How do you make ideas happen?
For a lot of people, the specific answer is on a case-to-case basis. Not everyone can transform a vision into reality. You must take into consideration all factors to bring those ideas to life. The common knowledge is this: For an idea to materialize, it needs good execution. But the key to any successful innovation is proper and timely planning.
Launching a Software as a Service product is like making an idea happen. The world wide web is your stage and you need a memorable performance to turn mere spectators into loyal followers. The problem is, there are thousands of others like you who are pitching their ideas too. A survey from Crunchbase reveals that there are more than 15,000 SaaS companies in the world and there are 7,000 of them in the marketing niche alone.
That means if you are launching your SaaS product in 2021, you will most likely face companies that are more prominent or better-funded.
So how do you stand out?
Sometimes we learn from the experiences of others. Take for example this background removal company that successfully pitched their product and dominated their niche three months after their official product launch.
Here is their product launching strategy:
- Trust what you offer or other people won’t.
- Invest in your website.
- Study your competitors and niche.
- Have a pre-launch roadmap.
- Build a community.
- Prepare a post-launch game plan.
- Don’t chase the money. Deliver value and the money will follow.
Trust what you offer, or other people won’t.
You are offering your service or product to the world. Whatever you do, do it with confidence or not at all. You must be the number one fan of your app or service. In the SaaS arena, this makes the difference between fizzling out in a few months or enduring another mile. Trusting your brand and product will also fuel you through tough times moving forward. Do everything to make sure that your product is worth trusting by other people too.
Invest in your website.
Get the right domain name and host.
If you are launching online, one of the most crucial things you and your team should have is the right domain and host. In choosing a domain name, you might come across one in a eureka moment or after days of deliberation. When thinking of a domain name, remember three things: keep it short, make it brandable, and let it speak your brand.
Keep it short. A good domain name should be around 6-11 characters. Make it brandable. The name should be catchy and memorable. Let it speak your brand. It should be related to your product or service. To exude an aura of reliability, you also have to get a trusted domain name extension (.com, .co, .net, or .io).
For the web hosting providers, some trusted websites are Bluehost, Dreamhost, Hostinger, Hostgator, WP Engine, and Namecheap.
Set up a pre-launch page.
Before launching, you should create a coming soon page to stir excitement from the community. You can also use that landing page to make a viral campaign to get leads even before your actual launch. The main aim of the campaign should be to collect emails from your prospective users or customers and tease your product or service.
Create a free service.
While setting up your website, thoroughly think about what you can put on your homepage to make visitors stay. A great way to do this is to provide a free service or free trial sign-up option. Besides giving your visitors a sample of the quality of your product, you can also minimize the bounce rate on your site if there is something that a customer can interact with on the page.
Study your competitors and target audience.
Study the big names in your niche. What are the top SaaS companies that you are up against? Learn from their success and keep note of their failures too. Analyze their online presence, obtain their data and analytics if you can, and check their customer feedback. From the information gathered, work on your selling point and how your product or service can be unique. What makes you different from other SaaS companies in the market? Develop it. What is the weak point of your competitor? Take advantage of it.
Does your product resolve some user or customer pain points? How well do you know your niche and target market? Posting survey questions for potential customers, conducting usability tests, and immersing yourself in user groups and forums can lead you to understand your audience more. The more you communicate with your prospective users, the better you will improve your product.
Create a marketing strategy based on what your competitor study and market study so that you can be prepared before the launch.
Have a pre-launch road map.
If you are a business, you don’t just magically become popular on the internet. Every step must be carefully planned – from the launch to selling subscriptions or gaining traction, a SaaS company must have a road map.
A pre-launch road map will set your direction and will remind you of the important things in your marketing journey. Preparing one will also let you avoid a costly failure. Your road map must communicate how to move your SaaS product or service down the line. It must have actionable steps that your team and stakeholders can clearly understand. It is crucial that everyone must be aware of their respective roles to put the whole team on the same page before, during, and after launching.
Build a community.
Even before your official launch, start building up accounts that help you reach your target audience. Create your social media base. Study where your prospective clients are hanging out online. Is it Facebook? Tiktok? Youtube? Twitter? Besides preparing your social media accounts, also set up your web blog. A blog is a great tool to communicate and interact with your customers, especially if you are aiming to let people understand more about your SaaS product or your brand. If you want to keep your audience even after the launch, maintain a blog and produce regular engaging content. Hubspot reveals that B2B companies that maintain a blog get 67% more leads than businesses that don’t.
Another platform that you don’t want to miss if you are planning to introduce and interact with a community of SaaS users is ProductHunt. This site is a tech product haven where people can search and introduce innovations. You can easily get people with similar interests in technology on this site. These searchers can also give feedback on your product.
Prepare a post-launch game plan.
After the launch, you need to sustain the excitement of your current customers and make new ones. You can only achieve this if you also prepare a post-launch strategy. Make a list of several customer acquisition channels and learn what platforms are good for marketing your product in the long run.
For example, investing in Search Engine Optimization for your website early on can be a great way to gain traction. It takes time to get those organic site visitors, but once you established your authority on the Google search engine results pages, the results will be worth it. You can also try making press releases or becoming more active in Quora. Since you are a SaaS startup, concentrate your marketing efforts on a few channels after the launch to avoid spreading your efforts too thinly.
Don’t chase the money. Deliver value. The money will follow.
As a startup company, it is natural that you will think of your revenue when you launch. But don’t get too carried away with the promise of getting millions of dollars. Instead, create value for your users.
If you are a startup with a limited budget, just start small. You may only have less than 50 customers at the start, but once you create value, those fifty people will invite others, creating a ripple effect.
How do you create value? There is no shortcut to this.
Let the onboarding process be easy for your customers. Promptly answer queries. Be honest with your users. Clearly orient them if there are changes to your product or service. Patiently explain areas where they do not fully understand. Respect and appreciate their feedback and critique. If you immerse in your community of users, you are giving a personal touch to your product or service, which can produce loyal customers. Yep. If there is one thing better than getting a customer, it’s getting a loyal one. And this loyalty does not come overnight.
Takeaway
Being new to the field is daunting if you are a SaaS company. If you find yourself looking for strategies to successfully launch your product or service, these seven strategies will give you the push that you need. The only thing that you need to do right now is to decide to finally put your product out there.
Plan. Understand. Learn. Unlearn. Now go and set that launching schedule!
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