Roofing PPC Mistakes That Kill Profit

Most roofing companies that come to us have already tried Google Ads. They spent $3,000 to $8,000 a month, got some clicks, maybe a handful of calls, and concluded that PPC "doesn't work" for roofers. The reality is that PPC works extremely well for roofers. The problem is almost always execution. After auditing hundreds of roofing accounts, we see the same ten mistakes draining budgets and destroying profitability over and over again. We manage PPC for roofing companies across dozens of markets, and the difference between a profitable campaign and a money pit usually comes down to fixing these exact issues.

The average roofing company wastes 40 to 60 percent of its Google Ads budget on clicks that will never become customers. On a $5,000 monthly spend, that is $2,000 to $3,000 going straight to Google with zero return. At scale, across a full year, that is $24,000 to $36,000 in preventable waste. Here are the mistakes responsible for that bleeding, and how to fix every single one of them.

The 10 Mistakes at a Glance

Before we dig into each one, here is a summary of what we see, how badly it hurts, and what to do about it.

Now let us break each one down.

Mistake 1: Broad Match Without Negative Keywords

This is the single biggest budget killer in roofing PPC. Google's broad match algorithm is designed to show your ad for anything it considers "related" to your keyword. Bid on "roof repair" with broad match and you will show up for "DIY roof patch," "roofing jobs near me," "roof rack for truck," and "how much do roofers make per hour."

We audited a roofing company in Charlotte spending $6,500 a month. Broad match keywords with zero negatives were burning 38 percent of their budget on completely irrelevant searches. That is $2,470 a month going to clicks from people who would never hire a roofer.

The fix: Build a negative keyword list of at least 100 terms before your first ad goes live. Include DIY terms, job seeker terms, material supplier terms, commercial terms (if you are residential), and informational queries. Then review your search terms report weekly and keep adding. After 90 days, a mature roofing account should have 200 to 400 negative keywords.

Mistake 2: Sending All Traffic to Your Homepage

Your homepage has navigation links, an about section, a blog feed, service listings, and five different things competing for attention. A visitor who clicked an ad for "emergency roof leak repair" does not want to hunt through your homepage to figure out if you can help them. They want to see that you fix roof leaks, you are available now, and there is a phone number or form right in front of them.

Homepages convert roofing traffic at 3 to 7 percent. Dedicated landing pages built for a specific service and keyword group convert at 18 to 28 percent. That is a 3x to 5x improvement in conversion rate without spending a single extra dollar on ads.

The fix: Build separate landing pages for each major service: roof repair, roof replacement, storm damage, inspections. Each page should have a headline matching the ad, three to four trust signals (license number, reviews, years in business, photos of local work), and one clear call-to-action above the fold. A phone number and form, nothing else competing for attention.

Mistake 3: Not Tracking Phone Calls

Roofing is a phone-first industry. Over 70 percent of roofing PPC conversions happen via phone call, not form submission. If you are not tracking calls with a platform that ties each call back to the specific keyword, ad, and campaign that generated it, you are flying completely blind. You have no idea which campaigns are profitable and which are wasting money.

Even worse, without call tracking you cannot feed conversion data back into Google Ads. That means Smart Bidding algorithms have no signal to optimize toward. You are paying Google premium prices for automated bidding that cannot learn because you are not giving it the data it needs.

The fix: Implement a call tracking solution with dynamic number insertion on your landing pages. Record every call so you can qualify them as leads or junk. Import call conversions into Google Ads so Smart Bidding can optimize toward calls that actually become booked inspections.

Tired of watching your roofing ad budget disappear? We specialize in PPC for roofing companies and have eliminated thousands of dollars in monthly waste for contractors just like you. Get a free campaign audit →

Mistake 4: Ignoring the Search Terms Report

Google Ads shows you exactly what people typed before clicking your ad. This report is a goldmine and most roofing companies never look at it. We see accounts that have been running for six months or longer with zero search term reviews. That is six months of budget leaking to irrelevant queries that could have been blocked in week one.

The fix: Check your search terms report every week for the first 90 days, then biweekly once the account matures. Add irrelevant terms as negatives immediately. Just as importantly, look for high-performing search terms you are not explicitly bidding on and add them as exact match keywords to capture that traffic more efficiently.

Mistake 5: Bidding on "Roofing" Without Qualifiers

The keyword "roofing" by itself is one of the most expensive and least qualified terms in the home services space. It matches everything: people looking for roofing materials, roofing jobs, roofing DIY videos, roofing company reviews with no intent to hire. CPCs for unqualified "roofing" terms run $20 to $50 with conversion rates below 2 percent.

The fix: Only bid on intent-qualified keywords. "Roof repair near me," "roof replacement estimate [city]," "emergency roofer [city]," and "roof inspection free" all signal someone who wants to hire a contractor. The CPC may be similar, but the conversion rate will be 4x to 8x higher because the searcher actually wants what you sell.

Mistake 6: No Geographic Targeting

We have seen roofing accounts targeting an entire state. One company in Phoenix was getting clicks from Flagstaff, 150 miles away. Their crews only work within 30 miles of the shop. Every click outside that radius is money burned.

The fix: Use radius targeting centered on your business location, typically 15 to 30 miles depending on how far your crews will travel. Layer zip code targeting on top for precision. In your campaign settings, set location targeting to "presence" only, not "presence or interest." The "interest" setting shows ads to people researching your area who may be located anywhere in the country.

Mistake 7: Running Ads 24/7 Without Dayparting

A homeowner who searches "roof repair near me" at 2 AM and gets your voicemail is not going to leave a message and wait. They are going to click the back button and call the next result. After-hours leads in roofing convert at 30 to 45 percent lower rates than business-hours leads because nobody is answering the phone.

The fix: Schedule your highest-budget campaigns to run during business hours when your team can answer calls live. If you have after-hours answering capability, run a reduced budget overnight targeting only emergency and urgent terms. Review your hour-of-day performance report monthly and shift budget toward your highest-converting hours.

Mistake 8: Not Using Ad Extensions

Ad extensions are free real estate in the search results. They make your ad bigger, push competitors lower on the page, and provide additional click targets. A roofing ad without extensions takes up two lines. A roofing ad with sitelinks, callout extensions, call extensions, location extensions, and structured snippets can dominate four to five lines and increase click-through rate by 15 to 20 percent.

The fix: Add every relevant extension type:

• Sitelinks pointing to your services, reviews, gallery, and contact page
• Callout extensions highlighting "Licensed & Insured," "Free Estimates," "24/7 Emergency Service," "5-Star Rated"
• Call extensions with your tracked phone number
• Location extensions connected to your Google Business Profile
• Structured snippets listing service types: "Repairs, Replacements, Inspections, Storm Damage, Gutters"

Mistake 9: Weak Ad Copy Without Urgency

Generic ad copy like "Quality Roofing Services - Call Today" does nothing to differentiate you from the 15 other roofing ads on the page. It contains no specific benefit, no urgency trigger, and no reason for the searcher to choose you over anyone else. The result is a below-average click-through rate, lower Quality Score, and higher CPCs.

The fix: Write ads that answer three questions: Why you? Why now? What do I get? Lead with a specific benefit ("Free Inspection + Same-Day Estimate"), add a trust signal ("Licensed, Insured, 500+ 5-Star Reviews"), and create urgency ("Limited Spring Availability" or "Storm Season Discounts End Friday"). Test at least three ad variations per ad group and let performance data pick the winner.

Strong vs. Weak Ad Copy Example

The strong version is specific, benefit-driven, and gives the searcher a reason to click right now.

Mistake 10: Ignoring Mobile Optimization

Between 65 and 70 percent of roofing searches happen on mobile devices. If your landing page loads slowly on a phone, has tiny text, buries the phone number below the fold, or uses a form that is painful to fill out on a small screen, you are losing the majority of your paid traffic before they even have a chance to convert.

The fix: Design landing pages mobile-first. The phone number should be a sticky click-to-call button visible at all times. Forms should have no more than three to four fields. Page load time should be under three seconds on a 4G connection. Test your landing pages on an actual phone, not just a desktop browser with the window resized.

How Much These Mistakes Actually Cost

Let us put real numbers on this. Take a roofing company spending $6,000 per month on Google Ads with a mix of these mistakes:

• Broad match waste: $1,500/month
• Out-of-area clicks from poor geo-targeting: $900/month
• After-hours clicks that never convert: $600/month
• Irrelevant search terms not caught by negatives: $500/month

That is $3,500 per month in preventable waste, or $42,000 per year. Redirected to properly structured campaigns, that same $42,000 could generate an additional 200 to 350 qualified leads annually. At a 20 percent close rate on a $12,000 average job, that is $480,000 to $840,000 in additional revenue.

The gap between a poorly managed roofing PPC account and a well-managed one is not 10 or 20 percent. It is 3x to 5x the results from the same budget.

The Bottom Line

Every one of these mistakes is fixable. Most can be corrected within a week. The roofing companies that treat Google Ads as a precision instrument, with tight targeting, continuous optimization, proper tracking, and strong landing pages, consistently generate leads at $60 to $120 each while their competitors burn through $200 to $400 per lead on the exact same keywords in the exact same market.

The difference is not budget. It is execution.

Ready to stop bleeding budget and start generating profitable roofing leads? We have managed PPC for roofing companies in markets across the country and we know exactly where the waste hides. Request your free roofing PPC audit → and we will show you exactly how much you are leaving on the table.