A 13-location service business had never run a single Google Ad. Six months later, they handed us the other four.
Leads Per Month
Cost Per Lead
Locations
Multi-Location
Google Ads
13
0
leads/month. $50 avg CPL.
13 locations.
A dental group with 21 practices across multiple states was spending six figures a year on Google Ads. The campaigns had been built, the budgets had been set, and everybody moved on to the next thing.
Nobody asked: when are these ads running?
Some accounts were live 24/7. Others had schedules from a previous agency with no explanation of why. Cost per lead ranged from $50 at the best locations to $170+ at the worst. The ad schedules had never been opened.
That’s not unusual. Ad schedules aren’t exciting and they don’t show up in performance summaries. But every dollar spent at 2am on a practice that closes at 5pm is a dollar that bought nothing. And across 21 locations, those invisible dollars add up fast.
Before a single campaign went live at any location, we built the measurement infrastructure. Phone call tracking with keyword-level attribution. Form fill tracking tied to specific campaigns and ad groups. Appointment request tracking. Every conversion type at every location, properly configured and tested before the first dollar was spent.
This isn’t optional. It’s the foundation. Without it, you’re spending money and hoping. With it, you know within weeks which keywords produce leads and which ones produce clicks. That distinction is what lets you optimize instead of guess.
Every location got its own keyword research, competitor analysis, and market assessment. A location in a dense metro area competing against 40 other businesses within five miles has a completely different keyword landscape than a location in a smaller market where three competitors share the entire search volume.
We mapped the competitive density, the cost-per-click range, and the available search volume for every service line at every location. That research determined the starting budget, the campaign structure, and the realistic expectations for each office. Some locations had $200 CPCs on high-value keywords. Others had $3 CPCs on general service terms. Building the same campaign for both would have been wrong before it launched.
Every location launched with Search campaigns only. No Performance Max. No Display. No remarketing. Search first, because Search targets people who are actively looking for a service provider right now. Everything else targets people who might be, eventually, if you’re lucky.
PMax was added only after months of search data proved a location could support it, meaning the search campaigns were producing consistent volume at an acceptable cost, and the data suggested additional demand existed beyond what Search was capturing. Five locations earned PMax. Eight didn’t. The eight that didn’t weren’t underperforming. They were in markets where Search captured most of the available demand, and adding PMax would have just shifted budget into lower-quality channels.
The total monthly budget wasn’t split 13 ways. It was allocated based on what each market could produce. Location A sat in one of the most expensive and competitive markets in the region, but the demand was there, so it got more budget than locations in smaller markets where $2,000 a month captured nearly everything worth capturing.
As data came in, budget moved. Locations that proved they could convert at scale got more. Locations that hit a ceiling at a lower spend held steady. The allocation was reviewed monthly and adjusted based on actual performance, not a formula.
Multi-Location
Google Ads
13
0
leads/month. $50 avg CPL.
13 locations.
They gave us nine locations to prove it worked. Six months later, they handed us the other four without being asked.
Six months in, the original nine offices hit 700+ leads per month. The client added the other four without being asked.
| Location | Leads/Mo | Cost/Lead |
|---|---|---|
| Location A | 193 | $45 |
| Location B | 99 | $29 |
| Location C | 87 | $77 |
| Location D | 83 | $50 |
| Location E | 82 | $38 |
| Location F | 77 | $55 |
| Location G | 70 | $31 |
| Location H | 64 | $47 |
| Location I | 48 | $69 |
| Location J | 45 | $40 |
| Location K | 38 | $55 |
| Location L | 36 | $75 |
| Location M | 23 | $76 |
845 leads a month. $50 average cost per lead. Location B pulling leads at $29 each in a competitive market with nothing but search campaigns. Location A doing 193 a month in one of the most expensive markets in the region at $45 each.
The range, $29 to $77, is the point. These aren’t the same market. They shouldn’t have the same campaigns, the same budget, or the same expectations. They don’t.
leads/month. $50 avg CPL.
13 locations.
Most agencies would have built one account, copied it 12 times, and moved on. That’s how you end up with identical campaigns in markets that have nothing in common and a $50 CPL next to a $200 CPL with no explanation.
Zero to 845 leads a month didn’t happen because of a clever strategy. It happened because every location was treated like its own business. Because that’s what they are. And because the client was smart enough to say “prove it on nine before we give you thirteen,” and the nine proved it.
leads/month. $50 avg CPL.
13 locations.
If every location runs the same structure, they’re wrong at most of them. We’ll look.