What Is Paid Social for SaaS?

Paid Social for SaaS explained

Paid social differs from paid search (Google Ads) in one critical way: on social, people aren't actively looking for your product. You're interrupting their feed. This means your creative and hook have to earn attention in under 2 seconds. The main paid social platforms for SaaS: - Meta (Facebook + Instagram): largest audience, best retargeting pixel, lowest CPMs for B2C and prosumer SaaS - LinkedIn: highest-intent B2B audience, but expensive ($8–15 CPC typical). Best for enterprise SaaS with high ACV - TikTok: growing for SaaS, works well for demo-style video content and younger founder audiences - X (Twitter): niche but effective for developer tools and indie hacker audiences When to use paid social vs paid search: - Use paid social when: your audience doesn't know your product category exists, you have a visual product, or you want to build awareness - Use paid search when: people actively search for your solution (e.g., "project management tool") - Use both when: you have budget for a full-funnel approach For most early-stage SaaS under $20K MRR, Meta is the starting point — it has the largest audience, best targeting options, and most forgiving CPMs for learning.