A Guide to Enterprise SaaS SEO

In the dynamic world of digital marketing for Software as a Service (SaaS) companies, the role of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is crucial. It's not just about improving visibility; it's a strategic approach to reaching the right audience at the right time. What sets SEO for SaaS apart from other industries? The answer lies in understanding the distinctive digital landscape in which Enterprise SaaS companies operate. With a B2B customer base looking for immediate and effective software solutions, SEO plays a pivotal role in guiding these customers to your doorstep, enhancing lead quality, and driving sustainable growth. 

This guide to enterprise SaaS SEO is to provide a clear roadmap of the basics of SEO for your Saas company to succeed online. Let’s dive in and illuminate the path to success with SaaS SEO.

Table of Contents

• The Basics of SEO & Applying it to Enterprise SaaS
• On-Page SEO Factors to Consider
• Technical SEO for SaaS Websites
• Content Marketing for SaaS
• Link Building for Improved SEO Strategies
• Why you should focus on Tracking & Analytics to Measure Success
• Future Trends in SaaS SEO

The Basics of SEO & How It Applies to Enterprise SEO SaaS

Before we jump into the specifics of SEO for SaaS businesses, let's take a step back and understand the basic concept of SEO. Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is the process of optimizing your online and website content so any search engine, such as Google, will show your page as a relevant result for searches of a certain phrase. This process is crucial to enhancing your online presence, boosting website traffic, and in the end driving conversions.

Applying this to a SaaS context, SEO helps potential customers find your software solutions amidst a crowded digital marketplace. Enterprise SaaS companies often cater to global audiences that rely on search engines to find new products and services to help them run their business. It is not just about finding SaaS solutions for their business, but also, you can educate your customer base to build brand awareness, credibility, and authority in your space. This will build brand recognition and position your company as a leader in the industry as opposed to only providing a tool or service.

According to a 2020 study by BrightEdge, 68% of online experiences begin with a search engine, and SEO drives 1000%+ more traffic than organic social media. This statistic underscores the power of SEO in reaching your target audience and leading them to your offerings.

As we venture deeper into the specifics of SaaS SEO, please remember your goal isn't merely to rank higher in search engine results but to connect with potential customers who are actively seeking the software solutions you provide. In the following sections, we'll explore how to do just that, employing strategies that specifically cater to the unique needs and dynamics of SaaS businesses. By investing in an enterprise SEO strategy, you will not only “just show up” when potential customers are searching, but it will, in turn, drive an increase in your search traffic, generating new leads and sales to expand your sales pipeline.

Here are 5 Things To Consider when Building your Enterprise SEO Strategy

1. On-Page SEO Factors to Consider

The first step in your SaaS SEO journey involves on-page SEO. This refers to optimizing web pages in order to rank higher and attract more relevant traffic. To start, you’ll need to look at elements on your website such as targeted keywords, title tags, meta descriptions, headers, URL structures, and body content. 

Here is a quick list of important on-page factors with descriptions as to why each is important:

• High-quality, Engaging content is the heart of on-page SEO (which also goes hand in hand with the bullet point above “engagement metrics”).
• Meta descriptions are short summaries of your page's content that can directly influence your click-through rate. These snippets of up to 160 characters summarize a page's content and play a significant role in your website's click-through rate. A compelling meta description can pique the interest of potential customers, encouraging them to click on your webpage when it appears in their search results.
• Engagement metrics and bounce rates are crucial indicators of how users interact with your site. High engagement and low bounce rates signal to search engines that your site offers value, which can help improve your rankings.
• Title tags define the title of a  webpage and are one of the first things a user sees in search results. Including relevant keywords in your title tags can boost your visibility for those keywords.

To drive this point home, a 2017 SEMrush study found the four most critical ranking factors were website visits, time on site, pages per session, and bounce rate - all elements directly influenced by effective on-page SEO. This indicates the immense impact well-executed on-page SEO can have on your SaaS website's search engine rankings and, consequently, your reach among potential customers.

2. Technical SEO for SaaS Websites

After addressing on-page SEO, we dive into the world of technical SEO. This focuses on improving the back-end elements of your website, ensuring optimum health and performance to set your website up to rank as highly as possible. Think of it as fine-tuning your website's engine for maximum speed and efficiency.

One aspect of technical SEO involves optimizing your website for different languages and regions. Given the global nature of SaaS, it's vital to use hreflang tags and geo-targeting to ensure your content reaches the right audiences. Consequently, a comprehensive, clean site structure helps search engines crawl your website more effectively and understand its context, especially when dealing with multiple product and informational pages.

Core Web Vitals (found in Google Search Console) includes metrics such as First Contentful Paint (FCP), First Meaningful Paint (FMP), Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), and Speed Index (SI) are crucial to your site's user experience. These metrics provide a quantitative way to measure your site's loading speed, visual stability, and responsiveness. A good performance in these areas can significantly enhance your site's SEO.

Aspects like fast loading speed, mobile optimization, and SSL certificates ensure a positive user experience, a factor that Google considers important. Remember, a happy user often translates into a higher search engine ranking.

Google made it clear in their 2021 updates that Core Web Vitals and page experience signals are important ranking factors. Thus, maintaining a robust technical SEO strategy is no longer optional but a necessity for SaaS websites. Effective technical SEO sets a solid foundation for your website, enabling your other SEO strategies to work more efficiently.

3. Content Marketing for SaaS

A core part of your SaaS SEO strategy is content marketing. It involves creating and sharing valuable content consistently to attract and engage your target audience. The content could be in various forms, such as blogs, whitepapers, case studies, webinars, or how-to guides.

For most SaaS businesses, content marketing often involves industry-specific terms that a potential user would be constantly using in their daily environment. These can range from broad terms such as  "cloud-based project management software" to more specific ones that may be similar to "AI-powered CRM for small businesses." The goal is to use this content marketing to educate potential users about the features and benefits of their software. This can include lead magnets such as in-depth how-to guides, FAQs, webinars, and case studies that serve as great tools for the potential customer.

Here at Search to Sale, we don’t just tell clients that they should focus on high-quality content, we implement these strategies on our own website. For example, our Keyword Research Tool suggested the target search query “White Label SEO Tool”, so we created an in-depth article called White Label SEO Services + SEO Reporting Tool which has led to a huge improvement in our ranking for this term.

Content marketing isn't just a way to educate potential new customers; it is also a proven strategy to improve search rankings. According to the Content Marketing Institute's 2020 B2B report, 89% of B2B marketers use content marketing strategies. Furthermore, 72% of successful content marketers credited their success to the development of a content marketing strategy. This shows how powerful content can be when leveraged correctly for SaaS SEO. With high-quality, useful content, you can not only attract but also retain users, driving sustainable growth for your SaaS business.

4. Link Building for Improved SEO Strategies

Link building is another essential component of an effective SaaS SEO strategy that is underutilized. This involves both internal linking (such as website architecture) and external linking, which earns you high-quality backlinks from other websites.

For SaaS businesses trying to establish themselves as an authority in their space, targeting high-authority tech and industry-specific websites for guest posts, backlinks, and feature articles can be a powerful link-building strategy. Working on these fundamentals helps in gaining visibility and credibility at the same time when trust plays a significant role in customer acquisition. Engaging with influencers in the industry can also amplify reach and foster trust among potential users.

Paid tools such as Ahrefs can be leveraged to find opportunities for backlinks, helping you identify sites that might be open to linking to your content. Remember, it's not just about the quantity of backlinks but their quality that matters. A backlink from a high-authority site is worth more than several from lower-authority sites.

The value of link building is underscored by a 2020 Backlinko study, which found a strong correlation between a site’s overall link authority (as measured by Ahrefs Domain Rating) and higher rankings. This affirms the critical role that link building plays in the SaaS SEO landscape. 

5. Why you should focus on Tracking & Analytics to Measure Success

An SEO strategy is as good as its tracking and analytics. For any business, keeping an eye on your SEO efforts is crucial for understanding what's working and what needs improvement. This is where tools like Google Analytics and Search Console become indispensable. They offer insights into your website traffic, user behavior, and keyword rankings, helping you optimize your strategies.

You may also want to employ paid tools like HotJar for heat mapping and user behavior analysis. Another idea to test out is pop-up chats can further boost engagement by providing real-time assistance to visitors. Keep in mind, engagement is a key factor in search ranking, so these tools provide insights that can guide data-driven decisions.

According to a 2020 Databox report, 70% of marketers use Google Analytics to track their SEO performance. This highlights the widespread reliance on analytics in measuring SEO success. 

To highlight the impact SEO can have on your company, let's turn to the numbers. A 2020 report by HubSpot revealed a striking fact: companies see a three-fold higher ROI on SEO campaigns than on paid advertising. This compelling statistic is a powerful testament to the payoff of well-executed SEO strategies. Also, 69% of marketers invested in SEO in 2021. 

(HubSpot State of Marketing Report, 2021).

It's not just about visibility or rankings - it's about significant returns on your investment. The key takeaway from this so far - SEO isn't just a nice-to-have, this is a must-have for substantial growth and return on investment. So keep analyzing, optimizing, and adapting your SEO strategies to stay on the growth track.

Future Trends in SaaS SEO

As we look into the future of search engine optimization, several emerging trends will likely shape SaaS SEO strategies. 

See the list below to gauge if your company is set up for future success -

• AI and Machine Learning: AI and machine learning are at the forefront, with 60% of marketers already harnessing their power for SEO strategies in 2020, according to Databox. SaaS businesses should expect to rely more on AI for tasks ranging from content optimization to predictive analytics.
• Mobile-First Indexing: Google's shift to mobile-first indexing highlights the need for SaaS businesses to optimize their websites for mobile users, who accounted for roughly 50% of global web traffic in 2020, as per Statista.
• Entity vs. Keywords: search engines are moving past ranking content based on Keywords and more towards Entities. What are Entities, you say? Here is the answer from Googe themselves, “[we] define an entity as anything that is “singular, unique, well-defined, and distinguishable … [the] algorithm will examine these factors and use them to help create a web of connections between different entities to help make searching more effective for the user.” In basic terms, they are moving away from ranking solely on ambiguous stand-alone keywords and contextually analyzing the language around the topic at hand and ranking based on many factors (or entities). 
• Video Content: The rising prominence of video content cannot be overlooked. With video expected to make up 82% of all internet traffic by 2022, SaaS companies should incorporate video content, like product demos and customer testimonials, into their SEO strategy.
• E-A-T (Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness): Google's emphasis on E-A-T (Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) necessitates a focus on high-quality content and authoritative backlinks for SaaS businesses. 
• Data Privacy and Security: Similarly, increasing data privacy laws like GDPR and CCPA underscores the importance of transparency in handling user data, and maintaining a secure (HTTPS) website.
• Featured Snippets and SERP Features: With featured snippets appearing for about 12.3% of search queries, according to Ahrefs, optimizing for these and other SERP features like 'People Also Ask' boxes will boost visibility.
• Personalization: Lastly, personalization will likely become more integral to SEO, with a 2020 SmarterHQ survey indicating that 72% of consumers engage only with personalized messaging. For SaaS businesses, tailoring content and user experiences based on user behavior, location, and device will be key.

Search Engine Optimization as a whole is dynamic and exciting, with several trends converging to offer a more personalized, engaging, and valuable user experience. Staying abreast of these trends will ensure that your SaaS business remains ahead of the SEO curve.