The Best Ways To Improve Your Google Ads ROI
Get a Live screen share review or a Written report.
- Expert audit review providing both a detailed and summary breakdown of your Google Ads account.
- Learn what are the areas with the most potential to increase leads and sales.
- Identify any areas already set up well.
- See which features are not set up covering the relevant capabilities of the Google Ads system.
- Recommendations backed up using your account data where ever possible.
Advertising Objectives
Before optimising any campaign, it’s critical to align your Google Ads strategy with your broader business goals and website objectives. In this section, we assess whether your account is structured to support what matters most—whether that’s generating high-quality leads, driving online sales, or increasing market share.
We’ll evaluate:
Campaign Objectives – Are campaigns optimised for bottom-line goals like conversions, leads, or revenue, not just traffic?
Funnel Alignment – Do campaigns match user intent at each stage of the buying journey—from cold traffic to ready-to-convert?
Goal Configuration – Are website and CRM-based goals accurately tracked and prioritised within the account?
AI & Automation Readiness – Is your data structured in a way that enables Google’s Smart Bidding and machine learning to work effectively?
Business Fit – Does your current ad strategy reflect your unique service model, sales cycle, and customer value?
We’ll map your Google Ads strategy against your actual commercial goals—identifying what’s working, what’s misaligned, and where smarter use of tracking, segmentation, and automation can drive more ROI.
Advertising Strategy
A strong advertising strategy is the foundation of a successful Google Ads account. In this section, we evaluate how well your current campaigns align with your business goals—whether that’s lead generation, online sales, or brand growth.
We assess:
If your campaign types match your funnel and customer journey
Whether budgets and bidding strategies support your key objectives (CPA, ROAS, LTV)
How effectively your account balances performance, scale, and efficiency
If Google’s automation is being guided by accurate conversion signals and strategic inputs
This ensures your ads aren’t just running—they’re running with purpose.
Conversion Tracking
Conversion Tracking shows you what happens after someone clicks on your ads – whether they purchased your product, filled in a form to become a lead or signed up for your newsletter
By tracking these actions, known as “conversions”, you’ll know which ads, keywords and campaigns work the most effectively. This helps invest more wisely and boost your return on investment(ROI) by getting more leads and sales.
Audit Format
We offer a comprehensive, multi-format audit designed to give you both data-backed insights and actionable advice:
a) Live Data Dashboard
A dynamic Google Looker Studio (formerly Data Studio) dashboard giving you real-time visualisations across campaigns, keywords, audiences, and conversion paths. Updated daily with fresh data pulled directly from your account.
b) Live Screenshare Audit
We walk through your Google Ads account together via a video call, highlighting critical issues and opportunities. You’ll get expert commentary and strategic advice tailored to your goals—no jargon, no fluff.
c) Written Audit Report
A professionally written report outlining best practices, weaknesses, and personalised recommendations. Each section includes explanations and links to relevant resources or blog posts for further detail.
d) Follow-Up Q&A Session
After the audit, you can ask questions about anything uncovered. We clarify your next steps—whether you handle changes internally or want our help implementing them.
Lead Generation
Generating leads is one thing—generating the right leads is what truly drives growth. This section of the audit reviews how well your Google Ads account is set up to attract, qualify, and convert valuable prospects.
Many service-based businesses focus on maximising lead volume at the lowest possible cost per lead (CPA). But true performance comes from balancing volume with lead quality—so your budget targets the prospects most likely to become paying customers.
We assess:
Whether your campaigns are optimised for CPA or lead quality outcomes
If your conversion actions reflect meaningful business value—not just form fills or vanity metrics
Whether ad copy, targeting, and landing pages are aligned to attract your ideal audience
Use of audience layering, intent signals, and funnel segmentation to improve targeting precision
If similar campaign types are delivering consistent CPAs—and where inefficiencies lie
How CRM or offline data is being used to improve Google’s machine learning and optimise spend
This review ensures you’re not just getting more leads, but better ones—so you can scale confidently with smarter targeting and stronger ROI.
E-commerce
For e-commerce brands, success in Google Ads hinges on more than just visibility—it’s about profitably scaling sales. This part of the audit focuses on how well your campaigns are set up to maximise revenue, return on ad spend (ROAS), and lifetime value.
We review how effectively you’re using campaign types like Shopping, Performance Max, and Search, and whether your setup takes full advantage of Google’s automation without losing control.
We assess:
How your campaigns are optimised for revenue, profit margin, or ROAS goals
Shopping feed health: titles, descriptions, images, product categorisation, and errors
How well Search and Shopping campaigns complement each other—or compete
Use of Smart Bidding strategies (Target ROAS, Maximise Conversion Value)
Performance Max setup: asset quality, audience signals, exclusions, and product segmentation
Whether high-performing products or categories are receiving appropriate budget share
Use of remarketing, upsell, and cart abandonment strategies
How conversion tracking and enhanced conversions support accurate optimisation
This review helps you focus spend where it matters—on the products, audiences, and channels that drive the highest return.
Goal Alignment vs Tactical Execution
A successful Google Ads account doesn’t just chase clicks and low cost conversions— it pursues business outcomes. This section assesses how well the tactical execution (keywords, ad copy, bidding, targeting, landing pages) aligns with the client’s actual commercial goals — such as revenue, lead quality, or customer acquisition cost.
What we evaluate:
Is there a clearly defined primary objective? (e.g. form submissions, phone calls, purchases, revenue growth)
Do campaigns map to distinct stages of the funnel? (awareness, consideration, conversion)
Are conversion actions tracked in a way that reflects true business value? (e.g. lead scoring, offline conversion tracking, CRM feedback loops)
Is budget allocation aligned with goal priority? Or are upper-funnel campaigns draining spend at the expense of high-intent search?
Are short-term and long-term strategies balanced? Or is the account overly focused on quick wins or vanity metrics?
Score Criteria:
A well-scored account shows evidence of strategic thinking — with conversion tracking, campaign structure, and budget distribution clearly designed to serve defined business outcomes, not just platform metrics.
Road Map Summary
After reviewing your entire Google Ads setup, we don’t just hand over a list of issues—we provide a prioritised action plan that outlines where to focus first, and how to scale next.
We apply the 80/20 rule: focusing on the most impactful changes that can immediately improve performance, while also identifying longer-term opportunities for sustainable growth.
Your personalised roadmap includes:
A summary of key strengths and quick-win opportunities
Medium-term improvements to boost efficiency, lead quality, or sales volume
Features, targeting methods, or automation tools not currently in use
Strategic advice tailored to your goals, budget, and business model
Clarity on what to fix, test, or scale—and in what order
This roadmap gives you the clarity and confidence to improve results—whether you act on it internally or partner with us to implement it.
Account Structure
Effective account structure is the foundation of any successful Google Ads strategy. When campaigns and ad groups are logically organised, it becomes much easier to build, analyse, report on, and improve performance across the board.
A well-structured account makes it clear which areas are working and which need attention—enabling faster, more confident decision-making. It also creates the conditions for advanced optimisation, such as bid strategy refinement, ad testing, automation rules, and campaign experiments.
In this section of the audit, we assess how well your account is set up to support smart, scalable growth and whether the current structure is helping—or hindering—your results.
We review how your campaigns and ad groups are structured—looking for logical organisation by product, service, audience, or funnel stage. Poor structure leads to wasted spend and missed insights, while a clean setup makes optimisation faster and more effective.
Naming Conventions
An effective naming convention is more than cosmetic—it directly improves the manageability and performance oversight of your Google Ads account. When assets are named clearly and consistently, it’s easier to navigate the account, analyse results, automate reporting, and avoid costly mistakes.
In this part of the audit, we assess and score how well naming conventions have been applied across:
Campaigns and ad groups
Ads and extensions
Audience segments
Negative keyword lists
Shared budgets and rules
We also evaluate whether your naming structure captures key targeting elements—such as ad group themes, audience types, placements, or funnel stages.
Finally, we check your use of labels and asset grouping to ensure account organisation supports streamlined analysis, automation, and scalability
Reporting
Most Google Ads accounts either lack proper reporting or rely on default views that don’t give enough clarity. As part of your audit, we’ll deliver a custom-built Google Looker Studio report—designed to give you real-time visibility into what matters most.
This interactive dashboard connects directly to your Google Ads account and updates daily, so you always have access to accurate, visual performance data—without the need to dig through the Google Ads interface.
Your Looker Studio report includes:
Key metrics like impressions, cost, conversions, CPA, ROAS, CTR, and more
Breakdown by campaign, ad group, keyword, device, location, and audience
Visual charts to highlight trends, opportunities, and inefficiencies
Easy filters so you can drill down by time period, channel, or goal
A clear layout tailored to your specific objectives—lead generation, e-commerce, or brand awareness
We also assess your current reporting setup and identify any blind spots—ensuring you not only get the data, but also understand what it means and how to act on it.
This live report becomes a valuable tool for ongoing optimisation, even if you don’t work with us long term.
Let me know if you’d like a CTA at the end enc
Ad Serving
Ad serving issues occur when multiple keywords in your account compete for the same search term. This internal competition—also known as self-competition—can lead to wasted spend, reduced Quality Scores, and inconsistent user experiences.
In this section of the audit, we examine how well your account is structured to ensure that the most relevant ad is triggered for each query.
We assess:
Whether the account is experiencing keyword conflicts or cannibalisation
If the correct keyword is triggering the right ad and landing page
Use of granular negative keywords at the campaign or ad group level to sculpt traffic effectively
Whether traffic sculpting is applied to manage funnel stages, match types, or keyword intent
Use of diagnostic tools to assess ad relevance and identify overlap issues
By refining your ad serving setup, we help ensure that each search triggers the most relevant and effective ad—improving CTR, Quality Score, and ultimately, your conversion rate.
Networks & Channels
Google Ads offers a wide range of networks and placements to run your campaigns, including Search, Display, YouTube, Gmail, and partner sites. Each network serves a different purpose and behaves differently in terms of audience intent, cost, and conversion performance.
In this part of the audit, we evaluate how well your account leverages these channels—and whether spend is being directed toward the placements that actually deliver results.
We assess:
Which networks are currently in use (Search, Display, YouTube, Discovery, Search Partners, etc.)
Performance breakdown by network: cost, CTR, conversions, CPA, ROAS
Whether Display or YouTube campaigns are segmented properly or mixed into Search (e.g. via Performance Max)
Use of exclusions to avoid poor placements or brand-unsafe content
Potential for scaling on high-performing networks—or reducing spend on underperformers
This review helps ensure you’re not just “everywhere”—but in the right place, at the right time, with the right message for each channel.
Ad Groups Themes
How your keywords, ads, and targeting are grouped within ad groups has a direct impact on ad relevance, click-through rates, and conversion performance. Poorly themed ad groups often result in generic messaging, wasted spend, and lower Quality Scores.
In this part of the audit, we assess how well your ad groups are structured and whether they follow a logical, focused theme.
We review:
Whether ad groups are tightly themed around specific keywords, products, or audience intent
If there are too few or too many ad groups, making the account difficult to manage or scale
How product groups are structured in Shopping or Performance Max campaigns
Whether display audiences are separated by intent, topic, or funnel stage
If ad messaging is aligned with the theme of each group—for stronger message match and relevance
A clean, well-structured ad group setup improves performance across the board—boosting Quality Score, reducing wasted clicks, and creating a clearer path from search term to conversion.
Device Strategy
User behaviour varies significantly between devices. What works on desktop may underperform on mobile, and vice versa. In this section of the audit, we evaluate how well your campaigns are optimised for device-level performance—and whether adjustments are needed to improve ROI.
We assess:
Which devices are currently targeted (desktop, mobile, tablet, TV)
How performance metrics (CTR, CPC, CPA, ROAS, conversion rate) vary by device
Whether bid adjustments are in place to reduce spend on underperforming devices
Mobile landing page experience and speed—especially for lead gen or e-commerce
If certain campaigns should be segmented by device for tighter control
If device-level trends are ignored, you may be overspending on low-converting traffic or missing opportunities to scale on high-performing segments. This review helps ensure your budget is working efficiently across every screen.
Shared Libraries & Centralised Assets
Efficient accounts leverage shared libraries to maintain consistency, reduce errors, and streamline optimisation — particularly in multi-campaign environments. Proper use of shared assets also enhances scalability and collaboration.
What we evaluate:
Are shared negative keyword lists used to prevent overlap and wasted spend?
Are shared audiences and placements being centrally managed?
Is budget strategy managed via shared budgets where appropriate?
Are ad assets (e.g. headlines, descriptions) reused strategically through asset libraries or RSAs?
Score Criteria:
We assess how well the account utilises shared resources to maintain structural integrity, ensure consistency, and simplify account management.
Manual, Automation and AI Approach
We believe the best-performing Google Ads accounts strike the right balance between human expertise, automation, and AI-driven optimisation. While Google’s machine learning can drive powerful efficiencies—especially through Smart Bidding, Responsive Search Ads, and Performance Max—these systems are only as effective as the data and strategy behind them.
That’s why we use a hybrid approach:
Manual control where precision and oversight matter—like audience segmentation, ad messaging, and negative keyword sculpting
Automation for routine adjustments, bid rules, and ad scheduling to ensure efficiency and consistency
AI for real-time bidding, conversion optimisation, and predictive targeting—guided by your actual goals and quality CRM data
By combining these elements, we prevent wasted spend, maintain strategic control, and ensure Google’s automation is working for you.
Automated Rules
Automated rules allow your Google Ads account to make time-based or event-driven changes without manual input. When used correctly, they help improve efficiency, enforce guardrails, and maintain performance even when you’re not actively managing the account.
In this part of the audit, we review whether you’re using automated rules effectively for tasks such as:
Pausing low-performing ads or keywords
Adjusting bids based on CPA or ROAS thresholds
Changing budgets based on time of day, day of week, or conversion trends
Scheduling ads to run only during peak hours or business availability
We assess:
Which rules are active, and whether they align with your goals
Whether rules are being used to automate repetitive tasks and reduce human error
If rule-based actions are conflicting with smart bidding, scripts, or manual changes
Opportunities to add rules that enhance performance or efficiency
A smart automation layer can save time and protect performance—but only if it’s set up with clear logic and strategic intent.
Automation Scripts
Automated scripts offer a more powerful, flexible way to manage your Google Ads account compared to standard rules. They allow for custom logic and conditional automation—ideal for larger accounts, complex strategies, or advertisers seeking tighter control over performance.
In this part of the audit, we evaluate:
Whether scripts are currently used—and if so, how effectively
The type of scripts in place (e.g. bid adjustments, anomaly detection, budget pacing, account hygiene)
How custom or publicly available scripts are integrated into your workflow
If scripts conflict with manual processes, rules, or smart bidding
Opportunities to implement new scripts that can improve performance or reduce workload
We also highlight trusted and proven scripts from the public domain and identify gaps where custom scripting could reduce repetitive tasks, improve response times, or protect ad spend from performance anomalies.
When used correctly, automation scripts offer enterprise-level capabilities—bringing consistency, speed, and intelligence to your optimisation efforts.
Measurement & Optimisation Criteria
AI systems optimise toward the goals you feed them — but if those goals are misaligned with business value, performance becomes illusory. This section evaluates the metrics and conversion actions used to train bidding algorithms and inform optimisation decisions.
What we evaluate:
Are primary conversions aligned with revenue or lead quality, or are low-value actions like page views or time on site being counted?
Are soft conversions (e.g. eBook downloads, contact form starts) correctly weighted or excluded from Smart Bidding?
Is there evidence of micro-conversions being used without qualification filters?
Are offline conversions or CRM outcomes fed back into Google Ads to refine optimisation?
Are account managers monitoring the right KPIs (e.g. cost per qualified lead vs. cost per lead)?
Score Criteria:
We assess how well the account defines success — and whether the optimisation criteria support actual business outcomes, not just vanity metrics or platform proxies.
Human Oversight of AI-Led Decisions
While Google Ads’ AI can optimise bids, placements, and creative in real time, blind trust in automation leads to complacency and misaligned outcomes. AI excels at pattern recognition — not business judgement. This section evaluates whether there is a structured process for reviewing and correcting automated decisions.
What we evaluate:
Are Smart Bidding results reviewed regularly to ensure alignment with lead quality or ROAS goals?
Is there a feedback loop from sales or CRM data to challenge AI assumptions?
Are underperforming auto-generated assets (e.g. in RSAs or PMax) paused or replaced promptly?
Is there evidence of critical intervention — pausing poor placements, excluding irrelevant search terms, or overriding budget shifts?
Score Criteria:
Accounts are scored on the presence of intelligent human oversight — ensuring the AI is guided, not just enabled. We look for a balance between automation scale and strategic correction.
Locations
Precise location targeting ensures that ad spend is directed only to areas of commercial relevance. Poor configuration leads to wasted budget, skewed performance data, and irrelevant traffic — particularly in service-based or regionally limited businesses.
What we evaluate:
Targeting strategy: Are locations aligned with the business’s actual service or delivery areas?
Presence vs interest: Is Google set to target users in the location, or those merely interested in it — and is this choice appropriate?
Exclusions: Are unwanted regions, countries, or postcodes explicitly excluded to avoid bleed?
Granularity: Are campaigns structured to allow performance visibility and budget control by location (e.g. by country, region, city)?
Location reporting: Is performance by location actively monitored, with adjustments made based on CPA, ROAS, or lead quality?
Score Criteria:
We assess how well the account applies geographic targeting logic, minimises waste, and reflects business operations on the map — not just in theory.
Languages
Incorrect language settings can limit reach, serve ads to the wrong audience, or skew performance metrics — particularly in multilingual regions or international campaigns.
What we evaluate:
Is the campaign targeting appropriate languages for the intended audience and region?
Are there any mismatches between language settings and user browser/device preferences?
For English-speaking markets: Is “English” selected explicitly, or is the setting left too broad?
Score Criteria:
We score based on accuracy, clarity of intent, and whether the language settings align with the target market’s actual browsing behaviour.
Bidding Strategies
Bid strategies are designed to optimise Google Ads around specific objectives — whether it’s maximising visibility, driving conversions, or achieving a target cost per acquisition. If the chosen strategy doesn’t match the campaign’s goal or data maturity, it can lead to wasted spend, reduced efficiency, and poor-quality results.
What we evaluate:
Does the bid strategy for each campaign align with its true objective — brand awareness, consideration, or conversion?
Are Smart Bidding strategies (e.g. Target CPA or ROAS) used appropriately to scale conversions at a sustainable cost?
Is manual or Enhanced CPC bidding still in use — and if so, is there a justified reason for maintaining manual control?
For lead generation: Is the bidding strategy optimising for the right balance between lead volume and quality?
Are campaign goals (e.g. bidding for top positions to gain visibility) being leveraged strategically to support upper-funnel growth?
Is performance being monitored and refined in response to conversion trends, bid strategy learning phases, and data sufficiency?
Score Criteria:
We assess whether each campaign’s bidding approach is strategically selected and actively managed — not only to support Google’s AI optimisation but to deliver measurable business outcomes across the funnel.
Devices
User behaviour varies significantly by device. Mobile, desktop, and tablet traffic often convert at different rates, and failing to account for this can result in wasted spend or missed opportunities. Device-level performance insights should inform bidding and user experience strategy.
What we evaluate:
Are device-level performance trends (e.g. CPA, ROAS, bounce rate) actively monitored?
Are device bid adjustments applied where necessary to optimise budget allocation?
Is mobile traffic converting effectively, or is it suffering due to landing page speed, layout, or usability?
Is the campaign over-reliant on one device type, reducing diversification and reach?
Score Criteria:
We assess whether device performance is tracked and acted upon — and whether the account uses data-led decisions to optimise delivery across mobile, desktop, and tablet.
Campaign Type & Objective Alignment
Selecting the correct campaign type (Search, Performance Max, Display, Video, etc.) is foundational to execution. Misuse leads to wasted spend or poor control.
Are campaign types appropriate for the business model and marketing goals?
Is Performance Max used with the right feed, signals, and exclusions?
Are legacy or experimental types (e.g. Smart Display) still active without clear justification?
Ad Scheduling
Not all hours (or days) perform equally. Ad scheduling allows you to control when your ads are shown, ensuring your budget is focused on the times when your audience is most likely to convert.
In this part of the audit, we evaluate how well your campaigns are using time-based targeting to improve efficiency and ROI.
We assess:
Whether ads are currently running 24/7 or during strategic time windows
How performance varies by hour of day and day of week (CPA, ROAS, conversion rate)
Use of bid adjustments to increase visibility during peak hours or reduce spend during low-converting periods
If scheduling aligns with your business hours, sales cycle, or customer behaviour
Opportunities to tailor scheduling by device or region for further refinement
Poor ad scheduling leads to wasted spend and missed conversions. We help ensure your ads show when they matter most—maximising impact and minimising waste.
Ad Rotation
Ad rotation determines how Google chooses between multiple ads in the same ad group. When configured correctly, it enables more effective A/B testing and ensures the best-performing ads receive more exposure. When misconfigured, it can skew results or prevent proper optimisation.
In this part of the audit, we assess how ad rotation is being managed and whether it supports meaningful performance improvements.
We review:
Whether ad rotation is set to optimise for conversions or rotate indefinitely
If rotation settings align with your ad testing strategy and campaign goals
Whether all ads are being given fair exposure before performance-based rotation kicks in
How many ads are active per ad group—and if variations are significant enough to test (e.g. different USPs, CTAs, or offers)
If manual vs. automatic optimisation is helping or hindering performance
The goal is to ensure your ad rotation settings support both machine learning and strategic testing—so you can continually improve results without sacrificing control.
Budgets
Your budget setup plays a critical role in campaign performance. Overspending on underperforming campaigns or underfunding high-converting ones can limit growth and waste valuable ad spend.
In this section of the audit, we assess how your daily and monthly budgets are distributed across the account—and whether that allocation aligns with your goals and performance data.
We review:
Whether budgets are aligned with campaign objectives (lead gen, eCommerce, awareness)
If top-performing campaigns are limited by budget
Use of shared budgets across campaigns and whether they’re helping or hurting performance
Daily spend trends and pacing throughout the month
Budget flexibility for Smart Bidding strategies (e.g. Maximise Conversions or Target ROAS)
Whether scaling opportunities exist for profitable campaigns
We also check for signs of budget caps blocking growth and identify where reallocating spend could deliver better returns. The goal is simple: ensure your budget is working as hard as possible for the right outcomes.
Types of Searches
Keywords are words or phrases used for targeting your ads with user search terms. The three most popular search types include:
Transactional Searches – People are looking to complete an action. Well suited for advertisers targeting prospects later in the buying cycle. Transactional keywords with commercial intent can be even more successful.
Informational Searches–Also known as “question words” as they frequently contain: “why,” “how,” and so on. Typically more useful for generating awareness and interest earlier in the buying cycle.
Navigational – people are searching for a website, company or brand name. Bid on your keywords to increase CTR and reinforce your brand by showing in the top ad position.
Keyword Selection
Keywords are the most widely used targeting options for Google Search.
- Average keywords per ad group,
- match types used and performance by type.
Top 1-5% of keywords by spend and conversions. Identify anomalies in CPA & conversion rate for keywords. - Check negative keywords, the number of negative lists and what levels are applied.
- Added vs not added ratio from search terms report.
Match Type
Google has a range of keyword match types including the exact, phrase, modified broad match and the default broad match type.
- What match types are used?
- Can any more be used?
Quality Score
Quality Score is an estimate of how relevant your keywords, ads and website landing page are to a person seeing your ad. Higher quality scores typically lead to lower costs and more traffic.
Quality Score can be increased by improving expected CTR, landing page relevance, keyword/ad relevance, geographic performance and device performance.
Chart of quality score for all keywords with impressions
Bonus bonus: Find your QS weighted by
Impressions.
Audience Targeting
Audience targeting for Google Search helps you get more granular in your targeting, and bid differently by demographics, past website user, similar audiences and in-market.
Search Terms Report
These are the actual searches entered into Google by people who click on your ads.
Identify relevant search terms with high potential to expand your keyword list with separate bids.
Search terms of less relevance to your business can be made negative keywords, increase CTR and reduce wasted spend. Optimum keyword match type combinations can be identified from the search terms report
Impressions Share
Impression share is the number of times your ad was shown compared to the number of times it could be shown. Bidding higher will increase your impression share but will also increase the average cost per click.
- What’s the potential of this account? Is it constrained by Budget or Rank?
- Which campaigns can increase bids to get more impressions while still achieving the campaign primary goal.
- What is Top vs Other
Business Offering
Every company has a business offer covering what you do, how you do it and why you do it. The business offer consists of unique selling points, features, benefits, guarantees, promotions, calls to action, proof testimonials and qualifications.
Even if your competitors are very similar, ad testing results show what parts of your business offer, sales copy and image assets appeal to your prospects and customers.
Key performance indicators (KPI) such as click-through rate, conversion rate and conversions per impression highlight ways to measure the performance of adverts.
A/B test results show the best ad versions while multivariate test results display the performance of ad elements like headlines, descriptions and even wording and phrasing.
Understanding the costs and conversions for each element of your advertising assets is critical for making sure the most useful parts of your offer get emphasized.
Click Through Rate
CTR is the number of clicks that your ad receives divided by the number of times your ad is shown: clicks ÷ impressions = CTR
Increasing CTR can increase traffic and conversions. Increasing your CTR can also increase the keyword quality score and therefore reduce advertising fees such as cost per click.
Ad Types & Formats
Google Ads have a range of advert formats across Search, Display and YouTube networks.
Google Search has Standard Text Ads, Responsive Ads for Search, Dynamic Search Ads, Shopping Ads.
Google Display has Responsive Ads and uploaded ads. Video Ads can run on YouTube and other video sites on the Display Network.
- Are ad types and formats being tested?
- Is their significant variation in performance?
Destination Pages
Landing pages are important for both quality score and conversion rate. Google uses automated systems and human evaluation to determine landing page relevance. Improvements such as increased time on site can lead to higher quality scores over time.
Landing pages should be relevant to the advert copy by providing more detail about your business offering: features, benefits, guarantees, unique selling points, promotions, service, product, calls to action, locations and proof of services such as qualifications or reviews.
You can choose to send traffic from your ads to destinations such as your website home page, landing page, funnel or Mobile App.
- Is the homepage being used too much?
- Are their dedicated landing pages or sales funnels?
- What percentage of PPC traffic goes to the home page and what is the comparative conversion rate?
- Are A/B test ads and landing pages being tested consecutively to improve quality score and conversion rate?
Ad Testing
Define ad testing strategy and outline ad testing approach and results.
- How many ads are there per group?
- Are big differences being tested, such as promotions, benefits, USP’s, guarantee?
Ad Extensions
Ad Extensions show below the base advert and can help increase CTR and conversion rate. There are various types of ad extensions including site links, callouts, locations, etc.
- Do all campaigns have the relevant ad extensions?
- Are any ad extensions suitable to be applied as account-level to streamline your efforts?
Audience Targeting
Audience targeting is the ability to show ads to groups of people on millions of websites and apps across the internet based on their shared interests, characteristics and content they interact with.
Target people that have never been to your website and retarget past website visitors for up to 540 days.
Broad audiences such as Demographics and Affinity are more suited for brand awareness top of funnel marketing. Layered audiences work better for consideration and conversion goals.
Audiences Targeting
Google Display has a range of audience targeting options to reach prospective customers at all stages of their purchase funnel.
In-Market, Affinity and Custom Audiences, as well as Placements, Topics, Demographics, Remarketing and Similar audiences. These targeting options are available on the Google Display Network as well as YouTube and Gmail Ads.
Site Exclusions
Are there placements that should be excluded, either websites or apps? (e.g. AdsenseForMobileApps.com)
Network Comparison
- What are the metrics of Display compared to Search? For example cost per conversion.
- How qualified are the audiences?
- What potential impact on brand for display campaigns performing with a comparable CPA to Search?
Ad Formats Types
- Are responsive or uploaded Ads used?
- Are dynamic ads or standard/static ads used?
- Are lots of versions being tested? More ads can be tested at the same time on the display network in comparison to the Search Network
- How are text ads performing compared to image ads?
General Structure
- What’s the performance of Display compared to Search?
- How many targeting channels are used
- What’s the goal of these campaigns?
- How have the campaigns been organised?
- Does ad copy match the stage of the audience purchase funnel covering cold, warn and hot traffic?
Category Exclusions
Showing your ads next to controversial topics such as war, violence and crime can have a negative effect on your brand through association, conscious or subconscious.
- Are certain categories blocked such as tragedy, death, grief or emergency?
- Certain categories can be blocked to only associate your brand with categories where your audience are more likely to to be impacted from your ads.
YouTube
- Are YouTube campaigns being used?
- What’s the performance like relative to others? What’s the goal of these campaigns?
- Are YouTube remarketing lists being built?
4 Step Audit Process
Pre-call
01
15-30 Minute phone call to understand your company in more detail and provide context to the audit
Complete Audit
02
You enable partner access to your Google Ads, and we review your account in-depth.
Screenshare Audit
03
We do a live screen share audit to highlight the main areas of improvement like reducing cost, increasing leads or sales.
Written Audit
04
We provide the final written audit, along with a formal proposal for managing your Google Ads.
Start FREE Audit Process Now!
Step One = 15-30-minute call to understand your business and provide more context before the screen share and written audits are completed.