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One of the biggest challenges, in the journey to build a healthcare SaaS business is to ensure you have a steady flow of visitors to your healthcare product, and at the same time, they convert to subscribers.
According to a report, the US healthcare SaaS market is expected to rise at a CAGR of 17.9 percent during the 2021 to 2028 timeframe. Healthcare companies are incorporating SaaS products due to its benefits. These include ease of use, cost-effectiveness, customer support, security, scalability, and much more.
Build a healthcare SaaS business that offers a myriad of advantages to the users. This may include access to digital health products at a reasonable cost and privacy and security of user data. If you’re offering the right benefits, the there are high chances of conversions.
So, here are three useful tips for all healthcare SaaS business entrepreneurs to scale and convert more customers.
#1 MVP for Initial Traction with Your Healthcare SaaS Product
The goal to build a SaaS business is to solve a problem. While building your healthcare SaaS product is an ongoing process, but building a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) can be a solution.
When you know what is the purpose of your healthcare SaaS product, immediately start building the basic version which solves the problem. Once your healthcare MVP is ready, take it to the market and iterate it with customer feedback.
That’s how Zenefits was launched.
Parker Conrad, the founder and CEO of Zenefits, said in an interview: “We wanted to just launch something in order to get out the door. So when we had our launch article in TechCrunch, literally half the product didn’t exist yet. We figured that nobody was going to dive so deep into the product that they would actually get to [the end]. We reasoned that most companies would stop [halfway through] and want to talk to us. That gave us at least a couple of days after we launched to get the second half built.”
Fitbit is a great example of a successful healthcare MVP. It started as a basic device that measured sleep and steps. But overtime, it developed a range of fitness watches and trackers with advanced features such as guided workouts, heart rate monitoring, pulse oximetry, and other wellness functions. This was all based on user feedback and market trends.
Sujan Patel of Content Marketer, shared another way of engaging with customers. In a #BiteSize interview with us, he shared, “The simplest way to do this is to actually start talking to your customers. When they signup for a freemium model, you need to understand who your customers are, talk to them and help them. Just email them and say, “Hey! I’m the CEO here and I just want to talk to you.” Ask them questions about what they do, what they thought the tool did and how can you help them. And really just coach them through it. It really doesn’t matter how much time you spend.”
#2 Your Existing Customers Can be Your Sales People
Like mentioned in one of the Kissmetrics blog post, “When your customers pay month-to-month, everyone is a part of the sales team.”
Marketing and sales work together.
A terrific SaaS VP of Marketing once told Tomasz Tunguz, a venture capitalist at redpoint, (as written in his blog post), “If the sales team is focused on hitting this quarter’s revenue target, then the marketing team ought to be focused on next quarter and the following quarter.”
Since, not all healthcare SaaS businesses can afford a huge salesforce, they should influence the existing customers to be their sales person. To do so, healthcare SaaS companies can leverage modern day marketing tools and channels such as content marketing, social media marketing, e-mail marketing, and SEO to place a strong hold over their existing customers.
For instance, sending out regular newsletters to your customer base can keep them aware and informed about the upcoming healthcare SaaS products. It is also a great way to attract new customers and build a strong connection with them.
In another #BiteSize interview with us, Sujan explained how they convert customers into sales people. He explained, “When somebody purchases a subscription, we say, “Congrats” and there’s a pre-written Tweet that says I just upgraded my small business to the 21st century and we kind of make it goofy and tweak it around. And over time we have optimized this. Right when customers purchase a product, you pop a share button and make it relevant. People are super excited. In B2B, viral loops and sharing works effectively when people have the most excitement. When they’re most emotionally vulnerable and when they’re most excited, when those two converge, that’s when you get the most out of virality.”
#3 If You Are Using Freemium Model, Do It Right
ZenDesk, Evernote, Expensify, Dropbox, each of them have built a vibrant user base using freemium products. That’s right, but that doesn’t mean Freemium model is ideal to build a healthcare SaaS business.
The free model has dozens of iterations — free trial, trial-to-paid, trial with credit card information, trial with no credit card information, freemium model, 90-day free trial, limited version free, etc., etc. The common feature is free. Free is the oil of the SaaS marketing engine.
In a #BiteSize interview with us, Brian Balfour of Hubspot said and said it right, “Freemium is not easy, but when you get it right, it is awesome!”
He further said, “A lot of people are doing it just because others are doing it. It feels sexy in some shape or form. But there’s mismatch – the Freemium model works only for very specific types of audiences and so you have to make sure you have those specific elements.”
Another reason why Freemium model shouldn’t be applied blindly is explained by Lincoln Murphy in his blog post.
“Evernote seems to be one of the few, but they are in a great position to play the numbers game required by Freemium. First, they aren’t B2B only; business customers can use the service, but so can anyone else. In fact, Evernote is one of the few companies to say – and mean – that anyone with an Internet-connected device is a potential user / customer. Most companies being honest with themselves cannot say that. So in the B2B world, building a sustainable business off of 3% conversions just doesn’t happen.”
If you’re looking for custom healthcare software development, then you’ve come at the right place. Arkenea has got you covered. Our offerings ranges from third-party integrations, maintenance and support, UX/UI design development, and more. To know more about it, hop on a consultation call with us today.