Case studies / Legal
Family law & conveyancing · Victoria, AustraliaTwo businesses with nothing in common. Both of them rang.
One owner, two firms, a family law practice and a conveyancing business, each funded at AU$750 a month. A divorce and a property settlement have almost nothing in common as purchases. Forty of the forty-two monthly enquiries still arrived by phone.
One owner, two businesses with almost nothing in common.
Shamac Lawyers handles family law and Mr. Conveyancer handles property transfers, two separate businesses under one owner, both operating in Victoria, Australia.
We were brought in to run Google Ads for both firms side by side, each on its own budget and its own voice, rather than treating them as one combined account.
One owner, two brands, two budgets.
Shane McClure ran Shamac Lawyers for family law and Mr. Conveyancer for property transfers, separate businesses under one owner, each advertising in Victoria on AU$750 a month.
Four things shaped how they were run.
Two brands, not two practice areas
Separate businesses with separate names and positioning. That's cleaner than one firm advertising both, and it means neither account can borrow the other's messaging, landing pages, or credibility.
AU$750 each is a genuinely small budget
Two accounts at this level leave no room for exploratory keywords. Everything had to be tightly matched from the start, in both.
Victoria only
Both practices were licensed and operating in Victoria. Enquiries from other states or overseas, and there were some, cost the same as usable ones and couldn't be acted on.
Conveyancing is a price question first
Most property enquiries open with what it costs. That shapes both the ad copy and the intake, and it's the opposite of family law, where price is rarely the first thing anyone asks.
Four decisions, run twice.
Two accounts, kept entirely separate.
Build the phone in first
Call tracking and call focused campaigns from the start in both accounts. Ninety five percent of enquiries arrived by phone, an account measuring form submissions here would have been reporting on 5% of its own performance.
Every enquiry attributable to a campaign.
Write each brand in its own register
Family law messaging built around discretion and what happens next. Conveyancing built around cost, timing, and certainty. Same owner, same budget, and nothing shared between the two, because someone facing a separation and someone buying a flat are not remotely the same reader.
Two accounts that never sounded like each other.
Bound both to Victoria
Targeting held to the state both practices were licensed in, with the search terms tightened continuously against the interstate and overseas enquiries that arrive in any family law account.
Budget concentrated on matters that could be taken.
Answer the price question in the ad
Conveyancing ads built to address cost and timing directly rather than deferring it. When the first question is always the same one, answering it before the click removes the enquiries that were only ever going to ask it.
~29 conveyancing leads a month at ~AU$26.
Forty calls. Two forms.
- Phone calls ~40 a month
- Form submissions ~2 a month
- Combined monthly media AU$1,500
- Blended cost per lead ~AU$36
Ninety five percent by phone is the most extreme split we've measured on any account, and it held across two businesses whose customers have nothing in common.
It's worth setting against our criminal defence account where 45% of leads arrived by form. Same broad professional services, opposite result, because contact preference isn't a universal rule, it's a property of the specific decision someone is making.
In criminal defence, a share of people cannot speak freely, they're at work, or living with family who don't know. Here, neither audience had that problem. One needed a conversation because their situation was too complicated to write down. The other wanted a price and a timeline, which is faster to ask than to type.
Both arrived at the phone for opposite reasons, and an account built around forms would have missed nearly all of it. Which is the practical point: don't assume, measure.
One small thing we found in the lead log
Among the genuine enquiries were submissions from a competing marketing agency using the firm's own contact form to pitch its services, and a couple of test entries that had never been cleared out.
Trivial in volume, and worth mentioning because they inflate a lead count for free. If you pay per lead or report on lead volume, it's worth reading the list occasionally rather than counting the rows.
No enquiry content, contact details, or case information appears on this page. Per practice lead counts are derived from the client's reported split and are approximate.
Four things for service businesses.
Measure contact preference, don't assume it
Two of our accounts in adjacent categories ran at 95% phone and 45% form. There's no general rule, there's only what your customers actually do.
Answer the first question in the ad
If every enquiry opens with the same question, addressing it before the click filters out the people who only wanted to ask it.
Separate brands need separate voices
One owner running two businesses is two marketing problems. Sharing messaging or landing pages between them undersells both.
Read your lead list, don't just count it
Test entries, spam, and sales pitches inflate lead volume. If anyone is reporting on or paying per lead, someone should be opening them.
What went into it.
Four of our services, across two accounts.
Do you know how your customers prefer to reach you?
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