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Self-serve SaaS
Growth marketing for self-serve SaaS, bid on accounts that pay.
Octomize is a SaaS growth marketing agency for self-serve and product-led products with free trials or a freemium plan. We send activation and paid conversion events from your backend to Google Ads and Meta, so they look for users who reach value and pay, not for more sign-ups. Budget follows the CAC payback your plan price can carry.
What's included
- Server-side events for sign-up, activation and paid conversion
- Google Ads Search for category, problem and competitor terms
- Meta Ads for top-of-funnel reach and trial retargeting
- Sign-up and onboarding page work aimed at activation
- Card-upfront vs no-card trial planning per campaign
- Budgets set from CAC payback, reported by cohort
Why self-serve SaaS ads go wrong
A free trial or freemium plan makes signing up cheap for the user, so ad platforms find sign-ups with ease. Many of those users open the product once and leave. If sign-up is the conversion you report, Google and Meta keep buying more of them, and your cost per sign-up drops while revenue stays flat.
Your price also leaves little room. A low monthly plan takes many months to repay what you spent to win the customer, and churn eats into those months. Self-serve growth depends on paying for activated users at a cost your CAC payback period can absorb.
What we run for self-serve SaaS
Google Ads for SaaS captures people searching your category, a problem or a competitor. Meta Ads for SaaS reaches people before they search and brings back trial users who stalled. Both bid on server events: sign-up while data is thin, then activation and paid conversion, as we explain in Meta Ads for SaaS past the sign-up.
We also work on the pages between the ad and the product: the landing page, the sign-up form and the first onboarding screens. We match each page to the campaign and decide with you whether that traffic sees a card-upfront or a no-card trial.
Where we work
Self-serve and product-led SaaS companies selling in the United States, the United Kingdom and the EU. We plan campaigns for the markets your users pay from.
How it works
- 01
Find the activation event
We look at your product data with you and pick the action that best predicts a paying account: a first project, an invited teammate, a connected integration.
- 02
Send server events
Your backend sends sign-up, activation and paid conversion to Google Ads and Meta's Conversions API, matched to the click or the user's email.
- 03
Launch search, then Meta
Search goes live first on terms with clear intent. Meta follows to reach people who don't search yet, once tracking shows which sign-ups activate.
- 04
Hold to payback
We raise budget on campaigns whose cohorts pay back inside your target and cut the ones that bring sign-ups that never activate.
What we do: the system
We don't just run ads. We own everything that determines outcomes.
- 01 · Strategy
Digital strategy
Before we touch an account, we set the plan: which channels, what budget, what a lead or a sale is worth to you, and what we test first.
- Channel mix and budget split
- Target CPA or ROAS set from your margins
- A 90-day plan with clear milestones
- 02 · Landing page
Landing pages + CRO
Most paid traffic is lost on the page, not in the ad. We build or rework the page around one offer and one action, then keep improving it on real visitor behavior.
- New pages or fixes to the ones you have
- Message matched to the ad and the search
- CRO roadmap from session recordings
- 03 · Tracking
Tracking & measurement
If the numbers are wrong, every optimization is a guess. We set up tracking that holds up against ad blockers and cookie limits, and send real outcomes back to the ad platforms.
- GA4 and GTM, client- and server-side
- Enhanced Conversions and Meta CAPI
- Offline imports: qualified lead, booked call, closed deal
- 04 · Ads
Performance marketing
With the plan, the page and the tracking in place, we build the campaigns and optimize them every week on real data.
- Google Ads and Meta Ads builds or restructures
- Keyword, audience and creative testing
- Bidding toward profit, not just volume
- 05 · Reporting
Profit-focused reporting
You see sales, profit and lead quality, the numbers your business runs on, not clicks and impressions.
- KPIs agreed with you up front
- ProfitMetrics when margin data is available
- Regular updates in plain English
- 06 · Growth
Business growth support
Once the system runs, the data shows where else you can grow. We bring you the ideas.
- New products or services the data points to
- New channels and markets to test
- Offer and pricing ideas from what converts
Further reading
GDPR and Ad Tracking in the EU: What Needs Consent
What GDPR and the ePrivacy rules mean for Google Ads and Meta tracking in the EU and UK: what needs consent, what Google requires, and server-side limits.
Google Ads Conversion Tracking: Set It Up Right
How to set up Google Ads conversion tracking: the Google tag, which actions to make primary, counting, windows, transaction IDs and how to check it works.
How it works
A simple 3-step process from audit to results.
Intake + access
Request your free Profit Growth Plan
Fill out a quick form and share access. We review your current setup.
What's broken, what to fix
Audit + strategy
We identify gaps in tracking, landing pages and campaigns, then deliver a clear plan.
Continuous improvement
Execution & optimization
We implement, test and refine. You get regular updates on profit-focused metrics.
What you get
Everything you need to scale profitably.
Execution, growth foundations and transparent pricing.
Execution
- Account build or restructure
- Ongoing optimization and testing
- Creative direction inputs
- Keyword research and expansion
- Audience targeting and refinement
Growth foundations
- Landing page improvements + CRO roadmap
- Tracking setup and fixes (GA4, GTM, SST)
- Offline conversion imports for lead gen (Google + Meta)
- ProfitMetrics integration when needed
- Reporting aligned to business outcomes
Transparent pricing
- Free Profit Growth Plan first
- No setup fee
- Flat retainer + % of profit or revenue impact
- Finalized after scope is defined
- You decide after reviewing the plan
Partners & reviews
Trusted by partners. Rated by clients.
Official partner
Server-side tracking that keeps conversion data accurate as browsers block more.
Official partner
Profit-based tracking, so campaigns bid on real margin, not just revenue.
Member
Part of BESCO, the Bulgarian Startup Association.
★★★★★ 5.0 rating
FAQ
Questions we get asked.
Should we optimize ads for free sign-ups?
Only at launch, while the platforms have nothing else to learn from. Sign-ups are cheap and include many people who never come back. As soon as activation volume allows, we switch bidding to activated accounts, and to paid conversions where those come often enough.
Card upfront or no card for the trial?
A card-upfront trial brings fewer sign-ups with more buyers among them. A no-card trial brings more sign-ups and leaves the work to onboarding. We test both against the same paid conversion event, often with a different choice for search and for Meta traffic.
Does Meta work for a self-serve SaaS product?
It works best at the top of the funnel and for retargeting trial users who stalled. It needs activation or paid events sent from your server, otherwise it finds the cheapest sign-ups it can.
Our price is low. How much can we spend to get a customer?
We work it out from your plan price, gross margin, churn and how many months you can wait to earn the money back. That CAC payback limit sets the budget and the bid targets for each campaign.
Do you work on the product's onboarding?
We work on the landing and sign-up pages and suggest changes to the first onboarding steps, since they decide whether a paid click activates. Your product team owns the in-app work.
Let's talk
Get your free Profit Growth Plan.
Tell us about your business. We'll review your setup and come prepared with initial directions for your custom Profit Growth Plan.
- Free audit + strategy document
- No obligation to proceed
- Clear recommendations with expected impact
Google Ads Certified · ProfitMetrics Partner · TAGGRS Partner
30 min · Google Meet
Chemistry call with Octomize
with Boris Stoyanov
You're booked.
We've sent a calendar invite with the Google Meet link to your email.