B2B Lead Generation Outsourcing: When to Hire a Paid Media Agency

Here's the reality: most companies outsource when they don't have dedicated paid media specialists, need pipeline faster than a 6-month hiring process allows, or want to test new channels without betting headcount on unproven strategies. The partnerships that work align incentives to pipeline, not lead volume. The ones that fail optimize for metrics that don't matter.

When Outsourcing Makes Sense

Capacity constraints
Building an internal paid media team means hiring a strategist ($120K–$160K), channel specialist ($90K–$130K), designer ($80K–$110K), and analyst ($85K–$120K). That's 6–12 months and $400K–$600K in fully loaded costs before anyone runs a single campaign (source: OpenView 2024 SaaS benchmarks).

We've worked with dozens of companies who tried the hiring route first. By month 4, they're still interviewing. By month 8, they've made bad hires. By month 12, they're rebuilding the team. Outsourcing gets you to market in 30–45 days with $8K–$25K monthly retainers, and you're not stuck with headcount if it doesn't work.

Speed to pipeline
The difference between a new internal team and an experienced agency isn't skill. It's reps. We've run thousands of LinkedIn campaigns. We know what creative converts for enterprise SaaS buyers. We've already made the mistakes your team would spend 6 months making.

Most agencies launch campaigns in 2–3 weeks. Internal teams ramping from zero take 8–12 weeks to get anything live. Then add another 12 weeks of testing before they find what works.

Testing new ICP or vertical
We see companies paralyzed by expansion decisions. Should you move upmarket from SMB to enterprise? Test a new vertical? Your internal team has to learn everything from scratch, new objections, new buying committees, new creative angles.

Agencies bring benchmarks. We know enterprise buyers respond differently than SMB. We know which channels work for fintech vs healthcare. You're not paying us to learn, you're paying us to apply what we already know.

What to Outsource: Paid Media Focus

LinkedIn Ads
We run more LinkedIn campaigns than any other channel, and here's what we've learned: it's expensive, but it works when you're selling to specific titles at specific company types. Based on our client data, average cost per lead is $976, with cost per opportunity at $20,374. Those numbers scare people until they realize one enterprise deal pays for six months of spend.

Conversion rates tell the real story: 34% of leads become MQLs (lower than Google), but once they qualify, 61% become SALs and 67% of those turn into opportunities. LinkedIn leads convert slower but close faster. We've seen this across 30+ B2B SaaS clients.

What agencies actually manage: audience segmentation that goes beyond job titles, creative testing (static vs video vs carousel, video wins 70% of the time for enterprise), conversion path optimization, and CRM integration that doesn't break when LinkedIn changes their API (which happens quarterly).

Google Search
The underrated workhorse. Cost per lead averages $832, lower than LinkedIn, with cost per opportunity at $6,533. The math works better, but only if you know what you're doing with intent mapping.

Here's where most internal teams fail: they bid on everything remotely related to their product. We've inherited accounts with 200+ keywords, zero negative keyword management, and landing pages that try to be everything to everyone. Conversion rates tank.

The data from our campaigns: 47% lead to MQL rate (higher than LinkedIn), but only 33% MQL to SAL conversion. Why? Google catches buyers earlier in their journey. They're researching, not ready to talk. You need nurture sequences, not just "book a demo" landing pages.

What we handle: keyword research that separates tire-kickers from buyers, negative keyword management (we update weekly, not monthly), landing page testing, and conversion rate optimization. Most companies think Google is easy because anyone can run an ad. Running profitable Google campaigns is different.

Programmatic Display & Retargeting
Longer attribution windows, lower cost-per-impression ($8–$15 CPM for B2B audiences), but you need view-through conversion tracking or you'll think it's not working. We use this for account-based activity where we're targeting 100 specific companies, not broad awareness plays.

Meta (Facebook/Instagram)
Works for prosumer SaaS and lower ACV products (<$10K). CPL runs 40–60% lower than LinkedIn, but lead quality drops proportionally. We've tested this extensively: Meta works when you're selling to individuals who make quick buying decisions. It fails for enterprise sales with 6-month cycles and buying committees.

Pricing Models: What to Watch For

Let's be direct: most agencies push retainers because it's predictable revenue. Per-meeting pricing exposes us to performance risk. Hybrid models balance both. Here's what each actually means for you.

Retainer-based ($8K–$25K/month)
You pay a fixed monthly fee. We manage strategy, creative, optimization, and reporting. Ad spend is separate, either billed directly to your card or passed through with 0–15% markup (if it's 20%+, push back).

Why agencies like this: Predictable cash flow, we get paid even in slow months. Why you might like this: Forces us to optimize for long-term performance, not just hit meeting quotas. We're incentivized to improve efficiency because our fee doesn't scale with spend.

The catch: Requires 3–6 month commitments. You're paying whether we deliver or not. Make sure there's a 90-day performance out clause tied to specific KPIs (pipeline created, cost per opportunity, meeting acceptance rates).

Per-meeting ($200–$600 per qualified meeting)
Pay only for meetings that show up and meet qualification criteria. Common with appointment-setting firms, rare with full-funnel paid media agencies (like us) because we can't control whether your sales team shows up to meetings or how they qualify leads.

Why you might like this: Low risk. If we don't deliver, you don't pay. The catch: We define "qualified." We've seen agencies game this, lowering qualification standards to hit volume targets. Also, this model breaks at scale. If we're delivering 30 meetings/month at $400 each, you're paying $144K/year just for meetings, plus ad spend.

Hybrid (retainer + performance bonus)
Base retainer covers ongoing management, bonuses tied to pipeline milestones (meetings held, opportunities created, closed-won revenue).

Why this works: Shared risk. We're motivated to deliver outcomes, not activities. You're not overpaying if performance is flat. The catch: Requires transparent CRM reporting and attribution. If your sales cycle is 9 months, we won't see closed-won bonuses for nearly a year. Most agencies won't wait that long unless the base retainer covers their costs.

Example: In-House vs Outsourced Cost Breakdown Graph-ready data (source: OpenView SaaS benchmarks, 2024 + Scalewell analysis)

Included in agency retainer (cost amortized across agency's client base)*

Vendor Evaluation Checklist

We've been on sales calls where prospects asked terrible questions. Things that sound smart but don't predict performance. Here's what actually matters when evaluating agencies.

Industry & ICP alignment
"What percentage of your clients are in [your industry/vertical]?" This is the first question you should ask. Agencies with vertical specialization outperform generalists by 30–45% on pipeline efficiency (source: Gartner, 2023 marketing services provider research).

We're biased here, we focus on B2B SaaS specifically, but the principle applies everywhere. An agency that worked with enterprise SaaS companies knows what creative angles work, what objections come up, which titles actually make buying decisions. A generalist agency working with SaaS, healthcare, manufacturing, and e-commerce won't have that depth.

Questions to ask:

• Can you share 3 case studies from clients in our industry with similar deal sizes?
• What's your experience with our specific buyer personas (e.g., VP of Engineering at Series B SaaS)?
• What objections do you typically see from our ICP, and how do you address them in creative?

Red flags:
Claims of being "full-service for all B2B companies" without vertical depth, inability to name competitors or comparable clients, generic portfolio with no industry patterns. If their case studies span yoga studios, law firms, and SaaS companies, they're not specialized, they're desperate.

Account structure & platform expertise
This is where you separate real agencies from amateurs. Ask to see anonymized account structures from similar clients. If they hesitate or say "we customize everything," they don't have a documented process.

For LinkedIn:

• Do they use a TAM? If not, they're wasting your budget.
• How do they segment audiences? Good answer: layering job title + TAM. Bad answer: "we target decision-makers."
• How do they report on attribution? For complex sales process, it's mostly about influenced pipeline.
• Do they run ABM activity with suppression lists for existing customers? If they're retargeting your current customers, you're wasting money.

For Google Search:

• How granular is their keyword structure? We prefer thematic ad groups (5–15 related keywords per ad group) over single keyword ad groups. SKAGs sound smart but become unmanageable at scale.
• What's their negative keyword strategy? Should be reviewed weekly, not monthly.
• Do they separate brand, competitor, and generic intent into different campaigns? If everything's in one campaign, they can't optimize by intent stage.
• How do they handle landing page mapping? 1:1 keyword-to-landing-page matching or templated approach? Neither is always right, depends on your offer complexity.

Questions to ask:

• Walk me through your audience segmentation strategy for our ICP.
• How often do you audit and optimize account structure?
• What attribution model do you use, and how does it inform budget allocation?

Red flags:
Reluctance to share account structure examples (claim it's "proprietary IP"), vague answers about targeting strategy like "we use best practices," "we'll figure it out once we start" without a documented process, no clear testing methodology.

Creative production & testing framework
Creative is why most investments fail. Not targeting. Not budget. Creative. And most agencies don't have a structured approach, they throw stuff at the wall and hope it works.

Here's what good looks like: 3–5 creative variants tested per campaign launch (not 10+, that dilutes learning), 50+ A/B tests run annually on landing pages (that's roughly one new test per week), clear creative brief templates that capture ICP pain points, objections, and desired outcomes, and access to in-house designers or an established freelance network with 1–3 day turnaround.

If an agency says "we'll use your brand assets" or "you'll need to provide creative," that's code for "we don't know how to make ads." They're a media buyer, not an agency.

Questions to ask:

• What's your creative testing cadence? (Should be weekly or bi-weekly for active accounts)
• How many landing page variants do you typically test per quarter?
• Can you show me examples of high-performing creative from clients in our space?
• Who owns creative production, internal team or do we need to hire separately?
• What's your process for incorporating sales feedback into creative iteration?

We ask our clients' sales teams every two weeks: "What objections are you hearing? What questions keep coming up?" That feeds into the next round of creative. If an agency isn't doing this, their creative goes stale in 60 days.

Red flags:
No creative examples to share, reliance on client's internal team for all creative (they should at least art-direct), slow turnaround times (>1 week for ad variants is unacceptable), generic stock photo approach without custom design, no structured testing methodology, or saying "we'll test everything" without a prioritization framework.

Reporting, SLAs & communication cadence
Most agency relationships die because expectations weren't set upfront. Here's what needs to be in writing before you sign.

Questions to ask:

• What metrics do you report on weekly vs monthly?
• How do you track leads through our CRM to closed-won? (They should have CRM read access or regular exports)
• What's your process when performance dips or we're off-target?
• Who's our day-to-day contact, and what's their response time SLA? (24 hours maximum for non-urgent, same-day for urgent)
• Do we get direct access to ad accounts, or is everything gated through you?

On that last one: you should have admin access to your own LinkedIn and Google ad accounts. If an agency refuses, they're planning to hold your data hostage.

What to request:

• Sample weekly and monthly report templates from current clients
• Screenshots of their dashboard or reporting tool
• Reference calls with 2–3 clients who have been with them 12+ months (not cherry-picked success stories, ask for recent clients)

Red flags:
Reluctance to commit to SLAs, reporting only on vanity metrics (impressions, clicks, CPL without pipeline context), claims that attribution isn't possible (it absolutely is), monthly-only reporting for active accounts (you need weekly visibility to catch issues early), no direct ad account access.

Team structure & continuity
You're not hiring an agency, you're hiring specific people. The senior strategist who impresses you on the sales call might never touch your account.

Questions to ask:

• Who will be our main point of contact, and what's their experience level? (Get their LinkedIn profile. Check tenure and client work.)
• Will we have dedicated resources, or is this a shared team model?
• What's your average account manager tenure? High turnover means constant knowledge loss and ramp-up time.
• How often does the team change on client accounts?
• Do we get access to senior strategists, or just account coordinators?

Here's the truth: most agencies sell you with A-team and service you with B-team or C-team. Ask directly: "Will the people in this room be working on our account?" If they hedge or say "our whole team collaborates," that's a no.

We tell prospects upfront who's working on their account and what each person's role is. If we can't commit specific names before signing, we don't take the deal.

Red flags:
Junior team assigned despite senior team selling you, high employee turnover (check their LinkedIn company page, if you see 30% of the team left in the past year, that's a problem), vague answers about team structure like "we'll assign the best fit," no clear escalation path for issues (who do you call if your point of contact is unresponsive?).

Pricing transparency & contract terms
This is where agencies hide risk. Read the contract carefully, better yet, have your lawyer read it.

Questions to ask:

• What's included in the retainer vs billed separately?
• Are there setup fees, and what do they cover? ($5K–$10K setup for ad account buildout, creative development, and CRM integration is reasonable. $15K+ is high unless you're a complex enterprise account.)
• What's the minimum contract term, and what are the cancellation terms?
• How do you handle ad spend, direct billing to our card or pass-through with markup?
• What happens to creative assets and data if we part ways?

On ad spend markup: 0–10% is fair, 15% is high but acceptable if you're getting strategic value, 20%+ is a rip-off. Some agencies claim they need markup to "cover management overhead," but that's what your retainer pays for. Push back.

What good looks like:

• Clear line-item breakdown of services (strategy, creative, reporting, account management)
• 90-day cancellation notice or month-to-month after initial 3–6 month term
• You own all creative assets and have direct admin access to ad accounts
• Transparent markup structure if applicable
• Performance out clause (if we don't hit X pipeline in 90 days, you can exit without penalty)

Red flags:
12+ month contracts with no early termination clause (you're locked in even if they underdeliver), setup fees >$10K without clear deliverables (what are you actually building?), vague "full-service" pricing with no itemization (you have no idea what you're paying for), refusal to provide client references (obvious reason: their clients aren't happy), contracts that claim the agency owns all creative IP (absurd, you paid for it, you should own it).

Example: Channel Performance Benchmarks Graph-ready data (source: Scalewell client data)

How to Measure Success

Most companies measure the wrong things. Here's what actually matters.

Cost per qualified lead (CPQL)
Calculate total program cost (retainer + ad spend) divided by qualified leads, not form fills, not "engaged contacts," not "marketing qualified" using some made-up scoring model. Qualified means your sales team accepted the lead and logged it as an opportunity or booked a meeting.

B2B SaaS benchmarks: $200–$800 depending on ACV and sales cycle (source: SaaS Capital, 2024 benchmarks). If you're selling $100K ACV products, $600 CPQL is cheap. If you're selling $10K products, it's expensive.

The metric that matters more: month-over-month trend. Mature campaigns should see 15–25% CPQL reduction over 6 months as creative gets smarter and targeting gets tighter. If your agency's CPQL is flat or increasing after 90 days, they're not optimizing.

Cost per opportunity
This is what we actually optimize for. CPQL measures top-of-funnel. Cost per opportunity measures whether leads convert through your sales process.

When this metric goes wrong, it's usually not the agency, it's lead routing delays, bad sales follow-up, or qualification drift. We track meeting show rates (60%+ is good), meeting-to-opportunity conversion (25%+ is good), and time-to-first-touch (under 5 minutes during business hours).

Pipeline created
Total pipeline value generated monthly, segmented by channel. This is your scorecard for everything.

Target: +3X return on total program investment (retainer + ad spend) within 6 months. Example: you're spending $35K/month ($15K retainer + $20K ad spend). After 6 months, you should see $420K–$700K in pipeline created. If your average deal size is $50K, that's 8–14 opportunities.

If you're not hitting 3X return after 6 months, something's broken. Either targeting is off, creative isn't resonating, or your sales process is leaking opportunities. We've never seen an account fail because "paid media doesn't work", it fails because strategy, execution, or follow-up is broken.

Example: ROI Curves by Pricing Model Graph-ready data (source: Scalewell case studies)

Note: Retainer models take longer to break even but deliver better long-term ROI due to compounding creative and targeting improvements. Per-meeting models show faster early ROI but plateau as easy wins get exhausted.

Biggest Risks to Avoid

We've inherited dozens of accounts from other agencies. Here's what typically goes wrong.

Misaligned incentives
Agencies paid per-lead will game your qualification criteria. We've seen it: "engaged with content" becomes "clicked on an ad," "director level or above" becomes "anyone with a LinkedIn profile." Insist on qualification tied to real buying signals, title, company size, budget authority. Require weekly reporting on meeting show rates (should be 60%+) and sales acceptance rates. If an agency won't commit to these metrics, they're planning to deliver garbage leads.

Poor CRM integration
If your agency is sending leads via CSV upload, run. Leads should flow directly into your CRM with UTM parameters, campaign source, form field data, and timestamps. We've seen companies lose 30-40% of leads in manual handoffs. CSV uploads also break attribution, you can't trace leads back to specific ads, audiences, or creative variants.

Ask upfront: "Show me how leads flow from ad click to CRM record." If they can't walk you through the technical integration in detail, they haven't built it yet.

Lack of creative ownership
Most agency contracts claim ownership of all creative assets. This is absurd. You're paying for them, you should own them. Before signing, get in writing: "Client owns all creative assets, ad copy, landing pages, and strategic documentation produced during engagement. Agency will provide all source files within 5 business days of contract termination."

We've had clients come to us unable to access their own landing pages because their previous agency locked them out.

No attribution model
B2B buyers touch 7–13 pieces of content before converting (source: Gartner, 2024 buyer journey research). If your agency only reports last-click attribution, they're missing most of LinkedIn's value. LinkedIn drives early awareness, Google captures late-stage intent. Last-click makes Google look like a hero and LinkedIn look worthless.

Insist on multi-touch attribution. We use first-touch (awareness credit), linear (equal credit across touchpoints), and U-shaped (extra credit to first and last touch). This shows true channel contribution.

When to Keep It In-House

Not every company should outsource. Here's when agencies (including us) won't deliver ROI:

You're spending less than $10K/month on ads
Agency economics don't work at that scale. At $10K–$15K retainer + $10K ad spend, you're paying $20K–$25K/month total. We can't staff an account properly for that. You'll get junior resources and minimal strategic attention. Better to hire one strong generalist and have them learn as they go.

Your ICP or offer is still unvalidated
If you don't know who buys, why they buy, or what messaging resonates, don't hire an agency to figure it out for you. We can't fix a broken product-market fit with paid media. Run your own scrappy campaigns, talk to customers, iterate on messaging. Come to us when you've got 10-20 customers and understand what works.

You need hourly creative iteration
Some companies need real-time creative pivots, testing 5 new ad variants daily, adjusting copy based on sales calls that morning. That's not how agencies work. We batch creative production, test systematically, and iterate weekly or bi-weekly. If you need daily creative sprints, keep it in-house.

You have deep expertise and excess capacity
If your team includes a paid media manager with 5+ years in B2B SaaS, a strong designer, and spare cycles to run your activity, don't outsource. You'll spend $120K–$300K annually on an agency that can't move faster than your internal team.

The companies that should outsource: Series A–C B2B SaaS scaling from $5M–$50M ARR, validated product-market fit, no paid media expertise in-house, and willingness to commit $20K+/month (retainer + ad spend) for at least 6 months.

If that's you, the decision isn't whether to outsource, it's which agency treats qualified pipeline, not lead volume, as the success metric.