B2B PPC is different from consumer PPC in three ways that change everything: search volume is small, the sales cycle is long, and a lead is not a sale. An agency that is good at ecommerce will often struggle with B2B, because the habits that win there, chasing volume and optimizing to on site conversions, are the wrong habits here.
If you are hiring an agency for B2B, the question to ask is not how many accounts they manage. It is what they do about the 60 days between a form fill and a signed contract.
Most cannot answer it, and that answer tells you more than any case study.
What makes B2B PPC different?
Four structural differences, all of which follow from the same thing: fewer people, worth more each, taking longer to decide.
| Consumer or ecommerce | B2B | |
|---|---|---|
| Search volume | High. Thousands a month | Low. Often under 200 a month for the core term |
| Time to decision | Minutes to days | Weeks to many months |
| Who decides | One person | A committee, often 3 to 8 people |
| What the conversion is | The sale itself | A form fill that may or may not become a sale |
| Cost per lead | Usually lower | Usually much higher, but worth more |
What this means for you: every optimization loop in Google Ads is slower in B2B. You get less data, later, and the data you get is about leads rather than revenue. An agency that does not plan around that will optimize your account toward cheap enquiries from people who will never buy.
Why does low search volume change the strategy?
Because Smart Bidding needs conversions to learn, and B2B accounts often do not produce enough. Google publishes the thresholds. For Target ROAS on Search and Shopping, Google states you need at least 15 conversions in the past 30 days. For Target CPA, Google recommends evaluating over 30 days with at least 30 conversions.
A B2B account producing twelve enquiries a month sits below both. That has three consequences a good agency will plan for:
- Fewer campaigns, not more. Splitting a small conversion pool across six campaigns guarantees none of them learn. Consolidate.
- Simpler bidding. Maximize Conversions before Target CPA. Sometimes Manual CPC on a handful of exact match terms genuinely beats automation.
- Mid funnel conversion signals. A qualified lead action that fires within days gives the model something usable, where a closed sale ninety days later does not.
Our post on bidding strategies covers the thresholds by campaign type.
How should B2B measure success?
On pipeline, not on leads. That requires sales data flowing back into Google Ads, and it is the single biggest separator between B2B accounts that improve and B2B accounts that plateau.
Without it, the platform optimizes toward whatever produces the most form fills, which in B2B is usually the wrong traffic: students, job seekers, competitors doing research, and people at companies far too small to buy.
Google is changing how that data gets uploaded. It states that from June 15, 2026, offline conversions import and enhanced conversions for leads uploads are migrated to the Data Manager API and blocked in the Google Ads API. Ask any prospective agency how they handle this. If they have not heard about it, they are not doing offline conversion work. Our post on offline conversion tracking covers it in full.
The reporting that matters in B2B is a chain: clicks, enquiries, qualified leads, opportunities, closed revenue. An agency that reports the first two and stops is reporting the two that matter least.
What should a B2B PPC agency actually do for you?
Beyond the standard account work, six things are specific to B2B.
- Connect your CRM. Without this nothing else on the list works properly.
- Separate brand, competitor and category campaigns. These have wildly different costs and intents and should never share a budget.
- Exclude the wrong companies. Job seekers, students, agencies, and companies below your minimum size. Negative keywords do some of this. Qualifying copy does the rest.
- Build for the committee, not the individual. The person who searches is often not the person who signs. Content that helps them sell internally converts better than content that sells to them.
- Use remarketing properly. With a long cycle, staying visible between the first visit and the decision is worth more in B2B than almost anywhere else. See our post on remarketing.
- Test LinkedIn and Microsoft Ads honestly. Both have real B2B audiences. Neither is automatically better than Google.
Our post on what a PPC agency does covers the baseline that applies to any account.
How do you vet a B2B PPC agency?
Ask five questions and listen for whether the answers are specific.
“How will you connect our CRM to Google Ads?” A good answer names your CRM and the method. A weak answer talks about reporting dashboards.
“Our sales cycle is X weeks. How does that change how you manage the account?” Look for mention of mid funnel conversion actions, longer evaluation windows, and reporting lag. If they say it does not change anything, they have not thought about it.
“What do you do when there are not enough conversions for Smart Bidding?” A good answer mentions consolidation, simpler bidding, and mid funnel signals. A weak answer says Google’s AI handles it.
“What would make you tell us to stop advertising?” Anyone who cannot describe a scenario where the channel is wrong for you is selling, not advising.
“Who actually works on the account?” In B2B the account needs someone who understands your business, not someone running a checklist across forty accounts.
Our post on choosing a Google Ads agency covers the general vetting process and the contract terms worth checking.
What does B2B PPC cost?
Two separate numbers: the media spend and the management fee. The all industry average cost per click was $5.42 and the average cost per lead $66.69, but B2B terms are frequently well above both, because the value per customer justifies higher bids from everyone competing.
On fees, the common models are a flat monthly retainer, a percentage of ad spend, or a hybrid. For B2B, a flat retainer usually aligns better, because percentage of spend rewards an agency for spending more in a channel where restraint is often the right call. Our post on Google Ads management pricing breaks down each model.
Common questions
Is Google Ads or LinkedIn better for B2B?
They do different jobs. Google reaches people actively looking for a solution. LinkedIn reaches people who fit your target profile whether they are looking or not. Google is usually cheaper per lead. LinkedIn targets more precisely. Most B2B programs that work use both.
Should we bid on competitor names?
Often yes in B2B, because the audience is small and someone comparing vendors is a genuine prospect. Expect a low Quality Score and a higher cost per click, and expect your competitors to do the same to you.
How long before B2B PPC works?
Add your sales cycle to the normal 90 day learning window. For a three month cycle, the first honest read on revenue is around six months. Our post on how long Google Ads takes to work covers the timeline.
Is Performance Max useful for B2B?
Sometimes, but it needs a strong conversion signal to avoid wandering into consumer traffic. Do not start there. Get Search working with qualified lead data first.
What about gated content and whitepapers?
They produce a lot of leads and very few sales. If you use them, keep them as a separate conversion action that is not used for bidding, or the account will chase downloads. See our post on lead quality.
Do we need a separate landing page for each campaign?
At minimum one per service line, ideally one per major search intent. The B2B buyer is comparing several vendors in a tab each, and a generic page loses that comparison. Our guide to high converting PPC landing pages covers what belongs on them.
Where to go from here
Before you talk to any agency, answer one question internally: can you tell which campaign produced your last five closed deals? If you cannot, that is the first thing to fix, and it will make every agency conversation afterwards far more productive.
If you want to talk it through, our Google Ads management page explains how we work, and our case studies include long cycle lead generation accounts. You can get in touch and we will give you a straight read on whether the numbers support it.
