The Indian SaaS ecosystem is rapidly maturing, and the country is on track to become the second-largest SaaS nation by 2026, with total revenue expected to reach $100 billion.
With the rapid pace of digital transformation and the rise of cloud computing, SaaS has emerged as the preferred software delivery model, opening up a plethora of opportunities for startups to enter and make their mark in the market. Thus, the evolution of b2b saas sales strategy.
However, with the number of SaaS companies nearly doubling in the last five years, scaling a product in the crowded Indian SaaS space is becoming difficult. However, this does not mean that there is no room for new SaaS businesses or that scaling your existing business is impossible; however, your marketing must hit the target if you want to succeed.
In this article, we will cover all about sales and marketing strategy for saas in India.
What is SaaS Sales Strategy?
SaaS is a subscription-based service; marketing strategies should prioritize long-term, repeat customers over quick, one-time sales. And marketing to these customers requires time and effort, from raising brand awareness to closing the deal and nurturing them to become repeat customers.
Relation between sales and marketing strategy for SaaS
Whatever your SaaS sales model is, you should be aware that the ability of your Sales and Marketing teams to collaborate will be critical to your success.
While you’ll most likely treat Marketing and Sales as separate departments, it’s critical that these groups work together to achieve their common goals — especially if you’re using a hybrid sales model that relies on website signups and interactions to acquire new paying customers.
Marketing is in charge of raising brand awareness, strengthening brand reputation, and attracting prospects and leads. B2B SaaS sales strategy is in charge of persuading leads, closing deals, and keeping customers. Neither can function effectively without the other.
Marketing relies on Sales for information, direction, and feedback, and Sales relies on Marketing to effectively distribute brand knowledge and generate high-quality leads. Create a collaborative culture between the two teams, and consider using a CRM to unify data between them.
Stages of SaaS Startup Sales Strategy
Each SaaS company will gradually perfect its own sales approach, but the SaaS sales process generally follows these steps for their effective b2b SaaS sales strategy:
1. B2B SaaS Sales Strategy: Identify your Customer
To begin with a sales strategy for SaaS startup, you must understand who your customers are. This can be a one-time process, but as your SaaS company grows, you may discover new audience segments to target. You might also notice that your current audience is changing and evolving with new or different characteristics. In any case, you’ll need to develop customer personas in order to generate higher-quality leads and speak more directly to people’s wants, needs, and experiences.
2. B2B SaaS Sales Strategy: Prospecting
Next, focus on prospecting as an important aspect of sales strategy for SaaS startup. Prospecting is typically the responsibility of marketers, but sales professionals can also participate. There are many approaches to sales prospecting for leads, including content marketing, SEO, community engagement, and cold email outreach.
3. B2B SaaS Sales Strategy: Building Connection
Depending on your sales model, connection could mean attracting a prospect organically to your website or reaching out to them via email or an automated chat message on your website using a tool like Intercom.
If customers contact you through your website, make sure to respond quickly — according to Xant.ai research, the vendor who responds first receives 35-50% of sales, so make sure you’re monitoring and optimizing your team’s email response times.
In any case, you must introduce prospects to your brand and give them something to do next, whether it’s reading more about your product or taking a key action like starting a free trial.
4. B2B SaaS Sales Strategy: Demo & Trials
Most SaaS companies try to get users to sign up for a free trial, then walk them through a series of steps to introduce them to the product. This frequently includes demonstrating the product (via video, automated guided tour using software such as Intercom, or via a personal guided tour by a sales rep). Some SaaS providers promote a demo over a free trial. What you select will be determined by your product and overall SaaS startup sales strategy.
5. B2B SaaS Sales Strategy: First Sale
This is when sales reps are usually the most active, and it’s often the first customer touch point for a SaaS sales rep, who will reach out to individuals who have tried the software and try to close the deal. Induslge in the best sales and marketing strategy for saas.
This outreach is typically done via email but can also be accomplished through phone calls or SMS messages. According to a Hubspot report, 86% of professionals prefer email as their primary communication medium. I like to use Intercom to send an automated email series to everyone who has signed up for a free trial, educating them on how to use Email Analytics and offering incentives to upgrade to a paid account over the course of a few weeks.
Ensure that your sales representatives act as advisors and provide friendly, timely communication. According to one Salesforce report, 79% of customers prefer salespeople who act as advisors when it comes to understanding sales and marketing strategy for SaaS .
6. B2B SaaS Sales Strategy: Continuous Sale
From here, SaaS sales teams are in charge of keeping active customers subscribed. After all, keeping a customer is usually much less expensive than finding a new one.
This could also be a chance to upsell existing customers on a plan with new features or entirely new products. Customer service that is friendly, timely, and thorough is essential for retaining happy, loyal customers. 73% of customers will stay with a company that has friendly customer service representatives.
With the rising popularity of social commerce, brands can keep up with existing customers and build trust and increase recurring sales.
SaaS Sales Strategy Template
A profitable SaaS sales strategy can be developed at both the organizational and individual levels, but it is more commonly established by a higher-up or even the company’s owner.
Here are the steps you should take to develop a SaaS startup sales strategy for your company.
1. Select a SaaS Sales Model.
First and foremost, select a SaaS sales model. This will be determined by the nature of your product, but you have three options, which we discussed above. You have the option of using the transactional sales model, the customer self-service model, or the enterprise sales model.
A customer self-service model will suit the majority of new SaaS businesses well. You can expand into transactional and enterprise sales as your company grows with Saas startup sales strategy.
2. Determine your target audience and develop a value proposition for your software.
Create buyer personas and outline the problems they face to identify the target audience.
Use the “Target Audience, Problem, Solution, Value” format to create an easy-to-scan summary of your software’s value proposition. This is how it appears:
- Who is your intended audience?
- What is the problem they are having?
- Solution: How can your software assist them in resolving the problem?
- Value: What benefits or outcomes can they expect from using your software?
3. Establish prospect qualification standards.
Now that you’ve determined who to target, it’s time to establish additional sales qualification criteria. The truth is that if your software is useful enough, it can serve a large number of customers and prospects.
However, you do not want to target just anyone. Sales reps have limited time, and chasing unqualified prospects is a sure way to waste time and fall short of quota. Learn how to qualify leads, then create a list of targeted qualification questions that you or your sales representatives can use to weed out unqualified prospects.
4. Make a sales playbook that includes email templates, phone scripts, and closing techniques.
You know who you’re going after and who is qualified to be a customer under sales and marketing strategy for saas. Now is the time to create a sales playbook that your entire organization can use to increase the likelihood of a closed-won deal.
A sales playbook will include everything your sales representatives will need to nurture prospects. You can include materials such as email templates, qualifying questions, call scripts, and closing techniques. You can also include general industry information and a cheat sheet containing common characteristics of your target buyer personas.
5. Set activity and revenue targets for sales representatives.
Without objectives and goals, a sales strategy is incomplete. Setting activity goals and sales quotas will ensure that your sales reps feel empowered to meet business objectives.
You can set volume quotas (for example, “sell 50 premium subscriptions per month”) or profit quotas (for example, “sell $25,000 in revenue every quarter”).
The number of phone calls, emails, meetings, LinkedIn connection requests, and other activities can be used to track activity goals.
6. Use key metrics to track sales performance.
Last but not least, monitor sales performance by tracking key metrics. This allows you to adjust goals as needed and celebrate company victories. You can use sales automation software to keep track of the metrics automatically.
7. Create a strong customer service program.
While this is not technically a sales strategy, developing a strong customer support program can help you sell the product more effectively. Why? Knowing when and where customers encounter problems allows you to improve the product, increasing positive word-of-mouth and product adoption.
Not to mention, when making a purchasing decision, consumers are increasingly considering customer service. By providing excellent customer service, you can ensure that your current customers stick with you and tell others about their positive experience.
How Ampliz Boosts Sales and Marketing Strategy for SaaS?
Selling a SaaS product differs from other types of selling, but the core principle remains the same: it’s all about providing immeasurable value to your prospects and customers. With the advice and strategies we’ve provided, you’ll be able to launch a lucrative career in SaaS sales and design a sales strategy for a SaaS startup — or, if you’re developing a SaaS product, you’ll be able to increase annual recurring revenue year over year.
If you are looking for the best sales intelligence tools to boost your Saas sales, take a look at Ampliz. Because before you go executing the sales strategy for SaaS startup, you ought to have a reliable lead or prospect list. So, with Ampliz, get the most comprehensive email list of prospects and develop the sales strategy for SaaS startup. The list contains demographic, technographic, and firmographic details on the prospects. Thus, you can reach out to them at the best possible time when they are proactive in taking a decision as a part of your sales strategy for saas startup.
The Final Thoughts
It is a marathon, not a sprint, to perfect your SaaS sales strategy. Be patient as you develop your sales strategy for a SaaS startup, learn more about your product, your target customers, and your sales reps, and keep these things in mind as you develop your SaaS sales strategy.
- Select a SaaS sales model and develop a SaaS sales strategy template that aligns with your product and business objectives.
- Integrate your sales and marketing teams with the SaaS sales strategy template so they can effectively collaborate.
- Use both inbound and outbound lead generation strategies under the SaaS sales strategy template.
- At all stages of the sales process, provide excellent customer service.
- Make every effort to keep your customers.
- It is less expensive to keep them than to replace them when it comes to designing a SaaS sales strategy template.
The more time you put into your SaaS efforts and SaaS sales strategy template, and optimize for your specific characteristics and goals, the closer you will be to achieving high-momentum growth.
