Hi there,
Thanks for reaching out! I'm happy to give you some initial thoughts and guidance on getting started with Google Ads for your astrology business. It's a journey for sure, and can be a bit of a minefield if you're new to it, but getting it right can really make a difference. Based on my experience running campaigns for lots of different service businesses, I've pulled together some advice that should help you get on the right track.
There's a fair bit to get through, so I've broken it down into a few sections. It's a lot to take in, but hopefully it gives you a clear picture of what's involved and what you should be focusing on first.
We'll need to look at your website first...
Before you even think about spending a single pound on ads, we have to talk about your website. This is honestly the most common mistake I see people make. They spend a load of money on ads, get lots of clicks, but then wonder why nobody is getting in touch. More often than not, the website is the problem.
Think of your website as your digital shop front. If someone walks in but it's messy, they can't find the till, and it doesn't feel safe, they're just going to walk straight back out. Your website is no different. If you drive traffic to a site that isn't ready, you're essentially just pouring your budget down the drain. From my experience, a poor website will lead to very low conversion rates, which means a really high cost to get a new client, if you get any at all.
So, what makes a good website for a service like yours?
A Clear Goal
First things first, what do you actually want someone to do when they land on your site? Do you want them to book a reading? Fill out a contact form for a custom chart? Schedule a discovery call? You need to decide on the single most important action and build your main page around that. This is your 'call to action' (CTA). Everything on the page, from the words you use to the images, should be guiding the visitor towards taking that one step. Don't give them ten different options, it just causes confusion. Make it super obvious what they should do next.
Building Trust
For a personal service like astrology, trust is everything. Someone is coming to you for guidance, they need to feel comfortable and confident in your abilities. Your website has to reflect that. A professional, clean design is a must. But it's more than that. Here's a few things that can help build that trust:
-> Testimonials and Reviews: This is probably the most powerful tool you have. Real words from real, happy clients are worth their weight in gold. If you have them, put your best ones front and centre.
-> About You: People are buying from you, not a faceless company. Have a good 'About Me' page with a friendly, professional photo. Talk about your journey into astrology, your philosophy, what makes you different. Let your personality shine through, it helps people connect.
-> Clear Contact Info: Make it easy for people to see you're a real person. An email address, maybe a business phone number, and links to any professional social media profiles all help.
-> Professional Copywriting: The words on your site (the 'copy') are your salesperson. Clunky, unprofessional writing with spelling mistakes can instantly destroy trust. It needs to be persuasive, clear, and speak directly to the problems and desires of your ideal client. For instance, instead of just saying "I do birth chart readings", you could say something like "Uncover your unique life path and understand your true potential with a personalised birth chart analysis." It sounds a lot more appealing, doesn't it? Getting a professional to help with this can make a huge difference. It's an investment that pays for itself many times over.
I remember working with a client in the wellness space. Their website was getting traffic, but they weren't getting any bookings. We rewrote their homepage copy to be more persuasive and added a bunch of testimonials they'd been hiding. Just from those two changes, their booking rate doubled almost overnight. It really is that important.
Finally, your site needs to be fast. If a page takes more than a few seconds to load, people will just leave. You can use free tools online to check your site speed. It's a small technical thing, but it has a massive impact on wether visitors stick around or not.
I'd say you should start with Google Ads...
You're right to be looking at Google Ads. For service-based businesses, especially niche ones like astrology, it's almost always the best place to start. Why? Because you're reaching people at the exact moment they are looking for help. They are literally typing "astrologer near me" or "how to get a birth chart reading" into Google. They have a problem, and you have the solution. This is called 'intent-based' marketing, and it's incredibly powerful.
This is much more effective than social media ads (like Facebook or Instagram) for a service like yours, at least to begin with. On social media, you're interrupting someone while they're looking at pictures of their friends' holidays. They're not in the mindset to buy. With Google Search ads, you're answering a direct need. So, your conversion rates will almost always be higher.
Getting a Google Ads campaign right involves a few key parts:
Keywords are Everything
The foundation of a good search campaign is choosing the right keywords. These are the phrases people type into Google that will trigger your ad to show. You need to get inside the head of your ideal client. What would they search for?
You can group them into themes. For example:
-> General Readings: "astrology reading", "online astrologer", "book an astrologer"
-> Specific Services: "birth chart analysis", "natal chart reading", "relationship astrology", "synastry chart"
-> Local Searches: "astrologer in [Your City]", "astrology services near me"
You'd want to do some proper research to build out a full list. It's also important to think about 'negative keywords' – terms you don't want to show up for. For example, you'd probably want to add "free", "DIY", and "learn astrology" as negatives, because those people aren't looking to pay for a reading.
Here's a small sample of what your keyword list might start to look like:
| Keyword Theme | Example Keywords | Searcher's Intent |
|---|---|---|
| Birth Chart Services | "buy birth chart reading" "natal chart analysis" "professional birth chart interpretation" |
Looking for a specific, detailed reading about themselves. High intent to purchase. |
| Relationship Astrology | "love compatibility reading" "synastry chart for couples" "relationship astrologer" |
Looking for insight into their romantic life. Often an urgent or emotional need. |
| General/Local Queries | "best astrologer online" "astrologer london" "book astrology consultation" |
Looking for a trusted expert. Might be comparing options. |
Compelling Ad Copy
Once you have your keywords, you need to write the ads themselves. Your ad needs to grab their attention, show you can solve their problem, and convince them to click. A good ad should always:
-> Match the keyword they searched for. If they searched for "birth chart reading", your ad headline should say something about "Birth Chart Readings".
-> Highlight what makes you unique. "Expert astrologer with 15 years experience" or "Personalised, in-depth readings".
-> Have a clear call to action. "Book Your Reading Today" or "Get Your Personalised Chart".
Let's imagine someone searches for "relationship astrology reading". Here’s how a good ad could look:
| Example Google Ad | |
|---|---|
| Headline 1 | Relationship Astrology Readings |
| Headline 2 | Understand Your Connection |
| Headline 3 | Book a Private Session Today |
| Description | Gain deep insight into your relationship dynamics with a professional synastry chart reading. Uncover strengths & challenges. Book your confidential reading online now. |
You mentioned being up to date with AI changes. That's a good point. Google is pushing a lot of automation, like Performance Max (PMax) campaigns. For a very small business with a limited budget, I'd honestly reccomend starting with a standard Search campaign. It gives you much more control over your keywords and spending. Once the campaign is performing well and has lots of data, you could test out some of the AI features, but I wouldn't start there. You need to walk before you can run.
You'll need a realistic budget and clear expectations...
This is the big one, especially when you're just starting out. You said your budget is small, which is completely fine, but it's important to be realistic about what that can achieve and how you should think about costs. It's not just about the ad spend; it's about the Cost Per Lead (CPL) or Cost Per Acquisition (CPA).
In simple terms, how much does it cost you in ad spend to get one new, paying client?
The cost per lead can vary massively depending on how competitive your market is. Just to give you some real-world perspective from campaigns we've managed: we're currently running a campaign for an HVAC company in a competitive area, and they're seeing costs of around $60 per lead. I also remember running ads for childcare services where we saw a CPL of around $10 per signup. And one of our best consumer services campaigns was for a home cleaning company, where we achieved a cost of just £5 per lead. My guess is that astrology would fall somewhere in the middle. You could be looking at anything from £10 to £50 per lead (a 'lead' being someone who fills out your form or calls you).
I usually recommend a starting ad spend of at least £500-£1000 per month. Why? Because you need to spend enough to get enough data. If you only spend £10 a day, you might only get a handful of clicks and it could take weeks to know if something is working or not. A higher budget lets you test things faster, learn what works, and start optimising for better results much sooner.
Let's do some simple maths to show how this works. This is a crucial exercise for any business running ads.
| Example Budget Calculation | |
|---|---|
| Monthly Ad Spend | £1,000 |
| Estimated Cost Per Lead (CPL) | £25 (this is a guess, it would need to be tested) |
| Expected Number of Leads (Budget / CPL) |
40 leads per month |
| Your Closing Rate (as an example) (The % of leads you turn into paying clients) |
25% (i.e., you convert 1 in 4 leads) |
| New Clients from Ads (Leads x Closing Rate) |
10 new clients |
| Cost Per New Client (CPA) (Budget / New Clients) |
£100 |
So in this example, it costs you £100 in ad spend to get a new client. The big question is then: is the average value of a client more than £100? If a reading is £150, you're profitable. If you also get repeat business from that client, it's even more profitable. This is the kind of calculation you need to do. It's not about just getting cheap clicks; it's about getting profitable customers.
It's also really important to understand that you likely won't see amazing results from day one. The first month is all about gathering data, learning what keywords convert, which ads work best, and finding your true Cost Per Lead. The real sucess comes from the ongoing optimisation after that initial learning phase.
You probably should think about measuring success...
You can't manage what you don't measure. Running ads without proper tracking is like driving a car blindfolded. You're spending money but you have no idea where you're going or what's working. This is where conversion tracking comes in.
Conversion tracking is a small piece of code that you put on your website. It tells Google Ads when someone has completed the action you care about – like submitting your contact form or clicking to book a session. Without this, Google's system can't optimise for you, and you have no way of knowing which keywords or ads are actually bringing you business. It's the single most important technical thing to set up before you start.
Once tracking is set up, you can start looking at the key metrics to understand performance:
-> Click-Through Rate (CTR): This is the percentage of people who see your ad and click on it. If your CTR is very low, it usually means your ad copy isn't compelling enough, or your keywords aren't relevant to your ad. It's an early warning sign that something is wrong with your messaging.
-> Conversion Rate: This is the percentage of people who click your ad and then go on to become a lead. If you're getting lots of clicks but your conversion rate is low, it almost always points to a problem with your website or landing page. Either the page is confusing, it doesn't build enough trust, or the offer isn't what they expected from the ad.
-> Cost Per Lead (CPL): As we discussed, this is your key number. It tells you exactly how much you're paying for each potential customer. The goal of any good campaign management is to get this number as low as possible while maintaining the quality of the leads.
-> Return On Ad Spend (ROAS): This is the ultimate measure of success. It's the total revenue you generate from your ads divided by how much you spent on them. If you spend £1,000 and make £3,000 in bookings, your ROAS is 3x. This tells you if the whole effort is actually making you money.
The process of "managing" a campaign is really just a continuous cycle of looking at these numbers, forming a hypothesis (e.g., "I think this ad isn't working because the headline is weak"), making a change (testing a new ad with a stronger headline), and then measuring the results to see if your change worked. It's a process of constant testing and refinement. This is what an expert does week in, week out to improve performance over time.
This is the main advice I have for you:
To pull all of this together, here is a summary of the actionable steps I'd recommend you focus on. This is the exact stratgey we'd use for a new client in your position.
| Step | Action | Why it's important |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Foundation First | Conduct a full audit of your website. Focus on creating a clear call-to-action, building trust with testimonials and a professional 'About Me' section, and ensuring the copy is persuasive. | To maximise your conversion rate. Sending traffic to a poor website is the fastest way to waste your ad budget. |
| 2. Set Up Tracking | Install Google Ads conversion tracking on your website to measure when a user completes your desired action (e.g., submits a contact form). | Without tracking, you are flying blind. You won't know which keywords, ads, or audiences are driving results, making optimisation impossible. |
| 3. Build a Search Campaign | Create a standard Google Search campaign. Start with a tightly-themed group of keywords that show high intent (e.g., "book astrology reading"). Write 2-3 compelling ads for that group. | This targets people actively searching for your services, giving you the highest chance of getting quality leads from the start. |
| 4. Set a Realistic Budget | Allocate a monthly budget you are comfortable with (ideally £500+) to allow for sufficient data collection. Understand your target Cost Per Lead and overall ROAS goals. | A proper budget allows for faster testing and learning. Knowing your numbers helps you make informed decisions about whether the campaign is a success. |
| 5. Launch, Measure, Optimise | Launch the campaign and let it run for 2-4 weeks to gather initial performance data. Analyse the results (CTR, Conversion Rate, CPL) and begin making improvements. | Paid advertising is not 'set and forget'. Continuous optimisation based on real data is what separates successful campaigns from failed ones. |
I know this is a huge amount of information, and it can feel overwhelming. It's not just about setting up an ad and hoping for the best. It's about a deep understanding of your audience, a methodical approach to testing, creating compelling copy, and constantly fine-tuning your website and campaigns based on data. That's where professional help can make a huge difference.
Working with someone with expertise in this area can help you avoid costly mistakes, speed up the learning process, and ensure that every pound you spend is working as hard as possible to grow your business. We've helped many service businesses, just like yours, navigate this process and get a real return on their investment.
If you'd like to chat through this in more detail and have a look at your specific situation, we offer a free initial consultation. We could review your website together and map out a more concrete plan of action for you. Just let me know if that's something you'd be interested in.
Hope this helps!
Regards,
Team @ Lukas Holschuh
