{"id":5708,"date":"2022-08-24T19:00:26","date_gmt":"2022-08-24T19:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/"},"modified":"2022-08-24T19:00:26","modified_gmt":"2022-08-24T19:00:26","slug":"how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/","title":{"rendered":"How to audit your Google Ads account like a pro"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Brad Geddes is no stranger to paid search. And as one of the co-founders of Adalysis, he\u2019s done his fair share of audits. In this SMX Advanced 2022 session, he provides a framework for how to audit your own accounts, or perform audits for client proposals. Let\u2019s dive in.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why perform an audit.<\/strong> There are a few reasons why you\u2019d perform a Google Ads audit:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Someone is unhappy with performance. Their conversions have decreased and spend has gone up. Something has gone wrong.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>The account owner wants to make sure they are following best practices and nothing is wrong.<\/li>\n<li>The account owner is happy with what they are getting, but they want more.<\/li>\n<li>The agency is performing an audit as part of a proposal and they need to know what the products are, how they sell, what their funnel is, and if part of that funnel is being ignored.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><strong>Asking the right questions. <\/strong>When you\u2019re performing an account audit there are several pieces of information you need to know. Geddes addresses some of the questions you need to ask yourself or the client.\u00a0<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>What is the goal of your Google ads account?<\/li>\n<li>What do you want out of it?<\/li>\n<li>What do you consider a successful account?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_81 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-grey ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<div class=\"ez-toc-title-container\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<span class=\"ez-toc-title-toggle\"><a href=\"#\" class=\"ez-toc-pull-right ez-toc-btn ez-toc-btn-xs ez-toc-btn-default ez-toc-toggle\" aria-label=\"Toggle Table of Content\"><span class=\"ez-toc-js-icon-con\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Diving_into_the_account_The_audit\" >Diving into the account. The audit.\u00a0<\/a><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-3' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#The_account_overview\" >The account overview<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Account_settings\" >Account settings<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-4\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Who_is_managing_the_account\" >Who is managing the account<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-5\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Trends\" >Trends<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-6\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Looking_at_the_big_picture\" >Looking at the big picture<\/a><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-3' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-7\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Impression_share\" >Impression share\u00a0<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-8\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Keywords\" >Keywords<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-9\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Ad_group_sizes\" >Ad group sizes<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-10\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#RSA_performance_and_pinning\" >RSA performance and pinning<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-11\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#The_competitor_analysis\" >The competitor analysis<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-12\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Bid_methods\" >Bid methods<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-13\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Audiences\" >Audiences<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-14\" href=\"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/24\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro\/#Wrapping_up\" >Wrapping up<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Diving_into_the_account_The_audit\"><\/span>Diving into the account. The audit.\u00a0<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_account_overview\"><\/span>The account overview<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>One of the first things you should look at is the scope. How big is the account? Is it two campaigns or 30? What is the ad spend? Are there search and display campaigns, or just search?<\/p>\n<p>The second thing you want to look at is the sophistication level of the account. Is the account manager new? Will you have to educate that person? If they are a professional then you can address them in a different way than if they\u2019d only been working in Google Ads for a few months.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Next, what are you not seeing? What is not being tracked or only used in certain campaigns? Geddes says that the most common conversions not being tracked are phone calls, downloads, and mailto links. Geddes suggests using Google\u2019s conversion action sets and adding different conversions together and applying different activities to different campaigns. This way you can use interaction goals for top of funnel and CPA goals for bottom of funnel.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Account_settings\"><\/span>Account settings<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Once you\u2019re happy with the conversions or know what needs to be fixed, Geddes suggests looking at campaign settings. What you\u2019re looking for is consistency in the setup process.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Some things to look for are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Are all of the campaign targeting the same locations?\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>Are they creating ads by device?\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>Are they using bid adjustments?\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>How are they bidding?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Who_is_managing_the_account\"><\/span>Who is managing the account<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Is someone actively managing the account? Geddes brings up the point that sometimes an account is spending millions of dollars per month and if it has five changes over the last 30 days, it\u2019s likely that nobody is managing it. Other times it may have a huge number of changes but it\u2019s all done by API, meaning that nobody is overlooking the data. And other times someone is really into the account, actively managing it and you\u2019ll see a ton of changes and what is being worked on.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This should give you an idea of how active the management is and what is being used to make changes. Is it API, third-party scripts, a human, or something else?<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-text-color has-background has-cyan-bluish-gray-background-color has-cyan-bluish-gray-color\">\n<p><!-- START INLINE FORM --><\/p>\n<div class=\"nl-inline-form border py-2 px-1 my-2\">\n<div class=\"row align-items-center\">\n<div class=\"col-12 col-lg-3 col-xl-4 pe-md-0 pb-2 pb-lg-0\">\n<p class=\"inline-form-text text-center mb-0\">Get the daily newsletter search marketers rely on.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"col-12 col-lg-7 col-xl-6  pe-lg-0\">\n<div class=\"form-nl-inline\">\n<div class=\"row g-0\">\n<div class=\"form-group col-12 col-lg-8 mb-0\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"col-12 col-lg-4 col-xl-4 mb-0\">\n<div class=\"d-none\">\n<p>Processing&#8230;Please wait.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<button class=\"btn btn-dark inlineButton w-100 rounded-0 font-weight-bold\" type=\"submit\" name=\"submit_button\">SUBSCRIBE<\/button>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"col-12 col-lg-2 col-xl-2 ps-1\">\n<p class=\"text-center mb-0\"><a class=\"nl-terms\" href=\"https:\/\/searchengineland.com\/termsofuse\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">See terms.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><!-- END INLINE FORM --><\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-text-color has-background has-cyan-bluish-gray-background-color has-cyan-bluish-gray-color\">\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Trends\"><\/span>Trends<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Once you have the base level audit complete, Geddes suggests looking at trends. Instead of looking at month-to-month trends, look at year over year. Consider how last March did compared to this year instead of looking at February vs. March.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Ask the client if they can provide a few time frames when they were happy with the account for reference. This way you can look at date ranges, compare the visual data, and analyze whether search volume has dropped significantly. If search volume dropped, did someone remove keywords? Is impression share going up? Quality score issues could also be present as well as problems with extensions. Was a new landing page launched?<\/p>\n<p>Knowing these factors can help you chase down what happened and isolate areas of change.<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Looking_at_the_big_picture\"><\/span>Looking at the big picture<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Geddes makes the point that in a traditional audit, you don\u2019t have time to look at every detail. Instead, you look into what the problem areas are.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Impression_share\"><\/span>Impression share\u00a0<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>How often are those ads showing or not showing? Are you losing impression share due to budget? How about ad ranks? If impression share is high and the client still isn\u2019t happy, can you add new targeting with some different display or keywords?<\/p>\n<p>If the issue is budget, can you manipulate the budget to get more? If you took the budget from another campaign, would you get more? Budget manipulation is likely the easiest way to gain additional conversions, says Geddes.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Is it an ad rank issue? If so, then you\u2019ll want to dig into Quality Score. Is it ad relevance? Is it a landing page issue?Does the landing page match the keywords in the account? Did they launch a new website or page that caused the experience to be affected? Look at the trends and timeframes of when things changed. Have a conversation with the client and find out what happened.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Keywords\"><\/span>Keywords<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>What keywords is the client using? What does their targeting look like? Look at their match type usage and trends. What is their conversion rate by match type? Do they have a lot of broad match keywords with conversions, but no exact match? Is anyone going through the query report and adding those keywords to the account?<\/p>\n<p>Duplicate search terms also occur. So Geddes suggests adding a negative keyword to the lower performing ad group can often result in an increase in conversions. Controlled duplicates can often result in additional conversions.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Keyword conflicts can also occur if you are blocking your own keywords. However, he points out that Google doesn\u2019t look at match types, campaign negative lists, or MCC negative lists, so you could be blocking keywords that don\u2019t even show up in Google. Geddes points out that Microsoft does, so you can use that to find Google conflicts.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Geddes also goes over engrams, more with negative keyword lists, search term reports and queries, and more.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Ad_group_sizes\"><\/span>Ad group sizes<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Geddes uses a simple pivot table to look at ad group sizes. How many keywords are by ad group and how many search terms exist by ad group? How are the ad groups being managed? Do the ad groups need to be broken down smaller?<\/p>\n<p>Consider the top spending ad groups first. Is there is a large number of them? RSAs don\u2019t cover everything, so Geddes suggests still using granular ad group organization \u2013 even with the new ad formats.<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"RSA_performance_and_pinning\"><\/span>RSA performance and pinning<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>When you get an idea of how that client is managing RSAs, we want to know what\u2019s their overall asset breakdown. What is your overall pinning usage? Are they pinning everything a little bit? Nothing pinned? What\u2019s your ad strengths? And then finally, what\u2019s that asset performance breakdown? So you want that high level of? Are these RSAs unique and are they doing well? How is the client thinking about it?<\/p>\n<p>Looking at the overall asset report you can determine how many different ads an asset is in. Is it on purpose? Did multiple people create the pins? Are they consistent?<\/p>\n<p>Geddes reminds us that pinning doesn\u2019t conversion rate or CTR. You\u2019ll likely see a lower ad strength because you\u2019re controlling the message. But once you have an idea of how ad groups are broken down and how they are doing, you also need to know who you should be paying attention to.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_competitor_analysis\"><\/span>The competitor analysis<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Auction insight shows you who you\u2019re competing against. What\u2019s that overlap rate? How are different people addressing these search terms? Do we fit the same? Do all the ads look the same? How do we stand out in this crowd? Who are your top competitors? And then looking at how their ads are selling against you, you can devise your own sell against strategy.<\/p>\n<p>Once you do that, you can still do ad testing just like you could before. You may have some ad groups with multiple ad types, and some ad groups that are just all RSAs. So when you\u2019re doing RSA ad testing, you may do them by theme, like RSA one is about discounts, RSA two is about prices, etc..\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Geddes notes that clients love insights. Multi ad-group testing is a great way to let clients know that they can increase clicks, conversions, or other metrics by doing X.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Bid_methods\"><\/span>Bid methods<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Geddes concludes by saying that there is a lot more that can be done than what he\u2019s discussed here, but you only have so much time to complete the audit. The big methods to look into are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>How are they bidding<\/li>\n<li>How are they using bid modifiers<\/li>\n<li>Target CPA is common, but it may not be the best option because it does not use device modifiers to adjust bid<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Audiences\"><\/span>Audiences<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>How are audiences being used across the account? Geddes says that audiences are are so useful and so much reporting and audience bid adjustments can be used with several types of automated bidding.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Google doesn\u2019t use audience modifiers to change the bids.They use the audience modifiers to say \u201cyou want to show your ads more to this audience group, or less to this audience group.\u201d So use your bid modifier in an ad serving way. But if someone has zero audiences or they have zero search audiences, or maybe they have some display ones for remarketing. But that\u2019s often a place of improvement in accounts. Dig deep into audiences and the ways you can create custom audiences<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Wrapping_up\"><\/span>Wrapping up<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Geddes wraps up discussing ad extensions and closing out the audit. He discusses presenting the audit to the clients, and how some can be 10 pages or even 100 pages. He concludes by reminding us that not every client will read the audit who understands your level of knowledge. They simply want to know what to do. What are the important highlights and recommendations?<\/p>\n<p>The post <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/searchengineland.com\/how-to-audit-your-google-ads-account-like-a-pro-387486\" target=\"_blank\">How to audit your Google Ads account like a pro<\/a> appeared first on <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/searchengineland.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Search Engine Land<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Brad Geddes is no stranger to paid search. And as one of the co-founders of Adalysis, he\u2019s done his fair share of audits. In this SMX Advanced 2022 session, he provides a framework for how to audit your own accounts, or perform audits for client proposals. Let\u2019s dive in. Why perform an audit. There are a few reasons why you\u2019d perform a Google Ads audit: Someone is unhappy with performance. Their conversions have decreased and spend has gone up. Something has gone wrong.\u00a0 The account owner [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"h5ap_radio_sources":[],"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-best-seo-blogs"],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":false,"author_link":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/author\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5708\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craighordlow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}