Clean Power Australia Case Study

Quality solar leads at around $8 each

A solar business doing more than $20M a year buys its work through Google Ads and Meta Ads, and both channels are judged on the cost of every lead.

Google AdsMeta Ads

Performance highlights

Cost per quality solar lead

$20M+

Annual revenue of the business

Channels run: Google Ads and Meta Ads

Background

The business

Clean Power Australia is a solar business doing more than $20M a year. New work arrives through Google Ads and Meta Ads, and the number that decides whether that spend is working is the cost of each lead.

The Challenge

Where Clean Power Australia started

Solar is bought on cost per lead. A household does not browse its way through a solar catalogue the way it might with retail — it asks one or two businesses for a quote, and the business that gets the enquiry first usually gets the appointment. The cost of producing each enquiry therefore sets the ceiling on how much media the business can buy.

A cheap lead is not automatically a good lead. Solar campaigns can generate volume at a low headline cost by leaving targeting broad enough to catch people who were never going to buy a system — a roof that cannot take panels, or an enquiry that never answers the phone. The cost that matters is per lead the team can actually work.

Because two channels run at once, the harder question is not which platform is cheaper in isolation but whether both are judged on the same number. Comparing a search click against a social impression is how accounts end up defending spend that is not producing work.

The Approach

What we did

Manage both channels against cost per lead

Google Ads and Meta Ads are run to the same measure: the cost of a lead the business can act on. Clicks, impressions and CPM are inputs to that number, not the result.

Split the channels by intent

Search captures households already looking for solar; social reaches households that have not started looking yet. Each is asked to produce leads at a cost the business accepts, rather than being judged on what a platform reports about itself.

Hold quality ahead of volume

The client's own description of the work is 'quality solar leads', and that is the standard the account is held to. A lead count grown by loosening targeting would show up as a better cost per lead and worse business.

Keep the account responsive

The client describes the team as responsive and proactive. Campaigns are reviewed as the numbers arrive, so a lead cost that drifts is corrected rather than explained at the end of the month.

The Results

What changed

Quality solar leads at around $8 each, from Google Ads and Meta Ads.
Both channels are judged on the cost of a lead the business can work, not on clicks or impressions.
The work runs behind a business doing more than $20M a year.

Why cost per lead is the number that matters in solar

A solar system is a considered, high-value purchase, but the enquiry behind it is cheap to lose. Households typically contact one or two businesses after a search, so the campaign's job ends the moment a qualified enquiry arrives — and the cost of producing that enquiry is what sets how many the business can buy in a month.

That makes solar accounting simpler than most categories. There is no long attribution puzzle to argue about: the media either produces workable enquiries at a cost the business can carry, or it does not. Everything else — impressions, click-through rates, audience size — is an input to that one number.

It is also why the figure published here is a cost rather than a multiple. A lead cost is a running number, and the honest way to report it is as the price of a lead today, not as a growth percentage borrowed from a different engagement.

What 'quality' adds to a cost per lead

Cost per lead on its own can be made to look excellent by widening targeting until enquiries come cheap — and then the business pays for them in time wasted chasing people who cannot buy. Clean Power's description of the work is 'quality solar leads', which is the standard the account is held to.

The client's own words put the same weight on responsiveness and proactivity as on the number itself. An account where the lead cost drifts and nobody corrects it looks fine in a monthly screenshot and feels very different on the phone.

Read that way, $8 is not a claim about what solar leads cost in general. It is what one specific business is paying, through two specific channels, for enquiries it considers worth working.

“Jake has been great to work with. Professional, responsive, and consistently delivers great results. He’s helped us generate quality solar leads for around $8 per lead and has been proactive throughout the process.”

Felix Clifton-Sprigg

Client, Clean Power Australia