Reflections on Content as a Marketing tool for SaaS companies

in Founder's Blog. Last Updated on January 16th, 2019

Software as a Service (SaaS) is an incredibly interesting and dynamic industry – however it suffers from a reputation of being ‘boring’ when it comes to the content marketing practises associated with it- dense whitepapers, too much blatant sales-y content, too-little too-late infographics with stats that are hard to care about, and many more issues that highlight the challenges that come with working to market software that aims to simplify life for its users, but is itself complex and sometimes difficult to understand. However, that hasn’t stopped those of us in the industry from trudging on and getting creative with our content, and most importantly aiming to provide value to our audience.

Content in marketgoo

At marketgoo, we mainly generate 2 different types of content: The first is content for our audience to use as a Resource; since we offer SEO tools directly to Small Businesses, and we help our Partners (mostly Hosting Companies) provide SEO tools to their customer base, it makes sense for us to educate all our users and potential users on the basics of SEO, and help them learn while they do.

In this very blog, we distribute content such as longform posts based on the SEO questions we get the most, industry-specific SEO Cheatsheets, Case Studies as well as information we think will benefit our users. This not only helps us position ourselves as the experts we are 🙂 but also empowers our users to keep taking their site’s search engine optimisation into their own hands and secure their online success with our SEO tools. This approach has been successful for us, not only netting us new customers but also creating a permanent knowledge base that continuously provides value.

The second category of content we produce is what you see within our tool: the personalised tasks and recommendations each user gets. They provide background information on a given SEO concept, explain why it’s important for the user’s site, and give step by step instructions on how to do it. Creating these was a mammoth task, and their continuous updating and maintenance is daunting but rewarding because we get to transmit our search engine optimisation knowledge and best practises to users who are not tech-savvy and easily overwhelmed, and being an important part of their website’s online success through SEO is what we are here for.

From all these efforts, our main takeaway about content has been this: content marketing for SaaS companies (and most others) is one of the smartest long term growth strategies you can adopt. Why? Because good content affects and influences almost every other marketing and growth strategy you have. It’s the inner shell and outer shell of what you promote but it’s not promotional in and of itself, it’s always relevant, helps build trust in you and assures a slow but steady growth in site traffic and conversions.

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So by now hopefully I’ve been able to explain why Content is important to our team, and is a crucial part of our long term Marketing and Growth Strategy. Now the time has come for us to give it wings and turbocharge it! That means we are looking for someone to spearhead this into something big. Interested? Keep reading!

How to be the Ideal SaaS Content Marketer

Our own content creation comes with a set of challenges for which you should be prepared, ideally with the following set of smarts:

  • Visual Smarts: good eye for design, layout and knowledge of design tools is a plus
  • SEO Smarts: understand how your content plays in to a larger SEO strategy, and have at least a general understanding of the concepts surrounding Search Engine Optimisation.
  • Tech Smarts: we are in the tech space after all! if you’re continuously striving to learn new skills, have a working knowledge of content management systems, have some markups skills, and are obsessed with tech, we want you!
  • Productivity Smarts: be a self starter and work well with deadlines. No one is going to be micromanaging you but we expect you to be proactive, set goals for yourself, fulfill the objectives you’ve agreed on and consistently track your key indicators.
  • Writing Smarts: writing must be a passion of yours, as well as strong copywriting and proofreading skills.

To see specifics and read more about what it means to work at marketgoo and what we offer, keep reading here.

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Founder, CEO and Head of Culture at marketgoo. From time to time I like to write about our startup life, culture and the SaaS and SEO ecosystem.