So, you have developed a cutting-edge software solution that solves a common problem that companies face. But, the problem is, how do you make sure your target audience knows about your software? In such a competitive market, it’s essential to stand out from the crowd and effectively spread the word about your software. Because of this, your marketing tactics should revolve around the needs, pain points, and goals of your target audience. We all know that it’s not as easy as it sounds! That’s why we have put together this list of the top 15 marketing tactics for software companies to use in 2024 and beyond.
1. Content Marketing
Content marketing is one of the best marketing tactics for software companies, and virtually every other company out there. By creating valuable and informative content, including blog articles, eBooks, and videos, you can establish your brand as a thought leader and build trust with your audience. You can share insights, best practices, tips, and more to help position your company as an industry leader. Don’t forget to utilize SEO best practices when creating your content, but we’ll talk about that more later on.
2. Website Personalization
Website personalization is a relatively new idea for B2B companies, but has taken the industry by storm. Essentially, website personalization refers to the practice of showing your website visitors a custom view of your website based on their firmographic information. This makes your website more relevant to their specific needs, instead of having a general view. As an example, if your audience includes both SMBs and enterprise companies, you can show the SMBs relevant case studies, use cases, and call to action based on what is most likely to resonate with their needs. There’s no way they would resonate with a case study from an enterprise company with 5000+ employees! Visitor Queue is the top website personalization software on the market for B2B companies. Check out the short video below to learn more about website personalization.
3. Make Data-Driven Decisions
As a marketing professional, you should be well-versed in making data-driven decisions. Especially when we have so much data at our fingertips. Utilize web analytics tools, like Google Analytics, to gain insights into your audience’s behavior, track campaign performance, and identify areas for improvement. You should analyze user interactions, conversion rates, and customer demographics to refine and optimize your targeting and messaging. Not to mention, this can help you allocate your budget and time effectively and get the most out of your marketing efforts.
4. Email Marketing
The world of email marketing is vast. Everything from email onboarding and form follow-ups to newsletters and drip campaigns can be used in your marketing tactics. Email marketing remains one of the most effective ways to nurture leads. And, maintain a strong relationship with your existing customers. It can be helpful to segment your email lists based on user behavior, preferences, industry, job title, and/or lifecycle stages. Then, you can tailor your email marketing messages and maximize engagement. Email marketing may take a while to get set up, but once you are set up, you’re golden.
5. Webinars and Online Events
Hosting webinars and online events to engage your target audience can be a great way to grow impressions. Educate your audience on industry trends and best practices, while subtly plugging your software into the content. But, don’t make the entire webinar a sales pitch! You can provide valuable insights, tips, and live demonstrations to establish credibility. You can capture leads during the registration process and follow up with personalized emails to nurture those leads. Plus, you can let the webinar live on your website as a piece of gated content in the future.
6. Utilize Case Studies
93% of customers review case studies before converting. Knowing this, it’s easy to see how important it is to utilize case studies in your social media and website marketing strategies. If you’re looking to generate more case studies, a software called otrillo is a great option to help collect feedback from your customers. otrillo helps users create written or video case studies within the platform. So, you don’t have to go back and forth between various editing platforms before you get something usable. This helps you save time and money creating case studies, allowing you to show proof of capability to prospective clients.
7. Strategic Partnerships
The next marketing tactic for software companies is creating partnerships. By collaborating with complementary software companies or industry associations, you can find new growth opportunities and get in front of a highly relevant audience. Try to find partners whose products or services complement yours. Then, explore possibilities for cross-promotion or co-marketing initiatives that are a win-win for both parties. By leveraging each other’s networks and customer bases, you can reach a broader audience and generate mutually beneficial results. We have done this in the past by writing a blog article with another company, that we then promote in our newsletter and social channels. Then, create another blog article for their website. After this, they can also publish the article and share it in their newsletter or social channels.
8. Building Customer Retention
While we all know that acquiring new customers is important, retaining existing ones is equally important for long-term success. After all, you constantly hear that you need to build MRR. Using strategies to boost customer satisfaction, like providing customer support via live chat, offering loyalty programs, and updating your software can help retain customers for the long term. We love to promote our loyalty program where our loyal customers can earn recurring revenue from each new account they refer to us. Happy customers not only become brand advocates, but they also can contribute to your revenue through upsells, renewals, and referrals.
9. SEO, SEO, SEO
Implementing a strong SEO strategy is an essential marketing tactic for software companies. By optimizing your SEO strategy, you can enhance your online visibility and drive organic traffic to your website, which means free impressions! By doing keyword research, optimizing your website structure and content, improving site speed, and acquiring high-quality backlinks, software companies like yours can improve their search engine rankings. Plus, you can get more website visitors. This means you can attract more potential customers. With SEO, you can establish a strong online presence and outrank your competitors. As a result, you can sustain organic growth. Keep in mind that SEO is changing every day. So, it’s essential for companies to stay on top of trends.
10. Leveraging AI
The next one of our marketing tactics for software companies is AI. Software companies should be taking advantage of artificial intelligence, or AI, to increase efficiency, innovation, and competitive advantage. By integrating AI technologies into your processes, you can automate repetitive tasks, improve data analysis and insights, and provide a personalized experience to your customers. AI-powered chatbots can provide instant customer support, machine learning can optimize your marketing campaigns, and VAs can streamline internal processes. And, by embracing AI, you can boost productivity and stay in front of technical advancements. If you’re looking to learn a little more about AI, check out our recent article, 10 Ways B2B Companies Can Use AI for Marketing.
11. Retargeting Campaigns
Using retargeting campaigns, specifically within Google Ads, you can reach potential customers who have previously visited your website, but did not convert. You can use retargeting ads to remind your prospect about how valuable your software is. Which can keep your tool at the top of their mind. You can offer incentives, showcase new or enticing features, and share testimonials to increase the likelihood of these prospects converting. Retargeting in Google Ads is relatively easy once you get it set up.
12. Video Marketing
According to a recent study published by TechSmith, 83% of people prefer watching videos for information over text alternatives. Knowing this, it’s important to cater to this portion of your audience. You can utilize the power of video marketing to captivate your audience and communicate the value of your software. Create engaging product demos, explainers, customer success stories, new features, and other types of videos. Typically, video content has higher engagement rates than traditional graphics on social media. This means you can showcase your software and get more impressions. Plus, software can tend to be tricky to fully understand. So, providing simple and straightforward videos can be very helpful for your prospects.
13. Social Media Strategies
Social media can offer tremendous opportunities for software companies to engage with their audience. LinkedIn is the best social media platform for B2B companies, as its users are looking to learn and find new resources. On LinkedIn, you can share blog articles, images, tips, stats, videos, and more to provide insight and frame your company as a thought leader. Plus, you should try to encourage conversations, respond to comments, and build a community around your brand. Paid social media is also a great way to discover new leads, but it can get pretty pricey!
14. Participate on Forums
Forums, like Quora and Reddit, are great places to answer questions and build authority with prospective customers. Follow and engage with relevant topics, and answer questions that are aligned with your objectives as a company. It can be helpful to use a personal-looking profile, instead of a company profile so it looks more organic and less salesy. In addition, you can link to previous blog articles, video series, and other pieces of content to help prove your points and provide useful information.
15. Update Your Competitive Analysis
While I’m sure you have done competitive analysis in the past, it might have been a while since it was updated. So, it can be helpful to re-do or update your current competitive analysis so you know exactly what your competitors are doing today. This can help you find new gaps and opportunities in their current marketing tactics. Then, you can use this to your advantage. If you’re a little rusty on how to perform a competitor analysis, check out this article.
Final Words
As you can see, there are a number of marketing tactics for software companies to take advantage of this year. By using a combination of marketing tactics on this list, you can get your company in front of a wide audience, and fill your sales funnel with qualified leads. While there is no one-size-fits-all solution to marketing tactics for software companies, using a handful of different tactics can be helpful. If you have any questions about using Visitor Queue for website personalization, do not hesitate to reach out.