 a month.
• Reachdesk's gifting plans start at USD 20,000 a year.
• A custom-merchandise minimum order runs USD 2,500.
• 85% of programs saw improved account engagement once it was tracked.
• 78% saw pipeline growth improve from ABM specifically.

Why there is no roofing-specific ABM budget number

Account-based marketing is surveyed as a B2B discipline, not broken out by trade, so a roofing company has to start from the same numbers a SaaS or industrial-services company would use and adjust the account list. The Momentum ITSMA and ABM Leadership Alliance 2023 ABM Benchmark Study (a web-based survey fielded in August 2023 among 320 ABM heads and practitioners) is the closest thing to an industry-wide reference, and it puts the average program at 30% of total marketing budget, with 66% of respondents planning to raise ABM spend again in 2024. It was also named the number one B2B marketing priority for a third year running in the same firm's separate January 2023 MPX Survey.

Treat 30% as a floor to model against, not a target to hit blindly - the number describes programs that already have a defined account list, which a roofing company has to build first.

The accounts a roofing ABM budget is actually buying

ABM only works against a named list, and for roofing that list is commercial, not residential: general contractors bidding new builds, property managers and building owners re-roofing existing portfolios, and facility managers overseeing multi-site maintenance contracts. The Associated General Contractors of America counts 27,000-plus member firms, including 6,500-plus leading general contractors, roughly 9,000 specialty-contracting firms and 11,000 service providers and suppliers. BOMA International represents 16,500-plus members who own or manage more than 10.5 billion square feet of commercial space, including over 80% of prime U.S. office space. IFMA counts 25,000-plus facility management members in over 140 countries.

Those three lists overlap in every metro area a roofing company already serves - the work is turning a trade association directory into named target accounts, not buying more search traffic.

What the tooling and tactics actually cost

Two published vendor pricing pages give a roofing company a real cost floor instead of a guess. Account-based engagement platform N.Rich states a realistic starting point of USD 5,000 a month for a mid-size account program, rising to USD 7,000-15,000 a month for a larger account list or multiple simultaneous campaigns; it also reports an average cost per account engagement of USD 1-3, against USD 10-50 on LinkedIn. Gifting and direct-mail platform Reachdesk publishes plans starting at USD 20,000 a year, with a USD 2,500 minimum order for custom branded merchandise sourced outside the platform.

Neither figure is roofing-specific pricing - both are what the software and the gifting programs cost regardless of trade - but they are real numbers a roofing marketing lead can put in a spreadsheet next to the 30% budget-share figure above.

Which ABM model to actually fund

The ABM Leadership Alliance 2023 study found most mature programs do not pick one model - they run several tiers at once: 75% of programs use one-to-one ABM against a handful of named top accounts, 68% use one-to-many against a broader named list, and 61% use one-to-few for a mid-size tier between the two. Only 45% of programs run just one model; 30% run all three.

For a roofing company, that typically maps to one-to-one against the five or ten regional GCs worth a dedicated relationship, one-to-few against a defined portfolio of property management firms, and one-to-many against the wider facility-manager list reached through shared content and paid social.

Budgeting the measurement, not just the outreach

The gap between claimed and measured ROI is the single biggest risk in a roofing ABM budget. ITSMA's 2023 data shows 81% of marketers say ABM ROI beats their other marketing, yet only 52% actually measure ABM ROI at all - meaning close to half of that 81% is an opinion, not a result. Programs that do measure report real gains: 85% saw improved account engagement, 78% saw pipeline growth, 77% saw better sales team satisfaction, and 74% saw revenue growth they attributed to the program.

A roofing company should budget a share of the ABM line - even 10-15% of it - specifically for attribution and reporting work, or the 30% budget figure above buys activity with no way to defend it at renewal time.

Where ABM fits next to a roofing company's existing paid search

None of the figures above argue for replacing search or local lead-gen with ABM - they argue for running a separate, named-account program alongside it. A roofing company that already spends on paid search for storm-response and residential leads is targeting an entirely different buyer than the GC or property manager an ABM program reaches, and the two budgets should be tracked, and reported on, separately so neither one absorbs credit for the other's results.

That separation also protects the 52%-measurement figure above from becoming another unmeasured claim: if a roofing company cannot show which closed deals came from the named-account list versus organic search or referral, the ABM budget has no defensible renewal case next year.

A first-year budget shape

Put together, a defensible first-year roofing ABM budget starts with a named list built from AGC, BOMA and IFMA-adjacent directories, funds a pilot at the N.Rich or Reachdesk entry price point, and reserves a measurable share for reporting before the first quarterly review. Scaling past year one should track toward the 30% benchmark only once the account list and the attribution model are both proven - not before.

Compare that against what a general growth-marketing partner would model for measurement and reporting infrastructure at Web Tonic's data intelligence services, against broader account-based growth work at Web Tonic's growth marketing services, and against creative production built for a named-account motion at Web Tonic's performance creative services.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much should a roofing company budget for account-based marketing?

There is no roofing-specific ABM budget study, so the honest starting point is the B2B-wide number: the Momentum ITSMA and ABM Leadership Alliance 2023 ABM Benchmark Study puts the average ABM budget at 30% of total marketing spend, with 66% of programs planning to increase it again in 2024. Applied to a roofing marketing budget, that means roughly a third of the line item, not a side project funded from what is left over after residential lead-gen.

Who counts as an account for a roofing company - is this the same as consumer lead-gen?

No, and pretending otherwise wastes the budget. ABM targets named organizations, not homeowners. For roofing, that means general contractors (AGC of America counts 6,500+ leading GCs among its 27,000+ member firms), building owners and managers (BOMA International represents 16,500+ members managing 10.5 billion-plus square feet of commercial space), and facility managers (IFMA counts 25,000+ members in 140+ countries). Each is a named list you can build and track, which is the entire point of ABM.

What does the software and tooling actually cost?

Published vendor pricing, not a lead-gen agency's rate card. Account-based engagement platform N.Rich states a realistic starting point of USD 5,000 a month for a mid-size account program, rising to USD 7,000-15,000 a month for a larger account list or multiple campaigns. Gifting/direct-mail platform Reachdesk publishes plans starting at USD 20,000 a year, with a USD 2,500 minimum order for custom branded merchandise sourced without the platform. Either is a real line item to model against, not a guess.

Does ABM actually outperform the marketing a roofing company is already running?

The B2B-wide answer is a qualified yes, with a catch. ITSMA's 2023 study found 81% of ABM marketers rate ABM ROI higher than their other marketing - but only 52% actually measure ABM ROI at all. A roofing company adopting ABM should decide how it will measure return before the first outreach goes out, or it joins the 48% making the same ROI claim without the evidence to back it.

Is one big account list enough, or does a roofing company need several tiers?

ABM Leadership Alliance data shows most mature programs run more than one model at once: 75% of programs use one-to-one ABM (a handful of named top accounts), 68% use one-to-many (a broader named list run through shared campaigns), and 61% use one-to-few (a mid-size tier in between). A roofing company chasing a small number of regional GCs alongside a wider portfolio of property managers is not being inefficient - it is matching the pattern the benchmark data shows works.

Sources

_{Momentum ITSMA & ABM Leadership Alliance, 2023 ABM Benchmark Study
Associated General Contractors of America, construction data
BOMA International, 2025 fact sheet
IFMA, membership announcement
N.Rich, pricing page
Reachdesk, pricing page
N.Rich, 2025 State of ABM report}