A radius is a circle, and service areas are not circular. Targeting by municipality or postal area matches reality better. The setting that matters most is whether you are reaching people physically in the area or people merely interested in it, which by default is frequently the latter.

The setting that wastes the most money

Platforms distinguish between people physically present in a location and people who have shown interest in it, and the default has historically included both.

For most advertisers that default is wrong. A plumber in Langley does not want clicks from somebody in Toronto researching Langley, and yet that is what the interest setting delivers.

Changing it to presence only, meaning people actually in the area, is a single setting and it is frequently the largest single improvement available on a local campaign.

Worth checking rather than assuming, since defaults change and an account set up by someone else may never have had it looked at.

Why the radius is the wrong shape

A radius draws a circle. Service areas are not circles.

A twenty kilometre circle around a business in the Fraser Valley includes water, farmland, mountain, and municipalities separated by a bridge that adds forty minutes at the wrong time of day. It also excludes places thirty kilometres away along a highway that are genuinely twenty minutes.

Travel time is what actually constrains a service business, and it correlates poorly with distance. A radius is a proxy for travel time and a bad one wherever geography or traffic is uneven, which describes most places.

What to target instead

Named municipalities and neighbourhoods

The most accurate approach for most service businesses. You select the places you actually serve, and the list matches how you would answer the question if a customer asked.

It also lets you include somewhere distant that is easy to reach and exclude somewhere close that is difficult.

Postal areas

More granular where a municipality is too broad, particularly in a large city where you serve part of it.

A radius, but as a starting point

Reasonable for a first setup or where the area is genuinely uniform, and worth refining once the data shows where the work is coming from.

Exclusions matter as much as inclusions

Frequently overlooked and immediately useful.

Somewhere you will not travel to, an area where the work is consistently poor value, a place where you cannot compete on response time, or a municipality with requirements you do not hold. Excluding these stops paying for clicks you would decline.

Exclusions also handle the overlap problem. Where a broad targeted area contains a pocket you do not serve, excluding the pocket is cleaner than redrawing everything.

Reading where the work comes from

Platforms report performance by location, which is the data that should drive this and is rarely looked at.

Two things to look for. Areas producing clicks and no enquiries, which are candidates for exclusion. And areas producing enquiries at a better rate than average, which are candidates for a higher bid or their own campaign with a page naming that place.

That second one is where the useful finding usually is. Most service businesses discover that a small number of areas produce most of the good work, and concentrating the budget there is a straightforward gain.

Bid adjustments by area

The nuanced version, once there is enough data.

Rather than including or excluding, bidding more in areas that convert well and less in areas that convert poorly keeps the coverage while shifting the spend. That suits a business that will travel anywhere but prefers not to.

It needs enough data per area to mean anything, which on a small budget can take months. Until then, the blunt include-and-exclude approach is more reliable than adjustments made on four conversions.

The mismatch to fix first

Whatever areas you target, the landing page has to match them.

An advertisement targeted at three municipalities pointing at a page naming only one loses the visitors from the other two, who arrive and see somewhere else named. That is a conversion problem created by the targeting rather than by the page.

The options are a page naming all the areas served, or separate campaigns each pointing at their own area page. The second performs better and takes more setup, which is a reasonable trade once one area proves worthwhile.

The order to do this in

The first two take ten minutes and address most of the waste. The rest depends on data you have to accumulate first, which is the same sequencing as restricting hours in ad scheduling and not paying for clicks at 3am.

Frequently asked questions

What is the biggest geographic targeting mistake?

Leaving the setting that includes people merely interested in an area rather than physically present in it. That delivers clicks from other provinces researching your town.

Why is a radius the wrong shape?

Service areas are not circles. A radius includes water, farmland, and places separated by a bridge, while excluding somewhere further away that is twenty minutes along a highway.

What should I target instead?

Named municipalities and neighbourhoods matching how you would answer if a customer asked where you work, or postal areas where a municipality is too broad.

Do exclusions matter?

As much as inclusions. Excluding somewhere you will not travel to, or a pocket inside a broader area you do serve, stops paying for clicks you would decline.

How do I know which areas are working?

Platforms report performance by location. Look for areas producing clicks and no enquiries, and areas converting better than average, which deserve their own campaign and page.

Does the landing page need to match?

Yes. An advertisement targeting three municipalities pointing at a page naming only one loses visitors from the other two, which is a conversion problem created by the targeting.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

Ads set to a radius somebody drew years ago?

We replace it with the areas you actually serve, add the exclusions, and check the setting that sends your budget out of province.

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