Google Ads success story · Payroll and HR software provider

How Paylocity lifted conversion value 62% by fixing the link between its ads and its CRM.

Name: Overtop Media Digital Marketing
Address: 933 Louise Ave Suite 101-18, Charlotte, NC, 28204, US
Telephone: (704) 237-0707
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Only 12% of Paylocity’s Google Ads leads could be found in its CRM. Until that was fixed, Google could not learn which leads turned into sales. Fixing it came first; better bidding followed.

Business: Paylocity
Market: Not stated
Goal: More high-value business leads

Two colleagues reviewing figures on a tablet at a wooden meeting table

The results.

Google did not publish the period these results are compared with.

62%lift in conversion value
19%increase in first-time appointments
61%increase in the marketing-qualified lead conversion rate

Paylocity internal data (self-reported), as cited by Google in a Think with Google article published in November 2025. No comparison period was stated.

The challenge.

Paylocity sells payroll and HR software to businesses from small firms to large enterprises. The leads that matter most are the ones its sales team qualifies.

But only 12% of the leads from Google Ads could be matched to records in its CRM. Google could not see which leads became sales-qualified, so it could not bid for more of them.

Find the gapOnly 12% of ad leads matched the CRM.
Fix the match keysClick ID, email and phone on every lead.
Pick the right conversionSales-qualified leads as the main goal.
Bid on valueValue-based bidding learns from real sales stages.

What they did.

Enhanced conversions · Google Ads Data Manager · Value-based bidding on sales-qualified leads

Found the matching gap: Enhanced conversions through Google Ads Data Manager showed where leads were being lost between the ad click and the CRM.
Fixed the match keys: The Google click ID was added to every lead alongside email and phone, and the upload files were cleaned up. Always including the click ID was the breakthrough.
Bid on sales-qualified leads: With leads matching, value-based bidding was tested with sales-qualified leads as the main conversion and conversion values attached, so the campaigns aimed for leads the sales team wanted.

Why it worked.

Our read on the decisions behind the numbers, and what any business can take from them.

Data first, bidding second: Smart bidding is only as good as the results it can see. Fixing the match rate gave it something real to learn from.
The right conversion: A sales-qualified lead is much closer to revenue than a form fill. Bidding on it lifted value, not just volume.
Sales and marketing on one number: Both teams could now see the same leads and the same results, which made the gains easy to trust.

How we would run this play for your business.

You do not need a national budget to use the same ideas. This is how Overtop Media Digital Marketing puts them to work in our google ads management.

Check your match rate: We start by measuring how many of your ad leads can be found in your CRM. If the number is low, that is the first fix, built into our analytics and conversion tracking work.
Send back the stages that matter: Our team feeds qualified leads, meetings and closed deals back to Google so it learns what a good lead looks like for you.
Value the leads: Different deals are worth different amounts. We set values so bidding favors the leads your sales team wants most.
Report in pipeline: You see qualified leads, meetings and pipeline from Google Ads, the same numbers your sales team uses.