If you’re in the software-as-a-service (SaaS) business, then acquiring new customers is essential to your success. But what does SaaS customer acquisition mean?
There are some general trends and statistics that can give you an idea of what it takes to succeed in this area. Here’s everything you need to know about SaaS customer acquisition.
What is SaaS Customer Acquisition?
There is no one-size-fits-all solution to acquiring customers. The best way to acquire customers for a SaaS company will depend on the product, target market, and other factors.
However, some common acquisition channels for SaaS businesses include online advertising, content marketing, and lead generation through partner channels.
Customer Acquisition Techniques That Will Boost Your SaaS Growth
Customer acquisition is not about growing your user base.
If you examine the Pirate Metrics framework that SaaS companies use to monitor their growth, you’ll see that acquisition attracts a prospect but ends before they begin using your product.
Therefore, customer acquisition means getting visitors to sign up.
Getting someone to start using your software begins with the next phase – Activation.
Nevertheless, acquiring new customers is the most critical part of growing a Software as a Service (SaaS) business.
You can’t convert users into paying customers without getting new users in the first place. As Pierre Lechelle explains, you have to have enough customers at the top of the funnel to ensure that they go through the different funnel stages.
Without the customers who buy your products, there will be no sales.
The above chart illustrates the point well. Given that the average conversion rate for each step of the sales funnel is so low, you need to drive a lot of traffic to your landing page in order to generate paying customers.
So, let’s examine some strategies you can use to acquire more customers for your software as a service (SaaS) company.
As a new business, your only option for growth is acquiring new customers.
However, you might have a hard time figuring out how to do it, correct?
If you’re looking to boost your SaaS growth, then today is your lucky day. In this post, we’ll show you customer acquisition techniques that are sure to give your business a boost. So what are you waiting for? Keep reading to learn more!
The B2B SaaS Buying Process Has Changed
The selling of business-to-business (B2B) software solutions has drastically changed. According to research firm, Gartner, the new normal for sales of business software is:
Only 17% of customers’ time is spent with vendors.
In this new world of business, acquiring new customers is the most challenging task for any company. To succeed in this climate, companies need to adjust their approach.
Unless your company is lucky enough to be selling a product that sells itself, you have to work really hard to generate leads.
In order to succeed in the highly competitive world of business-to-business (B2B) selling, you need a solid foundation in lead generation, lead nurturing, and customer relationship management (CRM) systems. These are basic tools every business needs in order to be successful.
The harsh reality of acquiring customers for B2B software is that a high volume of prospects needs to be funnelled in at the top of the sales funnel in order to produce a decent number of closed sales.
B2B Software Conversion Rate
The sad truth is that most sales for business-to-business (B2B) software products fail.
The conversion rate is so low that you have to spend a lot of time and money feeding many leads into the top of your sales funnel before you can get a decent number of customers out of the bottom.
If a company wanted to increase product sales by $20 million dollars, they would first need to figure out how many people they would have to contact at the top of their sales funnel.
In our analysis, we found that different demand generation methods yielded varying results.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) typically results in a lower conversion rate than Pay Per Click (PPC) ads, LinkedIn Ads, Email campaigns, and Webinars.
Most businesses combine multiple lead generation strategies, but the reality is that most will only convert 1% of leads into customers.
SaaS Companies Need to Pay Attention to Their Customer Acquisition Costs
The harsh reality of CRO is that if your CAC is too expensive, you’ll never be able to turn a profit.
For a startup company, where nearly all customers will be new and all sales and marketing activities will be focused on acquiring those new clients, this lead generation formula will work.
For companies that sell more than one product, it can be tricky.
How do you allocate your marketing budget between acquiring new customer and maintaining revenue with existing ones?
Over time, the revenue from new customer purchases decreases while the revenue generated from repeat business increases.
At its most basic, this metrics is about measuring the efficiency of your sales team. How much are you spending for each dollar of sales?
Most businesses do not have good data on how much it costs to acquire a customer. Here are a couple of examples of companies who have this data.
Publicly traded companies like Zoom can give you some idea of the market size.
As a SaaS company, it’s important to keep an eye on your customer acquisition costs. Oracle is a good example of a company that serves more mature markets and doesn’t have to spend as much on sales and marketing as a high-growth company like Zoom.
How to Assess Customer Acquisition Performance
Next, it’s time to take a critical look at the performance of your acquisition efforts. It’s easy to get sucked into the trap of focusing on things like CTR, OE, number of webinars, etc, but what really matters is the bottom line.
You need a way to track and analyze your sales funnel all the way to a closed sale. A solution such as Salesforce can help you do this.
It’s probably difficult to find conclusive data about the full lifecycle of customer acquistion. A more subjective way to measure this is through win-loss interviews with customers.
Companies use win-loss analysis to learn why customers chose them over competitors. These insights can help drive improvements across sales and marketing, leading to more revenue.
Take Action: Double Down, Cut Underperformers, Experiment
Once you have collected enough data, it’s time to act.
Increase your spending on your best performing acquisition tactics. Reduce your spending on your worst performers.
The owners of these programs may protest your recommendations, but you can present fact-based performance data to back up your claims. This will help solidify your position and give you the upper hand in the situation.
Test out different ideas, products and markets to see what works best for you.
Don’t get caught up in chasing the latest trend. Do your research and experiment to see what works for you.
SaaS Customer Acquisition – Statistics and Trends
SaaS customer acquisition is a process by which a company can identify and attract new customers for its software products or services. There are a number of ways to acquire new customers, but the most common and effective method is through lead generation.
Lead generation is the process of identifying potential customers who may be interested in your product or service, and then nurturing those leads until they are ready to purchase. There are a number of lead generation strategies that can be used, but the most effective ones typically involve some combination of online and offline marketing tactics.
These methods include content marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, social media marketing, and email marketing.
Offline marketing tactics that can be used include direct mail, trade shows, and print advertising.
The most important thing to remember when it comes to SaaS customer acquisition is that it’s not about getting as many leads as possible – it’s about getting high-quality leads that are likely to convert into paying customers.
The SaaS model is growing at an impressive rate.
The growth of companies like Dropbox and Slack is astonishing. In just 15 months of operation, Dropbox reached over $1 billion in revenue. And in just 5.5 months after launch, Slack had a 63% paid seat growth.
SaaS companies need to maintain high growth rates in order to stay afloat. Zendesk’s dollar-based net expansion rate of 115% during the fourth quarter of 2016 is impressive, but other companies need to match or exceed this rate in order to compete.
Compared to companies in other verticals, a software firm that is growing at 20% a year has a 92% likelihood of going out of business.
Our new infographic on customer acquisition for Saas businesses, outlines the most common activities, the most frequently measured KPIs, and the investment on retention.
By not requiring a credit card number for a free trial, you will generate twice as many customers.
The probability of trial customers becoming paying customers is 70% higher when salespeople contact those free trialers.
89% of companies prioritize acquiring new customers, 59% focus on renewing existing customers, and 46% place a high priority on selling add-ons and upgrades.
Sales reps that contact active free trial users are 70% more likely to get them to buy the full product.
44% of companies offering software as a service offer free trials, with 41% of them using a 30 day trial period.
52% of software-as-a-service (SaaS) businesses spent more money on retaining customers than they did in 2017.
50% of paying users log into their software only once or twice a month.
Conclusion
SaaS customer acquisition is a process of attracting and converting leads into customers. In order to be successful, businesses need to understand the latest trends and statistics surrounding this topic. This blog post has provided you with everything you need to know about saas customer acquisition, so that you can make your business more successful.
