Is Google Search Ads (SEM) Dead for SaaS? 🤔
Hey everyone đź‘‹
I’m James, founder of therappai (AI video-therapy platform) and previously co-founder of Whip Around, a fleet-management SaaS that scaled past $20 M ARR.
Back at Whip Around, Google Search Ads were gold.
We could target pain-driven keywords, run clean landing pages, and print pipeline with predictable CAC.
Fast-forward to 2025 — I’m now running campaigns for therappai, and the landscape feels completely different:
CPCs have skyrocketed 🔥
Intent feels diluted by AI summaries & zero-click searches
“Therapy app” searches trigger huge consumer-app competition
Even well-optimized ads convert inconsistently unless paired with strong brand or social proof
So I’m genuinely curious —
👉 Is SEM still working for you in SaaS?
Are you seeing ROI from paid search?
Or are budgets shifting toward content, organic, and social (LinkedIn, influencers, short-form)?
Has AI-powered search changed your attribution or funnel strategy?
Would love to hear what other founders and growth leads are seeing — especially those balancing both B2B lead gen and B2C app installs.
TL;DR: Used to crush it with Google Ads in B2B SaaS, now struggling to see the same ROI.
Is SEM dead — or just evolving into something else?
This is a fair observation and one that lines up with a broader shift happening across SEM right now. Conversion rates today depend far more on whether a prospect already trusts the brand before they click, since cold clicks rarely convert at the rate they used to without that trust already in place.
Building on that, SEM probably isn't dead so much as it's stopped working as a standalone channel. High-intent, bottom-funnel keywords still tend to convert reasonably well in B2B contexts, though usually at a higher cost per customer than before. The bigger shift seems to be that search now plays more of a validation role than a discovery one. People often find a brand elsewhere first, then turn to search to confirm credibility before taking action.
For consumer-facing categories like therapy apps, this dynamic is even more pronounced, since paid search competes directly with broader consumer ad budgets and trust-sensitive intent in the same auction. Overall, it's less a question of SEM losing relevance and more a sign that paid search now needs to work alongside brand and content efforts rather than carry the funnel on its own.
Really insightful comparison between your B2B and B2C experiences. I think SEM isn't dead but definitely requires more brand awareness now to work efficiently. Your point about AI summaries and zero-click searches is spot on - the intent signals are definitely muddier than they were a few years ago. For B2C health/therapy apps especially, social proof seems crucial before the click converts.