Google Ads in Newstead, Brisbane

How we structure Newstead Google Ads campaigns

Most B2B campaigns follow the same architecture for us:

Branded search. Cheap, high-converting, always-on. If a Newstead prospect types your business name plus "contact" or "phone," we bid to make sure you're at position 1. This usually accounts for 10-15% of spend and 30-40% of conversions.

Non-branded search — high intent. "[Service] [problem] Brisbane" queries. The person already knows what they need and is shopping. These convert in single-digit visits but cost more per click. We pre-qualify with smart match types and negative keywords (one Newstead accounting client had 40% of their budget going to job-seekers searching "accountant Brisbane jobs" before we cleaned up the keyword list).

Non-branded search — research stage. "How to [problem]" / "Best [solution] for [industry]" queries. These don't convert directly but they bring qualified prospects into a retargeting audience. We send these to content-rich landing pages (long-form guides, ROI calculators, comparison sheets), not to a generic homepage.

Retargeting (display + RLSA). Anyone who's visited the site in the last 30 days gets shown brand-reinforcement ads on properties they're already on. Cheap, high-converting, but only works once the top of funnel is delivering volume.

The Newstead client mistakes we see most

Too much spend on broad-match keywords. Newstead businesses get sold on "smart bidding" by other agencies who let Google's algorithm spend on whatever it wants. The result: thousands of clicks from unqualified searches, occasional accidental conversions, terrible ROI. We start every account with exact-match and phrase-match only, and add broad-match selectively after 90 days of data.

No real conversion tracking. "Page view" and "button click" don't count. The conversion event needs to be a form submission with a real email, a phone call >2 minutes, a meeting booked, or a sale completed. We set up Google Tag Manager + GA4 + CRM integration to capture the full path.

Landing pages that don't match the ad. If the ad promises "Free SEO audit for Brisbane businesses" and the landing page is the homepage with a generic contact form, you're paying for clicks that bounce. Every Newstead campaign gets at least 3-5 dedicated landing pages tied to ad groups.

No negative keyword discipline. A Newstead law firm shouldn't pay for clicks from people searching "DIY legal templates." A Newstead software company shouldn't pay for clicks from job seekers. We build a 200-500 keyword negative list at launch and grow it monthly.

Pricing and ad spend

Most Newstead clients sit between $2,000 and $8,000/month in ad spend, plus management fees.

Management fees: 15% of spend for accounts up to $5K/month, 12% for accounts $5-$15K, 10% for larger. Minimum $600/month management.

We don't take accounts under $1,500/month total because there isn't enough budget to actually optimise — you'd just be paying for our reporting.

We don't accept commission on "impression boosting" or other vanity-metric campaigns. Every dollar spent has a measurable outcome.

Reporting and transparency

Monthly reports for every Newstead client:

Real ROAS. Spend in. Revenue (or pipeline value) out. The actual number, not a Google-default "conversions" report.

Cost per qualified lead. Total qualified leads (the ones that progressed in your sales process) divided by total spend. The most important single number.

Quality score and impression share. Where in the auction we're winning and losing. These predict next month.

Top performing + worst performing ad groups. Where we're shifting budget for next month.

No "impressions delivered" or "clicks attained." Those are activity metrics, not outcome metrics.

How long until you see real ROI

Honest answer: 30-60 days for Google Ads to settle, 90 days for confident ROI numbers.

First 30 days: launch, optimise, learn. Account will probably underperform — that's normal. We're feeding the algorithm and clearing junk keywords.

Days 30-60: account starts converging. Conversion rate stabilises. Cost-per-conversion comes down 20-40%.

Day 60+: real optimisation. We have enough data to A/B test ad copy, landing pages, and audiences. ROAS typically continues improving for 6-12 months as we refine.

A Newstead B2B campaign walkthrough

Composite from three B2B SaaS / professional services accounts over the past two years.

A Newstead-based commercial property advisory came to us spending $4,500/month on Google Ads with a cost-per-conversion of $380. The "conversions" were mostly newsletter signups — not actual qualified property inquiries. Real qualified leads were maybe 2-3 a month, putting their effective cost-per-qualified-lead near $1,500. Average deal value was $12K-$80K, so the maths still worked, but barely.

What we changed in the first 60 days:

1. Rebuilt conversion tracking. The website's contact form was the only thing being tracked as a conversion — phone calls (high-intent for property) were invisible. We added call tracking via CallRail, mapped calls > 2 min as conversions, and re-built bid strategy around those. 2. Pruned 40% of the keyword list. Anything containing "DIY," "job," "course," "free," "template" — all moved to negative keywords. Cost dropped immediately, conversion rate doubled. 3. Built three dedicated landing pages — one for sale advisory, one for leasing, one for valuations. Generic homepage traffic moved to category-specific pages. 4. Switched bidding from "Maximise conversions" (Google's default) to "Target ROAS" once we had 60 days of conversion data.

Result by month 4: spend stable at $4,500/month. Cost-per-qualified-lead dropped to $290 (down 80%). Qualified leads up to 12-15/month. The principal's quote: *"I don't think about Google Ads anymore. That's the whole point."*

How we handle competitor bidding (and bidding on your name)

Competitor bidding (you bidding on their brand names): legal in Australia, common, but use carefully. Useful in a few specific scenarios — usually when a competitor has poor service or a known weakness — and you can be the "considered alternative." Less useful as a default. We typically allocate 5-15% of budget to competitor terms when there's a real positioning angle, zero when there isn't.

Defensive bidding (bidding on your own brand): mostly always-on, and cheap. If a Newstead competitor is bidding on your brand name (they probably are), you NEED to be at position 1 on your own brand or you'll lose a percentage of branded searches to them. Branded search converts 8-15x better than non-branded, so even a small leak is expensive.

Trademarked terms: we don't use them in ad copy (Google's policy + Australian trademark law). Bidding on the keyword is fine; copying the trademark into headline or description is not.

Negative competitor keywords: equally important. If your brand contains a generic word that competitors also use ("Brisbane Property," "Newstead Advisory"), we use match-type discipline to make sure you're not paying to show up for their searches accidentally.

Reporting cadence and what's in each report

Weekly internal review (we do this, you don't see it): account health check, keyword performance scan, ad copy A/B status, budget pacing vs target, anomaly detection (sudden CTR drops, quality score changes).

Bi-weekly client summary: 1-2 paragraphs sent via email — what moved, what we changed, what's queued. Designed to read in 90 seconds.

Monthly performance report (full): PDF or shared Looker Studio dashboard covering:

- Spend in / Revenue (or pipeline value) out — real ROAS, not Google-default conversion value - Cost per qualified lead — the most important single number - Conversion rate by ad group, landing page, device, location - Quality scores trending — predictive of next month's CPC - Top 5 performing search terms (what queries actually generated conversions) - Top 5 search terms we paused (what queries wasted budget) - Three things we did, three things we're doing next

Quarterly strategy review (call): 45 minutes. Lifetime account performance, year-over-year trends if applicable, budget allocation questions, new campaign opportunities, anything you've been thinking about that I should hear.