Solved: Ads Not Converting in Liverpool (The Real Reason)

Hi there,

Thanks for reaching out! It's a really common problem to get traffic but no sales in a specific area, so don't feel like you're alone in this. I've had a look at your situation and I'm happy to give you some initial thoughts. Tbh, when we see this, it’s rarely about the location being ‘bad’ for business. It's almost always a disconnect somewhere between the ad, the website, and what the local customer actually wants. We just need to find where the leak is.

Let's get one thing straight: It's almost never the traffic's fault...

When an advertiser tells me they're getting "bad traffic", my first thought is always to look at their website and their offer. Traffic is just people. If the right people are clicking your ad (which we'll get to) but not buying, the problem isn't the people—it's what they experience after they click. You're successfully getting them to the front door, but they're taking one look inside and walking away. We need to figure out why.

Think of it like a physical pipe. Your ad spend pushes water (traffic) into one end. The other end is where the money (sales) comes out. Right now, your pipe has a massive hole in it somewhere. Pouring more water in won't help; it'll just make a bigger puddle on the floor. Our job is to find that hole and patch it.

The typical online sales journey looks something like this:

Your job, before you spend another penny on ads, is to figure out which 'leak' point is the biggest for your Liverpool traffic. Are they bouncing from the landing page instantly? Or are they adding to cart and then abandoning at the shipping page? The answer tells you exactly what to fix.

We'll need to look at who you're actually targeting...

Okay, with that out of the way, let's look at the ads themselves. Even if the website is the main problem, poor targeting can make it worse by sending people who were never going to buy in the first place. You mentioned you're getting traffic, which is good, but is it the *right* traffic?

A common mistake is to simply draw a circle on the map around Liverpool and assume everyone inside it is a potential customer. This is rarely the case. We need to get much more specific. I've audited hundreds of accounts, and most are wasting money on audiences that are far too broad. You need to think about your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), not as a demographic, but as a person with a specific, urgent problem that you solve.

Is the problem your product solves felt more acutely by certain people within Liverpool? For example, if you sell high-end outdoor gear, targeting "people in Liverpool who like 'hiking'" is a start, but it's lazy. A better approach is to target people who follow specific brands like Arc'teryx, who are members of local hiking groups on Facebook, or who have shown interest in related publications. You want to find the signals that separate casual interest from genuine intent.

I remember one campaign we worked on for a women's apparel brand; they were targeting very broad interests. We narrowed it down to focus on people who followed specific boutique designers and shopped at high-end competitors. Their return on ad spend jumped to 691% almost overnight. The audience was smaller, but it was the *right* audience.

Here’s a simple structure you can use to test audiences in Liverpool, moving from broad to specific:

By splitting your audiences like this, you can deliver a much more relevant message. You wouldn't say the same thing to a total stranger (ToFu) as you would to someone who was just on your website an hour ago (BoFu). Your BoFu ads could include a special offer, like "Free delivery to all L postcodes this week only!" to create urgency and local relevance.

I'd say your website is where the real problem likely is...

Right, let's move on to the most likely suspect: your website. Someone from Liverpool clicks your ad because they are interested. They land on your site. And then... nothing. This is the moment of truth. An ad can only make a promise; it's the website's job to deliver on it and close the sale.

Here are the questions I’d be asking if I were auditing your site:

1. Does it look trustworthy? First impressions are everything. A cluttered, slow-loading, or amateur-looking website screams "scam". People are incredibly protective of their payment details online. You need to earn their trust within seconds. This means professional product photography, a clean design, no spelling mistakes, and clear contact information. For Liverpool specifically, do you have any local trust signals? Customer reviews from people in Liverpool? A mention of local delivery options? Even a small thing can make a big difference.
2. Is the offer compelling? Why should they buy from you, right now, instead of from Amazon or a local shop in Liverpool ONE? What problem are you solving for them? This needs to be crystal clear. I often see sites that just list features. Nobody buys features; they buy outcomes. They buy a solution to a pain point. One client we worked with was selling cleaning products, and their sales were just okay. We helped them change their messaging from "Eco-friendly ingredients" to "A sparkling clean home without worrying about harsh chemicals around your kids and pets". Revenue increased by 190%. Same product, different message. It was a message that addressed the customer's real 'nightmare'.
3. Is it easy to use? This sounds obvious, but you'd be amazed how many sites fail here. How many clicks does it take to buy something? Is the "Add to Cart" button obvious? Is the checkout process simple, or does it ask for their life story? Crucially, how does it look and work on a mobile phone? Most ad traffic is mobile. If your site is a pain to use on a small screen, you are throwing money away. Check your analytics—if your mobile bounce rate is sky-high, you've found a major problem.

The difference a small improvement in your website's conversion rate can make is staggering. It's the highest-leverage activity you can focus on. Let's look at the numbers.

You probably should be looking at different numbers...

This brings me to my next point. You need to stop obsessing over traffic and start obsessing over your funnel metrics and what a customer is actually worth to you. If you don't know your numbers, you're flying blind.

The real question isn't "Why am I getting no sales?", but "Where in the journey am I losing people?". You need to have tracking set up for each step:

• Page Views: How many people who click the ad actually see the page?
• Adds to Cart (ATC): Of those who see a product, how many add it to their basket?
• Initiated Checkouts (IC): Of those who add to basket, how many start the checkout process?
• Purchases: Of those who start checkout, how many complete it?

If you see a huge drop-off between ATC and IC, you know your problem is likely on the cart page or with your shipping costs. If the drop-off is between the landing page and seeing a product, your probably sending them to the wrong page or the homepage is confusing.

But the most important number of all is your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV). This tells you how much profit a customer brings you over their entire relationship with your business. Once you know this, you know how much you can afford to spend to acquire them. It completely changes the game from a cost-mindset to an investment-mindset.

Let's calculate a hypothetical LTV for your business. Play around with the sliders below to see how small changes can drastically alter what a customer is worth.

Once you know a customer is worth, say, £1,200 to you, paying £50 or even £100 to acquire them through ads suddenly looks like an incredible bargain, doesn't it? This math is what separates businesses that struggle from ones that scale aggressively.

You'll need a clear, actionable plan...

Okay, that was a lot of theory. Let's turn it into a concrete plan you can implement right away to start getting sales in Liverpool.

Step 1: Pause and Diagnose (1-2 Days)
Stop your current ads immediately. You're just burning cash. Your first job is to become a detective. Go through your analytics (Google Analytics, your ad platform's data, etc.) and find the biggest drop-off point for users from Liverpool. Is it bounce rate? Cart abandonment? Be ruthless and honest with yourself.

Step 2: Fortify Your Website (3-4 Days)
Based on your diagnosis, fix the most obvious problems on your site. This is your highest priority. If you have a high bounce rate, improve your page speed and clarify your headline. If you have high cart abandonment, look at your shipping costs and simplify the checkout process. Add trust signals: customer reviews (ideally from the UK), clear return policies, and professional imagery.

Step 3: Relaunch with a Test Budget (Ongoing)
Don't just turn the old campaign back on. Build a new one based on the tiered audience structure I outlined above. Start with a small budget focused on your most specific, high-intent audiences first (e.g., retargeting past Liverpool website visitors). Create ad copy that speaks directly to them, maybe even mentioning a local angle. As you start to see sales, you can gradually expand your budget and test broader audiences.

I've summarised the main action points for you in the table below. This is the exact process we'd follow.

I know this can seem overwhelming. It's a lot to take in and a lot to implement. The truth is that while the principles are simple, executing them effectively requires experience. An expert eye can often spot the critical issue in minutes that a business owner might miss for months, simply because we've seen the same patterns play out across hundreds of different accounts.

This is where working with a specialist can make a huge difference. We can help you diagnose the problems quickly, implement the solutions based on proven strategies, and manage the ongoing optimisation process to ensure you're not just getting traffic, but profitable growth.

If you'd like to go through this in more detail, we offer a completely free, no-obligation strategy session where we can take a look at your ad account and website together and give you some more tailored advice. It might be the most valuable 20 minutes you spend on your business this month.

Hope this helps!

Regards,

Team @ Lukas Holschuh