Two kinds of number, kept apart
UK pages disagree because they are not measuring the same thing. Here is what each one actually is, as read on 15 November 2026.
| What was measured | Figure | Source and date |
|---|---|---|
| “plumber near me”, UK top-of-page bid | £2.09 to £13.41. The page also lists 90,500 UK searches a month. | SoNick Marketing, Keyword Planner via DataForSEO, September 2026. |
| “emergency plumber” | £5.53 to £37.19. 12,100 searches a month. | Same table. |
| “boiler repair” | £3.90 to £14.77. 5,400 searches a month. | Same table. |
| “boiler installation” | £7.80 to £25.98. 4,400 searches a month. | Same table. |
| “gas engineer near me” | £2.30 to £11.87. 8,100 searches a month. | Same table. |
| Local trades, as a group | £1.50 to £3.00 a click | Whito, page updated 15 November 2026. Whito says this is not a measured account sample. |
| “Most UK trades” | £3 to £15 a click, then an illustration at £7 | Trade2Base, 27 May 2026. No sample size on the page. |
SoNick describes the top-of-page bid as Google’s estimate of what advertisers have paid to appear at the top. Your invoice can be lower or higher. A firm in a small town in Scotland is not obliged to pay the top of the “emergency plumber” range, and a firm in a crowded part of London should not budget off the bottom of it. Whito’s own page says London campaigns cost about 15 to 30 percent more than the rest of the UK. Treat that as Whito’s claim and check your postcodes in Keyword Planner.
We are not publishing a Local PPC Experts average. There are not yet ten booked plumbing jobs in a pool we can show, with the months and the count. When that exists, this page will say so in the first paragraph and label it as our accounts.
Turn a click range into a job
Pick a search, pick a click price inside the published range, and use your own gross profit. The enquiry counts below are made up.
Illustration. “Emergency plumber” at £8 a click, inside the September 2026 range of £5.53 to £37.19. Forty clicks is £320 paid to Google. If eight calls are in area and the right job, and two book, the media cost is £160 per booked job. Add a £299 management fee plus VAT (£358.80) and that month’s two jobs carry £358.80 between them as well, about £180 each, so about £340 all-in. If the gross profit on a call-out is £90, this illustrated month lost money. If you are booking boiler installations at £700 gross profit, the same click maths can work. The click price did not decide it. The job did.
Do the sum in three lines:
- Gross profit on that job type, after materials and the people you send.
- All-in cost for the month: Google’s bill, management, VAT you cannot reclaim.
- Booked jobs of that type. Cost per booked job = line 2 ÷ line 3. If line 3 is zero, say zero. Do not borrow bookings from another job type to rescue it.
The calculator will take the job value. The lead sheet is where the booked count comes from. Fees and VAT are set out on the cost guide and the pricing page.
Split the three jobs the trade already has
The plumbing and heating page separates emergency call-outs, servicing and installations. The September 2026 ranges explain why the split is a money decision, not a tidy one.
- Call-outs. “Emergency plumber” has the widest and highest range in the table. You need a person on the phone while the ad runs, a short service area, and a gross profit that survives the drive. If evenings are unanswered, turn the ads off in the evening rather than buying calls nobody takes.
- Servicing. Closer to “boiler repair” and “gas engineer near me”. Worth running when the service diary has gaps. A full week of services does not need more clicks.
- Installations. “Boiler installation” is a high bid range on a smaller search count. One booked job can carry a higher cost per click than a call-out ever will. Send those searches to a quote page that asks for the postcode and the current system, which is the decision already described on the industry page.
Negatives belong on each campaign: parts-only searches, jobs you do not hold a ticket for, and the towns outside the area you set in the service-area guide. A cheap click for “boiler spares” is the wrong job.
| Search | Campaign | The page or the call should ask |
|---|---|---|
| Emergency plumber | Call-outs only, and only while someone can attend. | What has happened, the town, and whether they need someone today. |
| Boiler repair, gas engineer near me | Servicing, when the service diary has a gap. | The town, the boiler, and whether it can wait for a booked visit. |
| Boiler installation | Installations. Do not mix it into the emergency campaign. | Postcode, the current system, and whether they own the property. |
| Boiler spares, plumbing jobs, courses | None. Exclude them. | Nothing. You have already paid if the ad was eligible. |
Write the limit on the ad, in the towns you actually cover. A call-out ad should say you answer during the hours someone is there. An installation ad should say it is a survey, not a same-day visit. Leave the price off unless the figure in the ad is the figure on the invoice.
After the first week, open the search terms report and refuse what is not a job. The habit is on the lead sheet guide. For this trade, the usual waste looks like this.
| If the report shows | Do this |
|---|---|
| How to, DIY, a diagram, spares, parts | Exclude it. They are fixing it themselves. |
| Plumber jobs, apprenticeship, salary, course | Exclude it. They want work, or a qualification. |
| A town that is not on your list | Exclude the place name. Presence does not stop someone in a covered town typing a town you will not drive to. |
| Your company name | Keep it on its own line. They already knew you. It is not a cold “emergency plumber” click. |
What to ignore when you set next month’s budget
- A single UK average that mixes solicitors with plumbers. Whito’s legal figure and its local-trades figure are different rows for a reason.
- A cost per lead from a directory, unless you have converted it to a won job with the Checkatrade worksheet.
- Last July’s emergency spend, if you are planning boiler replacements for spring. The searches are not the same product.
Across the UK the planner ranges above are national. A heating engineer on the Isles of Scilly, in the Highlands, or in inner London should treat them as a bracket and then look at their own postcodes. The break-even lines do not change at the border. The gross profit and the drive do.
When the diary fills, switch one campaign, not the account
The first cold week is when a single budget does the most damage. Emergency calls use the engineer who was supposed to survey a boiler replacement. The replacement searches keep spending, the survey gets cancelled, and the report later shows a healthy cost per lead because the call-outs were cheap to count and expensive to attend.
Decide the switch before the week arrives. If the emergency diary is full through Thursday, pause the emergency campaign on Thursday morning and leave the installation campaign running into the quote form. If you have no one to survey, do the opposite. Write the rule on the lead sheet as a job type, so the person answering can say “call-out” or “installation” without a debate. A paused campaign is a decision you can see. A blended campaign that “did well” in a cold snap is a diary you cannot.
Questions from owners
How much do Google Ads cost for a plumber in the UK?
There is no single price. For September 2026, Keyword Planner top-of-page bids republished by SoNick Marketing were £2.09 to £13.41 for “plumber near me”, £5.53 to £37.19 for “emergency plumber”, £3.90 to £14.77 for “boiler repair” and £7.80 to £25.98 for “boiler installation”. Your town can sit anywhere in those ranges, or outside them. Divide your own spend by booked jobs before you treat any of those figures as a budget.
Why do other sites say local trades cost £1.50 to £3 a click?
That is Whito’s stated range for local trades, on a page updated 15 November 2026. Whito also says the published averages are not a measured sample of UK accounts. SoNick’s ranges are bid estimates for named searches, and they are wider. Quote the source beside the number. Do not average them into a new “typical” click.
Is an emergency call more expensive than a boiler installation?
The September 2026 top-of-page range for “emergency plumber” starts higher and ends higher than “plumber near me”. “Boiler installation” is also a high range, at £7.80 to £25.98. The installation can still be the better buy if the gross profit on the job is several hundred pounds and the call-out is not.
How many clicks do I need to book a job?
Nobody can say for your town without your calls. A worked example on this page uses made-up counts so you can see the division. Replace them with the lead sheet. Ten booked jobs in the trade is the point at which a single cost per booked job is worth publishing. Below that, keep the range and the counts.
Does London cost more than the rest of the UK?
Whito says London campaigns cost 15 to 30 percent more per click than the rest of the UK. That is Whito’s statement, not a count of our accounts. Use Keyword Planner for your own postcodes before you adopt the percentage.
Should I put call-outs and installations in one campaign?
No. The plumbing and heating page on this site splits emergency call-outs, servicing and installations because the budgets, the hours and the areas differ. A burst pipe needs a phone answer. A boiler quote needs a postcode and a callback. One average cost per lead hides which of those is working.
Are these figures plus VAT?
The click ranges are what the sources say advertisers pay Google, before you add a management fee. Our Managed plan is £299 a month plus VAT at 20%. Check the tax line on your Google Ads invoice as well. A click range that ignores both bills understates the cost per booked job.
Do you have your own average for plumbers?
Not one we will publish as a single figure. We will publish a range from accounts we run once a trade has at least ten booked jobs in the pool, with the count and the months. Until then the tables on this page are other people’s published figures, dated and named.
Should I turn all the ads off when the emergency diary is full?
Turn off the emergency campaign, and leave the installation or servicing campaign running if you can still quote that work. One shared budget will spend the replacement money on the calls you can no longer attend. Pause the campaign that matches the full diary, and say so on the lead sheet, so the month is not judged as if every enquiry was still welcome.
Which campaign should boiler repair be in?
Servicing, with gas engineer searches, when the service diary has a gap. Emergency plumber belongs in the call-out campaign, and boiler installation belongs in the installation campaign. Boiler spares, jobs and courses should be excluded. The published bid range does not sort them for you.
What should I exclude if it shows in the search terms report?
DIY and how-to searches, boiler spares, plumbing jobs, apprenticeships, courses, and towns you will not drive to. Keep searches for your own company name on a separate line. They are people who already knew you, so they should not be folded into the cost of an emergency click. Google omits some low-activity queries, so a junk call that never appears in the report still needs a negative.
Where the figures come from
Checked on 15 November 2026 unless a source prints its own date.
- Google Ads for plumbers and trades. SoNick Marketing. UK Keyword Planner figures via DataForSEO, September 2026. Top-of-page bid ranges, not a guaranteed click price. Read 15 November 2026.
- Google Ads cost UK 2026. Whito, updated 15 November 2026. States that most small businesses pay £1.50 to £2.50 a click and that local trades pay £1.50 to £3.00. Whito also says these published averages are not a measured UK market figure.
- Checkatrade vs Google Ads for tradespeople. Trade2Base, 27 May 2026. Says most UK trades pay £3 to £15 a click, then illustrates £7 a click. No account sample is published on that page.