The Google Ads audit checklist we run before touching a single bid
Almost every underperforming Google Ads account we inherit has the same shape: the tactics are fine and the foundations are broken. Bid strategy arguments are the most visible part of paid search and usually the least valuable. Here is the order we actually work in.
1. Are the conversions real?
Before anything else, open the conversion actions table. Count how many actions are set to Primary. If page views, add-to-carts and form starts are all feeding the same optimisation target, the algorithm has been told that a bounce is worth the same as a purchase. Deduplicate, demote soft actions to Secondary, and confirm the counting setting matches the business model — 'One' for lead generation, 'Every' for ecommerce.
Then check the conversion value. If value is missing or hardcoded, value-based bidding is bidding on a fiction.
2. Does the platform agree with your backend?
Export last month's platform conversions and compare with orders or CRM records over the same window. A variance under about 10% is workable. Anything wider and every downstream decision is guesswork. Common causes: no server-side tagging, consent mode misconfigured, cross-domain checkout, or duplicate tags firing.
3. Is brand traffic inflating everything?
Segment brand and non-brand into separate campaigns and report them separately, permanently. Blended ROAS with brand folded in flatters every account and hides whether paid media is generating incremental demand or invoicing you for traffic you already had.
4. Where is spend actually going?
Sort campaigns by cost and look at the top five. In most accounts, over 70% of spend sits in campaigns nobody has restructured in a year. Then sort search terms by cost with zero conversions over 90 days — that list is your immediate savings.
5. Is Performance Max contained?
Performance Max will happily harvest branded and remarketing traffic and report it as new performance. Add brand exclusions, segment asset groups by product margin tier, and check the channel and search category reports for the share of conversions coming from terms you would have won for free.
6. Is the feed doing its job?
- Disapproved and limited products, and how long they have been sitting there
- Titles that lead with the brand instead of the category a buyer searches for
- Missing GTIN, product type, and custom labels for margin segmentation
- Price and availability mismatches against the live store
7. Is the landing page part of the audit?
Pull the landing page report and sort by cost. Load each top page on a throttled mobile connection. If the largest contentful paint is over four seconds, no bid change will rescue that campaign. Check that the ad promise and the page headline say the same thing — mismatch is the most common cause of a high click-through rate with a poor conversion rate.
8. Are the automations fighting each other?
Auto-applied recommendations, scripts, rules and a smart bidding strategy can all be adjusting the same account in different directions. Turn auto-apply off. You want one owner of change so you can attribute outcomes.
9. Is there enough data for the bid strategy in use?
Target CPA and target ROAS need roughly 30 conversions in 30 days per campaign to behave. Below that, consolidate campaigns or move to maximise conversions with a sensible cap until volume supports the smarter strategy.
Working the list
Fix in this order. Measurement, then structure, then containment, then feed, then landing pages, then bidding. Most accounts recover a double-digit percentage of wasted spend before anyone gets to step nine, which is precisely why step nine gets argued about so much.