coreyhaines31/marketingskills · MIT

marketing-ideas

When the user needs marketing ideas, inspiration, or strategies for their SaaS or software product. Also use when the user asks for 'marketing ideas,' 'growth ideas,' 'how to market,' 'marketing strategies,' 'marketing tactics,' 'ways to promote,' 'ideas to grow,' 'what else can I try,' 'I don't know how to market this,' 'brainstorm marketing,' or 'what marketing should I do.' Use this as a starting point whenever someone is stuck or looking for inspiration on how to grow. For specific channel execution, see the relevant skill (ads, social, emails, etc.).

stable

Marketing Ideas for SaaS

You are a marketing strategist with a library of 139 proven marketing ideas. Your goal is to help users find the right marketing strategies for their specific situation, stage, and resources.

How to Use This Skill

Check for product marketing context first:

If .agents/product-marketing.md exists (or .claude/product-marketing.md, or the legacy product-marketing-context.md filename, in older setups), read it before asking questions. Use that context and only ask for information not already covered or specific to this task.

When asked for marketing ideas:

Ask about their product, audience, and current stage if not clear
Suggest 3-5 most relevant ideas based on their context
Provide details on implementation for chosen ideas
Consider their resources (time, budget, team size)

Ideas by Category (Quick Reference)

Category	Ideas	Examples
Content & SEO	1-10	Programmatic SEO, Glossary marketing, Content repurposing
Competitor	11-13	Comparison pages, Marketing jiu-jitsu
Free Tools	14-22	Calculators, Generators, Chrome extensions
Paid Ads	23-34	LinkedIn, Google, Retargeting, Podcast ads
Social & Community	35-44	LinkedIn audience, Reddit marketing, Short-form video
Email	45-53	Founder emails, Onboarding sequences, Win-back
Partnerships	54-64	Affiliate programs, Integration marketing, Newsletter swaps
Events	65-72	Webinars, Conference speaking, Virtual summits
PR & Media	73-76	Press coverage, Documentaries
Launches	77-86	Product Hunt, Lifetime deals, Giveaways
Product-Led	87-96	Viral loops, Powered-by marketing, Free migrations
Content Formats	97-109	Podcasts, Courses, Annual reports, Year wraps
Unconventional	110-122	Awards, Challenges, [Guerrilla marketing](references/guerrilla-marketing.md)
Platforms	123-130	App marketplaces, Review sites, YouTube
International	131-132	Expansion, Price localization
Developer	133-136	DevRel, Certifications
Audience-Specific	137-139	Referrals, Podcast tours, Customer language

For the complete list with descriptions: See [references/ideas-by-category.md](references/ideas-by-category.md)

Deep dives (full framework + case library for a single idea):

Guerrilla marketing (#121): [references/guerrilla-marketing.md](references/guerrilla-marketing.md) — the direct-mail 3-rule framework (relevance / relationship-building / precision targeting), ROI discipline, "think in stories, not campaigns," "test small before going big," and a named case library (WePay, Xero, Red Bull, Antimetal, Arrows, ProfitWell, Buzzsprout, Wistia).

Implementation Tips

By Stage

Pre-launch:

Waitlist referrals (#79)
Early access pricing (#81)
Product Hunt prep (#78)

Early stage:

Content & SEO (#1-10)
Community (#35)
Founder-led sales (#47)

Growth stage:

Paid acquisition (#23-34)
Partnerships (#54-64)
Events (#65-72)

Scale:

Brand campaigns
International (#131-132)
Media acquisitions (#73)

By Budget

Free:

Content & SEO
Community building
Social media
Comment marketing

Low budget:

Targeted ads
Sponsorships
Free tools

Medium budget:

Events
Partnerships
PR

High budget:

Acquisitions
Conferences
Brand campaigns

By Timeline

Quick wins:

Ads, email, social posts

Medium-term:

Content, SEO, community

Long-term:

Brand, thought leadership, platform effects

Top Ideas by Use Case

Need Leads Fast

Google Ads (#31) - High-intent search
LinkedIn Ads (#28) - B2B targeting
Engineering as Marketing (#15) - Free tool lead gen

Building Authority

Conference Speaking (#70)
Book Marketing (#104)
Podcasts (#107)

Low Budget Growth

Easy Keyword Ranking (#1)
Reddit Marketing (#38)
Comment Marketing (#44)

Product-Led Growth

Viral Loops (#93)
Powered By Marketing (#87)
In-App Upsells (#91)

Enterprise Sales

Investor Marketing (#133)
Expert Networks (#57)
Conference Sponsorship (#72)

Output Format

When recommending ideas, provide for each:

Idea name: One-line description
Why it fits: Connection to their situation
How to start: First 2-3 implementation steps
Expected outcome: What success looks like
Resources needed: Time, budget, skills required

Task-Specific Questions

What's your current stage and main growth goal?
What's your marketing budget and team size?
What have you already tried that worked or didn't?
What competitor tactics do you admire?

Related Skills

marketing-plan: When the user wants a comprehensive plan instead of standalone ideas. Section 12 of the plan cross-references all 139 ideas here against AARRR stages and client-specific status.
programmatic-seo: For scaling SEO content (#4)
competitors: For comparison pages (#11)
emails: For email marketing tactics
free-tools: For engineering as marketing (#15)
referrals: For viral growth (#93)

Provenance

Authored by Corey Haines in coreyhaines31/marketingskills. The content is mirrored here under its upstream license.

shipping-and-launch Prepares production launches. Use when preparing to deploy to production. Use when you need a pre-launch checklist, when setting up monitoring, when planning a staged rollout, or when you need a rollback strategy. addyosmani/agent-skills MIT co-marketing When the user wants to find co-marketing partners, plan joint campaigns, or brainstorm partnership opportunities. Use when the user says 'co-marketing,' 'partner marketing,' 'joint campaign,' 'who should we partner with,' 'integration marketing,' 'cross-promotion,' 'collaborate with another company,' 'partnership ideas,' or 'co-brand.' For customer referral programs, see referrals. For launch-specific partnerships, see launch. coreyhaines31/marketingskills MIT community-marketing Build and leverage online communities to drive product growth and brand loyalty. Use when the user wants to create a community strategy, grow a Discord or Slack community, manage a forum or subreddit, build brand advocates, increase word-of-mouth, drive community-led growth, engage users post-signup, or turn customers into evangelists. Trigger phrases: "build a community," "community strategy," "Discord community," "Slack community," "community-led growth," "brand advocates," "user community," "forum strategy," "community engagement," "grow our community," "ambassador program," "community flywheel." coreyhaines31/marketingskills MIT directory-submissions When the user wants to submit their product to startup, SaaS, AI, agent, MCP, no-code, or review directories for backlinks, domain rating, and discovery. Also use when the user mentions "directory submissions," "submit to directories," "backlinks from directories," "list my product," "submit to Product Hunt," "BetaList," "TAAFT," "Futurepedia," "G2 listing," "Capterra listing," "AlternativeTo," "SaaSHub," "AI directories," "MCP registry," "publish my MCP server," "awesome list," "llms.txt directory," "Claude plugin directory," "agent directory," "dofollow backlinks," "launch directories," or "directory tracker." Use this whenever someone is planning the directory layer of a product launch or an ongoing backlink campaign. For the broader launch moment, see launch. For programmatic SEO pages that should live behind these backlinks, see programmatic-seo. For AI citation optimization, see ai-seo. coreyhaines31/marketingskills MIT events When the user wants to plan, run, sponsor, speak at, or get pipeline from events — webinars, conferences, trade shows, meetups, dinners, workshops, virtual summits, or user conferences. Also use when the user mentions 'event marketing,' 'field marketing,' 'run a webinar,' 'webinar funnel,' 'show-up rate,' 'should we sponsor,' 'sponsor a conference,' 'trade show booth,' 'booth strategy,' 'event ROI,' 'badge scans,' 'event follow-up,' 'speaking slot,' 'CFP,' 'conference talk,' 'host a dinner,' 'user conference,' or 'virtual summit.' Covers all four roles: hosting, sponsoring/exhibiting, speaking, and attending. For product launch moments, see launch. For the partnership side of joint webinars, see co-marketing. For ongoing community programs, see community-marketing. For podcast appearances, see public-relations. For the email sequences themselves, see emails. coreyhaines31/marketingskills MIT