Google Ads
Your Google Ads will only be as good as the website behind them
Ads send traffic. The website converts it. If the website isn't ready, the ads just accelerate the leak.
By Pete Flynn · 10 May 2026 · 5 min read
Every new clinic I work with, I look at the website before I look at the ad account. In most cases, the website is where the money is leaking. Not the ads. The website. Google Ads is a traffic system. It sends people to a destination. If that destination is slow, confusing, or missing the information people need to decide to book, most of that traffic will leave without taking action. The campaign can be dialled in perfectly and still perform badly if the website behind it isn't ready.
The five website checks
Run these before you spend a dollar on Google Ads.
A weak website does not just underperform. It destroys the ad budget alongside it.
PageSpeed Insights score (mobile)
Poor
Needs work
Good
Target: 75 or above. Under 50 will cost you significantly more per booking.
Mobile speed
Under 50 on PageSpeed Insights. Visitors leave before the page loads.
75 or above. Under 2 second load on mobile.
Single clear CTA
Multiple competing actions, nothing obvious above the fold.
One primary action, above the fold, impossible to miss.
Real team photos
Stock images. Recognised immediately, trust destroyed instantly.
Your actual team, your actual clinic. Shows who they will see.
Prices visible
Fees hidden or absent. Visitors go to a more transparent competitor.
Ballpark fees with context. You control the narrative.
Mobile booking works
Clunky, errors, takes more than 2 minutes, requires a phone call.
Books in under 60 seconds on a phone, with instant confirmation.
Ads send traffic. The website converts it.
Think about what actually happens when someone clicks your ad. They land on a page. In the next 3 to 5 seconds they make a decision: does this look like the right place, or do I hit back? That decision is made almost entirely from the website, not the ad that got them there.
If the page loads slowly, they're often gone before the content appears. If the call to action is buried, they don't know what to do. If there's no price, no team photo, no sense of who they're going to see, they'll make a mental note to come back later. They rarely come back.
I've watched clinics spend thousands on Google Ads and wonder why nothing is converting. The ads were fine. The click-through rate was good. The website was the problem. We fixed the website. Results changed within two weeks.
Paid marketing is a microphone. If the website is broken, you're amplifying the broken thing louder.
Five things to check before you run a single ad.
These are the first things I look at when a new clinic comes to me. If any of these are wrong, I won't launch until they're fixed. Not because I'm being difficult. Because launching without them costs the clinic real money with predictably poor results.
The pre-launch website checklist
Check 1
Speed on mobile
Go to PageSpeed Insights and paste your URL. Run the mobile test. Under 50 is a serious problem. Under 70 is room to improve. Above 80 and you're in good shape. Most clinic websites score in the 20s and 40s. A slow site loses people before your headline even registers.
Check 2
One clear call to action
What do you want someone to do when they land? Book online, call you, or fill in a form. Pick one, make it obvious, and put it above the fold on mobile. If someone has to scroll to find out how to contact you, most of them won't.
Check 3
Real team photos
Stock images break trust the moment they're recognised, and people recognise them immediately. An iPhone photo of your actual team in your actual clinic outperforms a professional shoot of people who don't work there. Show them who they're going to see.
Check 4
Prices visible
People want a ballpark before they book. If fees are buried or absent, many will click away to a clinic that's more transparent. Not because you're more expensive, but because you've made it harder to decide. You control the narrative. Put the fees up there with context.
Check 5
Mobile booking actually works
Most ad clicks come from mobile. Pull out your phone right now and try to book an appointment on your own website. If the process is clunky, takes more than a minute, or throws an error, that's what your patients experience every day.
Ready versus not ready.
The difference between a website that converts ad traffic and one that doesn't isn't always obvious from the inside. Here's what it looks like from the outside.
Not ready for ads
- Mobile score under 50 on PageSpeed Insights
- Multiple competing calls to action with no clear priority
- Stock images, no photos of the actual team or clinic
- Fees hidden or absent, no way to estimate cost
- Booking link that errors or redirects incorrectly
- Navigation that's hard to use on a small screen
Ready for ads
- Mobile score 75 or above on PageSpeed Insights
- One primary call to action, above the fold on mobile
- Real team photos that let patients know who they'll see
- Fees listed with enough context to make the decision easy
- Booking flow that completes in under 60 seconds on a phone
- Navigation that funnels clearly toward the next step
Need a website that converts?
A clinic website should do one thing well: turn visitors into bookings.
If the website isn't converting the traffic you already have, paid ads will just accelerate the waste. We build clinic websites designed to convert from the first visit.
See our website serviceCommon questions