Marketing that helps a SaaS company promote services and products requires a specific kind of strategy and thinking.
Due to the business model of SaaS companies, which sell access to software stored online based on a subscription, the marketing needs to take a different approach from selling products and software customers can own.
A well-designed SaaS marketing strategy is based on several pillars, such as educational content, materials designed to increase awareness, and tools that catch and keep the users’ interest.
If you’re looking for guidance on how to build a solid marketing strategy for a SaaS company, make sure to keep reading. We’re going to discuss a few of the most popular tools that specialists like to use to promote business growth.
SaaS Marketing: Definition
SaaS marketing is not a fixed concept – it’s basically any type of digital marketing you can use to promote and build awareness around software products. Plus, it often includes elements of offline marketing and Above-The-Line marketing to build awareness and position a product in a new market.
So, what is SaaS marketing? While it is a combination of traditional marketing practices, the process involves people and elements that don’t often come together.
That’s because product developers, programmers, and other tech-oriented people have to work with marketing and sales to create a powerful marketing strategy that will get people interested in trying a new software product.
Tools To Help With Saas Marketing
1. Build Content Areas
Software products often respond to several needs of different people. So, instead of using a general approach (a blog for your business) in an attempt to attract everyone’s attention, it’s best to use a targeted approach by creating content areas.
These content areas are often smaller blogs, hyper-focused on one topic. This way, your content will appeal to different people, who have different needs, and they’ll be able to see this by reading the blog posts that respond to their specific problems.
By creating different blogs with different user interfaces and user experiences, you’ll provide each content segment with a different voice. For this, you have to create different user personas and identify each one’s pain points.
As time goes by, these separate blogs will become content areas (or hubs) and generate their own communities, which in the end, leads to better coverage of your target audience as a whole.
2. Focus On Video Content
There’s no doubt about it – video content is all the rage right now, and not just for entertainment. According to the 2020 Content Marketing Institute report, 66% of marketers use video content as the main form of content delivery.
In the world of Saas marketing, video content brings in more qualified leads each year and is the medium most likely to turn viewers into paying customers.
That’s because, when done right, video content helps you showcase the features of your software product while also addressing the viewers’ pain points.
However, high-quality video content is not easy or cheap to produce. So, you need to build a content distribution strategy first and then make sure your content is engaging enough to reach a broader audience.
Tip: Video content is the ideal medium for educational content, but try to keep it short and simple. Long-form video content is not always the best way to promote a software product, but you can use it to reply to some of the most frequently asked questions received from users.
3. Influencers Can Be Helpful
Influencer marketing is going strong nowadays, and SaaS businesses can find reliable collaborators in this world as well. However, you’d have to find niche-specific people who understand your software products and consider them useful.
It may also be a good idea to work with micro and nano influencers (under 10,000 followers) than to focus your efforts on getting the attention of someone with a huge following that’s not relevant to your niche.
One way influencers can help is by creating content designed to educate the audience and spread awareness with regard to some of the most important features of your product(s).
4. Customer Experience & Service – A Must-Have
In the case of SaaS companies, the marketing doesn’t stop the moment a customer pays for the product. Because this business model is based on subscriptions and upgrades, you also need to work on customer retention.
You do that by making sure the customer experience is exemplary and that people feel taken care of by your customer service team. Also, don’t stop producing value for your paying customers by offering exclusive access to content designed for their needs.
Wrap Up
SaaS marketing is the type of marketing that never stops. You have to constantly care for your customers while also looking for high-quality leads and spreading awareness.
This is why, before anything else, SaaS businesses must create a reliable and scalable marketing strategy.