Your Google Ads headline is 80% of the battle.
If you can’t grab attention, nothing else matters.
I run Pest Control SEO, and I’ve written hundreds of Google Ads for pest control companies. Let me show you exactly what elements you need in your ad copy and how to test variations for continuous improvement.
What Ad Copy Elements Are Critical to Attracting Clicks
The first one that we want to be thinking about is really ideally the exact match keyword that whatever someone is searching.
I keep talking about the crossover between website and Google Ads, that we should understand what our target market is searching.
So we should be doing keyword research regardless on something like SEMrush, or maybe we could even use Google Keyword Planner, and we can see what people are searching.
The Primary Keyword in Your Title
Usually, in that first sentence in our Google Ads copy, and this is kind of nuanced because Google actually just tests themselves and they’ll figure it out best.
So it’s not like you kind of just set the headlines, you set the descriptions, and then they will figure out the rest.
But in terms of different things that we want to have in that title copy, one will definitely be that primary keyword.
A lot of people will be searching pest control Chicago. So we’ll want to be mentioning that exact keyword.
And maybe we can even have different of the top variations of that. So that might be Chicago exterminators, pest control Chicago IL, Chicago pest control, all these different kinds of keywords that are basically the same, but just getting that exact match keyword.
And again, a lot of this comes down to targeting where we’ve already set up the campaigns and the ad sets properly.
And now we’re setting this up for very particular kinds of ads. We don’t want to run just general pest control near me ads.
They should be very, very targeted that this ad is only for pest control in Chicago or only for mosquito control in Glenview, like getting very clear on what that is.
And that makes it a lot easier when we have that proper structure in place.
Include an Offer
Something else we’ll want to have there is an offer.
We might want to have, and really we talked a lot about offers already. I like to refer to Alex Hormozi’s $100 Million Dollar Offers, great book if you guys haven’t read it.
And we want to think about what offer we’re going to use here.
And kind of the beauty of offers is that it’s not just you use them in one place. So we love doing Facebook ads. We love getting stuff going on the website. We love Google ads, all of these different marketing opportunities.
And the great thing about offers is that once you come up with a few really good ones, you can use them everywhere.
So we want to be using that great offer that we’ve came up with. Hopefully you’ve watched that other video or read the other section and understood about how to create a great offer.
And instead of just doing a small discount, we can do something big upfront. So we should be using that offer in the Google Ads headline copy.
And that should be some of the other headlines that we do.
And again, the great part is that Google tests these so we can include multiple offers in the different headlines that we test within this ad. And then Google will just figure out the best ones and then use those.
So I would recommend either using a variation of one offer, just framing it a little bit differently, or just three to five completely separate offers.
The Call to Action
And then in this copy, we also want to have some very clear call to actions of something like, “Hey, call us today.”
You know, “Get a free inspection now.” All those different kinds of things. There should be some kind of call to action there.
And again, Google will also test these.
The Three Placements
There are three placements that we have here. So the first one, we want to do that keyword. The second one, usually the offer. Then the third one, the call to action.
Then beyond that, we also have the descriptions. There will be two to three lines of text below the ad that is set up.
And those should really be supporting information, but I would say they’re not nearly as important as the actual title themselves.
You really have to nail the title.
And now the description there kind of just acts as supporting information.
The ad might go something like this: Pest Control, Chicago, Illinois, $50 off your first service, get your free inspection today.
And then the description might be, Pest Badger is the most reputable pest control company in Appleton or whatever, Chicago, whatever you want to say. We’ve been in business for 20 years.
Obviously I’m just making this up, but more so just supporting details.
So it’s not so much we’re capturing the attention now because the attention is already captured with the headline, but now we just have some more supporting information.
So they read the title, now they’re reading the description. And that kind of supports their belief. Should I click on this?
They read the description. You’ve been in business for a while or you are local or you are premium or however you’re positioning yourself, which we’ve also talked about.
Then that is the supporting information that will get them to click.
Which Call to Action Yields the Best Response
Regarding call to actions, free inspection is a pretty easy one. That’s one we can always use.
And again, we want to go back to our offers.
And really, I haven’t seen one particular call to action work best because this is also something to note that Google Ads, advertising, organic marketing, all of it depends on where you are.
Google Ads in one area might be much different than in another area. It might be a much different size of the area, it might be different kinds of keywords, people might interact with the ads differently.
So I wouldn’t say there’s one that you necessarily want to focus on, but usually we want to include some kind of offer and then lead into just a nice, easy call to action.
Hey, call today, fill out our contact form now.
Add Some Oomph
But it usually should have some kind of oomph to it, some kind of emphasis of using an exclamation point or maybe capitalizing the word FREE, things like that, just to catch their eye a little bit and just be like, “Wow, free” or “Wow, they’re really excited about this.”
Just those little things that make that difference.
How to Effectively Include Pricing or Offers in Your Ads
We’ve already covered this a little bit, but again, we need to identify our offers within our business.
This is really actually like comes down to the core of your business because we’re going to be using an offer somewhere in all of our marketing.
Your offer should be plastered across your website and across your Google Ads and across your Facebook and all of these other platforms.
So we need to figure out what that offer is and then we can put it in our ad copy.
First we figure out that, that is actually the hard part of figuring out what the offer is, and then we can do that.
Example: Free Grub Preventative
For example, one market has really bad grub issues in lawns. So if you’re going to give away a free grub preventative, they’re going to be all over it.
You just mention that in your Google Ads copy.
It’s going to depend on the seasonality and the area you’re in. So figure out your best offers and you’ll be testing these.
And you can actually test them in Google Ads and you’ll see, and this is actually even a good point to mention here, that this is part of testing offers.
You can have many different offers within your Google Ads and you’ll see that some are performing much better than others.
So this is also kind of a safe testing ground to see which offers are working best, what are people actually interested in.
Like a free grub preventative when you sign up for our entire package. It’s just value stacking, right?
Should Your Ad Copy Focus More on Urgency or Trust?
I would almost say that the headline should really be not necessarily about urgency. I don’t know if that’s the right word, but just overall attention grabbing.
We need to grab the attention at all costs.
But then the description can be more trust building, more demonstrating our reputation, our trust, and all of those different things. Maybe how many reviews we have and such.
So the headline, really, we need to grab the attention at all costs. But then we have that supporting information.
Because, like, again, if we can’t grab their attention, then nothing else matters.
The hook is 80% of it. And that is the title there.
And then we have that kind of affirming description below that. That doesn’t matter too much, but it’s kind of just like you’ve hooked them emotionally and now you have to get them fully sold logically.
How to Test Ad Copy Variations for Continual Improvement
There’s that kind of initial testing load, I guess you could say, of you might test 10 different headlines or so.
And Google will naturally flesh out, like I’ve said tons of times at this point, Google will naturally figure out what the best headlines are.
So you could potentially just stick with those headlines that it has naturally figured out.
But I think it would be useful, and we usually recommend this, of going in every month or so and putting in new headlines.
Which again, this is almost overkill and you kind of need a Google Ads person or some kind of agency taking care of this.
But if you do, then it is worth it to go into your top campaigns and checking like, “Hey, are we actually, okay, this set of headlines is working really well, all the rest of them suck. Can we put some more in that might match that or even exceed that?”
Everything about marketing and advertising is testing.
We get an initial group of testing that works pretty well and then we’ll test even more and then that will work even better.
And then by the time we’re testing for over a year, that will be really, really good.
The Bottom Line on Google Ads Copy for Pest Control
Your headline is 80% of the battle. Grab attention at all costs.
Include three elements in your headlines: (1) exact match keyword, (2) offer, (3) call to action.
The description is supporting information. Build trust and credibility there, but the headline does the heavy lifting.
Test 10 different headlines initially. Let Google figure out which ones work best.
Your offer should work across all platforms. Once you create a great offer, use it everywhere.
Call to actions should have oomph. Use exclamation points, capitalize FREE, make it exciting.
Go into your top campaigns monthly and add new headline variations. Keep testing.
Google Ads is a safe testing ground for offers. You’ll quickly see what people actually want.
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Nail the headline. Everything else is secondary.
