These days, having a great product alone doesn’t determine the success of a SaaS brand. What truly matters is how the product is presented to the target audience through ‘content’. It plays a key role in generating business organically.
Content strategy is the first step where it all begins. It is what keeps visitors engaged, often for the long term. However, if this foundational step is not planned well, you won’t see the results you expect, no matter how much effort you put in, whether through building backlinks or implementing other SEO strategies.
That’s why to assist all the business sites operating in SaaS who are planning to start or the ones who are already doing content marketing but not getting the right results, we’ve written this blog post and included significant insights:
- For SaaS websites that are producing content for the first time:
- Challenges one may face while planning content
- Step-by-step approach one needs to follow to develop the best content strategy
- For Established SaaS Brands that are getting traffic but struggling to see actual results:
- Mistakes one makes while planning content
- Advanced Strategies that can help convert each content piece into a conversion asset
- How Our BoFu Content Strategy Can Help SaaS Websites Generate Inbound Leads (For both Web Page and Blog Content)
- The Link Acquisition Approach We Prioritize for SaaS Brands
- Tools we use for content research, planning, improvement, optimization and performance tracking
- Our approach to maintain transparency and communication with our clients
So, let’s get started with the challenges SaaS websites usually face when producing content for the first time.
Major Challenges Faced by New SaaS Brands While Planning Content
Starting out as a new SaaS brand seems exciting but when it comes to planning content, it gets confusing.
Well, we do feel you and it’s absolutely normal as just like you, many emerging brands are struggling with the same situation and are continuously looking to get the answers to the following questions:
- Who are we writing for?
- What should we write about?
- Why are we writing for this?
- How do we stand out?
- What is the right tone?
- How do we keep it going?
You can relate how tough it is to get the answers especially if you are doing content planning for the first time. But, don’t panic, we are here to guide you on how to proceed and are sharing the solution in the next section!
Steps to Develop SaaS Content Strategy (For Those Who Are Planning to Write Content But Don’t Know Where to Start)
Here is the step-by-step content strategy approach that can help you achieve desired results through content whether you just have started your journey in this field:
Step 1. Get a Clarity on Your Audience and Identify their Pain Points
The content strategy for any SaaS brand becomes more informed when the business owner is clear about their target audience and their pain points. This helps them create content around what the potential customers actually care about.
Wondering how you will get to this? Well, by defining your ideal customer profile (ICP).
Here, we are sharing a few questions whose answers will help you define the correct ICP for your SaaS business:
- What industries are likely to benefit from my product? (whether it is e-commerce, healthcare or education)
- The target audiences’ status (startups, mid-sized companies or enterprises)
- Who will use my product? (whether marketing managers, IT admins, or CEOs)
- Location of my target audience (whether local, national, or global)
You can get answers to these questions, either through leveraging existing data (like analyze demographics, purchase patterns and behavior of existing customers in your CRM, look at audience insights like age, gender, location and interests through Google Analytics) or prefer to get the direct feedback from customers via conducting surveys.
Step 2. Decide Which User Section You Want to Target (Based on Customer Journey)
Next, define the objective you want to achieve with content marketing. Whether it’s driving website traffic, generating leads or building brand awareness?
a. If it is: growing brand visibility, increasing traffic, and capturing interest, then you need to answer the queries of prospects in the awareness stage.
You can create high-level content that introduces concepts, solutions or trends related to your product without being overly promotional.
Like, for a marketing automation SaaS business, we suggest the following content ideas:
- Blog post: “What Is Marketing Automation and Why Does It Matter?”
- Infographics: “10 Trends Shaping SaaS in [Trending Year]”
- Video: “Beginner’s Guide to [Industry Topic]”
b. If you want to nurture leads – Build trust and educate prospects about your product. This you can achieve by creating engaging content for the users who are actively researching solutions and comparing options.
You can offer more in-depth, solution-oriented content that highlights your expertise and starts positioning your product as a solution.
Like, for such sites, we suggest the following content type:
- Case study: “How [Your Product] Helped [Client Name] Achieve 2x Growth”
- Guides: “Step-by-Step Process for Choosing the Right [Product Type]”
- Comparison blogs: “Tool A vs. Tool B: Which Is Best for Your Needs?”
c. For the ones who want to drive conversions and close deals – You need to plan content that can convince and convert prospects who are ready to make a purchase.
Like, our content suggestions for such brands would be:
- Product demos: “How [Your Product] Solves [Specific Problem]”
- Testimonials: “Hear What Our Customers Say About [Product Name]”
- Offers: Free trials, live walkthroughs, or personalized consultations.
Step 3. To Target Right Content, You Need to Target the Right Keywords
If you want to get the desired results out of your content, it is a must to include the right keywords in every content piece you create.
Because a content piece is considered successful when it hits the target audience’s intent, which is possible through right keyword research.
Like for the users in the awareness stage, you can use Top-of-the-funnel (ToFu) keywords. While the ones who are evaluating options or in consideration stage, you can use Mid-of-the-funnel (MoFu) keywords and for the ones who are on the verge of taking a decision, Bottom-of-the-funnel keywords are the target terms you should use.
To get in-depth information, you can also read our article – Mastering SaaS Keyword Research that Drive Signups and Demo Requests in which we’ve covered each essential information along with the sample report that we share with our all SaaS clients.
Also, we would like to share here that all the SEO strategies that work together to achieve success. While content is key, your overall SEO health is equally important. We have clearly shown how we strategize and execute the SEO process for our SaaS clients
Due to These Mistakes in Content Strategy, Existing SaaS Brands are Getting Traffic But No Leads
Now, coming to discuss the content strategizing related mistakes that cost SaaS sites a great loss.
These are the major ones:
Mistake 1. Focusing on Product Features in All Content
The brands that overemphasize on product features in all their content miss leads from awareness and consideration stage.
They feel like educating clients about the features of their service can bring them business. But in reality, clients are interested more in learning what the service model can do for them.
As a brand, only if you give them the feeling- “Yes, this is what we were looking for and can help us simplify our work”, will they view your software service features.
Mistake 2. Overlooking Keyword Research While Choosing Content Topics
The brands who create content without performing this crucial and foundational step of SEO i.e. keyword research, usually reduce discoverability of their created content themselves.
By not doing so, they fail to understand the search intent of their target audience. As a result, choose topics that do not satisfy user needs, leading to poor engagement, low conversions and high bounce rates.
However, here, we would like to add one more fact; focussing solely on keywords can also land you in trouble. Sites that follow this, usually stuff keywords in their content; making it seem robotic and consequently they fail to engage users and convert them.
Mistake 3. Ignoring Content Distribution
Content distribution is as critical as content creation because it ensures the right people see your content at the right time. Those brands who often overlook this, limit their reach and impact of their created content.
Do you know even valuable content goes unnoticed without promotion? We say this because some of our articles got positioned in top-results after we acquired backlinks from authoritative domains.
You can also check out our article, “How Many Backlinks Are Enough to Rank on the 1st Page of Google?”, in case you want to know the number of links you need to acquire for your content to make it rank on top results.
Mistake 4. Not Updating Content Regularly
With every day, new things get added as well as deleted from our lives as the world is really fast. Similarly, is the case of the SaaS industry.
You’ve put in efforts on content two years ago and got it ranked in the top position; that’s great. But, if you think the same content is going to rank even today, then it might not happen.
As things have evolved in that span, new stats came into existence. That is why revisiting and refreshing older content becomes most important. Otherwise, witnessing drop in rankings due to outdated content is something not to be amazed at.
However, this is not the only reason for a ranking drop, you can check out our other article on Google ranking dropped dramatically, where we’ve covered all the possible reasons and their solutions as well.
Mistake 5. Lack of Educational Content
Trust takes time to build and this is something that SaaS brands usually look for. Some of them use paid-advertisements to win that trust but there is a great difference when you appear in sponsored ads and rank organically in the top search results (based on user’s perspective).
The brands who often focus more on promoting their SaaS product and features, assuming that users will automatically see the value, themselves narrow the scope of leads.
Without educational content, you cannot win that trust. Decreased brand authority, poor user engagement, lower customer retention and missed conversion opportunities are the popular losses of not covering ‘educational intent’.
Mistake 6. Not Using Clear CTAs (Call-to-Actions)
You planned, published as well as distributed the content but did not guide users to the next step, how will they proceed?
They may feel lost or unsure about how to get started, potentially reducing their overall satisfaction with your brand.
Whether on your website or blog page, content without a CTA forces prospects to leave without taking meaningful action.
Mistake 7. Underestimating Visual Content
You remember some of what you read and more of what you see, right? Similarly, adding visual content contributes more engagement, comprehension and retention.
The brands who underestimate the visual content are mostly the ones who overemphasize text-based content. As a result, they get minimal engagement and readers leave without fully absorbing the key takeaways.
Advanced Strategies One Should Try to Convert Each Content Piece into a Conversion Asset
Basics done; now it’s time to uncover the advanced strategies you can follow to get the desired results from each content piece published under your brand name.
Here, these are:
1. Prioritize Content Pillars and Clusters
Search engines like Google always prioritize websites with organized and authoritative content. That’s the reason, every successful SaaS business includes content pillars and clusters in their strategy.
Content pillars help them rank for broad keywords while clusters enable them to target long-tail keywords, driving all types of traffic.
Like, a cloud-based restaurant management software company can use “The Ultimate Guide to Cloud-Based Restaurant Management Software” as the pillar content and the cluster topics as shown in the figure:
If specifically, you want some guidance on what topics you should cover for your SaaS website, contact us to get some help. We will try making things easier for you.
2. Encourage Collaboration with the Teams
Your sales and customer support teams directly interact with your audience daily. Right? They know their challenges, goals they want to achieve for their business and specific queries better than anyone.
A Key Takeaway:
This small shift makes your content feel relatable and authentic, helping prospects see themselves in your solution instantly.
3. Experiment with New Formats
Everyone learns differently. In the same way, some of your clients like reading blogs while others will feel more engaged when they watch videos, podcasts or participate in interactive quizzes.
Here, are some more ideas you can try:
Covering all these formats for your SaaS software will help you in:
- Reaching a larger audience
- Improving your SEO score
- Boosting engagement
- Showcasing your expertise
4. Emphasize Linkable Assets
Creating linkable assets is the perfect solution for those brands who are looking to establish authority. In case you are new to this term, let’s define it to help you understand!
Linkable assets are high-value, shareable content pieces created specifically to attract backlinks. This not only improves your SEO score but also positions your brand as a thought leader in the industry.
To know more, you can also read our detailed insights on SaaS Link Building Services.
Here’s How Our Team Can Help You Generate Inbound Leads for Your SaaS Business (BoFu Strategy for Keyword Research, Website Content and Blogs)
We, as your content strategist, focus on generating inbound leads through content and attract users that are more likely to convert into paying customers for SaaS websites.
That is why, we start following BoFu strategy even from our first step- keyword research. Then, include the identified keywords on the pages that you want to rank in top-results.
Let’s elaborate!
1. BoFu Keyword Research
Our team of keyword analysts use premium tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs for conducting the process of keyword-research. We know what actually matters to your business (leads and conversions), that’s the reason, focus on targeting bottom-of-the-funnel (BoFu) keywords even from the beginning.
Here are the essential keywords we find after research:
- Customer-centric keywords
- Outcome-oriented keywords
- Integration and compatibility keywords
- Feature-related keywords
- Long-tail Question keywords
- Comparison and Alternative keywords
- Trial and freemium keywords
- User-Experience Focused keywords
- Best Platform Keywords
To get a better idea, you can also check the keyword research report we’ve submitted to one of our SaaS clients. This report includes product as well as blog BoFu keywords.
2. Content Strategy for Blog Content
For each blog post, we ensure choosing keywords that have good search volume and can help in boosting the overall site authority.
Wondering how? We interlink the main product page strategically with the blog post. Thus, when the post grabs customer’s attention, it also gives a positive push to the ranking of the main page.
3. Content Strategy for Product or Any Other Significant Page of Website
Ultimately, your objective is to land users on your product or services page, so that they click the CTA, submit you the information and finally subscribe to your service. Right?
That’s the reason, after updating blog content strategy, we also check the page where you want to land the visitors.
Our team analyze the flow on that page, including:
- Presence of clear and compelling Unique Selling Propositions (USPs)
- Strategical usage of primary and secondary keywords on that page
- Language relevancy as per the target audience
- Visual and interactive content presentation and placement
- Usage of action-driven words in CTAs
- Presence of security certifications or trust signals on the page
- Navigation is both seamless and user-friendly
Additionally, we do intimate you if there is any element present on your site that is disrupting user-experience so that only those elements catch user’s attention where it is supposed to.
Rest, changes will be done when we discuss the things with you and know your perspective on that.
Link Acquisition for SaaS Brands (We Also Acquire Links for the Content We Publish)
We acquire backlinks for BoFu content pieces so that they also start ranking. All the backlinking sites in our inventory are trustworthy and authoritative with real traffic.
To get an in-depth overview of our link-building strategies, the report we create, sample backlinking sites, the benefits that you can expect out of our services, check our article written on SaaS link-building.
Tools We Use for Content Research, Planning, Improvement, Optimization and Performance Tracking
To support your content strategy, we use a set of premium tools that help with content research, planning, improvement, optimization and performance tracking.
Let’s take a look!
Research Tool
Our content team conducts thorough research to deeply understand your target audience, industry trends and competitors’ strategy for the content strategizing process.
The advanced tool we use for research is ChatGpt. Let’s tell you more about it!
- ChatGpt
No doubt, the internet is full of information but what’s the benefit if we cover the same content and present it to users. Right?
That’s why we use ChatGpt to analyze each topic whether going to publish on your site page or a blog post on a third-party website.
GPT helps us identify pain-points and gather required information quickly. By using this tool, we enhance our research efforts and deliver content that is not only creative but also highly-informative.
Content Planning Tool
When we get insights and are ready with our strategy, we ensure including details related to the planning on Google sheets. This is how, we use it:
- Google Sheets or Docs
We save content plans created for your website in one place by using Google Sheets and name them as ‘content calendars’. This helps us keep things organized and accessible to both our teams and you, in real-time.
You can also leave your feedback in case you want to. With content calendars, we ensure that our content team always stays aligned on the latest revisions and unidirectional.
Content Improvement Tool
To polish our created content, we ensure checking it with content improvement tools like Grammarly. Let’s tell you how!
- Grammarly
The tool Grammarly helps us maintain the quality and professionalism that content published under your brand should exhibit.
Along with making content error-free, it helps ensure every information we are going to include is original and doesn’t inadvertently duplicate other’s work. So, you can expect human written and plagiarism-free content from us.
Content Optimization Tool
We create engaging content but ensure it to be SEO-friendly as well. To do this, Surfer SEO is our preferred tool.
- Surfer SEO
The tool Surfer SEO helps ensure our created content is well-optimized for search engines while maintaining relevance and value for your target audience.
Besides, it also helps us check the content aligned with the ideal word count, keyword density and heading structure.
Content Performance Monitoring Tools
We consistently check performance of our created content using content performance monitoring tools like Google Analytics, Search Console and Hotjar.
Let’s tell you how all these help us get invaluable insights!
- Google Analytics
The tool Google Analytics helps track and analyze the performance of our created content. As we want to ensure that every content piece that we create drives measurable results for your SaaS business.
Also, it helps us track how visitors interact with the content. Using it, we check page views, bounce rate, average session duration and engagement rate of your SaaS website.
- Google Search Console
The tool Google Search Console lets us know how often your site appears in search results, the number of users visiting your site from search results and your ranking for specific keywords.
Also, it helps us detect which content piece attracts the most links from other sites.
- Hotjar
The tool Hotjar’s heatmaps help us see where users click, scroll and spend the most time on your pages and thus, we get to know which content grabs attention and which areas users ignore.
This is How We Maintain Transparency and Communication with Our Clients
From onboarding to content submission and detailed reporting, we guide and inform our clients every step of the way transparently. Even for those who prefer minimal involvement, we proactively evaluate progress and keep them informed to ensure their goals are met seamlessly.
1. Our Operating Hours
As a client from the US, you can reach out to us from 11.30 p.m. to 1.30 p.m. (EST/ET) the next day.
UK and Commonwealth countries’ residents can contact us from 9.30 a.m. to 10.30 p.m. (GMT/BST).
And if you are from Australia, you can call or text us from 1.30 p.m. to 2.30 a.m. (Australian Eastern Time/AET).
In case, we have not mentioned timings for your region here, choose to contact us.
2. We Stay Active on All Communication Channels
Our team is accessible on all communication channels. Whether you try reaching us on WhatsApp, Skype or prefer to mail us, we are ready to hear and help you.
After getting your query, a dedicated team member will entertain you and will smoothen your experience with us.
3. We Provide Consistent Updates on Project Progress
We share direct dashboard access of our project management tool, i.e. Basecamp. Here, you can track your campaign’s status, view deliverables and stay updated on progress in real-time.
4. We Share Real and Complete Insights
In every report you are going to receive from our end, we ensure sharing real and complete SEO insights. We include every metric that you should know, that too, in easy-to-understand format.
FAQs
Query 1. How often will you update my content strategy?
Our response: We, as your content team, continuously monitor performance and make adjustments as needed based on analytics or audience feedback. Also, we can refresh the strategy if you want us to do that.
Query 2. How long does it take to see results from a content strategy?
Our response: For a SaaS website, it usually takes 3 to 6 months to start seeing noticeable results from a content strategy. In this timeline we create content, optimize them and engage the audience which helps us build momentum.
However, significant results, like improved rankings, increased organic traffic, and lead generation, often take up to 12 months, depending on the competitiveness of your industry.
Query 3. How do you align the content strategy with my overall marketing goals?
Our response: We first understand your objectives and then accordingly align content strategy. Be it brand awareness, lead-generation or sales, we create targeted content that supports those goals, optimize it for SEO and integrate it with your marketing channels to drive measurable results.
Query 4. What types of content do you recommend for my business?
Our response: We start by performing a content audit to understand your current strategies, then analyze your competitors’ content to see what’s working for them.
Based on these insights, we recommend creating blog posts, infographics, or case studies that are tailored to your customers’ needs.
Final Thoughts
With this, we are going to wrap our discussion on content strategy for SaaS brands. We tried our best in answering every concern, still if any thought revolves in your head, feel free to contact us.