Ogus Marketing Group runs PPC for lawyers and law firms in the US and Canada: Google Ads first, with Facebook Ads where they earn their place. The goal is not clicks or “leads” in a spreadsheet. It is a predictable number of qualified calls and forms each month, at a cost per signed client your firm can live with, and reporting that shows you exactly what each case cost to acquire.
We are a Google Ads Partner agency based in Hamilton, Ontario. Our founder, Jack Ogus, has managed more than $10M in Google Ads spend and more than $1M in Facebook ad spend, much of it for law firms and accounting firms. Law firm PPC is our core service, not a side line next to web design and SEO. (We don’t sell SEO at all.)
Why law firm PPC goes wrong
Legal is one of Google’s most expensive categories. LocaliQ’s 2026 benchmarks put the average cost per click for Attorneys & Legal Services at $9.87 and the average cost per lead at $131.63, against an all-industry average CPC of $5.42 and cost per lead of $66.69 (LocaliQ, 2026 Search Advertising Benchmarks). At those prices, the accounts we audit usually lose money in the same places:
- One campaign for every practice area. Family law, wills and a DUI practice share one budget, so Google spends it on whichever terms are cheapest to click, not the cases you most want.
- Paying for the wrong searchers. “Lawyer salary,” “free legal aid,” “law school near me” and “divorce forms” all contain your keywords. None of them hire you.
- Tracking that stops at the click. The agency reports clicks and “conversions,” but nobody connects those to signed engagements, so a campaign that produces tire-kickers looks the same as one that produces clients.
- Ads running when nobody answers. A $12 click that rings through to voicemail at 7 p.m. is money gone, and the caller has usually phoned the next firm on the page.
- Budget spread too thin. $1,500 a month across five practice areas and a whole state buys a few clicks a day everywhere and proves nothing.
PPC management for law firms is mostly the discipline of fixing those five things and keeping them fixed.
What our law firm PPC management includes
Every engagement covers the same core work. The detailed Google Ads mechanics (match types, our negative keyword lists, Local Services Ads, bar advertising rules) are on our Google Ads for lawyers page. Here is what you get from us at the service level.
1. A campaign for each practice area, with its own budget. If you want more estate planning matters and fewer family law calls, you move money between campaigns, not hope Google figures it out. Within each campaign, ad groups follow the searcher’s situation (“arrested for DUI,” “truck accident,” “contested custody”) so the ad and landing page match what the person typed.
2. Geography you can actually serve. We target the counties and cities where you take matters and where your attorneys can appear, and we exclude people who are merely “interested in” a location from elsewhere.
3. Search-term review every week. We read the actual searches your ads appeared on and add negative keywords for anything that won’t become a client. This is unglamorous and it is where most of the savings come from.
4. Ad copy that a bar regulator and a client would both accept. Specific, factual ads that name the practice area, the location, and what happens when someone calls. No “best lawyer in town,” no guarantees, and no “specialist” language unless your attorneys hold a recognized certification. Your firm signs off on all copy before it runs.
5. Landing pages for each practice area. Your home page has to serve everyone. A PPC landing page serves one type of client, with the phone number at the top, a short form, and the responsible attorney named.
6. Call tracking and lead qualification. Calls and forms are tracked back to the campaign and keyword. Qualification is built into the marketing itself: ad copy that says which cases you take, and form questions that screen out wrong-fit inquiries. Signed cases are imported back into Google Ads, and we use that data to change bids and keywords.
7. Facebook Ads where they fit. For most firms, Google comes first because it reaches people who are searching now. Facebook can work for retargeting people who visited your site and for planned-ahead practice areas like estate planning. We add it after search is profitable, not before.
8. Reporting in plain numbers. Each month: spend, calls, forms, cost per lead, and, where your intake data allows it, cost per signed client by practice area.
PPC by practice area
The keywords, budgets and intake problems differ a lot between practice areas. LocaliQ’s legal benchmark data (US campaigns from April 2022 to March 2023, so directional rather than current) shows how wide the spread is (LocaliQ, Legal Search Advertising Benchmarks):
| Practice area | Avg. CPC | Avg. conversion rate | Avg. cost per lead | What changes in our campaigns |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Personal injury | $9.30 | 5.45% | $159.17 | Separate campaigns by case type (auto, truck, slip and fall); 24/7 call handling is close to mandatory; aggressive negatives on “settlement calculator”-style research searches |
| Criminal defense | $12.30 | 9.90% | $101.49 | Urgent, often late-night searches; ad schedule follows your phone coverage; charge-specific ad groups (DUI, drug, assault) and exclusions for “inmate search” and “arrest records” |
| Family law | $7.69 | 8.52% | $103.54 | Filtering out DIY searches (“divorce papers,” “how to file without a lawyer”); separate custody and divorce ad groups because the client and urgency differ |
| Estate planning | $7.92 | 9.65% | $72.24 | Planned purchase, not a crisis; flat-fee offers and consult bookings matter; Facebook retargeting more likely to pay off |
| Immigration | Not in LocaliQ data | Not in LocaliQ data | Not in LocaliQ data | Filtering out government-form and case-status searches; language-specific ads and landing pages where your firm serves clients in that language |
Each practice-area page goes into the keyword themes, negatives and intake setup we use for that type of firm.
What PPC for lawyers costs: a worked example
There are two costs: ad spend paid to Google, and the management fee paid to us. Ad spend is the larger number for most firms, so that is what this example works through. For the full method, see our guide on how much a law firm should spend on Google Ads.
Scenario (assumptions, for illustration): a three-attorney firm practicing family law and estate planning in one metro area, with $5,000 a month for Google Ads. It wants both practices to get enough data to judge within 90 days.
We would split the budget by campaign, not leave it to one shared pot. Using the LocaliQ legal averages above as starting assumptions:
| Family law | Estate planning | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly budget | $3,000 | $2,000 |
| Daily budget ($ ÷ 30.4) | about $99 | about $66 |
| Clicks per month (budget ÷ CPC) | 3,000 ÷ $7.69 ≈ 390 | 2,000 ÷ $7.92 ≈ 253 |
| Clicks per day | about 13 | about 8 |
| Leads per month (clicks × conversion rate) | 390 × 8.52% ≈ 33 | 253 × 9.65% ≈ 24 |
| Implied cost per lead | about $90 | about $82 |
Why 30.4: Google can spend up to twice your average daily budget on a busy day, but caps the monthly charge at 30.4 times that daily budget (Google Ads Help).
What we would watch: the estate planning campaign sits at about 8 clicks a day, which is near the bottom of what we’d want for a readable test. If its cost per lead holds up in month two, it is the first candidate for more budget, because estate planning matters often come with lower cost per lead in this data. If family law fills the consult calendar with people who wanted free advice, that is a keyword and negative-keyword problem we fix before adding spend.
Your real numbers will differ. Big-city CPCs on the highest-intent terms often run well above these averages, so we check Keyword Planner bid ranges for your market before setting a budget. Our sister program Law Firm PPC Pros works from a $1,000 USD/month minimum ad spend, but for a full campaign in a competitive practice area and city, plan on more, and on one practice area at a time if the budget is tight.
Proof: Brown Law
Brown Law (Lorie Brown) is a nursing law practice: it represents nurses, a narrow audience with a short list of relevant searches. Over 10 months of Google Ads with us, the firm got:
- 141 leads, including 86 phone calls
- $8.13 average cost per click
- 10.32% conversion rate (clicks that became leads)
- $81.39 cost per lead
- 20%+ of leads became clients
For context, that cost per lead is about 38% below LocaliQ’s 2026 legal average of $131.63. By our arithmetic from those figures (141 leads × $81.39), total ad spend over the 10 months was roughly $11,500, or about $1,150 a month, and a 20% close rate works out to roughly $407 in ad spend per signed client. It shows that a niche practice does not need a personal-injury-sized budget. It needs tight keywords, a landing page written for one kind of client, and fast follow-up. Lorie Brown, President of Brown Law, said she was “thrilled with the results.”
Read the full Brown Law Google Ads case study or see all our case studies.
Choosing a law firm PPC agency: questions to ask
Whether you hire us or another legal PPC agency, ask:
- Who owns the Google Ads account? It should be your firm, so your conversion history stays with you if you change agencies.
- What was our cost per lead last month, and how many of those leads signed? If the agency can’t answer the first half, tracking is broken. If it never asks about the second half, it is optimizing for the wrong thing.
- Can I see the search terms report? You should see the real searches you paid for, including the bad ones since excluded.
- How do you handle bar advertising rules? The answer should include who approves ad copy (you) and which claims they avoid.
- What happens to calls after hours? If the plan is “ads run 24/7” and your phones don’t, the plan is wrong.
Your first 90 days
Month 1: Audit, build and track. We start with a free audit of your current account if you have one: search terms, wasted spend, tracking gaps. Then we agree on practice areas, geography and budget split; set up call and form tracking; build or revise landing pages; and launch campaigns with conservative match types and a full negative keyword list. Before launch, we test-call the tracked numbers and submit test forms to confirm every conversion records.
Month 2: Clean up and tighten. Search-term review drives most of the work: new negatives, paused keywords, bid changes by device, time of day and location. We tighten the qualifying questions in ads and forms, and we adjust the ad schedule to match the hours your phones are covered.
Month 3: Decide with data. With roughly 60 to 90 days of data, cost per lead and early sign rates are readable. That is when we recommend moving budget between practice areas, expanding to new case types or cities, or adding Facebook retargeting, and when we can tell you plainly if a practice area isn’t working.
Who we’re not the right fit for
- Firms that want SEO. We run paid ads only. We don’t offer SEO and won’t pretend to.
- Firms that can’t answer the phone. If nobody covers calls during ad hours and you won’t add an answering service, PPC will waste your money.
- Firms looking for guaranteed case numbers. Nobody honest can guarantee signed cases from ads. We can show you the math, the tracking and the trend.
Frequently asked questions
What is PPC for lawyers?
PPC (pay-per-click) for lawyers is paid advertising where the firm pays each time someone clicks its ad. For law firms that mainly means Google Ads search campaigns, where your ad appears when someone searches for a lawyer in your practice area and location. Done well, it is the fastest way to put your firm in front of people who need a lawyer this week.
How much does PPC cost for a law firm?
There are two costs: ad spend paid to Google and the agency’s management fee. LocaliQ’s 2026 average CPC for legal is $9.87, with an average cost per lead of $131.63. For one practice area in one market, most firms should plan on at least $2,500 to $3,000 a month in ad spend to gather usable data. Our budget guide shows how to calculate your own number.
Is PPC worth it for small law firms?
It can be, if the firm picks one practice area and a tight geography, tracks calls properly, and answers the phone fast. Brown Law, a niche nursing law practice, averaged $81.39 per lead over 10 months on roughly $1,150 a month in ad spend. PPC is not worth it for a firm that spreads a small budget across every practice area or can’t follow up on leads quickly.
How long does law firm PPC take to work?
Calls can start in the first week. Judging cost per lead and lead quality reliably takes 60 to 90 days, because you need enough leads, and enough time for them to sign or not, to separate a good campaign from a lucky or unlucky few weeks.
What is the difference between PPC and Google Ads for lawyers?
PPC is the pricing model and the broader category. Google Ads is the platform where most law firm PPC happens. Other PPC channels include Facebook Ads and Google’s Local Services Ads, which charge per lead rather than per click. Our Google Ads for lawyers page covers the platform in detail.
Do you work with law firms outside Ontario?
Yes. We are based in Hamilton, Ontario, and manage campaigns for law firms across the US and Canada. All of the work is done remotely, and the campaigns target the cities and counties where your firm takes clients.
Get a free Google Ads audit for your law firm
If you’re already running Google Ads, we’ll review your account for free and show you where the budget is going: which search terms are wasting money, whether calls are being tracked, and what your real cost per lead is. If you’re not running ads yet, we’ll build a budget and campaign plan from your own numbers.
Call 365-366-2524 or request your free Google Ads audit.
Ogus Marketing Group is a Google Partner agency based in Hamilton, Ontario, running Google Ads and Facebook Ads for law firms and accounting firms across the US and Canada.