Google Ads vs Local Service Ads? [which one should you use]

Why should local service businesses look at engaging local service ads?

The biggest pro is that you are showing up at the top of the search results. The key is really following the lead off of Google's platform.

What are local service ads? Should you be using them? And how are they different to normal Google search ads? And we're going to be answering all those questions and much more in this interview that I have with one of Define Digital Academy's coaches, Ashley. Because ultimately at the end of the day, as a local service business, do you really care where your leads come from? Because all you really want is to make sure that you've got a high quality flow of leads coming into your business. And that's why I invited Ashley on so that we can go through and talk about the differences between local service ads and also Google search and which one is right for you and your business. So sit back and enjoy as we have this live interview with Ashley.

All right. Hello everyone.

And today I've got the absolute pleasure of having Ashley with me. Hey Ash, how are you going?

I'm good, thanks. How are you doing?

I'm doing really— hey, and also as well, just wanted to let people know is Ashley is actually one of our newest Defined Digital Academy coaches who is inside of our Google Ads Mastery program. And I wanted to get her on because we're going to be talking about local service ads. Now, one of the things that we do need to obviously clarify is that local service ads are not available in all countries. but Google is starting to roll it out more and more and more. So that's why we wanted to get, I guess, on the front foot. And, Ash, so I'll just throw it over to you. If you could just give everyone a bit of a summation about what local service ads are and how they actually differ from your traditional Google search campaigns.

Yeah, absolutely. So local service ads are basically just another ad format that Google has started to offer to local service-based businesses. Not every industry is going to be eligible for it, but a lot of them, them are. And when they do show up in Google Search, they show up right at the top. And so it goes local service ads followed by the traditional Google Ads, then it's the map pack, and then organic. So that's a huge thing, just showing right at the top of the search results. And then the biggest differences that you'll see between the traditional Google Ads and the local service ads is the way you end up paying for the ads themselves. So with the traditional ads, we pay per click. So anytime somebody clicks on it, whether it's a good click or not, we're paying some money. Whereas with the local service ads, we're paying per lead. And so people can click and interact with the profile all you want until they call you or message you. You don't pay anything. So that's a big plus and a big benefit for a lot of business owners. The other big difference that you'll see is the amount of control that you have over the ad. So you do have a lot less control with the local service ads compared to what you can do with a search ad.

So in terms of just functionality, just so we can really clear for everyone who might be new to these local service ads, is it more based on their Google Business Profile or is the data coming in from their website?

Yeah, so it connects with the Google Business Profile. And so when the ad does show up, it looks almost exactly like a Google Business Profile listing. So it shows your rating, all of your reviews, and a little bit of the business information.

Okay, let's now go into some of the pros and cons. So, well, firstly, if you just sort of lay out, let's start with some of the negative things. What are some of the cons or perceived negatives of local service ads that people need to be aware of? I think you've mentioned their control is one big thing. I really do hope that you enjoy this interview with Ashley, who is one of our Defined Digital Academy coaches inside of our Google Ads Mastery program. And in fact, Ashley just ran an extended masterclass about local service ads and how you can use them for the best effect for your business. And if you're a local service business and you're getting frustrated with not being able to generate a highly regular flow of quality leads coming into your business, I highly encourage you to join Google Ads Mastery. Google Ads Mastery doesn't only provide you with teaching and training, it also gives you direct access to not only me but coaches like Ashley who can help you with your Google Ads campaigns. One of the core features inside of Google Ads Mastery is our live support. We actually offer live support to local businesses like you every day between Monday and Friday, plus we also have weekly live coaching calls. So if you'd like to hear more about how Google Ads Mastery can help you see more ads for your business, why don't you follow the link in the description below where you can see more information about Google Ads Mastery, and if you use the coupon code YouTube, we'll also give you a 20% lifetime discount to Google Ads Mastery. But right now, let's get back into the interview, but I hope to see you inside Google Ads Mastery real, real soon.

Yeah, the lack of control is a huge negative. So you're not bidding on keywords, that's all up to Google. You're basically telling them what service you're offering and you can toggle on and off some services within that. But for the most part, it's just Google going to find you leads. And so if you do want to target a specific service within your industry, it's near impossible to do that with a local service ad. So that is a big con with them. You cannot go through search terms and add them as exclusions. You can't do any of that. The ability, or the lack of ability, to fine-tune the ad is just not there. You're not writing headlines, you're not writing ad descriptions or anything like that. So all of that is up to Google.

So it would be obviously really, really, I guess, important for people to really make sure that they've got their services really lined in. So when they're adding in what services they're providing in their Google profile, that it's they don't want to go straight too far from what their core services are that they offer.

Exactly, yeah. So you want to make sure your Google Business Profile is fully optimized with all of your primary industries or your primary services and all of the secondary services that you do actually offer, not something slightly related to what you offer. You want it to be really honed in and targeted on what you do, do for your clients.

And then the same will be true for the service, the service areas that, or the suburbs and zip codes. You want to make sure that that's a really, really tight a group to, to where you really want to be getting leads from as well.

Yeah, definitely. And with the ads, you can choose where you want to target the ads. A lot of businesses tend to go broader when they do the, the targeting, and that will actually have a negative effect. If you have a brick-and-mortar business and somebody from 30 minutes away ends up calling you but you're too far away, if that doesn't turn into a good lead, then Google is taking that as a negative signal, which ultimately ends up hurting you. So The tighter that you keep that location targeting, the better.

Yeah. Okay, now talk about some of the pros. I mean, why should local service businesses look at engaging local service ads? What are the benefits of it?

The biggest pro is that you are showing up at the top of the search results with a search that is highly relevant to the service that you are offering and your area. So the ads tend to get triggered when somebody is searching for your service and they're in your industry. So like dentist near me or dentist San Francisco, that's when it, the ads tend to populate and that is a highly relevant search term. And so to show up at the top of the search results with that is huge. The other thing is that you have to go through a really big verification process with it and background checks and you have to put your licensing and everything in. And the reason Google makes you do that is because they are basically vetting you and telling the searcher that, hey, we trust this company. They are a legit company. We've checked them out. And so to have that checkmark and that added level of trust to the searcher is huge too.

And the things like obviously your Google reviews, this is where this all becomes important because Google is going to be taking that into account as to who to recommend inside of the local service ads placements.

Yeah, the reviews are one of the main things that influences where you rank with the local service ads and how you respond to those reviews and how many reviews come in. Google's looking at all of those things to then determine who to show and who not to show. Job.

Okay, can you sort of break down— now obviously we do know you can't do keyword targeting— what are some of the optimization options that you do have within your local service ads?

The biggest thing that Google, like we said, is looking at is the reviews. And so making sure that you have that system set up to ask clients for reviews so that you are gathering those reviews, that they're trickling in a few new reviews each week, is a huge one. So if you don't have that set up that is something that will heavily impact how your ads are doing. The other big thing that Google does look at is your speed of response. And so if a lot of the phone calls end up going to voicemail, that's going to send a negative signal back to Google and that will push your ad down in their algorithm. Same with messages. If somebody messages you and you never follow up with them, it's a negative signal. So having those two systems in place to be able to respond to leads quickly and then to gather new reviews is huge. Then the main optimization that you can do within the, the platform itself is marking the leads. And so you can go in and you can listen to the calls and then you can mark it whether it's a good lead, a bad lead, whether they booked, whether they were outside your service area or asking for a service you don't offer. You can mark all of that and then tell Google basically it's a good lead or not and help guide the algorithm that way.

And are you able to put in any, say, target bids or target cost per acquisitions that you're wanting to in order to affect your placements as well?

A little bit. So you have two bidding strategies basically that you can choose. You can choose maximize leads, which Google is just going to get you the most amount of leads possible, which is usually the one that you want to use. And you can set a limit with that one as well. So you can tell them that you don't want to go over a certain cost per lead too. Yeah, you have a little bit of room that way.

All right, so now talk to, I mean, it sounds like obviously what we obviously recommend that you want to be playing in both fields, local service ads and also Google search. Just talk through some of the strategies or the best, I guess, the best practices that you really encourage for businesses. Should they start with both or should they start with one platform? What's kind of the strategy you use there?

I usually always recommend if the client has the budget to start with both. If we can test both at the same time and then track the leads and figure out which one is more beneficial for that company, that is what ideally you want to do. I have a lot of businesses that I work with that the local service ads perform better, and that's just in that area. Nobody else is running them. So they get really cheap cost per lead and a really good return on investment. And then I have other businesses that are in a more competitive area or a more competitive niche, and their cost per acquisition is a little bit higher. And the search ads tend to perform better. So it is always good if you can to test both. But there are certain times when local service ads may not be the best choice. So if you are a new business or you haven't started building your reputation online and gathering the Google reviews, local service ads is probably not something you want to visit. If you don't have that system set up to respond to leads, probably not where you want to start either with local service ads. Um, also if you want to target like a very specific niche within your industry, you have to do that with search ads.

Okay, so, so more the runway you'd be looking for, for— so if you're a new local service provider, you'd want to more start going into Google Search, going through the practice of Google Search, really making sure that you're building out your, your local, your business profile, reviews are working, all of those things working, and then you would introduce the local service leads, uh local service ads, sorry, into, into the mix?

Yeah, absolutely. If they have zero reviews or next to no reviews, start with the search ads and then put in a system that will get them reviews. And then 3, 4 months down the road, down the line, you can introduce them. And having them both work together would be really big.

Okay, let's sort of move, because I mean, ultimately for a lot of local service businesses, when they— when it really boils down to it They don't really care whether it's Google Search or whether it's local search ads. It really comes back to, hey, I just want my phone to ring and I want high quality leads and a good steady lead flow coming through. So, you know, just sort of paint the picture of when you're managing both of those fields, what are you looking between on the two platforms to make those decisions on, you know, where you're putting more money, where you're putting more attention, coming back to that core goal of just getting more leads for the business.

Yeah, the key is really following the lead off of Google's platform. So what is happening with that lead afterwards? Are they booking an appointment? How much are you paying for that lead? How much money are you getting back from that lead? And so that's the main thing that I am tracking with both platforms. And if, if one is significantly better than the other, then we'll lean into that one as much as we can. If they're both equal, then we'll, we'll continue the road. But yeah, that's the main thing. We just want to get as many appointments for the least amount as possible.

And do you ever use any learnings from local service ads? Do you any use any of those learnings to then come back and add in some optimizations inside of your Google Ads campaigns?

Yeah, absolutely. You don't see this, what people are searching for, but you can listen to the phone call. So Google is recording all the phone calls. So if you see that there is one specific phone call type or service coming through consistently that is converting really well, then absolutely, we'll try that on the, the traditional Google Ads. Search as well, for sure.

Okay. Given that you mentioned, I just want to track back a little bit because you didn't mention the importance of your actual My Business profile to make sure that that is set up correctly. And, you know, what are the best practices, especially for local service providers, in order to— before they even start doing the local service ads, how should they be setting up? And I want you to go through everything, so photos, descriptions, you know, what's kind of the best practices that you look for for setting up that profile?

Basically answering as many of the backend questions on the Google Business Profile as you can. So Yeah, big one is your service industry, your services that you offer in the secondary services, and then obviously gathering reviews and responding to those reviews. Your description is a big one too. You want to make sure that your services are within the description and the area that you service is in that description as well. And then as you work through the backend, Google will just keep asking questions on whether you speak certain languages or what type of audiences, uh, you target for your business, um, whether you take appointments or whether you have certain bathrooms on site. Answer as much as you can, like fill out as much of that profile as you can just to show that it is completed.

Okay, and are there any limitations? So let's just say you've got a service and you might have a physical store or physical office, but then you do just offer mobile services in other cities or other locations, you know, how does that work, uh, in terms of the ranking for local service ads?

Um, it doesn't change anything necessarily because you are still just targeting the area with the ads you're setting up, the area that you service in. So it doesn't, it doesn't change much having a brick and mortar versus a mobile business.

Okay. Alrighty. So last, have you got any last thoughts or essentially last recommendations for anyone who's not running local service ads who wants to start getting into it? Yeah. What would your recommendations be for, for their first, first-ditch go at local service ads?

Uh, just fill out the profile as much as you can, add in your, your callouts that you can put in there, focus on differentiating factors on what sets you apart from your competitors, and then just really focus on getting those reviews. The reviews is huge with the local service ads.

Yeah, and because you did mention reviews are so important, I mean, do you have any sort of recommendations or any extra thoughts that people may not have thought about of ways that you can really make sure you've got a good review system in place for your business.

Nowadays, automated texting is just so easy to set up. Um, yeah, having— once you finish a job, having a text get sent to that client 2 or 3 days after that, first just making sure that they're happy. And if they're not happy, then you can reach out to them and, and fix it and make sure that they do become happy. And if they are, then prompting them to leave a review, just send them the link and, and have them do it.

Yeah, yeah, great. Hey, Ashley, it's been an absolute pleasure, uh, having you on. So thanks for coming on and sharing your knowledge. And, uh, yeah, we look forward to seeing you again next time.

Thanks so much, Aaron.