Growth is a primary goal of most companies regardless of their size, industry, or the number of years they've been in business. And it goes without saying that revenue growth is one of the most important aspects to overall growth.
For more revenue, you need to work on increasing the amount of value a customer brings in over their lifetime with your business, also known as the customer lifetime value (CLV).
And for that, you really need to know your audience.
You should understand the kind of content they like to consume, what kind of CTAs work best for them, and understand which microconversions are most likely to lead to a sale.
In business, this journey is called the marketing funnel and has multiple stages to it.
The marketing funnel starts from before your customer even knows your brand and goes well beyond a purchase is made.
In this article, we will look closely at the SaaS marketing funnel, its stages, specific strategies for those stages, and how to know if you need to make any changes to help prospects go down the funnel faster.
A SaaS marketing funnel follows the path of your customers' journey from the moment they first hear your brand's name until the post-purchase process —including retention and/or advocacy.
Every visitor is put through a sales process that is wired to lead them toward making a purchase. They are shown retargeting ads, presented content that aligns with their wants and needs, or getting emails if they signed for your newsletter. By tracking how your prospects and paying customers interact with your company at each stage, you can optimize both the sales and marketing process, helping your audience purchase your product faster.
For example, at the top of the funnel, you might have Google display or social-media ads to let people know of your brand name. Then you may ask people to sign up for your newsletter. Further down the funnel you might send emails enticing people to try out a free trial.
As you go further down the funnel, the number of people will decrease, but those who stick around under the later stages of your funnel will be your most qualified leads that are very likely to make a purchase from your business.
A SaaS marketing funnel is broken down into five stages in order to easily categorize each lead and customer and pinpoint where they are in the funnel.
The five stages are called
Let's have a closer look at each one of those.
Awareness is the first stage and is at the very top of the funnel. The people here are just starting to hear your brand's name and still are learning who you are and what you do.
It is a place for good first impressions and attracting new leads that are not familiar with your brand yet.
The Consideration stage comes after people have learned your name and have a brief understanding of what you're offering.
If you manage to leave a good first impression on your audience, or if they would like to know more about your business, they will visit your website again.
Here, it's important to note that this won't happen for everyone at the awareness stage —at least not immediately. Some people will simply not be interested in your products/services or won't be in need of them. That said, leaving the funnel at the Awareness stage doesn't mean that they cannot come back a few months or years later and join at the Consideration stage (and this applies to each stage, it's just more common at this point).
This is the stage where people are making their final researches before officially converting into paying customers.
The biggest decision they will make will be choosing between you and your competitors. There many factors that come into play here like price offers, range of features, special deals, etc.
You need to show the leads at this stage "why you, and not them?" You should really focus on what sets you apart from all the other brands.
The Retention stage comes after a customer has made a purchase. The results at this stage depend on how satisfied customers are with their decision of purchasing from your brand.
This is where your high-quality services really come into play because if people really like your product or service, they will come back for more.
Your primary goal in the Advocacy stage should be to lead your customers to make referrals. After all, what is better than customers bringing in more customers?
Some people will naturally talk to their friends and family about your business, but some people may need some encouragement and convincing even if they are happy with your services.
We just looked over at each stage and as you saw, they are all very different from another. Different leads at different stages have very specific needs of their own and marketers adjust campaigns differently for each stage.
Here are examples of marketing strategies that work well with each stage of the marketing funnel.
At this stage your goal is to let people know your name and what you have to offer. a few strategies that will work well for this goal are:
As people are continuing their research on your brand, you should show them that you are what they were looking for.
This stage is mainly about how you are different from competitors. What makes you better? Why should people choose your brand, and not theirs?
This is what you are trying to show, so, marketing should be focused on your individual brand.
As much as we enjoy acquiring new customers, we all love it way more when they stick with our brand for a long time.
You should focus on keeping customers happy and helping them get the most out of your offers.
The leads you will gain from referrals are perhaps the highest quality leads. They come to your brand, already inclined to make a purchase. This is why, encouraging advocacy is a key step.
And the best way to do it is to set up a referral program with great deals for both referrals and referees.
Your SaaS marketing funnel is what generates leads and helps their conversion into paying customers. You should know if the strategies you use along the funnel are actually working toward your goals.
To track that, you must implement appropriate SaaS marketing analytics and determine key metrics to measure. They will be measuring many different aspects of the funnel and letting you know if your efforts are making the impact you hope to achieve or if they are creating issues.
You cannot solve a problem if you don't know what's causing it. So tracking your marketing funnel and strategies is extremely important.
They will show you how everything is working for your business, what you need to do more of, what you need to improve, and what you definitely need to cut out.
Here are six important metrics we have gathered for you to track in order to see how your marketing funnel is doing.
An increase or decrease in your website traffic can say a lot about your marketing. Keep an eye out for the number of visitors you get over a certain period of time.
This could show how a certain campaign you have going on or a special promotion is working. More traffic might mean that people have liked your ads or campaigns and wanted to know about your brand.
It could also be a metric to track for your content marketing. If what you have on your website applies to your audience they will be coming to your website more often. So, website traffic is also an indicator of content quality.
Your leads are your everything. They are what generates you your revenue and where majority of your marketing is targeted.
It is very important to look out for the number of leads you have and where they are accumulated on the marketing funnel is a sign of how much revenue your business is likely to make in the future.
You can specify the leads you have into two categories based on their unique behavior and place in the marketing funnel.
One is marketing qualified leads (MQLs). They show signs of potential of making a purchase and converting.
The other one is sales accepted leads (SALs). These types of leads show heavier signs of conversion in the future and more likely to making a purchase.
Free trials usually come up around the decision stage of the funnel which is pretty down the road. The people who have come that far, are usually very interested in making a purchase and they are type of prospects you don't want to lose.
Tracking the number of free trial sign-ups will give you a good idea of how many people are actually considering to buy your products or services.
Of course, not everyone who signs up for a free trial will become a customer, but it is likely that a significant portion of them will.
So if you have high numbers of free trial sign-ups it might be an indicator that your marketing efforts and strategies have worked well and you have managed to generate qualified leads.
Referrals happen only if customers are really happy with your services. Tracking the number of referrals made will show you how people are enjoying your products. More referrals is an indicator of successful features.
Customers who come to you from a referral are inclined to make a purchase and enter the funnel somewhere pretty close to the end. So the more referred customers you have means the more highly qualified customers you have.
Bounce rate is the percentage of people that leave your website after seeing a single page. This page is usually your homepage or a landing page that an ad leads you to.
It is always a good idea to check your bounce rate regularly to get feedback and see if many people at the top of the funnel are leaving.
If the bounce rate is high, there might be something on your homepage or landing pages that is repelling people. You might want to try new designs or adding more call-to-action (CTA) buttons.
A high bounce rate may also be an indicator that you are addressing the wrong crowd since many people are leaving just at the beginning of their customer journey.😎
You can use HockeyStack to create funnels, goals, segments, surveys, and more so you can track what matters for your SaaS with no code.
CTR or click-through rate is the the percentage of clicks on an ad per impression.
It mostly depends on your copyright and CTAs on ads. If they are interesting you are likely to have a high CTR.
And a high CTR will prove that your marketing campaigns at the first stages of the funnel are working well.
This is also a good indicator of whether you are addressing the right audience. Because regardless of how good your ads, and wording, and CTAs are; if the people don't need your services they won't click on your ads.
What is marketing funnel approach?
The marketing funnel approach is when you segment the audience into stages based on how qualified they are to become customers and do your marketing according to the leads' interest level. It helps you better target audiences and allows you to design campaigns that are more relevant.
What are the stages of the marketing funnel?
A traditional SaaS marketing funnel has five stages:
Awareness — where people are first starting to recognize their problem and that they need a solution.
Consideration — where people start to do research and look for possible solution methods.
Decision — where people are continuing research and trying to decide between a few different products/services.
Retention — where people have made a purchase from your business and you want them to come back for another.
Advocacy — where you want your customers to spread out a good word about your company.
What exactly is HockeyStack? How do we help marketers drive revenue more efficiently?
Jump in to uncover the ins and outs of Marketing Mix Modeling – from its mechanics to its ideal applications – with Drew.
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