Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Short-term (< 3 months)
When I started working with a B2B SaaS client a few months ago, they handed me a marketing budget and said "go find us customers." Sounds simple, right? Wrong. Their previous agency had burned through €15,000 testing Facebook ads, LinkedIn campaigns, and Google Ads with barely any results to show for it.
Here's the thing everyone gets wrong about testing marketing channels: they think you need big budgets and long timeframes to figure out what works. The truth? Most expensive "tests" are just expensive failures waiting to happen.
After working with dozens of startups and seeing the same mistakes over and over, I developed a completely different approach. Instead of throwing money at channels and hoping something sticks, I learned how to validate channels cheaply before investing serious budget.
In this playbook, you'll discover:
Why the traditional "test everything at once" approach kills startups
My lean testing framework that saved clients thousands in wasted ad spend
The Bullseye Method applied to real channel validation
How to identify your most promising channels in 30 days for under €500
Specific metrics that matter when testing on a shoestring budget
This isn't another theoretical framework. This is what actually works when you can't afford to waste money on marketing experiments.
Industry Reality
What Every Startup Thinks About Channel Testing
Walk into any startup accelerator or read any growth marketing blog, and you'll hear the same advice repeated like gospel: "Test multiple channels simultaneously to find what works fastest." The conventional wisdom goes something like this:
The Standard Playbook:
Launch campaigns across 5-7 channels at once
Allocate equal budget to each channel initially
Run tests for 30-60 days minimum
Double down on winners, cut losers
Optimize the winning channels for scale
This advice exists because it sounds logical. More tests = more data = better decisions, right? Plus, when VCs or advisors ask "what's your customer acquisition strategy," having multiple channels running makes you look sophisticated and thorough.
The problem? This approach assumes you have unlimited time and money. It treats marketing budget like play money instead of the precious resource it actually is for most startups. I've watched companies burn through their entire runway testing channels that were never going to work for their specific business model.
Here's what really happens when you follow this advice: You spread your already-thin resources across too many channels, making it impossible to properly test any of them. You end up with inconclusive data, frustrated that "nothing is working," when the real issue is that you never gave any single channel a fair shot.
The worst part? Most startups think this failure means they need more budget to test properly, when what they actually need is a completely different approach to validation.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
Last year, I was brought in to help a B2B SaaS startup that was hemorrhaging money on marketing. The founder had read every growth hacking blog and was convinced they needed to be "everywhere at once." When I looked at their setup, it was a perfect example of everything wrong with traditional channel testing.
They were running:
Facebook ads targeting "startup founders" (€2,000/month)
LinkedIn sponsored content (€1,500/month)
Google Ads on generic SaaS keywords (€2,500/month)
Content marketing with outsourced writers (€1,000/month)
Cold email campaigns through an agency (€800/month)
Total monthly spend: €7,800. Results after 3 months: 12 trial signups, 2 paying customers. The math was brutal - they were spending nearly €2,000 to acquire each customer with a €150 monthly plan.
But here's what I discovered when I dug deeper: the real growth was happening somewhere else entirely. Their best customers weren't coming from any of these expensive channels. They were coming from the founder's personal LinkedIn posts and word-of-mouth referrals from their early users.
The founder had been treating his LinkedIn content as a "side project" while pouring money into paid ads. Meanwhile, his thoughtful posts about the problems he was solving were generating genuine engagement from exactly the right people - other founders dealing with the same pain points.
This is when I realized the fundamental flaw in how most people approach channel testing. They start with the channels they think they "should" be using (usually paid ads because they seem measurable) instead of identifying where their audience actually hangs out and what they respond to.
That's when I developed what I now call the "Lean Channel Validation" approach - a way to test marketing channels that doesn't require big budgets or long timelines, but still gives you reliable data to make smart decisions.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
Instead of the traditional "spray and pray" approach, I created a systematic way to validate channels cheaply before investing real money. Here's the exact framework I used to help that SaaS client (and many others since) find their most effective channels without burning cash.
Phase 1: Channel Discovery (Week 1)
First, I don't start with channels at all. I start with understanding where the existing customers actually came from. I created a simple survey for their current users asking two questions: "How did you first hear about us?" and "What convinced you to sign up?"
For this client, the answers revealed something the analytics couldn't: most customers had multiple touchpoints before converting. They might have seen a LinkedIn post, then Googled the company, then signed up during a conversation with a colleague who was already a user.
Next, I mapped out their ideal customer's "day in the life" - what tools they use, what content they consume, what problems keep them up at night. This isn't market research; it's detective work to understand their behavior patterns.
Phase 2: Micro-Tests (Weeks 2-3)
Instead of launching full campaigns, I designed tiny experiments with maximum learning potential:
The €50 LinkedIn Test: Instead of expensive sponsored content, the founder posted 5 pieces of content over two weeks, each targeting a different pain point. Budget: €0. Time investment: 2 hours. Result: One post generated 47 comments and 12 DMs from potential customers.
The €100 Google Ads Test: Rather than broad keyword targeting, I created one ultra-specific ad targeting "SaaS founders struggling with customer retention." Small budget, laser focus. This generated 3 trial signups in week one.
The €75 Cold Email Test: I helped them craft 3 different email templates and send 50 emails per template (150 total). The twist? Instead of pitching the product, the emails offered a free resource related to their main pain point. One template got a 40% response rate.
Phase 3: Rapid Iteration (Week 4)
Based on these micro-tests, I could see clear patterns. LinkedIn content was generating the highest-quality engagement. Google Ads worked for very specific, problem-aware keywords. Cold email worked when it led with value, not sales.
Instead of scaling the "winners" immediately, I iterated on them. For LinkedIn, we tested different content formats. For Google Ads, we expanded to related specific keywords. For cold email, we refined the value-first approach.
The key insight? Channel testing isn't about finding THE perfect channel. It's about understanding how your specific audience behaves across different touchpoints, then creating a system that works with those behaviors rather than against them.
By the end of month one, we had a clear picture of what was working and why. More importantly, we had validated this with less than €500 in total spending - a fraction of what they'd been burning monthly on their previous "comprehensive" approach.
Micro-Testing
Run €50-100 experiments before investing serious budget. Small tests reveal big insights about channel viability.
Pattern Recognition
Look for behavioral patterns, not just conversion numbers. Understanding why something works matters more than the metric itself.
Value-First Validation
Lead with value in every channel test. People engage with helpful content before they engage with sales pitches.
Iterative Improvement
Perfect the approach before scaling the budget. Optimization happens through refinement, not just increased spending.
The results from this lean approach were dramatically different from their previous "test everything" strategy:
Financial Impact:
Monthly marketing spend dropped from €7,800 to €1,200
Customer acquisition cost decreased from €1,950 to €180
Trial-to-paid conversion increased from 16% to 34%
Channel Performance:
LinkedIn content generated 28 qualified leads in month two (vs. 3 from previous sponsored content)
Targeted Google Ads produced 12 trial signups with €300 spend (vs. 4 signups with €2,500 previous spend)
Value-first cold email achieved 23% meeting booking rate (vs. 2% from previous sales-focused emails)
But the most important result wasn't a number - it was clarity. After one month of lean testing, they understood their customer acquisition better than they had after six months of expensive experiments. They knew exactly where to focus their efforts and budget for maximum impact.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
Here are the key lessons I learned from implementing this lean channel testing approach across multiple client projects:
1. Behavior beats demographics every time. Understanding how your customers actually discover and evaluate solutions matters more than their age, company size, or industry. Focus on behavioral patterns, not buyer personas.
2. Start with free, scale with paid. Every paid channel has a free equivalent you can test first. Master the free version before investing in the paid amplification.
3. Quality of engagement trumps quantity of reach. One genuinely interested prospect is worth more than 100 unqualified visitors. Design tests to attract the right people, not the most people.
4. Channel fit is product-specific. What works for one SaaS might fail for another, even in the same industry. There's no universal "best" channel - only channels that fit your specific value proposition and customer behavior.
5. Test messaging before testing channels. The same message can perform completely differently across channels. Sometimes the channel isn't wrong - the message is.
6. Document everything, even failures. Failed tests teach you as much as successful ones. Keep detailed notes about what you tested, why, and what you learned. This knowledge compounds over time.
7. Timing matters more than you think. B2B channels often have optimal days/times that dramatically affect performance. Build timing into your test design from the start.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS Startups:
Start with founder-led content on LinkedIn before paid social
Test problem-aware Google Ads keywords before broad targeting
Use free trials as lead magnets in cold outreach
Focus on communities where your ICP already discusses their problems
For your Ecommerce store
For Ecommerce Stores:
Test organic social content before paid social campaigns
Use Google Shopping feed optimization before increasing ad spend
Test email marketing with existing customers before cold acquisition
Leverage user-generated content as social proof in channel tests