{"id":25300,"date":"2020-01-17T10:51:53","date_gmt":"2020-01-17T10:51:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.proprofs.com\/c\/?p=25300"},"modified":"2025-11-05T06:25:17","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T06:25:17","slug":"saas-customer-lifecycle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.proprofschat.com\/blog\/saas-customer-lifecycle\/","title":{"rendered":"Saas Customer Lifecycle: Key Stages, Insights & Best Practices"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Has this ever happened to you? <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

That you bought a SaaS product and then completely forget that it exists? <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The SaaS customer lifecycle is something that is continuously growing and ever-evolving. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There really is no autopilot that you can put into action and then arrive at the end of the journey.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Don\u2019t forget that the process generates recurring revenue, which is the lifeblood of any business to survive in the long run.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, what exactly is this SaaS customer lifecycle?<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s start with understanding the entire lifecycle by defining the basics. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/span>What is SaaS Customer Lifecycle<\/b><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Do you know that 80% of US end-users<\/a> prefer cloud-hosted and SaaS apps for communication and organization purposes, compared to 51% in 2016?<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

A clear indicator that the SaaS market is on the rise<\/strong>. And rising trends tend to influence people into following them. But before you set out to follow any trend, it is important that you first understand what the SaaS customer lifecycle entails for you.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The SaaS customer lifecycle is inclusive of three stages – <\/span>acquisition, engagement, and retention.<\/b> Each stage allows you to understand the current mindset of your customers and helps you build strategies that encourage them to move to the next stage.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

All SaaS businesses need to emphasize on relationships that can foster stronger customer experiences. You can start by adopting a more tactical attitude to customer lifecycle management. Along the way, these SaaS customer lifecycle stages can take you closer to attaining success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the next section, we aim to dissect the existing three stages of the SaaS customer lifecycle and divide them into nine sub-stages.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, let\u2019s dive in!<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/span>9 SaaS Customer Lifecycle Stages<\/b><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

SaaS customer lifecycle stage consists of three main phases – acquisition, engagement, and retention that includes 9 stages of SaaS customer lifecycle. These SaaS customer lifecycle stages can take you closer to attaining success. Here are the 9 stages:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Acquisition<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  1. Outline Buyer Personas & Targets<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Develop Awareness<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Qualify Your Customers<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Engagement<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

      \n
    1. Customer Purchase<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
    2. Onboarding & Activation<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
    3. Product Regularity<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

      Retention<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        \n
      1. Renewals<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
      2. Referrals & Advocacy<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
      3. Innovation<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

        Let\u2019s get a more detailed look, stage-wise.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        <\/span>Acquisition<\/b><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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        Customer acquisition takes a lot of effort. <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

        That\u2019s probably because this is the time when your customers approach you without any knowledge about your brand. And to acquire them as your customers, you first need to ensure that they are made aware of their problems.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        Sounds off, right?<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        But you know what, even if customers can\u2019t describe their problems<\/span>, they can express that something is not right and needs immediate attention. And when they reach such conclusions, they seek answers. And that\u2019s where your brand needs to be present. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        You need to present content that helps your customers get answers to their questions. This can either be through a knowledge base or via live chat. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        Make sure you do not pitch sales. Instead, pitch the idea of instant support and resolution of answers.<\/span><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        Under the acquisition, you need to:<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        1. Outline Buyer Personas and Targets<\/b><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

        Have you come up with your USPs<\/em><\/strong> or unique selling propositions that differentiates your SaaS business from your competition?<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        This is the first question that needs to be answered before you progress further to determine your customer acquisition strategy.  <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        Once this has been accomplished, you may use these insights to identify market segments<\/a> that may be naturally attracted to your sector.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        With your targets in place, the next step is to assess and evaluate your sales process<\/strong>. Get your sales team into action to list the most powerful influencers and identify targets with decision making power. You now have your buyer personas.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        The last step of this stage is to put the buyer personas and targets into play and define your primary marketing initiates targeting these audiences specifically. What you have already started doing, be it intentionally or not, is to customize their experiences by drawing in on the needs and expectations of a targeted audience base. Therefore, your marketing efforts and collaterals can be nuanced and specified to their needs too.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        2. Develop Awareness<\/b><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

        With marketing strategies<\/a><\/span> up and running, your <\/span>SaaS customer lifecycle journey actually kick starts when the target audience becomes aware of a specific issue. This is where all the effort that you have put in to get the word out about your product or service will play a vital part.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        Ideally, it should communicate to them that their issue can be resolved via the SaaS solution that you can offer. Treat this as the educational stage where you are basically doing all that you can to inform someone of what you have on offer.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        This may mean providing a lot of contexts that can be achieved through content marketing. Blog posts, videos work well to demonstrate issues that your solution can tackle. Other than that, you can also use live chat software to provide in-depth solutions to customers in real-time.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

        With one of the best live chat tools<\/a><\/span> in place, you can:<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n