Considerations When Starting an Online SaaS Company
Starting an online business is something thousands of people from all over the world are interested in doing. In order to run one successfully, you will likely need to use a wide range of different types of software. Accounting software, subscription management software and many others are required to run a purely online business.
These types of services exist on the cloud and are completely on-demand and centrally hosted. However, not only are people using cloud services for their businesses, but some people are even starting companies that provide these types of services for other businesses. Starting and running an online SaaS (software as a service) company can be lucrative, but also comes with it’s own potential challenges.
With that in mind, this article is going to look at some things to consider and think about when starting an online SaaS company.
What Will Your Pricing Strategy Be?
Of course, if you are running a business, one of your primary goals will be to make money. But when it comes to making money from a SaaS business, there are numerous different strategies you can adopt. There are usage-based pricing, flat-based pricing and tiered-pricing options. Each come with their own unique pros and cons, and you should think long and hard about which you will use.
Whichever strategy you end up going with, you want to make sure the prices you use are in line with the industry norm. People are used to paying a certain amount for a certain service, and if your price is too high people might be unwilling to pay the premium. On the other hand, if you go too low, some might think of your product as low-quality and will look past it. The pricing should be enough to make you money, but also be fair for the user.
Thoroughly Test Your Product and Software
In order to achieve the most success, you want your product to be ready as soon as you release it. In order for this to occur, you need to test your product and software thoroughly. Before you ever release your product to the masses, you need to test everything yourself. This includes testing the security, testing the performance, load testing, UI testing, and compatibility tests.
Once you have tested everything, it’s time to release it to some people who might be within your target market to test the product. These people shouldn’t be friends or family members, as you want them to provide you with honest feedback.
Once the testers within your target market have given you feedback, it’s time to make the necessary finally tweaks. Then and only then will you be ready to release the finished product. Releasing the product or service before fully testing can reveal issues that you should have caught, which could stop a lot of people from purchasing or trying it.
Customer Service and Experience is Very Important
When people make the switch to a new product (especially one that they are paying for), you want to give them a good first impression. As a result, you need to ensure that the user experience is smooth, transparent and that you offer a friendly onboarding process. In addition to this, there are bound to be questions among your users, so offer high quality customer service, too. Good customer service is important to any business, especially the ones in this space.
In addition to making sure the customer experience and your service is good, make sure to be receptive to feedback. Whether you open up an email account for feedback or offer an online form, you should have a place where people can ask questions or voice their concerns.
We sincerely hope that the tips and information in this blog post are able to help you successfully start and run your SaaS business.
