BrightLocal vs. Google Ads

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
BrightLocal
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
BrightLocal is a search engine optimization tool that tracks search rankings, builds citations, and monitors online reviews and stresses local search performance.
$39
per month
Google Ads
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
Google Ads (formerly AdWords) is Google's pay-per-click online advertising program. With Google Ads users set their budget and choose where their ads appear in search listings, and on partner websites. Google Ads uses cost-per-click (CPC) bidding.
$500
in Ads credit in the first 60 days
Pricing
BrightLocalGoogle Ads
Editions & Modules
Track Plan
$39
per month
Manage Plan
$49
per month
Grow Plan
$59
per month
Offer A
$500
in Ads credit in the first 60 days
Offer B
$1500
in Ads credit in the first 60 days
Offer C
$3000
in Ads credit in the first 60 days
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BrightLocalGoogle Ads
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsBrightLocal offers custom enterprise plans for businesses with more than 50 locations.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
BrightLocalGoogle Ads
Considered Both Products
BrightLocal
Chose BrightLocal
BrightLocal was the best value I found for local SEO research and reporting features at a price that worked for a startup agency. The features are surprisingly robust for the price point, and I was able to service multiple clients from my account.
Google Ads

No answer on this topic

Features
BrightLocalGoogle Ads
SEO
Comparison of SEO features of Product A and Product B
BrightLocal
6.7
12 Ratings
15% below category average
Google Ads
-
Ratings
Keyword analysis7.08 Ratings00 Ratings
Backlink management4.05 Ratings00 Ratings
SERP ranking tracking7.711 Ratings00 Ratings
Page grader7.52 Ratings00 Ratings
Competitive analysis7.611 Ratings00 Ratings
Site audit / diagnostics9.98 Ratings00 Ratings
Site recommendations6.64 Ratings00 Ratings
Task management3.56 Ratings00 Ratings
SEO Channels
Comparison of SEO Channels features of Product A and Product B
BrightLocal
8.6
13 Ratings
12% above category average
Google Ads
-
Ratings
Local SEO8.613 Ratings00 Ratings
Social SEO7.96 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile SEO10.04 Ratings00 Ratings
Global SEO7.72 Ratings00 Ratings
SEO Platform & Account Management
Comparison of SEO Platform & Account Management features of Product A and Product B
BrightLocal
9.2
11 Ratings
8% above category average
Google Ads
-
Ratings
Multi-domain support8.59 Ratings00 Ratings
Integration with web analytics tools9.910 Ratings00 Ratings
Ad Campaigns
Comparison of Ad Campaigns features of Product A and Product B
BrightLocal
-
Ratings
Google Ads
6.1
8 Ratings
32% above category average
Ad campaign creation00 Ratings7.48 Ratings
Ad deployment00 Ratings7.17 Ratings
Display advertising00 Ratings7.48 Ratings
Ad display and retargeting segmentation00 Ratings7.28 Ratings
Sequence targeting00 Ratings5.67 Ratings
Contextual advertising00 Ratings6.28 Ratings
Social advertising00 Ratings2.03 Ratings
Ad Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Ad Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
BrightLocal
-
Ratings
Google Ads
7.1
8 Ratings
34% above category average
Ad dashboards00 Ratings6.78 Ratings
Ad performance reports00 Ratings8.28 Ratings
Ad conversion tracking00 Ratings7.48 Ratings
Ad attribution reporting00 Ratings7.48 Ratings
Ad forecasting and optimization00 Ratings6.08 Ratings
Ad Auctions
Comparison of Ad Auctions features of Product A and Product B
BrightLocal
-
Ratings
Google Ads
8.0
7 Ratings
18% above category average
Ad bidding00 Ratings8.07 Ratings
Best Alternatives
BrightLocalGoogle Ads
Small Businesses
Nozzle
Nozzle
Score 10.0 out of 10
Serpstat
Serpstat
Score 9.3 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Advanced Web Ranking
Advanced Web Ranking
Score 8.2 out of 10
WordStream
WordStream
Score 6.9 out of 10
Enterprises
Conductor
Conductor
Score 9.2 out of 10
Adobe Advertising Cloud
Adobe Advertising Cloud
Score 8.8 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
BrightLocalGoogle Ads
Likelihood to Recommend
8.6
(14 ratings)
8.5
(123 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
9.6
(21 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(14 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
7.5
(2 ratings)
9.0
(8 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
1.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
BrightLocalGoogle Ads
Likelihood to Recommend
BrightLocal
If you are a local business owner or marketing agency catering to local businesses, BrightLocal is a must have software. It has everything you need to track your local marketing efforts and to identify opportunities to make improvements, all at a very reasonable price point. You can also create nice looking reports to send to clients which are simple to create.
Read full review
Google
Google Ads is a useful advertising tool to build brand exposure and generate lead volumes for your chosen product. Whilst it can be costly at times due to competitor bidding strategies and requires constant monitoring to ensure campaigns perform as expected, it typically provides the desired quality and quantity of leads for custom budgets.
Read full review
Pros
BrightLocal
  • When we use BrightLocal's citation building service, I know that we're getting quality citations done right. Their staff will email you with any questions and always double check the information before creating inaccurate citations.
  • I love that BrightLocal is very quick about making changes when requested. For example, if we can't find a city on the drop-down list, you can chat them and they'll add it. Or if a report is pulling incorrectly, they'll re-run it within a reasonable timeframe.
  • BrightLocal has a lot of different reports that are easy to send to your clients. You can even add them to a web-viewable dashboard so that your client can simply bookmark a link and view their reports when they please.
Read full review
Google
  • Automated targeting via Smart Shopping campaign. It's one of the best campaign types in Google Ads. In the beginning, you may see lower revenue and ROAS, but once you give some meaningful time to your campaign, it is most likely to perform well.
  • Smart bidding strategies: Google Ads has developed some really great bidding strategies such as maximizing conversion and maximizing conversion with ROAS settings. Based on one's requirement and their goal with revenue and target ROAS, they can choose the appropriate bidding strategy.
  • Reporting: A business owner and advertising must know about their audiences, how their campaigns have been performing, what's working and what's not, and for that reason, powerful, effective reporting is needed, and Google Ads provides rich details reporting that covers almost every aspect of a business.
Read full review
Cons
BrightLocal
  • Up and down rankings were not always right on with the local search, but only off by one or two spots
  • It felt like it was only used for local SEO, and I know there are more features, just never got to them.
  • Didn't seem useful for every single client in the way Ahrefs or Spyfu did
Read full review
Google
  • If you don't know what you're doing, it will be a costly mistake. You need to target ads, and it is difficult the first time to do that.
  • There isn't a feature to run an add for a couple set date spans, just hours you want to run them or a single date span.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
BrightLocal
No answers on this topic
Google
I think Google Ads is good for getting your company out there and becoming more visible to potential customers in general. However, for specific product launches, social media advertising might be a better fit. Also, our user base is younger so social media is a better channel for our target audience.
Read full review
Usability
BrightLocal
No answers on this topic
Google
Its a complex tool and they make it easy to use, you get get up and running very quickly, but its the more advanced features and understanding all the small details to optimise your campaigns in Google Ads. I would recommend using a Google Ads Rep or using an external agency is you are starting out.
Read full review
Support Rating
BrightLocal
Although their customer support has always contacted me, they have not always been helpful. Many times I've had reports or information disappear with them telling me they had no record of it, even when I had reports that the information was in there. There are times when their system did have bugs and the support was able to help me there. Overall, the support staff is there but they cannot always do much and need to wait for their development team to get back to them which often takes a long time.
Read full review
Google
We have not yet had an account rep who hasn't tried to bully me or other employees to raise our budgets. At the same time, several years ago, one attempted to help refine our ads and ended up changing the ads to be something we were not affiliated with
Read full review
Online Training
BrightLocal
No answers on this topic
Google
Daily use with advanced account structures. Familiarity with reporting/api and complex setups.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
BrightLocal
Thryv reached out to me about 3 weeks before signing up with BrightLocal. While all of their features were impressive, there were only about 3 features that I would have used. Thryv wanted $200 per month for their service, which I found to be way overpriced for what I was wanting to use it for. I selected BrightLocal because it had the features I wanted at a lower price and then add ons. After using BrightLocal for a week and speaking with Becki, a customer service executive, I have discovered more features that I would use on BrightLocal than on Thryv.
Read full review
Google
Our agency invests heavily in Google Ads (particularly paid search advertising) on behalf of our clients relative to competitors like Microsoft and Yahoo because Google is the top search engine in the world. Google collects the most search data which enables the company to improve its AI to drive better performance for agencies and brands. As such, our paid search and app install campaigns always start with Google. If a client has a large budget, we will allocate media dollars to other search engines, but in some cases, the entire search budget goes to Google because we see the best returns.
Read full review
Return on Investment
BrightLocal
  • BrightLocal's ranking reports have helped us better serve our clients' SEO needs, especially local SEO.
  • Reporting is nicely accomplished with their online client report dashboards.
  • Negative: some of their software defects are glaringly obvious take forever to fix, creating a number of awkward moments when we talk our clients through their reports.
Read full review
Google
  • Google Ads is often one of our highest ROI channels, especially when you factor in branded ads.
  • Depending on the stage your business is in, search ads can be really powerful from an ROI perspective, providing an investment with a very high spend cap.
  • If you do not manage the campaigns well though, you can quickly spend a lot of money on nothing. So make sure someone is keeping an eye on your account.
Read full review
ScreenShots

BrightLocal Screenshots

Screenshot of Location SummaryScreenshot of Local Search Rank CheckerScreenshot of Local Search GridScreenshot of Local Search AuditScreenshot of Google My Business AuditScreenshot of Citation Tracker