Lead generation for professional services is the work of turning people who search Google for an architect, a surveyor or an engineer into quote requests for your practice, and measuring what each request costs and how many become paid jobs. In the UK "architect near me" and "structural engineer near me" are each searched 6,600 times a month, while "lead generation for professional services" gets 10 (DataForSEO, Google Ads UK, 12 November 2026).
So the demand is there. Most practices just look for it in the wrong place.
The mistakes we see most often when a technical practice asks us how to find clients are three:
- waiting for referrals while the person who needs drawings or a survey calls the first name Google shows them;
- paying a directory without counting the enquiries it sends;
- counting contacts instead of jobs: on the Italian "surveyor + city" searches we read, 13 results out of 30 were job ads or the professional body's own pages, and nobody arriving from there is about to hire you.
We don't have an architecture practice among our projects. We do have two companies that measure every enquiry. Contesini Consulenze started Google Ads from scratch: 299 enquiries at €7.20 each, with 68% becoming a sales opportunity. Macropix makes LED walls and has received 2,906 enquiries from Google Ads since 2018, at €39.44 each in 2025.
What does that have to do with a technical practice?
Those numbers exist because every enquiry was counted and tied to its channel. A practice needs the same sum: how much do I spend for every job I sign?
In this guide:
- who holds the searches for "architect" and "surveyor" in three Italian cities;
- the four channels that bring in work;
- the cost-per-enquiry formula, with real CPCs;
- which enquiries to drop;
- what advertising rules allow on ads, prices and reviews.
A note on scope: this guide covers technical professions (architects, surveyors, engineers) and consultants without a regulated title. Other practices have their own guides: law firms, accountants, payroll consultants, financial advisers and psychologists.
Let's start with the data.
Where people look for an architect or a surveyor (6 searches, 3 cities, 58 results)
People looking for a technical professional type the profession and the city, and land on a page split between practices, directories, the professional body and job ads. On 12 November 2026 we read the mobile first pages for "architetto" (architect) and "geometra" (the Italian surveyor and building technician) in Rome, Turin and Brescia, with the location set in each city: of 58 organic results, only 24 were practice websites.
| Search (Italy) | Searches a month | Average CPC | Practice sites in top 10 | Directories | Professional body | Job ads | Map (reviews, top 3) | AI Overview |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| architect, Rome | 1,300 | $5.25 | 4 of 9 | 3 | 1 | 1 | none | none |
| surveyor, Rome | 590 | $2.86 | 8 of 10 (6 from one site) | 1 | 0 | 1 | 465, 247, 258 | yes, cites the body |
| architect, Turin | 1,000 | $2.67 | 5 of 9 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 103, 36, 12 | yes, body, Houzz, Spazi Belli |
| surveyor, Turin | 480 | $2.32 | 1 of 10 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 179, 66, 248 | yes, body and 5 practices |
| architect, Brescia | 170 | $2.07 | 6 of 10 | 3 | 0 | 1 | none | yes, body and 2 practices |
| surveyor, Brescia | 210 | $3.19 | 0 of 10 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 5, 2, 54 (the body) | yes, body, PagineGialle, Indeed |
| Total | 3,750 | $2.07 to $5.25 | 24 of 58 | 16 | 8 | 9 | 4 pages of 6 | 5 pages of 6 |
Three things stand out.
The map decides surveyor searches. In Rome and Turin the top listings have hundreds of reviews (465 for the first in Rome). In Brescia the map shows listings with 5, 2 and 1 review, plus the professional body in third place: a few reviews would get you in.
One site holds six of ten positions in Rome. It is a surveying practice with a page for every district (Centocelle, Fidene, Monte Mario, Labaro, Acilia, La Storta). Not elegant. It works.
Nobody is buying ads. Across six pages with CPCs of $2 to $5 we did not find a single ad.
The UK picture has the same shape with bigger numbers: "surveyor near me" gets 1,900 searches a month at an average CPC of $10.13, against $6.38 for "architect near me" (DataForSEO, Google Ads UK). We did not run the city-by-city survey in the UK, so treat the Italian table as Italian.
The four channels that bring work to a technical practice (and what each does)
The channels that bring enquiries to an architect, a surveyor or an engineer are four: the Google Business Profile, a website with a page per service, Google Ads and directories.
Google Business Profile
It carries the most weight on "surveyor + city" searches: in 4 pages of 6 the local pack sits above the organic results. Google says local results are mainly based on relevance, distance and popularity, and reviews count towards popularity.
The gap between 2 reviews and 465 closes by asking every client for a review when the job ends. How to set up a listing for the practice and for each professional is in our guide to Google Business Profile for practitioners.
A website with a page for every service
A surveyor's client rarely searches for the title. They search for the job: a building permit, an energy certificate, a land registry change. In Italy "geometra cila" (a surveyor for a renovation notice) gets 40 searches a month at an average CPC of $6.41, more than double "surveyor, Rome": whoever types it already has work to hand out.
The Roman practice holding six positions made the same choice by geography: one page per district. The pages and details a practice site needs are in how to build a website for professionals; how to rank them is in our guide to SEO for professional services.
Google Ads
The fastest channel. With CPCs of $2.07 to $5.25 and no competitor on the page, a practice can buy the top spots cheaply. Account structure, negative keywords and budget are in Google Ads for professional services; here the point is the cost per enquiry.
Directories and platforms
Houzz, Edilportale, ProntoPro, AddLance: 16 results out of 58 are directories. In Rome Houzz lists 1,499 architects on the same page, so the visibility is real but shared.
On Houzz Italy the basic profile costs nothing; the Pro plan is €119 a month after a 30-day trial and advertising starts at €299 a month (Italian price page checked on 12 November 2026). ProntoPro appears in two of our pages with 802 and 334 reviews, but its price per enquiry is not published on the official pages we opened: ask before you sign up.
What an enquiry costs, channel by channel (the formula, with real CPCs)
Cost per enquiry is what you spend divided by the enquiries you get. On Google Ads: cost per enquiry = average CPC ÷ share of clicks that become an enquiry.
Here it is with the CPCs from the table and two stated assumptions, 5% and 10% of clicks:
| Search | Average CPC | Cost per enquiry at 10% | Cost per enquiry at 5% |
|---|---|---|---|
| architect, Rome | $5.25 | $52.50 | $105 |
| surveyor, Turin | $2.32 | $23.20 | $46.40 |
| architect near me (UK) | $6.38 | $63.80 | $127.60 |
| surveyor near me (UK) | $10.13 | $101.30 | $202.60 |
And a directory?
The same sum, with the fee instead of the CPC. A €299-a-month Houzz advertising package costs €59.80 per enquiry if it brings five, €29.90 if it brings ten. If it brings one in a month, that enquiry cost €299.
Then comes the step almost nobody takes: dividing the cost per enquiry by the share of enquiries that become jobs. If a surveyor in Turin pays $23.20 per enquiry and wins one in four, each job costs about $93 in advertising. Set against the fee for the job, that number tells you whether the channel pays.
The cost you don't see is time: every wrong enquiry is a phone call, a site visit, a quote written for nothing.
Do you know what each job from Google costs you?
With CPCs of a few dollars and no competitors on the page, the problem is rarely the price of the click: it is the enquiry nobody tracks, or the page that doesn't convince. Let's look at your listing, service pages, campaigns and tracking together.
Book a strategy callWhich enquiries never become jobs (job seekers, the professional body, price shoppers)
A qualified enquiry is a contact with work to hand out, in your area, on a workable timeline. The rest should be spotted straight away.
The table shows three sources of wrong enquiries:
- job seekers: 7 results out of 30 on the "surveyor + city" searches are job ads (Indeed, Jobijoba, Adzuna, Randstad). Some of the people filling in your form want a job, not a surveyor;
- people looking for the professional body: it appears in 8 results out of 58 and the AI Overview cites it in 5 pages out of 5. Those searches are about the register, not necessarily about hiring;
- price shoppers: "quanto costa un architetto" (how much an architect costs) gets 170 searches a month in Italy. On platforms one request reaches several professionals: ProntoPro, in the Brescia result, promises "4 preventivi personalizzati" (4 tailored quotes).
The filter belongs in the form, with four fields: type of job, property location, timing, whether a builder is already involved. With those you drop the job application and the out-of-area quote before calling back. When enquiries pile up, you need a CRM: we compare the common ones in the best lead generation tools.
On Google Ads the same sources become negative keywords: "jobs", "vacancies", "register", "membership".
A benchmark for your filter: for Contesini 68% of enquiries become a sales opportunity. If yours are far below, the problem is not the channel but the searches you appear on. How to count them is in website not generating leads.
What you can say in an ad or on your site (the Italian rules, and what to check at home)
In Italy a registered professional can advertise by any means, Google Ads and directories included, as long as the advertising is informative, truthful and not disparaging. That is article 4 of Presidential Decree 137/2012, which allows "informative advertising by any means" on activity, specialisms, qualifications, practice structure and "fees requested".
So fees can be published. The limits are confidentiality and anything "misleading, deceptive or disparaging", and a breach is a disciplinary offence.
The Italian codes of conduct add detail. For architects, article 36 of the CNAPPC code (in force from 2 December 2024) lets the local Order "check or monitor" its members' ad campaigns. For surveyors, article 12 of the CNGeGL code allows advertising on the features, results and fee of a service and bans "misleading advertising, however carried out".
Outside Italy, check your own regulator's code before you write an ad that compares you with other firms or names a client. In practice: no "cheapest surveyor in town", which you cannot prove, and no site photos with a client's address without their consent.
On reviews Google's rule is the same everywhere: businesses must not "offer incentives" for a review or "selectively solicit positive reviews from customers". Ask everyone, with no discounts attached.
How ChatGPT and AI Overviews name you when someone looks for a surveyor (the professional body in 5 answers out of 5)
When someone looks for a technical professional, AI answers name the register first and then, if they can find them, practices with clear details. In our six Italian pages the AI Overview appeared in 5 and cited the Order or Board in all 5.
Practices got in only twice. In Turin, for "surveyor", the AI Overview named five practices, two taken straight from their Google listing, with address and services. In Brescia, for "architect", it named two.
What did they have in common?
A listing with categories and services filled in, and a website that names each service. ChatGPT, asked through DataForSEO by an architect looking for clients, gave the same advice: Google listing, one page per service, reviews.
You cannot get cited on demand. You can be citable: the same name, services and area on your listing, your site and your register profile. More in our guide to local AI visibility and on our GEO service page.
Consultants without a regulated title: what changes (health and safety, food safety, business advice)
For a consultant without a regulated title lead generation works the same way, but the client is nearly always a company. In Italy "RSPP esterno" (outsourced health and safety officer) gets 320 searches a month at an average CPC of $12.24, more than double "architect, Rome"; "consulente HACCP" (food safety consultant) gets 210 at $2.42.
The form filter changes too: sector, headcount and compliance deadline matter more than location. If most of your clients are companies, the full method is in our guide to B2B lead generation, and a comparison with other practices is in marketing for accountants and professional firms.
Frequently asked questions
It depends: it is worth it if you know how many enquiries it sends and how many become jobs. On Houzz Italy advertising starts at €299 a month: with five enquiries that is €59.80 each. ProntoPro does not publish its price on its official pages, so ask first.
It depends on the CPC and on how many clicks become enquiries. With the UK average CPC of $6.38 for "architect near me", an enquiry costs $63.80 if 10% of clicks convert and $127.60 if 5% do.
Yes, in Italy. Article 4 of Presidential Decree 137/2012 allows informative advertising on "fees requested", as long as it is truthful and not misleading. Elsewhere, check your regulator's code.
Yes, but ask all of them and offer nothing in return. Google's policy bans incentives for reviews and asking only happy clients.
It depends on how fast you need enquiries. Google Ads brings contacts from day one, and on the six Italian searches we read there was no paid competitor; SEO and the Google listing cost less over time but take months and reviews.
Lead generation for professionals, in short (and the number to check on Monday)
6,600 UK searches a month for an architect nearby.
24 practice sites out of 58 results.
No ads across six pages.
The professional body cited by AI in 5 answers out of 5.
Fees can be published, reviews should be asked of everyone.
The demand is there and few competitors are on the page. What is almost always missing is knowing which channel brought in the last job.
On Monday, open the enquiries from the last three months and mark where each came from and whether it became a job. That sheet is worth more than any new channel, and if you want to set it up with us, start from our lead generation page.
