You must be wondering, how much does Google Ads cost to run in UAE for my business?
And rightfully so, it is important question to ask.
Marketing is much like investing. To make an informed decision, you need to understand how much will it cost to invest and what kind of return to expect.
Unfortunately, most of the information available regarding Google Ads costs is based on advertising in the United States. If you are looking to advertise in the UAE this information is unhelpful and misleading.
This is what you need to know.
The cost of google ads (google adwords) in Dubai for small businesses is between AED 5,000 - AED 25,000/month, for medium businesses AED 25,000 - AED 75,000/month and for large businesses AED 75,000+/month.
This total amount is determined by the cost per click (CPC), times the amount of clicks, plus agency management fees (which only apply if you don't run the ads yourself).
Monthly Google Ads Cost Formula = CPC * Clicks + Agency Management Fees
Here are some Industry specific cost per click averages for 2024:
Solar Panel Installation: AED 2.22 - AED 6.39
Pest Control: AED 20.39
MMA Gym: AED 4.44
Accounting Services: AED 28.00
Landscaping: AED 11.55
There may also be some additional costs, like landing page creation. This might be added to improve the conversion rate of your PPC traffic, however this cost is a one time investment.
Agency management fees range between AED 3,000 - AED 10,000/month.
Landing page creation costs between AED 2,000 - AED 20,000.
If you want to learn more, we are here to share our insights into advertising costs of Google Ads in the UAE.
In this guide you will learn:
Let’s dive in.
Google Ads Cost per Month in UAE
“Is running Google Ads in the UAE cheap or expensive?”
This is probably the first answer you are looking for.
Well the cost heavily depends on your industry. But I do have some good news.
We have found that advertising on Google Ads to the UAE can be significantly cheaper than other parts of the world, such as the United States and United Kingdom.
For most industries the market in the UAE is a lot less mature and is less competitive. This can make Google Ads a very lucrative method to grow your business.
And the good thing is you can run google ads yourself or you can hire an expert google ads agency in Dubai to run them for you
How is Ad Spend Calculated?
Google Ads works like an auction. We select a keyword that we would like our advertisement to appear for, and place a bid. How much we bid dictates our placement in the Google Ads search result.
Each keyword has an associated Cost Per Click (CPC). So the cost to run Google Ads is based on the keyword you have selected. There is generally a range to CPCs. The lower you are in the CPC range, the lower your Ad placement will be. The higher you are in the CPC range, the higher your Ad placement will be.
Your ad spend is calculated with the following formula:
Ad Spend Formula: CPC x Clicks
You can also use this formula to estimate your ad spend for a new campaign. Take the average CPC of your keywords and multiply it by your expected amount of clicks.
For example:
Average CPC: AED 3.50
Estimated Clicks per Month: 1,000
Estimated Ad Spend Formula: AED 3.50 x 1,000 = AED 3,500 per Month
This will give you a good estimate of how much you will be looking to spend.
Is Google Ads Profitable for my Business?
The same CPC is not the same for every business.
You need to understand more than just the cost of Google Ads to understand if it is profitable for your business.
A CPC of AED 30 may be considered expensive for a business that makes AED 500 profit from their service. The same CPC would be considered cheap for a business that makes a profit of AED 10,000 from their service.
You need to first understand your own service and how much you are willing to pay for a lead before you consider the cost of Google Ads.
Cost per click in UAE (2024)
Your Cost Per Click is going to be heavily dependent on your industry.
Generally the more competitive or high-ticket your industry is, the higher your cost per click will be.
Here we will break down the CPC of 5 different industries in the UAE.
This data is gathered straight from the source. The “Keyword Planner” on the Google Ads platform. You can access this tool by creating a Google Ads account.
Note: This data is based on historical data between August 2023 - July 2024.
Solar Panel Installation
Below are the keyword results for “Solar Panel Installation” across the UAE.
At first glance we can tell that the CPC is relatively cheap when you consider the cost of solar installation service.
The red square in the image highlights the CPC for different keywords.
Looking at the high-intent and relevant keywords we can see a top of range CPC between AED 2.22 - AED 6.39.
The cost of a solar system for a small villa in Dubai starts from AED 5,000+. Depending on the size of the villa the cost can go much higher!
Even if you have a very low conversion rate you will still have a very profitable campaign.
This a big win for anyone in the solar industry looking how to generate leads with Google Ads in Dubai.
Pest Control
Below are the keyword results for “Pest Control Service” across the UAE.
The average CPC for Pest Control Services in UAE is AED 20.39.
Ouch. If we compare the CPC of “Pest Control Service” to “Solar Panel Installation” we can see a big increase.
But worry not, the CPC is not as bad as it seems.
Pest Control is a high-intent and emergency service. Anyone who is searching for this service has a high chance to convert. So compared to other services we need less clicks to generate a lead.
Think about it. If you had rats or cockroaches in your home, are you going to delay and contemplate? Or are you going to book in a pest control service ASAP?
Exactly, you are going to book in the service ASAP.
Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) Gym
Below are the keyword results for “MMA Gym” across the UAE.
The average CPC for MMA Gym in UAE is AED 4.44.
The CPC here is relatively cheap. The average MMA membership for a month is around AED 600 in Dubai.
Most Martial Arts gyms tend to focus on social media marketing, and rightfully so. People want to see the gym they are going to and how they will train.
But this leaves the competition wide open for Martial Arts gyms on Google Ads in UAE.
Accounting Firm
Below are the keyword results for “Accounting Services in Dubai”.
Accounting firms seem to be highly competitive for Google Ads in UAE. The average CPC at the top of the page bid is AED 28.00.
The CPC may seem very high, but it is important to put this into the context of the service.
If you are in the accounting industry you know that the service has a high customer lifetime value (LTV).
The likelihood of a business changing its accounting firm is very small, especially if they are doing a good job. This is because of the services necessity to a business and it being a hassle to change.
With this in mind, accounting firms and similar industries are willing to pay a lot more to acquire a customer.
Landscaping Contractor
Below are the keyword results for “Landscaping Contractor”.
The average CPC for landscaping services in UAE is AED 11.55.
Looking at Bayut, we can see the cost for a landscaping contractor starts at AED 3,000.
Taking this into account, a CPC of AED 11.55 leaves us with a lot of room to play with.
If you are a landscaping contractor considering advertising on Google Ads, I would take this as a big win!
Factors influencing Ads Costs in UAE
You are probably fed up with the answer “It depends”. As much as it is true, the cost of Google Ads does truly depend on many things.
But there are many factors that have an impact on how much Google Ads will cost.
It is also possible to influence some of these factors to reduce your costs.
Let’s break down the different factors that influence the cost of Google Ads in UAE.
Google Ads auction dynamics
I can’t repeat it enough. Google Ads is an auction. This is important to remember when understanding the costs of Google Ads.
The more businesses bidding for a keyword, the higher the CPC.
Generally the competition is higher for higher-intent keywords. These are keywords with commercial intent, where someone is more likely to make a purchase.
Tip to lower cost: By focusing on keywords with lower competition you can lower your CPCs. Lower competition keywords can be found by looking at nicher search terms and searches higher in the funnel.
Bid strategy
Your bid strategy can have an effect on your CPC.
Manual bidding gives you complete control on how much you spend on your keywords. You can set the CPC yourself all the way from the campaign level to the individual keyword level.
If you do not need to appear at the top of the page result, manual CPC can be a good option to save costs. It will provide you the control to lower your CPC to not compete for the top of page bid.
Automated bidding or Smart bidding strategies provide Google the control to set your bid amount. With these bid strategies you can expect to pay towards the higher end of the CPC range.
Even though the CPC may be on the higher end, you can overall expect to pay less for your conversions. The smart bidding strategies take advantage of Google's data points to push your advertisements to searchers who are more likely to convert.
If you have a bigger budget and your goal is lower cost per conversion instead of cost per click, then Smart bidding strategies are for you.
Quality score
Quality score is a widely misunderstood aspect of Google Ads. Your quality score does not directly affect your CPC or how your Ad is shown.
Even though it does not have any direct effect, it is a good indicator for searcher relevancy.
Your quality score will indicate how relevant and beneficial your Ad is to your audience. There are 3 factors that make up quality score; expected clickthrough rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience.
You can use quality score as a guiding light to improve your Ad. By doing this you can indirectly decrease your CPC.
Relevance of ads
Your Google Ads appear on the Google Search Engine. Google's main priority is to provide the most relevant result for a search.
Knowing this you need to make your Ads as relevant as possible.
The more relevant your Ad the lower your CPC.
Google will be incentivized to show your Ad.
The more irrelevant your Ad the higher your CPC.
Google will punish you and take your money for wasting their searchers time.
Landing page experience
Your landing page can play apart into your CPC.
It is important to remember that Google wants their searches to have the best possible experience.
If your landing page is slow to load, has a high bounce rate or is irrelevant to your keyword this can have a negative impact on your costs.
Other than Google increasing your CPC, you are also just throwing money down the drain. If the searcher has a bad experience on your landing page they are not going to convert.
Tip: Try and get the hero section of your landing page as relevant to your keyword. This can be done by using dynamic text in your headline. Dynamic text takes information from a URL (in our case the keyword) and inserts it into your headline. This can significantly increase your relevancy throughout your campaign.
Competition
This one is pretty obvious. The more competition for a keyword, the higher the CPC.
Fortunately you can use this to our advantage. By using Google’s keyword planner you can identify low competition keywords and try to focus on them. Generally the lower the competition, the lower the CPC.
Target audience location
A couple factors to take into consideration with your audience targeting.
If you offer a service in a certain area or city, it is important to narrow your location setting to reflect this.
Google Ads will automatically default the targeting to your country. This is an easy way to waste budget on areas you do not service.
On the other hand, if your service is not limited to an area it may make sense to focus on cities in the UAE other than Dubai. With Dubai having the most competition, it has the highest CPC out of all the cities.
You can create a separate campaign that focuses on other cities. This takes advantage of the lower CPCs in other cities while ensuring your budget doesn't get spent on Dubai based traffic (higher CPCs).
Industry
Industry plays a large factor into the CPC, probably the most important factor. But unfortunately this is something you cannot control.
If you're in an industry with a high ticket service, an emergency service or have a high customer LTV, then expect to have high CPCs.
Additional Costs to Consider
Your ad budget will be the biggest and most direct cost in your Google Ads campaigns.
But remember, it’s not the only factor that matters.
Depending on your business, goals, and situation, there are other costs to consider when deciding if Google Ads is the right investment for you.
Management fees
Google Ads can be an expensive advertising platform if done incorrectly. If you are not looking to waste your money you may be considering hiring a professional Google Ads agency to run your campaigns.
If so, then you now also need to take the agency fees into consideration.
The cost to hire a Google Ads agency in Dubai can widely range from AED 3,000 to AED 10,000 per month.
Some agencies may charge you a flat fee per month. This is a very transparent method of pricing.
At first it may seem slightly more expensive, but as you scale your campaigns your agency fees stay the same.
Other agencies charge a percentage of ad budget per month. For example, an agency charges 25% of your ad budget. If you decide to spend AED 10,000 on your Google Ads budget per month the agency will charge you AED 2,500 as a fee.
Ad Budget may seem cheaper at first, but as you scale your campaign and grow you will also find your agency fee increasing with you.
Landing page creation
A purpose built landing page for your Google Ads campaign is essential. It can increase your conversion rate by 5x when compared to using your website.
If you are already running a Google Ads campaign and are looking to build a landing page. This will be an additional cost to consider.
Landing page creation in UAE can start from AED 2,000 to upwards of AED 20,000. Fortunately this is a one time investment. Once it is live you will recuperate your costs quickly.
Some agencies provide full lead generation solutions with Google Ads. These solutions tend to include everything needed for a fully optimised campaign. They generally include, landing page creation, crm integration, conversion tracking and a lot more, all in one cost.
If this is something that interests you, check out our complete Google Ads management solution.
Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO)
Creating a landing page is just the tip of the iceberg. From here the doors of conversion rate optimisation and A/B testing open.
Throughout your campaign's life cycle you should be constantly looking to improve the performance. Improving the performance of your Google Ads campaign itself is just half of the fight. We should also be looking to improve our audience's experience on our landing page.
It is important to find a CRO agency that understands the UAE market.
Conversion Rate Optimisation is not cheap. Finding a freelancer or agency in UAE that can do it well is already a difficult task, this is why it has such a high price tag.
Deciding a budget for Google Adwords in Dubai
Much like investing, setting a budget for Google Ads depends on you. How much you're willing to put in will dictate how much you get back.
Before we dive into how to decide your Google Ads budget in Dubai. It is important to understand the following 3 components:
Ad Budget: How much you are willing to invest into Google Ads.
Bid: The maximum amount you are willing to spend per click.
Cost: The actual amount you spent on your Ads.
Ad Budgets
How much you are willing to spend on your Google Ads depends on many factors.
To boil it down you need to ask yourself two main questions. How much are you willing to pay for a lead? And, how much are you willing to pay to acquire a customer?
Once we have the answer to those two, here is a conservative formula to figure out your budget when starting a campaign.
Avg CPC x 20 (clicks) x 30.4 = Monthly Google Ads Budget
Why 20 clicks?
20 (clicks) x 5% (conversion rate) = 1 lead a day / 30 leads a month
This is a good way to be realistic and safe when starting out your campaign. If you find that the monthly Google Ads budget is a lot higher than you are willing to spend, then I would suggest not considering Google Ads.
If your budget is too low, you will be out bid. Google will be forced to either show you lower quality traffic or not enough people. In the end you will not get enough traffic to get a substantial amount of leads.
To calculate your daily ad budget, use the following formulae:
Monthly Budget / 30.4 = Daily Budget
Recommended Ad Budget for Different Business Sizes
Still unsure what your Ad budget should be?
Here are some monthly Google Ads budget recommendations for businesses in the UAE based on their size:
Small Business: AED 5,000 - AED 25,000 per month
Medium Business: AED 25,000 - AED 75,000 per month
Large Business: AED 75,000+ per month
How to optimise Google Ads costs in UAE
There are ways to optimise your Google Ads costs. Some methods help you in reduce your average CPC, others help you bring in more qualified traffic, which lowers your cost of acquisition.
Let’s dive into some of these methods:
Improving ad quality
Google will reward you based on the quality and relevancy of your Ad to the searcher. Throughout your campaigns lifecycle you should be consistently looking to increase your Ad quality.
Here are 3 ways you can improve your ad quality:
1) Optimise Ad Copy
Make sure your Ad copy is hyper-relevant to your keyword. Make sure the headline addresses the needs of the searcher and has a strong CTA.
Let's use the keyword “AC repair near me” as an example. Highlighted in green we have an Ad optimised for this keyword. And in red we have an Ad that is not optimised.
2) A/B test Ad copy
Google allows us to run multiple Ads in the same Ad group. You can use this to your advantage to test variations of your Ad.
Over time you will refine your Ad copy and find out what resonates the most with your target audience.
3) Landing page experience
Improving your landing page experience can both lower your CPCs and lower your cost per lead. A well optimised landing page has a hyper relevant headline, answers the intent of your searcher, has a fast load time, clear call to action and is responsive on mobile.
Optimise ad scheduling
By analysing your campaign insights you will be able to figure out when your ads performed the best. You can then adjust your campaigns Ad Schedule to only run during the best performing times, making the best use of your Ad budget.
Use negative keywords
Decreasing your Google Ads costs is not limited to just lowering your CPCs. It is also important to find out where your money is being wasted.
Negative keywords allow us to cut off traffic from similar search terms with the wrong intent. This prevents our ad from showing to customers that would have never converted to a lead.
For example, we have a phrase match keyword “smart thermostat installation near me”. We are trying to attract searchers who are looking to hire someone to install a smart thermostat. But our keyword also has the potential to trigger the search “DIY install a smart thermostat”. This searcher is not looking to hire a company, instead they are trying to figure out how to do it themselves. They have no intention of hiring your company.
So we would look to add “DIY”, “Cheap” and “Instructions” to our negative keywords.
How to find negative keywords: Analyse search term reports
You are probably wondering, “Where do I find negative keywords?”. Luckily all of the information we need is in the search term report.
The search term report will show you all of the search terms (what people searched) that triggered your ads.
Here you can identify keywords that have the wrong intent and are less likely to convert. Basically any search term that is wasting your budget.
Once you have listed down these keywords you can add them into your campaigns negative keywords.
How much does Google Ads cost in UAE? Key takeaways
Here are the key takeaways from the article on Google Ads costs in the UAE for service businesses:
Cost Variability by Industry: Google Ads costs in the UAE vary significantly by industry, with less competition compared to the US and UK, making it potentially more cost-effective.
Cost Per Click (CPC): CPC is determined by the competitiveness of the keyword in the auction system. The more competitive or high-ticket the industry, the higher the CPC.
Ad Spend Calculation: Ad spend is calculated using the formula: CPC x Clicks. This helps estimate monthly ad expenses.
Industry-Specific CPCs:
Solar Panel Installation: AED 2.22 - AED 6.39
Pest Control: AED 20.39
MMA Gym: AED 4.44
Accounting Services: AED 28.00
Landscaping: AED 11.55
Factors Influencing Costs: Costs are influenced by the Google Ads auction, bid strategy, ad quality, landing page experience, competition, and target audience location.
Additional Costs: Consider agency management fees (AED 3,000 - AED 10,000/month), landing page creation (AED 2,000 - AED 20,000), and conversion rate optimization.
Budget Recommendations:
Small Business: AED 5,000 - AED 25,000/month
Medium Business: AED 25,000 - AED 75,000/month
Large Business: AED 75,000+/month
Cost Optimization Tips: Improve ad quality, optimize ad scheduling, and use negative keywords to reduce wasteful spending.
Optimising Google Ads costs is simple, but not easy!
So, that’s everything you need to know about Google Ads cost in UAE.
You may be thinking, "Okay I understand how the cost of Google Ads works, but how can I use this to benefit my campaign."
Then you can check out our guide here, where we break down how you can get the best ROI from your Google Ads campaign.
But if you are looking for an expert to lower your Google Ads costs, then reach out to us.
At Lead Ember we help service businesses in the UAE consistently generate new leads without extra effort.
We allow you to focus on what you do best while we ensure a steady stream of inquiries to keep your business growing.
Our complete Google Ads management solution solves all your lead generation problems without any extra effort. Reach out to us to find out how we can apply it to your business.