How to Fix Google Ads Not Getting Conversions: 7 Steps to Turn Clicks Into Customers

You’re spending money on Google Ads, watching clicks roll in, but your phone isn’t ringing and your inbox stays empty. Sound familiar? You’re not alone—this is one of the most frustrating problems local business owners face with paid advertising.

The good news: Google Ads not getting conversions is almost always fixable.

The issue rarely lies with Google itself. Instead, it’s usually a combination of tracking problems, targeting mistakes, landing page issues, or campaign structure flaws that can be systematically diagnosed and repaired. Think of it like a leaky pipe—you need to find where the water’s escaping before you can fix the problem.

In this step-by-step guide, we’ll walk you through exactly how to identify why your Google Ads aren’t converting and what to do about it. Whether you’re a plumber, lawyer, contractor, or any local service provider, these same principles apply.

By the end, you’ll have a clear action plan to stop wasting ad spend and start generating the leads your business needs to grow.

Step 1: Verify Your Conversion Tracking Actually Works

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: many businesses think they have a conversion problem when they actually have a tracking problem. Your ads might be generating leads right now, but if your tracking isn’t set up correctly, you’ll never know it.

Start with Google Tag Assistant, a free Chrome extension that shows you which tags are firing on your website. Visit your thank-you page or confirmation page and check if the conversion tag appears. If it doesn’t show up, your conversions aren’t being recorded—no matter how many forms people submit.

Next, open your Google Ads account and navigate to the conversions section. Look for the “Real-time conversions” report. This shows conversions as they happen, typically within minutes. If you know someone submitted a form yesterday but nothing appears here, you’ve found your problem.

The most common tracking failures happen when tags get removed during website updates, placed on the wrong page, or configured with incorrect trigger events. Sometimes the conversion tag fires on the form page instead of the thank-you page, counting every visitor as a conversion. Other times, the tag doesn’t fire at all because JavaScript conflicts prevent it from loading.

Run this quick diagnostic: submit your own form or call your tracking number. Watch the entire process from start to finish. Does the conversion appear in your Google Ads account within a few minutes? If not, you need to fix your tracking before anything else matters.

For phone call tracking, verify that your Google forwarding number is displaying correctly on both desktop and mobile devices. Test it by calling from your personal phone. The call should show up in your conversions report if everything works properly. For a deeper dive into tracking inbound phone calls via Google Ads, proper setup is essential for accurate attribution.

Don’t skip this step. If your tracking is broken, every other optimization you attempt is like driving blindfolded. You won’t know what’s working, what’s failing, or where to focus your efforts. Fix the tracking first, then move forward with confidence.

Step 2: Audit Your Keyword Intent and Match Types

Not all clicks are created equal. Someone searching “what is PPC advertising” has completely different intent than someone searching “PPC management services near me.” The first person wants information. The second person wants to hire someone.

This is where most local businesses hemorrhage their ad budget—targeting informational keywords when they should focus exclusively on commercial intent.

Open your Search Terms Report right now. This report shows the actual queries that triggered your ads, not just the keywords you’re bidding on. You’ll likely find searches like “how to,” “what is,” “free,” and “DIY” mixed in with legitimate buyer queries. These informational searches eat your budget without ever converting.

Broad match keywords are the usual culprit. When you bid on “plumbing services,” broad match might show your ad for “plumbing services salary,” “plumbing services definition,” or “plumbing services training courses.” None of these searchers want to hire a plumber—they’re researching careers or learning about the industry.

Review your Search Terms Report for the past 30 days. Export it to a spreadsheet and sort by cost. Look for expensive queries that generated zero conversions. Add these immediately to your negative keyword list.

Build a comprehensive negative keyword list that includes terms like: how, what, why, free, DIY, salary, job, career, training, course, definition, meaning, tutorial, and any other informational modifiers relevant to your industry. A lawyer might add “law school,” “lawyer salary,” and “how to become a lawyer.” A contractor might block “contractor license requirements” and “contractor training.” Learning how to create negative keyword lists in Google Ads is one of the most impactful skills for reducing wasted spend.

Consider shifting from broad match to phrase match or exact match for your highest-value keywords. Yes, you’ll get fewer impressions and clicks. But the clicks you do get will come from people who actually want your services, not people researching the industry.

The goal isn’t maximum traffic—it’s qualified traffic. Would you rather have 100 clicks from researchers or 20 clicks from ready-to-buy customers? Your conversion rate and cost per acquisition will answer that question clearly.

Step 3: Examine Your Landing Page Experience

Sending paid traffic to your homepage is like inviting someone to your store, then making them wander around looking for what they came to buy. They’ll leave before they find it.

Your landing page needs to deliver exactly what your ad promised—nothing more, nothing less. If your ad says “Get a Free Roof Inspection,” the landing page headline should echo that exact offer. When visitors arrive and see a generic “Welcome to ABC Roofing” message, they feel confused and click away.

Every high-converting landing page includes these essential elements: a clear headline that matches the ad promise, a single focused call-to-action, visible trust signals like reviews or certifications, and mobile optimization that works flawlessly on small screens. If your ads aren’t converting to sales, the landing page is often the primary culprit.

Test your page speed using Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool. If your landing page takes more than three seconds to load, you’re losing potential customers before they even see your offer. Many local searches happen on mobile devices with inconsistent connections. A slow page means lost conversions, period.

Look at your page through a stranger’s eyes. What do they see first? Is the form above the fold, or do they need to scroll? How many clicks does it take to convert? Every additional step in your conversion process causes drop-off. The simpler, the better.

Remove navigation menus from dedicated landing pages. This sounds counterintuitive, but navigation gives visitors escape routes. When someone arrives on a landing page designed to capture leads, you want them to make one of two choices: convert or leave. Don’t give them twenty other pages to explore instead.

Check your form length. Are you asking for their life story when all you really need is name, phone number, and service interest? Long forms kill conversions. Request only the information you absolutely need to qualify and contact the lead.

Message match extends beyond the headline. If your ad mentions “same-day service,” your landing page should prominently feature same-day service. If your ad highlights “licensed and insured,” those credentials should appear immediately on the landing page. Consistency builds trust. Inconsistency raises doubts.

Finally, test your landing page on an actual mobile device—not just the mobile preview in your browser. Tap the buttons. Fill out the form. Make sure the phone number is clickable. These small details determine whether someone converts or bounces.

Step 4: Tighten Your Geographic and Audience Targeting

Your plumbing company serves a 20-mile radius around your city. So why are people in another state clicking your ads?

Location targeting has a hidden setting that causes massive budget waste: “Presence or Interest” versus “Presence only.” The default setting shows your ads to anyone interested in your location, even if they’re physically somewhere else. That means tourists planning trips, people researching relocation, and students studying your city all see your ads—and some click them.

Open your campaign settings and find the location targeting section. Change it from “Presence or Interest” to “Presence only.” This ensures your ads only show to people physically located in your service area. The difference can cut wasted spend by 30% or more for local service businesses.

Next, review your geographic performance data. Which cities or zip codes within your target area generate conversions? Which ones burn through budget without results? You might discover that certain neighborhoods consistently convert while others never do. Adjust your bid modifiers accordingly—increase bids for high-converting areas, decrease for poor performers.

Check your demographic data in the audience insights section. Age ranges, household income, and parental status can reveal patterns about who converts and who doesn’t. If your data shows that one demographic consistently clicks but never converts, consider excluding them or reducing bids significantly.

For service businesses, time-of-day and day-of-week targeting matters more than you’d expect. If your business doesn’t answer phones after 5 PM, why run ads at full budget when someone calls and reaches voicemail? They’ll call your competitor instead. Adjust your ad schedule to match your availability.

Audience exclusions are equally important. If you’ve identified that certain audiences engage with your ads but never convert, exclude them. This might include people who already converted (unless you offer repeat services), job seekers who click ads looking for employment, or competitors researching your campaigns. Our comprehensive Google Ads optimization guide covers these targeting refinements in greater detail.

The goal is precision. Cast a wide net and you’ll catch everything—including a lot of junk. Tighten your targeting to focus exclusively on the people most likely to become paying customers. Your conversion rate will climb while your cost per conversion drops.

Step 5: Restructure Your Ad Groups for Relevance

Imagine searching for “emergency water heater repair” and seeing an ad that says “Full-Service Plumbing Company.” The ad isn’t wrong, but it doesn’t speak directly to your urgent need. You’ll probably click the next ad that says “24/7 Emergency Water Heater Repair.”

This is why ad group structure matters so much for conversions. When you cram 20 different keywords into one ad group, you can’t write ad copy specific enough to match each searcher’s intent. Your ads become generic, your Quality Score suffers, and your conversion rate tanks.

The solution: create tightly themed ad groups where every keyword relates to the same specific service or product. Some advertisers use Single Keyword Ad Groups (SKAGs), building an entire ad group around one keyword and its close variants. Others prefer themed groups with 3-5 closely related keywords. Understanding how many keywords per ad group works best can dramatically improve your campaign performance.

Let’s say you’re a roofing contractor. Instead of one ad group called “Roofing Services” with keywords for repairs, replacements, inspections, and installations, create separate ad groups: one for roof repair, one for roof replacement, one for roof inspections. Now you can write ad copy that speaks directly to each specific need.

Your ad for the roof repair group might say: “Need Roof Repair? Fast, Reliable Service. Licensed Contractors. Free Estimate.” Someone searching “roof repair near me” sees an ad that perfectly matches their query. Relevance increases, clicks improve, and more importantly, conversions follow.

Quality Score rewards relevance. When your keyword, ad copy, and landing page all align around the same specific topic, Google recognizes this and improves your Quality Score. Higher Quality Scores mean lower costs per click and better ad positions—you pay less while showing up higher.

Review your current ad group structure. If you see ad groups with more than 10 keywords, especially keywords covering different services or products, split them apart. Yes, this creates more ad groups to manage. But the improvement in relevance and conversion rate makes the extra effort worthwhile.

Write ad copy that includes the exact keyword or close variations in the headline. Use ad customizers and dynamic keyword insertion carefully—they can improve relevance when used correctly, but create confusing ads when overused.

The tighter your ad groups, the more specific your messaging, the higher your conversion rate. It’s that simple.

Step 6: Evaluate Your Bid Strategy and Budget Allocation

Automated bidding strategies sound appealing—let Google’s machine learning optimize your bids automatically. But here’s what they don’t tell you upfront: these strategies need conversion data to work effectively. Without sufficient conversion history, automated bidding is like asking a GPS to navigate without a map.

If you’re getting fewer than 30 conversions per month, automated bidding strategies like Target CPA or Maximize Conversions struggle to optimize effectively. The algorithm doesn’t have enough data to identify patterns and make smart bidding decisions. You’re better off using Manual CPC until you build up conversion volume.

Check your impression share metrics. If you’re losing impression share due to budget, you’re not showing up for all available searches. This means potential customers are seeing your competitors instead of you. When budget is the limiting factor, you need to either increase your budget or focus it more narrowly on your highest-intent keywords.

Look at your campaign performance data. Which campaigns generate conversions at an acceptable cost? Which ones burn through budget without results? Reallocate spending from underperforming campaigns to your winners. This sounds obvious, but many businesses keep funding campaigns that haven’t worked in months simply because they’re afraid to pause them.

Budget allocation should follow performance. If your “emergency services” campaign converts at $50 per lead while your “general services” campaign costs $200 per lead, shift more budget to emergency services. Focus your money where it works. If you’re wondering why you’re not getting leads, budget misallocation is often a hidden factor.

For businesses just starting with Google Ads or those with limited conversion data, Manual CPC provides control and learning opportunities. You can adjust bids based on performance, test different bid levels, and understand what it costs to compete in your market. Once you’re generating consistent conversions, transition to Target CPA or Maximize Conversions.

When using automated strategies, set realistic targets. If your average cost per conversion is $100, don’t set a Target CPA of $30. Google will either fail to spend your budget or deliver low-quality conversions. Set targets based on your actual historical performance, then optimize from there.

Monitor your average ad position and top-of-page rate. If you’re consistently showing in position 4 or lower, you’re likely missing conversions to competitors who appear higher. Sometimes increasing bids by 20-30% to improve position can actually lower your cost per conversion by increasing conversion rate.

Step 7: Test, Measure, and Iterate Your Ads

Optimization isn’t a one-time event—it’s an ongoing process. The campaigns that perform well today need continuous testing and refinement to maintain and improve results. Set up a systematic approach to testing so you’re always learning what works better.

Start with A/B testing your ad copy. Create two versions of an ad that differ in only one element: the headline, the description, or the call-to-action. Run both ads simultaneously and let them accumulate at least 100 clicks each before drawing conclusions. Small sample sizes lead to false conclusions.

Test different value propositions in your headlines. Does “Free Estimate” outperform “Licensed & Insured”? Does “Same-Day Service” convert better than “20 Years Experience”? You won’t know until you test. What works for one business might fail for another, even in the same industry.

Focus on metrics that actually matter for diagnosing conversion problems. Click-through rate (CTR) tells you if your ads are relevant and compelling. Conversion rate shows whether your landing page and offer resonate with visitors. Cost per conversion reveals your efficiency—are you getting cheaper or more expensive over time?

Ignore vanity metrics like impressions and total clicks. They don’t pay your bills. A campaign with 10,000 impressions and zero conversions is worthless. A campaign with 500 impressions and 10 conversions at a profitable cost is gold.

Create a 30-day optimization schedule. Week 1: Review search terms and add negatives. Week 2: Test new ad copy variations. Week 3: Analyze landing page performance and make improvements. Week 4: Adjust bids based on performance data. Repeat this cycle monthly, and you’ll see consistent improvement.

Know when to pause, adjust, or scale. If a campaign hasn’t generated a conversion after spending 3-5 times your target cost per conversion, pause it. Something is fundamentally wrong—either the targeting, the offer, or the execution. Fix the problem before wasting more money.

When you find a winning combination—a campaign, ad group, keyword, and ad that consistently converts at a profitable cost—scale it. Increase the budget, expand to similar keywords, or duplicate the structure for related services. Success leaves clues. Follow them.

Document your tests and results. Keep a simple spreadsheet tracking what you tested, when you tested it, and what happened. This prevents you from repeating failed experiments and helps you identify patterns across multiple tests.

Putting It All Together

Fixing Google Ads that aren’t converting isn’t about luck—it’s about systematic diagnosis and targeted improvements. Start by confirming your tracking works, then audit your keywords for true buying intent. Make sure your landing pages deliver on your ad’s promise, tighten your targeting to reach only qualified prospects, and structure your campaigns for maximum relevance. Finally, align your bidding strategy with your goals and commit to ongoing testing.

Here’s your quick checklist to work through:

✓ Conversion tracking verified and firing correctly

✓ Search terms reviewed, negative keywords added

✓ Landing page optimized for conversions with clear CTA

✓ Location targeting set to ‘Presence only’

✓ Ad groups restructured for tight relevance

✓ Budget focused on highest-intent keywords

✓ A/B tests running on ad copy

Most conversion problems stem from one or two of these issues, not all seven. Work through them methodically, starting with tracking—because if you can’t measure conversions accurately, you can’t fix anything else. Then move to keywords and landing pages, as these typically have the biggest impact on conversion rate.

Remember that improvement takes time. Google Ads optimization is measured in weeks and months, not days. Make one change, let it run long enough to collect meaningful data, then evaluate and adjust. Changing everything at once makes it impossible to know what actually worked.

If you’ve worked through these steps and still struggle to generate leads, it may be time to bring in specialists. At Clicks Geek, we help local businesses turn underperforming Google Ads into consistent lead generation machines. Our team has seen every conversion problem imaginable—and more importantly, we know how to fix them. Understanding Google Ads management pricing can help you evaluate whether professional help fits your budget.

Stop wasting your marketing budget on strategies that don’t deliver real revenue—partner with a Google Premier Partner Agency that specializes in turning clicks into high-quality leads and profitable growth. Schedule your free strategy consultation today and discover how our proven CRO and lead generation systems can scale your local business faster.

Your Google Ads should be generating leads, not just burning budget. Take action on these seven steps, and you’ll finally see the conversions you’ve been paying for all along.