best SaaS marketing campaigns

15 Unique & Best SaaS Marketing Campaigns Till Date

Last Updated: 21/02/2024By
Summary

15 Unique SaaS Marketing Campaigns Till Date

If you ever thought of creating an iconic B2B SaaS marketing campaign, We have got a tip for you.

Learn from the past example and steal them like an artist.

There have been countless, best b2b SaaS marketing campaigns, growth hacks, and case studies from which to learn.

In this article, We will be sharing the 15 best SaaS marketing campaigns to date. And all you need to do here is learn the intent behind them.

Ask yourself, “To make it work for my audience, what will I have to do?”.

We have a lot to cover here, like:

  • 15 Best SaaS Marketing Campaign Examples
  • Difference between Marketing Strategy and Marketing Campaign
  • Tips to create a good SaaS Marketing Campaign for your business

So, without taking any more time, let’s get started right away.

15 Best SaaS Marketing Campaign Examples Till Date

1. Miro

Miro is an online whiteboard collaborative tool. The competition is fierce, and everyone wants to make their home page rank on top of Google search results.

But let me ask you something. What do you think a user wants when they search for “Whiteboard online”?

  1. An immediate solution
  2. A tool where they’ll sign up and then get started.

If you search for solutions impulsively, you choose option A.

The team at Miro recognizes this, too. That is why they started using a new domain, “WebWhiteboard.com,” as their advertising platform.

webwhiteboard by Miro

Today, it ranks for some of the most competitive and vital keywords for Miro. It draws an organic monthly traffic of 175K visitors, motivating them to Sign up and unlock Miro Lite.

Using a separate tool-based domain allows Miro to reach their target audience directly while beating all their competitors.

Webwhiteboard organic traffic

Additionally, it allows Miro to reduce the type of users that want a whiteboard for a short while and will churn eventually.

It is still among the best SaaS marketing campaigns, which one can use in various niches.

It’s simple but gives a massive search engine leverage to reach thousands of users each month who are looking for an immediate solution.

2. Tawk.to

Tawk.to’s SaaS marketing campaign stands out as the case study for best for branding, showcasing the power of partnership and pricing strategy.

While giants like Zendesk, Zoho, and Intercom pour millions into marketing and PR, Tawk.to turns its customers into marketing allies.

Result? Over 20% market share in live chat software.

Unlike its competitors, Tawk.to offers its chat tool for free, indefinitely, for any website.

The only catch? The Tawk.to branding remains visible within the chat box unless users opt to pay for its removal.

This pricing strategy attracted millions of websites and turned them into a free marketing platform for Tawk.to.

Along with this, customers can also pay for additional premium services like AI assistants and chat agents.

You see, the learning from this b2b SaaS marketing campaign is not to give away a tool for free. But to find a better way to market your tool and reach serious customers who want premium services.

Tawk.to did it by partnering with free customers while providing them with an unbeatable service. 

The question you have to ask here is, in order to create the best SaaS marketing campaign, how can you deliver maximum value to users such that they become your brand’s advocate?

3. Hubspot

Hubspot is among the industry-leading CRM tools used by over 205k users across 135 countries.

If we track the progress of Hubspot, one of the best SaaS marketing campaigns they use is an effective inbound marketing strategy.

Whenever we learn about inbound marketing, we are taught to:

  • Create useful content 
  • Offer solutions
  • Generate leads 
  • Convert leads

However, companies still often miss out on a few steps.

The Hubspot marketing team created content in all forms, reaching millions of b2b professionals.

This includes their Hubspot academy for beginners, blogs for query-based solutions, and new forms of content like newsletters and podcasts for experienced professionals.

All this content helped them build trust and regularly engage the target customer at each stage of the marketing funnel.

Sure, it is a long-term approach when we are looking for quick results through SaaS marketing.

But when building an online business, it’s always best to have a core marketing campaign you can rely on—mixed with experiments and opportunities.

4. Dropbox

Dropbox’s referral marketing campaign is the best SaaS marketing example of harnessing the power of word-of-mouth.

In early 2010, when traditional marketing was still expensive for cloud storage startups, Dropbox invited its users for referral marketing.

Existing users could invite their friends and family to use Dropbox for additional storage space.

This SaaS marketing campaign is still considered the blueprint for referral marketing today.

The company grew exponentially from 100,000 to 4 million in just one year. And while the reason can be attributed to multiple things, one learning we can draw is creating a win-win-win situation for all.

In Dropbox’s case, they gave additional space to both referrer and referee, making the offer more appealing and helpful to existing users.

To create the best SaaS marketing campaign for your business, look out for such opportunities—something that helps you achieve your goal while ensuring users have equivalent benefits.

5. Semrush

Semrush is a popular SEO tool, but we rarely hear its growth story to become a $1.81 billion company.

During its growth phase, Semrush used monstrous affiliate marketing to increase its user base.

Semrush web-archive affiliate example

Even if we roll back in history and see their homepage—they promoted their affiliate program front and center.

The program drew a lot of attention because of the terms Semrush was offering. 

  • 10 years, first click attribution compared to competitors, who offered only 30 days.
  • 40% recurring commission with 2 times monthly payout.
  • Instant and 100% approval so anyone can join the program.

The deal was compelling enough to attract thousands of bloggers and influencers to become affiliates.

For example, Blogger Passion joined this program and has earned a commission of over $600,000.

While one can learn how to create a leading affiliate program here, it is also important to note how Semrush promoted it.

We include Semrush among the best SaaS marketing campaigns because it shares the importance of distributing your growth channel.

This is a step most SaaS marketing campaigns often skip, and they find it difficult to understand why the campaigns are not working for them.

6. Mailchimp

Mailchimp has run some of the best SaaS marketing campaigns in the past, mainly for brand awareness and traffic.

During one such campaign, a podcaster mispronounced Mailchimp to MailKimp.

What would you have done? Rolled it under the carpet and never addressed it? Right?

Mailchimp campaing example google search

Mailchimp saw it as an opportunity and created a full-fledged campaign around “Did you mean Mailchimp?

And they didn’t even stop at Mailkimp. They targeted keywords like MailShrimp, KaleLimp, JailBlimp, NailChamp and more.

Did they stop here? Nope. They created six fake brands with actual products–all promoting Mailchimp.

This craziness got their attention across the PR world, and it soon became among the best SaaS marketing campaigns for, ironically, brand awareness.

7. Zapier

Zapier is an online automation tool that connects apps and services to create a flawless workflow.

One of the biggest challenges that Zapier faced was creating tech-based content for regular users.

After all, the tool was all about connecting APIs.

But now, if we look back, Zapier has created among the best SaaS marketing campaigns, utilizing users’ search intent and SEO.

The team at Zapier understood that while their potential users are not looking for “how to connect APIs?”, they are looking to connect apps and services.

For example, connecting Slack with Trello, Google Sheets with Hubspot, MailChimp with Shopify, etc.

The team understood that the search volume of such keywords would be low. Also, creating a page dedicated to each integration would be a humongous task.

But since their users searched for it, they took the plunge and created a dedicated page for 6000+ apps and their integration.

And while Mailchimp’s checky campaigns would be considered viral—Zapier’s solutions-based SEO marketing is undoubtedly among the best B2B SaaS marketing campaigns to learn from.

8. Intercom

Intercom is a live chat software that helps businesses provide customer support. 

Founded in 2011, it is among the leading internet companies and has run various marketing campaigns.

Among many, the one that stands out is its boldness in calling out the competitors and showcasing how Intercom is a better option.

Intercom vs Zendesk Google search example

And we are not talking about a simple alternative page.

When you look for the keyword Intercom vs Zendesk (a competitor of Intercom), you are taken to a page that challenges Zendesk’s approach at each stage.

Intercom vs Zendesk competitive page

This is clear from the first sight of the page.

While this approach seems to be aggressive, it puts forward Intercom’s ability to share how it is better.

The whole page is dedicated to sharing the benefits, along with a video of customers switching from Zendesk.

One can surely learn to use competitors’ traffic to steal customers. It is not to say Zendesk is a bad company.

But with this marketing campaign, Intercom definitely stood out as an authority compared to its competitor.

9. Grammarly

Grammarly homepage

Grammarly is an online writing tool and assistant that helps users write correct English without grammatical errors.

One of the best things to learn from Grammarly is their understanding of the target audience.

In an interview with Contently, their social media manager shared how they shifted their focus from a small audience group interested in “writing error-free content” to a much larger group. 

Grammarly started creating content for businesses that wanted to improve customer support, write well, and communicate better.

This shift is still visible in the ads Grammarly runs today. They aren’t selling a tool but are selling solutions & benefits to businesses.

An important thing to learn here is to explore the use cases of your SaaS product and convey it to the audience.

At first, it may have been a tiny shift in approach for Grammarly. But over the years, it made it a $13B company.

10. Typeform

Typeform is included in the list of best SaaS marketing campaigns because of the learnings it followed, and it curated an experience that helped the brand grow.

Unlike other SaaS marketing examples, where marketers had to develop revolutionary growth hacks—Typeform followed a step-by-step process to reach a growth stage.

From the start, Typeform was launched on the community startup launching platform Betalist.

Platforms like this help SaaS companies get early users who have to share their feedback.

Moving on, the team recognized the importance of making the product solution-based.

After all, there are not many searches for “interactive form builder.” That is why the team created templates like Sign-up forms, Marketing Surveys, HR Surveys, etc.

Going ahead, the Typeform team also started integrating video forms, which today is an entirely separate SaaS tool known as Videoask.

One must learn here that the best SaaS marketing campaigns are not a one-hit wonder. A company must be goal-driven and consistently work towards the next stage.

From inspection to growth, Typeform optimized its marketing methods and grew year after year to become among the top form builders online.

11. Canva

Today, Canva is the first design tool that any new digital nomad would get their hands on. It’s simple, user-friendly and accessible.

The tool has disrupted the market since the beginning, and that is not out of luck.

If we turn back the clock, Canva has competed with giants like Adobe in the design space. The team knew they had to reach the right audience from the start.

They can’t simply wait for SEO’s slow results, nor can they outbid Adobe paid ads. Here’s when Canva developed a marketing campaign in the early stages.

Regarding the backlinks, Canva had over 2,200 within the first month of launching. This was done through PR sites and lists where design tools were mentioned.

Canva Backlink History

Moreover, Canva always wanted to make word-of-mouth their biggest marketing channel. Hence, they reduced any friction from signing up and focused on giving users complete access.

This resulted in more virality, and people started to use and recommend Canva to their friends.

One has to note here that once the ball started rolling for Canva, the team didn’t stop and let the virality fade away. They constantly introduce new features, partnerships, and content to engage their users to date.

12. Notion

Notion faces a unique challenge. The tool is so versatile that anyone can use it, but if one starts targeting everyone, something is wrong with your marketing.

This is where one of the best SaaS marketing campaigns by Notion stood out. Notion not only created templates for the users but also motivated users to create and share templates publically.

Today, Notion templates are digital products that people can buy and sell. For example, Easlo is one of the most well-known Notion template creators, earning over $300K selling notion templates in a year.

This is because each user creates a template for their specific audience, attracting more communities to use the tool.

Again, Notion didn’t just create a feature and hand it to users to promote. The team distributed and motivated their audience across channels.

On Reddit alone, Notion has a community of 332K members. People regularly share their templates on Reddit and engage with the team.

Notion Reddit Community

Notion used community-based marketing and created among the best SaaS marketing campaigns for us to learn from.

13. Wise

Wise, earlier Transferwise, is an international payment transfer software. It competes with platforms like PayPal, Stripe, and other payment transfer services.

The platform was launched with a simple USP: fastest transfer and lowest fees charged.

But when it comes to money, people are specialties before trusting any new tool. After all, banks used to always have hidden charges.

Wise recognized this hesitation and used a simple yet compromising growth hack to attract new users.

Wise calculator

They featured a calculator that was used to recommend the best way to transfer money, even if that meant promoting other ways to do so.

But it was important for Wise to build trust. And guess what, it paid off.

People started trusting the platform. It was clear that Wise was best suited for businesses and teams across borders.

Wise's organic traffic as shown bySemrush

Hence, more and more target audiences started using the tool.

While Wise no longer features this calculator, it is evident by the traffic growth that, compared to the tool, it did bring a vast user base to the website.

It is essential to learn that it’s not about creating a complex tool to develop the best SaaS marketing campaign.

Understand your audience and their concerns and try to address them by delivering a simple solution.

14. Buffer

Buffer is an outstanding social media marketing tool that has repeatedly created buzz.

Be it with their SEO strategy or the authoritative content marketing to produce and share original content.

But one of the best SaaS marketing campaigns ever undertaken by Buffer was to run as an open startup. They shared all company data publicly, even the salary of their employees.

Founders believed that transparency can foster trust, not just with users but also with potential employees and investors.

Additionally, users can vote for the feature they eagerly want the team to work on.

This trust and engagement instantly built a sense of belonging with the tool and helped Buffer attract customers and team members from across the globe.

15. Slack

Slack has seen the sharpest spike among enterprise platforms. While they have run various marketing campaigns, their model itself is a case study from which you can learn.

The tool is engaging and built for professionals. That is obvious from the first time you log in. But unlike other tools that were out there, Slack understood professionals are people too.

Anyone could sign up and use the tool. Additionally, teams only had to pay for premium features if they wanted services like custom sections, automation, workflow builder, etc.

But the idea behind curating was simple. Allow people to engage on the platform and bring their team to one place.

And that’s what happened. As of Slack’s 2022 report from Business of Apps, there were 35 million daily active users on the platform and $1.5 billion in revenue.

It is essential to learn that Slack’s model focuses on bringing the teams to the platform. 

This is an essential step for any SaaS marketing campaign to target since it often translates into revenue later in the user’s journey.

What Is The Difference Between Marketing Strategy and Marketing Campaign?

A marketing strategy is a long-term plan outlining how a company will achieve its marketing goals.

On the other hand, a marketing campaign is a focused, short-term initiative within the broader marketing strategy.

For example, marketing strategy might involve segments such as market research, competitive analysis, product positioning, and brand messaging. Marketing Campaign will be focused on promoting one particular feature of the entire product.

A SaaS company must have both. A long-term marketing strategy to know where the team should be headed and the best SaaS marketing campaigns to achieve the goal, step-by-step.

Here is a detailed comparison between these terminologies:

Marketing Strategy

Marketing Campaign

Long-term plan outlining overall marketing objectives, target markets, competitive analysis, and brand positioning. Short-term initiative focused on achieving specific marketing goals within a defined timeframe.
Broad and comprehensive, covering all aspects of marketing activities. Narrow and focused on a specific goal or objective.
Provides a framework that allows for adjustments and adaptations over time. Requires precise planning and execution within a set timeframe.
Assessed through key performance indicators (KPIs) aligned with overall business objectives. Evaluated based on campaign-specific metrics such as reach, engagement, conversions, and ROI.

What Makes A Good SaaS Marketing Campaign?

Creating the best SaaS marketing campaign involves various stages of understanding. To get started, here are a few points that you must remember:

  • Understanding your target prospect: Recognize what users are searching for and address their immediate needs. This can be through content, code, or a simple message on your site.
  • Optimizing for an important KPI: Your SaaS marketing campaign is best only when achieving your desired KPI. Choosing one helps you in your marketing strategy and can be scaled to get exponential results.
  • Have a clear value proposition: Offer value upfront. Some of the best SaaS marketing campaigns have shown how they delivered value first and charged for services that professionals would need to make their work easier.
  • Community building and engagement: Creating a community around your product, encouraging users to share their experiences and creations. If possible, build a community and motivate users to engage with one another.
  • Create Opportunities to Become Viral: This can be through PR, content collaboration, a tool, or a feature that makes customers want to share your product. This will help your brand create the best SaaS marketing campaign that enables you to reach an audience and gain users who further promote your product.

Time To Start Your Own SaaS Marketing Campaign

We started this article by talking about stealing the best SaaS marketing campaigns and presented 15 of the best examples of this time.

But remember, the following brands stood out and captured their market because they made a campaign specifically for their audience.

The above SaaS marketing campaigns were a bridge to connect users to the product. So, look out for the opportunity to build campaigns for your target users.

Use the above-shared examples as inspiration, and we are sure you’ll find your unique approach as well.