“Should I run Facebook and Google ads everywhere, or just in the suburbs close to home?” Builders ask this question all the time.
And often, the answer gets framed as a simple choice:
Go wide and waste your budget. Or go narrow and stay in control.
That sounds logical.
It’s the tension between casting too wide and too narrow, and learning how to Avoid Drowning in Leads while still generating enough of them to grow.
So, what’s the actual best way to run your ads? Wide targets, or narrow targets?
The Challenge With Going Wide
When you give your Facebook or Google ads a massive radius, you’ll certainly get plenty of views.
But 100,000 views isn’t 100,000 leads.
It isn’t even 100,000 clicks.
Let’s say that (after they click on your ad and follow your call to action) just 50 people actually end up as “leads” in your CRM.
Of those…
→ How many are reasonably close to you?
→ How many match your building style?
→ How many have the right budget?
→ How many are ready to build now?
If your CRM is filling up with low-quality leads, your ad campaign isn’t healthy. It’s just busy. The result of your “go-wide strategy” isn’t growth. It’s noise.
So, if going wide isn’t the answer, what about going narrow?
Narrow Targeting Has Setbacks, Too
Narrow ad targeting usually feels safer.
Instead of “spraying and praying” with your marketing budget, you’re focusing on a specific area, a specific suburb, a specific postcode. Usually, that’s somewhere close to home.
(Of course, it isn’t just about geographical location. You can tighten your ad campaigns in other ways, too – narrowing, for example, by age group, income level, past website visits, or the exact searches people are making.)
But here’s the real question:
In your target suburb, how many people are actually planning to build or renovate at any given time?
Enough to keep you in business? Enough to grow?
More than that, when you run a suburb-specific ad campaign and you don’t get the results you expected, it becomes very hard to diagnose the problem.
→ Was it the suburb?
→ Unfortunate timing?
→ Or was it the ad itself?
Your sample size is too small to tell. You have nothing to compare your results to. No measuring stick.
For now, all you have is guesswork.
So, if going narrow isn’t the answer either, what is?
The “Cast and Cull” Strategy to Avoid Drowning in Leads
Truth is, it isn’t about choosing between wide and narrow.
It’s about using both – in the right order.
When we launch a Facebook or Google ad campaign for a builder, we’ll often start with a 50-kilometre radius from where they’re based. Not because 50 kilometres is some magic number, but because we’re trying to see who bites.
We might run 5, 10, 15 different ads, too. Different copy. Different images. Different CTAs.
Then it’s about looking at that giant pool and trying to figure out:
→ Who’s clicking
→ Where they’re clicking
→ And why they’re clicking
This step is all about gathering data. Creating a point of reference. Creating your measuring stick.
Then, if it’s clear that a certain suburb just isn’t converting, we’ll get rid of it. We’ll stop spending money there.
On the other hand, if a particular suburb is performing well – if the “cost per click” is low and the leads are high-quality – we’ll obviously increase the ad spend there. (You don’t argue with momentum. You ride it.)
Or, if a particular suburb’s getting plenty of leads, but not high-quality ones, that’s when we’d adjust the ad itself or the customer journey. Maybe we’d change the copy or the image. Or maybe we’d add an extra layer of qualification, like a questionnaire or a 15-minute call.
Either way, this step is all about refining, refining, refining. Because that’s what good marketing is. You test, gather data, test again. You keep doing this until you know exactly what to advertise and exactly where to advertise it – until you’re getting big returns for every dollar you spend.
So, yes…
A “Go-Narrow” Strategy Is Eventually the Goal
But only when we’re confident we’re zooming in on the right target.
It was never wide versus narrow.
It was always wide, then narrow.
We’re casting a wide net, then culling the catch.
That’s how you Avoid Drowning in Leads, especially low-quality ones, or starving your business while you wait for someone in your ideal suburb to decide to build.
And look, as you’re going on that journey from wide to narrow – from guessing to knowing – if you’re landing great gigs along the way because the rest of your ad targeting is tight, is that really so bad?
Nobody’s going to say no thanks to a million-dollar job an hour’s drive away because they’ve got a $100k job across the street.
Of course, your ad targeting strategy is just one thing you need to nail if you want to get a steady stream of high-quality leads – which is why we’ve put this guide together:
The Secret To Getting Clients Who Come Pre-Sold
Inside, you’ll find:
- The new rules of builder lead generation (and why ignoring this will keep you stuck with price-shoppers and tyre-kickers)
- The surprising 30-piece content rule that can 8x your conversion rate for custom builds and major renos
- The 3 tiers of leads (and why most builders waste their budget targeting the wrong two)
- How to stop chasing clients and start educating serious, design-ready buyers who value your process
- The Proven Marketing Eco-System Blueprint that turns cold strangers into pre-sold, high-trust clients who show up saying, “We’ve already decided we want to build with you.”
Download it, take your time flicking through, and if you’d like some help putting it into action, we’ll be here.
Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn for builder-focused marketing insights.
