As a SaaS company, the majority of your focus is on building and selling your tech. However, there’s a high likelihood, especially at the enterprise software level, that your customers need access to services alongside your product in order to see success.
As Greg Liggett, VP of client success at Wrike says in this insightful interview with Artem Gurnov, “[Professional services] are obviously a must-have. And I would say that to a varying degree — based on the kind of the technology and how it’s implemented, the degree to which it’s implemented, and its customizations — that if you don’t have robust onboarding within a professional services engagement when you first buy a SaaS tool, you’re going to jump from one SaaS tool to another. That’s because the initial adoption is going to fall flat. And companies will tend to blame the tool rather than their investment in implementation and adoption.”
Giving your customers access to quality services is essential to SaaS success.
Access to quality services and support is absolutely critical to helping your customers get the most out of your technology. Simply having a software subscription isn’t enough; your customers need to know how to properly set up the product and how to effectively use it over time to achieve their particular business goals. When your customers do have access to the right services, they see results. This improves their lifetime value as they continue to renew their subscriptions month after month.
The problem, however, is working out how to scale your services division as your company and client base grow. With a limited budget allocated to implementation and support services, this vital aspect of customer satisfaction and success can fall by the wayside.
Using a marketplace services platform allows you to scale your services division according to demand.
There’s an elegant solution to the problem of giving your customers access to the quality services they need. Instead of relying on an in-house professional services team to serve our client base, connect your customers with your partners by way of a marketplace services platform.
A marketplace services platform allows your customers to explore the depths of your ecosystem and find the exact services they need in a matter of moments. Platforms that are specifically designed to sell services – such as Morphed’s commerce-enabled partner directory solution – provide a frictionless sales process and facilitate seamless, customer-centric interaction throughout the project lifecycle.
A strong partner program enables your partners to deliver top-quality services.
The key to solving for your customers through your partners is a brilliant partner program. The best partner programs keep your partners in the loop of new feature launches, problems, bug fixes, best practices, and so on. Regular product training, business support, and close partner relationships are all hallmarks of a good partner program, and ensure that your customers get the same level of skill and expertise from your partners as they would from an in-house services team.
