Google Ads for a taxi company: what to bid on and what to avoid

Google Ads can fill your phones or burn your money, and the difference is mostly in the set-up. This guide covers what a taxi company should bid on, what to block, the rules on rival firms' names and on the word "taxi", how phone calls from adverts work now that call ads are being retired, and how to set a budget you can test without regret.

Is Google Ads worth it for a taxi company?

Google Ads is worth it when a booking from an advert costs you less than the money you keep from that job. Work that sum out before you spend anything.

Start with what you keep from an average job: your commission, or your weekly driver rent spread across the jobs you give out. Then:

Example: if you keep £6 from an average job and your ads cost £300 a month, you need 50 jobs a month from the ads just to break even (£300 ÷ £6 = 50).

To know whether you got those 50 jobs, you need to count bookings by where they came from, including the phone bookings. Our guide to where your taxi bookings come from shows how to tag them.

Get the free stuff right first. Your Google Business Profile is the listing on the map, and our guide to the Google Business Profile for taxi firms covers it. Ads sit above it, and they're best at the searches your listing doesn't already win.

What keywords should a taxi company bid on?

Searches that name a place and a journey, from people who want a car. Broad words on their own, such as "taxi", bring in everyone from tourists to people researching the trade.

How tightly a keyword matches is up to you. Google's three match types are broad (no symbols), which can show your ad on searches related to the keyword; phrase ("taxi to bristol airport"), which shows it on searches that include the keyword's meaning; and exact ([taxi to bristol airport]), which shows it on searches with the same meaning or intent.

Start with phrase and exact match on the places you actually serve. Loosen it later, once you can see what people type.

Which searches should you block with negative keywords?

Block the searches from people looking for work, a licence or a toy, not a car. Negative keywords stop your ads showing on searches you don't want to pay for.

Words to add as negatives from day one:

• jobs, vacancies, careers, recruitment
• licence, license, badge, knowledge test
• insurance, finance, for sale, lease
• course, training, game, toy, model
• towns and airports you don't cover

Add both spellings and the plurals yourself. Google says negative keywords don't match close variants, so "licence" won't block "license" and "job" won't block "jobs".

Then check the search terms report every week for the first month. It shows the searches that led to your ads being shown, and you can add any that don't fit straight in as negatives. Ten minutes a week in that report is where the wasted spend shows up.

Can you bid on another taxi firm's name?

Google won't stop you using a competitor's name as a keyword, but it can stop you putting that name in your advert, and the law still applies.

Google's trade mark policy says it will not restrict trade marks used as keywords. When a trade mark owner complains, Google reviews it and may restrict the trade mark in ad text, including in ads from a direct competitor, and those restrictions are generally applied on an ongoing basis to ads from the same domain. Google also says it abides by local trade mark laws, so its policy isn't permission.

Your licence matters too. Birmingham City Council's operator conditions say a private hire operator must not advertise in a way that causes confusion with another operator licensed by the council or a neighbouring council.

If you bid on a rival's name, write the ad about you: your name, your price, your number. And expect the same back. Bidding on your own firm's name keeps your ad above anyone else's when a regular searches for you.

Can a private hire firm use the word "taxi" in its ads?

Not in London. Section 31 of the Private Hire Vehicles (London) Act 1998 makes it an offence to issue an advert for London private hire services that includes "taxi", "taxis", "cab" or "cabs", or words likely to be confused with them. "Minicab" is allowed. The offence carries a fine up to level 4 on the standard scale and has been in force since 1 June 2003.

Outside London, your council decides. Birmingham's operator conditions say no notice, sign or advertisement for a private hire operator, wherever it's displayed, may include the words "TAXI", "CAB" or "For Hire". Other councils have their own wording, so read your licence conditions before you write a single headline.

Keywords aren't shown to the searcher. Your headlines, descriptions and assets are, and those are your advertisement. If you're unsure about bidding on the word itself, ask your council's licensing team before you start. Hackney carriage proprietors can, of course, call themselves taxis.

Should you use call ads or call assets?

Call assets. Google's help page says the option to create new call ads was removed in February 2026, and existing call ads stop receiving impressions in February 2027. Google's own advice is to add your phone number to responsive search ads as call assets.

Call assets put a call button under your ad on mobile phones, and a "Call us" button with the number and a QR code on desktop. The number has to be verified: it must appear on your website, or your domain must be verified in Google Search Console. Under the advanced options you can schedule the call asset to show only on certain days and hours, and Google's own example is "only when your business is answering phone calls".

Turn on call reporting. It runs on Google forwarding numbers, so you can see the calls each advert produced, and you can count a call as a conversion once it lasts longer than a minimum length you set.

Ad calls that ring out are clicks you've paid for with nothing to show. An AI phone agent answers your booking line when your office doesn't, quotes your own fixed prices and books the job into your Dispatch AI account, which is one way to cover the hours your ads run and your office doesn't.

How should you set location targeting and the ad schedule?

Use location targeting to reach people where you work, and the ad schedule to run ads when you can take the job.

Google offers two location options. "Presence or interest", Google's recommended setting, reaches people in your chosen area and also people who've shown an interest in it. "Presence" reaches only people physically in the area. For everyday town searches, Presence stops you paying for someone three counties away reading about your town. For airport transfer searches, a separate campaign on Presence or interest can reach people booking their ride home before they fly back.

The ad schedule lets you choose the hours and days your ads show, and raise or lower your bids for particular times. Use it two ways: stop the ads when nobody can answer, and bid harder in your taxi busy periods, when your drivers can take the work.

How much should a taxi company spend on Google Ads?

Start with a daily budget you can afford to lose for a month while you test. Google treats your budget as an average daily budget: on a given day your campaign might spend up to twice that, but at the end of the month you will have spent no more than 30.4 times it.

Example: an average daily budget of £10 can spend up to £20 on a busy day, and no more than £304 in the month (£10 × 30.4). If you keep £6 from an average job, that month needs 51 jobs from the ads to break even (£304 ÷ £6 = 50.7).

Google's Keyword Planner shows estimated monthly searches for a keyword and the average cost for your ad to show on them. Check it for the searches in your own town before you choose a budget.

What should the advert and landing page say?

Your town, your price, your number, and one reason to book you. Send the click to a page about that journey, not your home page.

If you show prices, include the charges every customer has to pay. The Competition and Markets Authority's price transparency guidance treats online adverts as an invitation to purchase, says the total price should normally include any unavoidable charges, and says a "from" price is fine as long as it includes those charges and doesn't mislead. Under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 the CMA can fine a business up to 10% of turnover or £300,000, whichever is greater.

The landing page needs the phone number at the top, a booking form, clear prices and the council that licenses you. Leave out claims you can't prove, such as being the fastest in town. Our guide to a taxi website that gets bookings covers the rest of the page, and taxi company marketing ideas has cheaper ways to win work alongside ads.