Australian plumbers earn up to 5.6 times their advertising spend in won jobs, new data shows
Do online ads really pay for tradies? New data says yes, if you track leads to jobs.
SoudCoh followed Google Ads enquiries for Australian plumbers, electricians and cleaners through to the jobs they became. Whether online ads pay comes down less to what a lead costs than to how many enquiries turn into paying work.
Key findings
- Across 14 plumbing ad accounts, won jobs were worth about 2.5× Google Ads spend.
- In about two-thirds of those accounts, won-job value was higher than ad spend.
- Four plumbing businesses returned five times their ad spend or more in won jobs. The strongest, Bayside Plumbing in Sydney, reached 5.6× in its first 14 days.
- The typical plumbing business turned about 1 in 5 Google Ads enquiries into a won job.
- Value of won jobs vs Google Ads spend
- 2.5×
- 14 plumbing ad accounts that record job outcomes, measured from each account’s first day of spend
- Headline finding
- Google Ads enquiries that became a won job
- 1 in 5
- The typical plumbing business
Journalists are welcome to use these figures and to quote Rohit Sood. Please credit SoudCoh and link to the source.
The full story · Melbourne
Australian trade businesses that track their advertising enquiries through to booked jobs are winning more work than they spend on online ads, according to new analysis from Melbourne digital marketing agency SoudCoh.
SoudCoh followed enquiries from real client campaigns for plumbers, electricians and cleaners through to the jobs they produced. Across 14 plumbing ad accounts that record job outcomes, won jobs traced to Google Ads were worth about 2.5 times the ad spend. In about two-thirds of those accounts, won-job value was higher than ad spend.
Four published plumbing case studies show returns of five times ad spend or more in won jobs: Bayside Plumbing (5.6 times in its first 14 days of ads, and 5.2 times over its first 30 days), Plumbwell Plumbing (5.5 times in its first 14 days), Champion Plumbing (5.4 times over the last 30 days) and Eagle Plumbing (5.0 times in its first eight weeks).
The data also shows when and how that work arrives. In the plumbing accounts that received weekend enquiries, weekends brought roughly a quarter of enquiries but about a third of won revenue. Plumbing calls of three minutes or more became won jobs about twice as often as shorter calls, and searches that named a suburb turned into won jobs about 1.5 times as often as other searches. In the 11 cleaning accounts that record job outcomes, the won-job revenue tied directly to an ad click or ad call came to about 1.5 times Google Ads spend.
The typical plumbing business turned about one in five Google Ads enquiries into a won job. What matters is not what a lead costs but how many enquiries become paying jobs, and what those jobs are worth.
About the data
Won-job value is the value of jobs each business marked as won, from enquiries traced to a Google Ads click or an ads-only tracking number, measured from each account’s first day of spend. It is revenue, not profit, and it leaves out enquiries that could not be tied to an ad. The wider research draws on 81,722 unique search terms reviewed across 108 Google Ads accounts. SoudCoh has published 146 client case studies, 42 of them for plumbing businesses, at soudcoh.com/case-study. The full plumbing analysis is at soudcoh.com/blog-posts/what-turns-a-plumbing-search-into-a-won-job.
About SoudCoh
SoudCoh is a Melbourne digital marketing agency, founded in 2019, that helps businesses turn marketing into profit. Automation is at the heart of the work, alongside Google Ads, paid social, SEO, AEO and GEO, social media, websites and apps. It has 250+ active engagements across Australia, the UK, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and New Zealand, and is a Google Partner and Semrush Agency Partner.
Media contact
Rohit Sood, Founder & Director · contact@soudcoh.com · 1800 315 165
