Paid Search work
Every engagement where paid search was part of the build, across all thirty industries we publish in.
Industry
Proof type
26 entries
Two locations, two Google profiles, one lead-scoring model that tells the crew which job to call first
A regional roofing and building-services contractor was running paid search and Meta against a website that published the wrong office address sitewide, with leads landing unranked in a construction CRM. We rebuilt the site, separated the two locations in local search, and built a scoring model that sorts every inbound job into *urgent / when-you-can / another-day* before anyone picks up the phone.
4.8Google rating, primary profileWeb DevelopmentLocal SEOGoogle Business ProfileCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Automotive Sales & ServiceSame dealership, same staff: internet leads set appointments at 32%, phone-ups at 73%
The published dealership data shows internet leads and phone-ups being contacted at broadly comparable rates and converted into appointments at completely different ones. That gap is not about reachability and it is not about staffing, because it is the same staff. This model rebuilds the internet lead handoff around what a phone-up already does naturally.
CRMLead RoutingLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Automotive Sales & ServiceService converts at ~2.5× vehicle sales and gets budgeted like an afterthought
Automotive repair, service and parts carries the highest conversion rate of any industry in the published Google Ads benchmark set. Used-vehicle dealers sit near the other end of the automotive range. Both are usually funded from one line item called automotive, which averages across a spread wide enough to hide the entire argument.
Paid SearchLocal SEOGoogle Business ProfileCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Construction & ContractingGeneral contracting has one of the lowest conversion rates in home services — here's where the model puts the money
General contracting converts paid search clicks at 2.61% against a home-services average of 7.33%, which pushes cost per lead to $165.67. The model treats that as a qualification problem rather than a media problem.
Paid SearchLocal SEOContentCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Dental & OrthodonticsDental is one of the few categories where Meta costs more per lead than Google — that changes the plan
A dental click costs $8.00 and a dental lead costs $72.97 on search. On Meta the same lead costs $76.71, which inverts the usual relationship between the two channels. The model treats that inversion as information about intent rather than as a reason to pick a winner.
Paid SearchPaid SocialLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Ecommerce & RetailSame publisher, same window: ~11.7% conversion on Amazon vs ~1.3% on the brand's own paid traffic
Most channel comparisons in ecommerce are two figures from two publishers with two definitions, which proves nothing. This one is not: the same measurement provider, over the same twelve months, puts Amazon Ads conversion at 11.7% and paid traffic to brands' own sites at 1.3%. The model works out what that gap is actually made of, and what it costs to use.
Paid SearchPaid SocialEmail MarketingCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Energy, Solar & RenewablesSolar acquisition cost is forecast to rise 40% into a market contracting 19% — after the credit expired
US residential solar customer acquisition cost hit a five-year low of $0.60 per watt in 2025 and is forecast to rise 40% to $0.84 in 2026 as the market contracts 19% following the residential credit's expiry. Against an average installed price of $2.49 per watt, that moves acquisition from roughly a quarter of the price of a system to roughly a third.
Paid SearchLocal SEOLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Energy, Solar & RenewablesIn residential solar the benchmark you want doesn't exist — so the model builds your baseline first
This is the thinnest published vertical we work in. There is no solar cost per click, no cost per lead, no lead-to-sale rate, no website conversion rate and no speed-to-lead study. What does exist is strong market data: record enquiry volume, a battery attachment rate that varies by more than thirty points between states, and a subsidy that ended. The model is built to survive that combination.
ReportingCROLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Financial ServicesFinance buys the second-best click in the market and converts it worst of all 23 industries
Finance and insurance search ads earn a 9.83% click-through rate, second highest of the twenty-three industries measured, and convert those clicks at 2.64%, the lowest of all of them. The whole loss sits after the click. This model spends there first.
Paid SearchLanding PagesCROCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Fitness & Sports FacilitiesOne member in three leaves every year and the market is growing anyway — that's the trap
81 million Americans held a gym membership in 2025 and annual member retention is 66.4%. A facility can post growth while replacing a third of the people in the building. The model spends on the first ninety days of membership before it spends on the next lead.
CRMReportingEmail MarketingCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Food, Beverage & Specialty CPGThe first order doesn't pay for itself at any published margin — so it's a repeat-purchase business by arithmetic
Food and beverage consumer packaged goods run a 28 to 42% gross margin. The published cost per acquisition for the category is $49 against a $63 average order value. Those three numbers do not leave a positive first order anywhere in the band, which makes this a repeat-purchase business by arithmetic rather than by strategy.
Paid SocialPaid SearchEmail MarketingCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Healthcare & Medical89% of patients say booking at any hour matters; 11% of medical groups say most of their patients can
Physician search converts at 12.43%, well above the cross-industry average, and costs $40.04 a lead. The published gap in this vertical is not in the media. It is between the moment a patient decides to book and the moment a human is available to let them.
Paid SearchPaid SocialLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Home Services52% of home-services calls get answered — and 55% of businesses never ask the caller to book
In an emergency trade the money is lost in two places, and neither of them is the ad auction. This model instruments the phone before it touches the media, because the published rates say fewer than one call in four is both answered and closed.
Paid SearchLocal SEOGoogle Business ProfileCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Hotels, Resorts & TravelTravel has one of the highest paid-search click-through rates and no standard direct-booking benchmark
Travel attracts attention more cheaply than almost any category in the published search benchmark set and converts it at a middling rate. Meanwhile the single number that would settle the direct-versus-intermediated argument — what a brand's own booking engine actually converts at — is not published anywhere. This model instruments that gap first and buys media second.
Paid SearchLanding PagesCROCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Insurance Agencies & BrokersCommercial insurance is the one category where organic and paid cost the same — which changes what there is to optimise
Published acquisition costs for commercial insurance come in at $590 organic and $600 paid, blending to $593 — the narrowest organic-versus-paid gap of any industry in the set. When the channel choice is worth ten dollars, the model stops arguing about channels and goes after the conversion step, where finance and insurance ranks last of twenty-three industries.
Paid SearchTechnical SEOContentCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Insurance Agencies & BrokersEvery insurance cost-per-lead figure in circulation is a vendor price sheet — the model builds the number the agency doesn't have
There is no independent published cost per lead for an insurance agency, and none at all for personal lines. What circulates instead is lead-vendor pricing, which is a market price list rather than a benchmark. The model starts from that distinction and builds a cost per bound policy the agency owns.
CRMLead RoutingReportingCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Law FirmsThe intake gap: paying the market's highest cost-per-click while only 40% of firms answer the phone
Legal is the most expensive vertical in paid search. It is also the vertical where the largest published performance gap sits after the click, not before it. This model sizes the recovery available from fixing intake before adding a dollar of media.
Paid SearchLocal SEOLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Manufacturing & IndustrialMost of the purchase is over before a vendor is contacted — and one front-runner is usually already chosen
The published industrial buying research says the buying team is three people, more than 55% of the process is complete before any vendor is contacted, and the final shortlist narrows to two. This model spends against the part of the process that happens before the enquiry form, because that is where the shortlist is decided.
ContentTechnical SEOAEO GEOCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Manufacturing & Industrial$75.19 in the ad account and $553 across the business — manufacturing's two cost-per-lead numbers
Industrial and commercial search campaigns post the highest conversion rate and the lowest cost per lead of any B2B-relevant category in the published set. The blended manufacturing cost per lead across all channels is roughly seven times higher. Both are correct, and the gap between them is where this model does its work.
Paid SearchLanding PagesCROCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Med Spa, Aesthetics & WellnessA $1.4M average practice, $39.25 leads, and no published number for what a consultation costs
The aesthetics industry publishes its revenue and its size in detail and its funnel not at all. This model uses the benchmarks that exist for the top of the funnel, says plainly where the published record stops, and instruments the rest first-party.
Paid SearchPaid SocialLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Nonprofits & AssociationsDisplay costs $86 to acquire an email address and returns $1.11 — the published ad table is a ranking, not a menu
Nonprofit digital advertising has published costs and returns per channel that differ by more than an order of magnitude: $2.81 per email address acquired overall against $86 on display, and $2.48 back per dollar on search against $0.17 on Google Grants. The model reads that table as an order of operations.
Paid SearchPaid SocialEmail MarketingCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Real EstateReal estate has the fastest-rising cost-per-click of any measured industry — and refuses to average its two conversion rates
Inside one published vertical, residential agents convert at 1.29% and property management at 10.24%. The model refuses to average them, prices each channel to the job it actually does, and stops short of any claim it cannot source.
Paid SearchPaid SocialLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Restaurants & HospitalityNearly three-quarters of restaurant traffic never comes through the door
Off-premises is now the majority of the category and it is still being marketed as an add-on to the dining room. This model plans for the car park, the phone and the pickup shelf: where the demand is captured, which surface takes the order, and what the published search benchmarks say that costs.
Local SEOGoogle Business ProfilePaid SearchCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Senior Living & Elder CareOccupancy is near a decade high and almost no new supply is coming — the marketing problem changed
Senior housing occupancy reached 89.9% across the primary markets, with fifteen of thirty-one at or above 90% and inventory growth below 1.0% for a fifth consecutive quarter. At those levels the job stops being lead generation and becomes fit, timing and waitlist management.
Landing PagesPaid SearchLocal SEOCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Small BusinessesIndustry averages are the wrong planning input for a business running exactly one campaign
The published benchmark tables span a range wider than any optimisation a small budget can buy. The model spends the first month buying a measured baseline rather than acting on a number that describes an average of thousands of accounts and none of them precisely.
Paid SearchPaid SocialLanding PagesCapability ModelA modelled capability, not a client account. Figures illustrate what the model produces and are labelled as modelled wherever they appear.Veterinary & Pet ServicesThe cheapest, highest-converting paid leads in the whole benchmark set — arriving at practices seeing fewer visits
Animals and pets converts paid clicks at 16.22%, the highest rate of the twenty-three industries measured, at $31.50 a lead. The same year, practice visit volume fell for the fourth consecutive time. The model is built on that contradiction rather than around it.
Paid SearchLocal SEOGoogle Business Profile