SaaS Content Writing: How to Work With an Agency or Writer

When launching or running a B2B SaaS product, content writing is often a challenge to handle. With limited time and budget due to the demands of a startup, being proactive in your content is often an afterthought. Not only that, but finding the right content agency to partner with can be a great investment. Instead of overloading yourself or your initial employees, you can produce content when you need it through the right agreement and partner. We’ll walk through the top factors to consider when working with a content agency or writer in this post.

Part of The Founder’s Guide to B2B SaaS Content Marketing. Available as a PDF and Video Series.

What Is Unique About Content Writing for SaaS?

When it comes to content writing for traditional industries, it’s often easy to identify topics that will be searched for. As SaaS products are typically innovative, building awareness of your product or service often requires more effort. As an example, before the advent of cloud-based software, many companies were using locally-hosted software. Companies such as AWS and Azure needed to showcase the benefits of turning to the cloud. This created a unique education challenge. As a software company, you will face many of the same challenges. The right content marketing strategy can help.

Why Invest in SaaS Content Creation as a Founder?

As a founder or growth leader, it’s often hard to know what forms of growth to invest in. From cold outreach to land the first few customers, to long-term brand-building initiatives—there are a lot of options. For SaaS content writing, we typically recommend starting this initiative once your performance campaigns are working well and you want to bring your customer acquisition costs (CAC) down. Investing in content can be a great way to improve your brand’s online presence, but note that search engines can take time to establish your site as an authority on a specific topic. We’ll be diving into some of the benefits of investing in a content strategy as early as possible below.

Build Awareness and Authority

When it comes to your content marketing efforts, one of the main considerations should be brand awareness and building authority. Each content piece, if created right, should help move your brand closer to your goal as a category leader. By working with an experienced content strategist or content marketing agency, you’ll be able to create excellent content. When executed with a strong strategy in place, each piece of long-form content, be it a blog post or a series of white papers, will build your brand authority.

Grow Organic Traffic Through Search

SEO or Search Engine Optimization is the process of creating content optimized for specific search intent. By working with an experienced writer or agency, you’ll be able to climb in search engine rankings for your desired keywords. Companies such as HubSpot and Quickbooks generate millions of free traffic through their SEO efforts. Each piece of content will expose your brand to your target buyer, as they search for answers relating to your solution.

However, many companies often start with SEO only to be frustrated with the results. The key to getting this right is to truly understand buyer personas, their needs, and working with a B2B content writer or B2B content agency that is capable of generating results. The more you get your target keywords right and create engaging, useful content—the more likely you will be to succeed. 

As an example below, Canva.com generates over $30 million in organic traffic in the US alone. SEO allows their brand to gain invaluable exposure when compared to other lesser-known competitors. Even if better products enter the market, this strategically built moat for Canva will be hard for competitors to overcome, thanks to strong content operations and domain authority.

Build Your Email List

When you create amazing content, people want more. Building an email list filled with engaged potential buyers of your product is a great way of connecting with them. By creating blog content that leaves them craving more—and giving them more through eBooks or email—you can deepen the relationship. Working with a professional writer that knows how to add call-to-actions into each piece will greatly improve the likelihood that readers will join your email list. Beyond simply growing your list with content, you are also able to promote your content to your current list through well-crafted campaigns.

Generate Revenue with Conversion-Focused Content

Decision stage or bottom-of-funnel content is valuable in getting your prospect to choose you over the competition. This type of content will help ease your prospect into your sales funnel. Pieces such as buying guides, direct comparisons, case studies, and reviews will all be helpful in giving your buyer the confidence they need to make a decision. It is vital that you create compelling content for this purpose. This actionable content will be even more effective if produced by a writer with well-developed copywriting skills. Beyond this, even if buyers do not reach this content organically, your sales team can use each piece as a tool available to them to close the deal.

Reach Your Additional Business Goals

As a SaaS product, you not only need to sign your customers, but also keep them on your service and reduce churn. Your competitors will constantly be producing content and initiatives that will try and shift your customers to their service. By creating content for customer success, such as learning programs and support content, you will eliminate the risk of them churning early on or choosing a competitor later.

Content Writing for SaaS: Finding & Selecting a Writer or Agency

The first step to working with a content writer is finding one! Depending on the complexity of your product, this may not be an easy task. Beyond this, you must also factor in their writing style, content marketing capabilities, graphic design production skills, and availability. While industry knowledge may make it easier for your writer to start, we suggest prioritizing writing skills and production abilities. An experienced writer in the space can familiarize themself quickly with a new vertical or product through research and interviews. Writing skills on the other hand—often take years to develop.

Writer or Agency? Which Is The Better Option?

Some writers prefer acting as freelancers, while some work better through a team with an agency model. This can make comparing their services difficult. Individual writers will typically focus on a specific kind of content creation, whether this is marketing, sales, or support content. Agencies on the other hand, may have more flexibility when it comes to their resources and can provide additional services—such as web design, CRM implementation, full SEO strategy, or paid ad management.

We suggest looking at your content needs and budget. If you are only looking for a specific type of written content or a fixed deliverable, then a writer may suffice. However—if your startup has achieved stable revenue, or received funding and is looking to scale content—an agency may be a better option. Instead of relying on the availability of a single writer, you get the benefit of a full team. A content agency may also offer SEO, PPC, web design, and graphic design specialists to complement the writing.

As you move into more complex writing formats, such as eBooks, whitepapers, and case studies— having multiple writers and editors can create additional benefits. Take a look at our comparison table below:

A Word of Warning: Avoid the Temptation of Commoditized Content

In recent years, many content writing services have popped up offering content creation at extremely low price points. While this may seem tempting at first, they often lack the level of polish that is needed in a B2B context. From technical knowledge, to writing style, these writers who are tasked with producing content at very high volumes lack the time for research and refinement. As you develop your brand, these inconsistencies will become apparent and potentially harm how buyers perceive your product.

The best content is viewed and shared significantly more often than uninspired blog posts that are churned out to hit a word count quota. Our suggestion, if you are limited by budget, focus on creating higher quality content at a lower volume. Produce content that people will actually want to read!

Questions to Ask When Selecting a Partner

Ultimately, with SaaS content writing and creation being a long-term game, selecting the right partner can be a game-changer. When you are deciding between different potential vendors, choose wisely. Find our list of top questions to ask prospective writers and agencies for SaaS content writing below:

1. Have you worked with other companies in our vertical? This question will test their knowledge of your industry and address any conflicts of interest.
2. Do you have examples that you would be willing to share? This is helpful for seeing their style in marketing content, but due to privacy agreements, may be more difficult for sales enablement and technical content.
3. How do you handle the SEO elements or graphic design parts of your content? Many great writers are just that— writers. Typically with content creation, SEO performance or graphic design abilities are also important to consider.
4. Do you have experience with video or audio creation? Written content can be repurposed into video or audio content for greater reach. If you are planning on going beyond writing, this is an important consideration.
5. How do you measure the performance of your content? If your in-house marketing team will be relying on the content creator to measure performance, this is an important question.
6. How will you learn about our product or service? The transfer of knowledge is often key to ensuring content creation success. Will the writer be reading your existing material? Using the product? Interviewing your team/customers? You want to get a sense of their workflow.
7. How will topic creation work? Depending on your expectations, you may require the writer to produce topics themselves through the creation of a content calendar. If you will not be providing them with a brief, you’ll want to be sure they can handle the entire strategy.
8. How will you be promoting the content? If you expect your partner to promote the content through social media or email, ensure they have the capability.

Getting Started With SaaS Content Writing

The process of finding a partner for content creation for your SaaS brand may be daunting. To get started we suggest identifying your exact goals. By examing your needs for content strategy, content formats, promotion, and SEO, you can get a better sense of who you’ll be needing to work with.

Here at Sonan Digital, we specialize in the creation of content for B2B SaaS brands. To get a glimpse behind our process, this is typically how we work with our clients.

The Sonan Digital Process

1. We learn your business model, product, and goals: Developing a deep understanding of why you’re trying to produce content is the key to success.
2. We study your vertical and the competition: SaaS products are innovative and can serve many specific industries. Our strategy and approach will differ greatly between fintech and travel verticals for example. 
3. We complete a full content audit and understand your brand: Ensuring that you make the most of your existing content is a top priority. If you already have a catalog of eBooks or blog posts, we’ll let you know how else they can be used and improved.
4. We decide on the content types that make sense to produce: Depending on your niche and vertical, the content types we recommend will differ. If you are launching a new complex product, then a whitepaper may be well-suited to your needs. If you are instead targeting a niche, such as vets or physical therapy, then blog posts may be more fitting.  
5. We create content: Our team of B2B writers and strategists will get to work creating highly-polished professional content for your brand.
6. We promote content: One of the most overlooked pieces of content marketing is content promotion. Our team will ensure your content is seen. From social media management, to paid content promotion— our team of experts will help you see results.

If you are curious to learn more about our content creation offerings and services, be sure to check out some additional pages below:

• Content marketing services for B2B SaaS
• Our transparent pricing for content creation and related services
• Our contact page in case you’re ready to get in touch

Part of The Founder’s Guide to B2B SaaS Content Marketing. Available as a PDF and Video Series.