Where Google Ads Earns Its Place
Somebody types what they need, an ad appears, and you pay when they click it. That is the whole appeal: you can be in front of a buyer today instead of waiting for organic rankings to arrive.
So the question is not how many clicks a budget can buy. It is which searches are worth paying for. A small budget disappears fast on the wrong searches, the wrong locations and people who were never going to buy anything.
What I Do for You
Your ad budget should be buying customers, not clicks. All of this is included in the weekly fee.
- Campaign setup: campaigns built around the products and services that actually make money for the business
- Search targeting: deciding which searches belong in the campaign, and watching what people are really typing
- Location targeting: the budget going towards people who can genuinely become customers, which matters more for a local business than almost anything else in the account
- Negative keywords: blocking the searches that are clearly wrong for you before they eat the budget. Jobs, DIY, free, cheap, research, whatever does not apply
- Ad copy and landing pages: the ad matching what was searched for, and the page it leads to making the next step obvious
- Call and enquiry tracking: set up where it makes sense, so we can see which parts of the campaign produce calls and enquiries rather than visits
- Ongoing optimisation: reviewing the searches, the costs and the enquiries and changing the campaign, rather than leaving it running untouched
Local ads are different
Why Byron Bay Changes the Settings
Byron Bay is a tourist destination. That's great for some businesses. It is not so great if you are a Byron Bay plumber paying for somebody in Melbourne to click your ad while they plan a holiday.
Google has a setting deciding whether ads go to people who are in a place, or to anybody interested in that place. For a local service business, getting it wrong wastes a surprising amount of money. For an accommodation business the opposite is often true, because the person in Melbourne planning a trip is exactly who you want.
There is no one correct setting. That is why I don't take somebody else's campaign and change the business name over the top. I look at who your customers are and where they are when they're ready to buy.
Which Searches Are Worth Paying For
The best searches show clear buying intent: the service plus a place, or the urgent version of the service. Informational and DIY searches usually are not worth a click. The examples below are an electrician's, and the list for a restaurant or a clinic looks nothing like them.
Worth paying for
- Your service and your town, “electrician Byron Bay”
- A specific service, “emergency electrician”
- A product you actually sell
- A strong buying signal, “electrician near me”
Usually worth blocking
- Job searches, “electrician jobs”
- DIY searches, “how to fix a power point”
- Free searches, “free electrical inspection”
- Research, “how much does an electrician earn”
Two separate numbers
What Google Ads Costs
There are two costs and only one of them is mine. You control the budget that goes to Google.
| Your ad spend | paid directly to Google from your own account, and you choose the budget. Smaller campaigns can start from around $200 a month, though whether that is enough depends on what you sell and how competitive the searches are |
|---|---|
| My management | included in the weekly SEO fee, with no percentage of your ad spend charged on top |
| Your account | opened in your name, and it stays yours |
| Stopping | pause the campaign whenever you like. No minimum term, and the account is not held hostage to keep you paying |
Getting started
How Your Campaign Gets Built
We talk about your business
What you sell, which jobs are worth getting, and where you can actually serve customers.
I build the account
Campaigns, searches, locations, negative keywords, ads and tracking, all set up before anything spends a cent.
The ads go live
Within a few days, subject to Google's approval, and watched closely rather than left alone.
The campaign gets adjusted
Searches change, costs change, and some searches turn out more useful than others. The goal is not to spend the budget. It is to make the budget produce something.
Ads Now, Search Work Underneath
Google Ads and SEO do different jobs. Ads stop the day you stop paying for them. Local SEO is slower to arrive and carries on working after the spending stops.
For a lot of small businesses the answer is both, with the ads carrying the enquiries while the search work builds underneath. What the search side looks like after a few months is on the results page.
See my SEO servicesQuestions
Google Ads FAQs
The ones people ask before they spend anything. Ring me if yours is missing.
How much do Google Ads cost?
Two separate numbers. Your ad budget goes straight to Google from your own account and you choose it. Smaller campaigns can start around $200 a month, though whether that is enough depends on what you sell and what the searches cost in your market. My management is part of the weekly fee.
Do you take a percentage of my ad spend?
No. Management is included in the weekly fee, so raising your budget does not raise what you pay me. You can spend more with Google, or less, and my invoice is the same either way.
Who owns the Google Ads account?
You do. The account is opened in your name, the billing is yours, and the history stays with you if we stop working together. I'm not holding an account hostage to keep you paying.
Can you target just my local area?
Yes, and getting that right matters more here than almost anywhere. People all over Australia search about Byron Bay, so a local trade usually wants the setting that shows ads to people actually in the area. Accommodation is often the opposite. I check it before anything spends.
How quickly can Google Ads start?
Once the account is built and Google has approved the ads, they can be appearing within a few days. That is the main reason to run Ads when you need enquiries sooner.
Is SEO still worth it if I'm running ads?
Usually, yes. The two are not interchangeable. One buys you a position for as long as the budget lasts, the other builds something you keep. Most businesses running ads want the organic side coming along underneath rather than instead.
Do I need a big advertising budget?
No, but a small budget means being more selective. I'd rather run a tight campaign on the searches most likely to produce a customer than spread a small budget thinly across hundreds of loosely related phrases.