Florian Decludt

Demand Generation Manager @ Clutch

Growth Marketer

Marketing @ KlientBoost - The Performance Marketing Agency

Struggling to make your paid ads profitable? I can help.

I've generated $50M+ pipeline (& counting) for B2B Tech and SaaS companies through content marketing, paid search, and paid social demand generation and GTM strategies.

"We've never been able to make paid ads work for us." — common feedback from happy B2B clients.

Some of the leading minds in B2B follow my content for fresh LinkedIn and Google Ads growth recipes.

Right now, I'm leading marketing @ KlientBoost to add $250K MRR using the exact same strategies, principles, & processes we roll out for clients.

Here's how we can help you: 
- Done for you marketing—starts with a free marketing plan
- Fresh growth recipes to your inbox—klientboost.com/kitchen
- Follow me on LinkedIn to learn the latest winning B2B strategies

Got a burning question about B2B paid ads? My inbox is always open too.

LFGTM 🤘

Patrick Cumming

The best-performing B2B ad we ran last year was embarrassingly boring.

Overused hook. Basic copy. A link at the bottom.

It outsold all the pretty single image ads I spent hours tweaking 😭

Here's why that's not a surprise, and why most B2B marketers have this completely backwards.

There's a line going around right now: "𝘐𝘧 𝘪𝘵 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘴 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘢 𝘉2𝘉 𝘢𝘥, 𝘣𝘶𝘳𝘯 𝘪𝘵."

The logic being: make it funny, narrative-driven, unconventional. Don't let it feel like an ad.

Sounds smart. Gets a lot of likes from other marketers.

It's also mostly wrong.

Because buyers don't care about your content.

They don't care if it's funny. They don't care if it's pretty. They don't care if there's a story arc.

They care about the problems keeping them up at night.

Our top closed/won ad last year did exactly three things:

1. Used a hook everyone says is "dead" 
2. Proved we could solve a painful, specific problem 
3. Gave readers a way to get help

That's it. 

Just proof that we understood their problem and could fix it.

I've watched this same format outperform "creative" ads across nearly every B2B client I've worked with.

The fun stuff marketers celebrate in Slack? It generates reach.

The boring stuff buyers actually need? It generates pipeline.

Funny is an amplifier. Creative is an amplifier. Narrative is an amplifier.

But none of it matters until you've nailed one thing first: making the buyer feel genuinely understood.

Everything else is decoration on top of that.

If it looks like a B2B ad, burn it.

Read that hook in an article recently and it's a classic example of marketers getting it totally wrong.

If it's not funny, unconventional, or "narrative-driven", then it won't work and you should ditch it.

It's a nice sound-bite for easy reach, but doesn't play out in reality.

Truth is buyers don't care about your content at all. 

Don't care if it's funny. 
Don't care if it's pretty. 
Don't care if there's a story.

They care about the problems they're trying to solve.

You could have the most boring ad in the world. 

If it convinces them you can solve a painful problem it will work.

I know this because the ad that generated the most closed/won deals for us last year:

1. Had a boring overused hook everybody "hates"
2. Provided proof we could solve a painful problem
3. Added a link to get in touch if readers wanted help

I've seen similar formats work for almost every B2B I've worked with.

Ditching the fun stuff marketers celebrate for "boring" ads generate more qualified inbound.

Go figure.

It's not about ads that don't look like ads. 
It's not about making it narrative-driven.
It's not even about making it funny. 

It's about showing users you understand their problems and proving you can solve them.

Everything else is just an amplifier once you've already nailed that.

I'm hearing a lot of prominent B2B marketers saying Google Ads doesn't generate pipeline anymore.

But we increased non-brand SQL volume 76% YoY without increasing spend. So the maths doesn't check out.

If Google Ads isn't generating enough pipeline for you, I can guarantee it's down to one of these 3 fixable setup problems:

1. Targeting too many keywords

Sounds counterintuitive, but it spreads your budget thin and forces the algorithm to waste spend on search terms that don't convert.

I audited an account last month targeting 100 keywords when only 10 actually generated pipeline.

We increased non-brand SQL volume 76% YoY with the same spend by targeting just 10 keywords on exact match.

2. Poor budget allocation

Too much budget goes to campaigns that don't generate net-new pipeline. Usually competitor and branded search.

I audited an account where 50% of budget went to competitor campaigns that generated 90% fewer qualified leads than non-brand (which only had 25% of budget).

We run just 2 high-intent campaigns for our core service areas and eliminated competitor and brand completely.

3. No offline conversion tracking

You can't prioritize keywords without sending CRM lifecycle data to Google Ads so you know what's actually generating new business.

Of 20 accounts I've audited recently, just 2 had this set up. The rest had zero pipeline visibility.

We prioritize spend on keywords with proven conversion rates to pipeline. That was key to our 76% SQL improvement.

Bottom line: You can increase pipeline drastically with the right foundations. Without them, you're guessing and driving up costs with nothing to show for it.

AI creative isn't ready for ad campaigns.

Text posts I wrote in under 15 minutes the "old fashioned" way still outperform everything else.

Here's what actually works:

Skip AI-generated images. Single image ads are the worst performing format in B2B right now. 

Total waste of time scaling an already declining ad format with AI. 

Use AI for the foundations instead:

• Analyze call transcripts in minutes
• Extract real customer insights
• Build content roadmaps from actual data
• Turn insights into text posts and video scripts
• Write them with soul, not with Claude

I still haven't seen an AI creative drive more pipeline than something written by a human who deeply understands their audience.

Use AI to think faster, not to replace executing.

If you've ever asked yourself whether or not you should be bidding on your own brand name, this is for you (spoiler: you probably don't need to)

KlientBoost Playbook: Cut Wasted Spend On Google Ads 

I talk a lot of s*** about the funnel.

But it's not like it just doesn't work.

If you run enough ads to the right people eventually some will generate pipeline.

My problem with the funnel is that it's not how B2B buyers buy.

And that leads marketers who believe in it to prioritise the wrong things:

- "Only show cold TOFU audiences blogs"
- "MOFU audiences need more case studies"
- "Need to tweak step 6 in the 12 step BOFU flow"

After auditing 100s of B2B ad accounts over the last 8 years, I can tell you none of those things are ever the problem.

And trying to fix them usually results in disappointment.

The fundamental root cause of the problem is this simple:

- Not enough category buyers are seeing ads
- The message they are seeing isn't resonating

That's not a funnel problem. It's a strategy problem.

Now your priorities shift:

- "How do we make messaging more relevant and memorable?"
- "How do we reduce CPM to reach more category buyers?"
- "Do we have enough budget to saturate our audience?"

Answering those questions means more in-market buyers see a relevant message to generate pipeline this quarter.

More out-market buyers see a memorable message so they think of you when they move in-market next quarter.

Prospects are either in-market or out-market. They choose the brands they trust and associate with the category.

Better to optimise for that than a mythical funnel nobody actually goes through.

You spent $200K on ads last quarter.

Now your CFO wants to know how much pipeline it generated.

Do you have an answer?

This is the question that separates marketing teams that win over skeptical execs from the ones still fighting to be taken seriously.

"We were building awareness" won't cut it.

Yes, attribution is hard. But after a full quarter of spend there should be enough signal to defend marketing investment with data.

If you can't do that, you likely have a data black hole preventing you from tying your work to real business growth.

Here's what it looks like when that black hole is closed:

Last month we narrowed our audience from 180K down to 65K to reach more ICP buyers with higher frequency.

3 weeks into cold ads against a brand new audience:

- 2 qualified inbound leads attributed
- 2 closed/won deals attributed
- 19% lift in qualified leads

That's a lot of signal that LinkedIn Ads is working. Enough that I pitched our CFO for a $20K/mo budget increase and he took it seriously. Not just because of those 3 weeks, but because of months of historic data we've built up that consistently proves our marketing works.

That's only possible because of three things most companies skip:

- Server-side and offline conversion tracking
- 365-day conversion windows
- Audience lift analysis

80% of the B2B companies I audit are missing at least one of these and it's costing them the ability to prove their value to the business.

If budget is the blocker, repurpose a small slice of your ad spend to get them in place first (max $1K).

Because without a solid tracking and attribution setup, you're not giving yourself a fair chance to show that your marketing is actually working.

And you deserve that chance.

Prospects buy on their own timeline, not on ours.

As soon as you realise that, your entire approach to marketing 180s.

You ditch "informational" keywords on paid search because "your funnel will nurture them."

Instead, you target high-intent category and capability keywords with known buying intent. 

You stop optimising your paid social campaigns for traffic and conversions. 

You realise it's only getting you 1% reach and 2 frequency. 

You're throwing money at ad platforms but still invisible where it matters.

Instead, you target ICP segments with the budget to hit 80% reach and 10+ frequency over 90 days. 

Now you're attracting in-market buyers who become pipeline today. 

And building recall with out-market buyers who become future pipeline.

You're no longer asking: "how do we improve TOFU, MOFU, BOFU conversion rates?"

And asking: "how do we get relevant content in front of more category buyers?"

It's a big shift and scary to implement.

Until you see ad platforms finally recording pipeline after 30 days.

And closed/won deals attributed after 90.

Winning at paid ads isn't about "right prospect, right message, right time."

It's about "right prospects, relevant message, all the time."

That's what optimising for how buyers buy looks like.

Your ad platform is lying to you.

Not intentionally, but it's missing 30-50% of your conversions.

Here's the reality most marketers ignore:

Ad blockers and cookie rejection are creating a massive data black-hole. The numbers you're using to measure platform success are incomplete at best.

Consider iOS alone:

95% of users have tracking disabled. That means 95% of clicks from apps potentially go unrecorded. You're flying blind on nearly all mobile traffic.

This isn't a small gap. It's a canyon.

The platforms can't track what users won't let them see. Privacy settings, browser extensions, and cookie banners have fundamentally broken in-platform attribution.

In-platform data is still useful for directional optimisations within the platform itself. If Campaign A shows better metrics than Campaign B, that signal matters.

But treat it as a compass, not a map.

Don't make budget decisions based solely on platform reporting. Don't kill campaigns because the dashboard says they're underperforming.

Your actual results are happening in a world the platforms can't fully see anymore.

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Florian Decludt

Patrick Cumming

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The Battle

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Patrick Cumming

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