Learnings from B2B SaaS startup
The success of a B2B SaaS company depends on how well the marketing and sales team work minus their egos
According to a recent study done by Revenue Hero, “On average B2B companies took 1 day, 5 hours, and 17 minutes to respond to a demo request.” The test was performed on 1000 B2B SaaS companies. You can find a comprehensive blog post on the study here.
The findings also mention that 635 companies didn’t respond to the demo request.
“30.86% of the companies did use an enrichment tool. We mostly saw either Clearbit, 6Sense, or ZoomInfo. While it is likely that many of them used an enrichment tool to disqualify our request, we also saw that 100% of them did not send us an email or take us to a separate page that informed us that we might not be a good fit for them.”
A demo request is a potential lead for any B2B SaaS company and if it is a small size startup then every single lead is a gold mine. There would be leads that won’t qualify but still, it is a gold mine.
In my recently concluded project, one of the most hard-working colleagues mentioned that if there is no demo then she feels her day wasn’t great.
Later we found out that we were not tracking how many demos were happening every day and there was no process to follow with the people who took the demo but decided not to take a free product trial.
Earlier this year I started working with a B2B SaaS company as a Marketing and Communications consultant. The idea was to strategize the next growth phase of the company.
I was happy that I was finally going to work in a B2B company and the idea of taking a startup to the next level was as exciting as it was running the UltraMarathon in the hills of Lonavala.
Over the next two and half months I was involved in paid and organic Marketing and finally getting involved in Sales to find the drops in the process.
The project gave me ample opportunity to understand the B2B marketing and sales world from the lens of product.
Communications is everything
Be it B2B or B2C - communication is everything. What you write in the first fold of your website, why you exist, how are you naming the features in the product, content buckets for the blog, the ad copy for lead generation, the pitch deck, the demo deck, etc all need to have precise communication and solve the business problems of your target consumer.
This is where most startups struggle since they see the communication from the lens of product or tech. In doing so you will find that the home page will have everything even if the potential customer is not interested.
Deciding how to say in minimum easy and minus technical jargon is the beauty and challenge of communication.
Defining and tracking the process
If you define the process and follow it without fail then results are bound to happen. This isn’t rocket science but we will ignore the simplest things in business. Whether marketing or sales, one needs to define the process and ensure everyone follows it. This helps us understand where the drops are happening, enabling us to optimise and put accountability.
For instance, having a process that once a lead signs up for a free trial there should be someone from account management getting in touch and again checking in after a few days if the product is solving any of his/her problems.
He/she will not get in touch it is the company’s job to stand out. The same applies when a product subscription is expiring. And if we are automating then make sure it is tested well and we need to add a layer of human interaction, especially for Indians :)
Organic and Paid leads
During the project, I could test Meta for lead generation. Initially, the test failed but I tweaked the campaign after talking to the sales team. With a small daily budget of INR 3000, I decided only to test Lookalike Audiences and they performed well. Out of 30 MQL daily leads - 5 to 6 leads converted into SQLs. The lead cost improved over time as we let the campaign settle and take time to gather learnings.
If you have invested in content marketing then it will give you organic leads but simultaneously there will be a lot of users who will be trying the product organically. We need to have clear processes defined and how to engage with such leads.
The success of a B2B SaaS company depends on how well the marketing and sales team work minus their egos.
This becomes very important for a small startup. The marketing team can only optimise depending on the feedback of lead quality by the sales team and constant checking of the entire sales process. Similarly, the sales team should be involved in the communication journey so that can share the customer's perspective and concerns.
Also, the product has to be solid and thankfully it was in my last project.
Working with a young team half my age had its fun and challenges but definitely whatever works in the B2C world works in the B2B world. We have just hyped the segment with jargon. While the buying decision has a lot of rounds and takes time finally we are selling to humans.
Hopefully, my next stint will be in the B2B world with more such learnings :)