StartupTalky

Tag: Customer Profile

  • Zluri Founder on Developing Develop Your SaaS Product

    Zluri is an enterprise SaaS Management Platform founded in 2020 by Chaithanya Yambari, Ritish Reddy Puttaparthi, and Sethu Meenakshisundaram. The startup is headquartered at San Francisco, United States. StartupTalky took the initiative to get insights around building how to build a SaaS Product.

    Insights shared by Mr.Ritish Reddy, Founder & CEO, Zluri.

    How did you get your first 10 clients for your SaaS Company?

    We got out initial customers through referrals and content marketing.

    Each of the co-founders – Ritish, Sethu, and Chaitanya – had a decade of experience building/selling enterprise software before starting Zluri. They were founding members of Knolskape and made some excellent connections while working there.

    During the ideation phase (of Zluri) itself, we had pitched ideas within our circles. So, when our MVP (minimum viable product) was ready, the first thing we did was to reach out to our network for feedback. Not only did they give helpful feedback, but a few of them were also interested in the product, and a few referred to the right people, who later became our customers.

    What’s 1 pain which you are solving for your customer?

    We help companies solve the challenges of managing SaaS applications.

    Though all companies know the benefits of SaaS, not many are aware of the problems it brings. The high adoption of SaaS in the post-pandemic era has brought new problems for IT teams, like SaaS sprawl.

    When employees themselves start purchasing apps without the purview of IT, it leads to shadow IT and SaaS sprawl. This leads to budget wastage (in the form of unused & underused apps, many apps with similar functionality, unsuitable licenses ) and brings security and compliance issues if not dealt with.

    Traditionally, these apps were managed in spreadsheets but spreadsheets have their own limitations. It is time-consuming to update the app details every time a new one is bought, but they are also prone to errors.

    Further, many tasks are not possible in spreadsheets, like app discovery, visibility into SaaS usage, automation of giving and revoking access to apps while onboarding and offboarding, etc.

    Zluri solves these issues by eliminating SaaS wastage, reducing security and compliance risks, and automating IT tasks, like provisioning and deprovisioning of apps.

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    Finding an Ideal Customer Profile is very important for SaaS startups. How did you go about doing that?

    We knew one thing from the beginning that our product would be most useful for companies using a large number of SaaS apps. So, we reached out to IT and finance directors at many enterprises, where we got many insights on who would need our product the most.

    What we found was that big organisations were still relying on on-premise software. Though they were moving towards the cloud, most software apps were still not consumed as SaaS.

    On the other hand, though recently founded startups were using SaaS apps, the problems were not painful enough to solve for immediately.

    What are your views on the Indian SaaS market?

    Indian SaaS startups are in a position to grow rapidly today. What makes this possible is the demand for software and the availability of talent and capital in the Indian market.

    The software revolution powered by the SaaS delivery model is giving rise to SaaS consumption in the domestic and international markets. Companies have seen the benefits of SaaS in events like a pandemic.

    Then we have very talented people in the Indian market who can build high-quality products quickly. We can make a prototype, iterate at high speed, fail fast, and pivot.

    We have a lot of communities that support Indian startup ecosystems, like SaaS Boomi, TiE, etc.

    Further, Indian startups can launch in multiple markets simultaneously and win big in the international markets like the US, Europe, and Southeast Asia.

    What are a few things a founder must take care of during SaaS product development?

    A SaaS product needs to be developed based on the industry and customer you will be selling to. If you take SaaS, two kinds of people will be your customer: a buyer and a user.

    Before building the product, it is essential to understand them. Your product must help the end-user deliver value, and the value must be viewable to the buyer. So, before deciding to build a product, the first step is to talk to at least 100 users to understand their problems.

    Of course, you aren’t going to come up with a solution for each of those pain points initially, but you can go after the common ones to build an MVP (minimum viable product).

    Make sure to keep note of the other problems as well and include them in your product roadmap for the next few quarters.

    After completion of the minimum viable product, get the users feedback, validate the problem-solution fit with users, and analyse the scope for improvements.

    In some cases, users might suggest a better solution for some of their problems. In those cases, instead of going blindly with their solution, see how you can use innovative emerging technologies to provide the best solution for their problem.

    Remember, customers are good at telling their problems, but their solutions are mostly not good. It’s your job to think and come up with the best solution.

    Once you get the initial users, take their feedback regularly and keep improving your product.

  • How to Create Detailed Buyer Personas? – A Stepwise Guide

    You probably had a companion in your head when you were a youngster. They are known as buyer personas or audience personas in the context of social media marketing, although social media marketers also have them.

    However, in contrast to your imaginary buddy, these fictitious individuals are not created only to frighten your parents. They are a very beneficial tool for identifying your ideal consumer and pursuing them as clients. Buyer personas serve two purposes: first, they remind you to prioritize the desires and requirements of your audience above your own; second, they assist you in developing content that is more directed toward your ideal client.

    What is a Buyer Persona?
    Why use a Buyer or Audience Persona?
    Step-by-step instructions for creating a Buyer Persona
    Step 1. Do thorough audience research
    Step 2. Identify customer goals and pain points
    Step 3. Understand how you can help
    Step 4. Create your buyer personas

    What is a Buyer Persona?

    A buyer persona is an in-depth depiction of a hypothetical individual who is meant to stand in for your ideal customer. This character is made up, but it’s based on an extensive study of your actual audience or the audience you want to attract.

    You could also hear this concept referred to as marketing, audience, or consumer persona. It is impossible to develop a personal relationship with each client or prospect. On the other hand, you may construct a consumer persona to stand in for your actual clientele. Because various sorts of clients may purchase your items for various reasons, you may need the creation of more than one buyer persona.

    You will give this buyer persona a name, along with facts about their demographics, hobbies, and personality features. You will understand their objectives, problematic areas, and purchasing habits. If you like, you may even give them a face by utilizing stock photos or art since it could be vital for your staff to be able to match a face with a name.

    You should consider and talk about this hypothetical model consumer as if they were a real person. This will enable you to design marketing messages individually targeted to them as an individual audience. This will help you better serve actual customers.

    When you keep your buyer persona (or personas) in mind, you can ensure that the voice and direction of everything remain consistent. This includes product development, your brand’s voice, and the social platforms that you utilize.

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    Why use a Buyer or Audience Persona?

    Buyer personas ensure that your attention is directed on meeting the target audience’s needs rather than your own. Every time you choose your social marketing approach, keep your buyer personas front and center in your mind.

    Does an upcoming campaign consider at least one of your buyer personas’ unique requirements and objectives? If this is not the case, you have valid reasons to rethink your idea, even though it may be exciting.

    Once you have developed your buyer personas, you will be able to generate organic posts and social advertisements that speak directly to the target consumers you have identified. Particularly applicable to social advertising is the provision of very specific social targeting options, which make it possible to position your advertisement in front of precisely the audience you have in mind.

    Suppose you construct your social strategy around the idea of assisting your personas in achieving the objectives they have set for themselves. In that case, you will develop a connection with the actual consumers that the personas represent. It all comes down to cultivating customer trust and brand loyalty to simplify your sales process.

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    Step-by-step instructions for creating a Buyer Persona

    Your buyer persona shouldn’t simply be someone you’d want to spend time with; rather, it should be founded on facts from the actual world and strategic objectives. Here is how to create a fictitious client that is the ideal representation of your existing real-world clientele.

    Step 1. Do thorough audience research

    It is time to do some serious digging. Who makes up the majority of your social audience? Who are your current regulars and patrons? Who are your rivals aiming to attract as customers? Check out our comprehensive guide to audience research for a more in-depth look at these ideas in the meanwhile.

    Collect information about your audience from Google Analytics, your customer database, and social media analytics (particularly Facebook Audience Insights), and use this information to zero down on specifics such as:

    • Age
    • Location
    • Language
    • Spending power and patterns
    • Interests
    • Challenges
    • Stage of life
    • For B2B: The size of businesses and who makes purchasing decisions

    It is also a good idea to make sure that you have a solid understanding of the social platforms that are used by your audience. Utilizing technologies such as Keyhole. Co and Google Analytics, you may investigate where they currently spend their time online.

    Using technologies such as Buzzsumo search streams, you can also investigate the customers that your rivals are trying to attract.

    Check out our comprehensive piece for additional in-depth techniques, which explains how to do research on competitors by making use of social media technologies.

    Step 2. Identify customer goals and pain points

    What are the things that drive your customers? What is their ultimate goal? Depending on the sorts of goods and services that you provide, the objectives of your target audience might be either personal or professional.

    On the other hand, this highlights some of their weak spots. Which issues or challenges are your prospective consumers hoping to get assistance with? What is it that is preventing them from being successful? Which obstacles stand in the way of achieving their objectives?

    Engaging in some social listening and social media sentiment research is a vital alternative that can be used in addition to your sales staff and customer care department, which are both excellent options for finding answers to these issues.

    You may get a real-time glimpse into what people are saying about your company and your rivals online by establishing search streams to monitor mentions of your brand, goods, and competitors. You may find out why they like your items or whether aspects of the consumer experience are falling short of expectations completely.

    Step 3. Understand how you can help

    Now that you understand the objectives and challenges faced by your clients, it is time to consider how you may be of assistance to them. This requires thinking about more than simply the characteristics of your product or service and assessing the actual advantages that they provide.

    Your product or what it can perform is an example of a feature. A benefit is how your product or service makes the lives of your consumer simpler or more enjoyable.

    Take into consideration the primary obstacles to purchase faced by your audience and where your followers now are in the purchasing process. And then you should ask: how can we be of assistance? Put the response into a single, understandable statement.

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    Step 4. Create your buyer personas

    Collect all of your findings and then search for patterns shared among them. As you begin to organize these qualities into groups, you will have the foundation for the individual client personas you need.

    Provide your buyer persona with identifying details such as a name, a working title, a residence, and other aspects. You want to give the impression that your character is a genuine person.

    For instance, let’s imagine you’ve determined that your most valuable customers are ladies over the age of 40 who live in the city, have established careers, don’t have any children, and have a strong preference for excellent eateries. Your buyer persona may be “High-Achiever Haley.”

    • She is 41 years old.
    • She attends three spin classes every week.
    • She lives in Toronto and is the founder of her PR firm.
    • She owns a Tesla.
    • She and her partner take two overseas holidays every year, preferring boutique hotels.
    • She’s a member of a wine club.

    You get the essence of this now: this is not just a list of attributes. This is a comprehensive description of a possible client or consumer. It enables you to see your potential buyer as a human being rather than a collection of data points, which is an important distinction. These characteristics may or may not be shared by all of the buyers in your audience. Still, they are useful for representing a buyer archetype because they can be expressed concretely.

    Aim for around the same amount of material you would anticipate finding on a dating site (although, don’t forget to mention pain issues, which would not always fly on Bumble).

    Be careful to highlight who each consumer persona is right now and who they have aspirations to become as you develop your customer personas. This allows you to begin considering how your goods and services might assist customers in achieving their goals.

    Conclusion

    When making decisions about the content of your social media platforms and your overarching marketing plan, you should always keep your buyer personas in mind. If you treat these personas with respect, you will foster a connection with the actual customers they stand for, resulting in increased revenue and commitment to the brand.

    Use the procedures outlined here to get a head start on developing your personas to get a more in-depth understanding of your ideal clients. Also, make sure that your staff knows the best ways to target, assist, and collaborate with the clients and prospects you have. You will see an improvement in reach due to this and an increase in customer loyalty, and an increase in conversions.

    FAQs

    What is a buyer persona?

    A buyer persona is a detailed description of your target audience.

    Why is buyer persona important?

    Buyer personas are incredibly important to segment your customers into different groups.

    How many buyer personas should you create?

    There should be One buyer persona for one industry niche.