What's new
What's new

Google Ads?

DukeJCDC

Plastic
Joined
Mar 5, 2017
Hi all,

Just started in a small shop as general manager to help grow the business after being flat lined for years. I'm able to build a heck of a relationship with a customer one we start working with them but right now I'm trying to find those customers. The are in in is booming, but I've never stone much for cold calling or anything like that.

But we've got a website up and have already gotten a little bit of work through it. Has anyone here used Google Ads or any kind of paid advertising and gotten decent results for the money?
 
So google adds calling twice a day wore you down?

Surprisingly enough, they've never called me about it. Junk calls from other companies offering to help me with Google Ads for sure, but nothing from Google.

I have dived in on it though using Google for my webmaster, analytics, search console etc etc and its already brought in $ from people who've found us since our ranks improved in search results.

I just haven't taken the step of putting actual money into online advertising yet, wanted to see if anyone else has tried it.
 
What kind of work does this shop do?

Hopefully the web site had some proof reading, your post is a little hard to follow.
 
I've never stone much for cold calling or anything like that.

No one does, that's why those that do can be so successful. Success in, well, in anything often depends on going out of the comfort zone. Most try hard to stay in the comfort zone.

Advertising has a role for sure, helps you stay top of mind....but it is no substitute for direct personal sales. Its just so much noise if you don't also pick up the phone and ask for the business. One of our best accounts was a simple as that, "Hi, I'd like to bid on the some of your work" "ok, I've got one on the go today, I'll ad you on the RFQ". How simple is that? Would google ads have changed what that purchasing person did that day?

Eventually you get some momentum, and the phone occasionally rings (what a wonderful thing that is!) , but until then its shoe leather, dialing for dollars and STP (see the people)
 
Piss on google adds, I run Add Block Plus but sometimes one slips by and I see the little "Ad" at the beginning so I just keep scrolling.

My grandmother ran one of the most successful industrial supply/Machine shops in South East USA for 70+ years (5th largest power transmission supplier in the USA. Browning, Gates,,,,). I once asked her in the early 80's what her tip for success was. It was quite simple, "I only hire people who play golf". Granted this was a time when internet was still a thought and everyone had a sagging shelf full of Thomas registers (If you don't know what that is you may still be a bit young for a GM position).

Internet is a great source of information but if that's where you plan to make your sales then don't expect many big orders. When I deal with someone selling me a product or service I want a quick 90 second elevator pitch and then if I like what I hear, maybe a Wednesday morning/evening round of slinging sticks.

From the way your post comes off I'm willing to venture you are in your mid 20's to early 30's? Full of that "Hi Tech, new age selling and management style". My piece of advice is get over your fear of cold calling, Beat the doors down, and don't be one of those stay at the office GM's that are so common today.
If you search googles ad rates you can see it averages $10K per month with $1 per click. You could hire several salesmen on a commission with draw off of salary for that. Not to mention the ever so important face to face time.

Also, If you don't already... Learn to golf.
 
From the way your post comes off I'm willing to venture you are in your mid 20's to early 30's? Full of that "Hi Tech, new age selling and management style". My piece of advice is get over your fear of cold calling, Beat the doors down, and don't be one of those stay at the office GM's that are so common today.
If you search googles ad rates you can see it averages $10K per month with $1 per click. You could hire several salesmen on a commission with draw off of salary for that. Not to mention the ever so important face to face time.

Also, If you don't already... Learn to golf.


Haha Trust me, I have no fear of cold calling/cold visiting even. The owner of the company I work for has a fear of cold calling/cold visits, hence he has been stalled for 10 years with the same 2 customers. I'm looking into Google Ads as a way to market within my current means, also to do what most other shops aren't doing. Just having a website up for a month has already brought in $3k from new customers, I can imagine if I started actively chasing it online as well. As much as we all don't like it, look at Xometry, an online only manufacturing tech company.


Not to jump on this, but you've struck a pet peeve of mine with the age comment. Coming up in this industry full of old guys looking down on the young up and comers, is it a wonder that our workforce is in a literal sense, dying off with no replacements? Yes, I am precisely 30. I first became a shop manager at 25, and we had record months for the next 8 months straight. I had one of the youngest crews in our area with an average age in the early 20s and we were stomping the competition hands down. And now, being GM at 30, I plan on doing the same here.
:willy_nilly::angry:

You don't get ahead by doing the same thing the industry has been doing for the last 40 years. There is a reason the Thomas Register jumped on the "Hi Tech, new age selling and management style" and is now ThomasNet.

And you do know the companies that pay 10k a month are massive corporations right? My budget, I'm looking at $3/click and $500 a month. With my current ROI on just having a website, I've got about 3 months of that covered. I'm just looking for feedback from anyone who has tried it instead of naysayers who wouldn't even see my ads because of blockers :rolleyes5:
 
How long have you been off-shore -05?

Golf had a massive heart attack back during The Crash, and is not expected to make much of a recovery.



----------------------------

Think Snow Eh!
Ox
 
And you do know the companies that pay 10k a month are massive corporations right? My budget, I'm looking at $3/click and $500 a month. With my current ROI on just having a website, I've got about 3 months of that covered. I'm just looking for feedback from anyone who has tried it instead of naysayers who wouldn't even see my ads because of blockers :rolleyes5:

Didn't mean to jump on a nerve as I like young go getters getting on the manufacturing wagon. It was a bit late last night when I was replying and got tired of typing before I directly responded to your question. Yes, I have a lot of experience with Google Ad. I'm in contract factory management and deal with several "Large Corporations" as you described. (Well you said giant and our interpretation of large and giant may be different).

For example, if you google China prototyping, the first page comes up with Star Rapid in spot number four and Start-prototyping towards the bottom. I was Stars factory manager 2013-2016 and Start P's Plant consultant since 2016-present. Both factories occupy about 250K square feet and are in the same general area of Guangdong. Start P uses google ads and pays just shy of 40K per month and still has salesmen in USA and Europe. Star Rapid used google ads until 2015 and was paying just a tad over $35K+. Now they just have commission based salesmen on four continents and Star hits googles search near the top of the page with (Zero) Ad payments while Start P is near the bottom. Both places still almost double in size yearly yet one pays $45K per month while one is commissioned based.

So there is my direct experience with Google Ads. As you can see, It does work but at what cost? If you google USA Machine shops you will get pages of payed for spots from huge companies. I bet if google machine shops in whatever town you live in you will probably be on page 1 without buying Google Ads. Like you said earlier about "I wouldn't see it because of my ad block plus". You are 100% correct, And most other people use some sort of ad blocker. So, You can look at it as a hit or miss. If you buy into it and someone with Ad block is searching in your area, you will get missed. But then again, Someone without add block in some other state may be searching for a shop and may find you on page 1 or 10 or 50.

As much as we all don't like it, look at Xometry, an online only manufacturing tech company.

Yeah, you probably don't want to go there on this forum. Search Xometry on here and nobody has really anything to good to say about them. Same thing as MFG dot com that has been around since the 90's.

My budget, I'm looking at $3/click and $500 a month. With my current ROI on just having a website, I've got about 3 months of that covered.

You said you made $3K on your website with new customers, Ok great. But if you are paying $500 a month plus $3 per click how are you seeing enough ROI to prepay the Google ads for the next three months? Out of that $3k you made did you not have to supply a product at a cost to you?

At Start-P our average is one RFQ every 122 Clicks. Out of that only one in every fifteen RFQ's result in an order. I'm sure we get a better deal than $3 per click but if you based your figures off of what ours is that would cost you $5,490 per order.

You can take what I said however you want, I wish you best of luck in whatever direction you take.


How long have you been off-shore -05?

Golf had a massive heart attack back during The Crash, and is not expected to make much of a recovery.

Well,,,, Lets see. I think I moved permanently away in 2011 so pushing 9 years now.

And golf, Nah it's still around. When I fly into Nashville I take some of the guys from the Spring Hill General Motors plant out to a few rounds and same in Atlanta and Orlando with the L-3 guys. I agree it's not quite as popular as once was but still, a lot of money changes hands at the 19th hole. Heck, that's how I managed to sell my business to Fastenal with a 10 year lease on my buildings in a middle of the crash in 06!
 
we don't spend much time on the intranet bs and i'm in the younger generation few ticks older than the OP. its a tool nothing more just so people can search and see your legit. I've found getting out and networking has been 100x better time spent than cold calling....did that for a decade i'm done with that chapter. we were just in the bar drinking beers after wrapping up a big job start talking to a guy next to us what do you know he's a big knife hobbyist and looking to make his own stuff. you have anybody to help you out with prototyping and initial mfg....guess what we've got a tour of the shop lined up. never know where your next opportunity is going to come but guys that wait for the magic computer to call for their next quote is the wrong path me thinks....100 different business approaches to move forward.

I got into this trade and most guys think i'm nuts but i'm doing it because no one else our age is. want to do something very few of the younger guys do....get off your ace and go out and network and talk to people. computers, emails, texting f'in drives me nuts these days.
 
How long have you been off-shore -05?

Golf had a massive heart attack back during The Crash, and is not expected to make much of a recovery.



----------------------------

Think Snow Eh!
Ox

I was thinking the same thing.

Using that metric, Akron Ohio should be the business capital of the universe..........(hint) it's NOT.
 
Using that metric, Akron Ohio should be the business capital of the universe..........(hint) it's NOT.

Uhh, no.

Akron actually had to settle for being the de facto economic State Capitol of West Virginia, stiff and skinny rubber tires and soggy blimp era onward, given there weren't enough SPACE in coal mines to kill more than a few West Virginians at one go, no matter HOW barefoot and hungry they were.

:(

Generalization as to Adverts:

"pull" adverts are the "righteous" ones.

What we are pleased to read when we come LOOKING FOR your product or service line-up, actually WANT to read a bit about what you (claim to) offer or do. But only when WE "have a need". Not all-day, every-day when we do not.

Serve those off your OWN website, as with any other page, and they 1) do not get blocked, 2) DO reach the intended audience, 3) WHEN seeker is a better candidate to buy than when not, and 4) WILL be auto-indexed by Google and others as a normal part of what their site-crawling "robots" JF do, whether you pay them for enhanced "placement" towards the top of their search returns or never.

Do these. Do them well. Make them clean, concise, readable, and helpful. Keep them up-to-date.
"Static" lead-in only, no silly-"cute" scripting tricks as may get blocked, and for-damned-sure NO bandwidth-wasting video!

LINK to those videos if you must. Some can be very valuable, if only but the ONE TIME, not as an "up front" barrier to progress, every damned visit!

Do NOT waste my screen real-estate or time with "Hollywood" on first-arrival. Any tab does that will be closed in a New York Minute so I can go off and find a "real" supplier sooner!

Get it right? You may even get "bookmarked". Some of these I buy from less than once in three years. But when I DO buy, I hit the bookmark, place the order, no longer bother to check other sources, go on with my day. They have been every bit that useful as to saving me TIME if not also MONEY, their competitors will have kept prices within due bounds, I do not have to do that for them.


"push" adverts we did NOT ask for are the ones meant to be blocked.
Or we just boycott the arseholes who sent them if they DO get through. I'm too old to even SNIFF ladies USED panty-hose, let alone buy or wear NEW ones, never HAD a student loan, WTF is a "targeted advert" in that irrelevant crap?

Avoid those. They brand you a careless parasite with less-than-zero regard for the valuable time of your fellow worker-bee humans simply trying to earn THEIR honest crust, nearly always on OTHER matters, any given day.
 
And golf, Nah it's still around. When I fly into Nashville I take some of the guys from the Spring Hill General Motors plant out to a few rounds and same in Atlanta and Orlando with the L-3 guys. I agree it's not quite as popular as once was but still, a lot of money changes hands at the 19th hole. Heck, that's how I managed to sell my business to Fastenal with a 10 year lease on my buildings in a middle of the crash in 06!


I was in ref to The Great Recession that went from 4Q 2008 and lasted a cpl of years.

I am not privy to The Crash that you are in ref to.


???


--------------------------

Think Snow Eh!
Ox
 
I have a Google Ad running for a niche product we make, if you type in one of the key phrases we should show up. Very small budget, less than $100 a month spent. Since our customers for those items are Military/LE the user searching isn't necessarily the one placing the order, and it may be a month later when funding is approved, so I have no way of knowing ROI on the ad itself. So I pay $65 or $80 a month to Google and hope it wasn't a waste, just what Deming calls "unknown and unknowable" factors.

That said, for the job shop/prototyping work I don't bother with ads. Every good customer has been through network or reference.
 
I'm gonna go with thermite on this one, a good website is a much better way to spend your money. Skip the folderol "our mission is to abolish world hunger !" and show good photos of your work, your facilities, and maybe if you can list some famous customers. Have some cranky old bastard look the site over to remove wooey-gooey statements. Put contact information right up front where it's easy to find. If you have any special strengths - titanium axles ? bevel gear cutting ? cam grinding ? high-volume fastener mfg ? then promote those. Have an seo guy help you with the tricks to get yourself found easier, but don't let him swamp the site in gobbledygook. And make it load FAST, without thirty links to crap none of us want to see. No javascript.

Last but not least, a few cleavage shots are always welcome :D

I bet a good website is a much better investment than google ads, at least in the machine shop world. Do you ever click on alibaba ads, for example ?
 
And make it load FAST, without thirty links to crap none of us want to see. No javascript.

EG nailed it there. Nothing turns me off more than a website full of redirects and constant loading. Even PM with my add block on takes a bit so I ran a quick scan and wow! Only a 13% rating

I update my website weekly and can never seem to get above 85% so even if I did use google ads I'm sure many would click off before they get to see the whole front page.

Capture pm.JPG
 
Don't know about anyone else but I have anything with the name "google" in it blocked - ads, fonts, apis, maps, everything. When I see any of that shit buried in a website I leave instantly and never return.

ymmv

There are a couple of sites on Google that I use frequently. One is Google Earth and the other is Google Images. Often I will hear of an address or town with which I'm not familiar. Google Earth will take me there and show what it looks like. Google Images will often give me a lead to a product that I'm looking for.

I know that many dislike Google and probably rightfully so, but those two parts of Google have helped me out a great deal.

I've started to use DuckDuckGo more than Google for a search engine since Google does a lot of front-end filtering for political reasons as well as steering users to their advertisers.

That said, I think that you are missing out if you never use Google Earth or Google Images.
 
Last edited:
I don't know what all the fuss is about. I use Google (not Google Chrome) for the majority of my searches just as I am very pleased with Google Earth.

I have an internet programme (that I pay for) that protects my computer. The "protection" programmes that are free I wouldn't trust.

I do get several spam mails but almost all of those gets tossed directly into a spam file and they get deleted about every week or so - WITHOUT OPENING THEM.

On Google just by searching for "thread pitch diameter" one of my Youtube videos comes up as one of the first. I consider that damn good.
 
There are a couple of sites on Google that I use frequently. One is Google Earth and the other is Google Images. Often I will hear of an address or town with which I'm not familiar. Google Earth will take me there and show what it looks like. Google Images will often give me a lead to a product that I'm looking for.

I know that many dislike Google and probably rightfully so, but those two parts of Google have helped me out a great deal.

I've started to use DuckDuckGo more than Google for a search engine since Google does a lot of front-end filtering for political reason as well as steering users to their advertisers.

That said, I think that you are missing out if you never use Google Earth or Google Images.

I don't have maps.google.com blocked, BUT... as with EG, with near-as-dammit all ELSE with google*** in it blocked in local DNS so they are never even connected to for wasting of bandwidth in any way, not an "adblocker", which still wastes resources needlessly, the map & satellite loads have become so slow as to be useless.

I've had to go to other mapping providers. Not as good as google once was. But good enough.
 








 
Back
Top