There's no flat price — and that's the point
Your Google Ads budget isn't a sticker price; it's an outcome of your market. The same $2,000 a month that generates a flood of leads for one business barely registers for another, because the cost to reach a customer is set by competition, not by you.
That's why we don't quote a flat monthly number before understanding the business. A quote without context is just a guess dressed up as expertise.
The three numbers that set your budget
Almost everything about an ad budget comes down to three numbers working together:
- Cost per click (CPC) — what you pay each time someone clicks your ad. A plumber in a competitive metro might see $15–40 clicks; a niche B2B supplier might see $3. This is set by the auction, not by your agency.
- Conversion rate — the percentage of clicks that become a lead. A focused landing page might convert 8–12%; a leaky homepage might convert 1–2%. This one you can actually control.
- Cost per lead (CPL) — CPC divided by conversion rate. This is the number that matters, because it tells you what a lead actually costs you.
Work backwards from a lead you can afford
Instead of asking "what should I spend?", ask "what can I afford to pay for a customer?" — then work backwards. Say a new customer is worth $2,000 to you and one in four quoted leads closes. That means each lead is worth up to $500, and you can be comfortable paying well under that to acquire one.
Now flip it: if your cost per lead runs $80 and you want 25 leads a month, that's a $2,000 budget producing roughly 25 leads — six or so new customers against a spend that's a fraction of the revenue they represent. The budget isn't a cost you're guessing at; it's a dial you set against a known return.
The first month or two is about gathering the real numbers for your account — your actual CPC and conversion rate — and cutting waste. The compounding gains come from the optimization cycle after that.
Where ad budgets quietly leak
Most underperforming accounts aren't underfunded — they're undisciplined. The money disappears in predictable places:
- No negative keywords, so you're paying for searches that will never buy.
- Sending clicks to a homepage instead of a landing page built for the ad's intent.
- No conversion tracking, so nobody actually knows which clicks produced leads.
- Optimizing to clicks and impressions — vanity metrics — instead of cost per qualified lead.
- Broad match keywords left unmonitored, spending into irrelevant searches.
When Google Ads is the wrong first channel
Google Ads is the fastest way to generate qualified leads — but only when people are already searching for what you sell. If nobody is searching for your category yet, search has nothing to capture, and your money works harder creating demand on paid social first.
We'd rather tell you that than take the retainer. The whole premise of performance advertising is that the numbers lead — and sometimes the numbers say start somewhere else.