What is a good ROAS for SaaS Meta ads?

A good return on ad spend for SaaS Meta ads depends on your customer lifetime value. A 2x to 3x ROAS on first-touch revenue is considered strong, but subscription businesses should calculate ROAS against projected cohort LTV rather than day-one revenue. In this case, $5,994 in Meta ad spend generated $6,578 in immediate revenue (1.1x day-one ROAS) but $17,629 in projected 12-month cohort LTV (2.9x ROAS), which is excellent for a SaaS business.

What is a good webinar show rate?

Industry average webinar show rates typically range from 20% to 40% depending on the audience and promotion method. A 30% to 40% show rate is considered strong for paid webinar registrations. However, show rate alone is a vanity metric. A 9.3% show rate with a 39% close rate and healthy unit economics can outperform a 32% show rate with lower close rates. The metrics that matter are cost per close and customer lifetime value.

How do you calculate customer lifetime value for a SaaS subscription?

To calculate customer lifetime value for a SaaS subscription, multiply the average revenue per customer per period by the number of periods they stay active. Use retention curve data to project how many customers remain at each renewal. For example, if 13 customers pay $297 per quarter and your retention curve shows 100%, 75%, 55%, and 38% at each quarter, the LTV per customer is approximately $796 over 12 months. Blending across pricing tiers gives you a weighted average LTV.

What is cost per close and how do you calculate it?

Cost per close is the total ad spend divided by the number of customers who purchased. It measures how much you spend to acquire each paying customer. For example, if you spend $5,994 on ads and 24 people buy, your cost per close is approximately $250. This metric is more useful than cost per lead because it accounts for the full funnel from ad click to purchase, not just the initial registration.

Should I stop running ads if the first results look bad?

No. Early metrics like show rate or attendance can be misleading. A campaign with a low show rate might still produce strong unit economics if the people who attend are highly qualified buyers. Always wait for the full funnel data before making a decision. Track cost per close and customer LTV rather than intermediate vanity metrics. In this case, a 9.3% show rate that felt like a failure turned into a 2.9x ROAS once the full data came in.

How do you improve webinar show rates for SaaS?

To improve webinar show rates, implement automatic calendar event creation using tools like Zapier so the event appears on registrants' calendars without extra clicks. Add SMS reminders in addition to email sequences. Send a short pre-webinar video to build anticipation and commitment. Increase the number of reminder emails leading up to the event. These tactics move show rates by addressing the core problem: people register impulsively but forget to attend.

What is the difference between vanity metrics and real metrics in SaaS marketing?

Vanity metrics are numbers that look good on a dashboard but do not directly indicate business health. In SaaS marketing, registrations and show rate are vanity metrics because they do not tell you whether the campaign is profitable. Real metrics include cost per close, customer lifetime value, LTV-to-CAC ratio, and return on ad spend. A campaign with poor vanity metrics (low show rate) can still be highly profitable if the real metrics (close rate, LTV) are strong.

What is a good LTV-to-CAC ratio for a SaaS business?

A healthy LTV-to-CAC ratio for a SaaS business is typically 3:1 or higher, meaning the lifetime value of a customer is at least three times the cost to acquire them. In this example, the blended LTV is $735 and the cost per close is $250, giving an LTV-to-CAC ratio of approximately 2.9:1. This is considered strong and indicates the business can profitably invest in growth. A ratio below 1:1 means you are losing money on every customer acquired.

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The Journey to $1M ARR

As of March 3, 2026

$201,960 ARR$1M goal

20% there

The $6,000 Meta Ad Test Results Are In. I Was Wrong.

Nomiki Petrolla

March 3, 2026·7 min read

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My unfiltered journey to $1M ARR as a solo female founder.

I spent $6,000 on Meta ads and thought it was a waste. A 9.3% webinar show rate felt like a disaster. But the data told a completely different story. Here is the full breakdown of SaaS webinar funnel performance, customer lifetime value, and why you should never kill a campaign based on feelings.

TL;DR: A couple weeks ago I wrote about spending $6,000 on Meta ads and thinking it flopped. Cost per lead dropped from $22 to $9. Registrations jumped from 148 to 653. But only 61 people showed up to the webinar. I thought I wasted the money. I was wrong. 24 women closed. Day-one revenue was $6,578. Projected cohort lifetime value is $17,629. That is a 2.9x return on ad spend off a campaign I almost killed.

What You Will Learn in This Post

Quick Recap: The $6,000 Meta Ad Experiment
What Actually Happened After the Webinar
Cohort Lifetime Value: Why $5,994 in Ad Spend Returns $17,629
LTV Per Customer: The Number That Changes Everything
What I Learned: Feelings Are Not Data
The Real Lesson: Wrong Friction vs Right Friction in SaaS Funnels
What I Am Doing Next to Improve Webinar Conversion
The Bigger Picture: How to Evaluate SaaS Ad Spend

Quick Recap: The $6,000 Meta Ad Experiment

A couple weeks ago I wrote about spending $6,000 on Meta ads and thinking it flopped. I was frustrated. I was questioning everything. I almost pulled the plug on running another session.

Here is the update: I was wrong. The data told a completely different story than what I felt in the moment.

I redesigned my landing page to reduce friction and simplified my ad copy. Cost per lead dropped from $22 to $9. Registrations exploded from 148 to 653.

I was thrilled. Then the webinar happened.

61 people showed up out of 653. That is a 9.3% show rate. I sat there watching the attendee count and my stomach dropped. My previous sessions had a 32% show rate. I thought I had wasted $5,994.

What Actually Happened After the Webinar

Here is what I did not account for: the closes kept coming.

By the time I finished follow-ups, 24 women joined the February cohort. Thirteen at $297 per quarter. Eleven at $247 per quarter.

Here is the side-by-side comparison of the old funnel, new funnel, and what happens if I fix the show rate:

Metric	Old Funnel ($22/lead)	New Funnel ($9/lead)	Projected (20% Show)
Ad Spend	$3,256	$5,994	$5,994
Registrants	148	653	653
Attended	48	61	130
Show Rate	32%	9.3%	20%
Closed	14	24	50
Close Rate	29%	39%	39%
Immediate Revenue	$3,458	$6,578	$13,700
Cost Per Close	$233	$250	$120

Read that last line. My cost per close is nearly identical between the two funnels. The new funnel just did it at almost double the scale.

Cohort Lifetime Value: Why $5,994 in Ad Spend Returns $17,629

Immediate revenue: $6,578. Ad spend: $5,994. Day one I am $584 in the green.

But that is not how a subscription business works. These are quarterly memberships. The real question is: what is this cohort worth over time?

Based on our 12-month retention data (Theanna just hit our one-year anniversary live), here is what the full picture looks like:

Retention curve: 100% at signup, 75% at month 3, 55% at month 6, 38% at month 12.

Q1: $3,861
Q2: $2,896
Q3: $2,124
Q4: $1,466
Subtotal: $10,347

Q1: $2,717
Q2: $2,038
Q3: $1,494
Q4: $1,032
Subtotal: $7,282

Total projected cohort LTV: approximately $17,629.

Off $5,994 in ad spend, that is roughly $11,635 in net profit and a 2.9x ROAS.

I almost did not run this test. Let that sink in.

LTV Per Customer: The Number That Changes Everything

This is the number I keep coming back to:

$297 tier: $796 LTV
$247 tier: $662 LTV
Blended average: $735 LTV

My cost to acquire each customer is approximately $250. I am paying $250 to get back $735. That ratio is what lets me keep investing in growth.

And here is the thing. We have only been live for 12 months. I do not actually know what happens after month 12. If even half of that 38% sticks around for year two, LTV climbs past $850. I will find out soon enough.

What I Learned: Feelings Are Not Data

When I saw 61 people in a room where I expected 200, I felt like it failed. My brain went straight to: the new landing page was a mistake, I wasted $6K, I should have stuck with the old funnel.

But the data says something different:

My close rate went up. From 29% to 39%. The people who showed up were more ready to buy than any previous session.

My cost per close barely moved. $250 vs $233. For a $735 LTV customer, both numbers are excellent.

I got more total closes. 24 vs 14. That is 71% more customers from one webinar.

The only metric that got worse was show rate. And yes, 9.3% vs 32% is painful to look at. But show rate is a vanity metric if your close rate and unit economics are healthy. I would rather have 61 people show up who are ready to buy than 200 who are just browsing.

The Real Lesson: Wrong Friction vs Right Friction in SaaS Funnels

I originally thought removing friction was the move. Shorter form. Simpler copy. One-click signup. And it did work for volume. I more than 4x'd my registrations.

But what I actually removed was the qualifying mechanism for showing up, not for buying. The people who clicked a simple ad and signed up in 10 seconds were less committed to attending. But the ones who did attend? They were just as serious as my old audience. Maybe more.

So the landing page did not attract worse buyers. It attracted more casual registrants. The fix is not adding friction back. The fix is getting more of those 653 people into the room.

What I Am Doing Next to Improve Webinar Conversion

1. Fixing the show rate. This is the single biggest lever. If I can move show rate from 9.3% to even 20%, that is 131 attendees instead of 61. At a 39% close rate, that is 51 closes and over $37,000 in cohort LTV off the same ad spend. I am adding SMS reminders, a pre-webinar video, and a stronger email sequence leading up to the session.

2. Running it again at the same spend. The unit economics work. My cost per close is $250 for a $735 LTV customer. So I am running the same playbook again with the same budget and same low-friction landing page, but with a better system to get people to actually show up. I built a Zapier webhook that automatically adds the event to a registrant's calendar the moment they sign up. No extra clicks, no "add to calendar" button they forget to press. It just shows up. If that alone moves the show rate from 9.3% to even 15%, the results compound significantly.

3. Nurturing the no-shows. 592 people registered and did not show up. But that does not mean they are dead leads. People browse for a long time before they buy. If I am nurturing 600+ leads over the course of a year with replays, content, community wins, and founder stories, and even a small percentage convert later, that is revenue I have already paid for. The ad spend is sunk. Every future conversion from this list is pure profit.

The Bigger Picture: How to Evaluate SaaS Ad Spend

Every dollar I spend has to earn its way back. And this test proved that my funnel works. The webinar converts. The offer converts. The unit economics are healthy.

What did not work was my expectation of what success looks like. I was measuring show rate when I should have been measuring cost per close and LTV.

If you are a founder running ads and you see a "bad" number, do not panic. Do not kill the campaign. Wait for the full picture. Because sometimes what feels like a failure is actually your best-performing funnel yet.

Total ad spend: $5,994. Total projected revenue: $17,629. Lesson learned: trust the data, not your feelings.

Key Takeaways: SaaS Webinar Funnel Optimization

A 9.3% webinar show rate felt like a failure, but the close rate jumped from 29% to 39%
Cost per close was nearly identical ($250 vs $233) between the old and new funnels
24 closes from one webinar generated $6,578 in day-one revenue and $17,629 in projected cohort LTV
A 2.9x ROAS off $5,994 in Meta ad spend proves the unit economics work
Show rate is a vanity metric if your close rate and LTV are healthy
Reducing landing page friction increased volume 4x but decreased show rate, not buyer quality
The fix is not more friction. The fix is better activation: SMS reminders, calendar auto-adds, pre-webinar content
592 no-shows are not dead leads. Nurture sequences turn sunk ad spend into future profit
Never kill a campaign based on one metric. Wait for the full funnel data before deciding

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Hi! I'm Nomiki, founder of Theanna. I help women with ideas build companies through our 12-week program, Women Build Cool Sh*t. If you are a first-time female founder with an idea and the hunger to figure it out, come build with us. This blog is part of my journey to $1M ARR. I share everything: the wins, the losses, the revenue numbers, the experiments. Subscribe to follow along.