“Should I run Meta or Google ads?” is one of the most common questions we get from residential window & door replacement contractors who are about to start running paid traffic for the first time, or are about to fire whoever's running it now. The honest answer is: both, in a specific order, with a specific allocation. The two channels do completely different jobs in your funnel.
The fundamental difference: intent
Google Ads = harvesting demand
When a homeowner types “window replacement near me” or “double hung windows installed” into Google, they have already decided they have a problem and are actively shopping. Your Google ad gets shown because they raised their hand. The intent is high, the volume is bounded by the number of in-market searchers, and the cost-per-click reflects that intent, usually $8-$30 per click for contractor terms in competitive metros.
Meta Ads (Facebook + Instagram) = creating demand
On Meta, your ad gets shown to homeowners scrolling past dinner photos and friends' vacation pics. They are not searching for windows. They might not have realized their drafty windows cost them $400 in winter heating last year. Your ad has to create awareness, then create desire, then capture intent, all in the few seconds before the thumb moves on.
Why this matters for budget allocation
What each channel is genuinely good at
Google Ads strengths for window and door contractors
- Geographic precision. Show your ad only to searchers within your service radius. Easy to control.
- Buyer-intent keywords.“Window replacement Toronto,” “double hung windows installed near me,” “low-e window cost”, these are not browsing queries. These are buyers.
- Local Service Ads (Local Service Ad). The pay-per-lead format that puts you at the very top of Google with the green Google Guaranteed badge. Often a high-margin channel when the ideal customer profile fits.
- Branded search defense. When a competitor buys ads against your business name, you bid on your own name to keep that traffic.
Meta Ads strengths for window and door contractors
- Visual storytelling. Before/after window installations, drafty-window pain, energy-savings stories. Google search ads are text; Meta ads are short visual narratives.
- Demographic + interest targeting. Homeowners aged 35-65, in your service area, with home values in your job-size range, married, etc. Far more targetable than Google search.
- Lookalike audiences. Once you have a list of past customers, Meta can find more homeowners who look statistically similar, the largest demand-creation lever available to most contractors.
- Pipeline-stuffing volume.When you need lead volume for a slow month, Meta has the audience scale Google's in-market search demand can't match.
The order to build them in
For a contractor starting from scratch or with a broken existing setup:
Step 1: Get Google Ads & Local Service Ad running first
Highest-intent traffic, fastest path to first appointments, clearest ROI signal. The ramp time on Google search and Local Service Ad is fast, often within 2-3 weeks of launch you have a working baseline. This gets revenue flowing while the longer Meta ramp is in progress.
Step 2: Stand up Meta retargeting
Even before you run Meta to cold audiences, run Meta ads only to people who've visited your website but didn't convert. This is the cheapest, highest-converting Meta traffic you'll ever buy. It also gives you Meta pixel learnings cheaply before you spend on cold audiences.
Step 3: Meta cold prospecting + lookalikes
Once your pixel has 200+ conversion events, build a lookalike audience from your past customers and start running cold prospecting on Meta. This is where pipeline volume comes from once Google search demand is fully captured.
Step 4: Channel-mix optimization
With both channels running, every quarter you re-balance spend toward whichever channel is producing better cost-per-signed-job that quarter. The CAC math has to be tracked per channel, covered here.
The starting allocation that usually works
For a window and door contractor running their first $5K-$10K/mo of paid ad spend in a typical North American metro:
60 / 30 / 10
Typical month-1 split for a new window and door contractor: 60% Google search + Local Service Ad, 30% Meta retargeting + lookalikes, 10% reserved for testing new creative or audiences.
Over time as Meta pixel data matures and lookalike audiences improve, the mix usually drifts toward 40/50/10 or even 50/45/5 in favor of Meta, because Meta's scale is larger once the targeting infrastructure is real. But starting Meta-heavy on day one usually costs you 60-90 days of bad CPLs while the pixel learns.
The mistakes that cost contractors the most
1. Running Meta with no pixel data
Spending $5K/mo on Meta cold prospecting before the pixel has seen 100+ conversions is just paying Meta to learn who your buyer is at full retail price. Run retargeting first. Build pixel data with cheap traffic.
2. Skipping Local Service Ad because “Google's expensive”
Local Service Ads are pay-per-lead, not pay-per-click. The leads are pre-screened by Google. For most window and door contractors, Local Service Ad is the lowest-CAC channel they have access to. Skipping it is leaving margin on the table.
3. Running ads to a generic homepage
A Google search ad clicks through to your homepage. The homepage is built for a 50-second skim, not a campaign-specific offer. Conversion rate is abysmal. Real ad campaigns route click traffic through purpose-built landing pages tied to the ad creative.
4. No conversion tracking, no Meta CAPI
Without server-side conversion tracking (Google Enhanced Conversions, Meta Conversions API), you're flying blind on what's actually working. iOS 14.5+ broke client-side pixel reliability years ago; CAPI is non-optional now.
5. No phone-call tracking
Roughly 30-50% of window and door leads from paid media are phone calls, not form-fills. Without call-tracking software (CallRail, WhatConverts, native Local Service Ad call tracking), every phone call gets attributed to nothing, and your CAC numbers are dramatically wrong.
One channel that's not on this list
The infrastructure that has to exist regardless of channel
Whichever channel mix you choose, none of it works without the operational infrastructure underneath it:
- Sub-2-minute lead response across both channels. See the speed-to-lead math.
- Pre-qualifying funnel that filters out wrong-fit leads before your sales rep gets involved. See pre-qualified vs raw.
- A2P 10DLC compliance for any SMS automation in the lead- response stack. See TCPA / CASL compliance.
- Server-side conversion tracking (CAPI + Google Enhanced Conversions) so attribution actually works.
Ready to talk numbers on your own pipeline?
45-minute strategy call. Live look at your ad accounts. Written diagnosis you keep, whether you sign or not.
Final thought
Don't pick between Meta and Google. Build both, in order, with the operational infrastructure to convert what each channel produces. The contractors who win the next five years are the ones running a balanced, transparent, properly-tracked channel mix, not the ones “all in on Facebook” or “just doing Google because Facebook didn't work.” Both work. They work together better than either works alone.
Tagged