Software as a Service (SaaS) content marketing is the number one tool that your business should be implementing in order to generate leads, educate on your area of expertise, and convert potential customers into loyal users.
Content Marketing is the process of using media online to drive traffic towards your SaaS products and develop brand awareness by sharing information without explicit or singular promotion. Put simply, it is a clever way to drum up business online without overtly advertising.
If your content marketing efforts are falling flat, could use a refresh, or have not been kicked off yet, keep reading to learn more about developing a marketing strategy, how to determine your target audience, and how and where to focus your content.
Develop a Strategy for Your Content Marketing
Many SaaS marketers find themselves in a tough spot when it comes to content marketing for two reasons: they don’t develop a strategy and/or they don’t let the strategy run for long enough. It is a key part of online marketing to regularly post content in order to build momentum and gain traction in today’s online market. Most companies do not see results from content marketing right up front but staying dedicated and determined pays off in the long run.
Here are a few beginning steps for developing a winning content marketing strategy:
Determine Goals
It goes without saying that if you do not decide upfront what your marketing goals are, it will be incredibly hard to determine whether or not they worked. Setting marketing goals practically looks like answering a lot of questions: Who are you trying to reach? What are you trying to accomplish? Who will be producing the content? What does success look like?
Creating cycles where you will assess your success, determine new goals, revisit previous goals, and make adjustments will help you to keep your plans on target and attainable.
Plan Content
Content creation is a whole beast in itself, but with the right plan and strategy, it is the key to helping you develop brand awareness, educate your target audience, and convert customers. It can seem overwhelming when deciding what content you should post about, but that’s where having a plan comes to the rescue! Rather than deciding on a whim, you should develop a schedule of what type of content will be posted, where those posts will go, and how your content topics will be cycled.
The easiest way to keep track of your planned content is through implementing a shared calendar tool where you can get ahead on writing, plan for the future, and know that you are covered for weeks or even months at a time.
Measure Performance
The most important aspect of developing your strategy is determining your key performance indicators (KPIs). Your business overall should have a set of KPI’s used for tracking metrics benchmarks, but your content marketing should have it’s own set of benchmarks to track and measure the performance of your marketing content.
There are a plethora of metrics you may choose to track such as clicks, subscribers, conversions, views, etc. Your area of business will determine what type of metrics are most important to you, but the key is having a set of indicators that help you to track your progress.
Sales Funnel
A content marketing sales funnel is exactly what it sounds like. It is the figure for tracking your audience and funneling them through a pathway to becoming a converted customer. There are three main locations on the sales funnel– aptly named Top, Middle, and Bottom.
Top
At the top of the funnel is where your content should be marketed towards awareness and education. This is an audience who is not yet familiar with your brand or product. Your goal is to help your audience understand your product, assess their needs, and realize that your product or service can solve a problem for them. The success of this content can be tracked with click-based goals and traffic numbers. This is not the stage where you expect to see conversions or revenue, though that is the direction where you are trying to move.
Middle
The middle of the funnel is where your content is geared towards sign-up traffic and lead generation. This is an audience who is already familiar with your service, but may not yet be ready to buy in. Your goal is to shift this target from a casual reader into a member of your audience by getting their information. Marketing your product in a free trial or by offering newsletters and e-books is a great way to keep your product top of mind and in front of this audience who may be ready to try out your service but are not yet ready to convert. Engagement is a great way to gauge the success of this content by getting contact information, downloads and interactions.
Bottom
The bottom of the funnel is where your content is focused on customer conversion and retention. This is the audience who is ready to buy in and pay for your product. They may have already tried your product in a trial or are ready to jump in. Your goal with this content is to officially convert and to maintain that relationship through content offers, upgrades, and satisfaction. Goals for this level of content are easiest to track because this is where you count sales and revenue.
A noteworthy point to mention is that not all customers will come to you at the top of the funnel and work their way down. Many prospective buyers will have already done their research, will already be familiar with their needs or your product, and thus are ready to purchase. That is the ideal prospective customer! Therefore, it is important to make sure that your content is equally shared for every level of customer in the sales funnel. When a customer is ready to sign up, you don’t want them to have to search far and wide for a sign-up button, you want that to be the easiest part of the process!
Marketing Mediums
Now that you have established your marketing strategy, set goals, and determined the type of audience you are reaching, it is time to reach them and post that content. Knowing where and how to post content is the most important piece of the puzzle in content marketing.
Organic Search
Case studies show that your audience will primarily discover you through an organic search. This means that you want to post content in such a way that your target audience will reach you through the use of a search engine. Most SaaS companies take advantage of blog posts and optimized website landing pages to do this. This means posting regular content with researched keywords so that your page becomes a top search result.
Social Media
Content shared on social media is a great way to build relationships with your audience and help them to share their experience with your brand. Creating a steady presence on social media helps to keep your brand in mind and close at hand. Social media content is different from search engines because it has the potential to build an audience of readers who may not have thought to search for your related topics or brand. This content can help you market sign-ups and educating information.
Email Marketing
Using email marketing is a sure fire way to know that customers who are interested in your content will see your content. Unlike search engines and social media, email is not based on algorithms and analytics, therefore if your targeted customer has subscribed to your email you know it will come across their screen. This is a great way to share content geared towards conversions and retention.
Optimizing Content
Every piece of content that your company shares should be optimized towards a goal. This ensures that all of your marketing is measurable and useful towards gaining conversions. Some quick tips for making sure that your content is optimized for success include:
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and keyword research
- Previous content refreshes
- Calls to action
- Continual follow-ups
- Use of internal links
How We Can Help
At RevTek Capital, our main goal may not be content marketing, but our main goal is ensuring that our partnerships succeed in business. We understand that content marketing for your SaaS business plays a key role in that success. Therefore, we have access to marketing materials and special offers from marketing partners to help you develop successful growth strategies.
If you are ready to take your SaaS business to the next level with revenue based financing and content marketing assistance, connect with our team.
