About to head to the airport in Dublin to head back to the UK.

It’s been a great couple of days here at SaaStock 2022, especially after the whole pandemic thing.

Met lots of new cool people and remembered what it feels like to share your passion for work with like-minded folks in person.

Yesterday the talks were 🔥 too.

Here are 3 key takeaways for you:

1. How to bypass the wall between customer and business on your site

There’s always gonna be a wall that prevents visitors to resonate with what you’re saying on your site unless you start thinking this way…

The way you talk about your business systems (benefits, features, products, specs etc.) needs to match your customer perspective (what they are thinking, how aware they are etc.).

I always hammer on this.

But yesterday Matt Lerner, a big marketer and VC with 10 years at PayPal presented a very helpful and easy-to-remember framework for this.

The “Now you can” model.

In short, anytime you’re writing or testing new ideas for a headline, ask put it through the “now you can” test:

• “Now you can [keep employees more engaged at work]”
• “Now you can [cut time spent billing customers in half]”
• “Now you can [access all your tools from one platform]”
• And so on.

It’s useful because it instantly helps you understand whether you’re matching what people are thinking or wanting to do on your site.

A few considerations:

Once people understand what you do (meaning they are more mature or you have more brand equity), you can try and be more memorable and emotional in your headlines. But until then, stick to the basics and be direct.

Want to get ideas to test for your headlines or ads? In interviews with recent (important) customers, ask “what would that allow you to do?”. You’ll get a lot of potential “now you can” ideas.

But don’t just believe customers. Go ahead and test these in your ads and see if people click.

2. There are only 3 ways to grow your pipeline without spending more

Times are getting tougher and tougher with this looming recession.

So what should we do to get more people in the door without emptying our wallets?

Dev Basu at Powered by search had a great talk on this.

You can:

• Get more customers
• Get a higher revenue per customer
• Acquire them more cost effectively

Get more out of the traffic you already have by increasing CTR.

Get more qualified and higher paying customers by improving your messaging (I can help), rather than trying to get better at targeting.

Get more demos done at a lower cost by improving your offer (and CTA copy) rather than mercilessly cutting ad spending and being passive about it.

In short, don’t panic and keep it simple. Even a 10% improvement in each of these areas could give you an 80% increase in ROI.

3. Lessons in leadership from a war correspondent

Good talk by Jeff Kofman an Emmy-winning reporter, foreign correspondent and war correspondent:

• When you’re in a position of leadership people look at you to model that behavior. You have to stay calm (see above).
• Don’t assume that people know what’s going on. It’s dangerous. Communicate.
• Know the limits of your ability. Admit what you can’t do.
• When others try to shape your story. Own your story.
• When you’re told you can’t, keep going.

That’s it, folks.

I’m looking forward to going back to my routine honestly.

And to doing great work for my clients.

I have a slot free in November for a project.

If you want to chat about it, get in touch.