Service · Google Ads
Search, Local Service Ads, and Performance Max — for service businesses that need calls this month, not slides about Q3. Phrase + exact match only. Negative keywords day one. No broad-match wastage.
Google Ads, the way it should be run
Most service businesses are running broad-match Google Ads with no negative list, sending traffic to a homepage, and tracking nothing past click-through-rate. They're paying $4–$12 per click for searches that have nothing to do with their business. We've audited 200+ accounts. The same five mistakes show up every time. Here's how we fix them.
I started running paid search at 19. First client was a local HVAC shop. The agency they fired was charging $2,000/month on a $3,500/month ad spend, getting them maybe 14 leads with a $250 CPL. We rebuilt the account from scratch in two weeks: phrase + exact match only, 280-keyword negative list, four service-specific landing pages, LSA application filed week one. By day 90 they were at $3,200 spend and 41 leads. Effective CPL was $78. I've used the same playbook on 200+ accounts since.
What we don't do: "manage" ad accounts at the same settings the previous agency had them on. We don't run brand-awareness campaigns for service businesses. We don't enable broad match without aggressive bid caps and a mature negative list. We don't run Performance Max until we have at least 50 conversions/month of clean signal — anything less and PMax is just expensive Google generosity.
What's in a Google Ads engagement
We don't "manage" your account. We rebuild it. Within the first 14 days of a new engagement, here's what gets done.
Where Google Ads accounts bleed cash
If you're seeing a CPL above the benchmark for your category, it's almost always one (or several) of these. None of them require advanced expertise to spot — but they require you to actually look at the account, which is the part most agencies skip.
How Google Ads stacks with other channels
Search + LSA do 60–80% of the lead generation work in most service business funnels. The other 20–40% comes from layering. Here's how Google Ads connects to the rest of the stack.
Real numbers from real accounts
Three before-and-after snapshots from accounts we rebuilt in the last 18 months. Industry + region anonymized, numbers exact.
$4,200/mo Google Ads through a national agency. After rebuild: $3,800/mo, CPL $81, monthly booked jobs 18→47.
Previous setup was 80% Meta. Flipped to Search + LSA dominant. CPL dropped $118 → $47, jobs +62%.
LSA was off entirely. Added LSA with disputes, restructured Search. Effective CPL through LSA is $32 after disputes; Search is $48.
Who this is for
Google Ads management is most effective at certain budget thresholds and business stages. Here's where we fit and where we don't.
Pricing
We don't take a percentage of ad spend. We don't mark up media. Your ad budget stays in your Google Ads account, billed directly by Google to your card. The retainer covers strategy, build, ongoing management, weekly optimization, and dashboard reporting. CPL guarantee: if CPL isn't down 20%+ within 60 days of launch, the next month's retainer is free.
Common questions
Both. Google Search Ads have higher control and broader reach but higher per-click cost. LSA has lower control but the green Google Guarantee badge and pay-per-lead pricing (with disputes). For most service categories where LSA is available, run both. LSA dominates the top of the page, Search picks up the searches LSA doesn't qualify for. We typically split budget 40% LSA / 60% Search, adjusted weekly based on effective CPL.
Existing accounts: rebuilt and live within 5–7 business days. New accounts (no Google Ads history): 7–10 business days. LSA: 5–10 business days from application to live, dependent on Google's background check. We start moving on day one of the engagement; we don't "discovery phase" you for two months.
Depends on the category, metro size, and competition density. We publish CPL benchmarks for 100+ service verticals on our industries pages. Quick reference: HVAC $55–$85, plumbing $50–$90, electrical $70–$130, dental $50–$90, lawyers $80–$400 by case type, auto repair $28–$55. LSA effective CPLs typically run 30–40% lower after disputes.
We don't enable PMax until you have 50+ conversions/month of clean signal. Below that, PMax is expensive Google generosity. Once the data is there, PMax can add 15–25% incremental volume — but it has to be set up with conversion-value bidding, audience signals, and asset-group structure. We've seen plenty of accounts where PMax was running on autopilot and burning $2k/month with zero attribution. We'll tell you on day one whether you're ready for it.
Depends on the audit. If your existing account has 90+ days of clean conversion data and decent Quality Scores, we rebuild inside it (preserving the data). If the account is a mess (broken tracking, no negatives, broad match everywhere), we start a new one and migrate budget over 30 days. We tell you which approach during the audit.
We guarantee a 20% CPL reduction within 60 days of launch, or the next month's retainer is free. We don't guarantee a specific dollar CPL because that depends on factors outside our control (your category benchmark, metro competition, seasonality). What we control is the relative improvement, and that's what we put in writing.
We work primarily with US and Canadian service businesses. We've done UK and AU work occasionally. Non-English markets we typically refer to local specialists — we know our limits.
Weekly: 4-line email update (leads, CPL, booked jobs, what we're testing). Monthly: 30-min review call on screen with the dashboard open. Always: live dashboard access (Looker Studio or Google Ads native) you can pull up anytime. We don't send 40-page PDFs because nobody reads them. The dashboard is the report.
Related services
Score your site free. The $14 deep audit comes right after — named competitors, screenshot evidence, ranked fix list. Or book a 30-minute call.