Three months and $3,200 later, I had exactly 4 paying customers from Reddit ads.
That’s $800 per customer. For a product that costs $49.
Yeah. Not great.
The Problem with Reddit Ads
On paper, Reddit ads look amazing. CPC as low as $0.20 – that’s 50-70% cheaper than Facebook. CPM around $3.50 – way lower than LinkedIn or YouTube. Users are supposedly 27% more likely to purchase compared to other platforms.
So I went all in. Targeted specific subreddits where my audience hangs out. A/B tested creatives – different headlines, images, CTAs. Used the Reddit Pixel for retargeting. My CTR was 1.2% – better than the 0.5% average.
But clicks weren’t converting. People would land on my page and bounce within 10 seconds.
After installing session recording software, I discovered the truth: half my “clicks” weren’t real visitors. They’d register as a pageview, stay for 2 seconds, then vanish.
I found a Reddit thread where someone ran an experiment: 99% of their Reddit ad clicks were fraudulent. Bot clicks, misclicks, accidental taps. The actual human engagement was near zero.
The core problem? Redditors hate ads. They use ad blockers religiously. When ads slip through, the instinct is to scroll past or downvote. This isn’t Facebook where users mindlessly consume sponsored content.
The Organic Approach
After burning through my budget, I tried something different. Zero ad spend. Just being genuinely helpful in relevant subreddits.
First month was brutal. Hours of writing thoughtful comments, answering questions. Maybe 200 profile visits total. A handful of signups. Almost gave up twice.
But around week 6, something shifted. People started recognizing my username. They’d reply “oh hey, you helped me with X last week.” By month three, I was getting more signups than I ever got from ads – and better quality leads.
The Technical Challenge
Finding the right threads is the hard part. Here’s the math:
| Thread Type | Comments | Your Visibility |
|---|---|---|
| Hot/Trending | 500+ | Buried at bottom, nobody sees you |
| Rising | 50-100 | Might be seen, low probability |
| New/Fresh | 0-10 | High visibility, OP actually reads |
The key insight: visibility matters more than volume. A response on a 3-comment thread beats 100 responses buried in popular posts.
I built a tool to automate finding these threads: Wappkit Reddit. It filters posts by comment count across multiple subreddits simultaneously.
# My daily workflow
1. Set filters: < 10 comments + relevant keywords
2. Scan 5 subreddits at once
3. Export list of threads worth engaging
4. Engage with 10-15 threads
5. Total time: ~15-20 minutes
UI isn’t pretty – not gonna lie, it’s rough around the edges. But it saves 2+ hours of manual scrolling every day.
Practical Tips That Work
Pick 3-5 subreddits maximum. Go deep instead of wide. Learn the culture, the inside jokes, what gets upvoted vs buried.
Never mention your product in the first month. Just help people. Build reputation first. When you eventually DO mention what you built, it feels natural.
Let them come to you. Best conversions happen when people click your profile out of curiosity and reach out themselves.
Results Comparison
Reddit Ads (3 months)
- Spend: $3,200
- Customers: 4
- Cost per acquisition: $800
- Customer LTV: ~$150
- ROI: -86%
Organic Reddit (3 months)
- Spend: $0 (time investment: ~45 hours)
- Customers: 12
- Cost per acquisition: ~$0
- Customer LTV: ~$200 (higher retention)
- ROI: Positive
The organic customers stick around longer because they already trusted me before buying. They’d seen me help others. They knew I wasn’t just trying to sell them something.
When Reddit Ads Actually Make Sense
I’m not saying never run Reddit ads. They can work for:
- Retargeting warm audiences – people who already know your brand
- Brand awareness at scale – if you have budget and just need eyeballs
- Testing messaging – quick way to see which value props resonate
But for cold customer acquisition? Organic beats paid every time on this platform.
The Long Game
Building presence on Reddit takes time. There’s no shortcut. The people winning there now started 6+ months ago. They put in the work when nobody was watching.
But here’s the upside: most competitors won’t do this work. They’ll throw money at ads, get mediocre results, and declare Reddit doesn’t work.
That’s your advantage.
What’s your experience with Reddit marketing? I’m curious what’s working for others – drop a comment below.