Google Ads costs for UK trades
Google Ads costs for UK trades: how to work out what a click is worth
There is no single price for a Google Ads click. It depends on your trade, your area and how urgent the search is. Here is how to find your own figures.
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Google Ads is an auction, so there is no fixed price for a click. What you pay depends on how many businesses bid on the same search, how urgent the search is, where the searcher is and how relevant Google judges your ad and landing page to be.
Urgent searches usually cost the most. Someone searching for an emergency plumber or a locksmith at night is ready to book, so businesses bid hard for them. Planned work, such as a new kitchen or a garden design, is often cheaper per click but takes longer to turn into a job.
Key points
Area matters too. Clicks in large cities with many competitors tend to cost more than clicks in smaller towns.
The most reliable figures are your own. Google Keyword Planner, free inside a Google Ads account, shows estimated bid ranges for the searches you care about, in the places you work. Use those numbers before setting a budget.
Then work backwards from what a job is worth. As an illustration: if a click costs £5 and one visitor in ten becomes an enquiry, each enquiry costs £50. If one enquiry in three becomes a job, each job costs £150 in clicks. Whether that is worth paying depends on what the job earns you.
What this means for you
The landing page decides most of that sum. A page that turns more visitors into enquiries lowers the cost of every job, which is why we build the website and the tracking before running ads.
Ads stop when the budget stops. A website that is well set up for local search keeps working alongside them, and over time it can bring in enquiries that cost nothing per click.
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Because a single job can be worth hundreds or thousands of pounds, many businesses compete for the same urgent searches, and the auction pushes the price of a click up.
Google allows some ads that lead to a phone call, but most campaigns need a landing page. A page built for the ad gives the people you pay for something convincing to land on.
Target specific local searches, such as “emergency plumber Macclesfield”, ahead of broad terms. Add negative keywords to block searches that never turn into work. Improve the landing page so more clicks become enquiries.
Use Google Keyword Planner inside a Google Ads account. Enter the searches your customers use and set the location to the places you work, and it shows estimated bid ranges.
The website first. Ads send people to a page, and that page decides how many of them get in touch. Once the site converts and the tracking works, ads can add enquiries on top.
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