Growing a SaaS business, especially in today’s climate, is not the easiest of tasks. With the SaaS business model becoming more and more important to the overall software space, it is more important than ever for SaaS companies to lean into marketing tactics to actually get the word out about their businesses. Fortunately, SaaS businesses are very primed for online marketing, and they don’t have to worry about promoting specifics products in the way that an ecommerce store would. They also don’t have to deal with the perception of being an independent ecommerce retailer when most consumers trust major ecommerce and retail brands for their online shopping needs such as Amazon, Walmart, and eBay.
However, there are also big players in the SaaS space as well that you need to be aware of: Hubspot, Salesforce, and Adobe quickly come to mind. That being said, it is unlikely that your SaaS offering, particularly if it is more niche, is directly competing with these SaaS giants, and you can focus your SaaS content marketing efforts on particular buyer personas. When creating strategies here, you’ll want to not just sell the technology, but also sell the technology in a way that is a solution for the pain points that your potential users are experiencing. As a SaaS business, you are not just fighting to sell a subscription to your software, but you are also fighting the perception that a subscription-based software solution can actually solve this problem.
Because of this, a SaaS content marketing strategy can’t just make generic content. You actually have to create content that is helpful, informative, and generates a bit of buzz. While viral content is by no means the answer, you do want to make sure that there is a specific appeal to the content you are putting out. You also want to make sure that the content you are creating will actually convince people to become users of your SaaS solution – or at the very least give them a reason to sign up for a free trial. But in order to do this, the content itself actually needs to be discoverable.
SEO is, generally speaking, the most effective strategy to get potential SaaS users, as their searchers are generally high intent. Nobody is going on Facebook wanting to be served ads about an ecommerce analytics platform, but if they are actively choosing to search for one, then it is likely that they are doing research into their options. When SaaS companies engage in content marketing efforts, they should always consider the users and how they are perceiving the market. They should also do a lot of research into the problem or problems that their SaaS solution is actually looking to solve. Doing so will help them generate a content calendar and a laundry list of seed keyword ideas that they can further explore.
Once this is done, SaaS companies can then identify longtail keywords and informational queries that make sense for their business. They can then gear their content marketing efforts toward these keywords, and use search to get users directly to their SaaS website, which is very important when it comes to generating leads and converting casual browsers into users.