Google Ads for tradespeople can be used to win more clients and build better brand awareness.
We manage Google Ads for tradespeople and know how effective Google Ads campaigns can be.
We’ve had people tell us before ‘Google Ads don’t work for me’.
But they do! Issues with Google Ads for tradespeople arise when campaigns aren’t targeted, have the wrong goals or have the wrong keywords selected.
Interested in using Google Ads to reach more customers? Read on:
Say you’re an electrician and somewhere local to you, someone is in need of your services.
They Google ‘Bristol Electrician‘ and are presented with the first page of Google and its results.
The first page can be broken down into three sections: the top results, which are advertisments, the middle results, which are displayed underneath a map and are local listings and the bottom results, which are generated by Google as results it ranks as best matching your search term.
The bottom results are ranked as the result of Search Engine Optimisation – an extensive process that webpages can undergo in order to rank closer to the first page for your search term.
Your potential client is likely to select a result on the first page for ‘Bristol Electrician’ rather than clicking through to subsequent pages.
So essentially, if you want to get to that first page, you might use SEO – or you might skip the leg work and use Google Ads.
Google Ads for tradespeople can be targeted to a specific location
Targeting your ads to the area you serve is important.
You want to have your ads appearing where your customers are.
There is no point paying for your ads for ‘Bristol electrician services’ appear to internet users who are based in Leeds (not unless you’re about to go on a cross country trip anyway).
However, if you’re an electrician in Bristol, what you can do is target your ads to only appear to internet users in Bristol.
Are you able to provide services to more than Bristol alone? No problem – you can target Bristol and Bath. Or the whole of Somerset. Or maybe you just want to have your ads appear in a 10 mile radius around a particular part of London.
You can make sure the people you want to find you are able to – Google is your data loving oyster when it comes to targeted ads.



Ads can direct customers to a specific page on your site
Sending customers to your homepage after they click on your ad isn’t enough.
Ads are all about promoting and selling one of your services rather than having your customer wade through your site themselves.
We often recommend to clients that are looking to improve their website that they have the services they offer on separate pages.
This helps to keep your Google Ad relevant to what the customer has searched for.
Better relevance means you have a higher chance of winning that customer.
Google Ads can win customers who are searching for your specific services
With Google Ads, we call the search terms that a customer is typing into Google ‘keywords’.
Keywords can be single words, or certain phrases.
To create an effective Google Ad, you need to think about what words a customer will type to trigger your ad to appear.
If you use Google’s keyword planner (make sure your adblock is disabled!), you can enter the service you want to advertise and the planner will tell you the search terms people are Googling that are similar.
It will also tell you how competitive ad placement is for a keyword.

Google Ads don’t have to be expensive to be effective
Google Ads allow you to set a budget. You have the opportunity to set a monthly cap, as well as place your ads on pause at any time and adjust the spending.
This means once they’re set up, you don’t have to worry that they are going to eat away at your coffers.
There are also further ways you can save money:
A high Google Quality Score can bring down your ad spend too. Google calculates your quality score through a range of methods, but most prominently, how many people are clicking on your ads when they appear.
If Google can see lots of people are clicking on your ads, it deems them helpful and rewards you with lower costs for your ads.
As a tradesperson using Google Ads, you might think about considering when your services are needed. Do you always answer the phone? Are there certain times a client is more likely to be searching for you?
You can time your ads to fit around this. With a bit of consideration, you have the opportunity to make your spending more efficient.
The start of your online journey with Shake & Speare
We know that Google Ads for tradespeople can get you seen and start bringing in clients! But we also know they can be confusing at first. This article is not an exhaustive guide on how to do your own, but a good starting point explaining what they do.
If you want help getting yours started, we’re experts at managing Google Ads. We can help ensure you’re spending to budget, have maximised their efficiency and can nurse you through the process by explaining it in simple English.
We’re always open to a chat, and if you’d like to meet up then consider the beers on us!

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