Skip to main content Plumbing PPC Case Study
A call-only pay-per-click campaign for a Palm Beach County plumbing company produced 204 inbound calls in one quarter at $55.21 each, converting 26.15% of clicks. The campaign paid 71% more per click than the plumbing average and still delivered leads 39% cheaper than the home services benchmark.
Verified Results · Jul 1 to Sep 30, 2024
Every figure below is taken directly from the Google Ads campaign view for the reporting period. Conversions in a call-only campaign are qualifying phone calls, so the cost per conversion is a true cost per inbound lead.
204
Inbound Calls
about 68 per month
$55.21
Cost Per Lead
▼ 39% vs. $90.92 benchmark
26.15%
Conversion Rate
▲ 2.6x the category average
$11,262
Total Ad Spend
across the quarter
6.11%
Click-Through Rate
in line with category
780
Clicks
from 12,770 impressions
Metric
Result
Conversions (phone calls)
204.00
Cost per conversion
$55.21
Total cost
$11,262.39
Clicks
780
Impressions
12,770
Click-through rate
6.11%
Average cost per click
$14.44
Conversion rate
26.15%
Campaign Snapshot
Most case studies hide the setup. Here is the full configuration, so you can judge the result in context and replicate the structure.
Campaign type
Search, Call Only
Service
Plumbing Services
Ad groups
14
Conversion action
Qualifying phone call
Ad format
Call-only ads with call assets
Device targeting
Mobile only, by campaign type
Bid strategy
Target CPA
Geography
Palm Beach County, FL
Reporting period
Jul 1 to Sep 30, 2024
Landing page
None, the ad is the call
Keyword match types
Phrase and exact
Ad schedule
Staffed phone hours
The Challenge and the Strategy
A homeowner with water spreading across the kitchen floor is not going to browse a website, compare service pages, and fill in a contact form. They are going to call the first credible plumber they see, from their phone, in the next sixty seconds. Every step between the search and that phone call is a place to lose them.
Standard search campaigns add exactly those steps. The searcher clicks, waits for a landing page, hunts for a phone number, and decides again. Each stage leaks intent, and in a market as competitive as Palm Beach County, paying premium click prices to lose people at a landing page is an expensive way to lose.
So we removed the website from the equation. In a call-only campaign the ad itself is the phone number, and tapping it dials the business directly. There is no landing page and no form. That single structural change is why this campaign converted 26.15% of its clicks, while the wider home services category averages 10.22%. Industry data shows call-only setups convert at roughly twice the rate of standard search for emergency trades, and this campaign landed comfortably above even that.
We paired it with Target CPA bidding, which tells Google to buy calls at a set cost rather than chase the cheapest clicks. That is the second half of the story, and it explains the number most people find surprising.
The Execution
Built the Campaign Around the Call, Not the Click
We ran call-only ads so the tap dials the plumber directly, cutting the landing page, the form, and the second decision point out of the path entirely. The conversion action was a qualifying phone call, so the campaign was measured on conversations, not traffic.
Segmented 14 Ad Groups by Service and Urgency
Emergency calls, drain issues, water heaters and general plumbing were split into 14 tightly themed ad groups. That let the ad copy match the exact problem the searcher typed. Phrase and exact match kept each group narrow, and the search terms report was reviewed for negative keywords so parts, career and DIY queries never rang the phone. Tight query to ad matching is what holds a 6.11% click-through rate (CTR) at a premium cost per click, because relevance is what Google rewards with Quality Score.
Let Target CPA Buy Calls Instead of Clicks
Target CPA bidding optimizes toward a cost per conversion rather than a cost per click. It was free to pay more for an expensive click if that click reliably became a call, which is precisely the trade that produced a below-benchmark cost per lead. Winning the auction still depends on Ad Rank, so a strong Quality Score is what let a higher bid buy a top slot in the paid search results rather than simply overpaying for it.
Tightened Geography and Hours to the Service Area
Location targeting was held to a Palm Beach County radius and scheduled to the hours the phones were actually covered. A call-only ad is only worth serving when someone can pick up, so restricting delivery protected the budget from calls that would ring out. Because call-only inventory serves on mobile devices, device targeting and the ad schedule are the same lever here.
Benchmarked
A result only means something next to a benchmark. Measured against published 2025 and 2026 industry data, the campaign underperformed on cost per click and outperformed decisively on everything that determines what a lead actually costs.
| Metric | This Campaign | Industry Benchmark | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost per lead | $55.21 | $90.92 | 39% cheaper |
| Conversion rate | 26.15% | 10.22% | 2.6x higher |
| Click-through rate | 6.11% | 6.18% | in line |
| Average cost per click | $14.44 | $8.45 | 71% higher |
| Cost per call, emergency trades | $55.21 | $76.00 | 27% cheaper |
That fourth row is the interesting one, and we have left it in deliberately. This campaign paid $14.44 a click against a plumbing average closer to $8.45, because Palm Beach County is an affluent, heavily contested market and call-only inventory on mobile is expensive. Judged on cost per click alone, it looks like a losing campaign.
It is not, because cost per click is not what a plumbing company pays for. It pays for booked jobs. Converting 26.15% of clicks instead of 10.22% means each of those pricier clicks was worth roughly two and a half times more, which is how a campaign with above-average click costs still produced leads 39% below the category benchmark. Optimizing for cheap clicks would have made the headline metric look better and the business worse.
Key Takeaways
FAQ
A good cost per lead for plumbing Google Ads is roughly $56 to $101, and anything below $90 beats the home services average. This campaign delivered qualifying phone calls at $55.21, which sits under that range. Cost per lead varies heavily by market, and a plumber in a dense metro will pay considerably more than one in a rural area.
A call-only campaign is a Google Ads format where the ad is a phone number instead of a link, so tapping it dials the business directly with no website visit in between. A plumber should use one for urgent, high-intent services such as emergency repairs, where the customer wants to speak to someone immediately. It works best when someone is available to answer, so ad scheduling should match staffed phone hours.
Yes, Target CPA bidding works well for plumbing lead generation once the campaign has enough conversion history to learn from. It optimizes toward a set cost per conversion rather than the cheapest possible click, which aligns bidding with what a plumbing company actually buys. In this campaign it produced 204 calls at $55.21 each across the quarter.
What We Did
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