TL;DR
Facebook ads work for landscapers better than for almost any other trade, because the product is a photograph. WordStream's 2025 home improvement benchmarks put a Facebook lead at $42.95 and a click at $2.18 with a 5.3 percent conversion rate, against $90.92 for a Google search lead, and the same analysts project about $34 a lead for 2026. The lead is cheaper because it is earlier: a homeowner who stopped scrolling at your before-and-after had no plan to call a landscaper this week. The campaign that turns that into a booked site visit is a before-and-after carousel of your own work, a radius drawn around the neighborhoods you want, one offer with a date on it, an instant lead form, and a text inside sixty seconds of the submission. Run it February through May for design-build and in September for cleanups and snow contracts, at $30 to $50 a day. What fails is boosted posts and awareness objectives, stock photos, and accounts where nobody calls the leads. The budget, the offers that pull and the audiences are below, with the three things to skip.
Skill Mammoth manages Meta ads alongside Google Ads for contractors at $1,000 a month for both, so read this knowing we sell it. We also tell about a third of the landscapers who ask about Facebook ads to wait, because the form will fill up in April and nobody in the office will call the leads back, and that is the version of this channel that loses money. The general contractor version of this guide, with the trade-by-trade verdicts, is in the Facebook ads for contractors guide. This page is the landscaping-specific build.
Facebook versus Google for landscapers, 2026
| Metric | Facebook, home improvement | Google Search, home improvement | Google Local Services Ads, landscaping |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost per click | $2.18 | $8.33 | Not sold by click |
| Conversion rate | 5.3% | 8.05% | Every lead is a call or message |
| Cost per lead | $42.95 (2026 projection about $34) | $90.92 average; $48 to $144 for landscaping per 99 Calls | $31 to $72 per 99 Calls |
| How soon the lead buys | Weeks | Days | Days |
| Can you choose the neighborhood | Yes, to a one-mile radius | By city or radius | By service area |
| Verdict | Facebook buys the cheapest landscaping lead and the slowest one. It pays when the follow-up turns a three-week lead into a site visit, and it belongs after LSAs and before Search in the spending order. | ||
Sources: WordStream's 2025 Facebook benchmarks for home services and the 2026 projections from the same analysts; LocaliQ's 2026 search benchmarks for home and home improvement; 99 Calls' published nationwide ranges for landscaping. All are national averages a good account beats and a bad one misses by half.
Why landscaping is the trade Facebook was built for
Facebook ads fail for emergency trades because nobody with a burst pipe is scrolling. They work when three things are true: the job is visual, the ticket is large, and the homeowner has weeks to decide. Landscaping is all three. A paver patio is a $10,000 to $25,000 decision made over a month of looking at other people's backyards, and your ad is other people's backyards. The before-and-after format exists for this trade. Lawn care is weaker on Facebook because mowing is not visual and the ticket is small, but seasonal offers for aeration, cleanups and snow contracts still pull, and the lawn care leads guide ranks the channel against the rest.
The campaign that books site visits
Objective and form
Leads objective, instant form, not a traffic campaign sending people to your homepage. The form asks for name, phone, address and one multiple-choice question, "What are you thinking about?" with four options: patio or hardscape, planting and design, lawn renovation, something else. That one question lets the person who calls back open with the right sentence. Add one qualifying line above the fields: "Projects from $5,000. We reply by text within the hour." It cuts the form fills in half and doubles the close rate on the ones that remain.
Creative
A carousel of three to five of your own jobs, each card a before on the left and an after on the right, shot from the same spot. Phone photos are fine. The first card is your best transformation, because that is the only one most people see. No stock, no drone footage of a resort, no logo animation. The caption is four lines: what the job was and where ("Backyard patio and fire pit, Maple Grove"), the offer, the review count, and "Tap to book a free design visit." Fifteen-second video of a crew setting the last paver outperforms the carousel in most accounts if you have the footage.
Offer
One offer per campaign, with a limit. The ones that pull for design-build: "Free design consultation, booking April installs now" from February; "Patio by Memorial Day, four spring slots left" in March and April; "Financing from $X a month" if you offer it, because the payment reframes a $15,000 patio as a car payment. For maintenance and lawn care: "Spring cleanup, 20 slots" in March; "Lock in your 2027 snow contract price" in September. The generic "10 percent off" is the weakest offer in the trade because it says nothing about when or what.
Audience
Draw a radius, not a city. One to three miles around the neighborhoods where your best projects already are, because the homes there look like the homes in your photos and the neighbors have seen your trucks. Homeowners, 30 to 65. Skip interest targeting ("gardening," "home improvement") for the first month; Meta's own optimization on the lead form beats it with a small radius. A lookalike audience of past customers only works once you have a thousand of them, which rules it out for most landscapers.
Budget and schedule
$30 to $50 a day, which is $900 to $1,500 a month and buys 25 to 45 leads at the benchmark cost. Run February through May for design-build, pause in June when the crews are full, and run September for cleanups and snow. A landscaper who runs Facebook in July is paying to turn away work. Give the campaign three weeks before judging it; the first week's cost per lead is always the worst.
The follow-up, which is the campaign
A Facebook lead that waits a day is gone. The system is a text within sixty seconds of the form submission ("Hi Dana, Alex from Northside Landscape. Got your note about the patio. Can I call you at 4 today or tomorrow morning?"), a call within five minutes during business hours, and two more texts over the week if the first call misses. That requires the form connected to a CRM or at least to a phone, not to the Meta inbox that nobody opens. The lead follow-up system is the full build, and it is the difference between a $34 lead and a $34 waste.
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What a season looks like in numbers
A design-build landscaper spends $40 a day for four months, February through May, which is about $4,800. At the 2026 projection of $34 a lead that is roughly 140 form fills. Half will not answer the phone or will be outside the service area, which is normal for this channel. Of the 70 real conversations, a landscaper with a good follow-up books 35 site visits and closes a third, 12 projects. At a $12,000 average that is $144,000 in installed work from $4,800 in media, before management. The same budget on Google Search at $90 a lead buys about 53 leads that close faster and bigger. Run both with LSAs first and let the numbers from your own account decide the split by May.
Three things to skip
Boosted posts. The blue button under a post buys reach, not leads, and the people it reaches are mostly your existing followers. If you want to spend $20, spend it on the lead campaign.
Awareness and reach objectives. Meta will happily show your patio to 50,000 people for $200 and none of them will fill out a form, because you did not ask for one. Leads objective, always.
Facebook Marketplace listings as advertising. Posting "landscaping services" in Marketplace reaches bargain hunters and gets the listing removed. Local groups work when you answer a neighbor's question with a photo and a price range, which is free and not an ad.
Google Ads for landscapers, briefly
Because the question always follows: yes, run Google too. Local Services Ads first, at $31 to $72 a lead for landscapers with a Google Verified badge above the results. Then Search on project keywords with the city, at $48 to $144 a lead. The landscaping advertising guide has the full budget by month, including the yard signs and door hangers that cost less than any of this.
Frequently asked questions
Do Facebook ads work for landscaping companies?
Yes, for design-build and visual work. Home improvement Facebook leads benchmark at $42.95 with a 5.3 percent conversion rate, cheaper than Google's $90.92 and slower to close. They work with before-and-after photos of your own jobs, a lead form and a text within a minute. They fail as boosted posts.
How much should a landscaper spend on Facebook ads?
$30 to $50 a day, or $900 to $1,500 a month, which buys 25 to 45 leads at the benchmark. Run February through May for design-build and September for cleanups and snow contracts, and pause when the crews are full.
What is a good cost per lead for landscaping Facebook ads?
Under $45 is on benchmark for home improvement; a tight radius and a strong before-and-after often land $20 to $30. Judge the account on cost per booked site visit, which should be under $150, not on cost per form fill.
What should a landscaping Facebook ad say?
Four lines: what the job was and where, one offer with a limit ("Free design visit, booking April installs"), a proof number such as a review count, and one verb ("Tap to book"). Over a before-and-after of your own work.
Should I target by interests or by location?
Location. A one-to-three-mile radius around the neighborhoods where your best projects already are, homeowners aged 30 to 65. Skip interest targeting for the first month and let Meta optimize on the lead form.
Facebook ads or Google Ads for landscapers?
Both, in order: Local Services Ads, then Facebook for design-build, then Google Search on project keywords. Facebook is the cheapest lead and the slowest; Google is the readiest and the most expensive. The split should come from your own account's close rates by May.
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