#60 - Write your SaaS Growth

User experience is the sales guy?

Welcome 350 SaaS Founders, Tech Entrepreneurs, and  Marketers to the 60th edition of Write your SaaS Growth Newsletter:

In this edition, we discuss:

  • Cold Email: 6 principles to follow

  • Copywriting: 21 sentences for slippery slope copy

  • Email Marketing: Breaking down Notion’s email campaign

  • Product-Led Growth: 4 steps to make it work for your SaaS

  • SEO: Crafting the ''perfect'' SEO-friendly article

Let’s GO!

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Cold Email 📈

If you’re sending ANY cold emails at all, make sure you’re doing these 6 things.

Andre Haykal Jr says the cold outreach methods people have been using for YEARS work the best. Cold calls, cold emails, knocking on doors... Out of all these, only cold email allows you to reach an unlimited number of prospects efficiently.

Here are 6 things to effectively use cold email campaigns:

  1. Avoid these these phrases at all costs: - “Hi, it’s Andre I’m the owner of…” > Long introductions suck. Get to the point! - “Just following up” > Shows the prospect you're lazy - "I’d love to” > The prospect doesn't care what you’d love to do! 

  2. Keep the subject line straight to the point: - Quick question - Question for {name} - {firstName} / Andre - Intro These are all examples of quick and simple subject lines that have worked for me and my clients. Don’t overcomplicate it!

  3. Research you Ideal Customer Profile: You need to have a target to hit Narrow in on your ICP by getting clear on these attributes: - Company: > Industries >Technologies they use > Location > Total employees > Keywords - People: > Job Titles > Location

  4. Iterate, iterate, iterate: Thomas Edison made 1,000 different light bulbs before he found the winner Each campaign you send, dig through the data and look for opportunities to improve Successful campaigns are a result of consistent testing & iteration

  5. Start with the right software stack: Don’t neglect spending on the right tools! Here is all you need: - A domain name ($12/mo) with a business gmail ($7/mo)- ListKit.io to scrape email addresses ($99/mo for 1000 credits)- Smartlead to send emails ($94/mo)

  6. Have a good offer: It doesn’t matter if it’s yours or someone else's. Understand why the prospect needs it and leverage it to make a no-brainer CTA. This will make writing your emails much easier. What’s their problem and how do you solve it?

Copywriting 📈

A first principle of copywriting you need to know: Slippery slope writing.

Nova shares 11 magnetic sentences that get your readers to the next one (without being cringe) (+ why they work):

  1. Consistency is the dumbest way to succeed in history - Tim Denning. Tactic: Contrarian. Provokes a strong yes or no.

  2. It was the fourth week of quarantine when my wife began to cry - Michael Thompson. Tactic: Curiosity and resonance. You can relate and you want to know why.

  3. Writing online is a magnet for success - Kieren Drew. Tactic: Aspirational. Captures your interest (who doesn't want success)?

  4. The first client I ever landed paid me $15,000+/mo - George Ten Tactic: How did he do it? Sparks instant curiosity.

  5. This is every piece of advice I wish someone told me when I started growing my X account - Aaron Will Tactic: Saving time and mistakes.

  6. In 2022, Hollywood made $7,320,000,000 through storytelling - Parker Worth. Tactic: Credibility by association (Hollywood) and specificity.

  7. It's normal to feel unqualified - Takezo Tactic: Empathy. You can build movements by justifying people's failures (Russel Brunson).

  8. It took 7000 hours, 4 years, and 300 books to learn these 11 lessons - Taylin John Symmonds Tactic: Reduced perceived effort. "I've done it so you don't have to" + curiosity.

  9. Master psychology and you can (damn-near) print money at will - Jon Brosio Tactic: Provoke emotional response (make money) + promise of how

  10. My girlfriend hates Alex Hormozi - Jan Kaminski Tactic: Contrarian + Curiosity. You HAVE to find out why.

  11. Amazon is facing an $8B/year problem - Codie Sanchez Tactics: Slay the giant: When big names fail you pay attention

Want to know 10 more? Keep reading.

Email Marketing 📈

Let’s breakdown and analyze the good and the bad parts of SaaS emails.

Lulian provides a breakdown and analyzes the email sent by a SaaS tool Notion:

Image

  1. Placement of the CTA The placement of the CTA button feels a bit forced here. You are barely 2 seconds into reading the first paragraph and you are already hit with an ask.The reader needs more context to understand the message you are trying to convey and make a decision in their mind: Do they want to take you up on the offer or not?What I would advise instead is to let the rest of the copy work its magic all the way to the last line, and move the CTA beneath the text. However, that comes with its own fault, because:

  2. The copy feels rushed At least to me, this email gives off the feeling that it was written in a hurry. Even if it follows a well-known structure:- Company X had a problem → - They started using our solution → - Company X doesn’t have that problem anymore → - Don’t you want to be like Company X too?Each stage could use more specificity. For example “They had a tool overload” could be changed to “They were drowning in spreadsheets, unorganized documents, and outdated files”That would make the message more relatable to the reader and more efficient in driving action because it shows you deeply understand their pain points.

  3. This one is controversial If you are familiar with my content in the slightest, you’ll know that I am a big advocate for text-only emails for numerous reasons:- They’re great for deliverability- They have a more personal feel- They are readable on any email client and any deviceBut in this case, I would have actually loved to see something more visual, be it screenshots from inside the platform, or a GIF of a new feature I would unlock by buying the Plus plan.

The value proposition in this email does not come across clearly to me from words alone, perhaps for the reason outlined above as well.

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Product-Led Growth 📈

Product-Led Growth (PLG), explained in <2 mins:

Bandan says PLG works well for certain types of products and PLG can be clubbed with sales-led , marketing-led growth as well, or can be sequenced one after another.

Here are 4 signs to look for in a PLG driven case:

  1. User experience is the sales guy: Users can try the product without any external help/support. No sales folks needed and no marketing prompts. The experience of trying and using the product is such that the product speaks for itself

  2. Free to use, Pay to enhance: The free version is restricted in features but still has enough functionality to make the user curious about what’s in paid version. Eventually if users wants to enhance their experience, they can utilize the paid plans

  3. Value goes up with time: As you try and use the product more, you discover new relevant features and it seems like you sort of become more dependent on it over period of time.

  4. Advocacy spreads across the network: Users who start adoring the long-term value also cannot stop talking about it to their friends/colleagues. Hence, the product gets new users through word of mouth.

SEO 📈

Crafting the ''perfect'' SEO-friendly article.

Crafting the ''perfect'' SEO-friendly article has been a concept that SEOs obsess over. But people often forget the fundamentals

Low Fruits share 5 things that you should keep in mind when creating content::

  1. Your content should be scannable and consumable. That means it's optimized for reader experience: - Imagery for visualization - Short sentences that are broken down into different paragraphs - H2s and H3s headers that clearly explain what the following content will be about

  2. Write a catchy title that makes people click. It doesn't have to be a click-bait or over-promising. My approach is to keep the structure of the main question and add a little extra at the end that teases the content. Example: How to Write an SEO-Optimized Blog (Step-by-Step)

  3. Optimize the page speed. You can have amazing content with a catchy title, but if it takes too long to load, people would bounce. Here's what you can do:- Improve your hosting plan- Optimize your images to be below 200 KB- Do not upload heavy videos or add too much code

  4. Add your own opinion on the topic. Do not write what everyone else has written on it. Do not just repeat others. For search engines it's not just ''E-A-T'' anymore, it's ''E-E-A-T'' where ''E'' stands for Experience. Google prioritizes personal experiences more now.

  5. Write for humans, not for engines. Do not obsess over ''keyword density''. Focus on how you can best solve your reader's problems or how to best educate them. It also has to do with your authority as a writer. Readers can tell between a story-teller and a keyword stuffer.

How can we help each other? 🥅

  • Are you providing any marketing services to SaaS and tech companies? We’re vetting marketing experts to help SaaS companies hire specific marketers. You can apply here.

  • Add your SaaS tool as a featured blog. We have opened up guest posts for SaaS tools like yours in SaaSwrites. Promote your SaaS, get a juicy backlink, and create your content investment

  • Let me help you build a creative and unique marketing campaign for your Tech Product. Know more

Thanks for reading! SaaSwrites is a humble attempt to help SaaS founders and marketers grow their SaaS.

See you next Saturday.

Ricky,

P.S. If you liked this edition, it would mean the world to us if you share it with your friends. :) Thank you in advance!

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