You’re not sure how to grow your SaaS company. You’ve been hearing a lot about product-led growth, but you don’t know where to start. Growing your SaaS company with a product focus is easier than you think.
When growing your SaaS company with a product focus, it’s important to clearly define what that means for your business. Product-led growth is when your products are designed to create sustainable revenue and lead-to-acquisition. Product-led growth is often considered a more sustainable way to grow and scale your SaaS company than marketing-led strategies, such as lead generation. Product-led companies don’t just “hope” that the features they’re building will increase their chance of getting customers in the door, but they have a clear understanding of what value these features provide AND how that value is monetized in the long term.
Product-Led Growth means that every team in your business influences the product. Your marketing team will ask, “how can our product generate a demand flywheel.” Your sales team will ask, “how can we use the product to qualify our prospects for us?.” Your customer success team asks, “how can we create a product that helps customers become successful beyond our dreams?.” By having every team focused on the product, you create a culture that is built around enduring customer value.”
Allan Wille, Co-Founder & CEO, Klipfolio
Follow these 5 tips and you’ll be on your way to growing your SaaS company with a product focus.
1) Define Why You Are Doing Product Led Growth for Your SaaS Company
The first step in growing your SaaS company with a product focus is to clearly define why you’re emphasizing Product-led growth. Product-led growth is a more sustainable way to grow your SaaS company over time. Product-led growth is when the revenue of the company is driven by product success, not marketing results or luck. When you’re focused on Product Led Growth for your SaaS Company you prioritize investment in the product and focus on long term growth, while when you’re focused on marketing strategies, such as lead generation, you focus on short term growth with less investment in your product.
2) Define WHAT Product-Led Growth Means for Your SaaS Company
The next step in growing your SaaS company with a Product Focus is to clearly define what Product-led growth means for your business. Product-led growth does not mean you don’t spend money on marketing to acquire new customers. Product-led companies don’t just hope that features they’re building will increase their chance of getting customers in the door, but rather they have a clear understanding of what value these features provide AND how that value is monetized in the long term.
3) Define the Product Success Path for Your SaaS Company
The next step is to define the Product success path for your business. A Product Success path is broken down into three parts:
Product – Product-led companies prioritize investment in their product. Product Success starts and ends with your product and what you’re building. Product-led businesses understand how to build sustainable, scalable products that can provide value to customers.
Market – Successful SaaS companies not only deliver value through their products, they also know how to monetize this value over time by identifying the most effective markets for them to enter and most profitable customer segments for them to target.
Marketing – Product led growth doesn’t just “hope” that the features they’re building will increase their chance of getting customers in the door, but that they have a clear understanding of what value these features provide AND how that value is monetized over time via press releases, case studies, white papers, and more.
The future of growth is product-led. Data shows that companies leveraging a Product-Led Growth strategy perform better on average – faster growth, higher margins, lower burn and stronger valuation multiples. Product-Led Growth will soon become the norm, making it table stakes for SaaS companies that want to win in their markets. What is your company doing to adapt to the product led growth revolution?
Blake Bartlett, Partner, OpenView
4) Don’t Stop Growing Past Product Market Fit
Product market fit is important, but it doesn’t speak much about your ability to grow your SaaS company. Too many founders stop once they get product market fit because they think that’s all you need to do. Product market fit is just one small step in the Product Success Path. Your job isn’t done when you reach product market fit, it only starts there…just like every other stage in this path, reaching product market fit doesn’t mean anything if you’re not able to grow your SaaS company past it.
5) Follow the Product Success Path
Start with Product Market Fit, then scale to Product Value Leadership, Product Differentiation, Product Monetization and finally start building your own category (enterprise).
The product success path focuses on where you are in your product’s journey and what you need to do next in order to continue growing your SaaS business. While each stage in the Product Success Path speaks directly to how that stage can help you grow your SaaS business, product market fit is the best place to start because it’s where many SaaS companies struggle.
Ready to grow your company to the next level with product led growth? Or need help getting started establishing product market fit? Meet with our sales experts today on how our sales demo personalization platform can help you take the next step towards product led growth!
