AAMCO and the dealer own the obvious terms
They bid on “transmission repair” in every city. Beating them head-on costs more than it earns. Beating them on specific symptoms and makes does not.
One rebuild pays for a month of ads. One week of broad match wastes it.
A slipping transmission is a scary, expensive problem, and the owner searches hard before they commit. Clicks cost $10 to $30, the dealer and the national chains are already there, and half the searches are people trying to figure out if a fluid change will save them.
We separate the rebuild and replacement searches from the maintenance ones, bid for the big jobs, and track calls to the approved estimate so you know which keywords pay for the lift.
Rebuilds and replacements from $2,000 to $7,000. The upside is real. So is the waste, and here’s where it usually comes from.
They bid on “transmission repair” in every city. Beating them head-on costs more than it earns. Beating them on specific symptoms and makes does not.
“Transmission slipping” might be a $4k rebuild or a $150 fluid service. The ad and the page have to sort them before your service writer does.
“Transmission replacement cost” is a person calling five shops for the lowest number. Worth a call, not worth top bid.
Campaigns by symptom and by make: Slipping, won’t shift, grinding, check engine codes, plus the makes you rebuild most (Ford, Chevy, Honda, Nissan CVTs). Each gets its own ad and page.Bid for the diagnosis: Free or low-cost diagnostic offers pull the real cases in. We test the offer, then bid hardest on whatever converts to approved estimates.Towing and radius: If you tow, say so in the ad. Bids reach a little further, because a car that can’t drive doesn’t care about distance.Estimate tracking: Call tracking tied to your shop software (Tekmetric, Shop-Ware, Mitchell) so Google bids toward approved rebuilds instead of every ring.Examples from transmission repair accounts. The real lists run to hundreds of terms and get reviewed every week.
Your account is run by two PPC pros with 20+ years each. No handoff to a coordinator juggling 35 accounts.
Not quarterly. Not “when the algorithm settles”. Every week, by hand, so the junk never gets a chance to pile up.
Your Google Ads account, your data, your tracking, from day one. Leave anytime and take it all with you.
Who likes 12-month contracts? We don’t. We earn the next quarter by making the last one pay.
In most metros, $3k to $7k a month gets a shop steady rebuild work. In the biggest cities with the chains bidding, more. A single rebuild or two covers it, which is the point.
No. One transmission shop per metro. We can’t run your account honestly while bidding on the same terms for a competitor.
Yes. We record calls, score them, and pull approved estimates from your shop software so the numbers you see are jobs, not inquiries.
Your van is the shop. Every wasted click is a wasted drive.
How we run it →Fast decisions, insurance in the middle, and a national brand on every keyword. We know the game.
How we run it →The insurer steers. The consolidators advertise. The owner still picks. Be there when they do.
How we run it →Talk to a senior PPC expert who has run transmission repair accounts. Never a junior.