PPC for Electricians: Cost, Platforms, Tactics & More

What is PPC for Electricians?

PPC for electricians is an online marketing channel where companies bid for ad spots on different platforms—search engines, social media channels, and applications—to promote their electrical services.

Electrician PPC campaigns allow companies to target potential customers on PPC ad platforms using specific keywords, demographics, interests, etc.

In exchange for access to their target audience, electrical companies pay PPC ad platforms whenever the ad is clicked (cost per click or CPC) or viewed (cost per impression or CPM).

Small businesses sometimes face steep CPC and CPM costs. However, when a lead converts, they can earn multiples of the initial investment.

How does PPC advertising work?

PPC advertising operates on a similar framework regardless of platform or format.

• Advertisers define their target audience—the people they want their ads to reach—using specific criteria, such as keywords and demographics.

• Next, they pick a maximum bid, write the ad copy, and create the ad’s destination (aka landing page).

• Every advertiser targeting similar keywords or demographics enters into a virtual auction with the ad platform in question.

• That platform then picks the winner using its algorithms and guidelines.

Ad platforms use algorithms to match user needs with the most relevant ads.

For instance, Google Ads uses Ad Rank to determine if an ad shows (eligibility) and its position (higher rank = higher position). This rank is based on six key factors:

• The bid: Ads with more competitive bids are likelier to win the auction.

• Quality of the ad and linked asset: Google computes a quality score using the value of your ad and landing page or website to the customer.

• Compliance with ad rank threshold: The ad's overall quality should align with Google's minimum quality threshold for that search.

• Competitiveness of other ads in the auction: If there are many competitors with high-quality ads and high bids, the overall cost per click (CPC) can increase for everyone.

• Alignment between the ad and the search’s context: Google considers the overall context of the search, including the searcher’s location, search term, device type, other ads, and organic search engine results.

• Predicted impact of extra ad assets: Google predicts the impact of ad assets such as your phone number on the ad’s performance.

Later, we’ll look at different ways to optimize your ad for these key factors. 

Why Do Electrical Companies Invest in PPC?

Beyond being a powerful lead generation channel, PPC ads offer several other benefits to electrical companies.

Here’s why PPC campaigns are a powerful online advertising tool:

1. Quick results: PPC marketing campaigns can start yielding results immediately after they are launched, as long as advertisers use the right keywords and targeting criteria.

Electrical companies can also use tools to measure PPC ad results and gain valuable insights to support other online electrician marketing campaigns.

2. Cost-effective: Electrical companies fully control how much they spend and can use filters to ensure only quality leads view their ads. PPC ads have a high conversion rate and return on investment (ROI).

3. Precision targeting: PPC ad platforms have several targeting criteria electrical companies can leverage, such as demographics, hobbies, and browsing history. Businesses can also target people who requested a quote, visited their service or booking pages, completed a contact form, or clicked on their social media ads.

4. Broad reach: PPC ads are a double-edged sword: they reach potential and existing customers simultaneously, helping generate electrical leads and build brand awareness.

5. Effortless setup and operation: Electrical companies can independently set up ads using the platform’s guides, tooltips, and video tutorials.

What Platforms Do Electricians Use for PPC Apart from Google?

Google Ads is the most popular PPC ad platform, given that Google accounts for most of the world’s online traffic, and most customers rely on the search engine to find local businesses.

Google Ads offers a comprehensive suite of ad formats like display, video, and search ads. This gives you a wide range of options to reach your target audience.

However, electrical companies can explore other ad platforms to reach prospects across different channels.

Recommended read: Check out this definitive guide on Google Ads for electricians.

1. Meta

Electrical companies can run PPC ads on Meta's Instagram and Facebook platforms. Both platforms’ large number of active users and sophisticated targeting options let advertisers reach a broad pool of prospects.

Also, Facebook Ads Manager has intuitive dashboards that showcase key performance metrics like reach, page visibility, engagement, and return on ad spend (ROAS).

2. TikTok

With about 148.0 million highly engaged users aged 18 and above in the United States, TikTok is a popular short video platform for attracting new customers.

The platform offers various formats, including branded hashtag challenges, in-feed ads, brand takeover ads, and TopView ads.

A major advantage of TikTok is its local targeting functionality, which allows an electrician business to adapt its ad messaging to specific areas—zip codes, provinces, cities, states, etc.

3. LinkedIn

Commercial electrical companies can advertise on LinkedIn to reach audiences with twice the buying power of an average web audience. LinkedIn offers multiple ad formats, such as sponsored ads, native ads, dynamic ads, and sponsored messages.

LinkedIn also allows advertisers to target users using their job title, listed skills, and industry. However, compared to other ads, LinkedIn can be quite expensive.

How Much Does PPC for Electricians Cost?

Electricians spend an average of $500 to $10,000 monthly on PPC ads. If the campaign is set up correctly, they may earn multiples of their investment from converted leads.

For example, businesses enjoy an average return of $2 for every $1 spent on PPC ads.

Generally, the actual cost of a PPC ad relies on these key factors:

• Ad platform: Each PPC ad platform has different pricing structures. For example, while the Google Ads platform has an average CPC of $1.72, reaching users on LinkedIn can cost between $2 and $3 per click. 

• Target location: Advertisers compete fiercely for the limited ad slots to target residents in highly populated urban areas, translating to high CPCs. That’s why targeting customers in densely populated metropolitan areas like New York costs more than in remote communities like Nantucket.

• Available competition: Cost per click increases with the number of people competing for that keyword or audience. For example, popular keywords like “electrical emergency” or “electrical company near me” attract higher bids, driving up their CPC compared to branded keywords (containing your company name).

How Can You Run a PPC Campaign for an Electrical Business?

Here's a step-by-step process for creating your PPC campaign:

1. Set your PPC goals

By defining your goals upfront, you keep your PPC campaign laser-focused on what matters the most—driving real business results.

Your PPC ad campaign also directly determines the format, platform, and messaging you'll choose.

Depending on your business needs, your PPC ad campaign can target these goals:

• Boost website traffic

• Generate engagement

• Grow brand awareness

• Drive free estimate requests (aka leads)

2. Define your advertising budget

Defining your budget empowers you to invest strategically in PPC ads and achieve your business goals while protecting your bottom line.

Your PPC ad budget depends on your revenue, the number of customers you aim to acquire, and the volume of website traffic you need to achieve such goals.

Upcity, a platform that connects businesses with service providers, has a great process and formula for calculating PPC budgets. It starts by determining the number of customers required to reach your goals using this formula.

Then, use the PPC platform's ad management tool to find your keyword’s average cost per click. For example, you can use Google Keyword Planner to run search, display, or Google Local Services ads.

Finally, input the average cost per click you’ve computed into this formula.

The CSR and tech conversion rate is the percentage of leads your CSR (customer sales representatives) and techs convince into becoming customers.

After arriving at the PPC ad budget, the next step is picking a bidding strategy, which depends on your company and budget size.

“If you're comfortable spending your entire budget, I recommend [maximizing] leads,” says Brandon Doyle, marketing director at Blue Corona.

“But if you're saying, ‘Hey, I want to be sensitive to how much I'm paying for a lead,’ that's where you might take that max-per-lead play regarding your bid strategy.”

3. Do keyword research

Find keywords relevant to your business and target customers. Examples include “emergency electrician,” “electrician near me,” etc. 

The goal is to have a list of keywords customers use to search that are relevant to your business and have a high potential for generating qualified leads.

Your keyword list should encompass four broad categories, as this table explains.

Competitor keywords cost a lot to target and can quickly consume your ad budget. So, only target them if absolutely necessary.

To generate your list, use these tips:

• See things from the customer's perspective: What words would a customer have to search to find your services?

• Begin with broad search terms, then drill down: For example, electrical repair — [City] electrical repair — [City] electrical wiring repair — kitchen outlet repair [city, state].

• Use synonyms and keyword variations: For example, the keyword “electrical repair” can generate other keywords, such as “electrical wiring repair,” “electrical outlet repair,” and “electrical switch repair.”

4. Optimize your ads

To attract prospective buyers and exceed the quality threshold of the PPC ad platform, you’ll need persuasive ad copy and appealing creatives—images, videos, etc.

Your ad copy should clearly and concisely communicate your value proposition, exhausting the platform’s recommended word count.

If you’re running ads on any of Google’s properties, include ad assets such as site links, callouts, location extensions, reviews, and phone numbers to increase your ad’s prominence.

This way, your ad grabs attention compared to competitors with fewer extensions.

Pro tip: Program your ad to replace call extensions with lead capture forms during off hours so you don’t leave prospects on hold.

5. Create your landing page (and optimize it)

Landing pages are the last step in converting ad traffic generated by prospects into customers.

Your landing page copy should match the messaging, value proposition, and brand elements (logo, colors, tone, and voice) captured in your ad. 

Your landing page copy should seamlessly continue the conversation from your ad. Weave in the benefits that address the visitor's initial concerns and 

include real customer testimonials and reviews to build trust and attract job bookings.

Finally, a clear call to action should be included to encourage customers to take action and optimize the landing page design for mobile devices, which accounts for a significant portion of online traffic.

6. Review and test your campaigns

Before launching your ad, review its elements and destination (landing page or website) to boost your campaign’s effectiveness. Review the ad’s character count, additional assets, and messaging.

After launching the campaign, monitor key performance indicators (KPIs) such as:

• Clickthrough rate: the percentage of viewers that clicked on your ad.

• Cost per acquisition (CPA) and cost per lead (CPL): The amount it costs to acquire a customer (CPA) or a lead (CPL).

• Impressions: The number of times your ad is viewed.

• Quality score: Your ad’s quality in comparison to others.

You can use your PPC ad account’s analytics tools to track your campaign’s performance. However, if you want to monitor each campaign using the exact revenue generated, invest in ServiceTitan’s Home Services Marketing software.

It ranks your campaigns using generated revenue and highlights the zip codes generating the most calls. This information is showcased using an intuitive dashboard with easy-to-understand visualizations. This allows you to optimize your ad spend by focusing on high-performing campaigns and zip codes, maximizing your ROI.

We recently partnered with Scorpion, a builder of AI-powered Digital marketing solutions for local businesses, to help service companies increase their ad campaign’s effectiveness with Marketing – Pro Ads. Learn more about the partnership and how it helps you generate more leads and revenue.

What PPC Tactics Should Electricians Know?

Here are some PPC ad campaign optimization tips to generate conversions on a tight budget:

1. Go local

Electrical companies are all about local service. Therefore, it’s advisable to target your ads and messaging to the specific region you serve, reaching high-intent leads.

To localize your PPC ad, use local electrician keywords such as “electrician in [ your local service area]” and include zip codes. Also, use phone numbers with local extensions and exclude areas outside your coverage.

Additionally, use local PPC ad offerings such as Google Local Services Ads (LSAs) designed for companies that operate within a specific geographic area.

LSAs are a special type of PPC ad offering that allows advertisers to pay for each lead generated and empowers customers to call or message businesses directly from the search results.

To fully harness the revenue potential of LSAs, consider using ServiceTitan’s Local Services Ads integration, which empowers customers to book appointments directly from result pages.

Every job booking automatically reflects in ServiceTitan through the call booking screen, eliminating the need to copy customer information manually.

ServiceTitan’s Local Services Ads integration also provides performance tracking, which supplies valuable insights for optimizing ad spending for revenue.

Using this exclusive offering, available only for ServiceTitan users, you can streamline lead generation and drive job bookings from local prospects.

2. Leverage location extensions

Location extensions are a functionality in Google Ads that allows you to include a hyperlink to your company’s location at the bottom of your ad.

With a single click, potential customers can see your exact location and how far it is from them, driving foot traffic and boosting the chances of conversion.

Pair location extensions with location keywords and settings to ensure your ads appear only for people searching from your service area.

3. Use call tracking

Call tracking involves creating and assigning dynamic numbers to your PPC campaign to attribute each call to its source channel.

This technology makes tracking each campaign's profitability easy, ensuring every ad dollar generates revenue.

You can use standalone call tracking software like CallRail, WhatConverts, and Ruler Analytics to implement call tracking.

However, to save costs and consolidate your tech stack, consider using ServiceTitan's Marketing Pro – Ads, which offers call tracking plus a suite of marketing tools to streamline your entire campaign.

The platform allows you to create and assign unique tracking numbers to each campaign and displays their exact revenue using performance reports.

Such performance reports reveal campaign performance insights by channel and category. This lets you make data-driven decisions to improve your marketing strategy and campaign effectiveness.

ServiceTitan's Marketing Pro – Ads platform also has integrations for Google Analytics and Google Ads, which allow you to track campaign performance from one central hub.

This seamless integration also automatically feeds ad conversion data to the Ad Optimizer—an AI-powered software—which trains Google Ads’ system to place your ads in front of high-value leads that are most likely to convert.

This generates more qualified leads and conversions, maximizing your campaign’s ROI.

For example, Proximo Marketing—a marketing agency for trade companies—recently used the Ad Optimizer to run a campaign for a plumbing company. After a month with Ads Optimizer, lead quality increased from 44% to 60%, yielding almost a 100% better return on investment. This caused Proximo Marketing’s Liz Soto to call the Ad Optimizer a “next level” tool.

Brianna Skiffington, Chief Product Officer at Ad Leverage, says the Ad Optimizer brings infinite possibilities for companies running Ads. 

“The most scalable channel is now infinitely more scalable and more efficient because of the integration with ServiceTitan that you can utilize with Marketing Pro - Ads. You're able to multiply your revenue, literally.”

Check out this video to learn how to connect Google Analytics and Google Ads to ServiceTitan.

The Bottom Line

Now, you’re well aware of the potential of PPC ads and how to use them to attract qualified leads by appearing exactly when people search for electrical contractors. That protects you from suffering a fate similar to Ben's.

Remember to set your goals, research your keywords, and regularly measure and iterate.

Consider using software like ServiceTitan to generate leads using PPC ads and streamline operations to boost your company's revenue.

ServiceTitan is a software tool home service providers use to streamline marketing campaigns, manage customer interactions, and automate business processes. Join thousands of nationwide contractors already using the software to boost their revenue.