Technological advances have spurred software development, but SaaS businesses’ subscription model has made it a thriving industry. SaaS companies charge a subscription for their cloud-based product. The subscription business model means companies become profitable over time and must provide value or risk losing customers. Investors like businesses with predictable recurring revenue because it’s easier to forecast and understand the company’s health. Business health depends on growth. We’ve compiled a list of SaaS lead generation strategies. Need ideas? See below for suggestions.
Best SaaS lead generation strategies
Content Marketing
Content marketing helps businesses build their brand, attract website visitors, and generate leads. It has a compounding return, so it increases in value over time, like a smart investment.
Content continues to drive leads, whereas PPC advertising only does so as long as you keep spending. Content is a business’s asset, while online advertising is rented. SaaS marketers should note this distinction.
Content marketing ideas? Three SaaS companies use content to generate leads:
Dropbox
Dropbox attracts potential customers with targeted content on its Dropbox, Dropbox Business, Dropbox Tech, and Dropbox Developer blogs. They host webinars to show prospects their credentials.
Dropbox design blog
Intercom
Product management, design, startups, and marketing are the focus of Intercom’s content marketing strategy. Inside Intercom’s blog, podcast, and books help build their brand and generate leads.
Sales, marketing, and customer conversion blog from Intercom.
Read More blogs on techydetect.
Moz
Moz’s thought leadership is well-known. Daily blog posts, authoritative guides, and Whiteboard Friday videos generate leads.
Product trials
SaaS companies are increasingly using product trials to generate leads. If you don’t already, your business should offer a product trial on its website. You can use a sales crm tool to manage your leads.
Trials are effective lead generation tools if you’re selling to a tech-savvy audience that wants to try the product. Self-serve product trials can generate leads with minimal marketing investment.
Several guardrails should be mentioned. Depending on your product’s complexity and unit economics, you should provide onboarding or support to ensure a positive product experience. This could be done via one-on-one calls, group webinars, or automated emails.
Product trials indicate buyer intent. Someone is investing about your product. HubSpot knows that trial users are more likely to buy, so we track them as product qualified leads (PQLs).
The key is to demonstrate value in a light-touch, cost-effective way without overwhelming the prospect. Product trials can become a stream of qualified leads with ongoing optimization.
SEO
SEO makes content discoverable on Google, Bing, and Baidu. On-page SEO and off-page SEO are complementary.
SEO-on-page
On-page SEO is in your control. You must create content that people want to read, link to, and share.
These include keyword strategy, internal linking, page load time, and UI. This on-page SEO guide explains how to optimise a website.
Backlinks
Off-page SEO isn’t just link building, as many believe. Link quality is more important than quantity. Quality links from trusted sites always trump quantity. Social media shares and links are another quality indicator.
Creating a distribution strategy increases links and shares. Matthew Barby, HubSpot’s Director of Acquisition, spoke at SearchLeeds on ‘There’s more to life than “great content.”‘ Meganewshub has shared some essential marketing tips on backlinks.
Marketing-by-referral
Referrals are among the most effective leads, according to research. 56% of sales reps call referrals “very important,” but only one-third of businesses have a referrals programme.
Companies should incentivize referrals is hotly debated. If you incentivize too heavily, you may get low-quality referrals, according to one school of thought. Optimize your SaaS business based on what works.
Before optimising, launch a referral programme. There’s software that can power your referral programme from start to finish, but we recommend creating a landing page on your website.
Explain what makes a good referral to ensure quality. This person’s job title, industry, or company size. If, how, and when will people be incentivized?
Marketing teams can draught referral templates for sales, customer success, and support teams. Making it easy for sales reps to ask is key.
AdWords
Inbound marketing can reduce AdWords spend, but millions click on search engine ads daily. If you don’t want to miss out on potential leads, invest in PPC, especially as ads become more prominent in Google search results.
PPC has many advantages. It delivers targeted traffic to your website and is highly scalable, so you can increase or decrease spend daily. Its predictability in terms of cost and results appeals to CFOs or those who control marketing budgets.
Run tests to see what activity gives your business the best ROI. PPC can generate significant traffic and leads if you’re willing to pay, but industry competition varies widely.
HubSpot’s Ads Add-On lets customers run inbound and paid campaigns from the software.
Comarketing
Many SaaS businesses run co-marketing campaigns with companies that complement their product offering or share a similar business philosophy.
Co-marketing has no hard and fast rules, but companies usually create an ebook, webinar, or research. Companies share leads and costs.
Both companies can leverage each other’s audiences to reach new customers. Co-marketing is effective if both teams are aligned. Both teams must agree and understand expectations from the start.
By working with other companies, you can create valuable content and generate leads. Co-marketing is a cost-effective way to generate leads, increase brand reach, and show thought leadership. HubSpot often partners with other companies in co-marketing campaigns, like LinkedIn:
HubSpot and LinkedIn co-market social media and sales.
Retargeting
Most website visitors never take the action you want them to, whether it’s an ebook download, online purchase, or free trial. Retargeting (also called remarketing) can increase conversions by re-engaging website visitors.
Retargeting follows your website visitors around the web and displays ads. Ecommerce sites lead retargeting by using contextual offers to lure back visitors. Imagine looking at a pair of jeans online, leaving the site, and then seeing ads (often with a discount) for them on other sites or social media. So, retargeting.
Retargeting can turn website visitors into customers in any industry. Most retargeting software lets marketers target beyond website visits. You can launch a campaign based on events like opening an email or attending a webinar, and some tools let marketers target similar people who haven’t visited your website.
Retargeting helps marketers build trust, credibility, and familiarity with website visitors. HubSpot customers can leverage retargeting with the AdRoll integration.
These are tested SaaS marketing strategies to help software companies grow, but you should test, analyse, and optimise them to see what works for your business.
