This SaaS Inbound Marketing Starter Kit is the first step in setting up your SaaS marketing model for success.

1. SAAS
INBOUND MARKETING
STARTER KIT

2. MARKETING BASICS
ACQUISITION
CONVERSIO
N
RETENTION
Get ‘em
Persuade ‘em
Keep ‘em

3. ACQUISITION GOAL:
- Getting people to engage with your web
presence
Good acquisition:
- Getting potential customers to visit your site
Bad acquisition:
- Getting irrelevant visitors who become low-
quality leads
Acquisition cost:
- The money you have to spend to get a visitor.

4. ACQUISITION ● Blogging
● Micro-blogging
● Social media
● Data sharing
● Public relations
● Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
● PPC
● E-mail campaigns
● Affiliate marketing
ACTION ITEMS

5. CONVERSIO
N
GOAL:
- Getting online visitors to perform a desirable
action
Typical conversion actions:
● Download a whitepaper
● Sign up for a newsletter
● Sign up for a free trial
● Sign up for your service
● Sign up for your service and actually pay for it

6. CONVERSIO
N
Conversion goal:
- A page on your site which users reach
when they convert (thank you page)
Conversion rate:
- What % of your visitors performed the
conversion action
Conversion funnel:
- Path of conversion actions that leads to a
desired outcome

7. CONVERSIO
N
● Doing a better job at acquisition
● Optimizing landing pages
● Optimizing download/signup process
● Improving demo/trial offer
● Improving demo/trial experience
● Offering a free/introductory plan or
improving existing one
ACTION ITEMS

8. RETENTION Definition: Getting visitors to…
● Keep in touch with you
● Perform more conversion actions
● Pay you more money
Benefits of good retention:
● Increases lifetime value per customer
● Reduces churn
● Builds a community
● Increases customer satisfaction
7x
COST TO RETAIN
1 CUSTOMER
COST TO ACQUIRE 1
CUSTOMER
IT COSTS 7 TIMES MORE TO ACQUIRE ONE CUSTOMER
THAN IT DOES TO RETAIN ONE

9. RETENTION ● Product blogs
● Newsletters
● Sales calls
● Proactive customer support
● Microblogging
● Networking with existing customers/
prospects on social networks
ACTION ITEMS

10. CONTENT
CORE ASSETS +
ROADMAP
ACQUISITION CONVERSION RETENTION
MARKET
POSITIONING
MESSAGING
CONVERSION AND
RETENTION
ACQUISITION

11. WHAT WE’LL GAIN
1. We’ll know how to price our product, how to present it on your site and what kind of trial/demo is
most appropriate
2. We’ll know which search terms to focus on in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Pay-Per-
Click (PPC)
3. We’ll know exactly what to write about in our corporate site, blog and other content channels
4. We can focus our efforts on the markets, products and packages that have highest revenue
potential

12. MEASURING SAAS MARKETING ROI

13. WHAT WE SHOULD TRACK (WEB ANALYTICS)
● Number of visitors and visits to your site
● Traffic sources (which sites visitors are coming from)
● Popular content
● Bounce rates (% of visitors who left your site immediately)
● Conversion (% of visitors who completed a desirable action)

14. HOW TO MEASURE MARKETING ROI
Actual revenue metrics:
● Per online visitor acquired
● Per lead
● Per new customer
Translating CLICKS to CASH will allow us to know:
● Our acquisition cost for visitors from each online channel
● How much money we made off visitors from each channel
● Which channels to focus on
● How much to spend on each channel

15. MARKETING FINANCIAL MODEL:
LIFETIME VALUE / CUSTOMER (LTV)
TOTAL REVENUES PRODUCT PER PERIOD TOTAL RELEVANT VARIABLE COSTS
NUMBER OF CUSTOMERS
NUMBER OF PERIODS THEY REMAIN CUSTOMERS
LTV (LIFETIME VALUE PER CUSTOMER)
Lifetime Value represents the amount of CASH Adcade will add over the course of time, by
acquiring one customer.
FORMULA

16. MARKETING FINANCIAL MODEL:
LIFETIME VALUE / CUSTOMER (LTV)
$30,000 REVENUES PER MONTH $10,000 SERVER COSTS & SUPPORT
300 CUSTOMERS
24 MONTHS
$1,600 LTV
EXAMPLE

17. TRANSLATING LEADS TO CASH:
VALUE PER LEAD (VPL)
LEAD TO SALE CONVERSION
VPL
EXAMPLE
LTV
2% CONVERSION
$32
$1,600
FORMULA

18. TRANSLATING CLICKS TO CASH:
VALUE PER VISITOR (VPV)
VISITOR TO LEAD CONVERSION
VPV
EXAMPLE
LEAD TO SALE CONVERSION
FORMULA
LTV
4% CONVERSION TO LEADS
$1.28
2% CONVERSION TO SALES
$1,600
SIDE NOTE: So if we’re paying $1 per click for
SEO or PPC, Google is getting 78% of our profits.

19. BLOGGING, SOCIAL, AND SEARCH
ACTION ITEMS AND MEASURING ROI

20. BLOGGING, SOCIAL, AND SEARCH
BLOGGING SOCIAL SEARCH
THE
WORD
SPREADING
THE WORD
GETTING
FOUND
Creating content that
causes prospects to engage
Creating a buzz and
networking with prospects
Ensuring prospects find
you on search engines

21. BLOGGING, SOCIAL, AND SEARCH
YOUR WEBSITE
BLOGGING
BUZZWORDS
PRODUCT BLOG /
PAGES
MICRO - BLOGGING
ACQUISITION
SOCIAL
SOCIAL NETWORKS
POPULARITY SITES
MEDIA SHARING
PUBLIC RELATIONS
ACQUISITION
SEARCH
SEARCH ENGINE
OPTIMIZATION
(SEO)
PAY PER CLICK
ADVERTISING
(PPC)
ACQUISITION
SEO, PPC, social networks, PR and Twitter will generate traffic to our site.

22. BLOGGING, SOCIAL, AND SEARCH
YOUR WEBSITE
BLOGGING
BUZZWORDS
PRODUCT BLOG /
PAGES
MICRO - BLOGGING
ACQUISITION
SOCIAL
SOCIAL NETWORKS
POPULARITY SITES
MEDIA SHARING
PUBLIC RELATIONS
ACQUISITION
SEARCH
SEARCH ENGINE
OPTIMIZATION
(SEO)
PAY PER CLICK
ADVERTISING
(PPC)
ACQUISITION
Blogs and PR help SEO by attracting links; SEO drives traffic to our blogs.
TRAFFIC
TRAFFIC
LINKS
LINKS

23. BLOGGING, SOCIAL, AND SEARCH
YOUR WEBSITE
BLOGGING
BUZZWORDS
PRODUCT BLOG /
PAGES
MICRO - BLOGGING
ACQUISITION
SOCIAL
SOCIAL NETWORKS
POPULARITY SITES
MEDIA SHARING
PUBLIC RELATIONS
ACQUISITION
SEARCH
SEARCH ENGINE
OPTIMIZATION
(SEO)
PAY PER CLICK
ADVERTISING
(PPC)
ACQUISITION
Blogs and PR help SEO by attracting links; SEO drives traffic to our blogs.
TRAFFIC
TRAFFIC
CONTENT

24. BLOGGING, SOCIAL, AND SEARCH
YOUR WEBSITE
BLOGGING
BUZZWORDS
PRODUCT BLOG /
PAGES
MICRO - BLOGGING
SOCIAL
SOCIAL NETWORKS
POPULARITY SITES
MEDIA SHARING
PUBLIC RELATIONS
SEARCH
SEARCH ENGINE
OPTIMIZATION
(SEO)
PAY PER CLICK
ADVERTISING
(PPC)
Blogs build readership, and gradually bring qualified visitors to your site.
ACQUISITION

25. BLOGGING, SOCIAL, AND SEARCH
YOUR WEBSITE
BLOGGING
BUZZWORDS
PRODUCT BLOG /
PAGES
MICRO - BLOGGING
SOCIAL
SOCIAL NETWORKS
POPULARITY SITES
MEDIA SHARING
PUBLIC RELATIONS
SEARCH
SEARCH ENGINE
OPTIMIZATION
(SEO)
PAY PER CLICK
ADVERTISING
(PPC)
Possible retention channels - Product blogs, Twitter, and Social Networks
RETENTION
RETENTION
RETENTION

26. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
● Research the blogosphere, find a good niche subject
● Start writing 2-5 posts per week on the subject
● Read and comment on 50 leading related blogs
● They’ll reference your blog => traffic
● Plan your posts to include key SEO keywords
BLOGGING: COMPANY
● Setting up the blog:
○ On Blogger/TypePad – a few hours
○ Medium – a few hours
● Writing min. 2 posts / week (~1-4h / post)
● Reading & commenting on other blogs (~2h / week)
● Responding to comments (~1-4h / week)
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Total blog visitors and subscribers * % who visit the
website * VPV )
+ (% contribution of blog readership to purchase *
purchases from blog readers * LTV )
+ (% contribution of blog subscription to purchase *
purchases from blog subscribers* LTV )
FORMULA
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

27. BLOGGING: COMPANY
SUBJECTS THAT INTEREST A BROAD
RELEVANT AUDIENCE
253 COMMENTS FOLLOW AUTHOR
Jobs: Adcade is looking for a Sr Product Manager
PRODUCT AD
RSS FEED &
TWITTER FEED
SUBSCRIPTIONSUBJECTS THAT INTEREST A BROAD
RELEVANT AUDIENCE
87 COMMENTS FOLLOW AUTHOR
SUBJECTS THAT INTEREST A BROAD
RELEVANT AUDIENCE
133 COMMENTS FOLLOW AUTHOR
It is a MUST the author
engages with commentators
Recycles traffic back to
social pages and blog
Constantly
promote our
products
Important to build individual
following’s as well as the company’s
Great engagement practice
and sign of company growth

28. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
BLOGGING: PRODUCT
● Setting up the blog:
○ On Blogger/TypePad – a few hours
○ Medium – a few hours
● Writing min. 2 posts / week (~1-3h / post)
● Responding to comments (~3-6h / week)
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Total website visitors landing on blog * VPV)
+ (% contribution of blog readership to purchase *
purchases from blog readers * LTV)
+ (% contribution of blog & newsletter subscription to
purchase * purchases from subscribers* LTV)
FORMULA
● Usually written by product team, embedded in site
● Start writing 2-5 posts/week - product news, tips, etc.
● Aim at retaining existing contacts & cross-selling
● Focus on subjects users search for => SEO traffic
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

29. BLOGGING: PRODUCT
CHOOSE A
PRODUCT THAT
INTERESTS YOU
● PROD 1
● PROD 2
● PROD 3
● PROD 4
● PROD 5
LINKS TO HELP
CENTER
PRODUCT
CONTENT
RSS FEED &
TWITTER FEED
SUBSCRIPTION
Important to promote
additional products and
product specific content
Promote Help Center
content and any other
knowledge base material
23 COMMENTS FOLLOW AUTHOR
FOCUS ON PRODUCT FEATURES AND
BENEFITS
55 COMMENTS FOLLOW AUTHOR
FOCUS ON PRODUCT FEATURES AND
BENEFITS
13 COMMENTS FOLLOW AUTHOR
Product content should focus
on the problems they solve
Recycles traffic back to
social pages and blog
FOCUS ON PRODUCT FEATURES AND
BENEFITS

30. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SOCIAL (MICRO-BLOGGING): TWITTER
● Write a good bio (1-2 hours)
● Build a group of followers (ongoing)
● Read Tweets and Direct Messages from
colleagues/prospects (~1h/day)
● Tweet/Retweet 5-15 times a day (~1h/day)
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Total website visitors originating from Twitter * VPV)
+ (Blog visitors originating from Twitter * % who visit the
website * VPV )
+ (% contribution of Twitter interaction to purchase *
purchases from followers * LTV)
FORMULA
● Post 140-character “Tweets” several times a day
● Can be personal (“what I’m doing, check this out”) or
corporate (“our news, events and offers”)
● Follow people from your industry, they’ll follow you
● Use (sparingly) to drive traffic to blog and offers
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

31. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SOCIAL: FACEBOOK
● Recurring graphic design/minor web development
● One-time effort to build initial fan base
● Core content (from your blog, etc.)
● Somebody to post regular updates & reply
● For ~1000 users – 2h /day
● For ~5000 users – hire a part-time student
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Website visitors originating from Facebook * VPV)
+ (Blog visitors originating from Facebook * % who visit
the website * VPV)
+ (% contribution of Facebook interaction to purchase *
purchases from fans * LTV)
FORMULA
● Get people to “Like” it (1000+ and we’re in business)
● Generate frequent updates to make it spread virally
● Natural to connect your Page to your blog
● Advanced: Facebook application => viral acquisition
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

32. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SOCIAL: LINKEDIN
● Writing a good company profile (a few hours)
● Getting your team to build connections (ongoing)
● Activity on existing groups (~2h / day)
● Managing your own group
● < 500 connections – 4h /day
● > 500 connections – hire an agency
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Website visitors originating from LinkedIn * VPV)
+ (Blog visitors originating from LinkedIn * % who visit
the website * VPV)
+ (Direct leads from LinkedIn * VPL)
+ (% contribution of group membership to purchase *
purchases from group members * LTV)
FORMULA
● Build company profile with the right keywords
● Make noise and post content on large existing groups
● Start a group, invite your team’s connections
● Attract more members, post compelling content
● Advanced: LinkedIn advertising, searching for leads
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

33. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SOCIAL: GOOGLE +
● Writing a good company profile (a few hours)
● Getting your team to build connections (ongoing)
● Activity on existing groups (~2h / day)
● Managing your own group
● < 500 connections – 4h /day
● > 500 connections – hire an agency
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Website visitors originating from Google+ * VPV)
+ (Blog visitors originating from Google+ * % who visit
the website * VPV)
+ (Direct leads from Google+ * VPL)
+ (% contribution of group membership to purchase *
purchases from group members * LTV)
FORMULA
● Build company profile with the right keywords
● Make noise and post content on large existing groups
● Start a group, invite your team’s connections
● Attract more members, post compelling content
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

34. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SOCIAL: YOUTUBE
● Create the videos (endless hours)
● Create a profile and channel (a few hours)
● Manage your channel (~2 hrs. / week)
● Make new friends (one-time effort + ~2 hrs. / week)
● Network, comment on other videos (~1 hr. / day)
MEASURING ROI:
+ ( Website visitors through YouTube * VPV )
+ ( % contribution of video views to purchase *
purchases from viewers * LTV )
FORMULA
● Upload short videos – demos, presentations
(<100MB)
● Create company profile and your own channel
● Add videos to your channel (your own + others)
● Make lots of friends
● Invite them to see your videos, comment on theirs
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

35. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SOCIAL: PUBLIC RELATIONS
● A full-service PR agency costs $6-15K p.m.
● Just media list/editorial calendar can costs ~$4000
p.a.
● Just following up on PR can cost ~$1000 p.m.
● Writing a PR/article by a professional costs $200-600
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Website visitors through industry sites that covered
you or published your articles * VPV)
+ (% increase in direct traffic growth * VPV)
+ (% contribution to SEO efforts * website visitors
through SEO * VPV)
FORMULA
● Get a media list of industry journalists
● Write press releases – customer wins, new products
● Distribute to media list and follow up aggressively
● Do editorial calendar research on your industry press
● Submit vendor articles
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

36. SOCIAL COMMITMENT DAY / WEEK
COMPANY BLOGGING
~ 4hr / day
Read / Comment on 10 related blogs
PRODUCT BLOGGING
TWITTER
FACEBOOK
LINKEDIN
YOUTUBE
PER DAY PER WEEK
2 - 5 posts (~20h/wk)
Read / Comment on 50 related blogs
~ 4hr / day
Read / Comment on 10 related blogs
2 - 5 posts (~20h/wk)
Read / Comment on 50 related blog
Follow new prospects (~1h/day)
Read Tweets from prospects (~1h/day)
Tweet/Retweet 5-15 times (~1h/day)
Follow new prospects (~5h/wk)
Read Tweets from prospects (~5h/wk)
Tweet/Retweet 25-75 times (~5h/wk)
Post regular updates & reply (~2h/day)
Recurring graphic design (TBD)
Post regular updates & reply (~10h/wk)
Recurring graphic design (TBD)
Activity on existing groups (~2h/day)
Managing your own groups (~1h/day)
< 500 connections – 4h/day
Activity on existing groups (~10h/wk)
Managing your own groups (~5h/wk)
< 500 connections – 20h/wk
Network, comment on other videos (~1h/
day)
Manage your channel (~2 h/wk)
Make new friends (~2 h/wk)
PER MANAGER

37. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SEARCH: SEO
● A full-service SEO agency costs $200-1000 p.m.
● Or, buy just technical site optimization and DIY:
○ Find your top search terms and how you
rank today
○ List yourself in directories, indexes and
search engines
○ Improve site structure, add keywords to
existing content
○ Do PR, blogs and add resources to your
site
MEASURING ROI:
+ (Total website visitors originating from search engines
* VPV)
+ (Blog visitors originating from search engines * % who
visit the website * VPV)
- (Visitors from search engines before SEO program *
VPV)
FORMULA
● Optimize site to prevent SEO roadblocks
● Find 5 -10 search terms to focus on
● High-profile terms – big, competitive, low conversion
● Long-tail terms – small, non-competitive, high
conversion
● Build landing pages with search terms in titles & text
● Attract incoming links with the terms in the alias
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

38. HOW IT WORKS:
INVESTMENT REQUIRED:
SEARCH: GOOGLE ADWORDS
● A PPC agency costs ~$150-300 p.m. for small budget
● Set AdWords budget: $500-1000 p.m. is reasonable
● Even if you use an agency, you’ll need to invest in:
● Keywords research, reviewing/writing ads (~4-8 days)
● Meetings and reports (~3h / week)
● Auditing and monitoring the campaign (~2h / week)
MEASURING ROI:
● ROI is simple: Number of visitors * conversion to
purchase * LTV
● Check conversion, bounce rate and ROI per keyword
● Find your few “gold keywords” and get rid of the rest
● NEVER bid more than 70% of Value per Visit
● Use Keyword Tool to find all relevant search terms
● Prioritize – for enterprise SaaS, use 50-100 terms
● Divide into groups and write good ads for each group
● Build relevant landing pages with strong call to action
● Start advertising, test conversion and optimize
HOW WE CAN DO IT
HOW WE CAN DO IT

39. SEARCH: PROJECTIONS
$X / DAY
$X / DAY
$X / DAY
$X / DAY
$X / DAY
$X / DAY
IMPS / DAY CLICKS / DAY IMPS / WK CLICKS / WK
+
(Based on keywords you found relevant and Google
Adwords daily potential reach estimates)
IMPS / MO CLICKS / MO

40. SEARCH: SEO LANDING PAGES
1. Connect with intent: Offering a
user what they expect
2. Resolve (initial) user query:
Answering their initial query
3. Engage the user: Sending user
signals to search engines
4. Drive further user engagement
(if necessary): Additional
signals to both users and
search engines.
First engagement scenario: Content should be created with specific
intent in mind, with headlines, and/or
graphic headers that are obvious, short,
surrounded by adequate white space.
And the content must be specific enough
to inspire a user's attention.
PRIMARY HEADLINE FEATURING TOP PERFORMING
KEYWORDS
CONTENT
Users won't have time to read, but they
will make a quick decision on whether the
format they review matches an
expectation.
Users have short attention spans, and
most have a preconceived expectation of
what they should find, not matching that
initial expectation can equate to a quick
"back click.".
User’s should be able to perform a quick scan
above the fold to answer who, what and why?
SHARE All content should be shareable.
CTA
Obvious steps from landing pages to
conversion or core information – is a better
user experience = better potential rankability.

41. SOCIAL ADVERTISING
TARGETING AND GENERATING TRAFFIC

42. SOCIAL PREDICTIONS
FACEBOOK
LINKEDIN TEXT
SPEND/MO
REACH/
CAMPAIGN
IMPS/MO CLICKS/MO AVG CPC
LINKEDIN DISPLAY
TWITTER
KPI/MO
per quarter cpmper quarter(in & out of network)
(rough estimate)
(This data should be based around test campaign data)

43. IF YOU LIKE WOULD LIKE TO LEARN MORE
PLEASE EMAIL ME!
Mike Zarcone
zarcone22@gmail.com
THANK YOU!