Google Ads for B2B: 6 Lessons From a 9-Month Campaign

Performance Max delivered 20 times the impressions of our Search campaigns, at a cost per thousand impressions 22 times lower.

Search delivered a click-through rate more than ten times higher.

Both numbers come from the same nine-month program we ran for an enterprise compliance client, and together they explain most of what B2B advertisers get wrong about Google Ads. The six lessons below are the ones we would hand to anyone running Google Ads for a B2B company.

1. Search is where the intent lives

Across the program, Google Search campaigns earned a weighted click-through rate of 7.95%. Performance Max earned 0.76%.

That gap is not an accident of setup. Search shows your ad to someone who just typed a problem into Google. Performance Max shows your ad across Google's network to people the algorithm predicts might be interested. For a B2B offer with a specific buyer, the person who searched is almost always the better bet.

If your budget is limited, fund Search first. It is the closest thing Google offers to a buyer raising their hand.

2. Performance Max buys reach, so judge it on reach

None of this makes Performance Max useless. It does a different job.

Twenty times the impressions at a fraction of the cost per thousand is cheap visibility. For a B2B brand that needs its name in front of a market before the buying cycle starts, that has real value.

The mistake is measuring Performance Max on the same scorecard as Search. Judge it on reach, frequency, and cost per thousand. Judge Search on clicks from people who were looking. Put them in one report with one target and one of them will always look like a failure.

3. Events and webinars can outperform everything else

The highest click-through rate in the entire dataset came from a webinar Search campaign. It ran at 25.80% at a cost of $0.69 per click.

That was 23 times the click-through rate of the weakest event campaign in the same program, which managed 1.12%.

Specificity is the common thread in the event ads that worked. An event ad that named a specific partner from a law firm and gave a clear reason to register now reached a 4.16% click-through rate, well above the program's weaker event campaigns.

If you run events, give them their own Search campaigns, name the people who are speaking, and put a date in the ad.

4. Expect an expensive first month, then hold your nerve

In the first month of the program, the learning phase, the average cost per click was $5.76 at a 0.93% click-through rate.

By January, cost per click had fallen to $0.73, at the program's peak scale of 246,000 impressions in a month. That is an 87% reduction in cost per click while volume was going up, not down. These figures cover the whole program, across LinkedIn and Google together.

Month one is when the numbers look worst, and it is when a lot of B2B campaigns get pulled. Agree on a learning period before launch, decide what you will measure at the end of it, and don't judge the campaign until you get there.

5. Put a small, specific offer in the ad

The same program found that a free scan appeared in 7 of the 10 highest click-through ads, and the phrase "60 seconds" appeared in 5 of the top 7.

B2B buyers searching on Google are often early in their research and wary of sales calls. An ad that offers a quick, useful result gets the click. An ad that offers a demo asks for commitment before the buyer has any reason to give it.

If your only call to action is "contact us" or "book a demo," build something smaller to put in front of it. An assessment, a checklist, a calculator, a scan. Then test it in the headline.

6. The headline matters as much as the targeting

Google gives you far less room to write than LinkedIn, which makes every word count.

In the same program, rewriting a headline around the reader's problem instead of the product's feature produced a roughly 13x difference in click-through rate with the offer unchanged. We break that result down in LinkedIn Ads for B2B: 7 Lessons From a 9-Month Campaign.

Targeting gets you in front of the right person. The headline decides whether they notice. Most B2B accounts spend their optimization time on bids and keywords, and very little on the fifteen words the buyer actually reads.

Where to start

Open your Google Ads account and split your reporting by campaign type. Search on one line, Performance Max on another, events on a third. Then look at each one against the job it is supposed to do.

If one of them looks like a failure, check whether it is being judged on the wrong scorecard before you cut it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Google Ads good for B2B?

Yes, especially Google Search, because it reaches people at the moment they search for a problem you solve. B2B results depend on narrow keyword targeting, specific ad copy, and a low-commitment first offer.

Should B2B companies use Performance Max or Search?

Use Search for intent and Performance Max for reach, and measure each on its own terms. In the program described here, Search earned a 7.95% click-through rate against 0.76% for Performance Max, while Performance Max delivered far more impressions at a much lower cost per thousand.

How long does it take for B2B Google Ads to perform?

Expect the first month to be the most expensive while the campaigns learn. In this program, cost per click fell 87% between September and January. Agree on a learning period before launch so the campaign isn't judged too early.

What is a good click-through rate for B2B Google Ads?

It depends on the campaign type. Search campaigns targeting a specific problem can run well above 5%, while Performance Max and display placements usually run below 1%. Compare campaigns of the same type against each other, not against a single benchmark.

Want your campaigns measured on the right scorecard?

We plan, build, and manage Google Ads and LinkedIn campaigns for B2B companies, and we report each campaign against the job it is supposed to do.

Book a call at emdigital.ca/contact.