Content marketing is creating and distributing different kinds of content, mostly online, of a certain product or service. Its main goal is to attract, convert and retain targeted customers by engaging them through consistent entertaining and informative content.
With the ease of accessibility, the internet is the perfect platform for this. Almost everyone has access to the net through their mobile phones, tablets, or laptops. You may wonder what content is best suited for your brand. Content marketing targets these users and is able to generate attraction by providing valuable information about the product and being convinced to buy.
The Purpose of Content Marketing
The main goal of content marketing for any Saas startup is visibility. Visibility means more brand awareness, which translates to possible uptake on sales of products and services. A specifically suited content marketing strategy will bring profits and credibility to the company.
A perfectly executed content marketing strategy could give your company a boost up and separate them from other competitors. After all, being noticed first by potential customers is already a step in the right direction in creating long-term relationships that are very good for profit and, thus, the company’s success in the business.
HubSpot reports in 2020 that, 70% of marketers are investing in content marketing. This shows that it is a viable tool for generating profit. It builds trust by letting the companies show their customers a more relatable side of the business.
Content marketing focuses on brand awareness that builds brand loyalty. This allows the company to have an opportunity to interact with their potential customers and gain insights on customer feedback that can lead to improvements in their products and services.
Also, the Demand metric says that content marketing costs 62% less to produce, but it can generate three times more leads than other marketing or advertising tools.
Do SaaS Businesses Need a Different Content Marketing Strategy?
With Saas, you are both selling technology and service at the same time. Most marketing strategies end with the product being sold. But in Saas, potential buyers mostly consider the quality of support the provider can offer. They are not only scrutinizing the product itself, but they are thinking of the availability of technical support. This can range from initial training of personnel on how to use the software to off-hours troubleshooting.
You have to keep in mind that SAAS is software. Your marketing must include instructions to guide your potential customer in understanding what your product offers. There should be a consideration that your approach will have to include technical aspects. It had to be informative enough to satisfy your potential customers’ questions and engage them so they do not lose interest.
Your sales rely heavily on reviews. Nowadays, consumers have a different approach to buying. They don’t just buy the products based on the information that the company provides. They also base their decision on reviews or opinions of other people who have bought the product. They find it more convincing to rely on these reviews because they have tried the product themselves.
Ecommerce Vs. Saas Content Marketing
An eCommerce business is a business that has transactions on a website. Most eCommerce businesses are one-off sales, and usually, the interaction between the company and the customers end with the customer’s payment for the goods or service.
On the other hand, a SaaS business is a software company that sells its software on a subscription basis or payment plan. They support their customers throughout their subscription term by providing updates, customization, and troubleshooting with their software.
At a glance, the content marketing for the two is similar. They often use the same styles and have mostly the same goals in attracting potential customers to buy the product or services.
The difference is mainly in their focus. E-commerce business prefers the strategy of Search Engine Optimization or SEO. It generates more traffic to your website than traditional advertising. They cater their content to new customers.
On the other hand, SaaS business marketing content is focused on retaining customers. The content is mainly aimed at brand loyalty.
Here are the following content marketing tips for your business.
Content Marketing Tips For Saas Startups
1. Know Your Product And Services Well
It is imperative that you have the necessary know-how with regard to your product and services. You just can’t have a rudimentary understanding of what you are selling since it could lead to misinformation and may cause distrust between you and your customer. One content marketing tip is to have in-depth knowledge that will help you make informative content that is reliable and factual. Customers would trust you and your product since all their questions will be answered. They’ll feel assured they have the details they need for an informed purchase.
If you know your product and services well, you can design marketing content that would best showcase their best parts. You’ll have a plethora of angles to approach in your marketing strategy that can be helpful if various limitations constrict you due to budgeting, availability, censorship, etc.
2. Know Your Target Audience Well
Who are you selling to? What are the characteristics of your buyer? Age and gender could be determining factors with your target audience. They are very different in the content they consume. Younger customers are more into social media posts and vlogs. Older ones tend to gravitate more to podcasts or webinars. Someone with a more technical background would prefer a webinar or a downloadable guide.
Just like knowing your product well, knowing your audience well will help you tailor-fit your content marketing. It will allow you to be flexible in your approach but still achieve your goal.
There are so many profiles that you can form by studying the characteristics of your target audience. But you have to be more careful in the number of profiles you make. Too many profiles could lead to congestion and might prove difficult to handle. Focus on a limited number to be more efficient.
3. Create Topics Around Keywords With Great Potential
All customers would start their research on the internet by typing keywords on the search engine. Since they do not know your brand or your company yet, they would mostly type in words that best describe what they want or what problem they are encountering that needs to be solved.
The customer journey research would then move to reviews, instruction manuals, specific functions that they want to use, troubleshooting problems, and then the renewal process of the service. Identifying the keywords is important. The following marketing tools can help you with efficient keyword research.
- Semrush – An all-in-one tool. This site improves your online visibility with the various tools available to build, manage and measure campaigns across all channels.
- Moz– same with its competitor Semrush has an all-in-one SEO toolkit for advanced keyword research and offers online tutorials.
- Google keyword Planner – A tool used to generate related phrases from a target phrase. It identifies how much traffic a phrase generates and gives you an idea of competition and cost.
Your content must reflect those keywords in each step of the consumer’s journey. This helps in developing content that fulfills their needs. This makes your customer rely on your content more, thus increasing customer satisfaction and, importantly, customer retention.
Close.com has developed its website to attract visitors with keywords frequently searched by salespersons who are their target audience.
And then, at the end of their blog post, a content upgrade will be offered to the reader. If the reader is interested, he/she’ll subscribe to more content, thus retaining the customer’s patronage for a longer period.
4. Choose The Right Writer For Your Topics
An important content marketing tip is to make sure that you have the right writer for your content. The end product will reflect its creator. The writer must be knowledgeable about the product or service that he/she is writing about. He/she must have an in-depth understanding to explain better what your company is offering.
He/she must engage in terms of his/her writing style. Your potential customers must be entertained enough to stay to read/listen all throughout.
An example of this is Moz’s Rand Fishkin and his Whiteboard Friday video. He is known for his expansive knowledge of SEO content marketing, which shows in how his video is produced. He is articulate and expressive. Even Though his topics could be challenging to his viewers. His delivery is very clear and very understandable.
Even if he’s no longer on Whiteboard Fridays, he still gets about 1,000 searches every month.
5. Provide Valuable Information
SAAS is a very technical product. You must consider the information you want your content to contain. Too much and the customer could get bored, but too little could disappoint the customer with the lack of info.
Kinsta is a company that sells premium WordPress hosting. Their websites get a lot of traffic because of their in-depth blog post about hosting.
Case studies made by UpLead are also garnering readers. Their strategy is to write stories about how businesses acquire leads and users.
Content marketing educates the audience, says 72% of marketers (CMI). Your startup content marketing must give knowledge that is needed by your targeted audience. You’ll gain their trust and be a leading source of information for them. This will then improve traffic on your site.
6. Get Your Content Published On a Relevant Website
There are 2 billion websites online. Which website will you choose? And since 50% of most of these websites are viewed on mobile phones, how far can your content reach its intended viewers?
Having your content published on well-known sites could be beneficial for your company because you’ll have a greater reach for a broader range of customers.
You’ll reach not only your targeted audience but also those that might have been pulled by curiosity with regard to your product.
Another content marketing tip is to know which websites have consistent traffic. Research which websites match your product. Everywheremarketer.com recommends some of the sites that you’d like your content to be on.
Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are the most popular sites. These have a further reach of demographics and are very accessible. There are also video-sharing sites like YouTube and Vimeo, which attract a lot of viewers.
7. Make Use Of Different Types Of Content
Do not be limited in terms of the types of content you produce. You have access to all different types.
Video is one of the most well-known types of content. Almost everyone is familiar with video-sharing websites like youtube and TikTok. In Hubspot’s 2022 State of Marketing Trends report, video ranks first, blogs are second, and images are third in popularity.
It is true that people nowadays rarely read. But a lot of people still prefer blogs to get more information. How-to articles are very popular with 77% of respondents, followed by news and trends at 49% and guides and ebooks at 47% (Statista). You can use various editing tools to design your content. Removal.ai is one you can try.
According to a study by Wyzowl, the statistics show that viewers prefer videos at 73%; text-based article websites at 11%; 4% like infographics; while ebooks, webinar, and sales call each has a 3% preference.
Hutjar uses blog posts for their behind-the-seen content. Shopify uses podcasts, video content, resources, and courses to interact with its customers. Moz has Whiteboard Fridays videos for their content. Sleeknote has customer testimonials that prove to be valid and profit-earning for the company
Choose the one that will give you the best visibility and more recognition of your company. But keep in mind that efficiency and effectiveness is also major factor.
Conclusion
These are a few content marketing tips that can help you build a strong content marketing strategy for your product and services. Good content marketing could gain you a following, which translates to profit for the company.
The key point to remember with content marketing is to build a long-term relationship with your customers. This relationship takes time to build. It is more of a jog than a sprint. Be consistent with your content.
Trust is a major factor. Your customer must feel this connection with your company. You have to be relatable. You have to be their go-to guy. Your company’s integrity to be a problem solver must be ingrained in their minds. And if you have built that rapport, these customers will always come back to you.
