Common PPC Mistakes Made by SaaS Companies

I have worked one-on-one with dozens of SaaS companies in the last few quarters and what I found is that SaaS companies usually fall into one of the two following categories in terms of PPC advertising-

They're mostly using PPC campaigns to get most of their MQLs and revenue, but they've run into a problem and can't get better results.

They think PPC for SaaS is too costly to get MQLs and prefer using other methods like outbound marketing or SEO to get results.

Today I will address the major mistakes made by SaaS & D2C companies & how you can adopt a scalable SaaS PPC strategy to drive results.

Top 3 PPC Campaigns Mistakes Made By SaaS Companies

The Patience Paradox in PPC for SaaS

No doubt, paid advertising can be one of the best ways to drive revenue in a very short period compared to search engine optimization and content marketing, but it is not magic.

While working with a number of SaaS companies, I have noticed that most of these companies make changes very quickly in PPC campaigns. They do not have enough patience to measure performance over the longer term.

With no initial expectations, what would act as an indicator for the performance of the campaign? This is when these SaaS companies make decisions too quickly and do not give enough time for the campaign to prosper.

Premature Funnel Strategy Focus

This mistake is mostly (90%) made by companies who are trying PPC for the first time. Since they do not have any past historical data in PPC advertising, they start making changes to the bottom-of-the-funnel keywords in hopes of driving more sales and maximizing form fill-ups.

Any advertising platform needs time to understand your audience, their behavior, demographics, and what constitutes a valuable click.

If you optimize your campaigns during the trial stage, you may get high impressions but not necessarily from high-quality prospects you should be targeting.

Why? Because you have made changes at a stage where the advertising platforms learn the most about your target audience, their behavior, and other important parameters that would help maximize your campaign's success.

Do not disturb the campaign's base level metrics and give the advertising platform time to learn which clicks are quality clicks and which audience locations are best based on the actions taken by users on your website after seeing the ad.

Narrowing the Target Audience Too Much

These mistakes might be justified for various reasons. For instance, the SaaS industry is niche-specific, so it makes sense to narrow the audience targeting. But choosing too small an audience can be problematic.

A prime example of an overly narrow target audience might be-

• Job Title: Chief Technology Officer (CTO)
• Company Type: Startups with Seed Funding
• Industry: Technology and Software Development

Here, you are limiting your campaigns to a very small audience, whereas they should be visible to more potential customers.

Nowadays, advertising platforms are becoming more advanced, offering better options to fine-tune your target audience and exclude those who do not fit.

However, remember that you will be penalized in the form of higher cost per click whenever you narrow your target audience too much.

Delivering Complicated Message

I have also noticed these mistakes personally while working as a PPC consultant with SaaS companies.

See, if your audience can not understand the message you want to deliver then they will lose attention to your advertisement as well as your product as a whole.

While creating an ad copy and the text, you should give focus that the text should be able to convey the meaning it is written for like what is your products, what is its features & how it will solve the targeted audience problems.

All these aspects should be smoothly communicated with best ad copies and captions.

Whenever you decide to outsource your SaaS advertisements to a PPC agency, make sure to discuss these aspects with them and monitor how they are placing and positioning your campaigns on different channels and are they communicating your message smoothly?

SaaS advertising and marketing are challenging due to fierce competition so SaaS marketing agencies usually cut corners in ad campaigns. Therefore, double-check each of their steps.

Conclusion

Remember, from the moment you design and write an ad creative you are under watch by the audience and your competitors so always be transparent, maintain authenticity and precise in your targeting.

I hope you found this guide helpful. If so, please subscribe to our weekly newsletter for the latest updates on PPC, marketing automation, and artificial intelligence.

Thank you for tuning in today. If you have any questions or doubts about PPC for SaaS companies or PPC in general, feel free to ask in the comments or send me a direct message.