BlogmyQuery – BMQ

Introduction

Adobe Photoshop is a photo editing and manipulation software used by everyone from amateur photographers to graphic design professionals. It’s one of the most beloved programs in the Adobe design suite and can be harnessed for basic image retouching, all the way through to compositing digital art, creating mockups, adding effects to images, and even animation.

Keeping on top of software updates and new Photoshop features is essential for designers, as is looking at how other makers and creators are using the software. To set you up for success this year, we’ll explore the biggest Photoshop 2022 updates, including 8 of the most notable new Photoshop features 2022 and how designers are embracing and using the tool right now.

If you’re brand new to Photoshop, start with a Photoshop tutorial for beginners to discover Photoshop editing tips from the ground up. Or try an advanced Photoshop tutorial if you’re looking for Adobe photoshop tricks for experienced designers that extend beyond the basics.

What’s new in Photoshop?

As with most of Photoshop’s new releases, the most recent updates help to improve and evolve the program rather than giving it a complete overhaul. Once released, it doesn’t take too long for designers to identify the new Photoshop tips and tricks, honing in on creative Photoshop ideas and refining their techniques as they explore what’s possible and set new Photoshop trends.

So, what’s new in Photoshop in 2022? From brand new Neural Filters to improved communication with Illustrator, the focus in this update is around enhanced collaboration and more sophisticated finishes on existing tools. For those of us working in the creative industry, this is all very good news as the world forges ahead with increased flexibility and remote working.

How designers are using Photoshop: tricks, tips, and new features

So let’s get into it. We’ll briefly look at the key changes, the best Photoshop tricks, and more importantly, how designers are actually using them. So, what’s possible with Adobe Photoshop in 2022, and what new Photoshop techniques and editing tools should you be using this year?

1. Nailing compositing with Harmonization

First up is the new Harmonization Neural Filter. Essentially, this tool will match the colors and tones between the foreground and background. So when you go into your desired image, select your subject (in the foreground), then select the harmonization tool, you can use it to make your background match flawlessly. This works by allowing you to adjust the saturation, brightness, and overall color balance to find the best match with the background. Why is it so handy? It cuts down hugely on compositing time, which for many designers can be the most time-intensive part of image editing. To try out this tool straightaway, have a play-around using Photoshop add-ons. 

2. Replicating color & tone with Color Transfer

On the subject of Photoshop’s Neural Filters, another one worth taking notice of in this update is the Color Transfer Neural Filter. Photographers can rejoice with this tool. Imagine, you’ve spent the day at a photo shoot, and have hundreds of images ready to use. But what if you have one location where the lighting is perfect, and some of the images you want to use aren’t taken in that same position? Enter: the Color Transfer tool. You can use it to bring all your photos in line with the same color and tone, creating a seamless set of photos for your designs.

3. Playing with gradients thanks to improved Interpolation options

Gradients are having a moment in design – just look at these key graphic design trends for 2022 – and now, happily, Photoshop has upgraded its gradient tool with two new Interpolation options to make creating and adjusting your gradients that much easier. In addition to the Classic Interpolation tool, you now have the Perceptual Interpolation and Linear Interpolation tools. Both tools are designed to create more natural-looking gradients, which are closer to the way the human eye perceives real-world gradients. You’ve got a hint from the names of these tools, but one is for the OKLab color space and one is for use in the linear color space.

4. Creating NFTs using Photoshop

A real buzzword of the last few years, NFTs, or non-fungible tokens are digital assets that are bought and sold online via the blockchain. To become an NFT a piece of artwork is ‘minted’, then as it’s bought and sold the transaction history is stored in the blockchain. Photoshop is supporting the growth of NFTs and helping to combat art theft, an increasing problem in the industry, with Content Credentials–currently in BETA. For a more detailed overview of preparing an NFT Adobe has a breakdown here, but essentially it means more insight for audiences and buyers on whether the person selling the art is the Photoshop user who exported it. To take advantage of this new development, you’ll need to enable Content Credentials.

5. Verifying content authenticity with Content Credentials

When you export your file, you now have the option to select to include Content Credentials. This means your jpeg (or chosen file format) will include details like your name, your adjustments, the assets used and their file names (backgrounds, subject, icons, etc.), and which version of Photoshop you created the image in. This functionality is super important for verification when submitting your work, where your client or editor can immediately check the authenticity. Bear in mind, though, that if someone makes adjustments and re-saves the image, your credentials won’t carry through.

6. Working more collaboratively with sharing & commenting

Another anticipated update is the addition of sharing and commenting capabilities. It works similarly to Google Workspace, where your Photoshop work will also appear as a Cloud file. You can then share your file with individuals via their email addresses, or get a shareable link so the file can be accessed by all those who receive it. You have the option to allow commenting, saving a copy, or both, meaning collaboration and feedback just got a whole lot quicker and easier – with no need for file downloading and minimized risk in version control. 

7. Switching more effectively between Photoshop & Illustrator

Designers will rejoice at this next update: a better experience switching between Photoshop and Illustrator due to improved interoperability between the software. In practical terms, it’s now possible to paste vectors from Illustrator directly into Photoshop. You have the option to import with layers – meaning you can keep your Illustrator graphics stroke, fill, opacity, and other attributes. You can edit your Illustrator graphic directly in Photoshop, rather than going back into Illustrator, making your adjustments, and re-pasting into Photoshop. Hoorah!

8. Identifying subjects of an image with advanced machine learning

Last but certainly not least is an improvement to Photoshop’s use of artificial intelligence, via the new object finder tool, and an upgrade to the object selection tool. This tool analyses your image to find the main subjects (and even minor subjects), which you can then select automatically and with enhanced precision thanks to more powerful AI machine learning. You’ll save loads of time adjusting subjects quickly and easily, separate from your overall image. You can even prompt Photoshop to hone in on one part of the subject. For example, you might have a person identified as a subject, but you can highlight a particular detail (like a hat) by drawing a smaller box around it. The object finder tool also comes with its own new settings, for adjusting color, outline, and capacity. 

Conclusion

So, as well as handy improvements to tools, Adobe Photoshop 2022 is looking to the future with practical means to address issues like content authenticity. It’s also taking advantage of AI, and keeping up with our everyday need for more seamless collaboration. For designers, it’s a solid update with truly useful enhancements as well as a few exciting new features to play with.  

The post 8 Interesting Ways Designers Are Using Photoshop in 2022 appeared first on noupe.

You might have heard a lot about these two terms- B2B and SaaS. With the SaaS industry already exploding, 80% of businesses plan to switch completely to SaaS by 2025.

While the definition of these two terms may be known individually, less we know is the power of B2B SaaS.

B2B SaaS as evident is a business that offers software like applications, add-ons and plugins to other companies as a service. This form of service has been in existence for more than a decade now and companies like IBM, Microsoft, Google and Adobe are the big players.

But, what do these companies have in common? The short answer is-  Amazing Content!

Irrespective of the company size or the services they provide, these prominent B2B saas providers have a dedicated blog page, tutorials, helpdesks and web content online.

Hence, a B2B SaaS business necessarily needs content marketing to thrive in a competitive space and build its presence online.

In this blog, we will be sharing everything you need to know about B2B SaaS content marketing and its benefits along with the steps to build an effective B2B SaaS content marketing strategy.

What is B2B SaaS Content Marketing?

B2B SaaS content marketing is a form of inbound marketing that the business would need to solve problems, answer the reader’s questions and provide every nitty-gritty detail about its product or services. 

Thus, B2B content marketing would deliver the right content to the right audience at the right time.

Content in any form such as blog posts, ebooks, emails, whitepapers or web content will surely serve your audience but only at the right time.

Throughout your sales funnel, you would need to educate your audience with enticing content that serves the purpose of each stage. 

The thing with SaaS content marketing is that it is highly competitive. It is all about creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to not only gain a new audience but also retain the existing ones for a long time.

That’s what Nectafy did with one of its clients. This content marketing strategy saw a staggering 647% growth for one of its clients by merely using the content marketing efforts.

Hence, a well-devised B2B SaaS content marketing strategy is a lucrative tool in gaining the right audience and achieving better conversions.

Importance of B2B SaaS Content Marketing Strategy

When it comes to B2B, 91% of B2B marketers use content marketing in their strategy.

Content is King and it always will be.

Imagine yourself as a business that is willing to buy a product from a B2B SaaS provider.

What would you rather prefer- a forced selling pitch right from the beginning or educating your client about the benefits and problems it solves?

That’s what a B2B SaaS content marketing strategy guides you into. This strategic approach is of utter importance in targeting the right audience.

Here is how a content marketing strategy can help B2B SaaS providers:

Authority Building

You can’t survive in a competitive industry until you have built trust or authority over your customers.

And when it comes to B2B, the buyers are even more selective about the brands they are working with. This can only be achieved with the help of content marketing.

Building authority for your brand may require some time and most importantly, a well-executed content marketing plan.

Brand Awareness 

Content marketing is key to driving brand awareness. Let’s say, you own a content platform for SaaS with a non-branded domain name.

Now, how would you drive organic traffic to your website?

Using the mindful Google search queries such as ‘SaaS content platform’ or ‘Best Content platform for SaaS businesses’ may drive the right type of audience to your blog.

Plus, you get to recall your brand. The more you get noticed, the more people will remember your brand.

Educate your audience

The Top-of-the-funnel (TOFU) always involves educating your audiences and solving their pain points. Even down the funnel, you would need to consistently educate your audiences about the product features and benefits.

That said, content marketing plays a huge role right from the research stage till the decision stage.

In fact, 49% of buyers consider content as paramount during their purchase decision.

Drive traffic to your website

The more you create content that revolves around your industry, the more you can generate traffic that is trusted and relevant. 

Content marketing is a major contributor to your website traffic. By posting the relevant content along with the mindful SEO techniques, you can attract readers who are readily looking for the answers.

Now that you have seen the importance of a B2B content marketing strategy, a lot of planning and research goes into creating this.

How to build a B2B SaaS Content Marketing Strategy 

To meet your SaaS content marketing goals and to hook your audience, you need a robust content marketing strategy.

Obviously, it may take some time to hit the nail but with a strategy in place, you can be sure that you are going in the right direction.

To keep it short and concise, we have divided the process into five simple steps:

• Decide Your Goals
• Know Your Targeted Audience
• Create Content for Each phase of Buyer Journey
• Develop a Promotional Strategy
• Track and Optimize

The guide below explains each of the above steps in detail and the best practices to achieve exemplary results.

Decide your goals 

The first and foremost thing is goal setting. What do you want to achieve using content marketing?

The problem is that there are a lot of content marketing objectives to achieve and targeting all of them at once can be overwhelming.

From acquiring new customers to email subscribers or a free trial registration to customer retention, content marketing goals may vary for different businesses and at different times.

Goal setting gives your content marketing strategy a kickstart and a direction to plan ahead. Breaking down your end goals into small and achievable goals ensures that the content efforts are in the right direction.

Most content marketers consider the macro-goals as:

• Create brand awareness
• Educate your customers
• Build credibility and trust
• Lead generation

Know your target audience

Everything starts from the audience. Since your purpose is to sell it to the customers, you need content that empathizes with your audience.

The starting point for identifying your target audience is creating a checklist of questions like:

• What problems can you solve for the SaaS provider?
• What industry are they in?
• Which social media platform are they most active on?
• What trade shows do they follow?
• What type of content would they prefer?
• How large is their customer base?

By adding more questions to the checklist, you can come closer to identifying your buyer persona.

While you can use the market research tools for conducting audience research, search engines like Google or social media can be a free resource for identifying the target audience.

In some cases, you might have more than one type of buyer persona. Hence, the best practice is to create a unique profile for each of your ideal buyers.

Create Content for Each Phase of Buyer Journey

To get more qualified leads and better traffic, you need to create different content at different stages of the buyer journey.

Refer to the below infographic by Digital Insights.

While this may not be always imperative, a marketing funnel should necessarily be injected with content at all stages of the buyer journey.

One of the major perks of creating content at each stage of the buyer’s journey is that it helps in identifying qualified leads. If your target audience can relate to what you offer, they can proceed further.

On the other hand, if they find that what you offer isn’t a good fit, they can leave at the early stage. This is actually a good thing as you may only have qualified leads in your basket.

Most marketers divide the buyer’s journey into three phases:

• Awareness Stage: In this stage, the audience needs to be educated more about their pain points and aware of the potential consequences.
• Consideration Stage: In this stage of the buyer’s journey, the prospect might have more than one option to consider. They haven’t made a buying decision yet but are looking for the best possible solutions to solve their problems.
• Decision Stage: This is the buying stage. To turn your prospect into a customer, you need to build more trust and tell them why choosing your brand would be a win. Use social proof, customer testimonials and video reviews to build trust and close the sales.

Develop a Promotional Strategy

While Search Engine Optimization may get you a lot of traffic, you will still miss a large portion of traffic or resultant leads if you are turning a blind eye to other promotional strategies.

Besides the organic traffic, you can leverage social media, email marketing and paid advertising to boost content promotion and attract more qualified leads.

According to Hootsuite, 80% of leads that are generated from social media come from Linkedin. Thus, LinkedIn is a goldmine for grabbing your customer’s eyeballs.

To get even more personal with your customers, you can leverage the power of email marketing. Though traditional, 93% of B2B email marketers still use email to distribute their content.

Thus, a cross-platform publishing strategy can be significant in boosting engagement and driving qualified traffic.

Track and Optimize 

The last step is where you revisit the goals that you have created. Right from the beginning to the end, you need measurable data on what content works best and what are your potential target audiences.

By analyzing the performance of your content marketing efforts, you can evaluate and optimize the buyer journey wherever necessary.

The best way is to set up a report using an analytics platform. By doing this,  you can set up the desired KPIs and review the results of your campaigns.

A web analytics platform can track various metrics like page views, conversions, bounce rate, time on page and others.

Finally, you can also find the best performing content and what distribution channels work best.

Conclusion

Content marketing is undeniably one of the cornerstones for B2B SaaS providers. Use content marketing as a messaging platform to distribute and deliver the content to those that need it the most.

 By following the above-listed B2B SaaS content marketing strategies, you can fill in the potential gap between your audience and your brand. Additionally, content marketing contributes to increased brand loyalty, maximized lead acquisition and higher conversions.

Hope you have liked our actionable step by step guide to build an effective B2B SaaS content marketing strategy.

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