Booked jobs. Return on investment. Most agencies stop counting at the lead, which is why their reports always look better than your bank statement. Google Ads, Local Services Ads and social ads, run by an Austin PPC agency that cares about local service businesses.
These are not a menu. They are an order of operations, and the order matters more than the mix.
These sit right at the very top of the page, above the normal ads. You pay per enquiry rather than per click, and you get the green Google Guaranteed badge next to your name. They produce the cheapest won jobs of the three for trades that qualify. The catch is that qualifying takes background checks and licence verification, you cannot control what the ad says, and the reporting is thin. For a plumber or an electrician, this is still where the first dollar goes.
These are the text ads marked “Sponsored” that sit just above and below the regular Google results. They give back the control Local Services Ads take away. You choose which services to advertise, which words to appear for, what hours to run, and which towns to spend in. It costs more, and the difference between trades is enormous. LocaliQ's figures put roofing at $101.49 an enquiry against $39.25 for pest control, nearly three times the price. That data is from 2020 to 2021, so treat it as the shape of the market rather than today's exact price.
Facebook and Instagram work differently from the other two. Nobody is searching for you there, so instead of catching demand you have to create it. This is where off-season work comes from and where a roofer fills a slow February. It takes the longest to prove out and it is the first thing we cut if the numbers do not hold.
| Where the ad runs | You pay | Control you get | Typical cost per enquiry | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Local Services Ads | Per enquiry | Low | $39 electricians, $51 air conditioning, $57 plumbers (2026) | Cheapest won jobs, for trades that qualify |
| Google Ads | Per click | High | $38 to $101 depending on trade (2020-21 data) | More volume, and control over services and towns |
| Facebook and Instagram | Per view or click | High | Varies widely | Creating demand, filling the off-season |
Enough that a month's results actually mean something, and not a dollar more until the tracking proves out.
We recommend a minimum of $1,000 a month in ad spend. Below that, there is rarely enough activity to see what is working, so a campaign never gets a fair chance at positive results.
Above that, the right budget depends on what your jobs are worth. A roofer can afford to pay far more to win a customer than a company selling a $180 treatment. Pick your trade and your typical job, and the calculator shows how much room your jobs leave for advertising.
Room to work with
For pest control, a job like yours leaves reasonable room to pay for ads.
$1,000 a monthOur recommended minimum ad spend, whatever the trade.
A separate phone number for each place you advertise, every form fill labeled with its source, and the system set to count a booked job rather than a form submission. Where your scheduling software allows it, we feed the finished job values back into Google Ads so it learns which clicks actually turn into work.
Local Services Ads first for trades that qualify, then Google Ads, then Facebook and Instagram, each switched on only once the one before it is producing jobs you can count.
Reading what people actually typed to trigger your ads and blocking the useless ones, spending more in towns that pay and less in towns that do not, running ads only when someone answers the phone, and making sure the page people land on matches what the ad promised.
Enquiries, jobs booked and money in, each shown by where it came from, plus what a won job cost. Views and click rates appear further down, where early signals belong.
Call tracking numbers, connecting your CRM or scheduling software, and keeping a closed-job spreadsheet all carry real costs, in software fees or in hours. We quote them as a one-time setup fee, plus any monthly software costs, before the first ad runs, so you see the full price before anything goes live.
| Channel | Jobs booked | Cost per job won |
|---|---|---|
| Local Services Ads | 13 | $122 |
| Google Ads | 11 | $249 |
| Facebook and Instagram | 2 | $310 |
Every Austin PPC agency tells you what a lead cost. Almost none tell you what happened next, which is the part that decides whether the money came back.
Here is the arithmetic. SearchLight Digital studied 888 contractor accounts and 126,650 enquiries in February 2026. On Local Services Ads, an enquiry cost about $53. On Google Ads it cost about $104. On the face of it, Local Services Ads win by half.
Then look at how many of those enquiries turned into actual work. About 44 in every 100 from Local Services Ads, and about 42 in every 100 from Google Ads. Do the division and a $53 enquiry becomes roughly $121 per job won. A $104 enquiry becomes roughly $249. The gap is real, but half the size the headline number suggested, and you only see it if someone tracks the second step.
Against a $9,000 roof, $249 per booked job is a rounding error. Against a $180 pest control treatment, it is the whole margin. That calculation is the first thing we run and it decides everything after.
A $9,000 roof
Winning it costs about $249. Barely a dent.
A $180 pest control treatment
Winning it costs about $249. More than the job pays.
Two numbers, and they are not the same thing. Your ad budget goes to Google. The management fee goes to the agency. Any proposal that rolls them into one figure is hiding something.
Most agencies charge a management fee of 10 to 20 percent of whatever you spend on ads, usually with a minimum. That is the range given by both OuterBox in September 2026 and WebFX in 2026. CallRail puts it higher, at 15 to 30 percent. The honest read is that 10 to 20 percent is standard, 15 to 20 is where most land, and anything near 30 needs explaining.
Published Austin PPC agency rates are less useful than they look. Two of the five competitor pages we analyzed disclose a price, both bare floors at $500 and $3,500 a month, and neither explains what separates them. Not one discloses a percentage of spend.
Ask for a list of exactly what gets done each month and the numbers the work will be judged on. A proposal that cannot give you both is one you cannot price. Ask specifically whether the fee is a percentage or a flat amount, what the minimum is, whether there is a setup charge, and what happens to the fee if you pause for a month.
No competitor page we read says this, so here it is.
Do not run ads if nobody answers the phone inside an hour. Paid enquiries go cold faster than any other kind, because the person is ringing three companies in one sitting. An unanswered enquiry is just $53 set on fire.
Do not run ads if an average job cannot carry what an enquiry costs in your trade. Roofing at $101 an enquiry works. A $90 service call does not, and we will run that number with you before taking the work.
Do not run PPC if you have no capacity. More leads into a booked-out schedule produces bad reviews, and reviews cost you more downstream than the ads gained.
Go carefully if your rating sits below 3.5 stars. People check reviews before they call, so we pair ads with a review campaign and a look at what is behind the low scores.
And if you qualify for Local Services Ads and have not switched them on, do that before hiring anyone. It is the cheapest thing available to a licensed trade and you do not need an Austin PPC agency to set it up.
If you need the slower, compounding channel instead, start with local SEO
A free check of where you stand. We look at any ads you are already running, check whether you qualify for Local Services Ads, and see where your competitors are spending. In writing, whether or not you hire us.
What a job is worth. What an average job brings in and how often you win the ones you quote. Every recommendation gets measured against that.
Ninety-day plan. What gets done, who does it, when, what the tracking setup costs, and how the work will be judged. You approve it before we build.
Build and instrument. Tracking first, then the campaigns, in channel order.
Report. Monthly, opening with jobs booked and what each one cost.
Your ad accounts, your conversion data, your tracking numbers, your landing pages. We build inside your accounts, not ours, so nothing needs migrating if we stop working together. Ask every Austin PPC agency you talk to this question before you sign.
| Asset | Owner |
|---|---|
| Your ad accounts | Yours |
| Your conversion data | Yours |
| Your tracking numbers | Yours |
| Your landing pages | Yours |
Austin and the surrounding metro: Round Rock, Cedar Park, Pflugerville, Georgetown, Leander, Kyle, Buda, San Marcos, Bee Cave, Lakeway and Dripping Springs.
Geography matters more in advertising than people expect. An Austin PPC agency spending the same in every town wastes money on places you will never profitably serve. We set the spend town by town against your real drive times and job values.
Two numbers. Ad spend goes to Google and is yours to set. PPC management fees across the industry run 10 to 20 percent of ad spend per OuterBox and WebFX in 2026, with CallRail reporting 15 to 30 percent, usually with a minimum floor. Ask any Austin PPC agency which model they use and what the floor is.
It depends entirely on trade and channel. 2026 Local Services Ads benchmarks from SearchLight run roughly $39 for electrical, $51 for HVAC and $57 for plumbing. Google search ads run higher, with LocaliQ's home services data showing roughly $39 for pest control up to $101 for roofing, though that data is from 2020 to 2021. The better question is cost per booked job.
Usually both, in that order. Local Services Ads charge per lead, sit above everything else, and produce the cheapest booked jobs for eligible trades, but give you no control over copy or keywords. Google Ads costs more and gives control over services, suburbs and hours. Start with Local Services Ads if you qualify, then add Google Ads for the volume they cannot reach.
Google Ads produce lead data in two to four weeks, which is the main reason to run PPC management alongside slower organic work. Reaching stable cost per booked job usually takes two to three months, because that is how long it takes to accumulate enough closed jobs to optimize against rather than guess at.
Usually one of four things. The landing page does not match the ad promise, the form asks too much, the phone goes unanswered during the hours the ads run, or the search terms triggering your ads are not buying terms. Search term reports answer this in an afternoon and most accounts we audit have never had one run.
Run Local Services Ads yourself. Once you are verified they mostly look after themselves and there is little for an Austin PPC agency to improve. Google Ads and social ads are where a management fee earns itself, through weeding out the searches that waste your money, shifting spend between towns, and fixing the page people land on. If you are spending under about $1,500 a month in total, the management fee eats too much of it to make sense.
We recommend at least $1,000 a month in ad spend. Below that, there is rarely enough activity to see what is working. If that is out of reach right now, we will say so and point you to what makes more sense.
Nothing. They are yours. We build in your ad accounts, your conversion data stays with you, and there is nothing to migrate.
Most businesses can tell you their cost per click. Far fewer can tell you what a booked job costs, and that is the number that decides whether to spend more or stop. Book a consult with an Austin PPC agency that leads with it, and we will run the math on your existing campaigns at no cost before you commit to anything.