What is a Good Google Ad Conversion Rate?

Wondering if your Google Ads conversion rate is any good? It's one of the most common questions in digital marketing, but the honest answer is almost always "it depends." Industry averages are a starting point, but they don't tell the whole story. This guide will walk you through the benchmarks, show you how to define what "good" means for your business, and provide actionable steps to start improving your own numbers.

The Quick Answer: Search & Display Ad Benchmarks

If you're looking for a quick gut check, looking at industry-wide averages can be helpful. Keep in mind that these are just general guidelines, and your own results can vary dramatically. But for context, here's a rough look at average conversion rates across different verticals for Google Search and Display ads.

Average Search Network Conversion Rates by Industry

The Search network typically has higher conversion rates because you’re capturing users with active intent - they are actively searching for a solution you might offer.

• Advocacy: 19.80%
• Arts & Entertainment: 9.80%
• Automotive: 5.10%
• Beauty & Personal Care: 7.80%
• Business Services: 5.10%
• Career & Employment: 5.10%
• Dentists & Dental Services: 11.20%
• Education: 4.10%
• Finance & Insurance: 8.60%
• Health & Fitness: 7.00%
• Home Improvement: 9.10%
• Legal: 7.40%
• Real Estate: 3.30%
• Restaurants: 9.20%
• Shopping & eCommerce: 2.80%
• Sports & Recreation: 4.70%
• Travel: 3.20%

Note: These benchmarks are compiled from various industry studies and are subject to change. Use them as a directional guide, not a definitive target. Generally, a search ad conversion rate between 4% and 6% is considered solid for many businesses.

Average Display Network Conversion Rates by Industry

Display ads typically have much lower conversion rates because they function more like traditional "interruptive" advertising. You're showing your ad to people while they're browsing other content, so the intent to purchase is much lower. Here, the average conversion rate across all industries hovers around 0.5% - 1.5%.

Anything above 2% on the Display Network is generally considered excellent.

Why ‘Average’ is a Flawed Metric to Chase

Comparing your results to an industry average can feel productive, but it’s often a recipe for frustration. A B2B software company selling a $50,000/year subscription has a vastly different sales process than an eCommerce store selling $25 t-shirts. Both might be in the "technology" category, but their definition of a good conversion rate is leagues apart. Your conversion rate depends entirely on your unique context.

Here are just a few factors that make benchmarks an imperfect measure of success:

• Your Offer: It's much easier to get someone to convert on a "download free PDF guide" offer than a "request a $10,000 enterprise quote" offer. The higher the commitment, the lower the conversion rate will naturally be.
• Campaign Type: A branded search campaign (e.g., people searching for your company name) will always have a much higher conversion rate than a non-branded discovery campaign targeting top-of-funnel keywords.
• Keyword Intent: A query like "buy nike air max size 11" has far more commercial intent (and a higher CVR) than an informational query like "what are the best running shoes."
• Audience Temperature: Advertising to a retargeting list of people who have already visited your pricing page will convert at a significantly higher rate than advertising to a cold audience that has never heard of you.
• Definition of a 'Conversion': Is your "conversion" a newsletter signup, a contact form submission, an added-to-cart event, a phone call, or an actual purchase? A business tracking newsletter signups will report a much higher conversion rate than one tracking completed high-ticket purchases.
• Device: Users often research on mobile but prefer to complete complex purchases or fill out detailed forms on a desktop. This can lead to very different conversion rates between devices.

How to Define a ‘Good’ Conversion Rate for Your Business

Instead of chasing external benchmarks, the real goal is to find the conversion rate that makes your campaigns profitable. A good conversion rate is simply one that brings in new customers at a cost you can afford. Here’s how you can determine that for your business.

Step 1: Get Crystal Clear on Your Goals

First, what action are you counting as a conversion? Is it a sale, a quote request, a booked demo, or a free trial signup? The success of your campaign hinges on accurately tracking the action that holds real value for your business. Be precise here. If you’re in lead generation, you might even have multiple conversion actions, like a primary "Request a Demo" and a secondary "Download a Guide."

Step 2: Understand Your Unit Economics

This sounds complicated, but it's really about knowing your numbers. You need two key metrics:

• Customer Lifetime Value (LTV): How much revenue, on average, does a new customer generate for your business over their entire relationship with you?
• Target Cost Per Acquisition (CPA): Based on your LTV and profit margins, how much can you afford to spend to acquire one new customer?

Let's say your product costs $100 and has a 50% profit margin, meaning you make $50 in profit per sale. To be profitable, your CPA must be less than $50. You might set a target CPA of $30 to give yourself a healthy margin.

Once you have your target CPA, you can work backward to uncover your target conversion rate.

Step 3: Calculate Your Target Conversion Rate

The formula is straightforward:

(Total Ad Spend / Target CPA) / Clicks = Target Conversion Rate

Let’s simplify that with an example.

Imagine your average Cost Per Click (CPC) in Google Ads is $3.00, and your target CPA is $30.

This means you can afford ten clicks ($30 CPA / $3.00 CPC) to get one conversion.

To find your conversion rate target, you'd calculate: 1 conversion / 10 clicks = 10%

In this scenario, a 10% conversion rate means you're profitably acquiring new customers. A 5% conversion rate means you're spending $60 to acquire a customer, losing you money on each conversion. Suddenly, "good" isn't a vague average anymore - it's a hard number directly tied to your profitability.

Actionable Ways to Boost Your Google Ads Conversion Rate

Once you have your baseline, you can focus on improving it. Here are some of the most effective strategies to get more conversions from the same ad spend.

1. Align Your Ad Copy, Keywords, and Landing Page

Message match is everything. If someone searches for "blue running shoes," your ad headline should mention "Blue Running Shoes," and the landing page they click on should prominently feature blue running shoes. This seamless experience creates trust and confirms to the user that they're in the right place, immediately reducing bounce rates.

2. Optimize Your Landing Page Experience

Your landing page has one job: to get the user to convert. Make it ridiculously easy for them.

• Use a clear, compelling headline that matches the ad copy.
• Have one, and only one, Call-to-Action (CTA). Don't distract with links to your blog or social media.
• Keep forms short. Only ask for the information you absolutely need. Each extra field is another reason for them to leave.
• Ensure it's fast and mobile-friendly. More than half of all web traffic comes from mobile devices. If your page is slow or difficult to navigate on a phone, you're throwing money away.

3. Use Negative Keywords Aggressively

Negative keywords prevent your ads from showing for irrelevant searches, saving you money and improving your conversion rate by focusing your budget only on qualified searchers. For example, if you sell premium business software, you'll want to add negative keywords like "free," "cheap," and "jobs" to filter out unintended audiences.

4. Improve Your Offer

Sometimes, low conversion rates have nothing to do with your ads and everything to do with your offer. Is it compelling enough? Can you improve it by adding a guarantee, offering free shipping, providing a free trial, or including a valuable bonus? A stronger offer can dramatically increase the perceived value and motivate more users to take action.

5. Track the Entire Funnel, Not Just the First Click

A "conversion" in Google Ads is often just the beginning of the customer journey. A lead downloading an ebook doesn't pay the bills. To truly understand performance, you must connect your ad data to what happens next.

For lead generation, this means linking Google Ads data to your CRM (like Salesforce or HubSpot). This allows you to differentiate between campaigns that generate low-quality leads and those that generate leads who actually become paying customers. For eCommerce, it means connecting Shopify or your sales platform data to see which ads drive high-value purchases versus abandoned carts.

Final Thoughts

A "good" Google Ads conversion rate isn't about hitting an arbitrary industry percentage. It's about building a profitable system where your cost to acquire a customer is well below the value that customer brings to your business. By establishing your own baseline, constantly testing, and connecting your ad data to real business outcomes, you can move beyond guesswork and start making data-driven decisions that deliver real growth.

Connecting data from Google Ads, Google Analytics, your CRM, and your e-commerce store used to be a painful process of downloading CSVs and spending hours in spreadsheets. At Graphed, we help you connect all your marketing and sales platforms in one place and ask questions about your data in simple, natural language. We skip past the manual reporting work so our users can get instant, real-time dashboards to see which campaigns are actually driving sales and which ones need to be stopped - all in a matter of seconds.