THE SHORT ANSWER
For HVAC installers, Google Ads costs EUR 51 to EUR 366 per enquiry and works out at EUR 204 to EUR 2,196 per signed job once you allow for 4 to 6 enquiries per customer. Sound arithmetic for HVAC installers. At EUR 3,000 to EUR 8,000 per project there is enough gross margin to carry a four-figure acquisition cost and still be worth doing.
Most channel comparisons compare cost per click. Cost per signed job is the only comparison that decides anything. What follows is Google Ads applied to one trade only, HVAC installers: what it costs per enquiry and per signed job, where the ceiling sits, what it demands of you, and an unhedged answer at the end.
The numbers that govern the decision: projects run EUR 3,000 to EUR 8,000, the buyer is typically a homeowner or small office that wants cooling before summer, demand peaks the first heatwave and falls away in December to February, and 4 to 6 genuine enquiries are needed for each customer signed.
The numbers, at a glance
Modelled cost per enquiry: EUR 51 to EUR 366, from clicks at EUR 3.60 to EUR 11.00 converting at 3.0 to 7.0 percent
Modelled cost per signed job: EUR 204 to EUR 2,196, once you allow for 4 to 6 enquiries per customer
Time to first enquiry: days from a standing start
Verdict for HVAC installers: Sound arithmetic for HVAC installers. At EUR 3,000 to EUR 8,000 per project there is enough gross margin to carry a four-figure acquisition cost and still be worth doing.
The shape of Google Ads for this trade
Intent on Google Ads is the highest of any channel, because the person typed the problem into a search box. It captures demand that already exists. Nobody searches for a roofer on a whim.
The limit that rarely appears in a sales conversation: a minimum of around 30 conversions a month before the automated bidding has enough signal to work with. For an air conditioning business covering one metro, check that before anything else, because a channel you cannot feed will underperform its own benchmarks indefinitely.
The downside is worth stating plainly. You are bidding against every other installer in the postcode plus at least one lead marketplace with deeper pockets and better data than you. Skill required: Real. An untended account will spend a full budget on broad matches that were never going to convert.
Air conditioning demand arrives in a six-week window and nothing widens it
The first genuine heatwave produces more enquiries in ten days than the preceding four months combined, and the household wants the unit fitted this week. Capacity rather than demand becomes the binding constraint immediately. The businesses that make money here fill the shoulder months with maintenance contracts and commercial work, then treat the summer spike as margin rather than as the business plan. Every acquisition decision in this trade should be made against that shape.
Match types are the whole game and broad match is not free
An account left on broad match with automated bidding will find the cheapest conversions available, which in the trades means form fills from outside your area, outside your service list or outside your price range. The search terms report is the only honest record of what you actually bought. Reading it weekly and adding negatives is not optimisation, it is maintenance, and an account that has had no negatives added in a month is leaking budget by definition.
The arithmetic, with every assumption visible
Here is the full chain for air conditioning, with every assumption visible so you can substitute your own.
Click cost: EUR 3.60 to EUR 11.00 for air conditioning keywords, which tracks job value rather than competition alone.
Landing page conversion: 3.0 to 7.0 percent of clicks become an enquiry, assuming a page built for one trade rather than a homepage.
Cost per enquiry: EUR 51 to EUR 366, which is click cost divided by conversion rate.
Enquiries per customer: 4 to 6 for this trade, because not everyone answers, quotes or proceeds.
Cost per signed job: EUR 204 to EUR 2,196.
Against a midpoint project of EUR 5,500, the worst-case figure of EUR 2,196 is 39.9 percent of contract value. Whether that is acceptable depends entirely on your gross margin, not on your revenue, and that is the calculation most contractors skip.
Structure the account by service, not by town
The instinct is to build one campaign per town. It fragments conversion data across dozens of thinly funded units and starves the bidding system of the signal it needs. Geography belongs in location targeting and in the landing page, not in the campaign structure. One campaign per service line, with location targeting set to presence rather than presence or interest, concentrates enough conversions in one place for automated bidding to work.
Matching volume to the capacity you actually have
Volume is only useful up to the point your team can quote and deliver it. At 4 to 6 enquiries per customer, ten enquiries a month in this trade produce roughly one or two signed jobs, which at a typical EUR 5,500 project is a meaningful amount of work landing in the diary.
Buy or generate past that point and the extra enquiries do not become extra jobs, they become slower callbacks on all of them. The pattern is consistent: businesses that raise volume before fixing quoting capacity watch cost per signed job rise while cost per enquiry stays flat.
Keyword clusters and negatives that decide an air conditioning account
Almost all of the wasted spend in this trade comes from two sources: automotive queries and people looking for a portable unit. Both are cheap to exclude and both are expensive to leave running through a heatwave.
Bid at full value on: air conditioning installation plus a place name, split system installation cost, multi-split installation, office air conditioning, ducted cooling
Negatives to load on day one: car, van, automotive, regas, portable, hire, rental, window unit, gas refill, jobs, course, wholesale, unit for sale
Seasonal bid rule: raise ceilings and lift budget caps on the forecast rather than on the first hot day, because the auction moves before the temperature does
Split domestic and commercial: office queries carry longer cycles and higher values, and averaging them with domestic hides both
The outdoor unit location is where air conditioning jobs die
Condenser placement decides feasibility more often than anything inside the property. Wall construction, neighbour proximity, noise limits, whether the front elevation is permitted and the pipe run length all get discovered on site. An installer who asks for two photographs at intake, one of the intended internal position and one of the external wall, kills the unviable jobs before spending a visit on them and prices the viable ones accurately.
Work through this before committing to Google Ads
Write down your own gross margin percentage on a typical air conditioning job, not your revenue.
Compare your maximum per enquiry against the EUR 51 to EUR 366 per enquiry modelled above. If your ceiling is lower, fix conversion or job value before you touch the channel.
Agree the test volume and the review date before anything goes live, so that continuing or stopping is a decision about evidence rather than about mood.
Name the person responsible for the first call attempt and the target time. Every number on this page assumes contact inside minutes rather than hours.
How these figures were built
These figures are a benchmark model, not a survey. They combine an industry base range observed across Western European home-improvement campaigns with a country multiplier for local auction pressure. Treat them as a band to negotiate against, not a quote. Channel figures on this page carry a second layer of modelling on top of the lead-price band, since click cost and conversion rate both vary by market as well as by trade. Treat the spread as the important part rather than either end of it.
How Flock Leads prices this
For comparison, this is what exclusive air conditioning enquiries cost outright, with no retainer and no contract term:
Starter - 10 leads for EUR 750, which is EUR 75 per lead
Growth - 25 leads for EUR 1,750, which is EUR 70 per lead
Scale - 45 leads for EUR 2,925, which is EUR 65 per lead
Pro - 70 leads for EUR 4,340, which is EUR 62 per lead
Max - 90 leads for EUR 5,400, which is EUR 60 per lead
No retainer, no contract term, and no lead sent to a second business. Unused volume rolls over under the Flock Lead Promise.
Want leads like this in your pipeline?
Flock runs the campaigns, screens the enquiries and hands you only the ones that match your service area, job size and capacity. You pay per lead, not per month.
Book a 15-minute fit check | See lead package pricing
Related answers
Buying exclusive leads for heat pump installers: what it costs and whether it works
Buying exclusive leads for roofers: what it costs and whether it works
Buying exclusive leads for HVAC installers: what it costs and whether it works
Solar Panel Leads in Emilia-Romagna: Cost, Supply and How to Buy Them
Frequently asked questions
How much should an air conditioning business budget for Google Ads?
Work backwards from a signed job rather than forwards from a budget. At EUR 204 to EUR 2,196 per job and a typical target of one to two jobs a week, the monthly figure follows arithmetically. Setting a round number first and hoping it produces work is the most common and most expensive mistake in this channel.
Should HVAC installers use this channel or a different one?
Sound arithmetic for HVAC installers. At EUR 3,000 to EUR 8,000 per project there is enough gross margin to carry a four-figure acquisition cost and still be worth doing. The wider point is that these are not competing options. Local search is the long-term asset, purchased leads cover the gap while it matures, and paid advertising is the accelerator you switch on once you know your numbers well enough to calculate what a click is worth.
What is the single biggest mistake in Google Ads for this trade?
Sending traffic to a homepage instead of a page built for air conditioning alone. It typically halves the conversion rate, which doubles the cost per enquiry, and no amount of bid management recovers that.
Does seasonality change the answer for HVAC installers?
Materially. Demand peaks the first heatwave and troughs in December to February, driven by heatwaves and home-office comfort. Paid channels follow that curve and get more expensive at the top of it; local search ignores it; purchased volume can be aimed deliberately at the trough, when fewer competitors are bidding for the same households.
NEED A CLEARER PLAN?
Let’s turn your next move into momentum.
Talk to us →