SaaS or Software as a Service has transformed the way businesses and enterprises use software to improve their operations. However, without the right marketing, accessibility, pricing, and a well-designed sales funnel, SaaS providers can’t grow their businesses at a steady rate.
Every online marketing campaign can be measured using all kinds of data, but conversion rates and ROI are the key factors. In this post, we will cover the best practices successful SaaS companies use to improve conversion rates and boost sales.
- Conversion Rate Optimization in Theory
When it comes to conversion rate optimization, success largely depends on your ability to get into your customer’s heads and provide them with the information that will motivate them to make a purchase. Here are a few rules that define most digital audiences today:
- Most internet users are busy with their own lives, so they don’t want to invest a lot of time into finding the information they need. In other words, if your presentation is too boring, complex, or detailed, your customers will likely go somewhere else where they can quickly find what they need.
- Professionals and B2B experts who understand what they want simply hate intrusive website elements, ads, and other details that distract them. They don’t want any distractions, and they prefer to get straight to the point.
- Most people are OK with sales copy as long as they get to choose their terms and your offer provides them with the value they want.
All in all, as long as you show your visitors that you respect their time and you give them all of the valuable information right away, your conversion rates will improve. You want to attract your customer based on expertise, and you want to make promises you can keep rather than using cheap methods for generating sales. Let’s get to the five best practices you should use to improve your conversion rate optimization.
- 1. Perfect Your Homepage Landing Zone With Psychology
Your website’s landing page is the first step your customers take whenever they click on an ad or arrive at your website. It plays a major role in your success because it’s the page that either grabs attention or deters people from going through your sales funnel. You want it to be as direct and engaging as possible, and the key here is to provide customers with value they can’t find elsewhere.
However, to do that, you first have to get in your customer’s heads and figure out what they want before they even know what they want. To do this, you need to create one or more buyer personas. Put yourself in the shoes of your target customers to figure out their wants, needs, expectations, habits and more. Here are some questions to help you create you personas:
- What does your target customer do, and what responsibilities do they have?
- What information do their managers use to evaluate their work?
- What makes them successful?
- What challenges do they face on the job every day?
Once you understand what brings a visitor to your website, you will be able to customize the sales funnel according to their unique individual needs. Your homepage should display all of the compelling reasons why your product is the right choice and explain how it will help solve your customer’s problems and make their lives easier.
Provide your visitors with value using a short slogan that will make them interested in knowing more. Top everything off with high-quality, engaging imagery and strong CTAs to motivate them to take the next step. Other elements that will help you lead more people down the sales funnel include social proof, recognizable brands you’ve worked with testimonials, and the total number of satisfied customers.
- 2. Keep Leading Customers Down The Sales Funnel
If you managed to interest your visitors enough to make them want to know more about your offer, the next step is to point them in the right direction. Expand the information you mentioned on the homepage by providing more proof about the effectiveness of your product. Include details like short product explanations, infographics with clear statistics, case studies, explanations of different features, and, of course, a strong CTA.
CTAs like “Sign Up Now For A Free Trial,” “Request a Demo,” and “Buy Now” should be included
Too much information will do you more harm than good, because your website visitors will get overwhelmed. Sometimes it might be a little hard to find the winning formula right away, so you might want to create a few different versions and conduct A/B testing first. Leave the pages running for a few weeks and compare how many clicks they generated. Once you find the CTA that offers the best result, you can adopt it and build a better campaign around it.
- 3. Boost Trust With High-Quality Content
Content is often what makes or breaks a purchase. If your CTA is successful and your customers feel like your product might help their cause, you want to provide more information with high-quality content. Provide customers with access to corporate blogs, industry-expert tips, and similar information that will back the claims you’ve made on the landing page.
Make sure that you include an option to subscribe to your newsletters or get access to more exclusive content. Once they decide to leave their email, you’ll know that they trust the information you provided.
The so-called practice of lead nurturing can turn an inactive lead into conversion in no time. That said, you should play it cool and feed them information at a slow pace. Bombarding their emails with ads, information, and promises will chase most prospects away. If you’re having a hard time finding the winning formula, you can contact Digital Silk, a web design agency from Florida, for some expert insights on crafting the perfect conversion funnel for your target audience.
- 4. Offer Various Pricing Plans
No matter what type of product you offer, you should know that different prospects have different goals and budgets. That’s why you must create a pricing plan that fits everyone’s needs. However, to do that, you’ll have to create pricing plans based on the features you offer and their effectiveness at solving different problems. Most SaaS companies use the following pricing model:
- Freemium: Users get access to limited functionalities for free, but they have to pay for advanced features.
- Free trial: Users get access to all features for a limited time, after which they have to buy the full license.
- Pay as you go: Users pay for every feature separately.
- Custom plans: Pricing plans are tailored to the specific needs of every client.
Not all SaaS solutions fit all of these models. The first two options are by far the most popular models among SaaS providers because they allow users to experience the product before fully making a purchase. If your product delivers the desired results, your customers won’t have a problem buying it since they know what it does in practice.
If you convince your audience that your product is better than anything else available on the market, they will likely purchase without thinking twice. But signing up for a free trial or limited feature opportunity can still lead to paying customers in the end.
- 5. Don’t Forget About Micro-Conversions
Making sure that your pages are engaging and attractive can help significantly with conversion rate optimization. As your customers find their way down the sales funnel, you’ll want to keep a close eye on micro-conversions they make along the way. You want to track each visitor to see what convinced them to continue going down the funnel. Here are a few examples:
- They browsed through many pages on your website.
- They subscribed to your newsletter and downloaded a free eBook.
- They liked your content, so they shared it with friends on social media.
- They subscribed to your blogs.
Understanding what pushed your customers towards making a conversion can help you improve your offer even further. You can use the information you gather to improve targeting and content quality, as well as your newsletter and email campaigns.
Gathering the right data, analyzing it and utilizing it to your advantage will have a positive effect on conversions and your return on investment. Design Rush, a web design agency in Chicago, can help you get more details about CRO and other digital marketing practices.
- Final Thoughts
Conversion rate optimization is a time-consuming process that takes a lot of hard work. You’ll have to track all kinds of factors until you find the winning formula that will boost your conversions. Since every SaaS offer is different, you might also have to get creative and conduct A/B testing and try different methods until you find what works best.
Remember, your conversion rates are only as good as your analytics, testing, and constant optimization efforts. Start your efforts with the strategies above, and you’ll get the hang of things along the way. Good luck!
