Why You Need a SaaS Content Marketing Agency: A Guide

Content writing is just as much a science as it is an art. This guide will help you understand how to approach content marketing and writing strategies to get the most valuable results for your SaaS company.

An Example of How SaaS Content Marketing Works

Let’s set the scene. Suppose you have a customer who knows their manufacturing company’s order management system is outdated and doesn’t accommodate their needs like it used to. They know they need a new one, but they aren’t sure exactly what features are standard, so they turn to Google.

Here are the results for the term “what to look for in an OMS,” which they might use to start their research:

There are informative, relevant results available on page one describing what they should know as a buyer.

After these listings comes the “People also ask” feature, which lists other questions that people ask Google relating to this query.

Think about the type of person that would be searching for this. They’re likely in the early phases of looking for a new OMS and are researching which providers might be able to help them. Google understands that people are unique, so it wants to offer well-written, unique solutions that will help people find what they need.

Find out how your company can use high-quality content to bring traffic to your website through evidence-based, empathy-driven content writing.

Why Content Marketing for SaaS?

The internet is saturated with SaaS companies trying to promote their products to customers. However, most SaaS providers aren’t always clear about getting in front of their best customers by providing the answers they need.

People, including business decision-makers, trust search engines to find answers and solutions to the problems your software can solve. In addition, the vast majority of the decision-makers who ultimately use your software prefer to learn about it through articles instead of advertisements. SaaS content writing is the backbone of finding them when they need your services.

If you aren’t investing in vital search engine real estate to promote your business and software solutions, you may be missing out on website visitors who are looking for solutions that can help you find more long-term customers.

How to Use Content Marketing for SaaS

Every piece you or your SaaS content agency makes should aim to help your customers. This is key to driving them to want to work with you. With that, there are two basic principles: empathy, and evidence.

How to Use Client Empathy to Market Your Software

Chances are, your clients are choosing your software solutions to solve a problem that they can’t handle on their own.

In practice, this means conducting industry research to learn more about your target audience so you can directly address those problems in their business. It also means digging deeper into the intent behind everything they’re searching for online.

The key to effective content writing and marketing is to address these problems directly, so you bring more of the right kind of traffic for your software and services.

Creating Evidence-Based Content

Data should support every part of your marketing strategy, and your content is no exception. In addition to using client empathy at the core of your content, you should also use data to help you choose what to create.

For example, if your software is an order management system for industrial manufacturers, you may want to research the keywords manufacturers are using to look for solutions like yours. You may find they’re using different terms than you’d use to describe your products internally, instead using phrases like “manufacturing order management system.”

Using search engine tools like SEMrush can help you discover not only how your customers are phrasing their search terms, but also how often they’re searching for them. Revisiting the keyword example from above, “manufacturing order management system” received at least 20 searches within the United States at time of writing, and even more abroad.

Using this data can help you determine if this keyword is one you want to use to target your customers when they’re looking for information, making it more likely they’ll convert into leads.

Parts of a Good SaaS Content Strategy

An Established Target Audience

Whether you’re planning to write your own content in-house or you’re working with a SaaS content marketing service, it’s important to know who you’re trying to sell to.

This audience can look different for almost every company. However, you might also have multiple types of audiences you should try to target.

For example, suppose your software is designed to help organizations automatically process and resolve tax notices they receive from the state or federal government. Your primary target audience and ideal customer might be a large business with thousands of employees nationwide and locations in multiple states.

You might also have a lot of business opportunities with restaurant chains, payroll services, or other businesses that handle taxes for large groups of employees. While these audiences aren’t your primary target, they’re still part of your target audience and can help drive revenue for your services.

However, you probably wouldn’t talk to all those audiences in the same way—which is why it’s essential to establish who they are. Knowing how your target audiences like to consume information and solve their problems is essential to this process, and it will help you develop a more effective SaaS content marketing strategy.

Helpful Content to Answer User Questions

Providing direct answers to your visitors’ questions through your content allows your brand to stand out from the competition. In turn, it allows you to build credibility and makes them more likely to turn to you when they’re ready to invest in your software and services.

Let’s revisit our tax notice software example. Chances are, your target audience in the corporate tax industry might be looking for help with how to handle specific types of tax notices. If you have a blog post or landing page dedicated to resolving those notices, your audience will be more likely to rely on you for answers around those topics.

A Variety of Content Types

A good content marketing service for SaaS businesses will also provide more than just blog posts. While they are still important for attracting visitors to your site, content writing also encompasses long-form content like whitepapers or eBooks, infographics, and video content.

While you don’t necessarily need to create a feature-length film about your products or have your internal experts write an entire book on the subject of your industry, producing a diverse variety of content allows you to capture all the different ways your customers prefer to learn about their industry and your solutions.

Equal Parts Creation and Distribution

You may be familiar with the adage, “If you build it, they will come.” While that rule applies to Old Testament arks and baseball fields, the same can’t be said for your content.

Distributing your content to the masses is just as important as creating it in the first place—if not even more so. While simply publishing your content to your website might allow it to bring in a few website visitors with the right keywords, it’s important to make sure people know it exists. Your distribution and promotion strategy might include:

• Adding links to your content from other parts of your website
• Promoting it on your social media channels
• Including links to your written content in your marketing emails
• Incorporating QR codes linking to your content in your trade show materials
• Having your salespeople use it in their sales process

There are very few places where you can’t or shouldn’t promote your content, as it will help bolster Google’s algorithm while the piece is still new.

Emphasis on Conversions

Every piece of content you write or create should have an established purpose—even if that purpose is just for your visitors to keep reading more content.

“Converting” can have multiple meanings, depending on your desired goals for your content. Here are some of the most common goals for conversions you might use:

• Subscribing to your marketing emails
• Downloading another piece of content
• Submitting on a form
• Requesting a free trial of your software
• Clicking to call
• Reading the content itself

These aren’t the only examples, either—almost any action relating to making your website visitors into leads and guiding them down the path to purchase can qualify as a conversion.

SEO for SaaS Providers

Why are we mentioning SEO in an article about content marketing for SaaS? Because you can’t have one without the other. Your SEO strategy won’t get very far without quality content, and your content strategy won’t attract any customers without SEO.

Any content marketing agency for SaaS worth your investment will provide you with a foundation of keyword research, website performance audits, and optimization recommendations to help your content go further.

How to Use SEO to Spread Your Content

In addition to using the right keywords in your written content, SEO allows you to distribute your content to the masses who are searching for the keywords you use. For SaaS providers, this involves on-page, off-site, and technical SEO.

On-Page SEO for SaaS

On-page SEO mainly refers to the content of your website pages. Some common examples of improving on-page SEO include adding relevant keywords to the copy on your pages, page titles, headings, meta descriptions, and other signals that tell Google about what’s on your site.

Content writing plays a key role in having robust on-page SEO. Your website pages need well-written content to convey your solutions and industry leadership to potential customers. Incorporating keywords into that content is just as essential, as it allows Google to show your pages to its users as results and solutions.

Off-Site SEO for SaaS

Off-site SEO refers to the tactics you use to optimize your brand presence on platforms you don’t own. While off-site SEO isn’t as easy to control, it’s incredibly valuable because it helps your business build credibility with search engines. Common tools and tactics for improving off-site SEO include:

• Link building: Link building is the process of building relationships with other legitimate websites, including blogs and directories, so they will provide links back to your site to improve its credibility with search engines. The process can take time, but it can make a massive difference in how your pages rank on search engine results pages (SERPs), where your customers will see you among the top websites.

• Using social media: This includes both posting regularly and including links to your website in your business’s social media profiles. Encouraging your customers to review on social media sites or your company’s Google My Business listing can also support your off-site SEO tactics.

• Brand monitoring: Whether you use a brand monitoring tool or hire an agency to help you with the work, this can help you track what people are saying about your brand and where on the internet there are links to your site.

Technical SEO for SaaS

Technical SEO refers to the optimization tactics you implement on the back end of your website. It’s an invaluable tool to support your content marketing efforts—after all, the work you put into producing content won’t account for much if you don’t have a good user experience to help visitors find you.

Some common tactics to supplement technical SEO include:

• Using an SEO-friendly structure for your website
• Improving your website’s security
• Increasing your website’s load speed
• Making your pages more accessible to both people and search engines

Our Services: Working with a SaaS Content Marketing Agency

Anyone who has tried writing strong, authoritative marketing content for themselves knows just how hard it actually is—especially when you’re trying to handle all other aspects of your marketing strategy on top of it. That doesn’t include any other factors like distribution or the time it takes to build a strong baseline for SEO.

However, content writing can be a worthy investment when you have those baseline strategies in place.

That’s where we can help. At Avalanche Creative, we specialize in providing data-driven SaaS SEO services and content writing and marketing plans that can bring more qualified leads to your website.

Message us today to learn more.

Evidence-Based SaaS Content Marketing

At Avalanche Creative, we create evidence-based, easily executable content marketing and search engine optimization plans for both B2C and B2B SaaS companies. Our process takes the mystery out of marketing for SaaS providers and offers a watertight plan for SEO and content strategies that drive more traffic, attract more qualified leads, and build your brand authority.

Our content writing and SEO services for SaaS companies mitigate the risk of a bad investment in search engine optimization. We reduce these risks by researching and planning more thoroughly than anyone else. We also ensure your SEO and content marketing plan is viable for your company. Reach out to us today.

Other SaaS Marketing Resources

Since your potential customers are most likely to look for your software when they need it to solve a problem, it’s essential to build your brand awareness early in their journey. That way, they’ll be more likely to seek you out when they’re ready to buy. Outside of SEO and content writing, that can include:

• Paid search, also known as search engine marketing (SEM)
• Email marketing
• Your website
• Social media advertising
• Network marketing

Get Better Leads for Your Software Platform

Ready to invest in SEO and find the perfect keywords to attract your SaaS company’s best customers? Connect with us today.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Should SaaS Marketing Only Create Awareness Content?

No—a good content marketing strategy for SaaS includes content for every stage of the buyer’s journey.

Awareness content is essential for building your brand recognition and illustrating subject matter expertise before your customers know they need your products. Blogs, website pages, and video content are great for this.

But what about the consideration and decision stages? That’s where content can be your 24/7 salesperson—having content that addresses common objections and shows that your solution is the best option for them helps you close the deal without your sales team having to lift a finger.

Content like case studies, testimonials, and other pieces of content can address the later parts of the buyer’s journey.

What Should I Look for in a B2B SaaS Content Marketing Agency?

For SaaS firms that want to get higher-quality leads for their business and look beyond simply attracting more traffic to their websites, it’s essential to find an agency that prioritizes long-term solutions over quick fixes.

Not only should they use data, but they should also take the time to understand your customers and how they think. This allows you to find customers through targeted keyword campaigns, helping you get a better return on your content marketing investment.