Google Ads for plumbers
Google Ads for plumbers, run by someone who was one.
Plumbing PPC that puts you above the free results from the day it goes live. Set up properly it fills a quiet week. Set up badly it quietly burns a few hundred a month on people who were never going to ring you.
In short
How do Google Ads work for a plumbing company?
In a search campaign you bid to appear above the free results when somebody searches for a plumber. It is pay per click: you are charged when someone clicks, not when you appear, and you set a daily budget. For plumbing it works because the person searching usually needs somebody today.
Why it suits plumbing
Nobody browses for a plumber.
Plumbing is one of the trades ads were made for. When somebody searches, they usually have a problem right now and they are going to ring one of the first few results. There is no long consideration, no shopping around, no coming back in a month.
That urgency is why plumbing clicks cost what they do. Everybody bidding knows the person on the other end is about to spend money, so the trick is not paying less per click. It is not paying for the clicks that were never going to become a job.
Planned work behaves differently. A bathroom is researched for weeks, so it needs a different approach and usually a different campaign.
What I actually do
Stop paying for the calls you do not want.
- Only bidding on jobs you want
- If you would rather not spend Saturday night on blocked drains, we do not bid on it. An account that brings in work you resent is a failed account, however cheap the clicks were.
- Blocking the clicks that waste money
- Without this you pay for people looking up DIY fixes, plumbing apprenticeships, parts suppliers and jobs three hours away. It is the single biggest leak in every plumbing account I have ever inherited.
- Ads that say the job and the area
- Your trade, the suburbs you cover, and whether you turn out after hours, in the space of a text message. Vague ads get clicked by everybody, which is the expensive kind of popular.
- Sending clicks to the right page
- Somebody searching for a blocked drain should not arrive on a home page listing every service you offer. They should land somewhere that talks about blocked drains, with your number at the top of it.
- Counting calls, not clicks
- Most plumbing enquiries arrive as a phone call, not a form, which is exactly the thing badly set up accounts fail to measure. If the tracking only counts form fills you will conclude the ads are not working while the phone is ringing.
- Watching it, week to week
- Pausing what is quietly draining money, leaning into whatever is bringing jobs in. Accounts left alone drift, and they drift expensively.
Couldn't recommend Stu more. Goes above and beyond to get the results, is upfront and explains everything he does. Is the only advertising company I have worked with who genuinely cares about your results.
What it costs
One fee to build it, one to run it.
Turn it on for a busy month, off for a quiet one. The fee is the same either way and I take nothing from your spend.
New Zealand dollars, GST added on top.
- To set it up
- $300one-off + GSTAccount built in your name, the searches worth bidding on worked out, the wasteful ones blocked, ads written and conversion tracking connected so we can see what actually produces calls.
- To run it
- $600a month + GSTWatching what is spending and what is producing, cutting the searches that waste money, and moving budget toward the ones bringing work in. Month to month, stop whenever you like.
Your ad budget is separate and is not included above. It goes straight to Google on your own account, every cent of it buys clicks or views, and you set it. Most trade businesses start somewhere between $30 and $50 a day.
What that buys depends on your trade and your area, because you are bidding against whoever else wants the same clicks. I can give you a rough idea before we start, but nobody knows the real numbers until the campaign has been running a few weeks and there is actual data to look at.
The honest bit
Ads stop the day you stop paying.
That is the trade. Ads rent you the top spot for as long as the budget lasts. Getting found properly builds something you keep, but it takes months rather than days.
Most plumbing companies end up wanting both: ads to get moving, search building underneath, then the ads eased back as the free results start doing the work.
Neither is worth starting if the site they land on gives nobody a reason to ring. Paying for clicks to a page like that is the most expensive mistake on this page.
Questions
Things plumbers ask me.
How much should a plumber spend on Google Ads?
There is no figure that works everywhere, because it depends entirely on what a click costs in your trade and your area. What matters is whether your budget buys enough clicks to learn anything. Spread too thin you get a handful a month, no pattern to read, and a wasted first month. If that is where your budget lands, I will tell you rather than take a setup fee anyway.
What do Google Ads cost for plumbers?
Two separate things. There is my fee for setting the account up and running it, a fixed figure you see before anything starts. Then there is your ad budget, which you set and which goes straight to Google. The cost per click for plumbing is not the cheapest, because the jobs are worth a lot and everybody knows it.
Is it worth it if I am only a small operation?
Sometimes very much so, because you can turn ads off the week you are full and back on when it goes quiet. That control suits a small plumbing business better than it suits a big one. It stops being worth it if you cannot take the work, or if your website gives people no reason to ring.
Are Google Ads, AdWords and PPC the same thing?
Near enough. AdWords is the old name Google dropped years ago. PPC stands for pay per click, which is how search ads are charged, so PPC for plumbers and Google Ads for plumbers usually mean the same job. Anyone offering you any of the three means this.
What about Local Services Ads?
They are a separate Google product, available in some countries and some trades, and they work differently to the campaigns on this page. If you are somewhere they are offered and they suit your business, I will tell you and point you at them rather than pretend the campaigns here are the only option.
Should I bid on emergency plumber searches?
Only if you genuinely turn out, and only if the price is right when you get there. Emergency plumber is one of the most expensive searches in the trade because everybody wants it, so it pays for itself on a real call-out and loses badly on a tyre-kicker. It is worth running as its own campaign so you can see exactly what it returns.
Will I get emergency call-outs at two in the morning?
Only if you want them. Ads can be scheduled, so if you do not turn out overnight we simply do not run then. That is a setting most accounts never touch, and it is a common way for plumbers to pay for calls they were never going to take.
Let’s talk
Not sure whether ads stack up for your plumbing business?
Tell me what sort of plumbing work you want more of and where you cover. I will tell you straight whether ads are the right move for you, or whether your money is better spent elsewhere first.