One of the earliest forms of search engine advertising was Google Ads. With a landscape filled with many different advertising options, many contractors and home services businesses devalue paid search. Some even wonder whether choosing Google Ads over other possibilities is really in their best interest.
Statistics show that expert Google Ads advertising is vital to building repeatable and scalable marketing. The power of placing your brand atop the search engine results page using Google Ads is undeniable.
At Valve+Meter, we help contractors and home services businesses achieve growth when you stop viewing marketing as a cost by embracing data and statistics.
Understanding Google Ads as an Asset, not an Expense
Even as search engine marketing has evolved, Google Ads remains one of the most effective tools for building a sustainable marketing strategy. Statistics continue to bear out the value of using paid search in search engines, including Google Ads and Bing.
The key benefits of Google Ads are reaching exact target audiences at the top of the search engine results page, filling gaps within other paid media and organic SEO strategies, and providing cost-effective insights into new opportunities.
Reaching Your Ideal Homeowner
Successful marketing campaigns carefully consider the ideal buyer persona. The finest online advertising model is only impactful when the right eyes see it. A billboard in the middle of a forest cannot be effective.
The high efficiency of Google Ads to connect your contractor business with your ideal audience continues to improve. Beyond bidding on specific service keywords in Google Ads, paid search allows advertisers to hone in on the most relevant audiences.
A general Google Ads campaign may set parameters around a geographic location and demographics, including age and gender.
Most contractors believe they know their target audience. Performance marketing uses data to verify and fine-tune ad spending.
When the digital marketing team at Valve+Meter builds a Google Ads campaign, the first step is auditing a client’s current account. During this discovery process, data emerges about your current audience, content gaps, and visibility within search engines.
The second step in professional Google Ads campaigns is competitive research, including tracking Google Ads and examining highly effective copywriting. It’s not simply about bidding to win Google Ads. Paid search marketing must engage the ideal audience to click your ad.
Finally, great Google Ads monitoring and fine-tunes ad groups to hone in on the optimal audience. This includes writing a great paid search ad, adding negative keywords to ad groups, adding additional layers of filters, and designing a highly impactful landing page.
Since you, as the advertiser, pay only when someone clicks your Google Ads campaign, search engines have the incentive to place the most vetted ads at the top of the search engine results page (SERP) and across the Google display network that reaches more than 90% of internet users.
The combination of highly researched copywriting, negative keywords, and focused bidding helps increase impressions and clicks in Google Ads, Bing Ads, and social media paid search. This leads to a tertiary benefit of paid search wherein you can test hypotheses.
Landing page data informs your Google Ads campaign strategy. Marketers hone in on the ideal keywords and audience demographics within the Google Ads platform and delve deeper into negative keywords.
These steps and optimizing ad auctions realize better ROI. Performance marketing also provides responsive revisions to landing pages and follows the data to help you plan intelligently for expanded marketing.
Filling Gaps
Many contractors have limited time and resources to create high-quality and highly effective content. Additionally, organic content with best SEO practices requires time to be crawled, indexed, and rank well in search engines.
For these reasons, nearly every Google Ads marketing campaign uses ads and well-designed landing pages to fill content gaps. Initially, a landing page can tell your business’s story even if your website has deficiencies.
If your services suit a diverse audience, Google Ads campaigns can connect specific audiences to unique landing pages, providing highly impactful engagement. Designing a landing page requires less time and expense than most organic content.
The strongest marketing campaigns view Google Ads and organic content as symbiotic rather than separate. When content ranks well in search engine results pages, Google Ads campaigns can be reduced.
If there are gaps in content or an algorithm update adversely impacts organic performance, Google Ads campaigns can be quickly increased to prevent loss of revenue. Paid search specialists constantly monitor campaigns, ad rank, and organic search performance.
Adjusting strategy to optimize marketing spend is vital to the success of Google Ads marketing. The goal is not to have the highest ROI because this leaves potential customers lost to competitors. Paid search helps your visibility in Google Ads when you are least likely to appear in organic searches.
Insights into New Opportunities
Google Ads may be the greatest keyword research tool available to your contractor business. There are certainly a number of powerful tools used to build effective keyword research for organic content.
There are limitations to general research tools that constrain most marketing campaigns. Performance marketing at Valve+Meter recognizes the potential knowledge stored within Google Ads to gain insights into the smartest content marketing and SEO planning.
As powerful as Google Ads campaigns are at helping contractors collect data and track audience interaction, one of the greatest capabilities is extracting the exact keywords directly from Google Ads. When you use the terms homeowners use to find your paid search ad, your content and SEO team can craft organic content in the most cost-effective manner possible.
The ultimate goal of content marketing is reducing wasted ad spend and maximizing return on investment (ROI). This is a primary reason many contractors choose to work with Valve+Meter.
Our team practices math before marketing to test hypotheses and use data to drive marketing strategies. Google Ads drives interaction with your brand and provides incredibly fast and accurate insights into the specific keywords driving interaction with your contractor business.
To identify new audiences, organic SEO specialists use Google Ads to test hypotheses. The long-term goal of organic content is to create strong, highly influential brand messaging. Instead of speculating, Google Ads allows contractors to verify the potential new audiences, monitor interaction, and measure the results.
More than any other marketing channel, Google Ads reveals relevant keywords and provides keyword phrases to inform organic content. The subsequent data informs your marketing teams where your contractor business will likely grow.
When organic content is crafted for where your business is heading, you spend less on marketing and stay ahead of competitors. This is yet another reason why Google Ads stays so influential within performance marketing.
Data-Driven Marketing
Deciphering the differences between marketing tools can be difficult for contractors and home services businesses. Fortunately, performance marketing eliminates the guesswork. By auditing the unique needs of your business, every dollar you spend is deliberate and based on research.
So many advertising options are a testament to the array of platforms and broad landscape audiences now use. A digital marketing strategy includes six components beginning with Google Ads and including:
Display Advertising
Invaluable for retargeting, display ads connect with potential leads building on brand awareness. Ultimately, display advertising is extremely effective at accelerating conversions. One of the key benefits of display advertising is reaching users across multiple platforms. Beyond Google Ads and Bing Ads, display advertising is an effective tool in social media and targeting audiences across Google display networks.
Google Local Services Ads (LSA)
A high-quality method of reaching local homeowners is Google Local Services Ads. This is a pay-per-call advertising campaign. Ads on Search and Google Local Services pages serve potential leads in your chosen area. Instead of directing homeowners to a landing page, LSA immediately connects homeowners to your business. LSA is highly valuable in a paid media strategy because of it.
Paid Social Media
Like Google Ads, paid social media engages with audiences across platforms via advertising. Organic social media keeps your brand in mind, re-engaging audiences and building brand enthusiasm.
Email Marketing
For retargeting, email marketing guides leads from awareness through the buyer’s journey. Remarketing email cultivates brand awareness and builds brand enthusiasm among existing customers.
Content Marketing
The fifth element of a marketing strategy includes design, creative, and organic teams. Most often viewed as separate from paid digital media, performance marketing at Valve+Meter endeavors to act in contractors’ long-term interests. This includes reframing marketing as an asset within your business instead of an expense.
Why You Should Choose Google Ads in Numbers
The statistics tell the value and influence of Google Ads advertising. While the role of paid search varies between traditional marketing and performance marketing, statistics show contractors are deeply invested. When you want to reach your target audience quickly and make nimble decisions, there are few better methods than Google Ads.
- With more than 99,000 search queries every second, Google processes at least 8.5 billion daily searches (Internet Live Stats, 2022).
- Google Ads is the most popular platform for paid search advertising, followed by Bing Ads and Facebook Ads.
- Google Ads continues to be one of the simplest ways to keep your brand top of mind with existing customers and potential customers searching terms relevant to your industry. According to Google, contractors that use Google Ads see an average of 220% more traffic than those that don’t.
- Google Ads don’t simply increase traffic. When used properly, they influence the likelihood of making a sale. Studies have shown Google Ads have a higher conversion rate than other forms of advertising. Google found contractors using Google Ads saw an average conversion rate of 3.75% for search ads and .77% for display ads.
- This is likely because Google Ads can be targeted to specific audiences and locations. This allows contractors to reach the right people at the right time and increase the likelihood of making a sale.
- Google Ads can be tracked and measured. This allows contractors to see which ads perform well and adjust their campaigns accordingly.
- Google Ads reaches homeowners on all devices. In 2021, mobile devices accounted for the majority of Google Ads clicks, with tablets and smartphones generating more clicks than desktop computers.
Google Ads Search Ad Stats (ROI)
Delivering high-quality leads will always be the primary responsibility of marketing campaigns. Whether using traditional search and shopping ads or expanding into social media paid search, performance marketing measures success against lead generation, return on investment, and optimizing the capacity of your contractor business.
The goal of performance marketing is never to have the lowest ROI but to create repeatable and scalable campaigns. Across all Google Ads platforms, optimizing ad groups, identifying negative keywords, and effective ad placements define successful Google Ads campaigns. These statistics indicate that Google Ads can provide a high ROI under the right circumstances.
- For every $1 spent on Google Ads, contractors earn an average revenue of $2 (Google).
- In 2021, the average cost-per-click (CPC) for Google Ads ranged from $1 to $2 for search ads and $0.10 to $0.50 for display ads.
- 40 percent of contractors want to increase their Google Ads budget, indicating that this is an effective and lucrative tool for marketing (SocialMediaToday).
- According to Formstack, Google Ads are one of the top three generators of on-page conversions.
- 65 percent of all clicks made by users who intend to purchase go to paid ads (Wordstream).
Statistics Support Why You Should Choose Google Ads Social Media Ads
The relevance of Google Ads extends beyond search queries. Social media continues to grow, and contractors should incorporate social media Google Ads marketing into a strategy.
Highly targeted ad placement, video ads, and powerful ad copy influence the success of Google Ads. Considering the advertiser pays only when ads are clicked, marketing companies develop many ad groups to deliver the ideal images, videos, and copy for contractors.
- In 2021, Facebook was the most popular platform for social media Google Ads advertising, followed by Instagram and Twitter.
- The average cost-per-click (CPC) for Facebook Ads ranged from $0.50 to $2.00, depending on the industry and target audience.
- The average conversion rate (the percentage of clicks that result in a desired action such as a sale or lead) for Facebook Ads was 9.21%.
- In 2021, mobile devices accounted for most social media Google Ads clicks, with tablets and smartphones generating more clicks than desktop computers.
- The retail, e-commerce, and healthcare industries had some of the highest CPCs on Facebook due to high competition for keywords in those industries.
- According to SocialMediaToday, more than 7 million contractors invested $10.1 billion in Google Ads in 2017.
- HootSuite reports ads on social media had worldwide revenue of $153 billion in 2021, which is expected to grow to over $252 billion in 2026.
- EMarketer reports that Facebook’s ad revenues eclipsed the print industry in 2019. As a result, contractors who invest in these advertisements are on the right track to reap benefits.
- Ad spending is increasing. According to SocialMediaToday, 72 percent of contractors spent more on social ads in 2018, and 60 percent on text and mobile ads in 2018.
- The power of social media ads persistently grows worldwide. The exact figures spent on social media advertising is hard to pinpoint because it depends on the country and specific platform. Statista expected revenue to reach $103.5 billion in 2021, with projections of $139.3 billion by 2023. Meanwhile, HootSuite reports worldwide revenue of $153 billion on social media ads in 2021.
- The revenue generator for social media platforms continues to be advertising. Between January and July 2021, TikTok (ByteMod Pte. Ltd.) invested 34.4 million U.S. dollars in advertising on Instagram in the United States (Statista).
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Versus Google Ads (Paid Search) Statistics
Search engine optimization and Google Ads can operate in harmony. In performance marketing models, these two strategies combine to bring in more traffic. Both strategies offer advantages and disadvantages. Google Ads used alongside organic content help search engine visibility improve for contractors.
Organic SEO continues to be one of the most cost-effective marketing methods. Highly skilled SEO specialists create content targeting leads at different marketing funnel levels. Once organic content ranks well, search engine performance is more stable.
When search engine algorithms change and websites are neglected, SEO performance declines. Great contractors with great marketing campaigns always test and measure the results of their efforts. Thus, great marketing considers organic and paid advertising as harmonious efforts in search engines.
These statistics highlight some of the advantages of Google Ads advertisements over SEO.
- New Media Campaigns reports that paid search results gain 1.5 times as many conversions from click-throughs as organic search results.
- Google Ads can put you on the first page for a given search term within a day (New Media Campaigns).
- The idea that many homeowners can’t differentiate between paid ads and other content has radically transformed. As late as 2018, ScienceDaily showed fewer than 20% of users accurately identified native advertisements. In 2021, nearly 60% of homeowners can’t distinguish between a paid and an organic result (Marketing Tech News via Truelist).
- Google Ads visitors are 50 percent more likely to make a purchase than organic visitors (Unbounce).
- Google Ads statistics are easier to measure than SEO statistics, making it easier for contractors to track ROI and manage budgets (Unbounce).
- Google Ads is more effective when used with SEO (New Media Campaigns).
- Ignoring Google Ads marketing omits a quarter of search queries, as 27% of website traffic comes from paid search (Higher Visibility).
Google Ads Statistics and Trends
Just as Google Ads helps to reveal trends for the future growth of your contractor business, smart marketers watch the trends within Google Ads and other advertising.
- The industries spending the most on Google Ads advertising in 2018 include retail, travel, publishing, and education. The consumables, automotive, and home improvement industries are spending the least on Google Ads advertising.
- The most effective Google Ads channels are text ads, remarketing, and mobile.
- 4 out of 10 contractors want to increase their Google Ads budget.
- Google Ads, Facebook, and mobile are the most popular paid search platforms.
- 80 percent of respondents surveyed view artificial intelligence as an important player in the digital advertising industry during 2018. This group has risen exponentially year over year.
- Programmatic is gaining importance and popularity as a Google Ads channel.
- 85% of respondents in one survey put more importance on visual information than text in ads.
Google Ads and Local Search Ads
Google Local Services Ads continue to evolve. These ads show on Search and Google Local when homeowners seek services like yours in their local area. Additional features including Google Screened and Google Guaranteed show the power of this tool for reaching discerning local audiences.
- 82 percent of smartphone users are actively searching for businesses near them (Google).
- Nearly 30 percent of searches for something in a specific location will result in a purchase (Google).
- Three out of four people who find helpful information based on their location consider visiting brick-and-mortar businesses (Google).
- Almost one-third of all searches made on mobile phones are location-based (Google).
- More than 40 percent of homeowners use their smartphones to conduct research while inside a brick-and-mortar store (Google).
- 76 percent of people who search for something nearby on a smartphone will contact a business within one day (Google).
- Homeowners spend 10 percent more money in a store if they have clicked on the retailer’s Google search ad before visiting (Google).
- 40 percent of in-store purchases begin online (Blue Corona).
- Almost 70 percent of searches on mobile will call a business using a link from the search (PowerTraffick).
Google Ads Statistics for Industry Benchmarks
Broad statistics can often be deceptive like average click-through rate across all industries and most searched terms annually. While recognizing the limitations of this data, there are valuable insights to consider.
- The average click-through rate across all industries on Google Ads in 2018 is 3.17 on the search network. Through 2021, that trend has held with a good rate falling between 3-5%.
- The highest average click-through rate in Google Ads is found in the dating and personals industry, while the lowest click-through rate is found in the legal industry.
- The average cost-per-click across all industries in Google Ads on the search network is $2.69. The highest cost-per-click is found in the legal industry, while the lowest cost-per-click is found in the dating and personals industry.
- The average conversion rate across all industries in Google Ads on the search network is 3.75 percent. Conversion rates are highest in the dating and personal industry at over 9 percent. Conversion rates are the lowest in the advocacy industry at 1.96 percent. (WordStream)
- The average cost-per-action across all industries in Google Ads on the search network is $48.96. Cost-per-action is highest in the technology industry at over $133. Cost-per-action is the lowest in the auto industry at $33.52.
What Makes People Click and Convert
Nimbly responding to the interactions of people with advertising is vital to developing strong campaigns. Monitoring the types of advertisements most likely to earn clicks and conversions is important. Understanding these trends helps contractors position themselves for the best conversion rates.
- More than 40 percent of clicks go to the top three paid ads in search results (Wordstream).
- 90 percent of homeowners say they trust online reviews (Google).
- More than 95 percent of clicks go to the top four search results (Blue Corona).
- Contractors can raise conversions by 16 percent when they include cross-device data (Google).
Surprising Google Ads Statistics
Some statistics defy categorization but support the value of building a marketing campaign that balances Google Ads with organic SEO.
- While the average click-through rate for Google Ads is only 2 percent, the average click-through rate for the top paid result on the screen is almost 8 percent (Accuracast).
- More than half of all searches are longer than four words (Wordstream).
- Click-through rate declines considerably as position on the first page of search results drops. However, the last position on the first page of search results and first position on the second page of search results have a slightly higher click-through rate than some higher positions on the first page (Accuracast).
- More than 96 percent of Google’s total revenue comes from paid advertisements (PowerTraffick).
- Microsoft Advertising continues to grow with ambitions to double in size (Searchengineland.com)
- Watching the growth of TikTok is vital for marketers keen on following the trends of users. As the most downloaded app in Q3 2022, contractors without video ads are falling behind.
- Money is on the top of searchers’ minds with the most expensive keywords including insurance, loan, attorney, credit, and lawyer. (Wordstream).
Ready to Give Google Ads a Try for Your Business?
Valve+Meter Performance Marketing specializes in Google Ads strategies that lead to clicks and conversions. Our team is eager to build a complete strategy that audits your contractor business to find the potential and empower transformational growth. Request a free marketing analysis from our team today.