A paid lead is someone who asks about your service and ends up paying for it. Getting more clicks or likes is easy. Getting more people who actually book the job is the hard part, and it's what we set every campaign up to do.
This is the process we use for service businesses across Australia and Los Angeles. You can follow it yourself, or have us run it for you.
1. Pick one service and one offer
Don't advertise everything you do. Pick the service that's most profitable or easiest to sell, and build the campaign around that.
Then give people a reason to enquire now. A free quote this week, a fixed-price package or a limited number of spots all work better than "contact us for more information".
2. Get your tracking right before you spend a dollar
Meta needs to know when someone becomes a lead so it can find more people like them. That means:
- Your ad account and business page set up properly in Meta Business Manager.
- The Meta pixel on your website, and ideally the Conversions API as well.
- A clear "lead" event when someone submits a form or books a call.
Skip this and Meta will optimise for cheap clicks, not enquiries.
3. Make video that looks like you, not like an ad
The ads that bring in paid leads usually look like normal posts. You or your team, on the job, talking straight to camera about a problem your customer has.
A simple structure that works:
- Hook (first 3 seconds): call out the customer or the problem. "If your gutters overflow every time it rains..."
- Proof: show the work, a result or a quick before and after.
- Offer: what they get and why they should act now.
- Next step: one clear action, like "tap the button to get your quote".
Film a few versions with different hooks. A phone is fine. If you want to test your eye for hooks, try our Hook vs Flop game.
4. Choose where the lead lands
You have two options:
- Instant forms that open inside Facebook or Instagram. Fast and cheap, but you'll get more tyre-kickers unless you add a couple of qualifying questions.
- A landing page on your own site. Usually a higher cost per lead, but often better quality, because people have read more before they enquire.
Whichever you choose, keep it short. Ask only what you need to quote the job. If you're sending people to a page, it needs to load fast and say one thing. We cover this in more detail on our landing page service.
5. Launch simple, then test
Start with one campaign, a broad audience in your service area, and 3 to 5 ads. Meta's targeting is good enough now that broad usually beats lots of narrow interest groups.
Give it a week before making big changes. Then:
- Turn off ads with a high cost per lead.
- Make new versions of the ads that are working, with new hooks.
- Add fresh creative every 2 to 4 weeks, before the old ads wear out.
6. Follow up fast
This is where most paid leads are won or lost. Call within 5 minutes if you can. If you can't, send an automatic text so they know you've seen it, then call the same day.
Use a simple CRM so no lead slips through. Track every lead to the end: did they answer, did you quote, did they pay. That's how you find out your real cost per customer, not just your cost per lead.
7. Judge on paid jobs, not leads
A campaign with $20 leads that never book is worse than one with $60 leads that turn into paying customers. Every month, look at:
- Cost per lead
- Percentage of leads that turn into quotes
- Percentage of quotes that turn into paid jobs
- Revenue from those jobs compared with what you spent
What this looks like in practice
One local removalist we work with got 112 leads from $1500 in ad spend, at $13.39 per lead, using short videos filmed on the job and a quick form. Nothing fancy. Just a clear offer, honest creative and fast follow-up.
Do it yourself or hand it over
If you want to learn this properly, our Meta ads coaching walks you through every step in 5 live workshops, with your first lead within 14 days of your ads going live.
If you'd rather not touch it, our done-for-you Meta ads come with a 30-day lead guarantee. Not sure which fits? Book a free 15-minute strategy call.
