Google Ads Cost Calculator for Ottawa Businesses

How it works

How the calculator works

Google Ads is an auction. You pay only when someone clicks, and the price of a click depends on how many competitors want the same customer and how much that customer is worth. That is why a click for a personal injury lawyer costs many times more than a click for a facial — and why any honest calculator has to start with your industry, not a single “average” price.

The calculator uses three inputs:

1. Your industry. This loads a cost-per-click range and a click-to-lead conversion range drawn from published benchmark studies (sources at the bottom of this page). WordStream by LocaliQ’s 2026 benchmarks — medians from more than 13,000 search campaigns — put dentists at US$8.00 per click, home and home improvement at US$8.33, and attorneys at US$9.87, the most expensive of the group. Canadian ranges published by Digilite run $4–$18 per click for dental and $6–$25 for home services. Your industry’s slider range spans those published figures, converted and rounded for planning in Canadian dollars.
2. Your monthly budget. A realistic starting budget for a local service business in a mid-sized Canadian city is $1,500 to $3,000 per month in ad spend (Webloped, 2026). The slider starts there and runs from $500 to $20,000.
3. Your cost per click. Pre-set inside your industry’s range. Drag it up if you compete for top-of-page positions on expensive keywords; down for narrower, treatment- or trade-specific terms.

Your conversion rate — the share of clicks that become a call or form submission — is shown as a range from the same benchmark data (dental converts unusually well, at about 10.7% of clicks; legal at about 5.6%). Results show leads at the low end, the benchmark figure, and the high end — a range, not a fantasy point estimate.

Prefer to have the numbers run for you? See how our Google Ads management in Ottawa service works.

Benchmarks

Published benchmarks behind this calculator

All figures are planning ranges in CAD, built from the sources at the bottom of this page. Anchors: WordStream by LocaliQ’s 2026 Google Ads benchmarks (medians from 13,474 US search campaigns, April 2025–March 2026, USD) and Digilite’s 2026 Canadian CPC ranges (CAD). Where they disagree, the calculator’s range spans both. Canadian CPCs often run somewhat lower than US averages (Little Dragon Media, 2026).

Canadian cross-checks (Digilite 2026, CAD): dental $4–$18/click; home services $6–$25; legal $8–$45+. Webloped’s 2026 Canadian guide quotes higher top-of-page ranges (healthcare/dental $15–$65; legal $45–$175 competitive markets) — competitive keywords can exceed the slider’s top end, especially legal.

The formula

The formula, in plain language

Clicks per month = monthly budget ÷ cost per click

Leads per month = clicks per month × conversion rate

Cost per lead = cost per click ÷ conversion rate (equivalently, budget ÷ leads)

What it means

What your numbers mean

Cost per lead is the number that matters — not cost per click. An $16 click that converts at 11% produces a cheaper lead than a $6 click that converts at 3%. When you compare industries in this calculator, compare the cost-per-lead column.

Compare cost per lead to what a customer is worth. A dental lead that costs $100 is expensive for a cleaning special and cheap for an implant case. If you know your average case value and your close rate, you can work backwards to the most you can afford to pay per lead — and then judge any quote against it. (Our new-patient value calculator helps with exactly that math for dental and med spa practices.)

A range is the honest answer. Any tool or agency that gives you one exact number for “what Google Ads will cost” is guessing in a way that flatters them. Your real costs depend on your keywords, your service area within Ottawa, your ad quality, and your landing page. Use this calculator to set a sensible budget and spot unreasonable quotes — then judge a live campaign on its own tracked data after 60 to 90 days.

Budget too small is its own problem. At $500 a month in a $16-click industry, you buy about 30 clicks — too little data to improve anything. If the estimate shows under 8–10 leads a month, raise the budget, narrow the geography (one or two Ottawa neighbourhoods, not the whole city), or put the money into SEO in Ottawa first.

Assumptions

Assumptions and honesty notes

• Results are estimates for planning, not guarantees — of clicks, leads, cost, or revenue. Ivory Circuit does not promise any business a specific result from advertising.
• Benchmark figures are medians from mostly US campaigns, published in US dollars by WordStream by LocaliQ (2026), cross-checked against Canadian ranges published by Digilite (2026). Your Ottawa auction will differ — Kanata is not downtown Toronto, and a Tuesday in February is not a Monday in September.
• Some keywords cost far more than this calculator’s ranges — personal injury and other high-value legal keywords in competitive Canadian markets are quoted at $45 to $175 per click (Webloped, 2026). If your practice area is one of those, treat the legal range here as a floor, not a ceiling.
• “Lead” means a tracked call or form submission, following the benchmark studies’ definitions. A lead is not a booked appointment, and a booked appointment is not revenue. Your front desk is part of this math whether we say so or not.
• Nothing you enter is stored or transmitted. The calculation runs in your browser.

This is an estimate, not a guarantee.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

How much do Google Ads cost in Ottawa?

For a local service business, plan on a starting ad budget of $1,500 to $3,000 per month, at roughly $5 to $25 per click depending on industry — dental clicks run about $5–$20, home services $6–$25, and legal $10–$50 or more in Canadian planning data. What matters is the resulting cost per lead, which published 2026 benchmarks put between roughly $40 and $130 (US) depending on industry.

Why is legal so much more expensive than other industries?

Because one client is worth so much. WordStream’s 2026 benchmarks show attorneys paying the highest median cost per click (US$9.87) and the highest cost per lead (US$131.63) of any industry — advertisers can only sustain those prices because a single retained case covers months of ad spend. High-intent legal keywords in competitive Canadian markets can cost far more than the median.

What conversion rate should I expect from Google Ads?

The 2026 WordStream medians are 10.67% of clicks for dental, 10.35% for beauty and personal care (the closest published proxy for med spas), 8.05% for home and home improvement, and 5.55% for legal. Your landing page and offer move this number more than your bids do — a page that matches the ad and loads fast converts better at the same click price.

Is a $500 monthly budget enough?

Usually not for competitive local services. At typical Ottawa click prices it buys 25–60 clicks and a small number of leads, which is too little data to optimise with. It can work for a narrow, low-competition niche or a single neighbourhood; otherwise, save until you can spend $1,500+ per month for at least a quarter, or invest the $500 in your Google Business Profile and SEO instead.

Does Ivory Circuit manage Google Ads in Ottawa?

Yes — Google Ads management is one of our core services, and every engagement starts with a free Growth Audit so the budget is set from your numbers, not a package. Call (613) 366-4549, Monday to Friday, 9–5 EST, or request an audit through our contact page.

Sources

Sources

• WordStream by LocaliQ, Google Ads Benchmarks 2026 (medians, 13,474 US search campaigns, April 2025–March 2026; as reported by Little Dragon Media’s 2026 Canadian Google Ads pricing guide and AdBenchly’s 2026 benchmark table): Dentists & Dental Services — $8.00 CPC, 10.67% conversion rate, $72.97 cost per lead. Home & Home Improvement — $8.33 CPC, 8.05%, $90.92. Attorneys & Legal Services — $9.87 CPC, 5.55%, $131.63. Beauty & Personal Care — $4.62 CPC, 10.35%, $39.25. Physicians & Surgeons — $4.76 CPC, 12.43%, $40.04. All-industry median — $5.42 CPC, 8.18%, $66.69. All figures US dollars. WordStream publishes no med spa category; Beauty & Personal Care and Physicians & Surgeons are the closest proxies (proxy approach also used by RedFork Marketing’s 2026 med spa PPC guide).
• Digilite, “Google Ads Costs in Canada [2026 Explained]”: Canadian CPC ranges in CAD — dental $4–$18, home services (HVAC, plumbing, contractors) $6–$25, legal services $8–$45+.
• Webloped, “How much does Google Ads cost in Canada in 2026?”: CAD ranges by industry including healthcare/dental $15–$65 and legal $45–$175 for competitive, high-intent keywords; realistic starting budget of $1,500–$3,000/month for local service businesses in mid-sized Canadian cities.
• Little Dragon Media, “Canada’s 2026 Google Ads Pricing & Costs Guide”: Canadian CPCs often run somewhat lower than US averages for the same industry; Ahrefs data cited there puts most core Canadian dental keywords at about US$2–$7 per click.
• Pronk Med Spa Marketing (2026), citing Web Tonic and Pennock (2025–2026): med spa Google Ads keywords overall about US$5–$15 per click, with “med spa near me” in competitive markets at US$25–$45 — context for the top of the med spa slider range.

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