Forwrd
Steuerbot • Case Study • YouTube Ads (incl. Creative Production) & Google Search Ads

Fixed budgets. No room to scale spend. A need to make every euro work harder.

Steuerbot came to us in October 2022 with a clear constraint: fixed budgets, no room to scale spend, and a need to make every euro work harder.

Steuerbot

The numbers

0% reduction in CPA
0x lower CPA vs other marketing activities
0% improvement in CTR thanks to the videos we produced

About Steuerbot

Steuerbot is a German tax filing app that makes the annual Steuererklärung — one of the most dreaded tasks in the German calendar — fast, simple, and stress-free. Built for everyday Germans who want to get their tax return done without an accountant, Steuerbot guides users through the process step by step and maximises their refund automatically.

The constraint

Doing more with the same.

Every improvement had to come from doing more with the same: sharper targeting, tighter creative, smarter bidding, and the discipline to hold the line on efficiency across multiple quarters.

Consistent, compounding efficiency gains.

We managed YouTube and Search Ads for Steuerbot from October 2022 through Q1 2024, and the trajectory tells a clear story: consistent, compounding efficiency gains across every meaningful metric.

The story

Steuerbot came to us in October 2022 with a clear constraint: fixed budgets, no room to scale spend, and a need to make every euro work harder. They weren't looking for volume — they were looking for efficiency. What they found was a team that could deliver both.

Having built our YouTube expertise with SaaS clients like Kittl, we brought the same performance-first approach to Steuerbot — applying it to a category with its own unique dynamics: a highly seasonal product, a very specific German-speaking audience, and a conversion goal tied to one of the most personal financial decisions a person makes each year.

The challenge

Tax apps live and die by seasonality. The bulk of demand is concentrated in a narrow window — which means there is limited margin for error and limited time to optimize. You either get the structure right from the start, or you burn the budget during the only period that matters.

On top of that, Steuerbot operated within fixed budget constraints. This ruled out the most common lever for improving results — simply spending more to generate scale.

The broader account was running campaigns too, but at a fraction of the efficiency. Our brief was to prove that a structured, expert-managed approach could dramatically outperform the status quo — within the same platform, with the same product.

The work

We managed YouTube and Search Ads for Steuerbot from October 2022 through Q1 2024, and the trajectory tells a clear story: consistent, compounding efficiency gains across every meaningful metric.

Starting in Q4 2022, we built the account structure from the ground up — campaigns, bidding strategy, audience segmentation, and creative approach all aligned around a single goal: app installs at the lowest sustainable cost.

Campaign testing, filtering and audience optimisation animation
CPA reduction and growth optimisation animation

CPA: From first quarter to last

By Q1 2024, CPA had fallen by 65% compared to our first quarter. Not through luck or a single optimisation, but through methodical improvement across six quarters of active management.

Outperforming the broader account

Perhaps the clearest indicator is the disparity between our campaigns and the rest of the account. Throughout the partnership, our managed campaigns delivered a CPA more than 8x lower than what the broader account was achieving on other campaigns.

Same platform, same product, same audience pool. The difference was structure, expertise, and relentless focus on efficiency.

Mobile YouTube ad CTR optimisation animation

Efficiency across every metric

CPA may have been the headline metric, but the improvements extended well beyond it. CTR improved by more than 250% from the first quarter to the last — a sign that our creative and targeting approach was increasingly connecting with the right audience at the right moment.

Cost per view dropped significantly, average watch time improved, and CPC fell in tandem — a rare combination that signals genuine creative and structural quality, not just lower bids.

YouTube for a seasonal SaaS product

One of the less obvious achievements here is making YouTube work consistently for a product with sharp seasonal demand. Most advertisers either over-invest outside of peak season or under-invest when it matters most.

We built a rhythm that kept efficiency high year-round while ensuring the account was optimally positioned to capture demand during tax season — the moments when Steuerbot needed to perform most.

The creative

We handled the full creative process end to end: strategy, scripting, creator management, and post-production. Three hero videos drove the bulk of the performance — each built around a different psychological angle, and each designed to stop a German taxpayer mid-scroll.

Three angles, one goal: getting people to file.

The commuter hook

“Du pendelst jeden Tag zur Arbeit?”

Germany has millions of daily commuters — and most of them have no idea their travel costs are tax-deductible. This creative opened with a question that made viewers stop and think: wait, does that apply to me? The immediate relevance pulled people in before they had a chance to skip. A relatable life situation, reframed as a missed financial opportunity — and Steuerbot as the solution.

The authority play

Steuerfabi Werbevideo

We partnered with Steuerfabi — Fabian Walter, one of Germany's most trusted tax educators with over a million followers across TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube — to create a creator-led ad that felt like advice from a friend, not a product pitch. His audience already trusted him on tax matters. Pairing that trust with Steuerbot's product created an endorsement that no standard ad format could replicate.

The objection handler

“Du bist dir nicht sicher, ob das Einreichen einer Steuererklarung uber unsere App sicher ist?”

For many Germans, handing personal financial data to an app is a genuine barrier — especially for first-time users. Rather than ignoring this concern, we leaned into it directly. The creative acknowledged the hesitation, addressed it head-on, and turned the objection itself into a reason to trust. This kind of pre-emptive reassurance is one of the most underused tools in performance creative, and here it worked.

Together, these three creatives covered the full conversion funnel: awareness through relatability, consideration through authority, and conversion through trust. Each was scripted and produced by our team with a clear performance brief — not just to look good, but to drive installs.

While we no longer offer ad creative as a standalone service, this work reflects the deep creative expertise that continues to inform how we think about campaign strategy and structure for every client we work with.

Results that speak for themselves

A sustained 65% reduction in CPA. A CPA 8x lower than the rest of the account. More than 250% improvement in CTR.

All within fixed budgets, with no ability to simply spend more to grow. This reflects what happens when YouTube and Search are managed with a strong understanding of the platforms — going beyond basic campaign setup to building structures that scale over time and creating content that engages users before prompting a conversion.

Yann Durand
Ask me about a free audit

Meet Yann Durand

Co-founder of Forwrd. Google Ads, YouTube Ads and performance marketing specialist.

Hi, I'm Yann. I've spent the last 10+ years living and breathing Google Ads, YouTube and performance marketing — and honestly, I still love it.

I started out at a leading global agency in the UK after a first-class master's in digital marketing. Then I moved to the Netherlands to run Google Ads for Bestseller on brands like Jack & Jones, Vero Moda and Only, spending millions across 16 brands and 15 markets simultaneously.

The chapter that really changed things was Vienna. At waterdrop, I took non-brand Google Ads from €200k to €6M in revenue. That experience became the backbone of a system for D2C brands trying to scale with Search, Shopping and YouTube Ads.

After seeing the bad shape of most Google Ads accounts out there, I built Forwrd to go after the untapped potential most agencies leave behind. Where agencies stay on the surface, we go after the moves that actually shift revenue.

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