The cost of Google Ads has two parts: what you pay Google for the clicks, and what running the account costs, in your own time or at an agency. Here are both, with click prices and cost per lead from the accounts we manage.
By Victor Skretteberg, Arcads · Updated September 28, 20263 min read
Cost per click in eight accounts we run, June–Sept 2026
Google Ads is an auction. You pay when someone clicks, and the price is set by how many advertisers bid on the same search and how well your ad and landing page match it. Instead of an average from abroad, here is what our clients paid per click from June 9 to September 6, 2026. Branded searches are excluded.
| Industry | Search | Shopping | Performance Max |
|---|---|---|---|
| Saunas (leads, all of Norway) | NOK 14 | – | NOK 7 |
| Facade and roof cleaning, 9 regions | NOK 20 | – | – |
| Moving company, Oslo | NOK 50 | – | NOK 28 |
| Move-out cleaning, Oslo | NOK 55 | – | NOK 6 |
| Business leasing (B2B) | NOK 79 | – | – |
| Dog treats (online store) | NOK 16 | NOK 9 | NOK 9 |
| Tattoo supplies (online store) | – | NOK 4 | NOK 12 |
| Children’s sunglasses (online store, Norway, Germany, Denmark) | NOK 11 | NOK 17 | NOK 10 |
For services, a search click cost NOK 14–79; for the online stores, NOK 11–16. Services in Oslo and B2B were at the top. Branded searches, meaning people searching for your company name, cost NOK 4–22 per click, and under NOK 10 in five of the eight accounts.
Keep Search and Performance Max (PMax) apart when you read numbers like these. PMax also buys placements on YouTube, Display and Gmail, where clicks are cheap because people haven’t searched for you. A PMax click at NOK 6 is therefore not better than a search click at NOK 55. What counts is what a lead or a sale costs.
Excluding branded searches, a lead in the same accounts cost about NOK 188 for facade and roof cleaning, NOK 202 for move-out cleaning, NOK 412 for a moving booking, NOK 517 for business leasing and about NOK 1,090 for saunas. The numbers with caveats, and the difference between Search and PMax, are in What does a lead cost in Norway?.
Google has no minimum spend. But for smart bidding (target CPA or target ROAS) to work, a campaign needs around 15–30 conversions over 30 days. With fewer, the algorithm has too little to go on, and prices jump around.
Monthly budget per campaign ≈ expected cost per lead × 15–30.
If you’re at NOK 200 per lead, the campaign needs NOK 3,000–6,000 a month. At NOK 500, it’s NOK 7,500–15,000. If you split the account into many campaigns, each of them needs enough data.
If you sell online, you work it the other way: breakeven ROAS is 1 divided by your gross margin. With a 40% margin, you need NOK 2.50 back for every krone spent on ads. If your online store sends revenue including VAT to Google, you have to multiply by 1.25, and breakeven becomes 3.1x. More on that in What is a good ROAS?.
An account needs attention every week: the search terms have to be reviewed, budget moved between campaigns, and tracking has to count real sales and inquiries. The most expensive mistake we have found in accounts we’ve taken over is tracking that counts wrong. When we started with Leid.no, tracking counted far more purchases than actually happened, so Google was optimizing toward numbers that didn’t exist. You have three ways to get the job done:
Whichever model you choose, you pay the ad budget directly to Google.
The numbers come from our clients' own ad accounts.
profit year over year
Google Ads in Norway, Germany and DenmarkRead the case
ROAS
From broken tracking to profitable scalingRead the case
ROAS
Meta ads, September 2026Read the case
leads in 90 days
NOK 163 per lead incl. branded searchesRead the caseBe next on the list. The proposal is free and comes with no commitment.
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Search, Shopping and Performance Max. Structure, negative keywords and scaling based on profitability, not clicks.
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Numbers you understand, every Monday. What was done, what it brought in, what we're doing next week.
You see the proposal before you've paid a single krone.
Arcads is a Norwegian performance marketing agency in Skien that runs Google Ads and Meta Ads and makes the ads itself, for clients all over Norway. We mostly work with online stores and service businesses that live on leads, often with multiple locations.
Victor is the one you meet on the first call. He builds your Google account and digs into the numbers. You get a report every Monday.
Victor on LinkedIn
Jona makes the ads you see on this page. Videos, statics and concepts. 10+ new ones a week don't make themselves.
Jona on LinkedInWe got tired of agencies that invoice whether it works or not, so we built our own. No middlemen, no salespeople. You get us.
One partner instead of a slow agency, a freelancer you have to chase, or yet another evening in front of the ad account yourself.
| Arcads | Typical agency | Freelancer | Do it yourself | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Payment | 100% performance-based | Fixed fee | Hourly rate | Your own time |
| New ads | 10+ a week | A few a month | One at a time | When you find the time |
| Landing pages | Included, made by us | Extra invoice | Rarely | Your website |
| Reporting | Every Monday, numbers you understand | Quarterly report | None | You make it yourself |
| Who you talk to | Victor and Jona | Account manager | One person | No one |
| Lock-in | None | Often 6-12 months | None | None |
| Ownership | The accounts are yours | Varies | Varies | Yours |
Send us your website. You'll get a proposal for ads and a landing page by email within a couple of days.
Victor and Jona reply personally.The proposal is on its way within a couple of days. If it's urgent, email victor@arcads.no.
