Select Create campaign (Blue +)
Choose your campaign objective:
You can choose Leads or Create a campaign without a goal’s guidance.
Conversion Goals
This will default to Calls from Ads. It is okay to leave this setting.
Campaign Type
Choose Search to use the Search net
Select the ways to reach your goal
Choose Phone Calls.
Campaign name
Type in Home Inspection Call Ads
Bidding
What do you want to focus on? Use the drop-down box and choose Clicks. Do not worry about setting a maximum cost per click (CPC)unless you plan to use an automated bid strategy. If you want to use an automated bid strategy (not recommended), start by setting your max CPC between $10-$12. If you want to avoid using an automated bid strategy, we will set the bidding to Manual CPC after the campaign creation.
Networks
I leave Google search partners unchecked. If there is a lack of impression volume after launching the campaign, turning this on can increase your reach. Partner traffic often converts less than standard Search traffic does.
Locations
Choose Enter another location, Advanced search, and target your service area. This can be accomplished by using zip codes, cities, counties, or choosing a radius from your base of operations. Remember to hit Save when finished.
Target
Presence or interest or just Presence. This will depend on where you are targeting. If you have a lot of people buying homes from out of state (Florida being one that comes to mind), you may want to choose Presence or interest. If you need to narrow your targeting, you can choose just Presence.
Languages
Choose the languages that you want to target.Audience segments
You can choose however many audiences you like or none at all. If you choose an audience, make your Targeting setting for this campaign Observation (recommended). This will allow you to view metrics on your traffics’ interest. You may be able to use this information for more focused targeting in future campaigns. This feature is rumored to be going away in the future.
Automatically created assets
Set this to Off: Use only assets I provide directly for my ads.Click on More Settings
Ad rotation
Select Do not optimize: rotate ads indefinitely – We want to see how all ad copies perform and make adjustments as the data comes in. Optimizing ad rotation will hinder your ad performance later in the campaign life.Click on More settings again
Ad schedule
Set your ad schedule only for the days and hours you can and will answer your phone. This will conserve the budget, as the leads are only as good as your ability to answer and close them. Miss a call from a lead and wait more than a minute or two and the close rate for that lead dips drastically. These are hot leads. Treat them as such.Click Next
Keywords and ads
Label your first ad group as Home Inspection Phrase and then click that box again.
Enter Keywords
Open up your Campaign Build Resource and go to the Phrase tab. Highlight the keywords in that column. Hint*- Click on the top of the column to highlight the whole column, then hold down ctrl + C. This copies all of the keywords. Click on the Enter keywords box on the Google screen and hit crtl + V.
Ads
To run these ads, you must have the phone number you want to use in the ads located on a “landing page”. This is how Google verifies your ad, so it is imperative. Type that phone number into the Phone number box. Next, enter the landing page that you want your traffic to land on. Hint* – In another tab, go to the landing page that you want to use, highlight the address bar, right-click and copy. You can now paste this URL into the Final URL and Verification URL boxes. Once you enter the URL into the Final URL box and click on the Verification URL box, the Verification URL box with auto-fill with the Final URL box information. If this happens, feel free to skip to Headline.Headline 1 You want to use a keyword here that will appeal to what your audience is directly searching for. I like to use an H1 (Headline 1) that uses “home inspection” or “house inspection”. Ex: Complete Home Inspection, [City] Home Inspection, Thorough Home Inspection.
Headline 2
You used H1 to verify that you provide the service that your prospect is looking for. Now you want to use this H2 space to appeal to your prospects buying decision. What is important to your customer? Report turnaround time, time to inspection service, and cost are the 3 of the most popular concerns I have encountered in this industry (in general). You can also focus on quality, additional offerings, free thermal, etc. Ex: Same Day Reports, Next Day Home Inspections (especially when used with [City] Home Inspection as an H1), Thermal Imaging.Business Name
I have encountered businesses that have names that exceed the 25- character limit. It has often worked for me to exclude the word home if necessary. Ex: Anywhere’s Home Inspections can be shortened to Anywhere’s Inspections. If you have any trouble getting your ads verified due to Business name not matching, you can reach out to Google support. They can perform a manual review based on your website.
Description line 1
Here you have up to 90 characters to explain why this prospect should do business with your company and not scroll right past to a competitor. Focus on what sets you apart from your competition. What value will you bring to this person if they become your customer?Description line 2
Another 90 characters to work with. If you were crafty with your Desc. 1, you can focus on a call to action (CTA) here. If you need more space for description, please use this additional. Remember that your entire ad may not be shown to on every Impression (ad view). I like to go right to a CTA here, or put in a short and sweet “value proposition” and then a CTA.Call reporting should be set to on Conversion action Use account settings (Calls from ads)
Click on Done
Click +Call ad
Budget
When I set up campaigns, I start with a 5-day ad schedule, so we will only advertise around 21-22 days per month. A daily budget of $35 will often lead to a $600 – $700 per month ad spend. If you choose too small of a budget, Google will not show your ad very often, which defeats the purpose of advertising. I recommend starting with $25-$35 per day.
Your campaign is ready to publish. Click Publish campaign.
Now we need to fix your bidding. From the main screen, click on your Campaign. Then, on the left side of the screen, you will click on Settings. Now go to the Bidding drop-down. Choose Change bid strategy. Next, select Manual CPC and make sure that Enhanced CPC is NOT checked.Negative Keywords
This is one of the most important parts of your Google Ads campaign and one that is often looked over by amateurs and professionals alike. Negative keywords tell Google what keywords we do NOT want to appear for. This is how you save money. The goal is to show our ad for as many searches with the right intent as possible and avoid the searches that don’t have a chance of converting.
First, click on Keywords on the left side of the page. Then click Negative keywords.
Click on +Negative Keywords
Make sure Add negative keywords… is checked and select your Campaign
Open your Campaign Build Resource and go to the Negative KW’s tab. Click on the top of column A to highlight all of these keywords, right-click and press copy, or hold ctrl + C.
Go Back to the Google Ads screen, click inside the Negative keywords box and hold ctrl + V, or right-click inside the box and click paste.
Check the Save to new or existing list box and enter the name you want to use in the box. I call this list General.
We are not quite finished with Negative keywords just yet. Over the years, I have found that removing as many competitor names as possible will also increase the efficiency of your campaign. No matter how long you spend doing this initially, removing “competitor” names will be an ongoing process over the life of the campaign. I cover this in the Optimization manual.
Open your Campaign Build Resource and go to the Competitors tab. You will find some of the common competitors in your area, but we will want to be more thorough than that. The best way to do that is to open a Google tab, type in (without quotations) “home inspection [your city or target market],” and then hit enter. Your Search Engine Results Page (SERP) should look something like this:
Click on More businesses to open the full page 1 of the Google My Business listings. It will look something like this:
Before using this list to remove our competitors, we must learn what the keyword “match types” means. Match type is how we want the search engine to interpret our keyword or negative keyword. There are three match types:
Broad Match – Ads may show on searches that are related to your keyword, which can include searches that don’t contain the direct meaning of your keywords. This means you will show your ads to virtually anything related to any of the keywords. This will yield the most search volume but the broadest intent as well. This keyword is written with nothing around it. Using broad match keywords without a very strong negative keyword list will lead to you losing money every time.
Phrase Match – Ads may show on searches that include the meaning of your keyword. The meaning of the keyword can be implied, and user searches can be a more specific form of the meaning. This is a narrower form of targeting which can help to minimize budget waste. This will yield a smaller search volume than broad, more search volume than exact match, and keep the search intent fairly in line with your desired audience. This keyword is written with “quotations around it”. This is the preferred match type for new/er campaigns.
Exact Match – Ads may show on searches that have the same meaning or same intent as the keyword. Of the 3 keyword matching options, exact match gives you the most control over who views your ad but reaches fewer searches than both phrase and broad match. Some ad managers swear by exact match, and I have worked on accounts that needed more exact matches than any other type. That being said, in a smaller-scale lead generation campaign like this one, I like to gather data, then add exact match keywords based on search volume. During optimization, you will review the Search terms that Google allows you to see. When you see certain terms repeatedly, that is your cue to try adding them to your campaign. Exact match keywords are written with [brackets around them]. If text in my ad and my keyword match the search exactly and I have that same verbiage on my landing page, I will typically get better positioning for less cost. This is a major component of the success of your campaign.
With the match-type lesson over, it is time to add our competitors’ names to our list. When possible, we want to use the fewest words to exclude terms. When considering how to remove a keyword, think about place names in your area, keywords you are focused on, etc. For instance, if your business name is ABC Home Inspection, and you see a competitor name All Star Inspections, you would want to add their name to your list as “all star”. This tells Google that anytime someone types anything that includes all star with a space between those words, you do not want to show your ad. What would happen if someone typed allstar inspections? Would your ad show?
The answer is yes, yes, it would. There is no space between all and star. So, we can add allstar and all-star (broad match) to our negative list also. What if one of our competitors is named Home Inspection LLC? We don’t want their calls, but we can’t exclude the term home inspection. We add them to our list like this; [home inspection llc]. By adding it as exact, it would have to be typed EXACTLY like this to be excluded. Our ad would still show for home inspection (city), certified home inspection, etc.
See the below image for an example of how I would remove the names from the previous Google business listings page.
Once you have your list, follow the steps you did to make your General list. I would call this list Competitors.
Now we wait…
In the case of Miami inspectors, there are more than 20 pages of businesses. The more negative keywords (competitors, in this case) you put in, the less money you will waste. If you accidentally exclude a word or term that conflicts with our keywords, Google will let us know in our dashboard and then offer you remedies, but we still want to be careful.Select Create campaign (Blue +)
Choose your campaign objective:
You can choose Leads or Create a campaign without a goal’s guidance. 
Conversion Goals With Desktop searches, this becomes a little trickier. It will be covered in depth later in this tutorial.
Campaign Type
Choose Search to use the Search network.
Select the ways to reach your goal
Choose Website Visits and add your website/landing page.
Campaign name
Type in Home Inspection Desktop Ads
Bidding
What do you want to focus on? Use the drop-down box and choose Clicks. Do not worry about setting a maximum cost per click (CPC)
unless you plan to use an automated bid strategy. If you want to use an automated bid strategy (not recommended), start by setting your max CPC between $5-$7. If you want to avoid using an automated bid strategy, we will set the bidding to Manual CPC after the campaign creation.
Customer acquisition You have the option to Only bid for new customers. This is what I suggest unless you are going to upload your customer/client list to Google.
Networks
I leave Google search partners and Display unchecked. If there is a lack of impression volume after launching the campaign, turning Search Partners on can increase your reach. Partner traffic often converts less than standard Search traffic does.
Locations Choose Enter another location, Advanced search, and target your service area. This can be accomplished by using zip codes, cities, counties or choosing a radius from your base of operations. You can use multiples of the above. Remember to hit Save when finished.
Target Presence or interest or just Presence. This will depend on where you are targeting. If you have a lot of people buying homes from out of state (Florida being one that comes to mind), you may want to choose Presence or interest. If you need to narrow your targeting, you can choose just Presence.
Languages Choose the languages that you want to target.
Audience segments You can choose however many audiences you like or none at all. If you choose an audience, make your Targeting setting for this campaign Observation (recommended). This will allow you to view metrics on your traffics’ interest. You may be able to use this information for more focused targeting in future campaigns. This feature is rumored to be going away in the future.
Automatically created assets Set this to Off: Use only assets I provide directly for my ads.
Click on More Settings
Ad rotation
Select Do not optimize: rotate ads indefinitely – We want to see how all ad copies perform and make adjustments as the data comes in. Optimizing ad rotation will hinder your ad performance later in the campaign life.Click on More settings again
Ad schedule
Set your ad schedule only for the days and hours you can and will answer your phone. This will conserve the budget, as the leads are only as good as your ability to answer and close them. Miss a call from a lead and wait more than a minute or two and the close rate for that lead dips drastically. These are hot leads. Treat them as such.
Keywords and ads
Label your first ad group as Home Inspection Phrase, and then click that box again.
Enter Keywords
Open up your Campaign Build Resource and go to the Phrase tab.Highlight the keywords in that column. Hint*- Click on the top of the column, which will highlight the whole column, then hold down ctrl + C. This copies all of the keywords.
Click on the Enter keywords
box on the Google screen and hit Crtl + V.
Ads
To run these ads, you want to pick the web page that best describes what you do, why the user would want to choose your service, and any value propositions that your company offers (same-day reports, first responder discounts, etc.). These ads are different from call ads in that we add headlines and descriptions, and Google decides which headlines and descriptions to show and in what order. You can use the “pin” feature to pin a certain headline or description, but the more that you do this, the less Google will show your ad.
Headlines
Just as in the Call Ads, Headlines are 30 characters. You want to use keywords/phrases here that will appeal to what your audience is directly searching for. You can also get idea help from the Google Ads platform by clicking “View ideas” in the blue area of the ads section.
You definitely want to include keywords in your headlines, but also incorporate a call to action (CTA’s) and/or Value Propositions ($25 Off for First Responders, Same-Day Reports, etc.). We have very little engagement time with our prospects. Let’s use that time to highlight our company and services in the best possible light.
Just because Google suggests something does NOT mean it is a good idea. Please avoid the bad suggestions. Terms like education, courses, forms, etc., will waste your money. We want complete home inspections.
Now you can see Estimated Traffic totals on the right-hand side of your screen.
Mostly, I ignore these estimates. They are typically inaccurate, especially because they do not consider where we want our ads to appear on the Search Engine Results Page (SERP), which will affect our cost per click (CPC). Ad placement is directly related to lead quality. You don’t have to be first, but you don’t want to be frequently at the bottom of the page. I do pay attention if they show very LOW reach estimates.
Descriptions
You used Headline to verify that you provide the service that your prospect is looking for and a call to action or value proposition. Now you want to use the 90-character Description section to encourage your prospect to click your ad. What is important to your customer? Report turnaround time, time to inspection service, and cost are the 3 of the most popular concerns I have encountered in this industry (in general). You can also focus on ancillary offerings, experience, or anything else that would influence a buying decision. Just like for Headlines, you can consider the Google description suggestions.
Images
You can use this section to add images. Images can help your ad to stand out by adding “relevant visuals to complement their existing text ads,” according to Google. The images have to meet certain requirements. These are not absolutely necessary to have successful ads. The directions are pretty self-explanatory, though a cursory knowledge of graphics editing may be necessary.
Business name and logos
Google can auto-add your name and logo, but as with most things Google related, I prefer to take care of this myself. Click on the blue “Get access” button.
You will be directed to a screen that (at the time of this writing) asks two questions: Are you a private business or agency, and do you pay for Google Ads or does an agency? Next, it will take you to a screen to ask for your business name and address. If you have a Google My Business or Google Local Service Ads account, it may offer to auto-fill this information for you. Verification typically takes less than an hour.
Site Links
This ad extension option allows the user to click to a specific page of your website. Typical site links are: contact us, about us, schedule online, etc. Not only are you giving your prospects direct links to important conversion pages on your website, but your ad takes up more physical real estate on the SERP (search engine results page). Google suggests taking up more space attributes to a higher click- through rate (CTR), meaning more people per 100 ad views click on your ad. More in-depth information on CTR optimization can be found in the Optimization Guide.
Callouts
This is a good tool to add value to your ad. You will offer value propositions, ancillary services, or anything that you feel sets you apart from your competition. Using [InterNACHI Certified] will get you flagged for violating Google’s drug policy (Don’t ask me?!?). A good workaround is [NACHI Certified]. Do not use the brackets.
Click on More asset types
Promotions – Use this extension if you want to run a timed promotion. A helpful tip is to ensure that any promotions are run across all of your Google properties, including Ads, Google My Business, and, if applicable, GLSA. Also, any promotion mentioned in your ads should be immediately reflected on the landing page.
Prices – Use this extension if you are inclined to list your prices. I did not usually employ this extension on behalf of my clients.
Structured snippets – A popular technique to use structured snippets in your ads is to choose the “Service Catalog” feature and then list Values such as Home Inspection, Condo Inspection, Radon Testing, etc. These snippets can be applied at the Account level, meaning they will be used in all campaigns in the account or at the Campaign level, which makes them specific to a particular campaign.
Lead forms – When lead forms came out, I thought this would be a game changer in the industry. In my experience, this particular extension creates an undo amount of spam. The lead form asks for a 30-character Headline, a 25-character business name, and a 200-character Description. It allows you to choose which questions to include on your lead form, what information is required, and to ask qualifying questions. You can also add a background image and select your call to action (CTA). You also have the ability to create a form submission message, which is basically a confirmation notice to the submitter. This extension allows you automated lead delivery options, manual lead form downloads, and you may choose your lead form type.
Locations – If you attach your GMB profile to your Google Ads, your ad will be eligible to appear in the “Map Pack” on the SERP. This is typically an account-level implementation.
Apps – This extension is for app promotion. I have not met a home inspector that has their own app yet.
Click on Done and then Next
Budget
When I set up campaigns, I start with a 5-day ad schedule, so we will only advertise around 20-22 days per month. A daily budget of $35 will often lead to a $600 – $700 per month ad spend. In this case, a daily budget of $41.90 is suggested. If you choose an amount below this, Google threatens that they may not show your ad as much as you would like. I will launch it with this budget and see how often we reach our daily maximum. I will make my adjustments based on traffic volume and performance.
Your campaign is ready to publish. Click Publish campaign.
Now we need to fix your bidding. From the main screen, click on your Campaign. Then, on the left side of the screen, you will click on Settings. Now go to the Bidding drop-down. Choose Change bid strategy. Next, select Manual CPC and make sure that Enhanced CPC is NOT checked.
We also want to fix your devices. Since we have already created a call campaign, we do not want this campaign to scavenge mobile impressions from that one. Click on Insights & reports. Then click on When & where ads showed and then Devices. We want to click on Bid adj. pencil in the Mobile phones row and choose Decrease 100%.
I also Decrease the tablet bid adjustment to either 50% or 100%. In my experience, tablet traffic does not convert very often in lead generation. You are welcome to leave it alone if you wish.
Negative Keywords
This is one of the most important parts of your Google Ads campaign and one that is often looked over by amateurs and professionals alike. Negative keywords tell Google what
keywords we do NOT want to appear for. This is how you save money. The goal is to show our ad for as many searches with the right intent as possible and avoid the searches that don’t have a chance of converting.
First, click on Keywords on the left side of the page. Then click Negative keywords.
Click on +Negative Keywords
Assuming you took my advice and implemented the call ads first, you already have negative keyword lists saved in your account.
Simply click on Use negative keyword list and highlight the lists we created in the call ads.
Hit Save.
Conversion Tracking
Conversion tracking is not always 100%. Let’s get that out of the way right up front. We strive to get as close to 100% as
possible using Google Ads and Google Analytics. Full
disclosure: we had a team at the agency that took care of this stuff for me. Since then, I have learned more than I would have liked about conversion tracking, but I am far from an
expert. That being said, let’s delve into it.
The conversion actions we are trying to track are phone calls lasting more than a certain duration (start of f with 60 seconds), online scheduler starts, website form submissions, and website calls.Phone Calls: We start with a 60-second duration conversion threshold. We are trying to teach Google what a lead looks
like to us. Though we know that 60 seconds isn’t long enough to close a deal, it is longer than your typical telemarketer call. You can set the conversion threshold to 90 or 120 seconds as your account matures. Your number of conversions will
decrease, but these calls will more accurately represent a true lead or “conversion”.
Online Scheduler Starts: Some companies that I have worked with have an online scheduling feature. I have not found a way to track the scheduling completion unless your
scheduling software lands the user on a “thank you” page when finished, and that page has to be on a trackable URL.
The closest we usually come is to track when the scheduler is started.
Website Form Submissions: If the prospect chooses to submit a contact form from your website, you want to be able to
attribute this action back to Google Ads. This walkthrough
will focus on website form submission tracking, although the same principles can apply to other actions you may decide to track. A code will be generated at the end of the process that must be embedded on your website. Contact a website
professional if you are unable to do this yourself.
At the top of the dashboard, click on Tools and setting (wrench) and then click on Conversions under the Measurement column.
Next, click on the blue +New conversion action button. Then click on Website.
Enter your Website domain into the box and press scan.
Press the blue +Add conversion action manually.
Goal and action optimization – Use the drop-down box to choose Submit lead form. Next, choose Secondary option not used for bidding.
Conversion name – I labeled this conversion Website Lead Form in the example.
Value – I usually mark Don’t use a value for this conversion. If you want to assign a value, you should wait until you have some data to base this number on. You can divide the total jobs created by Google Ads by the total number of leads Google Ads generated in that same time frame. This will give you an approximation of the value of each lead.
Count – For leads, it is best practice to count One conversion per interaction.
Remaining conversion actions:
Click-through conversion window – 30 days
Engaged-view conversion window – 3 days
View-through conversion window – 1 day
Attribution model – Data-driven or last click
Enhanced conversions – Use user-provided data from your website to attribute conversions to ads in a privacy-safe way
Click Done
Website Calls: We should have call extensions applied to this ad, but you will still find some users want to know more before calling. We want to track calls from your website as conversions as well. To do this, we need to start a +New conversion action.
This time choose Phone calls. Next, select Calls to a phone number on your website.
Click Create and continue. Now follow the installation instructions.
I didn’t write these manuals to get rich. I wrote these manuals because many small businesses are underrepresented in the digital marketing world. Most cheap agencies and managers are ineffective, and the Google “smart” options are smart for
Google, but not so much for you. I DO NOT guarantee that these structures and tactics will work. I do guarantee that I have used these exact methods to make many service businesses, home inspectors in particular, 3-10x their monthly investment. I want you to succeed.
If you have tried everything that I have laid out and you are still struggling, send me an email at JasonB@serviceleadsdirect.com
Please explain the problems you are encountering and any steps that you have taken to fix them. I will respond and even jump into your campaign if need be.
Do not be surprised if it takes your campaign a few days to gain traction. This is common. If after a few days, you are not receiving impressions, double-check that keywords and ads are eligible. If so, you may need to add a broad match ad group, expand your geography, or increase your individual keyword bids (if using a manual bid strategy).
Check your account performance a minimum of weekly.
Answer calls, even if they are labeled “spam risk”. When using Google tracking numbers (something you have to do to allow Google to track your calls and conversions), it is normal for calls from ads to show up as spam risk.
Do not be afraid to make small changes, but only make one or two at a time. Too many changes will make it very difficult to understand which changes had positive or negative effects. Give each change at least a week, preferably 2, before you measure the effects of the change.
Your competitors set the market. The more competition, the higher the bids. Try to stand out from the crowd.
DO NOT IMPLEMENT GOOGLE SUGGESTIONS
Ad Auction – The process that happens with each Google search to decide which ads will appear for that specific search and in which order those ads will show on the page (or whether or not any ads will show at all). Each time an ad is eligible to appear for a search, it goes through the ad auction.
Ad Copy – The written or text part of an advertisement.
Ad Group – An ad group contains one or more ads that share similar targets. Ad groups are used to organize a campaign into common themes.
Automated bidding – A solution that helps advertisers automatically set bids based on performance goals.
Call to Action (CTA) – a piece of content intended to induce a viewer, reader, or listener to perform a specific act, typically taking the form of an instruction or directive.
Campaigns – Overall or top level of an ad account structure, including ad groups, keywords, budgets, and targeting.
Clicks – When someone clicks your ad, like on the blue headline or phone number of a text ad, Google Ads counts that as a click.
Cost Per Click (CPC) – Cost per click bidding means that you pay for each click on your ads.
Clickthrough rate (CTR) – CTR is the number of clicks that your ad receives divided by the number of times your ad is shown. For example, if you had 5 clicks and 100 impressions, then your CTR would be 5%.
Conversion – When a user performs some specified action after clicking an ad, such as making a call lasting (x) amount of time or submitting a form on your website.
Daily Budget – The average amount that you set for each ad campaign on a per-day basis. It specifies how much you are roughly comfortable spending each day.
Display URL – The web address that appears with your ad
Impressions – An impression is counted each time your ad is shown on a search result page or other site on Google network.
Keyword – Words or phrases describing your product or service that you choose to help determine when and where your ad can appear.
Negative Keyword – A type of keyword that prevents your ad from being triggered by a certain word or phrase.
Pay Per Click (PPC) – Google’s advertising solution which allows businesses to bid on keywords for a chance to show ads in Google
search results. When using Google Ads, you only pay when someone clicks on your ad.Search Volume – Indicates the number of search queries for a specific search term in a search engine within a given time frame.
See more resources at: https://support.google.com/google-ads/topic/glossary
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