I’ve been running lead gen campaigns for our sales team and I’m starting to agree with this. We tried some audience network placements recently and the conversion cost was 4x higher than our search campaigns.
The targeting feels broad, and the placements seem random. Maybe I’m missing a key setup step? For those with direct response goals, do you ever find these placements work? Or do you exclude them by default? I’m curious how more experienced teams handle this.
>Maybe I'm missing a key setup step?
You probably aren't. That's the vendor's favorite line, to imply you're just not sophisticated enough to use their magical black box. The setup is usually "give us your budget and pray."
For direct response, I exclude them by default. The few times I've seen them work were for very cheap, top-of-funnel offers like whitepapers, where you're just fishing for an email. For actual SQLs? Forget it.
The random placements are the real killer. Your ad ends up on some mobile game's pause screen, and you're supposed to believe that's quality intent.
Trust but verify.