Should MSPs run paid ads? (spoiler… only this one kind)

Most Tuesdays and Thursdays I do a drop-in marketing clinic for members of my MSP Marketing Edge. And the question of running paid ads comes up every now and then.

It’s a fair question. Paid ads are everywhere. And when you see competitors appearing at the top of Google search results it’s easy to assume that’s where all their new business is coming from.

But my honest answer to the MSPs I work with is usually "nah, don't bother".

That might sound surprising coming from someone who spends all day salivating about marketing.

But the reality is that most MSPs don’t get great results from paid ads. Not because the platforms don’t work, but because the way MSPs tend to use them doesn’t match how those platforms actually work.

Let’s break this down.

Google ads: Brilliant, but demanding

Google Ads are excellent at capturing urgent demand. When someone types “IT support company near me” or “managed IT services for law firm” or "help me help me there's smoke coming out of the server" they're already looking for help. In theory, this should be perfect for MSPs.

The problem is that running Google Ads properly is not something you do occasionally. It requires daily monitoring, constant optimisation, testing keywords, adjusting bids, improving landing pages and filtering out wasted clicks.

B2B paid search campaigns create a lot of noise and typically only convert a very small percentage of traffic that you've paid for.

Sure, economically it can work for an MSP because of the high contract value you can win. If a new client is worth $100,000 in lifetime revenue, then you'd pay $5,000 to win that client, right?

And I do know MSPs who run Google Ads very successfully. But every single one of them falls into one of two camps: Either they hired a specialist agency to manage the campaigns, or they invested the time to properly learn the platform themselves.

Yes, that means a 13 hour Udemy course and a lot of Red Bull.

Most MSP owners simply don’t have the spare hours to do that consistently. When Google Ads become something you “look at once a month”, they're not right for you.

LinkedIn ads: Better targeting, but do they work?

LinkedIn Ads are attractive for MSPs because you can target exactly the kind of people you want to reach: Business owners, directors, specific industries, even company sizes.

In theory that’s perfect for B2B.

In practice they're very easy to get wrong. The cost per click is usually higher than other platforms, and if your messaging isn’t extremely clear you can burn through budget very quickly.

The platform is excellent for reaching decision makers, but the targeting alone doesn’t guarantee results.

I see a lot of MSPs try LinkedIn Ads for a couple of weeks, get poor results, and conclude that paid ads don’t work. The truth is they just didn’t run them long enough to learn what works.

Meta (Facebook / Instagram) ads: Not for B2B?

Meta ads can be extremely powerful in consumer markets, but MSPs often struggle with them because the targeting isn’t as business-specific.

Yes you can reach large audiences cheaply. But ensuring that those audiences contain genuine business decision makers can be tricky. Meta tends to work best for awareness campaigns, content promotion, and retargeting rather than direct lead generation for B2B.

That’s why you’ll sometimes see large numbers of leads from Meta ads but relatively few of them turn into qualified opportunities.

There is one paid ad I always recommend

If there is one form of paid advertising I strongly recommend MSPs use, it’s retargeting.

This means showing ads to people who have already visited your website. Those visitors have already demonstrated some level of interest in what you do, so advertising to them is far more efficient than advertising to a completely cold audience.

That makes sense, right

In B2B marketing, retargeting has been shown to significantly improve engagement and conversion rates because you’re focusing your budget on people who are most likely to be looking for what you sell.

This makes it ideal for MSPs.

Your website might only receive a few hundred visitors per month, but many of those visitors are potential prospects researching their options.

If they leave your site and then continue to see your brand appear on LinkedIn, Google Display (like news sites), or Meta platforms for the next few weeks, you stay top-of-mind while they’re deciding.

That's a win.

Just make sure you exclude your existing clients from those campaigns. There’s nothing more pointless than paying to advertise to people who already buy from you.

So what should MSPs actually do?

If you’re determined to run Google Ads, either learn the platform properly or hire someone who already understands it. If you want to experiment with LinkedIn Ads, start small and expect a learning curve.

But regardless of whether you use those platforms, every MSP should be running retargeting.

It’s the simplest, lowest-risk form of paid advertising available, and it ensures that the people already investigating your services keep seeing your name while they make their decision.

Seeing as these days business owners research multiple MSPs before they ever speak to anyone, staying in front of them during that research phase is a solid bit of marketing.