Marketing tech stacks for early-stage B2B SaaS

+ the lean marketing stack

Hey there-

Today we’re going to talk about marketing tech for B2B SaaS, specifically:

• What a good marketing stack looks like

• The vast landscape of marketing tools

• The lean marketing stack

Let’s dive in.

What does a good marketing stack look like?

Picture this -

Someone sees one of your scheduled posts on LinkedIn which links back to your website. They click through to your website, look around, and a pop-up for a cookie consent banner shows up. Like most people, they click ‘Accept All Cookies‘ to dismiss the annoying banner.

This triggers a tag manager to load scripts for tracking tools. You now have access to a whole host of info, including their location, their scroll behaviour, how they arrived on your website, etc. You can see their actions in real-time as they look around your website.

Before long, they create a free account to test out your product. This:

• creates a new record in your CRM system containing all the information they used to sign up, and any additional info that your web analytics picked up

• triggers enrichment of the data in your CRM - populating their social media profiles and company website

• notifies you in Slack, Teams, or Discord that you’ve got a new signup

• adds the person to your marketing email list and email nurture sequence

• creates a user record in your CDP platform and product analytics platform

As they log on for the first time, a guided product tour and onboarding flow starts. Their usage info gets logged into your product analytics platform as they click around. They stop the tour halfway through and don’t log in for a couple of days.

This lack of activity triggers an email to go out to them asking if they need any help with your product, linking them to your calendar to book a demo. When they sign up for a demo, your calendar, CRM, and Slack/Teams/Discord sync up.

The next day, you have a demo with the person. The prospect discovers that your product is indeed a good fit and signs a deal on the spot. You mark the deal as won in your CRM, triggering your billing system to ask for first payment and notifying your team of the good news. This customer gets removed from your email nurture sequence and gets put on your company and product updates newsletter.

Once a month, you do a deep dive into your marketing, product, and finance data looking for trends and insights. You run a cohort analysis in your BI tools using your marketing and product usage data to see what factors influence signups which convert to paying customers. You notice that users who came in via specific channels and landing pages were more likely to become paying users. You decide to double down on your marketing efforts on these channels, eventually leading to more and more happy customers.

The end.

Now, every company is different but the above is what you can expect to see in those with a solid marketing stack. In that short example, at least 17 different types of marketing tools were used. Crazy right?

A good marketing stack does the following things well:

1. Gathers data about your prospects and customers including how they interact with your website, product, support team, emails, content, etc.

2. Transforms data into insights (or allows your team to do so)

3. Captures and nurtures leads throughout the buying journey

4. Personalises interactions at scale, helping with conversions, upgrades, support, communication, etc.

5. Automates routine tasks and alerts humans when decisions or input is needed

6. Keeps your data in sync across all tools

So what are the different types of tools that exist?

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The vast landscape of marketing tools

There are a LOT of marketing tools out there.

If you've never worked in sales or marketing before, the sheer number of tools on the market can feel overwhelming. To add to that, a lot of tools do seemingly the same thing but in a slightly different way. It’s all a bit confusing, to be honest.

So here’s a crash course:

Website & Content Management

• Content Management Systems (CMS) & Website Builders

  • Build and manage your marketing website

  • Examples: Webflow, Framer, WordPress, Contentful, Strapi, Next.js

• Landing Page Builders

  • Create dedicated campaign landing pages

  • Examples: Unbounce, Leadpages, Instapage, Carrd

• Website Performance/Monitoring

  • Monitor site speed and uptime

  • Examples: GTmetrix, PageSpeed Insights, Pingdom

• Content Creation/Design

  • Create marketing assets and content

  • Examples: Canva, Figma, Adobe Creative Suite

• Video Creation/Recording

  • Create video content and record meetings/demos

  • Examples: Loom, Riverside.fm

• Documentation

  • Create and manage marketing docs, branding, guides, knowledge bases

  • Notion, GitBook, Confluence

• Collateral Management

  • Organize and distribute marketing/sales materials

  • Examples: Seismic, Highspot, Showpad, Brandfolder

Web Tracking & Analytics

• Web/Visitor Analytics

  • Track who visits your site and what they do

  • Examples: Google Analytics, Plausible.io, PostHog, Heap, Adobe Analytics, Amplitude, Fathom

• Tag Management

  • Deploy tracking codes without touching your codebase

  • Examples: Google Tag Manager, Adobe Launch, Tealium

• Cookie Opt-in Banners

  • Legal compliance for GDPR, CCPA, etc.

  • Examples: OneTrust, Cookiebot, Termly, self-coded

• Heatmaps

  • Visualise exactly where users click, scroll, and interact on your pages

  • Example: HotJar, Microsoft Clarity, PostHog, CrazyEgg, FullStory, LogRocket

• Data Visualisation

  • Create dashboards and reports from your marketing data

  • Examples: Looker Studio, Tableau, Power BI

• Attribution/Multi-Touch Attribution

  • Track which touchpoints drive conversions

  • Examples: Adobe Analytics, HubSpot Attribution, Google Analytics 4

Customer & Lead Management

• CRM (Customer Relationship Management)

  • Manage leads, customers, and sales pipeline

  • Examples: HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Odoo, Zoho

• CDP (Customer Data Platform)

  • Unify customer data from all touchpoints

  • Examples: Mixpanel, Segment, Amplitude

• Lead Intelligence/Prospecting

  • Find and research prospects, enrich contact data

  • Examples: Apollo, ZoomInfo, Cognism, Instantly, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Lusha

• Data Enrichment/Verification

  • Clean and enhance your contact databases

  • Examples: Clay, Clearbit, ZeroBounce, Hunter.io

• Sales Intelligence/Prospecting Automation

  • Automate prospecting and sales outreach

  • Examples: Outreach, SalesLoft, Instantly, Lemlist, Apollo, Reply.io

Email & Communication

• Newsletters

  • Email marketing and newsletter platforms

  • Examples: Mailchimp, ConvertKit, Substack, Beehiiv, MailerLite

• Email Sequencing

  • Automated email campaigns and drip sequences

  • Examples: ActiveCampaign, Customer.io, Drip, ConvertKit, Klaviyo

• Live Chat/Customer Support

  • Real-time customer communication

  • Example: Intercom, Zendesk, Drift

• Community Building

  • Build and manage user communities

  • Examples: Discord, Slack, Circle, Mighty Networks, Discourse, Skool

Marketing Channels

• SEO Tools

  • Optimize for search engines and track rankings

  • Examples: Ahrefs, SEMrush, Moz, Screaming Frog, Google Search Console

• Social Media Management

  • Schedule and manage social media posts

  • Examples: Hootsuite, Buffer, Sprout Social

• SMS Marketing

  • Text message marketing campaigns

  • Examples: Twilio, SimpleTexting, EZ Texting, Postscript

• Push Notifications

  • Send mobile and browser push notifications

  • Examples: OneSignal, Firebase

• Webinar Platforms

  • Host educational and sales webinars

  • Examples: Zoom, WebinarJam, GoToWebinar, Demio

Conversion & User Experience

• A/B Testing

  • Test different versions of pages and campaigns

  • Optimizely, VWO, Unbounce

• Surveys & Forms

  • Collect feedback and market research

  • Examples: Typeform, SurveyMonkey, Google Forms, JotForm

• Onboarding Tools

  • Guide new users through your product

  • Examples: Intercom, Appcues, Pendo

Automation & AI

• Automation/Integration

  • Connect tools together and automate workflows

  • Examples: n8n, Zapier, Make

• Marketing Automation Platforms

  • Advanced multi-channel automation

  • Examples: Marketo, ActiveCampaign, Mailchimp, HubSpot

• AI-Powered Marketing Tools

  • Leverage AI for content, design, and optimization

  • Examples: ChatGPT, Claude, Copy.ai, Jasper, Midjourney, DALL-E, Synthesia, Grammarly

Specialised Tools

• Account-Based Marketing (ABM)

  • Target specific high-value accounts

  • Examples: Demandbase, 6sense, Terminus

• Competitive Intelligence

  • Research competitors' tech stack and strategies

  • Examples: BuiltWith, SimilarWeb, SEMrush, Ahrefs, SpyFu

• Affiliate/Referral Management

  • Manage partner and referral programs

  • Examples: ReferralCandy, Extole, Friendbuy

• Calendar Bookings

  • Schedule demos, consultations, and meetings

  • Examples: Calendly, Chili Piper, HubSpot Meetings, TidyCal

Annnnnnd I’ve probably missed a bunch. The landscape is constantly evolving. But truthfully, you don’t need much.

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Introducing the lean marketing stack

Given the vast landscape of tooling available, it’s easy to overthink your marketing stack. Fear not. There are only two tools you really need:

1. Web analytics to track traffic sources and conversions, and

2. Heatmapping to visualise user behaviour

With this lean marketing stack, you’ve got everything you need to acquire customers. You can see which channels are working, what content converts, where users drop off, what features people use, and which campaigns drive results.

Essentially, you can focus purely on understanding what works and optimising for better conversions. Anything extra is a bonus. Of course, add any other tools as needed to facilitate your customer journey (e.g. a calendar booking integration if you're inbound-sales-led), but start simple and expand as your needs grow.

If you're just starting out then check out Microsoft Clarity and PostHog. Either tool will serve you well for a long time.

Both of these solutions (at the time of writing):

• Are free / freemium

• Can handle UTM parameters

• Can build funnel visualisations

• Can handle conversion events

• Have heatmapping

• Can be deployed as a simple script in your <head> tag

• Can be run cookieless (a plus depending on the cookie laws of the countries you are targeting)

And that wraps up today’s post. Hope you found it useful. As always, please leave a comment if there’s any topics that interest you.

PS: I’m currently writing a marketing playbook which helps early-stage B2B SaaS companies build repeatable customer acquisition systems. If you’d like to be notified when it goes into early access simply subscribe today: