What is a good cost per lead for generator ads?

In most markets, $40–$120 per tracked lead and $150–$400 per booked assessment. Storm weeks run higher per lead but convert far better, so cost per sold install often drops.

Should generator ads run to the homepage?

No. Send install-intent traffic to a dedicated landing page about that install, with call tracking and a short form. Homepage traffic converts at a fraction of the rate.

How big should a storm budget be?

Plan for three to five times your normal daily budget for seven to fourteen days, then a tapered spend across the following sixty days.

Do I need separate campaigns per county?

If you serve more than two counties, yes. Separate campaigns let you control budget where crews have capacity and see cost per install by area.

Can I dispute bad Local Services Ads leads?

Yes. Wrong numbers, out-of-area calls, spam and jobs you do not offer are all disputable. Doing it weekly typically recovers a meaningful share of monthly spend.

Generator dealer ads

Generator dealer ads, built the way a dealer would build them

This is the tactical version: the campaign structure, keyword lists, negatives, landing page rules and budget math we use to run ads for whole-home standby dealers. If the advertising strategy page is the map, this is the turn-by-turn.

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How should generator dealer ads be structured?

Run three campaign types: a year-round install-intent Search campaign segmented by service county, a Local Services Ads profile for pay-per-lead placement above search results, and a pre-built storm campaign that stays paused until an outage. Each points to a dedicated landing page with call tracking, not the homepage.

Base Search campaign: install-intent exact and phrase keywords, county-segmented.
Local Services Ads: verified profile, weekly budget, active lead disputes.
Storm campaign: approved and paused, wider geo, emergency copy, 3–5× budget.
Retargeting: quote-page and pricing-page visitors for 60 days.

Keywords that buy installs

Job-seeker and DIY traffic is the single biggest source of wasted spend in generator accounts. A tight negative list is worth more than a clever headline.

Buy these

whole home generator installation, standby generator installer near me, generac dealer near me, home backup generator install cost, kohler generator installation, commercial standby generator installation.

Test these

generator installation financing, generator for medical equipment home, natural gas home generator, generator sizing for house.

Negative these

portable, inverter, rental, harbor freight, diy, wiring diagram, repair manual, used, free, jobs, salary, parts.

Landing page rules

One offer per page. A free assessment, or a quote. Not both plus a newsletter.
Phone number in the header, tappable, with call tracking on it.
Above the fold: what you install, where you serve, how fast you can be out.
Proof within one scroll: review count, star rating, brands carried, years in business.
Short form: name, phone, ZIP, home size. Every extra field costs conversions.
Page loads in under two seconds on a phone with two bars.

The test

Open the landing page on your own phone in a parking lot. If you cannot find the phone number in three seconds, neither can a homeowner sitting in a dark house.

The storm campaign, exactly

Build it in calm weather

Ad review, policy checks and landing page approvals take time you will not have during an outage.

Widen the geography

Outages do not respect your normal service radius. Add adjacent counties with a separate budget cap.

Change the promise

Base copy sells reliability. Storm copy sells availability: answering now, assessments this week.

Bid to be reachable

During a surge, position matters more than CPC. Being cheap and invisible costs more than being expensive and first.

Keep it running after

Taper over sixty days instead of switching off. The tail converts at the lowest cost of the year.

Tracking that ties an ad to a sold job

Dynamic call tracking numbers per campaign, call recording, form submissions tagged with the source page, and lead status synced back from your CRM. Without the last piece, you are optimizing toward leads instead of installs, and those are not the same list.

We report cost per booked assessment and cost per sold install by campaign, monthly. When a campaign cannot show sold work in ninety days, it gets rebuilt or cut.

Questions, answered straight

Keep reading

Related pages worth your time

Each of these goes deeper on one piece of the same system.

All generator dealer marketing services

SEO, Google Ads, Local Services Ads, websites, reviews, social and 24/7 call answering.

Programs and pricing

Storm Ready, Prime Power and Powerhouse — what each one includes and what it costs.

Case study and reviews

5.8× organic clicks, 114 tracked calls in five months, $61 average cost per lead.

The Local Services Ads playbook

Verification, ranking, budget math and how to dispute junk leads.

No pitch deck. No pressure.

A 20-minute conversation about your install pipeline: where your calls are going today, and what it takes to make them ring at your shop instead.