Reader question: my best climber quit. Do I keep the ads running?
When a tree company loses its lead climber, the ads keep bringing in jobs the crew cannot safely do. What to pause, what to keep, and how to say no well.
"My lead climber gave notice last week. He did every removal over a house. My ground guys are good but nobody else can rig a big tree. I am spending real money on Google Ads every month. Do I shut them off until I hire someone, or keep them going and figure it out?"
Do not shut everything off. Do not leave everything running either. Change what the ads are asking for, so the phone brings in the work your crew can do this month, and keep the rest of your marketing warm for when you hire.
Here is how to think about it.
The problem with leaving the ads alone
Your ads were built for the company you had last month. If your best performing keywords are "tree removal near me" and "emergency tree removal," the calls they bring in are probably the big, technical jobs: a leaning oak over a roof, a dead pine next to the power drop. Those are exactly the jobs you cannot do right now.
So every one of those leads costs you twice. You pay for the click, then you either turn the job down, sub it out at a thin margin, or send a crew that is not ready for it. The last one is the expensive one. One bad rigging day can cost more than a year of ad spend.
The problem with shutting them off
Google Ads campaigns that go dark lose momentum. When you turn them back on, it can take a few weeks before cost per lead settles down again. Your Local Services Ads profile, if you run one, also tends to lose ground when it is paused for long stretches.
More important, a lot of your monthly revenue is probably not big removals. It is pruning, crown cleaning, small removals in open yards, stump grinding, storm cleanup on the ground. Your ground crew can do all of that. Cutting the ads off cuts those jobs too.
What to change this week
Pause the keywords for jobs you cannot do. Go into the campaign and pause or lower bids on terms like "large tree removal," "crane tree removal," "tree removal over house" and the emergency terms if night calls usually mean a climb. Leave the ad group in place so you can turn it back on in a day.
Push the work you can do. Raise bids or add keywords for "tree trimming," "stump grinding," "shrub removal," "small tree removal" and "yard cleanup." If you have a separate pruning landing page, point those ads at it. If you do not, the website essentials guide shows what a service page should have.
Lower the daily budget, do not zero it. A reasonable move is to cut spend by a third to a half while you are short-handed. Watch cost per booked job, not cost per click. The Google Ads guide explains how to track that.
Update the Google profile. Make sure your services list leads with what you are doing now. A Google post that says "Booking pruning and stump grinding this month, call for a quick quote" sets expectations without announcing you lost someone.
What to say when the big job calls anyway
It will. Do not just let it go to voicemail. A good no keeps the customer.
"Thanks for calling. That sounds like a tree that needs a climber and full rigging. Our climbing crew is booked up for the next few weeks, so I do not want to give you a date I cannot keep. If it is not an emergency, I can put you on the list and call you as soon as a slot opens. If it is leaning on something right now, I would call [trusted company] today."
Two things happen. The customer trusts you more than the company that would have said yes and shown up late. And you keep a list of jobs to call back the week your new climber starts. That list is real money. Keep it in a spreadsheet with name, number, address, what the tree is, and the date they called.
If you are missing these calls because you are in the bucket yourself now, the missed calls guide has a text-back setup, and the calculator shows what those missed calls add up to.
Use marketing to hire, too
Climbers do not answer help wanted ads on job boards as often as they answer a friend. Some things that cost nothing:
- Post the opening on your Google profile and your Facebook page with a photo of your crew working. Climbers look at whether a company runs clean, safe jobs.
- Ask your best customers and your equipment dealer if they know anyone. Dealers know every climber in town.
- Put a line on your website: "We are hiring an experienced climber. Text [number]." Make it easy.
Your reviews help here. A climber choosing between two companies will look at both on Google, same as a homeowner. The median tree company in our data has 17 reviews and only 18.1% have 100 or more. A company that looks busy and well run gets the better applicants.
When to turn it all back on
Not the day the new climber starts. Give it two weeks of working together so you know what they can handle. Then turn the paused keywords back on, call through your waiting list first, and raise the budget back to normal over a week or two rather than all at once.
You can check how your review count and profile compare to other tree companies in the benchmark report.
If you want help rebuilding the ads around the crew you have now, the free 14-day trial covers any one service, no card: text or call (385) 526-4799.
Steven has spent the last several years running growth campaigns for local service businesses, tree service companies among them, and builds the benchmark datasets on this site from public Google listings. About the editor