Hydro Plumbing Services · Plumbing, hot water, leak detection and gas · Sydney, NSW

Hydro Plumbing Services: 1.7× Google Ads return in its first 18 days

Hydro Plumbing Services' first 18 days of Google Ads returned 1.7 times the ad spend in won work, up from 1.5 times at two weeks. More than one in four ad enquiries became a won job, and nearly eight in ten won jobs were marked won within a day.

Services: Google Ads management

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The results

What changed for Hydro Plumbing Services.

Each figure names the window it covers. Use the info button on a tile to see how it was measured.

Headline result
1.7×
Return on ad spend in won work
First 18 days of Google Ads
1.5×
Return on ad spend in won work
First 14 days of Google Ads
More than 1 in 4
Google Ads enquiries that became won jobs
First 18 days of Google Ads
Nearly 8 in 10
Won jobs marked as won within 24 hours of the enquiry
Enquiries at least two days old

How we measured

Won value is the agreed job price Hydro recorded for each job it marked as won; no payments are recorded. An enquiry counts as Google Ads when it is a call or web form traced to an ad click or campaign; test entries are removed, and website enquiries with no ad behind them are left out. Each job is counted against the day its enquiry arrived. Return on ad spend is won value divided by Google Ads spend over the same days, rounded down to one decimal. The 14-day window starts on the first day of ads; the 18-day window runs to the day of measurement, including that part-day, so the newest enquiries were still being quoted. A few larger jobs make up much of the won value, so the return moves with individual jobs. The speed figure covers won jobs from enquiries at least two days old and measures when Hydro recorded the job as won.

In one minute

The 60-second version

Hydro Plumbing Services, from the brief to the result in 5 short slides.

The business
A Sydney plumber for hot water, leaks and gas
Hydro Plumbing Services is a Sydney plumbing business covering hot water, leak detection, gas fitting and gas leaks, drains, taps, toilets and kitchen plumbing.
The problem
Starting Google Ads with no history to go on
Hydro's Google Ads account was new. The first weeks had to show whether ads would bring in won work, measured against the jobs Hydro actually won rather than clicks or calls.
What we built
Service ad groups matched to service pages, plus suburbs
A Sydney plumbing campaign with ad groups for leak detection, hot water, gas, water filters, taps and toilets, each landing on its own service page, plus a campaign for suburbs.
What happened
1.7× in the first 18 days, and still rising
The first 14 days of ads returned 1.5 times the ad spend in won work, rising to 1.7 times by day 18. More than one in four Google Ads enquiries became a won job.
1.7×First 18 days of Google Ads
What we learned
Most won jobs were decided within a day
Nearly eight in ten of Hydro's won jobs were marked won within a day of the enquiry, so the first day of follow-up is where the work is won.
Nearly 8 in 10Won jobs marked won within 24 hours

Insights

What the data showed

What Hydro Plumbing Services’ own records showed once the work was live. Open a card for the full finding and how it was measured.

Value
1.7×
The return rose from 1.5× at two weeks to 1.7× by day 18
- First 14 days1.5×
- First 18 days1.7×
Hydro's first 14 days of ads returned 1.5 times the spend in won work. Counting every day to day 18 lifts that to 1.7 times, so the days after the first fortnight returned more for their spend than the fortnight did. The account was still climbing when it was measured.
Speed
Nearly 8 in 10
Nearly 8 in 10 won jobs were marked won within a day of the enquiry
- Within 24 hours77%
- Later22%
Nearly eight in ten of Hydro's won jobs were recorded as won within 24 hours of the enquiry arriving. Counting only enquiries at least two days old keeps recent ones from skewing it. For an owner, it shows that most of the work the ads bring in is decided on the first day of follow-up.
Calls
More than 1 in 4
More than one in four Google Ads enquiries became a won job
- Won28%
- Not won yet71%
Across calls and web forms, more than one in four of Hydro's Google Ads enquiries had become a won job when the figures were taken. The newest enquiries were still being quoted, so this rate is a floor rather than a final figure.

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The starting point
Hydro Plumbing Services
Hydro Plumbing Services is a Sydney plumbing business covering hot water, leak detection, gas and general plumbing.
Plumbing, hot water, leak detection and gas · Sydney, NSW
SoudCoh services
- Google Ads management
What we put in place
The campaign work
- A Sydney plumbing campaign with ad groups for leak detection, hot water, gas, water filters, taps and toilets.
- Each ad group landing on its matching service page.
- A suburb campaign across Sydney, with calls and web forms traced from the ad to the job.
What the project delivered
The outcome
The first 18 days of Google Ads returned 1.7 times the ad spend in won work, and more than one in four ad enquiries became a won job.

In this case study

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Marketing for home services in Australia

58 pages · 2.3 MB

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Hydro Plumbing Services' first 18 days of Google Ads returned 1.7 times the ad spend in won work, and more than 1 in 4 ad enquiries became a won job. Those are early weeks for any account, and the return was still climbing when the figures were taken.

The business

Hydro Plumbing Services is a plumbing business working across Sydney. Its plumbers cover hot water installation and repair, leak detection, gas fitting and gas leaks, blocked drains, taps, toilets, water filters and kitchen plumbing.

What we set out to do

Hydro's Google Ads account was new, with no history to go on. The first weeks had one job: show whether the ads bring in work Hydro actually wins. So the measure from day one was won jobs and their value, taken from the client's job records, rather than clicks or the number of calls. Every call and web form was traced back to the ad behind it.

What we built

The account runs a Sydney plumbing campaign with an ad group for each kind of job: leak detection, hot water installation and continuous-flow systems, urgent no-hot-water repairs, gas leaks, licensed gas fitting and appliance installs, under-sink water filters, kitchen taps and mixers, toilets and stormwater. Each ad group sends people to the matching page on Hydro's website, so the page answers the search that brought them. A second campaign covers suburbs and regions across Sydney.

What happened

The first 14 days of ads returned 1.5 times the ad spend in won work. Counting every day to day 18 lifts that to 1.7 times, so the days after the first fortnight returned more for their spend than the fortnight did. More than one in four Google Ads enquiries had become a won job, with the newest still being quoted.

Hydro also moves quickly. Counting enquiries at least two days old, nearly eight in ten of its won jobs were marked won within 24 hours of the enquiry arriving.

What the numbers taught us

A new account rarely shows its full return in the first fortnight. Enquiries need time to be quoted and won, so the figure keeps moving for weeks. Judging Hydro's ads at 14 days alone would have understated them.

Speed is the other lesson. Most of the work Hydro won from its ads was decided within a day of the enquiry, so the first day of follow-up is where the ads earn their keep. A few larger jobs make up much of the won value so far, so we read the return alongside the share of enquiries won rather than on its own.

See how we run Google Ads management for trade businesses, or read more about marketing for plumbing businesses.

Key campaign decisions

The first 14 days of Google Ads returned 1.5 times the ad spend in won work, rising to 1.7 times by day 18.
More than one in four Google Ads enquiries became a won job, with the newest still being quoted.
Nearly eight in ten won jobs were marked won within 24 hours of the enquiry.

What the results measure.

The definitions behind the campaign results, from enquiries and conversion rates to advertising spend.

Conversion: An action recorded under the account’s conversion setup, such as a tracked call, form submission, booking or purchase. Platform call/form enquiries are described separately in the study; repeat calls can be separate events, so enquiries are not necessarily unique people.
Cost per job · cost per lead: Advertising spend divided by the relevant recorded enquiry or job count. The study identifies the denominator. Enquiry cost is considered alongside lead quality and job value.
Conversion rate: The share of people who clicked the ad and then did the thing. A high click count with a low conversion rate usually means the ad and the page are promising different things.
Ad spend: Money spent on the advertising platform. The enquiry costs and revenue-to-ad-spend figures here exclude agency fees and the cost of delivering the client’s service.
The measurement window: The period covered by the result, with spend and outcomes drawn from the same reporting window.
A starting point: Starting values appear beside the resulting figure when the account history is available.
Qualified lead: An enquiry that matched the service and the service area, so it was worth someone picking up the phone for. Where a study says qualified, somebody checked.
An anonymised client: A project published without the client’s name. The page identifies its sector and explains the scope of the work.

Put your own numbers to work: the ROAS you have to clear to break even, with your own click price and close rate. It takes about a minute and asks for nothing.

How we run accounts

The two numbers behind this result.

Every account we run follows the same written rules, published on the SoudCoh Compound page. This result rests on two of them: deciding what counts as a real enquiry, and starting each account with what the others learned.

Rule 01
Count real enquiries only
The number it moves: True cost per lead
We agree which calls, forms, bookings or sales count as a result, and a real test enquiry goes through every tracking path before the campaign goes live.
Rule 08
Every account starts with what the others learned
The number it moves: Waste blocked before the first click
Every change on an account like this one is written to that client's change history, and what it teaches, never the client's numbers, goes into the next account's starting point.

See SoudCoh Compound

If you want one of these

What actually happens after the first call.

Start with your goals and current setup. We review the opportunity, agree the work and plan the next stage with you.

The call
Thirty to forty-five minutes, free
What you sell, who buys it, and what one customer is worth to you. No deck. You leave with a real number for your situation rather than a range.
Week 0
The audit
We open your account — or your competitors' ground, if you do not have one yet — and write down every leak we can find. That list is yours whether or not you work with us.
Week 1
The build
Everything the account needs before it can spend a dollar: what it will bid on, what it must never pay for, the ad copy, the assets, the landing pages and the tracking. It waits in our approval queue, and a real test enquiry goes through every tracking path before anything is live.
Day one
You press go
Campaigns are created paused, every time, so you can read the whole build first. You activate when you are ready, not when we are.
Days 1–14
The clean
The busiest fortnight your account will ever have. Search terms read daily, waste negated, early winners promoted, ad copy iterated against what is actually being served.
From there
Rhythm
Weekly optimisation, reporting on a fixed cadence whether the news is good or bad, and a proper conversation each quarter about where the next block of budget should go.

Before you ask us anything

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FAQ

The questions this raises.

How the results were measured and how the approach could apply to plumbing businesses.

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How was Hydro's 1.7× return measured?

We took the value of every job Hydro marked as won from an enquiry traced to Google Ads in the first 18 days of ads, and divided it by the Google Ads spend over the same days. Won value is the agreed job price, and the figure is rounded down.

Why is the 18-day figure higher than the 14-day figure?

The days after the first fortnight returned more won work for their spend than the fortnight did, which lifted the overall figure. The newest enquiries were still being quoted when it was measured.

How quickly were Hydro's jobs marked as won?

Nearly eight in ten won jobs were marked as won within 24 hours of the enquiry. That figure covers enquiries at least two days old, so recent ones that had not had time to close do not skew it.

How far do individual jobs move the result?

A fair amount. A few larger jobs make up much of Hydro's won value so far, so the return moves with individual jobs. That is why both the 14-day and the 18-day figures are shown, alongside the share of enquiries won.

What do the results in this Hydro Plumbing Services case study measure?

Campaign results describe the enquiries or job outcomes reported for the client. Each figure identifies what it measures.

Which records support these results?

Result basis: First 18 days of Google Ads. The labels distinguish advertising conversions, call/form enquiries and won-job revenue. Enquiry events can include repeat calls; booked jobs are reported separately.

Would this work for plumbing businesses like mine?

We assess your service area, competition, margins and customer value, then build a plan around the opportunities in your business. The first call establishes the priorities, budget and tracking for that work.

Why does this study show a result but not a starting point?

Where a comparable earlier result is available, the study shows both values. New accounts report their launch result, with the tracking basis explained alongside it.