Wollongong paid advertising that earns its spend.

It's not just boosting a post and hoping for the best.

Paid advertising is a marketing tactic where you pay to place your message in front of a specific audience. Ads can show up in search results (Google Ads), social media feeds (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn) or as display banners on websites you visit.

Learn more about how paid advertising works.

Depends on what you're selling and who you're selling to.

• Google Ads: best for people actively searching (plumbing services, B2B software, "near me" searches).
• Facebook and Instagram: great for B2C brands with visual or impulse-friendly products.
• LinkedIn Ads: B2B heaven. Ideal for services, SaaS or anything targeting decision-makers.
• TikTok: killer for younger audiences and trend-driven products.
• Pinterest: great for products in home decor, fashion or events like weddings.

Wrong platform equals wasted spend. The right one becomes a revenue machine. Read the platform breakdown.

Paid search (Google Ads) shows ads to people actively searching for something: emergency plumber, buy running shoes online, best CRM software. High intent, fast results.

Paid social (Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn) shows ads while people are scrolling. It's interruption-based, so it grabs attention rather than answering a question. Great for building awareness, retargeting and storytelling.

Paid search catches demand. Paid social creates it. Read the full comparison.

Retargeting shows ads to people who've already interacted with your brand. Visited your site, added to cart, watched 50% of a video.

It's powerful because these people already know you. They just need a nudge. Retargeting closes the sale you almost made. Read the retargeting guide.

Paid ads are your demand accelerator. They drive traffic to SEO pages while organic builds, test offers fast before a full launch, support retargeting to lift conversions and amplify content.

They're not a standalone strategy. They plug into everything else you're doing. Read the full breakdown.

Yes, if done right. It's one of the fastest ways to grow visibility and drive sales.

Start small, test early, measure what matters and scale what works. The right strategy will make your money work harder than any other channel. Read the small business guide.

As soon as you can fund a proper test. Organic channels like SEO can take months to move, and while you wait, competitors running ads pick up the customers you should have had. A solid test point is $2,000 a month, or at least $1,000 to collect meaningful data. Here's why waiting to run paid ads is costing you.

Spoiler: it depends. Platform, competition, targeting and even your industry can wildly shift the cost. You'll need to wrap your head around CPC, CPM and what agencies might charge to manage your campaigns.

• CPC (cost per click): $0.50 to $50 depending on your niche.
• CPM (cost per 1,000 impressions): often lower ($5 to $20) but best for awareness campaigns.
• Monthly budgets: small businesses often start at $1,000 to $3,000 a month for decent testing and scaling. Enterprise clients test $20K+.
• Agency fees: a flat monthly fee or a percentage of ad spend, usually 10 to 20%.

The bottom line is return, not raw spend. A well-optimised $2K budget can outperform a messy $10K one. Read the full cost breakdown.

It depends on the platform and your offer. A general guide:

• Google Ads: results can start within days, especially for high-intent keywords. Expect 2 to 4 weeks for optimisation.
• Meta (Facebook and Instagram): 1 to 2 weeks for the algorithm to learn. Best results often show after 30 days.
• TikTok and Pinterest: slightly longer ramp-up but can explode with the right creative. Give it 2 to 6 weeks.

Results also depend on your budget, audience size and whether your offer is hot or meh. Read the full timing guide.

You can DIY it, and lots of people start that way. There's a learning curve, and mistakes cost money.

Pros of managing yourself: cheaper (no agency fees), full control and oversight.

Cons: steep learning curve, platforms change every 5 minutes, and you may not know what's not working.

Agencies bring expertise, testing frameworks, access to tools and actual strategy. Make sure they're data-led, not fluff merchants. Read the full comparison.

Start with your revenue goals. Then reverse-engineer:

1. Know your target CPA or ROAS.
2. Estimate how much traffic you need to hit your sales goals.
3. Multiply by your average CPC.

Also factor in your industry competitiveness, your customer LTV and whether you're in a testing phase or scaling phase. Your ad budget should grow as your results do. Read the budgeting guide.

You'll want to track both vanity metrics and revenue metrics. Here's what matters:

• CTR (click-through rate): tells you if your ad is getting attention.
• CPC (cost per click): lower is better, but not at the cost of quality.
• CPA (cost per acquisition): how much you're paying for a sale or lead.
• ROAS (return on ad spend): revenue divided by ad spend. The ultimate health check.
• MER (marketing efficiency ratio): total revenue divided by total marketing spend. Good for the big picture.

Use Google Ads conversion tracking, Meta Ads Manager and Looker Studio for dashboards. Read the measurement guide.

Good agencies don't ghost you after launch. Expect weekly or monthly reports, clear insights on what's working, dashboards (Looker Studio, Google Ads scripts) and strategic recommendations, not just data dumps.

If all you're getting is a spreadsheet and silence, run. Read the reporting guide.

Clicks without conversions equal wasted budget. Common culprits: wrong audience targeting, an unclear or weak landing page, slow website load time and a messaging disconnect between ad and page.

Fix your funnel, not just your ads. Read the conversion guide.

MER stands for Marketing Efficiency Ratio. It's your total revenue divided by total ad spend, and it includes all marketing spend, not just one channel.

While ROAS tells you if a single campaign is profitable, MER gives you the bigger picture. Read the MER guide.

It sends your conversions to the ad platform from your own server instead of the visitor's browser. Ad blockers, iPhone tracking prompts and declined cookie banners can't stop it, so fewer real sales go unreported. It can also send back what happens after the form, like the booked call and the sale, so the platform learns what a real customer looks like. Here's how server-side tracking teaches Meta to find real customers.

It's the art of running experiments to improve performance. Test one element at a time: headline A vs headline B, creative A vs creative B. See what gets more clicks, conversions or engagement.

Without A/B testing, you're guessing. With it, you're optimising. Read the A/B testing guide.

• Top of funnel: eye-catching, entertaining, high-value content. Hooks, humour, TikTok-style.
• Middle of funnel: trust builders. Reviews, case studies, behind-the-scenes.
• Bottom of funnel: direct offers, urgency, clear CTAs.

Match your message to your buyer's mindset. Don't pitch a sale to someone who's just met you. Read the creative guide.

One that stops the scroll in the first second. The hook is the first frame, line or second of your ad, and it decides whether anyone sees the offer at all. Write it to one specific person, match it to the platform's pace and test hooks against the same creative on watch time and click-through. Here are the hook formulas and formats that still pull.