5 Growth Hacks for SaaS Companies

As a SaaS company, you know that the success of your business depends on the number of new customers you get. You also know that it's getting harder and harder to get those leads because your competition is fierce.

Last Updated:
June 1, 2023

With the right growth strategies, you can acquire new customers, achieve rapid growth, and scale your business more easily. In this post, we'll share five of our best growth hacks for SaaS companies that want to attract more leads without breaking the bank.

5 Growth Hacks for SaaS Companies

While some traditional B2B marketing tactics are effective for SaaS companies, in most cases, it’s essential to think outside the box. Neil Patel notes that traditional growth marketing doesn’t work as effectively for SaaS companies, which benefit more from growth hacks that encourage rapid growth. If you’re looking to scale quickly, consider incorporating the following growth hacks so you can grow your customer base quickly with minimal additional effort.

1. Freemium Model

A freemium plan is one of the best growth hacks for SaaS lead generation and SaaS demand generation. You can use it to get new customers, leads, users, and downloads.

While many people won’t pay for something that they haven’t tried firsthand, they’ll happily accept a free version of your SaaS platform. Once they get used to using its features, they may be willing to upgrade to a paid plan.

The freemium model has become a mainstay among SaaS businesses of all kinds, whether in the form of a limited-time free trial or a free plan designed for solo users. Canva, Zoom, and HubSpot are just a few notable examples of SaaS companies that offer free versions of their apps.

This is a great way to get your product in front of people, but it’s also important to think about how you can upsell those customers once they’ve started using your service. Keep these tips in mind:

  • Continue to nurture your freemium users through carefully crafted and well-timed communications. Push them further along in the funnel by offering them value every step of the way. When they see how well you treat them even when they’re not paying for your service, they’ll be more inclined to pay for a higher tier.
  • Create urgency. Let users know their free trial is about to end. Tell your freemium user base what they’re missing out on with their free plan. Urge action so your freemium users get a case of FOMO.
  • Allow freemium users to unlock features. If your freemium user base wants access to just certain features from a paid plan, make it available for a smaller fee than they would pay for the full version of your plan. By making a small investment, users will be more likely to continue upgrading as they gain more value.

2. User Onboarding

User onboarding is a process that helps new customers become more familiar with your product. It’s a critical part of the sales funnel that helps to prevent buyer’s remorse and delivers a positive user experience. With automation, onboarding can also encourage users to try your services and purchase through self-service tools without involving an account agent. This will increase your customer base while reducing your cost per acquisition (CPA).

Onboarding is different from training — it's not about teaching users how to use your product or troubleshooting. That’s what your customer support reps and knowledge base are for. Instead, onboarding is about getting users excited about your product so they’re eager to start using it (and continue doing so).

There are many different approaches to user onboarding, but there are some common elements that make it effective:

  • Reduces the friction in the purchasing process
  • Uses gamification to motivate trial users
  • Offers content that is relevant to your audience
  • Makes it easy for trial users to invite others into the product
  • Provides free trials and demos

As you establish an onboarding process, consider what goals you have for your onboardings. This will help drive your onboarding steps and give users a positive onboarding experience.

3. Content Marketing

Content marketing is one of the best methods of SaaS lead generation and growth hacking. It helps to increase your brand awareness, establish thought leadership, build trust with potential customers, and generate leads.

By creating valuable content that resonates with your target audience — whether it's an ebook or a blog post — you attract people who find your content valuable and who will stick around to learn what you have to say. Here are some content marketing strategies to try:

  • Create a blog and write about topics that are relevant to your industry. Write articles that are helpful for your target audience and that include relevant keywords. The more you write, the more traffic you will get, provided you’ve optimized your articles for SEO.
  • Use video content marketing. Video content is an excellent way to get more leads, as it helps you explain things better than text alone can. Create videos based on topics related to your business or industry, and share them on social media channels like Facebook, Instagram, or any other platform where your target audience hangs out online.
  • Share case studies. Case studies can help build credibility for your brand in front of potential customers who are looking for solutions similar to yours. Having this type of proof of your SaaS product’s capabilities is a powerful tool during the B2B marketing and sales process.

4. LinkedIn Advertising

LinkedIn advertising is a great way to reach your target audience. SaaS Journal notes that LinkedIn paid ads enable SaaS businesses to reach audiences across the web.

You can target the ads by job title, company and role, industry, and many other factors. This makes LinkedIn advertising different from other platforms that target based on personal interests. This allows you to get in front of the right decision makers at the right time with relevant content that will help them find success with your product or service.

LinkedIn offers a few tips for getting started with LinkedIn ads:

  • Define the location where you want to target users. This is the only mandatory targeting field.
  • Choose your targeting attributes. Options include company, demographics, education, job experience, and interests.
  • Try an audience template if you’re new to LinkedIn advertising.
  • Limit your targeting criteria to one or two audience descriptors. This will help you avoid hyper-targeting, which can limit your results.
  • A/B test your audiences to learn who is most engaged.
  • Monitor and tweak campaign performance. The Demographics tab in your Campaign Manager will show you detailed information about who clicked on your ad by job title, seniority, industry, and other factors.

5. Account-Based Marketing

Account-based marketing (ABM) is a strategy that focuses on individual accounts. It helps you to identify and target key accounts, then build relationships with them and boost sales.

SaaS companies can use ABM to reach out to potential customers who meet specific criteria, such as size and industry. This isn’t the same as lead nurturing or drip marketing; it's more about getting in front of the right people and engaging with them at the right time.

The first step in implementing an ABM strategy is identifying which accounts will be your focus. You can do this by looking at the current customer base and identifying which accounts are generating the most revenue or have the highest lifetime value.

Once you've identified which accounts will be your focus, create separate lists of those companies by size and industry. From there, you can reach out to them with tailored messaging that speaks directly to their needs and interests.

Conclusion

The five hacks we’ve described above may not guarantee huge SaaS demand generation or growth overnight. However, in combination, they could help you get your business to the next level, especially with the right team behind them.

These tips were just the beginning, and there is no shortage of growth hacks to explore and use. The important takeaway from all of this is that growth hacking isn’t necessarily magic; it’s about finding what works for your business and putting in the time to fine-tune the process.

As you learn which growth hacks will work best for your SaaS company, be sure to keep up with SaaSMQL’s articles and resources. We’re your go-to resources for SaaS B2B marketing, ABM, and all things growth hacking. To learn more about how we can help you launch and scale ABM campaigns, get in touch.