A higher cost per call is fine — if the jobs are big
Eighty-three dollars a call sounds steep next to other trades. It isn't, when one pond, pad or septic job clears five figures. Cost per call only means anything sitting next to job value.
All industriesExcavation
Ads for excavation and dirt work.
Excavation is a lumpy business — a quiet month, then one job that makes the quarter. Ads suit it well, because you don't need volume here. You need the right handful of calls at the right time.
The reality
What makes excavation different.
Customers don't know what to search
Land clearing, dirt work, grading, site prep, "excavator near me" — a dozen ways to describe the same job. Catching all of them takes a keyword list built by someone who knows the trade.
Word of mouth doesn't arrive on schedule
Referrals come when they come, which is rarely the month the schedule looks thin. Ads let you open the tap in a slow stretch and ease off when you're booked out.
The proof
Straight from the account.
154 calls for big-ticket excavation work at $83 each. On jobs this size, a single close pays for months of advertising.
Excavation sites I've built
The approach
What I'd run for you.
Campaigns split by job type
Land clearing, grading, ponds, septic and foundations kept separate, so you can see which work is actually worth buying and put the budget behind it.
Bidding tuned to job value
Bid strategy built around what a job is worth, not the cheapest possible click. In excavation the expensive click is very often the profitable one.
Residential and commercial kept apart
Different searches, different budgets, different close rates. Run in one bucket, the cheap residential clicks eat the budget before the commercial ones get a look.
Seasonal throttling
Spend up when the ground's workable and the schedule's open, down when you're backed up. You're not locked into the same burn every month of the year.
Straight answers
What excavation owners ask me.
Isn't $83 a call expensive?
Not for this trade. Run your own numbers: if you close one in eight calls and your average job is $6,000, those eight calls cost you $664 and returned $6,000. That's the only comparison that matters — never the cost per call on its own.
Can you target only the jobs I want?
Yes, and it's most of the value. Keywords, ad copy and service-area targeting all get shaped around the work you want more of. If you'd rather not drive an hour for small residential jobs, the campaign can be built to stop asking for them.
Do you build the website too?
I do — Nebo Earthworks and Laser Level Dirtworks below are both mine. Ads and the page they land on work far better when the same person builds both.
In their words
Clients don't stay quiet about results.
Swipe to read through them.
Other trades I work with
All industriesReady when you are
Want this running for your excavation business?
Tell me your service area and your budget. I'll give you an honest read on what's possible before you spend anything.