5
0 Comments

12 Advantages of Building an Online Community for SaaS Business

The Software as a Service (SaaS) market is growing fast. The market is expected to grow from $225.6 billion in 2020 to $272.49 billion by the end of 2021.

If you have a SaaS business, it’s key to stay on people’s minds. One way to do this is to grow your online community. Over time, your fans and followers can provide priceless brand awareness and loyalty, but they can also help provide solutions to specific problems.

Read on to learn more about the advantages of online community building for your SaaS venture.

What Are The Advantages For Your SaaS Business From Building A Thriving Online Community?

1. Tap Into Changing Customer Purchasing Behavior

With so much information available these days, it’s more common for people to research before purchasing a product or service. For this research, they most often turn to the internet. They read product reviews, seek recommendations from like-minded users, and catch up on the businesses in which they’re interested.

Where better to do this than via an online community that’s already familiar with your brand?

2. Optimize Your CAC

There are several ways to decrease your customer acquisition cost (CAC). One of them is to build an online community.

If your community contributes content with a positive sentiment, it says a lot about your brand. As a result, potential customers are more likely to purchase your product or service.

The more content and engagement within your community, the higher your search engine rankings are also likely to be. In addition, using community-generated content means less money spent on expensive content and advertising.

Potential customers are more likely to find your business, sign up, and stay for the value your products, services, and online community add to their lives.

3. Beat Your Competitors

Your SaaS business can stand out from the crowd if you have a flourishing online community. Potential customers will easily find your business and its services, and they’ll have access to customer testimonials and reviews. All of this leads to increased trust in your business.

Once new or potential customers also form part of your community, they’re more likely to remain loyal to your business. Well done on beating your competitors.

4. Integrate and Streamline Departments and Processes

→ Customer Services & Peer Help
Most customers don’t enjoy having to call customer support helplines. However, with an online community, they can find answers themselves. For example, an online chatbot is often more efficient for your business and less frustrating for customers.

If your online community platform contains documentation and articles about your business and products, it becomes a wealth of knowledge for other customers. Customers also tend to help each other if they get stuck, saving your business time and money.

As a bonus, people are more likely to be satisfied with the customer service you provide — with little effort on your part.

→ Sales
Having an online community can be helpful in the different stages of the sales journey. For example, using a Q&A can help potential customers make more informed decisions in the pre-sales phase. They’re then more likely to make a purchase.

5. Capitalize on New Acquisition Channels

User-generated content created through discussion forums can be used for posts, Q&As, videos, and articles shared via your community platform. If prospective customers search for answers to their problems, the chances are high that they’ll stumble upon the answers provided by your online community.

If you include customer-created content on your community platform, prospective customers are more likely to trust and buy your product or service. In addition, new customers will feel more secure that there’s a community to support them if problems arise.

6. Drive Better Retention Rates and Revenue

Communities keep your customers engaged and allow them to form a stronger relationship with your business. For example, networking within an online community increases engagement with your brand and helps you stay in front of someone’s mind.

When customers like and share posts, add questions to forums, and reply to each others’ posts and queries, they’re more likely to stay loyal to your brand. Ultimately, this could lead to higher revenue.

7. Improve Your Digital Customer Experience

Building a community online can create a centralized space where your customers can connect with you and other loyal customers. Here they can find support, advice, learn best practices, and give feedback on your SaaS products and services.

In this way, your online community can become a hub for a streamlined customer experience.

8. Enjoy Stronger Relationships and Customer Loyalty

Customers who are active in online communities often form friendships and build relationships with the business. If they find value in engaging with others and with your brand, they’re more likely to become loyal fans.

9. Nurture Your Brand Ambassadors

Customers who already love a brand tend to enjoy talking about it. An online community will give them a space to share their stories and pass on their knowledge.

You can acknowledge the value they’re adding by highlighting their contributions and perhaps even rewarding them. This will further inspire them to keep promoting your business.

10. Tap Into Social Listening

Social listening is the process of tapping into social media channels to find out what others are saying about your brand. Social listening can help your business answer questions such as: What are my business’ strong or weak points? How do I compare with my competitors? Are customers satisfied with my product or service?

Answering these questions can become easy when you have a dedicated online community. You no longer have to create polls and send them via email, hoping for enough responses. Instead, you can get feedback straight from your online community.

11. Benefit from Better Product Innovation

The customers who form part of your online community can give immediate feedback on your SaaS products and services. They’re likely to use your product or service often and may be able to guide you in terms of what needs improvement.

Your community can also be involved in developing new products or services, either actively or passively. For example, you can keep track of the most popular user requests or ask what your community would like to change.
You can even use some of your most loyal customers to beta test new features. When you make changes, let the community know, as this builds loyalty.

12. Start Conversations

Customers that form part of an online community will naturally have conversations. Apart from using online communities for social listening, your SaaS business can also use this platform to start relevant and meaningful conversations about your brand.

You can engage customers on industry-specific issues. And instead of only reacting when your brand is tagged, you can be the conversation starter. Remember to always use conversations to your advantage.

Discover the pros and cons of free and owned community platforms, as well as get the invaluable 14 working tips for building the most effective online community for SaaS businesses on PayPro Global’s blog.

Trending on Indie Hackers
How I grew a side project to 100k Unique Visitors in 7 days with 0 audience 47 comments Competing with Product Hunt: a month later 33 comments Why do you hate marketing? 27 comments $15k revenues in <4 months as a solopreneur 14 comments Use Your Product 13 comments How I Launched FrontendEase 13 comments