Solar is one of the few trades where most operators can tell you their cost per lead to the cent and have no idea what a customer costs them. That gap is the whole problem. Purchased leads make the spend look controlled while quietly setting the price of every job you win. This guide covers what actually drives solar marketing costs in Australia, why the marketplace model distorts the numbers, how to think about budget as you grow, and what should be visible after 90 days.
The marketplace-lead trap
A marketplace lead is a form fill sold to several installers at once, usually within minutes. You pay for it whether or not it converts, you are calling someone who is already taking other calls, and the only levers you control are speed and price. Installers describe the same pattern: a reasonable-looking cost per lead, a poor conversion rate, and quotes discounted to win, which means the true acquisition cost sits well above the invoice from the lead vendor.
There is a second cost that never appears on a spreadsheet. Competing on price trains your sales process to open with a number rather than an assessment, which produces thinner margins on the jobs you do win and more time wasted on people who were never going to proceed.
Bought leads are not automatically wrong. They are a reasonable way to fill a gap while owned demand is built, provided you measure them on cost per installed system and review that figure rather than renewing automatically.
What actually drives the number
- Service-area size. Being visible across one metropolitan corridor is a different job to covering a capital plus regional centres. Each area needs its own page, its own proof and its own local signals.
- Competition depth. Capital-city solar terms are contested by national installers with large content libraries and long review histories. Regional markets are usually far cheaper to compete in.
- Product mix. Residential rooftop, battery retrofit and commercial installation are three different audiences with different content, campaigns and sales cycles. Chasing all three costs more than chasing one well.
- Channel mix. Search visibility is a build cost that compounds. Paid search is a rented cost that stops when the card stops. Most installers need both early.
- Your starting point. A business with a fast site, a complete Google Business Profile, accreditation displayed and steady reviews needs less remedial work than one starting from a brochure site.
Budgeting as you grow
Small installer, one or two crews. The goal is owning a tight radius and a clear niche. That means a complete profile, a handful of substantial service pages, rebate and payback content that shortens sales calls, review generation, and a small paid budget on residential installation intent.
Established residential installer. Now suburb coverage and product segmentation pay for themselves. Separate battery content and campaigns, expanded location pages, and enough content depth to capture research-stage searches rather than only ready-to-buy ones.
Residential plus commercial. Two funnels, two budgets, two sets of expectations. Commercial content and outreach run on a months-long cycle and should never be judged on residential metrics or funded from the residential budget when a quiet month arrives.
The test at any size: spend should be justified by installed systems at your average job value, not by traffic, leads or impressions.
Rebate cycles change the shape of spend
Solar demand moves with policy. The federal small-scale technology certificate scheme steps down over time, state and territory programs open, change and close, and every announcement produces a wave of research traffic. A flat monthly media budget misses those waves and overspends in the flat periods between them.
Plan for it. Keep base visibility running year-round so content is already ranking when interest spikes, and hold a flexible media allowance that can be released when a program change generates demand. Do not, however, build campaigns around specific dollar figures — programs change, and out-of-date claims are both a compliance risk and a trust problem.
What the first 90 days should show
Ninety days will not win the hardest organic terms, but it is long enough to tell whether the work is real. Expect: technical fixes complete, service and location pages published, rebate and payback content live and accurate, the Google Business Profile fully built out with accreditation visible and real installation photography, a review process running, paid campaigns split by intent and producing tracked enquiries, and call tracking installed.
Leading indicators should also be moving: map pack impressions and profile calls, ranking movement on research-stage terms, and a rising share of enquiries that arrive already knowing your accreditation status and service area. If nothing has shifted, the plan is wrong and it should be said plainly.
Comparing quotes
- Deliverables by month, not a channel list. Four service pages, a rebate content set and a technical fix list are deliverables. "SEO" is not.
- Asset ownership. Website, ads account, tracking and Google Business Profile in your name. If they sit with the agency, leaving costs you everything you paid for.
- Whether media spend is bundled into the fee, which hides both the management cost and the budget reaching Google.
- KPIs in writing and a review date. This is the difference between accountability and a rolling invoice.
- Contract length and exit terms. Long lock-ins protect the agency, not the outcome.
Where solar businesses waste money
The pattern repeats across the industry. Lead vendors renewed on autopilot without a cost-per-install figure. Broad paid campaigns funding DIY, wholesale, jobs and training searches. Thin suburb pages built from a template. Rebate pages with figures that went stale two program changes ago, quietly undermining trust. And a website rebuild every couple of years instead of steadily improving the one that exists.
Fee versus media
Keep them separate. Media buys visibility today; the fee pays for the structure that decides whether the media works. Bundled, you cannot tell whether a weak month was caused by insufficient budget or weak management. Early on, most installers need enough media to gather data across their main product lines and enough fee to build the owned assets that reduce reliance on paid over time.
Making the spend defensible
Track enquiries by source, agree what counts as qualified, and report on cost per installed system by channel. Compare owned enquiries against purchased leads on that basis, not on lead price, and the correct budget allocation usually becomes obvious within a quarter.
For the wider picture, see the solar installer marketing and SEO page and our tradie marketing hub. If lead sources are the immediate question, read how to get more solar leads, and for paid search structure, Google Ads for solar installers.
