New SAAS product: Adwords or GetApp/FindTheBest type approach for marketing?

I have a new task management app. Born out of frustration that the current models out there are lacking in a bunch of features you would think would be obvious plus I added a new feature which I think gives it an edge on every other company out there. I do have the disadvantage of not having some features which might be important like a mobile app version and things like that but what I have I feel is more than capable of competing with the other software out there so I wanted to get to market and let my customers have an influence on the further development of the product.

I hope to go live within a couple of months, currently in beta testing. So here's my problem. I have a limited budget after the development costs of the product. Credit cards are maxed and I will be paying for marketing out of my own wages.

That means a budget of $1k per month. So I am looking to hit the ground running. I have invested a lot of time into figuring out how adwords works, the problem is until i start a real campaign i wont know the cpc.

According to the search tool its in the region of $8-$12. I will explore that further as I believe the $8+ is based on top spot which isnt worth competing with the likes of Wrike for anyway but I explored another option.

I checked out sites like getApp.com, findthebest.com and a few others. I am waiting on feeback from the others but getapp.com charge $4 per click and they estimate 15% is achievable if I'm on the first page. That would get me 250 clicks for my $1k, they also say click through to trial conversions are around 15% and some educated guessing tells me around 7-10% of trials convert for similar companies in my industry. So that works out at around $250-$500 per customer.

I couldn't find any stats on it for my specific industry but I expect from my own experience if a company choose your product given the time and effort and commitment they put in to getting used to it as long as the product is stable and continues to improve then the average customer should last 2-5 years.

An average customer will net me approx $1k per annum so I am happy enough with those costs per customer albeit they are based on a lot of maybes at this point. That said I think the $4 per click is a good starting point because adwords has a lot of variables wheras getapp I can make reasonable assumptions with the data they have given me and the fixed cost per click.

My question for anyone with project management software marketing experience or marketing experience in general is there another alternative worth considering or am I on the right track. Of course ill explore SEO, social media, getting involved with related forums and helping out while subtly getting a pitch in for my product but those will take time so I need something that will get me customers in the door without breaking the bank.

One thing I left out was getApp said if I went with the $1k package I only get on the 2nd page, with $3k package I'm on the first page, they estimate 160 clicks on the first page per month so id imagine the 2nd page is way less so not viable and even 160 is pretty low IMO.

Also my initial aim is to get traction and get more solid numbers on CPA and all those important variables so I can make better projections and determine if its a viable product, at that point I will try and get a loan or investments to increase the marketing and development spend so this is a bootstrap job just to get people in the door.

I am a search engine marketing consultant. Have been using SEO and managing PPC campaigns for 15+ years. One of my current Adwords clients is an app creation client. I know the space quite well. Here is my advice:

1) $1k/mo will get you very little results unfortunately. Your best bet is to front end the first month with more budget, because you need a certain volume of data before you can make INFORMED decisions on whether it makes sense to continue and/or how to improve your Adwords campaign performance.

2) do not ignore bing/yahoo network. Some of your competitors do ; ) Generally your CPC will be lower there.

3) be smart about when you advertise. Performance on weekends and late night generally is diminished.

4) 7-10% conversion rates? Not happening. I would expect max 5% in your niche.

SEO

Organic SEO is a better long-term approach, IF you can achieve top 5 rankings. I personally would run adwords for a month or two, determine ROI... and if not feasible, move your budget to proper SEO, content development, and link building.

SE

If your budget is limited, PPC ads aren't likely to give you the biggest bang for your buck. I'd suggest a more organic approach to getting customers.

• Your ROI will be highest with blogging. Research what you customers would be interested in (productivity tips might be relevant in your case), and start writing interesting content around that. Promote your blog and the readership will trickle down as paying customers for your app.
• Reach out to prospects already using a competitor and pitch them on your app. Provide an extended trial so it's risk-free to take your app for a spin.