Home service marketing costs from under $200 a month if you run it yourself with software, to $2,500 to $12,000 a month with a specialist agency by one agency's estimate, before ad spend. Leads and ads come on top: one 2026 benchmark put Google Local Services Ads at about $53 a lead, and third-party estimates put Angi leads at roughly $20 to $90 each, depending on the trade.
This guide is for the owner of an HVAC, plumbing, roofing or pest control company. It splits the bill into the lines you will actually pay: software, your Google profile, the website, reviews, Local Services Ads, search ads, shared leads and phone answering. Every figure links to the page we read it from on 10 November 2026. Where a number is an estimate from someone who sells marketing, we say so. Where we use example numbers, we say that too.
The short answer
| Way of buying | Typical monthly cost | What is included | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Do it yourself, with software | From $29 to $699 for field-service software, plus about $95 to $135 for a review tool | Scheduling, invoicing and review requests. You do the marketing | Jobber, Housecall Pro, NiceJob |
| Freelancer | About $1,350 on average for SEO | Usually one skill: SEO, ads or a website | Ahrefs survey, 2024 |
| General agency retainer | Most often $501 to $1,000 for SEO; agencies average about $3,200 | SEO and reporting; ads are often a separate fee | Ahrefs survey, 2024 |
| Specialist home service agency | $2,500 to $12,000 for HVAC, by one agency's estimate | Several channels managed together | WebFX, Dec 2025 |
| Google Local Services Ads | Ad spend only: you pay per lead, about $53 on average in one benchmark | Leads from the top of Google, for your business alone | Google; Valley, Aug 2026 |
| Shared lead marketplaces | Leads × price: about $35 to $90 per HVAC lead and $20 to $85 per plumbing lead, by one estimate | Homeowner requests, often sent to several pros | Valley, Jun 2026 |
Read the table with care. The Ahrefs figures cover SEO providers of every kind, not only trades, and date from 2024. The $2,500 to $12,000 range comes from WebFX, which sells that service. The lead prices are third-party estimates, because Angi and Google do not publish price lists. Your own invoices and quotes beat all of these.
The line items
Most owners do not buy one thing called "marketing". They buy a set of lines, some fixed every month and some that rise with the number of leads. Here is what each one costs.
Google Business Profile and local SEO
The profile itself costs nothing. Google says creating a Business Profile and listing your business "is free" (Google). What costs money is the time to keep it right: categories, services, photos, posts and review replies. If you pay someone, it usually sits inside an SEO or local SEO retainer. In Ahrefs' survey of 439 SEO providers, the most common retainer was $501 to $1,000 a month, and 68.8% charged $2,000 a month or less.
The website
A website is usually a one-off build plus a monthly fee for hosting and changes. Prices vary too much for a fair range, so get two or three written quotes and check who owns the domain. One reviews vendor, NiceJob, sells a site add-on at $99 a month plus a $199 setup fee (NiceJob). A cheap site that hides the phone number costs more in lost calls than it saves.
Reviews
Review requests are cheap and they matter. In BrightLocal's 2026 survey of 1,002 US adults, 97% of consumers read reviews for local businesses, 74% look for reviews from the last three months, and 68% will only use a business rated four stars or more. A tool that texts every customer a review link costs $95 a month on NiceJob's Starter plan, or $135 on Pro, which adds email campaigns and referrals (NiceJob).
Google Local Services Ads
Local Services Ads are the listings with a badge at the top of many trade searches. Google says "you only pay when you get a lead", and your bid is the most you would pay for one. For its Maximize leads setting, Google recommends a minimum budget of 10 leads a week (Google). Google does not publish a typical lead price.
For a figure, the best we found is third-party. The Valley Marketing Group, a firm that sells LSA management, reports a $53 average cost per lead from SearchLight Digital's February 2026 benchmark of 888 contractors and 126,650 leads. It gives ranges of $30 to $70 for HVAC, $35 to $65 for plumbing and $55 to $90 for roofing (Valley Marketing Group, Aug 2026). We could not find SearchLight's own report, so treat these as estimates. Our guide to Local Services Ads covers how ranking and lead quality work.
Keep two numbers apart: the ad spend, which goes to Google, and any management fee, which goes to whoever runs the account. A quote that mixes them makes it hard to see what you are paying for.
Google search ads
Search ads charge per click, so the cost per lead depends on your landing page and how well calls are tracked. LocaliQ's 2025 benchmarks, from 3,211 US home services campaigns, put the average cost per click at $7.85 and the average cost per lead at $90.92 (LocaliQ). That is a vendor's benchmark from campaigns it ran, and it is the cost per lead, not per booked job.
Management is a separate line. WebFX, an agency, says fees are "typically 10% – 20% of your ad spend or around $1,000 to $3,000 per month". Its own entry tier is $750 a month plus a $1,200 initial fee, for up to $5,000 of monthly spend (WebFX).
Shared leads: Angi, HomeAdvisor and Thumbtack
Marketplace leads are priced per lead, and the same homeowner can reach several pros. Angi's pro FAQ says it connects customers "with multiple" service professionals, that "different sized jobs have different Lead Fees", and that it makes no guarantee of work (Angi pro FAQ). The Valley Marketing Group estimates $35 to $90 per HVAC lead, $20 to $85 per plumbing lead and an annual membership of roughly $300 (Valley Marketing Group, Jun 2026). That firm sells alternatives. Our Angi leads review goes through the terms.
Thumbtack also charges per lead. We could not open a Thumbtack page with current prices when we checked, so we give no figure. Use the charges in your own account.
Field-service software
Most shops already pay for job management, and many of these apps now sell marketing extras. Prices from the vendors' own pages:
| Software | Published monthly price | Users | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jobber Core | $49, or $29 billed annually | 1 | Jobber |
| Jobber Connect | $139, or $99 billed annually | 1 | Jobber |
| Jobber Grow | $199 for 1 user, $299 for 5; less billed annually | 1 to 15 | Jobber |
| Housecall Pro Basic | $79, or $59 billed annually | 1 | Housecall Pro |
| Housecall Pro Essentials | $189, or $149 billed annually | 5 | Housecall Pro |
| Housecall Pro Max | $329, or $299 billed annually; $35 per extra user | 8 | Housecall Pro |
| ServiceTitan | Not published: "Request Pricing", priced per technician | Any | ServiceTitan |
Jobber also lists a Marketing Suite add-on at $99 a month and a Receptionist add-on at $29 a month, and charges $29 a month for each extra user (Jobber). Prices exclude sales tax on both Jobber and Housecall Pro.
Answering and booking
A missed call is the most expensive lead you have, because you already paid to make the phone ring. Ruby, a live receptionist service, lists 50 minutes a month for $250, 100 minutes for $395 and 200 minutes for $720 (Ruby). Missed-call text-back and AI answering are other ways to cover nights and weekends; Jobber, for example, lists a Receptionist add-on at $29 a month. Google also says responsiveness and reviews affect how your Local Services Ads perform (Google), so answering well helps your other channels too.
Email and text
Your past customers are the cheapest channel you have: tune-up reminders, maintenance plans and estimate follow-up. Many review and field-service tools include email campaigns, such as NiceJob Pro above. Marketing texts in the US carry strict consent rules, so get clear opt-in and check with your provider before a campaign.
How HVAC, plumbing and roofing compare
Cost per lead moves a lot by trade. On Google search ads, LocaliQ's benchmarks put the average cost per lead at about $128 for AC installation and repair, $129 for plumbing and $228 for roofing and gutters (LocaliQ). The LSA estimates above follow the same order, with roofing highest. Pest control has no row in either source, so we give no figure for it.
Higher lead prices are not always worse. A roof replacement can carry a far bigger ticket than a drain cleaning, so it can absorb a bigger cost per job. That is why the number to judge by is cost per booked job against the profit on that job.
A worked example
Here is one owner-run HVAC company with five technicians. Every input is an example, not a benchmark. Swap in your own.
| Field-service software: Housecall Pro Essentials, billed monthly (example choice) | $189 |
| Review requests: NiceJob Starter (example choice) | $95 |
| Answering: Ruby, 100 minutes (example choice) | $395 |
| Agency fee for profile, site and LSA management (example) | $1,500 |
| Local Services Ads: 25 leads at $60 (example) | $1,500 |
| Shared leads: 20 at $60 (example) | $1,200 |
| Total spend for the month | $4,879 |
| LSA leads booked at 40% (example) | 10 jobs, $150 each |
| Shared leads booked at 20% (example) | 4 jobs, $300 each |
| Jobs from profile, website and referrals (example) | 12 jobs |
| All-in cost per booked job | $188 |
| Gross profit on a $500 job at 40% margin (example) | $200 |
In this example, Local Services Ads book twice as often as shared leads at the same price, so each job costs half as much. The all-in cost per job includes the fixed lines, which is the honest way to look at a month. Here it comes to $188 against $200 of gross profit per job, which leaves almost nothing. The fix in a case like this is rarely more leads: it is cutting the source that costs most per job and booking more of the calls you already get. The same arithmetic runs in our shared-lead cost calculator.
How to tell if the spend is working
Clicks, impressions and leads are not the result. A booked job is. Each month, for each source, work out three numbers:
- Cost per booked job. That source's spend divided by the jobs it booked.
- Profit per job. Average job value times your gross margin, before marketing.
- The gap. If cost per booked job takes most of the profit, that source keeps you busy without paying you.
To get there, every call and form needs a source attached: call tracking numbers on the site and ads, and a source field on every job in your software. Then put a marketplace's numbers into the shared-lead cost calculator and compare the result with your other sources. Our home service marketing guide sets out what to fix first.
- Ad spend and the management fee are shown as separate lines
- Your Google profile, ad accounts, domain and website stay in your name
- The provider does not sell or share leads with other contractors in your area
- Reports show booked jobs and cost per booked job by source, not just clicks
- Contract length, notice period and setup fees are in writing
- No guaranteed rankings or guaranteed lead counts
What Gigabit charges
Gigabit sells marketing to home service companies, so we are not neutral here. These are our published prices for one US location. Plans run month to month, and ad spend goes to Google from your own account, outside the plan price.
| Plan | Price | Who it is for |
|---|---|---|
| Growth Package | $100 a month, or $1,000 a year | The first 300 businesses keep this rate; after that it is $149 a month or $1,490 a year |
| Essentials | $399 a month | An owner-run shop that wants its own calls instead of shared leads. |
| Scale | $699 a month | A shop ready to cover more towns and answer more calls. |
| Full engine | $999 a month | A growing company that can't let a call go unanswered. |
The Growth Package covers your website, Google Business Profile, listings, posts and an SEO baseline. It does not include ad spend or ads management. Essentials adds review requests and replies. Scale adds Local Services Ads management, missed-call text-back, call tracking and estimate follow-up. Full engine adds the AI receptionist and Google search ads management. We never sell leads, and we never send one homeowner to several contractors.
See the full list of what each plan includes on our home services pricing page, or read what we run for home service businesses.
