In healthcare, a click costs more than in almost any other sector - and one that doesn't turn into an enquiry is budget spent sending a patient to a competitor instead. Paid media here has to do more than buy traffic: it has to reach patients at the moment of high intent, stay compliant with ASA and MHRA, and be tracked all the way to the booking, not the form fill. That's exactly what we manage, and prove.
Healthcare-only · London-based · UK-wide · No vanity metrics
Why Healthcare PPC Is Different
Here's what most PPC agencies won't tell you: healthcare paid media isn't a tap you can just turn on. Patients don't convert on impulse clicks. They research for weeks, compare providers, and look for reassurance before they ever make contact. An ad campaign that drives generic traffic without answering that hesitation just burns your budget, however good the click-through rate looks.
Healthcare has some of the highest costs-per-click in paid media, so every pound has to find a patient who's actually ready - not someone three weeks from deciding or comparing on price alone. The work is in the targeting and the intent: the right keywords and audiences, negative keywords that stop budget bleeding on irrelevant searches, and ad copy matched to where the patient is in their decision. Generalists optimise for the metrics that look good in a report - click-through rate, cost-per-click, impression share - and call it a win. None of those fill a diary. The job is the booking, not the click.
ASA, MHRA and the platforms' own healthcare policies govern what a medical ad can say, show and even target - from treatment claims and pricing to before/after imagery and audience restrictions. The traps are specific and easy to hit: prescription-only medicines like botulinum toxin can't be advertised to the public by name at all, Google and Meta restrict and sometimes suspend healthcare accounts, and a claim that converts today can trigger an ASA ruling tomorrow. Most agencies build the campaign for conversion and never check the line, especially in aesthetics, dental and pharma, where it's strictest. A disapproved ad costs you reach; a complaint costs you more than that.
A form fill is not a patient, and a 'conversion' in an ad account often isn't either. What lets a campaign actually improve, month after month, is tracking that runs past the click to the enquiry, and past the enquiry to the booked, paying patient at reception. Without that loop closed, you're optimising toward the wrong signal - pouring more budget into the campaign that generates the most form fills rather than the most patients. Get the measurement right and you can move spend toward what books; get it wrong and a healthy-looking account can be quietly losing money.
What Healthcare PPC Covers
Paid media isn't one job - it's six disciplines working together. Here's what each one does, in plain terms, and why it matters for your practice.
What it is
Before any ads go live, we map exactly what a patient searches for when they are ready to book, versus when they are just researching. We structure your campaigns around high-intent search terms and precise audience targeting, not broad, wasteful categories.
Why it matters
Most agencies bid on broad terms that drain budget with "informational" traffic. Someone searching for "what causes toothache" isn't ready to book; someone searching for "private emergency dentist near me" is. We target the patients who are ready to act, protecting your budget from irrelevant clicks.
What it is
Writing the ad copy patients actually click and trust - clear, honest, treatment-specific lines that match the search and set the right expectation, with no hype, false urgency or claims that breach the rules.
Why it matters
In healthcare the click is expensive and the patient is cautious, so copy that over-promises or feels salesy loses the click - or worse, triggers a disapproval. Honest, reassuring ad copy earns the right click from a patient who's ready, and keeps the account compliant while it does it.
What it is
Sending ad traffic to bespoke, treatment-specific landing pages designed to answer the patient's questions and guide them cleanly to an enquiry, rather than dumping them on a generic homepage.
Why it matters
A patient clicking an ad for "knee consultation" expects to see exactly that. Sending them to a busy homepage makes them work too hard to find what they need, and they leave. A dedicated, reassuring landing page does the deciding for them and captures the enquiry.
What it is
Continuously refining how much you pay per click, which times of day your ads show, and which locations are targeted, to lower your cost per acquisition rather than just maximising clicks.
Why it matters
Doubling your patients rarely means doubling your ad spend - it means fixing the waste. Broad bidding strategies and unmonitored budgets quietly drain your money on low-quality traffic. We optimise for cost per booking and revenue, not vanity metrics.
What it is
The engineering underneath: connecting your ad campaigns directly to your clinic's CRM and booking system, so you can see exactly which ad, keyword and campaign resulted in a booked, paying patient.
Why it matters
Most agencies stop reporting at the "form fill" or "click" and hope it became a patient. We close the loop. If we don't know which keyword generated a booked patient, we can't optimise effectively. We track your marketing spend all the way to the bank account, not just the website.
What it is
Every ad, targeting option and landing page checked against the rules that govern healthcare marketing (ASA, MHRA, GDC, GMC, CQC), alongside Google and Meta's own strict medical advertising policies.
Why it matters
A campaign that generates leads but breaches the rules is a liability. Google and Meta frequently suspend medical ad accounts that don't follow their strict health and pharmaceutical guidelines, cutting off your lead flow overnight. We navigate these rules daily, keeping your account safe and your ads live.
None of these work in isolation - they're one system, delivered in a deliberate order. That order is The Patient Acquisition System.
The Patient Acquisition System
The same system we apply to every engagement - here, focused on your paid media: we diagnose before we spend, build before we scale, and measure everything against booked patients.
We start by finding out why your current spend isn't turning into patients. We review how your existing account performs, where budget leaks, what your competitors are bidding on and doing better, and the journey a patient actually takes before they enquire. You get a clear roadmap before we spend a single pound, so you know what we're running and why.
We build the account around the patient's intent, not around whatever's easiest to switch on: the campaign architecture, the path through to enquiry, and the conversion tracking wired up before anything goes live, so every pound is measured from day one. This is the unglamorous groundwork everything later depends on, and where many agencies skip straight to spending.
We build and launch the campaigns that actually win patients: the keywords and audiences, the negative-keyword foundations that stop wasted spend, compliant ad creative, and landing pages matched to the click - all compliant by default. Every choice is made to earn the right click and lead to an enquiry, not just to drive traffic.
Once the campaigns are live, the work doesn't stop - this is where paid media earns its keep. We test and refine the keywords, bids, creative and landing pages, cut spend that isn't working, and track everything back to real, booked patients - not just clicks - so you always see what your investment is producing. This is where a well-run account compounds, month after month.
Industry Proof
Don't take our word for it. Here's what the data shows about what a healthcare click really costs, how many of those clicks ever become a patient, and where the budget leaks in between - and what it means for the enquiries your practice is winning, or paying for and losing.
£5.52
the average healthcare search click - and cost-per-click rose for more than half of healthcare advertisers over the past year. Competition for patients is intensifying, not easing.
£7.61
the average click for dentists - among the highest cost-per-click of any industry Google tracks.
58%
of NHS dental patients say they'd consider going private, most often for faster treatment - high-intent patients actively looking for an alternative.
£7.9bn
the size of the UK private dentistry market - and one in five UK adults used private dental care in 2024. Real demand a well-run campaign can capture.
21%
rise in initial private consultation fees in two years, to around £80 - these are considered, higher-value decisions, not impulse clicks.
43k
online dental reviews analysed in one study alone - UK patients research extensively before they commit, so the click is the start of the decision, not the end of it.
~6%
the healthcare search average conversion rate - more than nine in ten clicks you pay for don't become an enquiry. What happens to the other nine is where budget is won or lost.
Every one of these is a moment where your budget either finds a patient or quietly disappears. Healthcare paid media that gets them right doesn't just lower your cost per click - it turns more of the spend you're already making into booked patients. That's the difference between buying clicks and buying patients.
What Makes Us Different
Plenty of agencies 'run paid ads.' Far fewer can turn a cautious patient's click into an enquiry - and fewer still can prove the spend brought you booked patients. Here's what sets our paid media apart.
Most PPC agencies
Healthcare PPC with us
Report on clicks, impressions and form fills, and call it a win
Track every pound to booked, paying patients
Build a busy-looking account and leave it to run
Manage to cost per booking and lead quality, week after week
Chase clicks with hype copy and broad targeting
Earn the right click with honest ad copy and tight patient intent
Write whatever gets the click and never check the rules
Compliant by default - ASA, MHRA, GDC/GMC and Google & Meta healthcare policy
Send every click to your homepage and hope
Match each click to a fast, reassuring landing page built to convert
Treat your account like any other ad campaign
Understand patient intent and medical trust, because it's all we do
The difference isn't that we bid harder. It's that healthcare paid media is what we do - so the targeting, the compliance and the tracking to a booked patient are built in from the start, not learned on your budget.
Common Questions
Paid ads can put you in front of patients within days of launch - that's the real advantage over SEO. But the first few weeks are a learning period: the campaigns gather conversion data and we use it to cut waste and steer budget toward what actually books. Expect early enquiries quickly, and genuine efficiency - a stable, falling cost per booking - over the first two to three months. You get realistic expectations on the strategy call, not day-one promises.
Book a 30-minute strategy call and we'll review your current paid media - your spend, targeting, ad copy, tracking and the landing pages your clicks actually hit - show you exactly where budget is leaking and patients are dropping off, and outline the fastest wins. No pitch, no obligation.
Primary · Strategy Call
We'll review your current paid media, show you exactly where budget is leaking and patients are dropping off, and outline the fastest wins - you'll leave with a clearer picture either way.
Book a Strategy CallSecondary · Free Ads Audit
Get a free ads audit instead - a written breakdown of your Google and Meta accounts, delivered to your inbox, no call required.
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