Why You Need Subject Matter Experts in Your SaaS Content Marketing Strategy

Subject matter expertise is a must if you want to ensure higher ranking content, especially in technical niches.

Getting your content team and subject matter experts to work together can be an excellent strategy that allows you to better leverage each team’s strengths to grow your business and attract better-qualified leads.

First Things First: What Is a Subject Matter Expert?

In short, a subject matter expert (SME) is a person with a deep understanding of a particular subject, such as a process, technology, function, or machine.

For highly technical products and services, SMEs typically have an engineering or scientific background.

Engaging Subject Matter Experts in Content Marketing

When it comes to SaaS content marketing, ranking competitively for SEO and turning readers into customers requires a firm understanding of the technical side of the specific product or service.

Balancing great writing and subject matter expertise, though, is one of the most challenging aspects of SaaS content marketing.

Essentially, no matter how capable your content team is at the writing part, without subject matter expertise it’ll be difficult for them to execute content that resonates with your target audience.

Subject matter experts are a great source of information about new industry research and trends. Truth is, however, most SMEs are often busy with other tasks and don’t necessarily have the time or willingness to write content for the company’s blog. This is where many SaaS companies are thrown for a loop, wondering how to encourage SMEs to participate and stay involved in the content marketing efforts.

Amit Levi from Anodot has come up with a great approach to this dilemma – let the SEO team shed light on a keyword or topic opportunity and take that to the subject matter experts.

In turn, SMEs will have the final decision as to whether that opportunity fits well into the company’s wheelhouse and whether or not to publish on that topic.

Writing on Highly Technical Topics: Where to Start

Once the subject experts verify a topic, they are also committing to supporting the creation of the content. The next steps often include optimizing content for improved SEO, as well as creating new content that lives and breathes the product or service it’s related to.

Explaining highly technical ideas, though, is not always easy. If you’re trying to appeal to a more technical audience, providing a simple overview of the product or service is not likely to cut it.

Oftentimes, this means that your writers’ team will also need a good understanding of the product’s benefits and unique selling points. This will enable them to effectively commit your ideas to paper and attract and engage the right audience.

One of the best ways to ensure everyone in the content team is on the same page is to create a top-notch content brief. A clear writing brief will save time, eliminate the need for multiple revisions, and help you get more well-rounded, on-topic articles.

In addition, you writers will be able to create a more relevant content piece if they have enough information about the reader. In the content brief, include data on your target personas, such as pain points, goals, and behavioral insights.

Leveraging the Buyer Awareness Matrix and providing information about prospects’ awareness levels can further help the writer understand which persona is targeted with each piece of content and determine the writing style and level of detail.

Turning Complex Topics Into Compelling Content

Ultimately, having your content team and subject matter experts collaborate is an exciting opportunity to stand out in your industry.

Done well, creating insightful content based on subject matter expertise can better showcase your product’s technical data, position your business as an industry expert, and attract customers looking for compelling information and thought leadership.

Head to our blog to read more on SaaS growth and how to use content to drive sign-ups.