The SaaS PPC Checklist for 2026: With Detailed Guidance

Running PPC for a SaaS company is fundamentally different from standard e-commerce. You aren’t just looking for a quick transaction; you are hunting for a long-term relationship within a complex buying committee. To win, you need a strategy that balances high-intent search with laser-focused professional targeting.

This guide explores the exact framework used to scale SaaS products through LinkedIn and Google Ads, moving from foundational strategy to advanced AI-driven discovery.

Before diving into platforms, bids, or creatives, run through this checklist. If most of these are not locked in, scaling PPC will feel chaotic no matter how good the ads look.

The SaaS PPC Checklist:

If this checklist already feels solid, PPC becomes a system. If it doesn’t, the rest of this guide will show you where things usually break and how to fix them.

Phase 1: The Foundation (The Strategic “Pre-Game”)

Most SaaS PPC failures aren’t actually “ads” problems; they are “foundation” problems. If you don’t understand who you are talking to, no amount of bidding optimization will save your ROI. As emphasized in the core strategy, the first step is always Product Understanding. You must be able to describe the “Pain-Point-to-Product” bridge.

1. Deep Product Mastery and the ICP

In B2B SaaS, your product is a solution to a specific professional friction. To market it, you need to know:

• The User vs. The Buyer: In many SaaS companies, the person using the tool (e.g., an SEO specialist) is not the person who signs the check (e.g., the VP of Marketing). Your PPC strategy must account for both.
• The Ideal Customer Profile (ICP): This goes beyond simple demographics. What industry are they in? What is their company size? What other tools are already in their “tech stack”?
• Segmenting by Seniority: A Manager wants to know how your software saves them five hours a week. A CXO or VP wants to know how your software increases team-wide efficiency or reduces churn. If you serve the same ad to both, you are losing money.

2. Strategic Budgeting: Startups vs. MNCs

Budgeting for SaaS is rarely about having a fixed number; it’s about understanding the scope of the opportunity.

• The Startup Approach: If you are a startup, you likely need a “test-and-learn” budget. You aren’t trying to capture the whole market yet; you are trying to find the specific “pockets” of high intent where your CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost) makes sense.
• The MNC / Full Scope Strategy: For larger organizations or those ready for aggressive growth, you should create a “Full Scope” proposal. This involves identifying every person in your target market and calculating the cost to reach them across all platforms.

Phase 2: Mastering the LinkedIn Playbook

LinkedIn is the gold mine for SaaS because it allows for Identity-Based Targeting. While Google relies on what people search for, LinkedIn relies on who they actually are.

1. Native Targeting: The Power of Professional Data

LinkedIn’s biggest advantage is its “Job Title” targeting. This allows you to bypass the noise and speak directly to decision-makers.

• Job Titles & Roles: You can target roles with surgical precision—from Founders to PPC Managers.
• Firmographic Layering: Combine job titles with Company Size and Industry filters. If your software is built for enterprise-level logistics companies, you can filter out every company with fewer than 500 employees.
• Seniority Filters: Use the Seniority filter (CXO, VP, Director) to ensure your “Enterprise” ads aren’t being shown to interns.

2. Account-Based Marketing (ABM) and Custom Lists

For high-ticket SaaS, broad targeting is too expensive. You need to move toward Account Lists.

• Target Account Lists: Upload a list of 1,000+ companies that your sales team is currently trying to close. LinkedIn will match these companies and show ads only to the employees at those specific firms.
• Contact-Based Targeting: If you have an email list of leads from a webinar or a previous CRM export, upload it to LinkedIn to “warm up” those leads before they get a call from sales.

3. The Advanced Re-targeting Loop

To move prospects effectively through the funnel, you should implement three specific types of remarketing:

• Website Visitor Retargeting: Utilize the LinkedIn Insight Tag to retarget individuals who have visited specific, high-intent pages on your site, such as your pricing or “Compare vs. Competitor” pages.
• Google Ads Visitor Retargeting: This “pro-level” cross-channel move involves using UTM parameters to identify traffic coming from Google Search ads and then retargeting those same users on LinkedIn with social proof and case studies.
• Ad Engagement Retargeting: Instead of only focusing on website visitors, retarget people who have already interacted with your LinkedIn ads. This includes those who watched 50% of a video or clicked “Learn More” on a previous post, allowing you to build a “storytelling” sequence that guides them from awareness toward a demo request.

Continuing from our foundation, we move into the “Capture” phase. If LinkedIn is about identifying who your buyer is, Google Search is about identifying exactly when they are ready to solve their problem.

Phase 3: Dominating Google Search Intent

Google Search is the ultimate intent engine. In SaaS, people don’t just “browse” search results; they are looking for a tool to fix a specific friction in their workflow. To dominate this space, you must organize your account into three strategic pillars.

1. Pillar 1: The Brand Defense Strategy

It is a common mistake for SaaS marketers to assume they don’t need to bid on their own brand name because they “already rank number one organically.” This is a dangerous oversight.

• Preventing Lead Theft: If you do not bid on your own brand name, your competitors likely will. They will appear above your organic result, effectively poaching your most qualified, “ready-to-buy” leads at the very last second.
• Controlling the Narrative: Brand ads allow you to control exactly what a high-intent searcher sees—whether it’s a new feature launch, a specific landing page for a demo, or a limited-time offer.

2. Pillar 2: High-Intent Generic Campaigns

Generic campaigns focus on category keywords like “CRM software” or “Project Management tools.” The key here is segmenting by BOFU (Bottom of Funnel) intent.

• Keyword Selection: Focus on keywords that include high-intent modifiers like “software,” “platform,” or “tools”. These signify that the user is eagerly looking for a solution, not just a definition or a blog post.
• Niche Filtering: For specialized products, use modifiers like “CRM for IT industries” to ensure you are only paying for clicks that fit your software’s specific capabilities.

3. Pillar 3: Competitor “Conquest” Campaigns

In the SaaS world, bidding on your rivals’ brand names is standard practice. It allows you to present your software as the better alternative right when a user is researching the competition.

• The Keyword Strategy: You are legally allowed to bid on a competitor’s brand name as a keyword in Google Ads.
• The Trademark Trap: You must be extremely careful with your ad copy. You cannot use a competitor’s trademarked name in your actual ad text. If you do, Google will flag the ad for trademark violation and take it down.
• The “Better Alternative” Angle: Focus your copy on your Unique Selling Propositions (USPs)—things like “Faster implementation,” “Better UI,” or “Lower seat costs”—without naming the rival explicitly in the copy.

Phase 4: Scaling with Multi-Channel AI

Once your core Search and LinkedIn engines are stable, you can leverage Google’s broader network. This is where you move from capturing demand to generating demand at scale.

1. Demand Generation: The Unified Play

Google’s “Demand Gen” campaigns are designed to simplify your workflow while maximizing reach across visual platforms like YouTube, Discovery feeds, and Gmail.

• AI Optimization: A consolidated budget gives Google’s AI enough data points to learn which creative and which placement (YouTube vs. Discovery) is actually driving conversions.

2. Performance Max (PMax) as a Research Tool

Many SaaS marketers fear PMax because it can feel like a “black box.” However, it is an incredible tool for Keyword Discovery.

• Finding Hidden Intent: You cannot possibly think of every way a user might search for your tool. PMax uses Google’s AI to identify new, high-intent keywords you might have missed in your manual research.

It also targets high-intent users who have searched for your relevant terms and displays ads across places like discovery, YouTube, and display.

• The Search Term Feedback Loop: Regularly audit the “Search Terms” report in your PMax campaigns. When you find a new, high-performing keyword, “move” it into your manual search campaigns. This gives you total control over the bidding and ad copy for that specific term.
• Exclusion Lists: To keep PMax focused on finding new opportunities, add your existing target keywords as negatives in your PMax settings.

Conclusion

SaaS PPC works best when it is treated as a system, not a set of disconnected tactics. From building a strong strategic foundation to activating LinkedIn’s identity-based targeting and capturing real purchase intent on Google, every phase in this checklist serves a clear purpose. When these layers work together, PPC stops feeling reactive and starts becoming predictable.

Add AI-led expansion through Demand Gen and Performance Max, and you move from simply capturing demand to shaping it at scale. Use this checklist as your operating framework to keep strategy focused, execution disciplined, and growth sustainable.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What does a SaaS PPC checklist contain?

A SaaS PPC checklist covers every stage of building a predictable acquisition system. It includes ICP definition, buyer vs. user mapping, budget strategy, LinkedIn targeting setup, Google Search structure, competitor campaigns, remarketing flows, and AI-led expansion through Demand Gen and Performance Max. The goal is to replace guesswork with a repeatable framework that supports long sales cycles and multi-stakeholder buying.

2. How to effectively follow a SaaS PPC checklist?

Start with the foundation before touching ads. Lock in your ICP, decision-maker roles, and budget expectations first. Then move step by step through LinkedIn and Google setup instead of launching everything at once. Treat the checklist as a diagnostic tool. Review it quarterly to identify weak links in targeting, intent capture, or funnel progression.

3. Does a SaaS PPC checklist work for both startups and enterprises?

Yes, because the framework stays the same while execution changes. Startups use it to validate channels and find pockets of intent. Enterprises use it to bring consistency across large budgets, multiple regions, and complex account-based programs. The checklist adapts to scale without losing strategic discipline.

4. How do I use a SaaS PPC checklist during campaign audits?

During an audit, open your ad accounts alongside the checklist and review each section one by one. Check if your ICP targeting is still accurate, whether brand and competitor campaigns are active, and if remarketing is set up across LinkedIn and Google. Then verify basics like tracking tags, conversion events, and landing page alignment. Use every unchecked item as a task for your next optimization cycle, so the audit leads directly to improvements instead of just observations.