TLDR;
- Most UK SaaS agencies are a waste of time. Vet them on their SaaS-specific case studies and whether they talk about business metrics (LTV, CPA), not vanity metrics (clicks, impressions).
- Before you spend a single pound on ads, you MUST know your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV). It dictates how much you can afford to spend to acquire a customer. I've included an interactive LTV calculator below to work this out.
- The "Request a Demo" button is a conversion killer. Your offer must provide immediate value, like a genuine free trial (no card), a freemium plan, or a useful free tool.
- Focus your budget on high-intent channels first. For UK SaaS, this usually means Google Search for problem-aware buyers and LinkedIn Ads for precise decision-maker targeting. Forget 'brand awareness' campaigns on Meta; they're a trap.
- This guide includes a channel selection flowchart and performance benchmark charts to help you build a realistic strategy for the UK market.
Finding a decent user acquisition firm for a SaaS business here in the UK is a proper nightmare. Most are generalists who think sticking your logo on a Facebook ad is a strategy. They'll talk a good game about 'brand awareness' and 'engagement' but go quiet when you ask about Cost Per Trial or return on ad spend. They'll burn through your cash faster than a tourist on Oxford Street and leave you with nothing but a dashboard of useless metrics.
The truth is, acquiring customers for SaaS is a different beast entirely. It requires a level of precision and a ruthless focus on economics that most agencies just don't have. So, before you sign another retainer, let's talk about what actually works. This isn't about finding an agency; it's about understanding the game so you can spot the experts from the cowboys. We'll cover how to figure out what a customer is actually worth to you, where to find more of them in the UK, and what to offer them so they actually convert.
So, you're looking for a UK SaaS user acquisition firm? Be careful.
Right, first things first. The vast majority of agencies out there are not equipped to handle B2B SaaS. They're used to selling £20 t-shirts or getting leads for a local plumber. Your business is more complex. The sales cycle is longer, the decision-making unit involves multiple people, and the value of a customer is measured over years, not in a single transaction.
When you're vetting a firm, here's what to look for. And I mean really look for, not just glance at on their homepage.
-> Real SaaS Case Studies: Don't let them show you an eCommerce store that got a 10x ROAS. It's irrelevant. Ask for case studies from B2B software companies, ideally in the UK. I'm talking specific numbers. We once took a medical recruitment SaaS from a £100 Cost Per Acquisition down to just £7. That's the kind of result that matters. If they can't show you similar, they haven't done it. It's a massive red flag.
-> The Questions They Ask You: A good partner will grill you. They won't just ask for your budget. They'll ask about your churn rate, your average revenue per account, your sales cycle length, your ideal customer's biggest frustrations. If their first question is "what's your monthly ad spend?", run. They see you as a cash machine, not a partner. During our free consultations, the first 20 minutes is just us digging into the business model. If we don't understand the economics, we can't build a campaign that works.
-> They Challenge Your Assumptions: A good agency won't just take your orders. If your website is confusing or your offer is weak, they should tell you. Bluntly. We've had to tell potential clients their website was the reason their ads were failing, not the targeting. It can be a tough conversation, but it's a necessary one. An agency that just says "yes" to everything is just after your money.
Anyone promising you a guaranteed ROAS or a specific number of leads in the first month is lieing. It's impossible to predict performance with that certainty. What a good firm can promise is a rigorous, data-driven process of testing and optimisation to find what works. That's the only gaurantee worth having.
Before you hire anyone, can you answer this one question?
What is a customer worth to your business over their entire lifetime? If you don't know this number, you are flying blind. You have no way of knowing if a £50 lead is a bargain or a disaster. This is your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV), and it is the North Star for your entire acquisition strategy.
Most founders obsess over getting the lowest Cost Per Lead (CPL). It's a fool's errand. A cheap lead from a terrible-fit customer who churns in month two is infinitely more expensive than a 'costly' lead from an ideal customer who stays for five years. The goal isn't to be cheap; it's to be profitable. LTV tells you how much you can afford to pay to acquire a customer.
Here's how you work it out. No excuses, you need this number.
Once you have your LTV, you can work backwards. A 3:1 LTV to CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost) ratio is a healthy benchmark. So, with a £10,000 LTV, you can afford to spend up to £3,333 to acquire a customer. If your sales team converts 1 in 10 qualified trials into a paying customer, you can afford to pay £333 for that trial. Suddenly, a £50 cost per trial on LinkedIn doesn't sound so bad, does it? This is the maths that unlocks scalable growth.
Where should you actually be spending your money in the UK?
Forget spraying your budget across every platform under the sun. For B2B SaaS in the UK, you need to be surgical. Your customers are busy, and you need to show up where they are actively looking for solutions or where you can target them with unnerving accuracy. Here's the pecking order:
1. Google Ads (Search): The High-Intent Honey Pot
This is your number one priority. People go to Google to solve problems. If your SaaS solves a specific, urgent problem, you need to be there when they search for a solution. The key is to avoid broad, generic keywords. You want keywords that signal buying intent, not research intent. Don't bid on "what is project management". Bid on "best project management software for agencies" or "monday.com alternative uk". One of our software clients got 3,543 users at just £0.96 per user by focusing relentlessly on these high-intent search terms. It's about capturing existing demand, not trying to create it from thin air.
2. LinkedIn Ads: The B2B Sniper Rifle
If you need to reach a specific person—say, the Head of Finance at FTSE 250 companies based in London—LinkedIn is your platform. No other network offers this level of professional targeting. It's expensive, yes. We often see lead costs around the $22 (£17-ish) mark for highly qualified decision-makers. But remember your LTV. If a customer is worth £10k, paying £17 for a direct line to the person who can sign the cheque is a bargain. This is where you target by job title, company size, industry, even specific company names. It's perfect for account-based markering and reaching niches that are impossible to find elsewhere.
3. Meta Ads (Facebook/Instagram): The Scalable Powerhouse (with a catch)
Most people dismiss Meta for B2B. They're wrong. But you have to be smart. Forget running 'Brand Awareness' campaigns; you're just paying Facebook to find people who will never buy from you. The trick is to use conversion optimisation from day one. We've generated thousands of B2B software trials on Meta for as little as $2-$7 per trial. For one client, we drove 1535 trials for their B2B SaaS product almost entirely through Meta. You can target users based on interests (e.g., people who follow competitor software pages) or create lookalike audiences from your best customers. It's also incredibly powerful for retargeting website visitors and turning them into trial signups.
Feeling unsure which path to take? It depends on who you're selling to and how they think.
What are you asking them to do? (Hint: "Request a Demo" is the wrong answer)
This might be the most important point in this entire article. Your offer is everything. You can have the best targeting in the world, but if you're asking a busy decision-maker to do something that feels like high effort and low value, you've already lost. And the "Request a Demo" button is the king of high-effort, low-value offers.
Think about it. You're asking someone to commit to a 30-minute calendar slot to be sold to by a sales rep. It's arrogant. It screams "my time is more valuable than yours." And it's a huge point of friction. Why would they bother, when your competitor is offering a free trial they can start using in 30 seconds?
Your offer's only job is to provide an "aha!" moment of undeniable value. You must solve a small, real problem for them for free to earn the right to solve the big one. For SaaS, the gold standard offers are:
- A genuine free trial (no credit card required). Let them use the actual product. Let them experience the transformation firsthand. If the product is good, it will sell itself. This creates Product Qualified Leads (PQLs), not just Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs). PQLs are leads who are already convinced of your value.
- A freemium plan. Even better. Give them a core version of your product for free, forever. Let it become embedded in their workflow. The upsell to a paid plan becomes a natural next step, not a hard sell.
- A high-value, automated tool. If you can't offer a trial, bottle your expertise. A free, automated website audit. A free data health check. A mini-tool that solves one tiny part of their bigger problem. Give them value before you ask for anything in return. For our agency, it's a free 20-minute strategy call where we audit their failing campaigns. We provide value up front to demonstrate our expertise.
Delete your "Request a Demo" button. Replace it with something that gives, rather than takes. I guarantee your conversion rates will improve.
What kind of results should you realistically expect?
Right, let's talk brass tacks. Costs and results can vary wildly based on your niche, your offer, and how competitive your market is. But you need benchmarks. Here's what we see from our experience running campaigns for software companies, many in the UK.
The numbers can look scary if you're not armed with your LTV. A £75 Cost Per Acquisition might seem insane, but if that customer is worth £10,000, it's a fantastic deal. The key is the return, not just the cost.
Here's a rough guide to what 'good' can look like across different platforms for SaaS user acquisition. This isn't a promise, it's a ballpark based on our own client data to keep you grounded in reality.
Remember, cost is only half the story. The conversion rate from trial to paid for a Google Search lead might be 20%, while for a Meta lead it might be 5%. You need to track the full funnel. We had one client getting software trials for $7 on Meta, which sounds amazing. And it was, because their product was so good that enough of those cheap trials converted to make it wildly profitable. For another client, we focused on getting fewer, more expensive leads from LinkedIn, because they had a high-touch sales process and needed to speak to very specific people. The strategy must fit the business.
So, how do you actually choose the right firm?
Alright, you've done your homework. You know your LTV, you have a strong offer, and you know which channels you want to start with. Now you can go back to vetting agencies, but this time you're armed with the right questions. You're not looking for a vendor; you're looking for a strategic partner who understands the specific challenges of scaling a SaaS business in the UK.
Tbh, if you have to ask for references after you've seen their case studies and had a free strategy review with them, it's probably not a good fit. At that point, there's a lack of trust that will likely plague the entire relationship. Your decision should be based on demonstrated expertise, not a phone call with one of their happy clients.
Here’s a simple framework to make your final decision. Treat it like a scorecard.
| Vetting Step | What to Look For (Green Flags) | What to Avoid (Red Flags) |
|---|---|---|
| Review Case Studies | Specific B2B SaaS results, ideally in the UK. Mention of metrics like CPA, CPL, Trials, LTV. Clear explanation of the challenge and outcome. | Vague eCommerce results. Focus on vanity metrics like 'impressions' or 'clicks'. No numbers. "Guaranteed ROAS" promises. |
| Initial Consultation | They ask deep questions about your business economics (LTV, churn, ARPA). They challenge your assumptions. They provide genuine strategic ideas. | Their first question is about budget. They just agree with everything you say. They talk in jargon and buzzwords instead of plain english. |
| Proposed Strategy | A phased approach: test, learn, scale. A clear focus on high-intent channels first. A plan to improve your offer/landing page, not just run ads to it. | "We'll run ads on all platforms!" A focus on 'brand awareness' for a startup. No mention of creative testing or conversion rate optimisation. |
| Team & Expertise | You speak to the actual strategist who will work on your account. They can talk fluently about SaaS metrics and funnels. They have a specialist, not a generalist feel. | You only ever speak to a slick salesperson. They can't answer deep strategic questions. The agency feels like a factory, churning out the same plan for every client. |
Why you might need an expert guide
You could, of course, try to do all this yourself. The principles we've discussed are not secrets. But understanding them is one thing; executing them flawlessly is another. The difference between a profitable campaign and a failing one often comes down to dozens of small details: the exact keyword match type, the specific audience layering on LinkedIn, the headline on the ad creative, the loading speed of the landing page.
That's where an expert can make all the difference. Not just to set up the ads, but to act as a strategic partner who can see the whole picture, from LTV calculation to the copy on your checkout page. They provide the process, the experience, and the accountability to make sure your investment in paid acquisition actually pays off.
It's not about just hiring someone to press the buttons. It's about partnering with a team that has navigated this exact terrain before and can guide you past the common pitfalls that sink most SaaS startups. If you've found this guide helpful and want to discuss how these principles could be applied to your specific business, we offer a free, no-obligation strategy consultation where we can review your current efforts and identify your biggest opportunities for growth.
Hope this helps!
