PPC for plastic surgeons works best when you treat Google search as a cost-research tool, because that is how patients use it. The largest plastic surgery searches are cost questions, asked weeks or months before a consult. This guide builds Google Ads campaigns around those searches: which ones to pay for, how to structure campaigns, which searches to block, what the landing page needs, and how to measure consults instead of clicks.
Procedure searches worth paying for
Not every plastic surgery search is worth a click. Pay for searches that show a person is considering a procedure you perform, in your area, at your price point.
Worth paying for:
- Procedure plus cost: "tummy tuck cost," "breast augmentation cost"
- Procedure plus location: "mommy makeover near me," "blepharoplasty [city]"
- Procedure plus surgeon: "tummy tuck surgeon," "plastic surgeon for eyelid surgery"
- Your own names: the practice and each surgeon, in a separate brand campaign
Usually not worth paying for:
- Pure research with no buying signal: "what is a BBL," "tummy tuck scar pictures"
- Searches for a competitor by name, unless you've decided to compete on them
- Procedures you don't perform or don't want more of
Start with one or two procedures you want to grow, not your whole menu. For a channel-by-channel view, see plastic surgery advertising; for the wider plan, see the plastic surgery marketing hub.
Cost-research keywords and click costs
These are the five largest cost searches in the specialty:
| Search (US) | Monthly volume | Avg. CPC |
|---|---|---|
| tummy tuck cost | 33,100 | $9.37 |
| blepharoplasty cost | 33,100 | $4.89 |
| mommy makeover cost | 14,800 | $8.86 |
| breast augmentation cost | 9,900 | $7.72 |
| bbl cost | 9,900 | $7.39 |
Google Ads Keyword Planner data via DataForSEO, US, 12-month average to Sep 2026.
Volumes are national; your metro sees a fraction of them. Click prices in your area can be higher or lower than these averages depending on competition.
Hypothetical arithmetic: a $3,000 monthly budget on tummy tuck cost searches at the $9.37 average buys about 320 clicks. If 5% become inquiries (16), half attend a consult (8) and a quarter of those book (2), the cost per surgery is $1,500 before management fees. Swap in your own rates; these are placeholders, not benchmarks.
Campaign structure by procedure and location
A clean structure makes the account readable and the budget controllable.
- One campaign per procedure family (breast, body, face), or per high-value procedure if budget allows. Each gets its own budget so tummy tucks can't starve eyelids.
- Ad groups by intent: cost searches, procedure-near-me searches, surgeon searches. Each ad group gets ads and a landing page that match its intent.
- A separate brand campaign for the practice and surgeon names, with its own small budget.
- Location targeting to the area patients will realistically travel from for surgery, which is usually wider than for a med spa visit. Use "presence" targeting so you reach people in the area, not just people interested in it.
- Ad schedule that matches when your coordinator can answer calls. Lower bids or use forms-only ads after hours.
- Assets: call, sitemap links to cost and credentials pages, and a callout naming board certification.
Policy checks before launch. As checked on October 22, 2026:
- Google's Healthcare and medicines policy (opens in a new tab) restricts prescription drug terms and other categories. Surgical procedures aren't in its certification lists, but if the account also promotes injectables, check drug terms before using brand names.
- Cosmetic surgery is a sensitive category in Google's health in personalized advertising (opens in a new tab) policy. Customer Match, your data segments and lookalike segments aren't supported, and advertiser-curated audiences can't be used. Search keywords and Google's predefined audiences still work.
- Google's teen protections (opens in a new tab) restrict ads for cosmetic procedures from users under 18.
- Image assets can't contain sexual content, and Google's sexual content policy (opens in a new tab) counts visible female breasts and buttocks as nudity.
Claims in ad copy. Make no outcome promises. The ASPS Code of Ethics (opens in a new tab) treats promises of satisfaction, claims of superiority that can't be verified, and "board certified" claims without an ABMS-recognized board as misleading.
Illustrative example (fictional practice): Headline: "Tummy Tuck Cost Explained." Description: "See what's included: surgeon, anesthesia, facility. Board-certified plastic surgeon. Request a consult." Not: "Get the flat stomach you deserve" or "Best tummy tuck in Texas."
Negative keywords for plastic surgery accounts
Negative keywords stop your ads from showing for searches you don't want. Add these before launch, then review search terms weekly. More on building them in negative keyword lists.
Starter list:
| Group | Negatives |
|---|---|
| Price shoppers | cheap, cheapest, free, low cost, discount, coupon, deal |
| Medical travel | abroad, overseas, mexico, tijuana, colombia, dominican republic, turkey, thailand, costa rica, brazil |
| Jobs and training | jobs, salary, career, nurse, school, residency, fellowship, course, training, how to become |
| Insurance-only (cosmetic-only practices) | covered by insurance, insurance cover, medicare, medicaid, workers comp |
| Non-surgical or DIY | at home, exercises, cream, pills, without surgery, non surgical |
| Bad-outcome research | gone wrong, botched, death, lawsuit, malpractice |
Adjust to your practice. If you perform reconstructive breast surgery, don't block "insurance" or "reconstruction." If you offer non-surgical treatments, move those to their own campaign instead of blocking them.
Landing pages for cost-researching patients
Someone who searched "mommy makeover cost" should land on a page that answers cost, not a home page or a gallery.
The page needs, in this order:
- The cost answer: your range or what drives the fee, the consult fee, financing options.
- Who performs it: certification by the American Board of Plastic Surgery, with a link to the ABPS certification lookup (opens in a new tab), and the accredited facility.
- Recovery in brief, with a link to the full procedure page.
- A small set of consented cases for this procedure.
- A short consult form and a tap-to-call number.
Keep it fast on phones and keep ad pixels off the form and confirmation page. Then measure the next step: qualify plastic surgery leads by procedure, timing and budget so you can see which keywords produce surgeries.
Common mistakes:
- Sending every ad to the home page.
- Broad match without negatives on day one.
- Optimizing to clicks or form fills that never become consults.
- Letting the agency own the account.
- Running one budget across all procedures.
Managing it yourself vs Medfy's Google Ads add-on
Doing it yourself works if someone on staff has a few hours each week to read search terms, add negatives, check spend pacing and update ads. Our guide to Google Ads for practices covers the basics.
Medfy's Google Ads management add-on ($199/month) does the daily work inside guardrails you set:
- Daily search-term reviews and negative keywords
- Budget pacing with a monthly ceiling you control
- Ad copy suggestions checked against healthcare policy
- Every change logged and reversible
- Suggest-only or auto-apply for safe changes; budget increases wait for your approval, and daily changes are capped
Ad spend is paid directly to Google, never marked up, and ad platforms never receive patient data. Medfy's first-party analytics count calls, forms and bookings by source so you can see which campaigns produce consults. It can't promise a number of patients; nobody honestly can. See Google Ads add-on pricing, or audit your Google Ads first with the free audit.
Frequently asked questions
How much should a plastic surgeon spend on Google Ads?
There is no standard figure. Start with a budget large enough to buy a few hundred clicks a month on one or two procedures, then judge by cost per consult and cost per surgery, not clicks. Average clicks on the main cost searches run from $4.89 to $9.37 in the US, so the same budget buys about twice as many eyelid-surgery clicks as tummy tuck clicks.
Do Google Ads work for plastic surgery?
They can, because people search for procedures and prices before they book. Results depend on matching each search to a page that answers it, blocking cheap, abroad and job searches, answering inquiries quickly and tracking consults rather than clicks. No one can promise a number of patients. Test one procedure at a time and keep what produces surgeries at a cost you accept.
What keywords should plastic surgeons target?
Start with procedure-plus-cost and procedure-plus-location searches for operations you want more of, such as tummy tuck cost, blepharoplasty cost, mommy makeover cost, breast augmentation cost and BBL cost, plus procedure near me terms. Add your surgeon and practice names in a separate brand campaign. Exclude cheap, free, abroad, jobs and training searches from day one.