Product

10 Most Popular SaaS Insights from 2013

December 26, 2013

Once a fringe segment of the software industry, the market for software-as-a-service has exploded in recent years. Monthly or annual pricing plans are now a regularity in many corners of the B2B and B2C software world, and that trend will only become hotter in 2014 as more businesses explore unique ways to deliver products to consumers via subscription models.

Of course, as much as those formats make sense for software buyers, SaaS pricing and economic models also present some unique challenges, too – namely, high customer acquisition costs, more frequent customer churn, and the difficulty of deciding which metrics are most important to measure and track.

To help your growing SaaS business address those issues as we head into a New Year, we’ve curated the 10 most popular SaaS-related posts that were published on our site in 2013.

10) Stop Fueling High Churn Rates and Start Focusing on Customer Engagement

saas 10If your SaaS business is seeing customers attrite at an abnormally high or unhealthy rate, SaaS sales and marketing expert Lincoln Murphy suggests in this post that it might be time to pump up your customer engagement and focus more on acquiring higher quality users. Read more.

 

9) Priced to Please: 4 Factors of Successful SaaS Pricing

Saas9How do you price a subscription product? That’s not an easy question to answer and it often depends on your product, the market you’re targeting, and the buyers’ expectations in that market. That said, there are some common factors that often influence SaaS pricing, and SurveyMonkey’s Brent Chudoba shares some tips in this post that will help you create the best SaaS pricing structure for you. Read more.

 

8) Dropping Freemium: How One Company Killed Its Free Plan and Grew 40%

saas8For most SaaS companies, offering free trials and freemium plans is a no-brainer. But as SaaS entrepreneur Josh Pigford, the founder and CEO of PopSurvey, explains in this post, going in the opposite direction might actually do more for your SaaS company’s bottom line. Read more. 

 

 

7) 4 SaaS Customer Acquisition Best Practices from David Skok

saas7Your product is ready for prime time — but is your sales model scalable and sound? In this post, Matrix Partners‘ David Skok shares four SaaS customer acquisition best practices that will ensure your approach isn’t actually a disservice to your bottom line. Read more.

 

 

6) 4 Steps to Launching a Successful Free Trial

saas6Maybe you already offer a free trial, but is it really drawing in the quantity (and quality) of customers that you need? In this post, SaaS marketing strategist Peter Cohen encourages entrepreneurs to consider the full picture of the free trial experience and follow these four steps to improve their free trial yield. Read more.

 

 

5) How to Stay Out of the Startup Graveyard and Scale

saas5The path to scalability is littered with failed startups. Want to avoid that fate? GinzaMetrics CEO Ray Grieselhuber offers advice on making your company a success story, instead of a cautionary tale of early-stage promise unfulfilled. Read more. 

 

 

4) Is Raising Prices the Simple Key to SaaS Success?

saas4If you’re offering freemium plans in hopes of increasing customer acquisition, you might want to reconsider your pricing strategy. This guide explores how raising prices (and eliminating low value customers) can actually result in more profitable customers and higher retention rates. Read more.

 

 

3) 5 Key Sales and Marketing Metrics to Track for SaaS

saas3When scaling a SaaS company, keeping tabs — and acting on — key performance indicators is an absolute must. In this post, Intronis CEO Rick Faulk explains why that is especially true when it comes to sales and marketing, and highlights the most critical metrics to track your spending and success. Read more. 

 

 

2) What Are Key Performance Indicators for SaaS? 6 Metrics that Really Matter

saas2In this quick guide you’ll discover the six key performance indicators (KPIs) every SaaS entrepreneur needs to monitor if they hope to analyze their SaaS company’s performance and track its growth  — without drowning the business in useless data. Read more.

 

1) 3 Tips for Building Discounts into Your SaaS Pricing Model

saas1While every SaaS founder would love to have five-second sales conversations that center on cut-and-dry product pricing options, that’s not how most SaaS deals work — particularly as companies begin to scale. In fact, as SaaS expert Jason Lemkin explains in this post, SaaS discounting at the enterprise level is expected, not optional. And if you don’t price your product right, it could severely impact your bottom line. Read more.

Photo by Davide Novelo

What insight or takeaway had the biggest impact on your SaaS business in 2013? Let us know in the comments section below!

Senior Content Manager

<strong>Jonathan Crowe</strong> is Senior Content Manager at <a href="https://www.barkly.com/">Barkly</a>. He was previously the Managing Editor of OpenView Labs.

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