ES StudiosMeta Ads Made Affordable for Contractors

Will Facebook ads pay for themselves?

Name: ES Studios
Price range: $$

Type in your monthly budget, what a lead costs you and how many leads you close. The tool chest shows what is left from the jobs after you pay for the ads.

Monthly ad budget

Ad spend only. Start with an amount you can afford to test.

Your ad kit

$1,500 / month

$75 / lead: 20 leads
25% sold: 5 jobs
$1,200 / job: $6,000 gross

Core campaign$1,125

Test drawer · 25%$375

Contribution before overhead$4,500$6,000 gross − $1,500 ads

This is a model, worked out before overhead, fees and tax. Moving the drawer split only moves money between the drawers. Your lead cost and close rate stay the same.

The starting figures are an example in US dollars. Swap all five for your own.

Assumed cost per lead

Use your account history, or an assumption to test. Minimum $1.

Leads that become sold jobs

Sold jobs ÷ leads × 100. Include the leads you did not reach.

Gross profit per sold job

Job price minus materials, subcontractors and direct labour.

Budget reserved for tests

This comes out of the budget above, so it is not extra spend. Drag to change the drawer split.

How the sum works

Your assumptions leave $4,500 after ads, before fees, overhead and tax. Check the jobs you sold before you spend more.

Get the full working plan and PDF

Budget ÷ cost per lead: $1,500 ÷ $75 = 20 leads
Leads × close rate: 20 × 25% = 5 sold jobs
Sold jobs × gross profit per job: 5 × $1,200 = $6,000
Gross contribution − ad spend: $6,000 − $1,500 = $4,500

The sums use unrounded numbers. A part job, like 0.5, is an average from the model and is not booked work. The daily equivalent is $49.34 over an assumed 30.4-day month.

Example: a $2,000 test that loses money

A contractor tests $2,000, assumes $200 per lead, sells 10% of leads and keeps $500 gross profit per job.

One sold job brings in $500 gross profit against $2,000 in ads, which leaves you $1,500 down. We made these figures up to show the sum. They are not industry averages.

$2,000 ÷ $200: 10 leads
10 leads × 10%: 1 sold job
1 job × $500: $500 gross
After $2,000 ad spend: -$1,500

Get the full plan before you spend

You get the PDF guide plus a worksheet filled in with your numbers. It gives you a campaign brief, a test budget and a way to check the jobs you sold.

Book + PDFThe contractor guide to offers, audiences, creative and follow-up.
Six-part workbookYour $1,125 core and $375 test allocations, with owner and evidence fields.
Launch checklistSix checks to make before the campaign starts spending.
Three AI promptsAd brief, one-variable test and actual-results review using your figures.

Questions

Are these normal contractor ad costs?

No. The starting figures are an editable example. With the defaults, $1,500 ÷ $75 gives 20 leads. Closing 25% of those gives 5 jobs. Replace those assumptions with your own records.

Is contribution the same as profit?

Here, contribution means gross profit from the modelled jobs minus ad spend. For example, $500 gross minus $2,000 ads is -$1,500. Agency fees, software, overhead and tax still need accounting for separately.

Does reserving more for tests improve the result?

The split only allocates money. At the starting 25% share, $375 is reserved for tests and $1,125 for the core campaign. Lead cost and close rate stay the same until you edit them using evidence from the test.