{"id":17545,"date":"2023-03-16T10:45:01","date_gmt":"2023-03-16T10:45:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.searchenginejournal.com\/how-to-build-a-saas-ppc-campaign-thats-built-to-last\/478774\/"},"modified":"2023-03-16T10:45:01","modified_gmt":"2023-03-16T10:45:01","slug":"how-to-build-a-saas-ppc-campaign-thats-built-to-last","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marketingnewsbox.com\/?p=17545","title":{"rendered":"How To Build A SaaS PPC Campaign That\u2019s Built To Last"},"content":{"rendered":"

What makes a great SaaS PPC campaign \u2013 or at the very least, what will make a SaaS PPC campaign just a little bit better?<\/p>\n

In other words, what makes a SaaS PPC campaign built to last?<\/p>\n

As I was thinking about this recently, it occurred to me that nearly all the client PPC spend that I was fortunate enough to manage in 2022 was SaaS related, and the answers to this question were right under my nose.<\/p>\n

After analyzing my campaigns, there were a small handful of items that really seemed to stand out.<\/p>\n

These are the most important principles and strategies that contributed to the SaaS PPC campaigns I manage, which I believe are built to last.<\/p>\n

Conversion Window<\/h2>\n

I wanted to start by bringing attention to the conversion action conversion window because this can be an overlooked part of the setup for SaaS PPC accounts.<\/p>\n

\"HowScreenshot from Google Ads, February 2023<\/span>\"How<\/div>\n

(Find the conversion window for your conversion actions by going to Tools & Settings > Measurement > Conversion<\/em>. Then click on a Conversion Action > Click Edit Settings<\/em>.)<\/p>\n

Many industries can go from ad click to paying customers in a few days, hours, or even minutes \u2013 but SaaS products can easily take 30 to 90 days or longer.<\/p>\n

If you want to make sure your campaigns are receiving credit for every conversion that they earn, you will want to tweak the conversion window to make sure it is long enough to capture all conversions that result from your search and\/or display campaigns, over the entirety of the average customer sales cycle.<\/p>\n

While the default click conversion window for all new conversion actions in Google Ads is 30 days, you can manually set the attribution window for anywhere from 1 to 90 days.<\/p>\n

You can also set the window for Engaged-view<\/a> and view-through<\/a> conversions as well.<\/p>\n

Considering the average sales cycle for SaaS companies is 84 days<\/a>, it\u2019s important that you are not missing the opportunity to register all the conversions that your campaigns deserve.<\/p>\n

Offline Conversion Tracking Setup<\/h2>\n

When discussing what can be done to improve PPC outcomes, conversion tracking is often at the top of the list.<\/p>\n

While this is certainly true when it comes to B2B SaaS, there is one form of conversion tracking that could be the most important of all: offline conversion tracking<\/a> (OCT).<\/p>\n

Unless your SaaS business has a short, relatively simple sales cycle<\/a> that is completed online from beginning to end, it\u2019s highly likely that you will be unable to fully track a customer journey \u2013 from the first ad click to the moment they become a paying customer \u2013 without setting up OCT in your ad account.<\/p>\n

Uploading data about all the conversions that were achieved offline (like the signing of a contract that turned a sales lead into an actual paying customer) allows Google Ads to complete the circle of the customer journey by appending the offline conversions to all the customer data that was gathered during the online portion of the sales cycle for that specific user.<\/p>\n

As the algorithms in your account get more information about these offline conversions, your campaigns will become increasingly optimized, bid more effectively for high-value clicks, and produce more paying customers \u2013 and do this all with a lower cost per acquisition than you could have ever achieved without OCT.<\/p>\n

There is a lot to know about setting up OCT, but if you would like to know more you can check out How To Track Offline Conversions From Your Google Ads<\/a> by Tim Jensen.<\/p>\n

Seasonality \u2013 Not Just The Weather<\/h2>\n

As SaaS companies are, by definition, selling software products, you may not consider seasonality a big factor. And when it comes to the physical changing of the weather, that might still hold true.<\/p>\n

However, I found that \u201cseasonality\u201d can be a lot more than just changing weather and holiday shopping.<\/p>\n

If you research the industry your SaaS product serves and look at past campaign data with a macro lens, you are likely to find numerous times throughout the year that your campaign data will spike or fall on a fairly consistent basis.<\/p>\n

Some common \u201cseasonality\u201d that may affect your campaigns in positive or negative ways are:<\/p>\n

Fiscal Year Schedules<\/h3>\n

The vast majority of businesses have the first day of their fiscal year on October 1 or January 1.<\/p>\n

Many companies will be looking for new SaaS options around this time as they develop department budgets for the upcoming year.<\/p>\n

Not only will businesses likely have a renewed budget, but your competitors might be spending significantly more or less on their marketing efforts near the end of their own fiscal year.<\/p>\n

This can make your marketing costs go up if your competitor is frantically trying to spend their full budget by the end of the year.<\/p>\n

Or possibly even provide an opportunity for cheaper conversions if your biggest competitor pulls way back on marketing spend near the end of the year so they don\u2019t overspend on their yearly marketing budget.<\/p>\n

Industry Trade Events & Publications<\/h3>\n

Do you run the marketing for a SaaS product that is popular among a specific industry that has a big, national conference every summer?<\/p>\n

Maybe your product is popular among teachers, so you see a spike in searches every August and September as school districts assess their needs.<\/p>\n

What about IT products? I personally know that every year, thousands of IT professionals put their searching and planning for new software on hold for the week or two that precede the annual release of the Gartner: Magic Quadrant<\/em> report, which independently tests and rates IT security SaaS products.<\/p>\n

Two weeks a year, I am struggling just to get clicks. But then, in the span of a one-day search, volume explodes with new prospects searching for the IT products at the top of the ratings.<\/p>\n

Annual Product Releases<\/h3>\n

It has become trendy for the biggest players in each industry to put on huge conferences or product release events that get consumers excited about the releases planned for that year.<\/p>\n

If your SaaS product serves one of these markets, you will likely see a spike in searches and clicks around these events, because people are excited and motivated by what they are seeing.<\/p>\n

Or, you may see search volume fall, because all your potential customers aren\u2019t concerned with anything except for the big event.<\/p>\n

Either way, if you are in the B2B SaaS marketing game, you will likely find similar periods, every year, that end up being so predictable, they might as well be actual, \u201cseasonal\u201d events.<\/p>\n

If you plan ahead for whatever market conditions are likely during these \u201cseasons,\u201d you will have a much easier time hitting your client\u2019s goals on time and on budget.<\/p>\n

Go Negative<\/h2>\n

Have you ever heard of the power of positive thinking?<\/p>\n

Well, sometimes there is serious power in going negative!<\/p>\n

When it comes to PPC for SaaS, going negative can save you buckets of money on irrelevant clicks, poor-quality leads, and a lot of downright fraud.<\/p>\n

Not only that, but if your account is full of bad clicks and poor-quality \u201cconversions,\u201d then the algorithms that rule your campaigns will be fed with bad data.<\/p>\n

Worst of all, the algorithms will then compound the problem by going out and finding you more of those horrible clicks \u2013 so it\u2019s important to eliminate as much bad spend as possible.<\/p>\n

Here are some of the best ways to eliminate destructive spend in your SaaS campaigns:<\/p>\n

Basic Search Campaign Maintenance<\/h3>\n

I know it\u2019s boring, but you need to perform regular keyword maintenance on search campaigns and constantly add new negative keywords for terms that are not converting or are unrelated to your product.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a quick and easy process to find negative keyword candidates:<\/p>\n