Techniques to Increase ConversionsFor Your SaaS Business

Hiten Shah KISSmetrics Webinar • February 22nd, 2011

Twitter Hash Tag#measure

SaaS: Software as a Service

• Customer Self Service (sign up and pay online)

• Examples: 37signals, Zoho, Dropbox

• Transactional Sales (inside sales)

• Examples: HubSpot, Salesforce, Zendesk

• Enterprise Sales ("elephant" hunting)

• Examples: BazaarVoice, BrightEdge, Workday

• Hybrid (a little, or lot of everything)

• Examples: YouSendIt, LogMeIn, Google Apps

SaaS Sales Models

• Paid Sign Up (no free trial or free plan)

• Examples: CrazyEgg, Mozy

• Free Trials (timed trials)

• Examples: 37signals, Backupify

• Freemium (free forever → upgrades)

• Examples: YouSendIt, LogMeIn, Evernote

SaaS Pricing Models

Freemium (free forever → upgrades)

Visited Site Free Sign Up Upgraded

CrazyEgg Pricing Before

Visited Site Sign Up Pay

Paid Sign Up (no free trial or free plan)

CrazyEgg Pricing After

• Sign ups decrease by 10x

• Doubled revenue in the first month

• 2 years later, 25% of the revenue is from free customers

• There is a free plan in CrazyEgg’s future =)

CrazyEgg Results

Funnel Testing & Optimization

It’s important not to get distracted by intermediate metrics like the click-through rate of the button itself...we only care about the customer behaviors that lead to something useful”Eric Ries, The Lean Startup

“

Macro Conversions

Activation

• Web analytics application

• Install javascript code and start tracking data

• Project management application

• Create first project and invite a person

• Customer relationship management application

• Add their first contact and follow up with them

• Customer support application

• Receive and respond to a customer support request

Visited Site Sign Up Pay Activated

Paid Sign Up (no free trial or free plan)

Visited Site Trial Sign Up Activated Upgraded

Free Trials (timed trials & product limit trials)

Visited Site Free Sign Up Activated Upgraded

Freemium (free forever → upgrades)

SaaS Macro Conversion Funnels

$

$

$

1. Baseline your macro conversions

2. Identify optimization opportunities

3. Gather qualitative data

4. Create and implement A/B tests

5. Measure against your baseline, rinse & repeat

5 Step Process for Funnel Optimization

Baseline your macro conversions

Identify optimization opportunities

• Which step has the highest drop off?

Gather qualitative data

• Identify conversion barriers

• Surveying

• Survey.io, KISSinsights, Wufoo, SurveyMonkey, etc...

• Usability Testing

• In-person, UserTesting.com, FiveSecondTest, etc...

• Example

• Task completion survey http://kiss.ly/biUD9L

• SaaS plans page survey http://kiss.ly/f9ZlAb

Create and implement A/B tests

• Many ways to improve funnels

• Modify your steps

• Combine, remove or change the order of steps.

• Add UI elements to guide users

• Test your designs

• Headlines, images, buttons, microcopy, etc...

• Try radical variations

Measure against your baseline, rinse & repeat

Segmenting Your Customers

Account type segmentation

http://rowfeeder.com/plans

Company size segmentation

http://box.net/pricing

Custom segmentation

Custom segmentation data

Testing Your Call to Actions

Funnel A/B Testing Rules!

Survey, segment, analyze & then create tests

Customer Development Survey

http://survey.io

Segment and analyze

How to Increase Sign-ups by 200%

http://kiss.ly/seeplansandpricing

Don’t copy “best practices” blindly

Learn what works best for your customers

A Beginner’s Guide To A/B Testing: Exceptional Web Copy

http://blog.kissmetrics.com/ab-testing-web-copy/

Baseline then optimize your funnels

Segment your customers

Test your call to actions

3 Techniques for Increasing SaaS Conversions

How many of my visitors are converting into signed-up customers?How many of those signups are upgrading?How many of last month’s customers are still around this month?How long does it take, on average, for a visitor to become a customer?How much am I making each day in revenues?How much is the average customer paying me each month?

Hiten Shah hshah@kissmetrics.com • 650.241.4531

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