#67 - Write your SaaS Growth

30 day roadmap

Nov 04, 2023

Welcome 362 SaaS Founders, Tech Entrepreneurs, and Marketers to the 67th edition of Write your SaaS Growth Newsletter:

In this edition, we discuss:

Content Marketing: How content optimization can result in huge sales
Copywriting: 5 storytelling tips you need to attract your audience
Email Marketing: 10 Email Marketing Tactics to increase sales for your SaaS
Social Media Marketing: 30 day roadmap to build an audience
Digital PR: How to deploy a digital PR strategy for your SaaS

Let’s GO!

Content Marketing 📈

How content optimization can result in huge sales:

Ross says One of the best savings that exists for brands today can be found in content optimization.

Here’s the reality in many marketing teams: The content team has been cut. The content budget has been cut. The content experiments have died. And this makes it tough to get wins.

Here’s a win that many brands can tap into but many are overlooking while chasing the idea of always trying to do the new and try a new app:

Content Optimization

Take 20-30 old blog posts and update them with:

New takeaways based on current research
Incorporate third party quotes from experts
Include links to recent data you've found
Embed video content to support content
Add new sections based on the SERP
Incorporate CTAs to download things
Update links to newer content assets
Update old images with better ones

The result? A nice spike in traffic.

Want even better results? Apply this methodology to pages and blog posts that have historically converted well but may have loss traction over time and decay.

This is where you can find some great ROI from things you already have at your disposal.

Copywriting 📈

5 storytelling tips you need to attract your audience:

Kieran says 3 years ago, I had ZERO writing experience but now has 206,000 social media followers and 26,000 email subscribers. Want to know how I did it? Storytelling.

Here are 5 ways to use storytelling for your Copy:

Drop Details: People don’t care about stories they can’t see. Use:
1. Times
2. Senses
3. Colors
4. Emotions
Transport them to your tale.
Explain the Enemy: Every great story needs an enemy - and your audience needs to know what’s at stake. Create conflict and personify the cause.
Begin in the action: You’re writing for the internet. You don’t have time for the whole ‘once upon a time’ stuff. Dive right in, then pull it back and swing to the beginning. Give them a reason to pay attention.
Take them on a ride:
1. Bad storytelling: This happened, and then this happened, and then this happened.
2. Great storytelling: This happened, but then this happened, so that happened, but then this happened.
Remember the golden rule: Whenever you share a story, remember: It's never really about you. It's about your reader. Leave a lesson and they'll always come back for more.

Email Marketing 📈

10 Email Marketing Tactics to increase sales for your SaaS.

Christian says after 5 years of email marketing, I've: failed a lot, written 1,000+ emails, and generated +$200k for clients (that I'm comfortable attributing).

Here're the ONLY 10 things to know to actually make money from your emails:

Become the go-to for one thing. Inboxes will only become more crowded, so you'll need a strategy to stand out. My best one is to become known for one thing. The right people will be stoked to hear from you.
Write like a real person. People long to connect with other people. Not faceless brands. Treat subscribers like people and your offers will land better.
Trust precedes every sale. This becomes especially true as our markets become more sophisticated. Before diving into a pitch, try earning their trust first. (Add value, give a quick win, be generous, show your face)
Nobody's reading your emails at first. The golden rule of copy is that nobody reads copy at first, they skim it. Emails should be skimmable with bold text, headlines, white space, and a few relatable images.
First lines are as important as subject lines. These days, getting emails opened isn't really hard. It's getting them READ that's the challenge. Just like a social post, your email needs a good hook. You've got about 2-3 seconds to get their attention.
Reputation is MORE important than subject lines. Similarly, subject lines may get a few emails opened, but your reputation will get more of them opened (and read). And contrary to popular belief, you can establish a hearty reputation with only a handful of subscribers. Become the go-to person for something and they'll be stoked to see your name pop in the inbox.
Solopreneurs don't need all the bells and whistles. Lead Magnet. Welcome Sequence. Newsletter. Onboarding/Offboarding (if necc). Launch Strategy (if necc). That's about it. I've seen creators make dumb money with less.
CTAs should fit naturally into the conversation. When a CTA fits into the conversation or lesson of the email, it feels like a no-brainer. But when a CTA is just crammed in out of obligation or desperation, readers can tell. (And it feels like a pitch)
Tell stories, teach lessons. Don't forget that email is a personal channel. Stories help us connect with readers. They also help us communicate lessons and make a point. To become the go-to person, you'll want to establish yourself as a teacher. And storytelling is part of that.
Send as often as you'd like, so long as readers find it valuable. There is no magic cadence. Some folks send once a week. Others every day. If you have something to say that's worth hearing, send it. Otherwise, don't. On the same note, you can include CTAs in emails as often as you'd like...so long as it feels natural!

🧰 Marketing Tech Stack to Add this Week! 🧰

Are you looking to have a better operational excellence for your SaaS business?

ClickUp is one app that replaces all.

200,000+ teams manage tasks, docs, goals, and projects to be more productive. An All-In-One Suite To Manage People, Projects, And Everything In Between.

Try ClickUp for free.

Social Media Marketing 📈

30 day roadmap to build an audience.

Logan shares a 30-day roadmap to build an audience (that you can easily apply as a SaaS founder to grow more sales):

This is broken up into three major pillars:

Profile
Engaging
Posting

And one other thing... you can use 90% of this for any platform. Let's dive in...

Pillar #1 → Profile It’s early on so this isn’t the most important thing but it’s always good to establish a strong foundation. So for that… I’ll give you a checklist of things that you should try and have:

A profile picture that stands out (think of my yellow coloring). Doesn’t need to be bright or crazy, just something unique to you.
A bio that:
- Demonstrates your expertise
- Shows off some major achievements
- Includes a bit of personality (I sign a lot of my stuff with “All-around Cool Guy” and get a bunch of comments on it) (optional)
- Invites people to message you (something along the lines of “If you’d like to talk about X, Y, or have questions on Z, feel free to DM me!)
- An overall clean presence. Take some time to go through your profile from as unbiased a look as possible. “If I were someone coming across my profile, would I care about this, that, and this?” Clutter is never good.

Pillar #2 → Engaging Finding similar accounts to what you do or want to do is important. These can be direct competitors or indirect competitors. Wherever you think your audience will hang out really.

By making a list of them, you now have a group of people to engage with every day. Go to their profile, drop a reply or two, and move on with your day. Early on it’s important to engage with as many people as you can outside your own posts.

Connections and outside exposure are powerful! So focus on giving value-based replies that incline people to check out your page. Spending 10-20 minutes a day doing this will make a world of difference for your account.

Action item:

Make a list of 5-10 accounts that would be valuable to engage with every day based on what we outlined above.
Extra step: If you start vibing with some people and want to boost engagement more, start an engagement group with them.
Every day, you send each other posts that you want the other people to comment on.
You can even set up specific rules for reposting things once a week or something.

Pillar #3 → Posting In the beginning, engaging is more important than posting because you haven’t made a name for yourself yet. I would start with some basic evergreen content that you know will be valuable.

A good way to think about pieces of content is that they’re either more valuable or more general. More general content I post is digital marketing tips, lists of things you should have on your landing page, and words I use in my copy.

I know these posts will get 100+ likes but they’ll also attract a more broad audience. Whereas, if I post a long-form Tweet on how I’m running my client’s digital product sale, it’s much more valuable but will get <80 likes.

It’s good to have a mix of both because more generic content brings new people into your ecosystem. As you begin to progress and start to see people who regularly engage with you, you can post the handraiser-style posts to increase engagement and give out free tools.

Here’s a good format for that:

Line #1 = authority focused → “I’ve worked on over $x worth of Y deals.”
Line #2 = intrigue them → “And there’s one tool I’ve used time and time again throughout each of those deals.”
Line #3 = context + time to build → “It’s taken me N years to perfect but it’s been priceless in helping me get Z done twice as fast.”
Line #4 = CTA → “I decided that I wanted to share this tool with a few people for free. So if you want a copy/PDF/etc. of it, just reply below with “Tool” and I’ll DM it to you.”

That’ll do NUMBERS once you have a few people always paying attention to your content. Posts like that spread like wildfire if they get good engagement within the first hour of posting.

As for general content ideas, here are a few starters to help out

What are some common questions you always get asked?
What are three of your biggest career-defining moments?

Take the time to write these out in a longer form post that amazes people, provides some “here’s what I would’ve done…” or “here’s what I learned…”, and then asks them to reply below if they like this kind of content.

What are some unique experiences you’ve had while working? Either with clients, your computer, or your cat ruining a sales call. People come to social media for value, connection, and above all… entertainment.
People love lists. What are some groupings of information that you could list out that would help others? Think about me writing lists of words I use, buttons CTAs to use, landing page elements to have, sites I regularly visit, and more.
If you were training someone to take over your job, what is a list of lessons you would take them through right away? You could bunch these up and make a longer form post, or post them each individually (or both!).
What are some client deals/stories you have that bring up a valuable lesson that others could learn from? If you’re still stuck… just give ChatGPT a brief bio about yourself and tell it to ask you some questions that could help you create content. Or even just ask it for content ideas. You should get something worth working with!

Conclusion: Doing this over 30 days by spending 10-30 minutes each day engaging and posting will help you to prove if you can 'make it' in your niche. You'll meet great people, start to gain some traction, and build out the foundation you need to start selling digital products.

From here? It's about starting conversations with people you can help and figuring out what kind of offer they would want to buy. This can be tricky but done right... It results in people lining up to give you their credit cards (I've seen connections like this form in as little as two weeks).

So if you have expertise in any field, start with this roadmap. Within 4 weeks a LOT can happen.

Digital PR 📈

How to deploy a digital PR strategy for your SaaS.

Carol shares a video strategy for any SaaS to deploy:

Start a Podcast [make it about the same problem that your SaaS solves]
Collaborate with People [Interview users/other people who have solved the problem, someone who has perspective on it and knows how to do it]
Make Valuable Content [Don’t let the knowledge only stay in the podcast, use it in your tweets, stories or blog posts]
Repurpose to Short Form Video [You can take out 3-15 shorts from any 1h podcast so use it to reach more people on multiple platforms]
Repurpose to Evergreen YT Content [Turn the main topics of the podcast that have the potential to stay fresh for a longer time into 5-10min YouTube videos]
Promote your SaaS [Don’t be too heavy with it, but make sure to find a way to get those listeners to your website and sign up]
Get Sponsors [Eventually, you’ll be able to get sponsors on your podcast. That way you won’t only get new customers, but also earn directly from the pod]

You need a pretty solid plan to get started but it will fit any SaaS + removes the “what should I post” barrier.

Play the long game!

How can we help each other? 🥅

Let me help you build a creative and unique marketing campaign for your SaaS. Know more
Subscribe to my Marketing Campaigns Playbook newsletter
I’m building a new product MarkaTick - a marketing planner and tracker tool for businesses. Check it out here!

Thanks for reading! SaaSwrites is a humble attempt to help SaaS founders and marketers grow their SaaS.

See you next Saturday.

Ricky,

SaaSwrites

P.S. If you liked this edition, it would mean the world to us if you share it with your friends. :) Thank you in advance!

Write your SaaS Growth