SaaS-SEO - Everything You Need to Know!

1. What is SaaS SEO?
2. Why is SEO sensible for SaaS companies? What benefits does SaaS SEO have?
3. What are the peculiarities of SaaS SEO?
4. 3 Tips for Successful SaaS SEO Strategy
5. What tools can support the implementation of a SaaS SEO strategy?
6. Conclusion

For SaaS companies, it's becoming increasingly difficult to obtain affordable new leads. Click prices for social media advertising are rising year on year and the number of competitors in the market is not decreasing.

However, there's no need to panic, there are still several ways to predictably and affordably acquire potential customers.

One way for SaaS companies to obtain cost-effective leads is to rely on search engine optimization, as SEO is scalable and significantly cheaper in the long run than PPC channels or outbound marketing.

Nowadays, it is becoming increasingly important for SaaS companies to stand out from the crowd, and a good SEO strategy can help. The SaaS market now has a volume of more than 200 billion dollars and it is growing year by year.

Total size of the SaaS market (in billions of USD) in the last 14 years. Source: Statista

Unfortunately, many SaaS companies still make a lot of gross SEO errors which is why it's why we have written this article. We will discuss what matters in SaaS SEO and what the best practices are. In addition, I will show you a few helpful tools and software on OMR Reviews that can support you in all of this.

What is SaaS SEO?

SaaS companies offer their software over the internet and usually aim to increase their online visibility and attract more users to their platform. SaaS SEO is intended to help achieve this goal.

Basically, SaaS SEO encompasses various strategies and techniques to improve the website's ranking in search engine results. In addition to the classic principles of search engine optimization, there are some peculiarities in the SaaS industry that we will go into in more detail later.

Why is SEO sensible for SaaS companies? What benefits does SaaS SEO have?

SEO can be the missing puzzle piece for SaaS companies to outrank competitors who still rely on outbound and other traditional marketing channels.

But why is SEO sensible for SaaS companies?

The Compound Effect

There must be a good reason why SaaS giants like HubSpot and Pipedrive swear by content marketing and SEO. The reason is that over time, SEO for SaaS has an increasingly strong effect.

The Compound Effect works like this: You start to publish more and more useful content on your website, this content is found and linked to by others, which in turn positively affects the authority of your website.

Ergo: The more content you publish, the more links you get & the more visibility your website gains due to the ever-increasing authority – a positive upward spiral.

When you start with SEO for your SaaS company, it may take a while before you see the first results. But once the Compound Effect starts to work, the real fun begins.

It harmonizes perfectly with other marketing channels

We live in a world where omnipresence is the key to success. SEO plays an important role in the omnichannel marketing strategy of any SaaS company.

SEO & Content Marketing go hand in hand. The contents created for SEO can be repurposed for other marketing channels such as email marketing, social media marketing, etc. SEO also contributes to building brand awareness and authority, which ultimately helps to acquire users from other marketing channels.

SaaS SEO does not require huge investments

Compared to other marketing activities, such as paid ads, starting SEO measures do not require large investments.

Initially, the CAC for SEO measures is usually high, but as growth increases these costs can quickly decrease. While SEO requires ongoing investments, these costs do not increase with every click, as is the case with paid advertising. 

SaaS SEO can therefore be a good way to reduce CPA.

Many B2B SaaS companies like HubSpot or Zapier were able to become as successful as they are today thanks to a clever SEO strategy. I'll show you now how this can work for you and your company!

What are the peculiarities of SaaS SEO?

First of all, it must be understood that SEO for SaaS companies differs from, for example, SEO for online stores.

The sales cycles are much longer. A purchase in B2B has to be discussed, weighed, and decided upon internally first. It is rarely the responsibility of just one person, often it's multiple people.

Therefore, SaaS SEO is primarily about appearing very early in the decision-making process and being visible. The earlier you are found in the search process, the better.

That's why the content must be adapted to the entire sales cycle - from information gathering to the decision phase.

Source: Own graphic

Except for phase 1, all stages of awareness can usually be covered with search engine optimization.  

In practice, the whole thing might look like this:

1) The searchers have a specific problem: They don't know anything about your software yet, but they know there's a problem and they want to solve it.

2) The searchers want content and information about your software. They are not specifically looking for a software like yours, but are interested in content related to your offer. It is therefore possible that they will want to use your software in the future.

3) Search for your software. The searchers already know who you are and want to know more.

4) Search for information about similar software. The searchers already know that there is a software like yours and want to know more about it to see if it meets their requirements. They might not be ready to buy yet.

5) The searchers are ready to buy a software like yours. The searchers are interested in prices and/or offers.

3 Tips for Successful SaaS SEO Strategy

SaaS SEO does have its peculiarities – The basics of search engine optimization also apply here, though:

To remind you: The most important ranking factors of search engine optimization are:

• Good and helpful content

• Backlinks from strong authorities

• Flawless technology of the website

When it comes to SaaS companies, it's crucial to develop an SEO strategy that is based on creating compelling content that answers the users' search query and naturally generates backlinks.

However, we now want to show you the most essential tips & tricks so that your SaaS SEO strategy can soar!

Step #1 – The right keyword research

As already hinted, the SaaS purchasing process works differently than, for example, in e-commerce. The keyword research for a SaaS marketing funnel usually consists of three stages:

1. Top of the Funnel (ToFu)

2. Middle of the Funnel (MoFu)

3. Bottom of the Funnel (BoFu)

Top-of-the-funnel keywords aim at users who need to be made aware of your solutions.

Here, your SEO strategy revolves around informational keywords and content like "What is e-mail marketing?" or "How does a scheduling software work?".

Top-of-the-funnel keywords make a lot of sense in the SaaS business and should definitely be part of the SEO strategy.

Mid-funnel keywords are keywords where your users already know of a solution and need more information before making a decision. This includes informational keywords, but also specific ones, like "scheduling software" or "best e-mail marketing platforms".

Bottom-of-the-funnel keywords are very specific and more transactional or sales-oriented than informative. Here, your users know your brand and are searching directly for it to make comparisons or find out about prices.

Bottom-of-the-Funnel keywords for SaaS are usually product landing pages and target those who already know exactly what they need. This could be keywords like “ERP software for mechanical engineering”.

So how do you come up with these terms?

Start by making a list of the problems that your product can help solve. So do a little brainstorming and write down everything that comes to mind.

• What are common questions that your target group asks in connection with your product?

• What challenges does your target group currently face?

Once you have created a list of search terms, you can analyze the keywords with an SEO tool like Ahrefs and check if there is search volume for these search terms and how strong the competition is.  

Choose search terms from all three funnel stages and start creating “BoFU" content, as these are usually the content that brings the fastest SEO ROI.

An example of what these content can look like is coming up in the next section!

Step #2 –  Creating Conversion Near content

1) Comparison pages

Typical BoFu content could be so-called comparison pages.

If your potential customers already know what they're looking for and are familiar with your solution, it's quite possible that they will compare your solution with comparable products from competitors.

Therefore, it definitely makes sense to create comparison pages and include them in your own keyword strategy.

This means pages like "HubSpot vs. Pipedrive“ or "Zapier vs. Make“

Source: zapier

This way, you not only reach people who are interested in your solution, but also those who have so far been more familiar with the solution of the competition. On the comparison page, you then have the opportunity to present the advantages of your SaaS solution well to convince potential customers.

2) Alternative pages

In addition to the comparison pages, alternative pages have also established themselves in the SaaS cosmos.

This means pages like "HubSpot Alternatives“ for example.

Write down all your direct and indirect competitors and create an alternative page for each competitor.

Let's say you're SEO for the CRM tool Pipedrive. A direct competitor of Pipedrive is HubSpot.

So what did Pipedrive do? They created a page called "The 21 best HubSpot alternatives“, where they of course also talked about their own software.

In such articles you can always discuss why your platform is better than the competition’s.

Even if the search volume for such search terms is low, it's important to also cover these, since people are already ready to buy and just need a final comparison.

Source: pipedrive

3) Commercial pages

Commercial pages are actually a must in any SEO strategy – in the SaaS industry, these pages are indispensable, as they are the pages that give an insight into the range of your software.

This means keywords like:

• CRM for small businesses

• ERP system for mechanical engineering

• Accounting software

With these search terms you try to attract those who are already aware of the problem and are just looking for a suitable provider. So classic Demand Capture.

Step #3 Develop Product Led Strategy

The Product-Led-SEO approach comes from the book by Eli Schwartz.

The strategy is based on the assumption to create content that helps the reader to solve their problems with your own product.

These are not any ordinary sales landing pages. Instead, the focus is on your own product and its use cases.

Zapier is a great example for a product-led SEO strategy. They have generated countless, automatically created pages where different app & plugin integrations are introduced. So, when someone searches for "Connecting Clickup and Pipedrive“, they land on the page of Zapier shown below.

Source: zapier

The product-led approach does not work equally well in every industry, some SaaS sectors are much better suited for this strategy than others. Nevertheless, with a bit of creativity, a lot can be achieved for your own SaaS business.

What tools can support the implementation of a SaaS SEO strategy?

There are some useful tools that can save a lot of time and headaches to make implementing your SaaS SEO strategy even easier.

We will introduce some of the best SEO tools from the OMR Reviews community:

Ahrefs:

Ahrefs is the all-rounder tool in the SEO market. With Ahrefs you can analyze your competitors, examine your link profile and come up with new keyword ideas.

Semrush:

Semrush is similar to Ahrefs, a real all-rounder. Whether keyword research, link audits or traffic analyses – everything is possible with Semrush.

Google Analytics:

You just can't get past Google Analytics in online marketing. The analytics tool shows you how your website, individual landing pages, ads, etc. perform and which contents are popular.

Google Search Console:

Like Google Analytics, the Google Search Console is a must-have tool for those who do search engine optimization. Using the Search Console, you can find out how much traffic your website gets or whether there are technical problems.

Of course, you can also compare all the tools and software on OMR Reviews. There you will find many other aids and extensive ratings as well as experience reports from users.

Conclusion

SEO can be a huge growth lever for SaaS companies. Many well-known SaaS companies like Hubspot, Ahrefs or Zapier have impressively demonstrated it, all have relied on SaaS SEO.

The sooner a SaaS company immerses itself in the topic, the better, because search engine optimization does not work overnight and the competition does not sleep.