In this day and age, businesses from all spheres need to stay up-to-date with the latest technological advancements to keep up with the growing competition. To make a business atmosphere much more productive and efficient, entrepreneurs are investing in the latest tools and services in the market. Among these, SaaS stands as the most popular tech tool for business.
Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) business solution, where an application is hosted on the cloud and licensed on the basis of subscription, has gone on to become immensely popular among the emerging start-ups. SaaS offers an attractive package of benefits for small businesses that include faster execution, less up-front cost, flexibility, low level of dependency on IT and easier updates. Today, consumers prefer purchasing subscriptions on online music applications instead of buying a CD from a brick-and-mortar store or ordering food from an app instead of going to a restaurant. The solutions provided by SaaS are endless, and entrepreneurs are starting to take notice of that. Switching towards SaaS business model has enticing benefits for businesses to escalate their sales numbers.
Easier Updates
When setting up the on-premise software platforms or infrastructure, it not only time and energy consuming, rather it is also difficult to set up, especially for hardware devices. SaaS is cloud hosted and operated by a third-party cloud service provider. As the responsibility for upgrades would rest upon the shoulders of a service provider, one will reap the benefits of automated updates without any uninterrupted business operations. Since SaaS providers manage the application updates, it will ensure the usage of the latest version of the software without any hassle of reimplementing and re-customizing the default features.
Minimal Cost
Managing and operating an on-premise software is much more expensive as there are various investments that need to be made, such as on equipment, tools and devices, electricity bills, premise space, security and manpower. Switching to SaaS provides a business owner the advantage of not having to invest on such physical requirements. The initial costs for cloud services are typically much lower as compared with an on-premise setup. As the SaaS applications are subscription-based, there is little need for management operations. While budgeting for a new cloud solution, it is important to analyze the available options and choose the solution that best fits the budgetary needs of the company.
Less Maintenance Required
Cloud services do not require any hardware maintenance or repairs, it offers multi-incremental backups, if ever there’s a need to rollback. Data centers take care of any restoration or data backup, and failures are fixed in very little time as cloud service providers have a larger workforce. On the other hand, maintaining an on-premise system requires a lot more time and money. The IT team will spend considerable time administrating daily check-ups to fix issues and technical problems. Whereas on switching to SaaS, these maintenance requirements will no longer remain a concern.
No Requirement of Space
Having an on-premise system for a business requires loads of space as servers and hardware installations need to be set up. Installations like wiring, ventilation, and devices for security measures would require a much larger space and functional room. This won’t be the case if SaaS is adapted, as all the essential requisites are taken care of by the cloud service providers.
What to Keep in Mind when Making the Switch to Software-as-a-Service
Get Started with your Transition Fast
Switching to SaaS business model can be a long, tedious and ongoing process that can have an impact on each and every department within the company. Because of this, implementing it as soon as possible is a wise choice to make. SaaS solution can be used to serve the existing customers during its built-in phase until its ready for a full-fledged launch as a standalone platform.
Understand and Analyze the Market
It is extremely imperative for a business to determine and understand the addressable market for SaaS. One must identify their rival’s strengths and weaknesses and find relevant partners to assist with the switch. Once the market demand is understood and analyzed, there will be a unique perspective about your SaaS solution for your existing customers and clients.
Determining the Pricing Strategy
As compared to an on-premise system, SaaS offers way more flexibility regarding the price structure. Determining the price for your new solution will be a key factor to help you yield higher sales numbers. SaaS provides the opportunity to charge subscriptions based on monthly or yearly payment schemes. Upon acquiring knowledge about your target audience, determining the pricing strategy for SaaS services would become much easier to narrow down.
Refining the Existing Sales Strategy
It’s significantly much cheaper and easier to retain the existing customers than acquiring new customers. Refining the sales strategy for SaaS solutions will help to hold on to the present customers instead of hunting down new and potential ones.
Initially switching to SaaS may seem difficult, but once you have a product or service that offers significant value, then the upsides are seriously high.