How To Run Linkedin Ads For B2B SaaS Companies (A Better Way).
Most people are running Linkedin Ads completely wrong. Here is why and what I would do instead…
If you analyse enough ad accounts (like I do each week), even the ones managed by big ad agencies, you'll notice they all seem to be doing the same thing.
They run cold traffic to lead gen forms or forms on a landing page to get leads.
Or even worse (and much more common) the ads ask for a demo or trial sign-up out the door.
All this is doing is seeking out the people who are in-market for your product or service, the ones who are already problem-aware and solution aware.
The ones that are ready to buy now.
This is treating the platform as you would google ads, but on a social platform where the intent is totally different.
So many people are pivoting to LinkedIn ads as a profession, but coming from a google ads background.
The mindset is totally different, and a search mindset will not work in social.
The problem with going after the people who are ready to buy now.e-fold:
The % of people who are ready to buy now is a tiny part of any market, something like 1% of people are ‘in-market’ to buy now.
If you haven’t been present in earlier stages of their buying journey, and just sending ads to them with buy-now type CTAs, they will treat you like a commodity. There will be no affinity with your company.
As a result, the cost for a demo or free trial sign-up will be a lot and the unit economics might not make sense.
The above example is the LEAD GENERATION strategy which puts massive emphasis on sales to turn leads into demos or sales calls.
I can guarantee you, I have run thousands of $ on this type of strategy, and the conversion rates are sh#t.
The MQLs do not convert to SQLs at a good rate.
The SDRs are wasting their time chasing low-intent leads which have no intention of converting yet.
The very expensive demo sign-ups do not show up making the demo request show-ups double or triple in price because the turnout is low.
The costs put on your SDRs and sales team to chase low intent poor quality leads is a massive cost that should be quantified also.
Just spending a ton of budget on getting low-intent leads is super old-school. Just go to ZoomInfo and get the person's details there for a fraction of the price.
There is a better way.
What we need to do is CREATE demand first, then CAPTURE it.
How do we create demand?
The best way is through education.
We need to devise a multi-layer funnel content strategy and deliver this content with hyper-targeted Linkedin ads at scale (if you are B2B).
This is how I would do it (and what I do with my hyper-growth B2B clients)…
Firstly, Analyse your prospect's buyers’ journey.
Work out what key information they need to move from totally unaware of the problem you solve, to problem and solution aware in ‘in-market’.
Start by creating the content on the following steps of a buyers journey (then distribute it with ads)
Neither Problem nor Solution-Aware
A large part of your market (even larger if you are a tech company in a new market segment) may have the problem you solve.
But they either do not recognise they have the problem or do not realise the magnitude of it.
Here we create content (and distribute it) around the PROBLEM.
What is the problem? Who does it affect? Why is it important to prioritise and solve?
The goal here is to educate the people or accounts who are not considering or prioritising the problem you solve and why they should.
What makes this problem need attention? Why ignoring it can cause massive issues in the future.
Problem-aware but not solution aware
Here we focus on content which leads a prospect to understand how our market category, can solve the problem they are aware of.
This is not about how your company specifically can help, but how your category can.
Often one problem may have numerous solutions in different categories which you are competing indirectly against.
For example, I run Linkedin ads.
People may consider LinkedIn ads to help them create more demand for their products. But they may also choose to invest that budget in SEO or Google ads (don’t do that!).
Point is, I should help people who are looking to create demand for their business to understand why Linkedin ads are a better solution, as a market category, over Google or Facebook ads
Or other solutions which also claim to build demand.
If I am part of this journey, I am creating a totally new demand which would potentially not have existed in the first place.
And we as a company which is educating our prospects along the journey get put in the spotlight as the go-to in the market in the eyes of the prospect as they slowly learn why they need to solve this issue and how.
Only then do we CAPTURE demand.
Capturing demand is often all ad agencies do for B2B tech companies.
But this will lead to bad results.
Focus on creating demand and expanding the size of the industry more generally and only then capturing the demand created.
And you will be able to scale your demand this way. Ads focused on getting leads are a sure-fire way to get low demand and expensive outcomes.
