Outbound Marketing for Saas: What No One Is Telling You
Inbound marketing is all the rage. For good reason, too — it’s effective, and the technology tools we have available in 2022 make it easier than ever for marketers to draw people in with great content and other inbound tactics.
But outbound marketing isn’t dead for SaaS companies, and leaving it out of your marketing strategy could mean missing out on opportunities to generate new leads, build your funnel, and increase your sales.
Here’s what no one is telling you about outbound marketing for SaaS: it’s essential because in many cases, people don’t know what they don’t know.
They don’t realize their need, or they aren’t aware that solutions exist for a specific problem they encounter. Outbound marketing does the critical job of proactively finding high-potential prospects and getting the ball rolling on their buyer journey.
In this article, we’ll cover why outbound marketing is still an important part of modern SaaS marketing strategies and how you can implement it effectively to drive new leads and more sales.
Quick Takeaways
- Inbound and outbound tactics are both needed for a complete and well rounded marketing strategy.
- Outbound marketing enables companies to be proactive, targeted, and in control of the B2B buyer prospects they pursue.
- Research has found cold emailing to be the most effective outbound marketing tactic for lead generation.
- SaaS companies can better engage potential buyers by focusing on value and benefits rather than features.
Inbound vs. outbound: the what and the why
Inbound and outbound marketing are both important. In fact, they’re complimentary when executed well. Before we really dive into outbound marketing, let’s go over how these two approaches can be leveraged together to drive a complete, well-rounded marketing strategy.
Inbound marketing engages potential customers who are aware of their needs and are seeking a solution. It utilizes tactics like content marketing and search engine optimization. Inbound marketing requires a heavy lift in the beginning, but once you’ve established a presence can provide fairly passive opportunities for new leads and customers.
Outbound marketing is actively reaching out to potential customers who may know they have a need or problem but are not actively seeking a solution. Outbound tactics include cold calls and emails, newspaper and TV ads, and handing out flyers or brochures. Outbound marketing requires ongoing active effort, but the results are often seen more quickly (often in just days or weeks).
The customer lifecycle for SaaS companies is unique. The sales cycle is short thanks to clear and digestible pricing models for software products and services.
And once SaaS prospects convert to paying customers, they’re often customers for life. The ROI is high. This means it’s smart for SaaS companies to leverage many and varied strategies to capture as many new leads as possible.
Outbound marketing is more than cold calling
The bad rap that outbound marketing gets is understandable in some respects — technology has made it possible for marketers to be more intentional and targeted than ever before, but it’s also enabled those with poor practices to inundate unsuspecting recipients. We all know what it’s like to get spam emails or irrelevant messages: annoying.
But outbound marketing — when done right — is much more than cold contacting people. And we should note here that cold calling and emailing isn’t all bad either. It can be really effective and create value for customers when it’s implemented the right way.
Here’s the deal: outbound marketing does involve reaching out to prospects (often through cold contact) who may or may not even be aware of their need. But when brands know their buyer personas, have dedicated outbound representatives or teams, and take care to reach out to the right prospects, they have an opportunity to cultivate really high-potential leads that they may never otherwise have engaged without outbound efforts.
As for the customers you convert with outbound? They might never have enjoyed the benefits of your solution had you not reached out to them first.
Good outbound marketing is about being targeted, intentional, and professional — not pushy or annoying. Let’s dive into how exactly you can do it.
Effective outbound marketing for SaaS
Reach out to the right people
Outbound marketing is not the practice of casting the widest net possible and hoping for the best. While it involves cold outreach, that outreach should still be targeted and only done after research on your part. Any prospect you reach out to should have high potential for needing your solution.
Your outreach should also be personalized. Formulaic emails and generic messaging won’t go far with B2B buyers and other professionals who already have a lot on their plate. Find the right prospects with tactics like buyer personas, then be personal in your message so your potential buyer can see right away why your message and solution are relevant for them.
Write great cold emails
Email is by far the most effective tactic for B2B lead generation, as demonstrated by recent research from Chief Marketer. Crafting attention-grabbing, high-quality cold emails is one of the surest ways to build your sales funnel.
Some tips for effective cold email outreach include writing like you talk (be natural), always email a person (not an info@ email address), write great subject lines, be concise, and always include a clear call to action (or next step).
Focus on value, not features
People care about solving their problems first and foremost.
What this means: don’t spend time listing your product’s features and capabilities. Focus on the benefits your product will deliver to customers, and tell them about those. Be as specific as possible. Every time you talk to a potential customer, consider the unique challenges they and their organization face, and emphasize how you can solve them.
Talking about value rather than simply features helps potential customers quickly understand why your SaaS solution is relevant for them, how they can use it, and how they’ll benefit.
Make it a dedicated effort
Don’t make outbound marketing an afterthought. As we covered, outbound strategies require continual and active effort. They have best practices and techniques that representatives improve on with practice and experience. Having a dedicated team focused on outbound efforts ensures you’ll see the ROI you expect. On the other hand, making it an afterthought or lumping it in with other strategies means you’ll likely waste a lot of time on outreach without seeing a return.
Our outbound email software and lead generation services are custom-built for startups, consultancies, marketing agencies, and other B2B organizations. Schedule a quick call with us and find out how we can help you win more clients.