Most of the time, when we take on a new client, we see astronomical Google Ads costs. Some of our clients were spending between a quarter and half a million dollars a month on PPC. However, their cost per admissions were outrageous before we started working with them. They were paying between $15,000 to $23,000 per admission!
Believe it or not, those cost ranges are the norm when we take on new clients. And almost every one of our clients tells us, before we come in, that their cost per admission off of Google Ads is $5,000 or less. The issue is that they aren’t tracking, aren’t tracking properly, or their marketing team/vendor is not reporting properly.
The primary reasons for these exorbitant costs were that their campaigns were not structured properly, and there was no ongoing optimization or tracking. This client from last year was spending an average of $1,000 per call, with some keywords costing as much as $3,400 per call before we came in!
Here’s another client from this year that had literally spent $12,995 for a single call! Their average cost per call was $1,392 over a 4-month window.
Here’s what an account should look like. This is from a client who’s been with us for the past 9 months. Their average cost per call is only $72.34 and average cost per admission off of these campaigns has been $1,875 for the past 9 months.
How do we do this:
- Implement a best practice tree structure to the campaigns.
- Dial in audience, location, and time targeting.
- Constantly split test and optimize keywords, ads, and landing pages.
- Ensure accurate tracking integration and custom conversion reporting between Call Tracking Software, Google Analytics, and Google Ads.
While we never recommend Google Ads as the core element of any marketing strategy in behavioral health, it’s still a required part of effective, integrated campaigns. The problem is that providers not only rely on it too much, but vastly overpay when they do. For the providers mentioned above, the team here at Circle Social literally saved them hundreds of thousands of dollars a month, while still growing admissions.
If you’re looking to work with experts that know how to get results specifically for behavioral health, call 800-396-9227, or email us at engage@27aa2dbd3f.nxcli.io.