What it costs to reach you right now
Before spending, look at what other people pay to reach the person you are: a business owner searching for growth. On Google Ads, the phrases “how to advertise my business”, “how to get more customers” and “how to get more leads for my business” carry click prices from the mid-teens of pounds to over seventy.
Those prices exist because the searcher is about to spend money with someone. It is worth knowing that the industry set up to help you get customers pays between the mid-teens and over seventy pounds a click to find you, and that most of what it sells is more clicks.
1. Make your existing customers do the finding
The cheapest new customer is the one your last customer sends you, and online that runs through Google. Somebody hears your name, types it, and finds either a profile with photos, reviews and a phone number, or nothing. The Google Business Profile is free and it sits above the websites on local searches.
On every Manchester service search we read on 4 September 2026, the map pack showed three businesses with 20 to 70 reviews each. A steady habit of one review request per finished job, with the direct link, puts a small business in that pack within months. The reviews guide sets out the method and the rules.
2. Convert the visitors you already have
Most small business websites get visitors and lose them. Before paying for more, check three things on a phone: can a stranger tell what you do and where in one screen; is there a price or a starting price; and is the thing you want them to do the most obvious element on the page, with the phone number in reach.
A van leasing broker whose site we rebuilt reports enquiry-form conversion moving from roughly 1% to roughly 4% — the same traffic, four times the enquiries. That figure is the client’s own rather than ours, and it is labelled that way wherever it appears, but the shape of it is what conversion work does: it multiplies everything else on this list.
3. Rank for what people type when they need you
Not for your industry’s head term; for the specific searches. “Block paving Bolton”, “halal pick and mix”, “used van leasing”. Each needs its own page, titled in the customer’s words, answering the question in the first paragraph. The DIY SEO guide covers the method.
The Beds.ie store went from 672 organic clicks a month to 7,781 in five months by making 17,000 products reachable and describing them the way people search, read from Search Console. No advertising in that number. It is the largest example we have, and the same mechanism works for a five-page site at a smaller scale.
4. Answer the questions people ask before they buy
Every trade has a set of questions customers ask before choosing: how much, how long, what if, which one. Those questions are searched every month, the results are usually thin, and the business that answers plainly gets the enquiry when the searcher is ready. It also earns the citation when an AI answer summarises the topic, which on 8 of 14 UK results we checked it now does.
One page a fortnight, written from a real job, is enough. Publish the price, the timescale and the thing that usually goes wrong. Competitors will not, because it feels like giving something away. It is the opposite.
5. Get mentioned by other real websites
- Suppliers and manufacturers: “approved installer” and “find a stockist” pages.
- Trade bodies, chambers and local business groups: member directories.
- Local press: openings, anniversaries, charity work, a genuinely interesting job.
- Clients: a footer credit or an “as featured” mention on sites you have worked with.
- Directories that actually appear in the results for your search, and none that do not.
Each of these is a reason for Google to trust the pages from steps three and four, and each brings a trickle of direct visitors who are already warm. Buying links or joining schemes does the opposite and breaks Google’s spam policies.
6. Then, adverts
Adverts are not bad. They are the only thing on this list that works in days, and once the site converts they are a sensible way to add volume you control. The problems are the order people do them in and the way they are charged for.
| Cost | Time to first customer | Keeps working when you stop paying? | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Profile and reviews | Free | Weeks | Yes |
| Convert the site | A few hours of changes | Immediate on existing traffic | Yes |
| Rank for specific searches | Your time, or a block of hours | 2–6 months | Yes |
| Answer buyer questions | One page a fortnight | 2–4 months | Yes |
| Mentions from real sites | Asking | 3–6 months | Yes |
| Adverts | Your budget; management should be a flat fee, never a percentage | Days | No |
Source: Cybrial’s working order with clients; time ranges are what we have observed on live sites and are not guarantees. Management pricing: Cybrial growth blocks from £250 a month, never a percentage of ad spend.
If you do buy adverts, refuse any management fee set as a percentage of your spend. It pays the agency more for spending more. A flat block of hours pays them for making it work.
