How 7 Tech Startups Made it BIG with Content Marketing

• Monday, June 15th, 2020
• Blog, Content Marketing
• one response

Who doesn’t love an origin story? We certainly DO! The following stars tech startups and content marketing. It can also be a love story but we prefer the origin take. Let’s see how content marketing for tech startups can turn a new biz into a superhero!

Wondering why tech startups love content marketing so much? Because it works, of course!

And because it’s an inexpensive way to leave your mark in a super-crowded industry. Few startups have the money for a TechCrunch advertorial, after all.

Just take a look at the increasing percentage of marketers who have a well-thought-out content marketing strategy: 

Image Source: Smart Insights

By the way, do you have a documented content strategy? If not, publishing content is just like shooting in the dark! How will you know which of your arrows land properly? Check out our strategy services for tech companies and let’s get you to stop wasting money on content that may or may not work. 

Whether you are a company that is looking for a way to boost your sales or you just want to start your own tech company and are looking for a cost-effective way to make it BIG, we’ve got you covered.

This article is chock-full of tips, tricks, and inspiration from tech startups you’ve heard of because they invested in content marketing early on. 

Image Source: Marketing Land

89 percent of organizations use content marketing. It has an incredibly high success rate, with 72 percent of marketers saying it is more effective than magazine advertising.

If you are looking for ways to grow your business then content marketing is arguably your best bet. In this article, we highlight content marketing tips for startups that will help you get started.

We also mention a few examples of tech startups that have successfully used content marketing — just to paint a picture of how this tactic has transformed these businesses. So, let’s jump right in, shall we?

How Content Marketing for Tech Startups Helped 7 Businesses to Grow Exponentially

You’ve definitely heard of the superheroes below. If you use their services or if you’re simply inspired by them, you owe it all to the smart content marketing tactics they came up with

1. HubSpot: how a small company became worth US$8 billion

Image Source: HubSpot

HubSpot is a popular digital platform for marketing, sales, customer service, and client management that helps marketing teams grow traffic, convert leads, and track their digital marketing efforts.  

It is hard to imagine that almost 14 years ago this was a relatively unknown company and now it is worth almost US$8 billion. This impressive growth did not just happen. 

It was largely as a result of a well-thought-out content strategy, which enabled them to produce high-quality content that was in tune with their customers’ needs. 

This ultimately paid off because 75 percent of their leads come from content marketing. Hubspot releases new content daily. They post every day on their blog, develop free tools like the Marketing Grader, and broadcast webinars. 

These are some of the effective methods they use to generate traffic to their website and also grow webinar leads. They’ve also mastered the art of using calls-to-actions (CTA) at the bottom of every blog post, which has increased their leads tremendously. 

According to Mike Volpe, CMO at HubSpot, they also market their content from the customer’s point of view. Getting a customer’s perspective has enabled them to develop useful content, which has also helped them connect with their audience.

It is an added benefit that most of their content is free. They use whitepapers, eBooks, case studies to attract potential customers and they do it in an unparalleled way!

Volpe and his team understand the value of engaging content. They know that engaging content becomes a conduit to attract clients to their website and eventually turn them into leads. 

In order to make their online events engaging and informative as well as to attract more clients, HubSpot uses two types of webinars: demonstrations and educational webinars. To familiarise yourself with how they use content marketing to further their goal, log onto their website — it’s free and you can learn a whole lot of stuff!  

What to learn from HubSpot’s content marketing journey

Having been in the game for a while now, HubSpot has perfected the art of content marketing. Their continued success proves that all the tactics they use in their marketing strategies do work. 

If you’re a tech startup like HubSpot was a few years back, you might want to pick some, if not all, of these tried and tested tools and apply them in your own marketing strategy:

• Use of inbound marketing strategies, like webinars, free eBooks, and whitepapers, etc. 
• A free tool, Website Grader, that attracts millions
• Putting a CTA at the end of a blog post that leads to a webinar that relates to the post
• Making highly-innovative, educational and free content
• Creating content from a customer’s point of view – this shows a customer that you actually understand their need(s)
• Conducting tests to make sure you get quality leads

My kick-ass team at Copywritech can help you with all of the above and more. Let’s talk about content marketing that can make your tech startup worth Billions!

2. Buffer got 10,000 users each month

Image Source: Buffer

How do they do it, you ask? The short answer is: through content marketing. It really is!

Buffer is one of those tech companies that every sales and marketing person knows about today. It is hard to believe that when Buffer started out, no one even wanted to hear the pitch.

Leo Wildrich, the founder of Buffer, tried pitching his SaaS to bloggers and mainstream media outlets that were already well-known at the time. Sadly, they rejected his pitches so he had to find another way. 

Wildrich later decided to approach things from a guest blogging angle. He wrote more than 150 posts and publishing them on different blogs. 

Do you know what’s even more insane? He did all that within nine months! Talk about commitment…

He used the guest blogging relationships to grow the app and it gained 100,000 users in 10 months. He used high-visibility sites to reach clients that he couldn’t get to on his own. 

Instead of focusing on his client pool, which was insignificant at the time, Leo deployed audience-centric to create content for people who would most likely influence Buffer’s customers. This, in turn, has helped the company to grow at an impressive rate. 

Another key tactic that they used was compiling different content that was already available on a certain subject instead of writing their own. This made it easier for clients to get information quicker without having to read tons of articles on the same subject. 

Buffer has now grown into a social media giant with over four million users! They have also mainstreamed email marketing as one of their primary digital tools for sharing their highly-sought-after content.

What to learn from Buffer’s dedication to content marketing

• If you can’t get other sites to boost your platform (read: if you don’t have millions to invest in ads on the BIG platforms), start guest blogging on well-known sites. This will help build your reputation and ultimately position you as an expert. Always add guest posting to your SaaS content strategy.
• Curate content to grow your brand. Instead of torturing your brain to create a perfect blog post all the time, do what Buffer did. Compile (useful) information that already exists. Source helpful data from different credible sites and share these bits of information with your audience. There are plenty of useful tools that can help you to get started with content curation. Platforms such as Feedly, for instance, are quite effective on this front. It will help you to organize all your trusted sources in one place. 

Image Source: Feedly

• Use social media as the key driver for your content marketing strategy. Buffer uses its social media platforms as its primary channel to share their content. They are a social media SaaS after all, so they have to practice what they preach, right?

3. Mint – from small-time to BIG time 

Image Source: Mint

Mint gained credibility when it won TechCrunch40 in 2007. This was back when business blogging wasn’t really a thing. Mint began its digital journey by creating the MintLife blog. It used the blog to give finance tips, news roundups, and videos. 

They rounded up different writers, freelancers, and full-time editorial staff to create high-quality content that would attract potential customers. Part of their strategy was to use attractive and information-filled visuals to their advantage and it wasn’t long before the company went viral. 

Another strategy that Mint used was inviting other finance bloggers for ‘Question & Answer’ sessions on their blog. They also used guest blogging and featured content from fellow bloggers to expand their audience reach. 

Mint also used a beta list email database to draw in more customers. They then created an “I want Mint” badge that they urged users to embed on their blogs and social media pages. This acted as a method of free advertising. Genius, right?

Their name was featured in over 600 blogs. They also used mainstream media interviews to establish and position themselves as experts in their field, doing a week-long press tour every two months.

What to learn from Mint

• Don’t be afraid to start blogging, even if people don’t get excited at first. Mint started blogging even before it was famous. So start now!
• Guest blogging and featuring other bloggers on your page. Use other bloggers to build your own profile. Feature their content on your site and let them use your content on their blogs to generate more visibility.
• As always, use social media to push your agenda and advertise yourself whenever you can.
• Learn from Mint and do interviews on different platforms. This will help your clients to know what you are about and what they can expect from you.
• Use email marketing to rope in and secure the clients you already have.

Having trouble creating the right editorial calendar for your digital marketing? Get in touch with us today and we’ll get you started!

4. Glossier or how to gain 15,000 followers without any products

Image Source: Glossier

I know you are probably thinking, wait just a minute, this is not a tech startup, it’s a cosmetics company! 

Well, here’s the thing. Glossier, created by Emily Weiss in 2010, started off as a company blog called Into the Gloss. So, technically it was a tech startup that managed to gain over 15K followers without any products – crazy, right?

Now let’s see their biggest wins at content marketing for tech startups.

Glossier, known for its high-end beauty products, is frequently visited by thousands of women for cosmetic advice every single day. Not many companies can claim such an achievement.

Glossier used consumer interaction to help build its platform one follower at a time. It has now grown into one of the largest beauty brands available. 

How did they do it? 

Emily and her team used social media platforms like Instagram to interact with their audience and to get a feel of what the consumers wanted. She then used this feedback from her audience to help shape the brand into what it is today. 

Emily’s digital marketing team used creative teasers on social media to grow their respective social platforms, getting up to 15,000 followers before the launch of their first product. 

The Glossier team would also go online and ask their consumers what they wanted from the brand. They would then use the information to create an experience that consumers were looking for in a brand. 

Today, Glossier has nearly 800,000 Instagram followers, and they still use their social media platform to push their products and experience. If this example doesn’t show you that content marketing for tech startups works, then nothing will!

What to learn from Glossier

• It’s never too soon to put your brand out there. Emily and her team started advertising the Glossier name even before it was actually a brand. This piqued people’s interest in getting them customers even before the first product was launched. Ready to launch a tech company? Learn from Glossier and start with your content marketing for tech startups strategy.
• Don’t be afraid to tease. Making people wait for something exciting actually pays off. But in order to make it work, give them a little taste of what to expect from time to time to help entice them and to keep them interested.
• Consumer interaction is vital. The Glossier team interacted with their audience constantly and consistently. This helped them know what the consumers wanted and worked on fulfilling that need. 

5. Orbit Media generates 60,000 views a month

Image Source: Orbit Media Studios

When looking for a marketing strategy for software development companies, for instance, you will no doubt come across Orbit Media. It is one of the examples of tech startups that have used content marketing to grow their business.

The web services provider realized the power of content marketing for startups and now generates almost 60,000 visits each month, and they do it without ads. Orbit Media’s digital marketing team implemented software marketing ideas into their strategies and it has paid off big.

One of the strategies they’ve used successfully is sending out surveys. They target over 1,000 bloggers each year then transform the information they receive from the bloggers into statistics. They then present this information in the form of images and charts. This tactic, believe it or not, earns them over 4,000 backlinks.

That’s not all!

They are also quick to catch trends as they emerge and create statistics around them. They also collaborate with other companies, which enables them to achieve original research and develop meaningful relationships with people. This, in turn, opens them up to new opportunities to push their brand.

What to learn from Orbit Media

• Post only factual content, with zero ads if possible. This will boost your digital marketing efforts because people naturally hate ads – it’s nothing personal, they just do. Remember: content marketing for tech startups means zero fluff!
• Send out surveys on trending issues and receive feedback. You can then use the information to create insightful and engaging content for your blog.
• Conduct original research and collaborate with other companies to collect data. This will position you as a credible source of information in your industry.

6. Spotify – a masterclass in using customization 

Image Source: Spotify

Spotify is another perfect example of a tech company that has managed to excel where most have struggled with. 

Customization.

In 2020 and beyond, content marketing for tech startups is nothing without customization.

Due to the unique nature of their business, the digital music service that gives its users access to millions of songs needed an effective method to reach and interact with its audience.

Probably having tried and tested a few tactics with little or no luck at all, their customization efforts seemed to resonate well with its users. And just like that, they had discovered a strategy that would now set them on a path to success – which is what most startups are looking for.

As a company whose product knows no boundaries, Spotify’s customization strategy meant that it could customize its content marketing efforts such as emails, playlists including a data-driven microsite celebrating each user’s individual music listening habits.

Customization proved to be a gold mine for the Swedish music streaming and media services provider. In 2018, Spotify launched a digital consumer campaign where users received an email showing them their most listened to music in a story-like format. In fact, this campaign was so successful, they ran it again in 2019!

For Spotify, customization is king!

They understand that every customer’s needs and preferences are unique and the one-size-fits-all tactic is no longer effective.  

What to learn from Spotify

• As a tech startup or any other business for that matter, it is imperative you identify your audience’s needs and preferences and pick the right strategy to reach out to them. 
• Customized communication should be the backbone of your content marketing strategy. With customer preferences and expectations constantly evolving, you will need to deploy communication tactics that address the current needs of your customers, regardless of their geographical location.
• Always align your business goals with tools that will help you deliver quality and great user experience. Customization did exactly that for Spotify.

Struggling to put together a strategy for your content marketing? We can help you develop one today!

7. Investopedia – how to get 30 million visitors every month

Image Source: Investopedia

Investopedia is one of the most famous content-based startups that has carved a niche for itself in the financial space. It has some of the best content marketing examples that have helped them draw more than 33 million visitors each month. 

The company is now featured in almost all of the top websites for startups because of their incredible performance.

The financial content developer has gained this fame for creating authority content that satisfies both search engines and users. They have also mastered the use of simple language to explain complicated finance-related topics and use easy and concise explanations. 

Using tools such as the hub-and-spoke model for their keyword pages has been instrumental for such an achievement. Investopedia also uses simple and hypothetical examples to help further their explanations making them easy to understand.

What to learn from Investopedia

• Always keep your information as simple as possible. This will help your audience to understand your message and ultimately act on it.
• Try using the hub-and-spoke model to link to other pieces that will help explain your point.
• Present your content in a simple and easy to understand way. This will keep your target audience engaged and interested in what you have to offer. You can use images, charts and even examples to make the content fun.

7 Benefits of Content Marketing for Tech Startups

1. A cost-effective marketing tool. You don’t need a big budget to get started. You just need the right strategy and consistency.
2. It’s an effective way to attract and engage with customers at different stages
3. Improves your search engine ranking
4. A tried and tested way of capturing your audience’s attention
5. Helps build brand loyalty. You can use content marketing to grow loyal customers for your business.
6. It is super easy to customize. You just need the right data and analytics, which is readily available.
7. It is scalable. You can start small and enhance your efforts as you grow.

Conclusion – How to Rock Content Marketing for Tech Startups

Simply put, content marketing works for tech startups. This tactic is arguably one of the most cost-effective strategies you can use to grow your brand online starting today! Just to recap, here’s why content marketing should be an integral part of your growth strategy.

Consumers are constantly searching for relevant content that will help them solve their problems. Ads are okay and can help you to sell. However, if you want to sell even more, then you need to combine it with content marketing – it’s that simple.

Content marketing is your way of delivering value-added information that will, in turn, help your customers make informed purchase decisions. This is why consumers look for and read product reviews in the first place.

This customer behavior presents you with a golden opportunity to create and share meaningful content that can ultimately position your product or services favorably in the market.

Content marketing for tech startups needs to be executed with precision for it to work. For instance, if you are a solopreneur and you don’t have the time to create content, you can always outsource content writing services. 

Content marketing cuts across the board. If you are an expert in the technical field, for instance, and content creation is not your cup of tea, you can always hire technical writers to create easy to understand content for your website or blog. 

Adriana Tica

Adriana Tica is an expert marketer and copywriter, with 10 years in the field, most of which were spent marketing tech companies. She is the Owner and Founder of Idunn. In October 2019, she also launched Copywritech, a digital marketing agency that provides copywriting, SEO content writing, and strategy services to companies in the tech industry.