The internet is an ever-evolving digital entity, offering complex breeding grounds with seemingly limitless possibilities. 21st century capitalism takes shape online, and in a market built upon capital, those who capture customers’ attention more effectively win out.
SaaS (Software as a Service) products require marketing that is relevant to their product, often through digital channels in order to garner attention, promote it and introduce them to potential customers.Each year, many of the most promising digital products are left out of the market because they weren’t advertised to the right audience or using appropriate tools. How do you determine whether your marketing tactics are successful before it’s too late?
When discussing Return on Investment for SaaS Digital Marketing, this becomes especially pertinent.
This guide will provide an introduction to ROI (Return on investment) in SaaS and key metrics you should monitor, as well as strategies for increasing your returns. Let’s dive right in, shall we?
ROI in SaaS Marketing
ROI (Return On Investments) is the measure of profitability that indicates how successful your marketing efforts have been. In SaaS marketing, profitability is especially critical due to the high volume of customers and fierce competition it brings; 95%+ of year-one income for SaaS-based businesses goes towards client acquisition through marketing initiatives.
It is imperative that every dollar invested in your product or service is put to good use. ROI helps you do this by assessing the effectiveness of your marketing strategies and channels, what works well, what needs improvement and where improvements can be made.
Let’s begin with an essential metric: overall growth or profit. This measure measures the difference between investment returns over a certain time period and the amount invested.
Calculating an overall ROI over a certain period of time requires using a formula.
Return on Investment (ROI)/Total Investment = ROI.
Calculating the profitability of advertising efforts will enable you to determine their effectiveness. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to differentiate between marketing strategies that generate results and those which simply get carried along for the ride.
To gain this understanding, we must conduct more precise measurements.
Calculation of ROI by Channel:
A successful marketing campaign requires multiple components working in sync to generate leads that lead to sales. Obviously, you want to maximize the effectiveness of those channels with the greatest potential and eliminate or modify those which don’t perform well.
Monitoring leads generated is essential in this process. Many CRM programs offer this feature. It’s essential to monitor leads generated through individual channels like newsletters, emails and social media marketing efforts alike.
Let us examine the case for email marketing ROI:
Calculating an ROI through email marketing remains similar to prior calculations. Begin by estimating the total investment (costs) involved.
Total marketing expenses equal X (Email marketing allowance for teams) plus Y (Email marketing software). Thus, the total investment is equal to X + Y.
The next step is to calculate the revenue earned.
Email marketing generates revenue when its lead conversion rate reaches Z% and the median sales price increases by Z.
Let’s now use these numbers to calculate the return on investment from email marketing:
ROI = Z – (X+Y)/(X+Y)
Congratulations! We have calculated the ROI for email marketing within your business. Utilize this same formula to calculate other channels’ ROIs and gain the insight needed to increase those returns.
Acquire the Core of the Matter
Spreadsheets offer great versatility, but if you don’t know what to use them for, it could just as well be like throwing them away.
The purpose of this process is to increase profits and sales as well as expand your business. Calculating returns gives you insight into which channels perform best, but there’s more than that to it than that.
Answer the two most essential questions: “why?” and “how?“
1. What determines why some channels work and others don’t?
2. How can you improve key aspects that will boost ROI, ultimately leading to increased company growth?
Before answering these questions, it’s essential to become familiar with the elements that determine the success and efficiency of any marketing channel you employ.
Traffic
Traffic refers to the number of visitors to your website, app or blog. These numbers provide insight into who is visiting your site from where, helping you identify developments and trends.
MQLs and SQLs
Marketing Qualified Leads and Sales Qualified Leads are also known as MQLs or SQLs, which refer to prospective leads who show interest in your product or service. The latter refers to a lead who could potentially convert into a customer.
These metrics are vital as they allow you to monitor the conversion rates between MQLs and SQLs across campaigns and channels, thus assessing their efficacy.
Customer Acquisition Costs
CAC (Customer Acquisition Costs) is a straightforward measurement. As its name suggests, it’s the total cost of acquisition for each new customer. Calculating its formula requires simply dividing all marketing expenses incurred by the total number of new customers acquired.
Calculate your Cost-Per-Click (CAC) for all marketing campaigns and individual channels to gain a comprehensive insight into each campaign and channel’s effectiveness.
Lead Quality and BANT
Making one sale out of a thousand leads is pointless. Therefore, it’s essential to assess and control your leads’ quality; using a BANT score as an efficient method for doing this can be extremely beneficial.
1. Budget the prospect’s willingness and capacity to commit to your solution.
2. Authority Who have the final say regarding a sale?
3. Does your potential customer require your solution?
4. Timeline – How long must a potential buyer wait before making their purchasing decision?
Each variable should be rated from one to five and then multiplied by 5. This gives your score on a scale from zero to 100; zero being zero chance for becoming a client and 100 being your most likely outcome.
Data = Insights
Your desk top spreadsheets or the Excel ones on your laptop (it’s 2021!) are just tools to reach a goal. With more leads, sales, profits and perhaps an article in Forbesmagazine thrown in as bonus material for success – data = insights!
Today, we discussed various measurements that provide us with practical ideas and strategies.
If, for instance, your newsletter email campaign proves a huge success, statistics can help pinpoint why. Information such as targeted keywords and audience demographics, as well as content quality can all be utilized for additional campaigns like social media ads that will bring in more leads to the channel.
No amount of knowledge is useful unless you can effectively utilize it.
Final Verdict
The aim is to identify the most pertinent performance indicators and then develop an accurate tracking system for them.
Once you have your information, it is up to the marketing department and yourself to gather meaningful insights that can accelerate the expansion of your SaaS business.
