Presence, Not Interest
The default location setting includes people merely interested in your area. For a local business that is a large share of wasted spend.
Local PPC
Local PPC Management Where the Geography Settings Decide the Outcome
In a local account the targeting settings matter more than the ad copy. Who counts as being in your area, whether the ads run when nobody can answer the phone, and whether calls are counted at all. Local PPC gets those right first, then runs the campaigns — because no amount of optimisation rescues an account advertising to the wrong map.
We Check the Map Before the Copy
Most underperforming local accounts have a settings problem rather than a creative one.
Radius Drawn Honestly
Set to where you will actually travel or where customers will actually come, not to a round number.
Calls as Conversions
Local enquiries are overwhelmingly phone calls. An account counting only form fills is measuring the minority.
Hours Respected
Ads running at 2am for a business that answers the phone at 8 produce clicks and no enquiries.
Coordinated With LSAs
Local Services Ads occupy the space above search results. Running both without coordination means competing with yourself.
Local PPC, Explained
Where Does Local Budget Leak?
Four settings, all of them defaults, all of them fixable in an afternoon.
Review My Account →- 1
Location Targeting Too Broad
"Presence or interest" advertises you to anyone who mentions your city, wherever they are.
- 2
Untracked Calls
The conversion happens on the phone and the account never sees it, so the campaign that works looks like the one to cut.
- 3
Ads Running Out of Hours
Clicks at midnight from people who will call someone else in the morning.
- 4
No Location Extensions
Address and call buttons absent, so the ad asks for a click where a call would have done.
What Local PPC Management Covers
Settings, tracking, then the ongoing work — because the first two decide whether the third matters.
Paid and organic local visibility reinforce each other — see local SEO.
How We Run Local Accounts
Settings and tracking are corrected before any optimisation, because optimising a mistargeted account improves the wrong thing.
Settings Audit
Location, radius, schedule, devices and extensions — the four places local accounts leak.
Fix Measurement
Call tracking installed, thresholds set, form conversions verified.
Rebuild Targeting
Geography redrawn to reality, with exclusions for areas you do not serve.
Optimise Weekly
Search terms, negatives, bid adjustments by area and time.
Coordinate Channels
Search, LSAs and organic visibility managed as one plan rather than three.
Geography
How Location Targeting Actually Works
The setting has more options than most advertisers realise, and the default is rarely the right one for a local business.
What is the difference between presence and interest targeting?
Google offers targeting by people in your locations, and by people in or interested in your locations. The second is the default, and it includes anyone whose search or browsing suggests interest in the area regardless of where they are.
For a hotel or a tourist attraction that is exactly right — someone in another state researching a visit is a genuine prospect. For a plumber, a dentist or a restaurant it is not, and it can account for a substantial share of the clicks.
Switching to presence-only narrows reach and usually improves cost per lead immediately. It is the single most common misconfiguration in local accounts.
Should local businesses run Local Services Ads as well?
Where they are available for your category, they occupy the space above the standard search results and are charged per lead rather than per click, which many local businesses prefer.
They are not a replacement for search campaigns: they cover a narrower set of queries and categories, and they require verification and licensing checks. Where both run, they should be planned together so budget is not split against itself on the same query.
The verification process takes time, which is a practical reason to start it early rather than treating it as an afterthought.
Questions,answered.
Local PPC is paid search for a business serving a defined geographic area, where location targeting, call tracking and ad scheduling determine most of the performance.
The distance you will genuinely travel or customers will genuinely come — which is a business question, not a settings one. A radius set wider than reality produces enquiries you have to decline, which still cost the same as the ones you accept.
For most local businesses calls are the majority of enquiries. An account that counts only form submissions is optimising on a minority of its results, and will frequently conclude that a well-performing campaign is failing.
Usually not, unless someone answers or the enquiry can wait without being lost. A click at midnight that gets a voicemail is generally a click that calls a competitor in the morning.
Not necessarily, and we will say so if the organic and map visibility is already strong for the terms that matter. Where ads help most is filling gaps — terms you do not rank for, or periods where demand exceeds what organic delivers.
Still deciding if local ppc is right for you?
Talk to UsThe Radius Is a Business Decision, Not a Setting
The radius field in a local campaign looks like a technical detail and is treated like one. A number goes in, usually a round one, usually larger than it should be.
What it actually encodes is a question the business has to answer: how far will you travel, and at what distance does a job stop being worth having? A contractor who will drive forty minutes for a large installation and fifteen for a repair has two different radii, and one campaign cannot express both.
Getting this right is not an optimisation. It is deciding what work you want, and then telling the account.
Free Account Review
Find Out Who Your Ads Are Actually Reaching
Give us read-only access. We will check your location settings, whether calls are being tracked, and how much of the spend is going outside the area you serve.
Claim Your Free Marketing Audit
Enhance Your Brand Potential At No Cost!
- Expect a response within 24 hours
- NDA available upon request
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