Fox Valley Plumbing & Backflow — Google Ads Performance

✅ Cost-Per-Click Brought Under Control — June 4, 2026

Early June, the automated bidding was allowing cost-per-click to spike well above your $15 target on some keywords. We identified the cause and corrected it on June 4. Every day since, cost-per-click has held under your cap — cutting your cost per lead roughly in half. All performance below is measured from June 4 forward (the clean, corrected window).

Backflow CPC — before (Jun 1–3)

$59–$177

Backflow CPC — after (Jun 4–25)

$13.92

Blended cost per lead

~$83 → ~$54

Performance Snapshot

June 4 – 25, 2026 · Search campaigns · ads serve weekdays 9am–3pm

95Clicksin the corrected window

23Conversions (Calls)phone leads

$12.98Avg Cost-Per-Clickunder $15 cap ✅

$54Cost Per Leaddown from ~$83

$1,233Spend (Jun 4–25)5.3% CTR

Campaign Breakdown

June 4 – 25, 2026

Campaign	Impressions	Clicks	CTR	Avg CPC	Leads	Spend
Backflow Testing — Elgin	1,416	63	4.45%	$13.92	15	$877
Emergency Plumbing — Elgin	214	25	11.68%	$10.99	5	$275
Plumbing Services — Elgin	158	7	4.43%	$11.62	3	$81
Commercial Plumbing — Elgin	2	0	—	—	0	$0
Sump Pump Services — Elgin (launched Jun 7)	0	0	—	—	0	$0
Tankless Water Heater — Elgin (launched Jun 7)	0	0	—	—	0	$0
Total	1,790	95	5.31%	$12.98	23	$1,233

Reading the numbers: Backflow is the workhorse — strong 71% impression share and the most leads. Emergency has the highest click-through rate (11.7%) and the lowest cost-per-click, but is currently limited by rank, not budget (room to grow as Quality Score improves). Sump Pump and Tankless launched June 7 and are still ramping. Every conversion this period is a phone call — the campaigns are doing exactly what they should for a plumbing business.

What We've Optimized — June 2026

The work behind the numbers: what it was, and what it is now

Cost-Per-Click Control

Was: CPC spiking to $59–$177 on some keywords (early June)
Now: held at $12.98 avg, under your $15 cap every day since June 4
All 6 campaigns on Manual CPC for full bid control

Account Structure

Was: legacy single-campaign setup, mixed targeting
Now: 6 dedicated campaigns, 28+ ad groups, each mapped to a service + landing page
246 hyper-local landing pages across 11 cities

Wasted-Spend Protection

June 7: added 30 new negative keywords with the Sump Pump & Tankless launches — competitor brands (Rheem, Navien, Rinnai, Noritz, AO Smith), research terms (reviews, cost, DIY, how-to), and off-service terms (french drain, waterproofing)
Negatives block searches that would never convert, so your budget only pays for real plumbing demand
Ongoing search-term review adds new negatives every cycle

Ads Rebuilt

Was: ads with phone numbers in headlines (policy risk)
Now: 28 responsive ads rebuilt — compliant, keyword-relevant, Quality-Score-aligned
28/28 approved and serving

Conversion Tracking

Now: every phone tap and website call tracked across all 246 pages
Google call forwarding attributes inbound calls to specific ads
GA4 installed on .net — paid traffic measured separately from organic

Landing Page Speed

Was: emergency page loading in 5.15s on mobile
Now: 1.69s after hero-image optimization (performance 79 → 98)
Further speed work underway to lift Quality Score

The Strategy: Quality Score First

Why we're holding bids steady before scaling

We are deliberately holding bids at your $15 cap while we improve Quality Score — Google's rating of how relevant your ads and landing pages are. Higher Quality Score means Google charges you less per click for the same position. Raising bids before fixing Quality Score would just pay more for the same traffic. The landing-page speed and relevance work now in progress directly raises Quality Score; a re-evaluation is expected in early July. Once Quality Score lifts, we can scale spend efficiently and your cost per lead drops further.

What's Next

Early July: Quality Score re-evaluation — if it clears our threshold, we begin controlled bid scaling on Backflow.
Landing-page conversion work: sticky click-to-call, trust signals above the fold, faster interaction — lifts both conversions and Quality Score.
Sump Pump & Tankless campaigns: monitor ramp, tune bids as data comes in.
Search-term review: ongoing negative-keyword additions to protect spend.

Landing Page Behavior & Optimization

What visitor data reveals — and what we're doing about it

What the Data Shows

Heatmap and behavior tracking on your paid landing pages over the past 90 days reveals a clear behavioral pattern: 569 visitor sessions captured detailed interaction data. Visitors consistently focus their attention on the top ~30% of each page, spending approximately 33 seconds in active engagement. Your top-performing landing pages are Backflow Testing, Sump Pump, and Emergency Plumbing. Traffic is predominantly mobile — a natural fit for on-demand plumbing searches.

The insight: We can see exactly how people use your ad landing pages, where they look first, and how long they stay focused.

What We Verified

Our monitoring flagged a handful of technical browser alerts during the tracking window. Rather than treat these as dashboard noise, we investigated each one against your actual website code and your live Google Ads conversion data. The verdict: every flag was external browser noise — not a real problem on your site. Your ad conversions are firing correctly and were verified through June 23. This is how we work — we verify before we worry, which keeps us focused on what actually moves the needle for your business.

What We're Optimizing

Make the top a conversion unit: Place your phone number, trust signals (4.8★/123 reviews, BBB A+, licensed & insured), and service urgency above the fold. Since visitors focus on the top third, this is where the conversion happens.
Sticky mobile call bar: Add a persistent tap-to-call button that follows visitors down the page on mobile. No matter how far they scroll, your phone is reachable with one tap.
Streamline for focus: Keep paid landing pages lean and purpose-built. Every element points visitors toward calling or requesting service — no navigation clutter.
Speed up interaction: Fast page load + instant interactions lift both conversion rate and Quality Score. We're refining load time and button response across all pages.
Match headline to ad: Every landing page headline reflects the exact ad that brought the visitor. This consistency signals relevance to Google and confidence to the caller.

These upgrades lift conversions AND Quality Score together — a win on both metrics.