What $1,353 in ads actually did for Plyto last month

The number that stopped me

14 of our 22 signups last month did not come from an ad click.

We spent $1,353 across Google Search and Meta in the last 30 days. Ads produced 8 signups. Word of mouth, direct traffic, and organic produced 14. If I were reading someone else's dashboard I would call that a demand problem dressed up as an acquisition win. Since it is my dashboard, I have to sit with it.

Here is the honest breakdown, and what I am changing tomorrow.

The three campaigns, side by side

• AI Ad Generator Search (Google): $702, 2,778 impressions, 226 clicks, $3.10 CPC, 8.14% CTR, 17 conversions.
• Plyto: AI runs your ads (Meta): $376, 4,019 impressions, 136 clicks, $2.77 CPC, 3.38% CTR, 0 conversions.
• Free CRM Alternatives Search (Google): $275, 939 impressions, 75 clicks, $3.67 CPC, 7.99% CTR, 0 conversions.

Total: $1,353, 7,736 impressions, 437 clicks, 17 conversions, $3.10 average CPC.

One campaign carried everything. AI Ad Generator Search did 100% of the paid conversions. Meta and the free CRM angle contributed 39% of the spend and zero conversions.

Where the Google money leaks

Our Google ads were triggered by 200 distinct search terms and burned $393 across them. 34% of that ($133) went to searches that never converted once.

The most expensive non-converting searches:

• "verts ai": 4 clicks, $13.50
• "how to make ai flyers": 4 clicks, $13.18
• "email marketing free products": 3 clicks, $11.59
• "free crm": 3 clicks, $9.68
• "how to make ai ads on facebook": 3 clicks, $9.21
• "scalio app": 3 clicks, $8.46
• "free email lists for marketing": 2 clicks, $7.98
• "commercial ai video": 2 clicks, $7.84
• "scalio ai": 3 clicks, $7.50
• "ai ad generator": 2 clicks, $7.49
• "opensource mailchimp": 2 clicks, $7.42
• "quickframe ai": 2 clicks, $6.54

Read that list once and a pattern jumps out. Half of these are people looking for something free or open source ("free crm", "free email lists for marketing", "email marketing free products", "opensource mailchimp") and the other half are how-to searches or competitor names we do not convert on ("how to make ai flyers", "how to make ai ads on facebook", "commercial ai video", "quickframe ai", "verts ai").

Interesting wrinkle: "scalio ai" shows up on both lists. 3 clicks and $7.50 with no conversion, and separately 1 click and $3.06 with 1 conversion. Same term, different sessions, different outcomes. Not enough data to kill it, enough to watch it.

What actually converted

Eight search terms produced our 17 conversions worth of signal. The cleanest ones:

• "pippit ai": 2 clicks, 1 conversion, $7.28
• "ai commercials": 2 clicks, 1 conversion, $6.56
• "ad generator": 2 clicks, 1 conversion, $6.25
• "ai ad": 2 clicks, 1 conversion, $6.12
• "ai banner prompt generator": 1 click, 1 conversion, $3.59
• "ai commercial generator": 1 click, 1 conversion, $3.31
• "scalio ai": 1 click, 1 conversion, $3.06
• "ai garage sale ad": 1 click, 1 conversion, $2.33

Every converting term is either a competitor name or a specific "ai + ad/commercial/banner" phrase. Not one converter contained the word "free" or "crm".

Which pages carried the weight

Six landing pages saw ad traffic. Visits, reads past 15 seconds, and people who started typing in a form field:

• `/`: 370 visits, 260 read, 16 started
• `/go/ai-ad-generator`: 207 visits, 150 read, 42 started
• `/go/ai-ads`: 84 visits, 73 read, 0 started
• `/go/free-crm`: 79 visits, 51 read, 3 started
• `/go/chatgpt-ads`: 58 visits, 21 read, 4 started
• `/go/all-in-one`: 38 visits, 19 read, 0 started

`/go/ai-ad-generator` is the only page where intent shows up in the form: 42 people started typing out of 207 visits. That is a 20% form-start rate. The homepage got more traffic and more reads but under 5% typed anything.

`/go/ai-ads` and `/go/all-in-one` had solid read rates and zero people touch a form. Those pages are pitches, not entry points.

Three things I am doing tomorrow

1. Negative out the free crowd and the how-tos on Google. "free", "opensource", "how to make", and "free email lists" are going in as negatives on both search campaigns. That is roughly $60 to $80 a month back based on the non-converting list. The "Free CRM Alternatives" campaign spent $275 for zero conversions, so I am pausing it entirely and rebuilding it around paid-intent modifiers.

2. Kill the Meta campaign in its current form. $376, 136 clicks, zero conversions. The 3.38% CTR looks fine but nothing typed on `/go/ai-ads`. I am rerouting Meta budget to retarget the 260 people who read the homepage but never touched a form.

3. Send more traffic to `/go/ai-ad-generator`. It is the only page where visitors behave like buyers. Every converting search term is about ad generation, and this page has a 20% form-start rate. I was splitting traffic across six landing pages out of habit. That ends this week.

The uncomfortable truth in the 14-out-of-22 number is that our best channel right now is not paid at all. But if I am going to spend on ads, I would rather spend $702 on the one campaign that works than $1,353 on three campaigns and hope.