Blog record summary
- What a google ads audit is and why it is important to do a
- When You Should Perform an Audit
- The steps you should go through when performing an audit, and the questions you should ask yourself while doing it.
One of the greatest sins in the work of a Google Ads Account is to see it done. We who work with Google Ads daily, and across different customers, know that the work with an account is never done. The landscape we're moving in changes too often and too quickly to allow us to look at an account that is fully optimized – no matter how much work we have put in it.
Even if we know that the work to make the account better is never over, even the best can look blind at his own work. In INEVO, therefore, we give priority to setting aside time to review their own and their clients’ accounts every quarter — doing so-called audits.
An audit is a review of the account where different improvement measures are discovered, evaluated and proposed based on data and today’s performance. In this article we share our guide to conduct a good audit of your Google Ads account.
Continuity
A Google Ads audit can on many occasions, for example by taking over a new account, be a quick fix that leads to many improvement points that can be implemented immediately and provide clear and quick results for the customer. It is therefore absolutely necessary to audit an account if you take over an account based on the work of others. We see clearly the benefits of conducting audits when we take over an account because we will then evaluate others' work and try to improve this or change parts of the account so that it coincides more with its own best practices.
However, it is at least as important to continue to carry out audits over time and at regular intervals if you want the best effect of them. Even if you have faith in your own work, routines and setup, an auditor may reveal things you have ignored or things that are simply matured for change. Are the search terms, campaigns and budgetary challenges that were profitable last quarter still the same or are you wasting money by giving priority to these?
So... when should I conduct an audit?
As mentioned above, you should always make an audit when working with or taking over a new account.
We're also proposing to conduct an audit every quarter, which is 4 times a year. Do it yourself, or let someone else on your team complete it. This way you can get valuable insights and suggestions you don't notice yourself because you've seen yourself blind in the account.
If you feel that the results have stagnated or you think you can do better, it's time for an auditory. Can you improve the structure to work effectively in everyday life? Have you made any errors that result in stagnating results and should be corrected?
1. Conversion Tracking
Conversion tracking is one of the most elementary of a Google Ads account and no doubt most people are ultimately taking for granted the proper functioning of the account. Is there something so banal worth spending time checking? Definitely. Despite the fact that conversion tracking is an absolute must to operate a successful account and improve data based results, studies of over 2000 accounts show that only 29% of Google Ads accounts track their conversions effectively in a way that is in awe of jokes? Absolutely.
This means that 71% of the accounts did not measure conversions or they track the conversions incorrectly or in a less appropriate way.
The questions you have to ask yourself below this point are:
- Is the conversion trace set correctly?
- I'm measuring them. correct Things? Are there other goals that are more effective or should be complementary to today's targets?
- Have new types of conversions appeared that should be traced since the last audit? (For example, a new form on the website?)
2. Account Structure
Structure has a lot to say for the work on a Google Ads account, and can often have a big impact on the results. The item about the account structure is two-part. Firstly, it is about whether a good versus poor account structure can promote or inhibit the efficiency of the daily work of the account of the person operating it. Furthermore, structure is also important for the account's performance, purely technical.
Do you have too many or too many or different keywords in each ad group? This may lead to loss of relevance and end up doing worse and paying more. Is the campaigns and their budget appropriately distributed? A deep-depth approach to the structure of the account may provide answers to these questions.
The questions you have to ask yourself below this point are:
- Promotions: Based on your budget and the way you want to distribute it, is it appropriate to gather the advertising groups in two different campaigns and to merge these campaigns into one? Is it appropriate to split an existing campaign into several? Do other changes to the budgets?
- Advertising groups: Do the best ad groups get enough of the budgets? Are the bids reasonable? Discompetition or supplementing the advertising groups we have today?
- Ads: Is there enough advertising in each advertising group?
Three. Promotion Settings
This is, in most cases, a step of Google Ads auditory that is relatively fast to implement. Major errors here are likely to be detected continuously as they may have a drastic impact on the account’s performance.
Question you have to ask yourself below this point is:
- Are the promotion priorities set correctly in your shopping campaigns?
- Are the locations you're targeting for right? Should they be extended? Should you target a smaller area? And if you're targeting a larger area (e.g. a whole country), have you broken up into county, local government etc. to effectively bid-just and segment data?
- Is the bidding strategy, budget and advertising the way you wish?
- Is the targeting and bidding based on units correct?
- Is the advertising planning sufficiently and carefully set up based on your business? Is there days you shouldn't show your ad where you show them or vice versa?
- Do you bid-just based on the advertising planning detailed enough?
Find out how to use scripts to pay 24 hours a day, every day of the week here!
4. Search term
A completed account usually has: many keywords. Can you keep track of these every day?
The work on negative search terms and a sharp look in the search term report are important factors for an appropriate and well-maintained account. This is, however, work that must be done in the daily course and cannot wait for an auditor.
However, the implementation of a Google Ads audit is a good opportunity to look at the profitability of search terms. The study previously referred to in the article also shows that: 61% of the budget is discarded on keywords that never has led to a single conversion. There are of course some exceptions to the rule that a keyword should be profitable for offering money, but usually this is the search term we can do without.
Furthermore, this is the time to correct errors that may occur during the day-to-day work of a large account. Do we have duplicates or close variants among our keywords? Disse should take time to find and “stitch together” so that we get a better picture of the actual performance of the search term. Duplicates can be found and removed in Editor.
Question you have to ask yourself below this point is:
- Are there duplicate search terms?
- Do we have many unprofitable keywords that lead to us throwing ad crowns out of the window? Is it worth keeping these? Have we been careful enough to add negative keywords in these cases?
- Do we have keywords with exceptionally low quality points? What's this? Can we improve this? (If you have low-expected CTR, you should take a particularly careful look at the search term report, etc.).
5. Ads
When it comes to advertising, you can get at risk of wrongs either one way or another. Either the ad changes and tests are incorrect and too much, or they are left unmoved for too long.
As mentioned under the structural point, it is important that there are sufficient advertising texts in each advertising group. Mostly 2-3 depending on whether you are testing manually or allowing Google to do the job separately.
Process to A/B-test adverts should be a continuous process that happens over time, but if you conduct audits on behalf of others and look at the adverts with completely new eyes, it is always an advantage to be able to make creative recordings that can be tested.
Question you have to ask yourself below this point is:
- Do I have enough advertising in each advertising group?
- Is the content effective and meaningful? Can I test other ways of expressing the message?
- Do my ads send to the right landing sites?
- Do I use the keyword in the advertisement text?
6. Extensions
It's scary to go into the trap where you set up the account's extensions, and then forget them. Extensions are part of the ad that the applicant sees and should therefore, in theory, receive as much attention as we give the ad texts. Unfortunately, it's rarely like this.
Google itself reports an increase in the click rate of 10-15% on average using ad extension. They are therefore an important part of the audience. In the case of extensions, it is largely about making use of all relevant extensions, but also about making the extensions as relevant as possible. Relevance is an important keyword in the work on Google Ads, and the extensions are crucial to deliver this to those who are seeking. For many customers, we find that the very best results come when the extensions, such as structured clippings, callouts or sitelinks, are relevant down to product or service levels.
Question you have to ask yourself below this point is:
- Do we have all the relevant extensions we should have?
- Are the extensions relevant enough? Do we have time to increase relevance by adding extensions at ad group level where appropriate?
- Is the information in the extensions correct?
- How do they perform? Should we test another message?
Seven. Audiences
Audiences is an important part of most Google Ads accounts – whether it's remarketing lists, similar audiences, in-market audiences or all of them.
A Google Ads audit is a golden opportunity to double-check that everything that should be there is in place, that any bid adjustments you have set are still appropriate and whether any custom audits are mature for an update.
Read more about how to make good marketing lists here!
Question you have to ask yourself below this point is:
- Have you added enough marketing lists and cover the whole account?
- Do the different audiences have the right bids?
- Are you using customer list marketing? Is this mature for an update?
- Do you have control over where you use ‘targeting’ vs ‘observation’?
- Is the Membership duration set to a reasonable time period for your customers/visitors?
Eight. Documentation and reporting
As you go along the process, it is important that you document your findings. This because you most likely will need to share the results of your Google Ads audit with your colleagues internally or other externally, for example the customer. In addition, an important measure can quickly go into the Forgetbook if it is not written down.
It is only after the audit that the real job starts – the measures must be implemented. No matter how many actions you discover through the audit, a plan should be put in place to implement them. Are there few and simple measures that can be taken in a small hour or are there major measures that need to be distributed over time — and when will they be completed? Furthermore, who does what must be revealed – are you to complete the action list or to pass it to a colleague or any customer?