Do you know how your Google Adwords campaigns stack up against your competitors? Since Google does not typically release industry benchmarks, it can be difficult to determine if your PPC ads are performing above or below industry averages. Now you don’t have to guess.

Digital marketing company Acquisio recently released the results of its 2018 study of 50,000 Google Adwords PPC campaigns to determine benchmarks across 12 distinct industries — including Legal — for the following:

Cost Per Click (CPC) — measures how much an advertiser paid for each click. The Legal industry is the second highest with a CPC of $4.66.

Click Through Rate (CTR) — measures how many people who saw your ad actually clicked on it. The average CTR for the Legal category is 4.45%. Many experts say that the CTR of 2% or above is good, so the Legal sector performs above average.

Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) — measures the number of clicks that convert into a lead. Legal far outpaces every other industry with a CPA of $200. Depending upon what you expect to earn from an average client, this may or may not be a good number for your particular firm.

Conversion Rate (CVR) — measures how your ad performs against your conversion goal. When you set up your Adwords campaign, you have three marketing objectives from which to choose: build awareness, influence consideration, and drive action. If you want to encourage people to download an ebook or sign up for your newsletter, you would choose “drive action.” Your CVR would be the number of people who take action after clicking on your ad. The Legal category has a CVR of 6.51%.

In the charts below, you will see results displayed with and without machine learning. This is a form of artificial intelligence where algorithms make data-driven decisions without human interference, adjusting bids and budgets to achieve optimal results.