From one fisherman to another: here’s how to actually make a $300/month ad budget work for your guide business.
Let’s keep it real — most marketing agencies don’t even want to talk to you unless you’ve got a thousand bucks or more to throw around each month. But here’s the thing: you don’t need a huge budget to run smart, effective Google Ads campaigns for fishing charters. In fact, if I had just $300 a month for marketing a fishing charter or guide service, I’d put that budget to work in two very specific ways — and both are built for one thing: landing actual clients.
This ain’t about fluff or “brand awareness.” This is about low-hanging fruit — people who are already looking for exactly what you do, in exactly the place you do it. And we’re going to use Google Search and Google Display to get in front of them at the right time.
Let’s break it down.
First Things First: Nail the Google Search Campaign
If I’m running a tight budget, I’m skipping YouTube, skipping Facebook, and heading straight to Google Search. Why? Because the people searching “inshore fishing charters Naples FL” or “West Branch Delaware River fishing guides” are already in the market. They’re either planning a trip or staring at the weekend forecast, trying to figure out who’s going to put them on fish.
That’s the low-hanging fruit we’re after.
Let me give you two examples of how we do this:
Example 1: Inshore Fishing Charter in Naples, FL
Let’s say you’re running inshore trips for snook, redfish, and tarpon in the mangroves around Naples.
With a $300/month budget, I’d allocate around $9/day to a tightly focused Google Search campaign. Your ads would target high-intent search terms like:
- “Naples FL inshore fishing charter”
- “guided snook fishing trips Naples”
- “Naples tarpon fishing guide”
Not “Florida fishing charters” or even “fishing in naples” — those are too broad. We’re going after exactly what you do in your exact area.
I’d keep the ad groups inside your search campaign clean and simple, each focused on a specific target like tarpon, redfish, or family-friendly trips. And I’d write ad copy that matches those themed ad groups and speaks like we do — no corporate jargon. Most advertisers seem to write their ads like computers with keywords stuffed everywhere possible – and most end up looking the exact same. An ad that feels like it was actually written by the captain/guide usually wins.
With the right keywords and a clean landing page, even a $9/day campaign will get clicks from people ready to book. And with good conversion tracking in place, we’ll know exactly what’s working.
Example 2: Fly Fishing Guide on the West Branch of the Delaware River
Now let’s talk about one of my favorite places on the planet — the West Branch. If you’re a guide offering float or wade trips out of Hancock, NY, you’re sitting on some serious search demand during spring and early summer.
For your Google Search campaign, I’d focus on keywords like:
- “West Branch Delaware River fly fishing guide”
- “guided float trips West Branch Delaware”
- “Hancock NY fishing guides”
Again, we’re keeping it tight and targeting anglers who already know what they want. They’re not daydreaming — they’re booking.
A $9/day budget here can go a long way if we focus on the right keywords and keep our bids strategic. We don’t need to show up for every search — just the ones that actually lead to bookings.
Speaking of the West Branch, here’s a pic of me with a stud of a dry fly sipping brown trout from a recent trip down there. It’s just under 2 hours from where I live and I love taking my drift boat there a few times each season. This one took a size 18 sulphur spinner right off the back lawn of our Air BnB.
Keep It Going With $1/Day Display Remarketing
Here’s the part most guides miss — staying visible after someone visits your site.
Let’s say someone clicks on your ad but doesn’t call or fill out your form. What do they do next? A lot of the time, they head straight to weather.com to check the forecast before booking a trip.
And guess what? That’s where your ads can show up again — thanks to Google Display remarketing.
If I’ve got $10/day to spend, I’m always carving out $1/day from the budget for remarketing ads. That’s just $30/month to stay in front of the exact people who already visited your website — people who are already interested in your trips.
They’ll be reading fishing forums, checking local news, or (like we said) looking at the 10-day forecast on weather.com… and bam, there’s your logo, a killer image of a happy client with a nice fish, and a seasonal call-to-action like “Now Booking Summer Dry Fly Fishing” or “Book Ahead For Fall Streamer Fishing”.
You’re not chasing them. You’re just reminding them you’re there — and that you’re the guide who’s got it dialed in.
So What’s The Breakdown?
Here’s how I’d stretch a $300 monthly budget:
- $270/month ($9/day): Google Search campaign targeting exact-match & selective phrase match keywords for phrases directly related to what you offer.
- $30/month ($1/day): Google Display remarketing campaign, showing image-based ads to people who already visited your website.
That’s it. No fancy software. No gimmicks. Just real ads, shown to real people, at the exact time they’re looking for what you offer.
The Takeaway
Look, $300/month isn’t going to flood your inbox overnight. But it’s enough to show up when someone searches for your exact service. It’s enough to keep your name and logo in front of potential clients while they plan. And if you’re tracking conversions properly, it’s enough to book a handful of trips that more than pay for your ad spend.
We’re not just throwing money at ads for the sake of it — we’re building something reliable. Something scalable. Something that works while you’re out fishing. The $300 mark is where a lot of my clients start their Google Ads journey. It’s plenty to prove success and gives us the data needed to decide how to play with budget based on seasonality. Any less though, and Google will struggle to show your ads often enough throughout the day to really move the needle for your business. You likely won’t get enough clicks to convert enough leads to have the math make sense when you’re paying us to manage campaigns and paying Google for your actual ad spend.
If this sounds like the kind of marketing you wish someone would just handle for you, that’s what we do at The Click Hatch. We’ll run these campaigns for you, make sure everything’s tracking, and keep your calendar filling up — one smart click at a time.
Want help running marketing for fishing charters? Shoot me a message and we’ll put together a plan that works for your budget and your fishery.
Tight lines,
Dan at The Click Hatch
