The abbreviation SaaS stands for Soft as a Service. That is, software as a service. Usually these are cloud solutions that are physically located on servers on the Internet.
For clarity, here are some examples:
- Music service Spotify;
- Streaming service Netflix;
- iCloud cloud storage;
- Office 365 office suite;
- Adobe software package (Photoshop, Lightroom, etc.).
In the shortest possible terms, SaaS is any service that serves the user via the Internet. We will not delve into the specifics of the SaaS products themselves. Today, we will consider SEO for SaaS products and the specifics of their promotion on the Internet. It will be interesting!
Specifics of SaaS tools
There are perhaps two main features of SaaS that must be taken into account when promoting:
- A SaaS product will change over time, and you can’t 100% predict what it will be like in a month, a year, or five years. Netflix was delivering movies on VHS tapes in 1997. There was no thought of streaming or producing their own video content back then.
- You don’t know which pages of your web resource and which third-party sites attract more traffic, backlinks, and leads. This is typical for all SEO, but especially for SaaS product promotion.
The primary tasks of SEO promotion are to cover the semantics in the niche as much as possible and test as many methods of increasing traffic as possible in the shortest possible time. You simply have no time for thinking and lengthy testing.
How to Promote SaaS Products with SEO
This is a complex task. If you plan to seriously engage in promoting your SaaS product, be prepared to allocate time, money, and resources for this. Our strategy for promoting SaaS products using SEO is as follows:
- Conduct a site audit to detect and eliminate any problems that could be worsening your ranking.
- Perform comprehensive external and internal website optimization.
- Collect and systematize the semantic core that will be worked with in the future.
- Create high-quality, relevant and useful content (not only for search algorithms, but also for customers, real readers).
- Constantly publish new content and update existing content, including on external platforms, building up a high-quality link mass.
Of course, this is a very superficial description of the strategy. Each of the points includes additional blocks, each block is a list of tasks, each task is a search for solutions and ways to implement them. Just imagine that you are the owner of Netflix in the early 2000s, when VHS tapes became unnecessary, the usual business collapsed, something radically new was needed. Netflix managed to become one of the largest SaaS products. Why can’t you do it?
How SEO for SaaS differs from service website promotion
From a technical point of view, there is no particular difference in the methods of SEO promotion of service and SaaS websites. The same principles are used. What is important here is the variability of the SaaS products themselves and their evolution. As we said at the beginning of the article, SaaS products are rapidly developing, expanding, and sometimes changing dramatically. And each change makes its own adjustments to the SEO strategy.
SaaS marketing and online promotion require you to be flexible, enterprising, and ready to quickly restructure your work strategy and principles.
How to Create a Successful SaaS SEO Campaign
SEO for SaaS projects can be built on dozens of components. Somewhere the same tools and promotion methods are used as for classic service sites, somewhere more original and specific. Let’s consider some of the most relevant today.
Analyze your competitors
Competitor analysis is important in any niche, especially in the SaaS segment. Here you should analyze not only direct but also indirect competitors. That is, everyone who offers a fundamentally different product but at the same time is able to meet the needs of your audience.
For example, you create a video communication service with screen sharing. This is a convenient tool for remote work. Direct competitors are obvious: Zoom, Skype, etc. But there are also indirect ones—for example, the same Telegram. A completely different type of product, but you can also make video calls and turn on screen sharing here. We get an indirect competitor.
Divide the product into mini-products
If your SaaS product can be divided into mini-products, we recommend doing so. Then you will be able to reach a wider audience, which, for example, does not need a comprehensive solution. At the same time, you will expand the semantics for SEO promotion.
A good example of this is Adobe products. As a customer, you can purchase all Creative Cloud apps or choose cheaper subscription plans that include only the options you need. For example, Lightroom and Photoshop for photographers, Adobe XD, Photoshop, and Illustrator for UX/UI designers.
Create related mini-products
Sometimes it’s smart to create additional mini-products that fit your theme. If you stick with Adobe, here you can mention Photoshop Express or Lightroom Mobile – stripped-down versions of the main programs for smartphones, free or shareware.
When creating mini-products, it is important to follow several rules:
- Make sure they have semantics.
- Assess the scope of work and calculate whether the development will be financially justified.
- Determine how close these products are to your main one.
If you doubt that the mini-product will be in demand, that you will be able to promote it, and that it will really be connected to your main offer, it is better to abandon this idea.
Create mini-products based on other products’ APIs
Sometimes, you can make your life easier by using ready-made APIs that are freely available. You will save money on development, offer your audience a new product, and, at the same time, improve your SaaS SEO performance.
Here is an interesting example. As you know, you can send files to yourself in Telegram. In essence, it is an infinite storage of information, but not the most convenient. Telegram is a messenger, not analogue to Google Drive or Dropfiles. But the craftsman Pato05 created the Uploadgram platform on the basis of Telegram – an unlimited file sharing service that uses the messenger’s servers. At the same time, he did not violate the rules for using Telegram’s API.
Find other ways to use the product
Sometimes, you need to learn to look at your product from a broader perspective. If it has alternative or additional uses, talk about them. Then you will demonstrate its benefits and make your users’ lives easier. Of course, they will sooner or later find additional ways to use your product themselves, but why waste their time?
The previous example with Uploadgram fits in here perfectly. The developer not only created his own product based on the existing API but also showed a completely new way to use Telegram’s power.
Create Competitor Comparison Pages
It’s good if you know why your product is better than competitors’ offers. Why not convey this information to potential customers? Clearly, openly and understandably. In addition, an additional comparison page is also the search traffic it will bring.
For example, the Firefox browser offers this comparison table on its website:
Translate pages into other popular languages
It is obvious that translating pages into foreign languages can attract a lot of additional traffic. Especially if your product is not limited geographically, but there is one important point here – the translation must be done correctly:
- To start, translate a list of foreign language queries that are already bringing you traffic.
- Find sites through search that are at the top for the same queries.
- Download the semantics of the detected competitors from Ahrefs. We recommend working in the country where the number of native speakers of the selected language is the largest.
- Cluster the semantic core and translate content for different language versions of the site.
- Collect traffic, analyze efficiency.
Some people recommend translating pages with Google Translate first, watching the traffic increase, and then hiring a translator for a more accurate translation. But we recommend translating pages correctly right away. Google Translate makes mistakes, which affects ranking. This is important for SaaS SEO!
Expand semantics by popular one- and two-word phrases
This method can be used when SEO promotion has already yielded results, and the site has reached at least the top 10, and better yet, the top 5 or even the top 3. The task is to find patterns by which one- and two-word phrases Google ranks your resource faster and more effectively.
We see that the most effective keyword is generator. It can be used as a starting point when expanding the semantic core. The method does not always work 100%, but usually gives good results and contributes to the ranking of the site.
Create unique images and infographics
Firstly, potential clients want to see what your product looks like, how it works, how exactly it helps solve their problems, how it is better than similar products from competitors. Abstract images and simply thematic pictures are dummies. Specifics are needed not only in text content, but also in graphic content.
Secondly, ranking algorithms do not stand still. If earlier search engines could impose sanctions on a site mainly due to non-unique text content, now even borrowed images can give the same results, i.e. drive the site under filters and pessimize positions.
How to get links and traffic
External links, brand or product mentions, citations – all this helps to increase the recognition of the company and product, increase the trust of the target audience and its interest. Accordingly, it helps to increase traffic and has a positive effect on the ranking of the site. How to conduct SaaS marketing to achieve such results?
Leave comments on blogs
Commenting on popular blogs with or without links to your product is a good way to attract the audience’s attention. The logic of the actions is as follows:
- We find articles from the top 50 search results on your topic.
- We get acquainted with the materials and leave comments, referring to our product. You can do without a direct link, and limit yourself to a mention.
- We make sure that each comment complements the article, develops the ideas contained in it, and does not read as blatantly advertising and taken out of context.
The main advantage of this approach is that it is free. However, it requires time investment. In addition, some comments may be cleaned up by moderators.
Use business listings and review sites
The presence of your product on such platforms is a big plus. It promotes recognition, attracts a new audience and increases external link mass. Placement is free in most cases.
Some tips:
- try to fill out your product card/profile in as much detail as possible;
- Encourage customers to post reviews;
- Duplicate customer reviews on the project website.
Browser extension
If your product allows you to use a browser extension in some way to improve your customers’ user experience, use it. Here’s what you need to do:
- Highlight a small but useful feature in the product.
- Create a plugin that will perform this function.
- Prepare a brand icon, title and description.
- Translate the plugin into other languages (optional).
- Start driving traffic to the extension from the website and email newsletters.
Then you will not only provide your customers with a convenient and useful tool, but also get another page in the search results. Convenient. But this only works if your product can be tailored for the extension a priori.
A great example is the free ad-blocking extension AdGuard, which is essentially a “cut-down” version of the paid program of the same name:
Interviews with experts
In almost any area of business, interviews with industry experts are a very effective tool that indicates the reliability of information and increases the level of trust.
From a SaaS SEO perspective, these interviews also yield several positive results:
- Attract traffic from Google Discover;
- Build up their link mass thanks to specialist blogs;
- They bring traffic for narrow queries with the names and surnames of experts, as well as from social networks and from the channels of the interviewees themselves.
When a hypothetical Elon Musk gives an interview to a hypothetical Person, this interview will be read by Musk fans who were never interested in the magazine itself. The example, we believe, is clear.
Reviews from experts and industry bloggers
If you can find an expert or popular blogger who is knowledgeable about your niche and covers it in an interesting way, collaboration can be effective.
Example: a review of the Luminar photo editor on the popular photo editing channel PiXimperfect (3.5 million subscribers):
There are a few simple rules at work here:
- It is better to take into account not the quantity but the quality of reviews;
- Evaluate resources for placement not only by traffic volumes and link profiles but also by audience activity;
- Ask to make the review objective and not promotional;
- Be prepared to invest anywhere from $100 to $600 or even more into this channel.
A comprehensive review from an expert or integration with a popular blogger cannot be cheap. But they can also bring more traffic than other channels.
Freelance service exchanges
This is a very specific channel for getting links and traffic. Not every product can be promoted here. But sometimes it is possible. Here are some examples:
- You post a project for copywriters and ask them to submit the finished work in Google Docs.
- You invite new specialists to the team and provide a link to the work board in the Trello service.
- You draw up a technical specification with a request to correct errors on the website that a certain service finds.
That is, you contribute to the promotion of the mentioned services. This can and should be used.
On some exchanges, you can place direct advertising of your product if it is relevant to the audience. These can be various cloud storage, teamwork tools, communication tools, etc.
LTD sites
LTDs are websites that sell lifetime subscriptions to SaaS products. There are both advantages and disadvantages to publishing their offerings.
From an SEO perspective, SaaS campaigns are a plus. You get additional traffic, increase product recognition, build up your link mass, and improve your site’s ranking. But if you consider profit, a one-time purchase is less profitable than a subscription, in which the client brings money constantly and not just once for the entire time.
How to analyze the effectiveness of SEO promotion of SaaS products
There are many tools for analyzing SEO effectiveness in the SaaS category: Google Analytics, SE Ranking, CS Yazzle, Sitechecker.Pro, etc.
The bare minimum you need to do is analyze traffic. The aforementioned Google Analytics is quite sufficient for this. At the initial stage of SaaS SEO promotion, you can focus on them. Then you can select analytics tools depending on the traffic acquisition channels or link building. Everything is very individual here.
Let’s sum it up
In many ways, SEO for SaaS is almost no different from SEO for promoting other products on the Internet – goods, services, and services. However, there is a key point: SaaS often implies a subscription payment model. This means that the project must constantly remain at the top of search results in order to attract a new audience and retain the existing one.
Accordingly, SaaS promotion is usually even more complex and large-scale than other products. That is why SEO SaaS sometimes costs significantly more. However, in the end, it provides you with constant, not one-time profit, and all investments pay off. To achieve these results, partnering with the best SEO company can make a significant difference in ensuring your SaaS business stays competitive and profitable.
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