B2B positioning and offer for paid ads
Define who your ads are for, then choose the offer (RFQ, demo, consultation or assessment) that attracts qualified buyers, not just cheap leads.
Getting customers · 5 guides
B2B customer acquisition: from positioning to sales handoff
For B2B teams that win customers with Google, Meta and LinkedIn ads and a sales conversation. Lead cost is not lead value: what happens before the ad and after the form decides whether paid leads become customers.
The short version
What do these guides cover?
Short answer
These guides cover what happens around your ads: who you’re targeting and what you offer, how buying committees research, how to diagnose a drop in leads, and how leads reach sales quickly with statuses your ad platforms can learn from. For lead quality and scoring, see the lead generation guides.
Before you spend
Plan the offer, the journey and the channel mix
B2B buying journey
How buying committees move from problem to supplier choice, what ads can do at each step, and which signals to measure.
SEO vs paid ads for B2B lead generation
Decide by demand shape, deal value and how fast you need a quality signal, then use paid search data to plan SEO.
When results disappoint
Diagnose before you change campaigns
Not getting B2B leads from ads?
Check tracking, real vs normal variation, delivery, demand, relevance, offer and handoff, in that order.
Junk leads from ads
Why paid ads send spam, students, poor-fit and unreachable leads, and how to tell which.
Google Ads audit checklist
What changed, conversion counting, imports, search terms, PMax overlap, bidding, budget and landing pages.
Why Facebook ads don’t convert
Split no leads, junk leads and leads that never close, then check the right things in order.
After the lead arrives
Get leads to sales, and outcomes back to the platforms
Marketing to sales handoff
Speed-to-lead SLAs, routing and lead statuses so sales works every lead and ad platforms learn from real outcomes.
The sales feedback loop for ads
Turn “these leads are bad” into reason codes that map to ad fixes on Google, Meta and LinkedIn.
CRM lead stages for ad platforms
Design lead stages, capture click IDs and send qualified leads within each platform’s window and volume rules.
Which lead stage to optimise for
Choose the stage ad platforms should optimise for, using volume, delay, predictiveness and stability.
Router
Which guide should I read first?
| Your situation | Read |
|---|---|
| Planning a new campaign | Positioning and offer, then the buying journey |
| Deciding the channel mix | SEO vs paid ads and Google vs LinkedIn Ads |
| Too few leads | Not getting B2B leads from ads |
| Leads are junk | Junk leads from ads |
| Sales isn’t working the leads | Sales handoff |
| Sales rejects leads with reasons | Sales feedback loop |
FAQ
Getting customers: common questions
01Where do I start?
Use the router above. If you haven’t launched yet, start with positioning and offer. If campaigns are live but disappointing, start with the diagnosis order.
02How is this different from the lead generation guides?
This cluster covers what happens before and after the ad: the offer, the buying journey and the handoff to sales. The lead generation guides cover the lead itself: quality, scoring, cost per qualified lead and CRM feedback.
03Do these guides apply outside B2B?
They are written for B2B firms such as manufacturers, SaaS companies and consultancies. Real estate and education teams face the same handoff problems; see the industry playbooks.
Start with your account
See where your ad spend is losing customers.
The free assessment reviews wasted spend, campaign structure, performance constraints and measurement gaps across Google, Meta and LinkedIn. See also Zephra by industry.
- 10–15 minutes
- No CRM required to start
- No campaign changes during assessment