How Much Should You Spend on Google Ads in London?

Most London businesses should budget £2,500–£5,500 per month minimum in Google Ads spend to sustain competitive ad placement on their core service keywords. Below these thresholds, auction-position decay typically prevents you from maintaining top-3 placement on hero terms. The exact floor depends on your industry's CPC landscape.

Minimum viable Google Ads budgets by industry

• App development: £4,000/month (hero CPCs £15–£25)
• Web design: £2,500/month (hero CPCs £8–£16)
• Marketing agency: £4,500/month (hero CPCs £12–£24)
• PPC agency: £5,500/month (hero CPCs £18–£35)
• SEO agency: £4,000/month (hero CPCs £14–£28)
• Business plan writing: £1,500/month (hero CPCs £6–£14)
• Branding / logo design: £1,500/month (hero CPCs £4–£10)

How to allocate your budget

1. 70% to bottom-funnel: Exact and phrase match on transactional keywords ("hire", "agency", "services")
2. 20% to mid-funnel: Broad match on commercial investigation terms ("best", "top", "compare")
3. 10% to brand defence: Bid on your own brand name to prevent competitors from capturing your traffic

When to scale

Scale when you have 50+ clicks on a keyword group with a conversion rate above 3% and a CPA below your target. Scale by 20–30% per week, not by doubling overnight — auction dynamics punish sudden budget increases.

Below the minimum?

If your budget is below the minimum viable threshold, restrict to long-tail exact-match campaigns only. Target borough-level keywords like "web design shoreditch" instead of "web design london" — CPCs are typically 40–60% lower with conversion rates that are often higher due to stronger local intent.