White Papers · Automotive
4,081 Phone Calls from Google Ads
How a Chicago-area used car dealership specializing in special finance outworked the national marketplaces
Client
Special-Finance Used Car Dealer
Chicago area · special finance
Prepared by
Forward Digital Media
Hanna Marshall, Owner · October 2026
At a glance
- Client
- Used car dealership specializing in special finance, Chicago area
- Industry
- Independent pre-owned vehicle sales & financing
- Channels
- Google Search, Performance Max, Vehicle Listing Ads
- Tracking
- Google Ads conversion & call tracking, GA4
- Managed
- 2018 – 2026
- Headline result
- 14,034 total leads and 4,081 calls from ads; website traffic up 75%; calls up 4.1× in 2025
Executive Summary
Special-finance buyers don’t browse for fun. They search, they call, and they buy from whoever helps them first. This dealership’s job was to be the first call.
The client is a Chicago-area used car dealership specializing in special finance: helping buyers with credit challenges get into a reliable vehicle. Hanna Marshall managed the dealership's Google Ads from 2018 to 2026. The goal never changed: more calls, form leads and showroom visits from local car shoppers, at a cost per lead the business could scale.
The program was organized by shopper intent (brand, used-car shoppers, credit-challenged buyers, competitor shoppers and trade-ins) with Vehicle Listing Ads putting live inventory in front of people comparing cars in Google.
The short version
From March 2024 through June 2026, the account produced 14,034 total leads and 4,081 phone calls from 77,965 clicks. After the current Google Ads account launched, website traffic rose 75%, and phone calls from ads quadrupled, from about 50 a month in 2024 to about 205 a month in 2025.
The Challenge
Independent dealers bid on the same searches as franchise stores and national listing sites such as Cars.com, CarGurus and Autotrader, which usually have bigger budgets. To win, every dollar has to go to a shopper who is likely to buy from this lot.
- Different shoppers, different intent. Someone searching the dealership's name, someone searching "used cars near me" and someone with credit challenges need different ads and landing pages.
- Most dealer leads are phone calls. If calls aren't counted, bidding optimizes for the wrong thing.
- Shoppers compare inventory before they click. A dealer that isn't in Vehicle Listing Ads is invisible during comparison shopping.
Strategy
Campaigns built around intent
| Campaign | Who it reaches |
|---|---|
| Branded | Shoppers searching for the dealership by name |
| Used Dealer / Used General | Local shoppers searching for a used car dealer or used cars |
| Special Finance | Buyers with credit challenges who need financing help, a high-value segment for independent dealers |
| Conquest Dealer | Shoppers searching for nearby competing dealers |
| Vehicle Listing Ads (Performance Max) | Shoppers comparing specific vehicles by photo, price and mileage |
| Trade-In & We Want to Buy Your Car | Owners looking to sell or trade in, which feeds inventory |
Counting the calls
Call assets and call tracking made phone calls a measured result instead of a guess. Monthly calls from ads grew from about 50 in 2024 to about 205 in 2025, peaking at 347 in March 2026.
Phone calls from Google Ads by month, March 2024 to April 2026. Green bars: 2025 onward.
Results
March 2024 through June 2026 (the account's available history; campaigns wound down in May and June 2026).
Average monthly website sessions (GA4)
Results by campaign
| Campaign | Type | Clicks | Conversions | Cost / conv. | Calls |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Branded | Search | 13,332 | 4,621 | $2.31 | 847 |
| Used Dealer / Used General | Search | 25,829 | 4,009 | $8.48 | 890 |
| Special Finance (Bad Credit) | Search | 12,190 | 2,140 | $13.22 | 520 |
| Vehicle Listing Ads | Performance Max | 12,803 | 1,560 | $10.08 | 1,069 |
| Conquest Dealer | Search | 6,247 | 816 | $13.26 | 379 |
| Inventory | Search | 2,223 | 257 | $9.38 | 18 |
| We Want to Buy Your Car | Search | 1,257 | 201 | $10.98 | 146 |
| Trade-In (2 campaigns) | Performance Max | 922 | 111 | $12.85 | 95 |
| Used Make + Type | Search | 2,137 | 140 | $22.63 | 89 |
Phone calls from ads by campaign
- Vehicle Listing Ads drove the most calls. 1,069 calls, more than any other campaign, at $10.08 per conversion.
- Special finance was a core lead source. 2,140 conversions and 520 calls from buyers who needed financing help.
- Branded search was the cheapest lead. $2.31 per conversion across 4,621 conversions.
- Website traffic up 75%. Sessions averaged 6,713 a month from June to December 2024, up from 3,841 a month from December 2023 to February 2024, before the current account launched.
- Steady efficiency. From January 2025 through April 2026, leads averaged $12.53 each.
What This Means for Your Dealership
Five questions to ask your agency this week
- Who actually works in my account, and how often? If the answer is "a team" and "weekly," your budget drifts between check-ins.
- What counts as a conversion, and does it match my CRM? If your agency's lead count is far above what your BDC sees, bidding is learning from noise.
- What's my cost per lead by department? Sales, service, collision and finance should each have their own number.
- Is my brand traffic separated from Performance Max? If not, PMax may be taking credit for customers who were already looking for you.
- Do I own my Google Ads account? You should. Always.
Lessons for Independent Dealers
- You don't need the biggest budget. Intent-based campaigns and disciplined bidding beat outspending the marketplaces.
- Count the phone calls. Over 4,081 calls came from ads. Without call tracking, bidding would have ignored most of them.
- Show the car, not just the dealership. Vehicle Listing Ads were the top call driver.
- Serve the credit-challenged buyer. A dedicated financing campaign turns a hard-to-reach segment into a reliable lead source.
Data source: Google Ads and Google Analytics 4, March 2024 to June 2026. Conversions are the lead actions configured in each Google Ads account (calls, forms and other lead events). Cost per conversion includes all campaign spend.
Client Review
[Paste review from Don B. here]
To save this white paper as a PDF, use your browser's Print → Save as PDF.
Want a plan like this for your dealership?
Book a free strategy call. You'll get a read on your current Google Ads, Meta and tracking setup and a clear next step.