google ads for business in india: what works by industry, and when meta wins

google sells to people who already search for you. that makes it the first channel for some industries and the second for others. five sectors, the campaign type each should start with, the trap in each, and an honest google vs meta split.

our pillar on ai max for search campaigns in india explains how google now reads your pages and conversion data to decide who sees your ads. this guide applies that to google ads for business in india, one industry at a time: which campaign type to start with, which metric to judge it on, what the trap is, and when meta should get the first rupee instead.

• google holds about 97% of search in india (statcounter, march 2026, as reported by exchange4media).
• google's housing targeting restrictions apply to audiences in the us and canada only (google ads policy). in india, the binding rule for property ads is rera.
• india is a supported country for free product listings through merchant center (google merchant center help).
• call-only ads can no longer be created and stop serving in february 2027; call assets replace them (google ads help).
• we found no local services ads programme for india as of 29 october 2026.

google ads for business in india: which industries should start with google?

start with google if buyers in your industry already search for what you sell, with a place, a budget or a problem in the query. real estate, local services, coaching and b2b software usually qualify. d2c brands qualify through shopping. categories people don't yet know to search for usually start on meta, with google catching the demand meta creates.

this is our working view, not a google benchmark. "search intent strength" means how often buyers type the exact thing they want.

one new placement: google announced on 28 october 2026 that ads in ai mode are scaling to india, in english (google). they serve from existing campaigns, so the structure below still applies.

google ads for real estate india: what do rera and google's policies require?

google ads for real estate india should show the project's rera registration number in the ad, send each project to its own page with the authority's website, and be judged on cost per site visit. google's housing targeting limits cover the us and canada, not india, so rera and state orders set the rules here.

what we did

for lodha developers, 45 flats were sold, with sales attributed 100% to digital, at a conversion rate 3.8x the industry average. that is a digital programme result, not a google-only one. what carries over is the tracking: every lead traced to source. for another developer, average time-to-lead was 18 days, so we never judge a property search campaign on its first week.

google's policy and rera

google's 2020 policy bars housing advertisers from targeting by gender, age, parental or marital status or zip code, but only for us and canadian audiences (google ads policy; faq). nri campaigns aimed there must comply. we found no separate google housing policy for india.

rera fills that gap. section 3 of the rera act, 2016 bars advertising a project before it is registered. section 11(2) requires every advertisement to show the registration number and the authority's website, as quoted in a haryana rera order and andhra pradesh rera's guidelines. maharera's order list shows order 46c/2025 of 8 april 2025 on qr codes and font size (maharera). a search ad has no room for a qr code, so put the registration number in a description or callout asset and the qr code and website on the page, as our landing page guide covers. this is general information, not legal advice.

what to copy

• one search campaign per project, with its own budget and rera number in the ads.
• exclusions for "rent", "pg", "jobs" and other cities from day one.
• "site visit done" imported from the crm as the primary conversion.

google shopping ads india: how should a d2c brand use merchant center?

google shopping ads in india start in merchant center, not in google ads. get the feed approved and use free listings to see which products earn clicks for nothing. then run shopping or performance max on that feed. standard shopping gives more control; performance max reaches more inventory but needs clean conversion values and brand exclusions.

what we did, and what we didn't

for one d2c brand, ai retargeting delivered a 4.5x roas. we don't present that as a google shopping result. the lesson that carries over: returning shoppers convert well, so check how much of any shopping or pmax "success" came from people who already knew you.

what google's documentation says

free listings can show products on the shopping tab, search, images, youtube and lens, and india is on the supported list, though google doesn't guarantee they show (google merchant center help).

on choosing a campaign: since october 2024, performance max no longer automatically wins over standard shopping for the same products in one account. ad rank decides, as reported by search engine land. standard shopping keeps its own priority setting (google ads help).

feed health, custom labels and the new customer goal are covered step by step in our performance max guide.

what to copy

• fix titles, images, prices and stock first.
• label products by margin, then split budgets by label.
• start with standard shopping on a small catalogue; test pmax once value data is clean.
• run brand in search; exclude it from pmax.

google ads for local business: what works for academies, clinics and service firms?

google ads for local business in india means search campaigns tied to a tight radius, with location assets from your business profile and call assets on every ad. we found no local services ads programme for india, and call-only ads are being retired, so the job falls to search, assets and a fast reply.

what changed in 2026

• location assets pull your address, phone and hours from a linked google business profile, and closed locations don't show in ads (google ads help; location asset requirements).
• call ads are ending. google stopped new call-only ads from february 2026 and existing ones stop serving in february 2027; responsive search ads with call assets replace them (google ads help).
• local services ads (the "google guaranteed" format) aren't available in india as far as we can verify. coverage of the programme, such as ignite visibility, lists the us, canada, the uk and much of europe.
• lead form assets work on search and performance max, with eligibility based on policy history and spend or advertiser verification (google ads help).

what we did

for sports for life, a whatsapp ai agent delivered 5x faster first response, 60%+ qualification, zero manual first-touch and 200+ trial bookings in the first month. that is a follow-up result, not a google ads result, but local search leads go cold just as fast. the build is in our whatsapp ai agent case study.

what to copy

• a radius around each centre, with one ad group per centre or area name.
• location and call assets on every campaign; set the call schedule to staffed hours.
• negatives for "jobs", "salary", "franchise" and "free" (our search ads guide has the shared-list routine).
• an automatic whatsapp or sms reply within minutes of every form or missed call.

google ads for saas: how should b2b software spend on an indian budget?

google ads for saas should buy only the searches that signal a buyer: your category with "software" or "tool", competitor names, "alternative to" terms and pricing queries. on an indian budget, skip broad research terms entirely. judge the campaign on demos or qualified trials from the crm, never on clicks or signups.

an honest note on our saas result

for one saas client, a targeted linkedin and meta mix delivered 3x trial signups. that result did not come from google, and we won't dress it up as one. our think labs story shows what positioning looks like before search demand exists.

when google does fit saas

google fits once people search for your category by name, because search then captures buyers comparing tools. our pillar's ai max table limits search term matching to high-intent ad groups and url expansion to product and demo pages, or ai max finds "how to" and student traffic.

what to copy

• three ad groups to start: category terms, competitor and alternative terms, and your brand.
• negatives for "free", "download", "course", "jobs", "salary", "meaning" and "pdf".
• a pricing or demo page as the destination, never the home page.

google ads vs facebook ads: how should you split budget for lead generation?

for google ads vs facebook ads, the deciding question is whether demand already exists. if people already type your category into google, start with search and add meta to grow demand. if they don't know your category exists, start with meta. most indian lead-gen accounts end up running both, with google catching the searches meta creates.

for marut drones, we ran meta and google together across 13 states, with state-specific creative and forms. that mix took ₹25 lakh to ₹8.7 crore, with 23,420 leads and a 36x roas peak (case study). the industry-by-industry meta view is in our meta ads by industry guide.

illustrative example: a starting budget split

illustrative example with made-up numbers, not client data: how we'd split ₹1,00,000 in month one.

move money monthly towards the lowest cost per qualified lead in your crm (the arithmetic).

which google campaign type should you run by industry?

real estate, local services and saas should start with search and add performance max only after a month of qualified conversions. d2c should start with shopping or pmax on a clean feed. agriculture and new categories should run search on product terms beside meta. every industry should optimise for a crm stage, not a form fill.

who wrote this, how and why

puneetraj chavan wrote this. he is the founder of rapchik media and has spent 8+ years running performance marketing and automation for 30+ brands across india and the us. client results are from our campaign data. external sources were checked on 29 october 2026. platform-reported figures were not independently audited.

budget splits are illustrative. we wrote this because founders keep asking "should we be on google or meta?", and the honest answer depends on whether their buyers already search.

• google policy and assets: personalised advertising policy for housing · call ads to call assets · location assets · lead form assets
• shopping: merchant center free listings · standard shopping campaign priority · search engine land on pmax and standard shopping · google: ads in ai mode expand to india
• rera and india: haryana rera order on section 11(2) · andhra pradesh rera advertisement guidelines · maharera orders · exchange4media on india search share

want help deciding where your first rupee goes? see our performance marketing services or talk to us.

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written by puneetraj chavan

founder of rapchik media. 8+ years scaling 30+ brands across india and the us, from agri-drones to a us job portal. strategy and execution, same brain.

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