Case study — Coast Pave Asphalt, Gosford
What I learned spending $29,000 on Google Ads for my own business
The expensive lesson was not that Google Ads failed. It was that I had not properly defined what success meant.
Coast Pave is my asphalt business on the Central Coast. Every dollar in this account was spent trying to generate work for a business I still own and run.
I am publishing the numbers because you should be able to see how someone handles their own marketing before trusting them with yours.
The account summary
| Campaign | Status | Cost | Clicks | Impressions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Asphalt Contractor Near You | Paused | $28,999.23 | 18,774 | 4,498,006 |
| Campaign #2 | Paused | $318.34 | 219 | 39,450 |
The campaign report showed an average cost per click of$1.54 and a cost per conversion of$22.82.
On the surface, that looked excellent.
The dashboard was reporting what the account had been configured to count. The problem was that I had treated “conversion” as if it meant “customer enquiry”. It did not.
What Google was counting
1,285 in one column. 4,165 in another.
The campaign report's main Conversions column showed 1,285. The wider account view showed 4,165 all conversions because it included additional tracked actions.
Recorded actions — not confirmed leads
- 2,342Other engagements
- 1,003Direction actions
- 432Website and menu visits
- 340Call-related actions
- 48Form actions
4,165 recorded actions in total
These were recorded actions, not 4,165 leads.
Directions and website visits can be useful signs of interest. A click on a phone number can matter. But none proves that a useful conversation happened, a quote was sent or a job was won.
The call actions also used different definitions. One conversion required a call lasting at least 30 seconds and counted one conversion. Other actions counted every click to call. The separate Google Ads Phone calls metric recorded49 calls from 75 phone impressions.
Those figures cannot simply be added together and called customers.
The number I still cannot give you
No cost per lead. No return on ad spend.
I cannot give you a reliable cost per genuine lead, cost per quote, cost per acquired customer or return on advertising spend from this account.
I did not consistently connect the Ads data to the enquiries, quotes and completed jobs inside the business. Without that connection, dividing the spend by a collection of Google actions would create a precise-looking answer that the evidence cannot support.
That is the part that makes me look inexperienced, because I was.
I understood enough to launch and run the campaigns. I did not yet understand that tracking the wrong result well is still tracking the wrong result.
Where the clicks and money went
Most of the budget was not buying searches.
The account used Smart campaigns. The network report showed that the traffic was split very differently from what I had assumed.
| Network | Impressions | Clicks | Share of clicks | Spend | Share of spend |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Google Display Network | 3,838,752 | 15,695 | 82.6% | $18,476.95 | 63% |
| Google Search | 698,261 | 3,228 | 17% | $10,724.63 | 36.6% |
| Search partners | 443 | 70 | 0.4% | $115.99 | 0.4% |
I had assumed most of the budget was reaching people actively searching Google for an asphalt contractor. In reality, most clicks came from Display ads shown across websites and apps. About 63% of the spend went there.
Display advertising can be useful for awareness or reminding previous visitors about a business. But it is a different product from a Search ad shown after someone types what they need.
My goal was high-intent local enquiries. I should have known how much of the budget was buying Search traffic, how much was buying Display traffic and what each produced.
The 0.42% click-through rate
One number covering two different things.
The account-wide click-through rate was 0.42%.
That number combined millions of Display impressions with Search traffic, even though the two networks reach people in different situations. Judging them together hid the distinction I actually needed to understand.
The useful questions were not whether 0.42% was universally good or bad. They were:
- Which network generated the click?
- What was the person trying to do?
- Did the click become a genuine enquiry?
- Did the enquiry become worthwhile work?
What happened after the Ads stopped
Spend at zero. People still arriving.
By December 2025, the campaigns were recording no spend, impressions or clicks. From 1 April to 9 September 2026, Google Ads spend remained at $0.
- 2023–2025Paid campaigns active$29,317.57 spent across the account
- December 2025Spend reaches zeroNo spend, impressions or clicks recorded
- Apr–Sep 2026$0 on Google Ads528 recorded Business Profile actions
During that later period, Coast Pave's free Google Business Profile recorded:
Google Business Profile Performance, 1 April–9 September 2026. September is a partial month.
Those were actions, not 528 confirmed leads. They do show that people continued discovering Coast Pave and taking a next step while its Google Ads spend was zero.
The leading reported searches included “asphalt”, “asphalt central coast” and “central coast driveways”. Nearly 87% of profile views came through Google Search, and more than half were on mobile.
This does not prove that SEO caused every action or that Ads became unnecessary. It shows why the assets underneath the advertising matter: the website, useful content, real project photographs and Business Profile remained after the paid campaigns stopped.
What I would do differently now
Define a genuine lead before spending
Decide whether the result is a qualified phone conversation, a submitted enquiry form or another agreed action. Track directions, page views and general engagement separately.
Separate campaign purposes
Search, Display and other campaign types do different jobs. Each needs its own reason to exist, its own measurement and a budget that reflects the business goal.
Follow enquiries into the business
Marketing reporting should not stop at the platform dashboard. Record whether enquiries were relevant, became quotes and produced completed work.
Start narrower
Focus on the services, locations and searches most likely to become worthwhile jobs. Expand when the evidence supports it rather than asking the platform to find everything at once.
Build underneath the Ads
Ads can create visibility quickly. The website, Business Profile and search content give that traffic somewhere useful to land and build visibility that does not disappear with the daily budget.
Why I still use Google Ads
The lesson was not “never advertise”.
Google Ads can be useful when a business is new, has spare capacity or wants immediate visibility for a particular service.
The lesson was to understand exactly what is being bought and what the account counts as success.
Before optimising a campaign, define the result properly. Otherwise, you can improve the dashboard without knowing whether the business improved.
How this shapes All Trade Web & SEO
I work on Google Ads, the website, search, Business Profile and tracking as one connected system.
The work begins with the jobs you want more of and follows the result further than a click.
From $250 + GST
a week
Google ad spend is separate. Standard onboarding is included. Marketing-only has no minimum term and requires 14 days’ notice to cancel. The discounted website package includes an initial 12-week marketing commitment.
Not sure what your current numbers mean?
Send me your website address.
If I think I can genuinely help, I can then review the wider marketing and Ads account by hand.
No call required.