Company: Zapier

Founded: 2011

Founders: Wade Foster, Bryan Helmig and Mike Knoop

Description: Service that helps connect apps and automate workflows.

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Micro Marketing

1. Forums – Question by Question

It took 8 months of reaching out to potential customers in forums before Zapier got their first inbound customer. Before this, they landed customers by searching forums for users who wanted to integrate products such as Basecamp, Dropbox and Salesforce. They focused on helping one customer at a time before moving on to scalable solutions. (Post)

2. Integrating Apps by Hand

Zapier gave product tours and did integrations for customers in the early days. This helped them understand exactly what the product needed to do and what customers expected. (Post)

Content Marketing

3. Twitter

Zapier uses Twitter to announce new features, integrations and use cases. (Twitter)

4. Youtube

Zapier posts videos of product demonstrations and feature announcements. (YouTube)

5. Books – Learning Center

The company has written over a dozen books that showcase the platform. (Page)

6. Zapier Blog

Zapier posts tutorials, tips and announcements. (Blog)

7. 25k Handwritten Landing Pages

Zapier has a landing page for each app combination that contains handwritten copy from app partners. This is one of the most unique and effective SEO strategies that I’ve seen. (Article)

8. Podcast Interviews

The Zapier team shares stories and lessons while raising awareness about the platform.

Interviews:

• 5 AM Miracle Podcast
• Productivityist
• TalkPython
• Influence & Co.
• X27
• Growth Everywhere
• Product Hunt Radio
• Ben Tristem Podcast
• The Paul Minors Podcast
• Mixergy
• The Heartbeat Podcast

Freemium Marketing

9. Free Plan

Zapier offers a free forever plan. This allows them to stay in touch with these users and test offers on them. (Page)

10. Free Trial

All plans come with a 14-day free trial. (Page)

Paid Marketing

11. Google

Zapier advertises on Google like most other B2B SaaS companies. We also see some guarantee marketing in the copy with “99.99% up-time” and “bank-level security.” (Article)

Viral Feature Marketing

12. Partners Promote Integrations

Zapier shows app integrators how to use the platform to promote their integrations. This helps Zapier as well the team doing the promotion work. (Page)

13. Shared Growth

Zapier benefits from the growth of businesses in their ecosystem. The more popular an app gets, the more people want to connect it to other apps. This subtle strategy means that Zapier benefits from the work of hundreds of marketing teams. (Page)

Ease Marketing

14. Designing a Pain Killer

Zapier allows companies to focus on product instead of integration. They empower users to create new products from building blocks without code. Zapier grew fast by positioning themselves as a pain-killer for companies and consumers. (Book)

Social Proof Marketing

15. Y Combinator Acceptance (YC S12)

Acceptance and participation in Y Combinator generated lots of press for Zapier. (Tweet)

16. User Testimonials

Zapier uses consumer testimonials to encourage prospective users to sign up. (Page)

17. App Partner Testimonials

Zapier uses app partner testimonials to encourage teams to offer integration on their platform. (Page)

Gamified Marketing

18. Partner Levels

Zapier encourages team to promote their integrations by offering different rewards based on how many people use their integrations. (Page)

Flywheel Marketing

19. Gmail

Gmail is one of hundreds of apps that draws users to the platform. (Link)

20. Airtable

Airtable is one of hundreds of apps that draws users to the platform. (Link)

21. Trello

Trello is one of hundreds of apps that draws users to the platform. (Link)

Thanks for reading!

Which company you would like to see next?

Let me know — @DruRly.