The Software as a Service (SaaS) industry is expected to surpass $112.8 billion in 2019 and is fast rising to become one of the top industries to watch out for. Here are key statistics you need to know now to inform your strategy.
Insight: If you’re in the SaaS business, standing out from everyone else in a very competitive time is more crucial than ever before.
Data: Cisco states that 73% of organisations have said that nearly all their apps will be SaaS by 2020.
Key Action Point: As a leader of your SaaS business, you need to get your content strategy right to position your business as an industry leader that can offer the most value to your audience, thereby making you consistently top of mind in their buying decisions.
15% of the world’s biggest SaaS companies still don't have a blog (up from 11% in 2017). Data from Emily Byford's study showed that 38 out of the 250 biggest SaaS companies globally have no blog presence whatsoever.
There’s a subtle shift in how SaaS businesses use content. In fact, 24% use the blog to educate their readers, while 20% are purely company-focused.
Blog to educate and inform your target audience. Blogs that educate gain 14% more organic traffic vs company-focused blogs.
HubSpot vs WordPress. 68% of enterprise SaaS companies use Wordpress for their CMS.
Lack of CTAs indicates absence of content strategy. Lead generation is one of the greatest values we can gain out of blogging. That’s why it is surprising that many SaaS blog posts do not contain calls to action, which is vital for any lead-generating effort. In fact, 36% of SaaS blogs have no CTA. This shows that a lot of SaaS companies are blogging for the sake of blogging, without a content strategy to guide their efforts.
Insights from high-performing blog posts. Top-performing blog posts are 12% longer than average and they get 10x more shares on social media, 15x more backlinks, and 10x more referring domains.
Organic search. The top 10% of blog posts saw 2,514 organic search visitors per month
Involving customers. SaaS businesses are planning to fit in customer success stories into platforms as a marketing strategy.
An opportunity to stand out through podcast. 18% of the biggest SaaS companies have their own podcast.
Editor's note: This article has been updated with the latest data on the state of blogging in the SaaS industry. Thanks to Emily Byford for sharing with us her insightful work.