Where should a Google Ads audit start?

With conversion tracking. If the account counts the wrong actions, double counts leads or is missing offline results, Smart Bidding is optimising toward the wrong goal. Fixing measurement first makes every other change easier to judge.

How often should a Google Ads account be audited?

A full audit makes sense when you take over an account, when performance shifts without a clear reason, or at least once a year. Some checks, such as the search terms report and budget pacing, should be part of routine weekly management rather than an annual event.

Can I audit my own Google Ads account?

Yes. This checklist covers the main areas, and Google's own help pages explain each setting. An outside review is still useful, because it is easy to stop noticing problems in an account you built yourself.

Do I have to hand over my account for an audit?

No. Arche gets access through a Google Ads manager account link, so you never share login details. You remain the owner of the account and keep all its data whatever you decide afterwards.

What a Google Ads Audit Should Cover

Start with conversion tracking

Every other part of an audit depends on this one. Smart Bidding optimises toward whatever the account counts as a conversion, so if that is wrong, the whole account is learning the wrong lesson. Check:

Primary versus secondary actions. Only primary conversion actions appear in the Conversions column and are used for bidding. Page views, scroll depth or brochure downloads set as primary will pull spend toward cheap, low-value actions.
Duplicates. The same lead or sale counted twice, often by a Google Ads tag and an imported GA4 event firing together.
Counting settings. Google suggests counting one conversion per click for leads and every conversion for purchases.
Values. Real sale values for ecommerce, and sensible relative values for different lead types.
Enhanced conversions. Whether enhanced conversions are on, so hashed first-party data can recover conversions that cookies miss.
Offline results. For lead-gen, whether qualified leads and sales from the CRM are fed back through offline conversion imports.
Attribution. Google now offers only data-driven and last click attribution. Data-driven is the default for most actions. Confirm nothing important is set otherwise without a reason.

Account structure and settings

Brand and non-brand search in separate campaigns, so cheap brand clicks do not flatter overall results.
Campaigns split by genuine differences in intent, margin or geography, not by habit. Too many small campaigns starve each one of data.
Location settings checked. The default, Presence or interest, can show ads to people outside your area who have shown interest in it. Local service businesses often want Presence only.
Ad schedules, languages and networks reviewed. Search campaigns that are also opted into the Display Network deserve a hard look.
Clear naming, so anyone can read the account.

Search terms and negatives

The search terms report shows what people actually typed before clicking. It is where most wasted spend hides. Review it for irrelevant, low-intent and job-seeker queries, then look at how negatives are built:

Negative keywords do not match close variants. Excluding one word does not exclude its plural or synonyms, so those need adding. Misspellings are handled automatically.
Shared negative keyword lists for exclusions that apply across campaigns.
Negatives that are too broad and are blocking good traffic.
Brand exclusions where you want to keep your own or competitor brand terms out of specific campaigns.

Bidding and budgets

Bid strategy matched to the goal and the data. Target ROAS needs reliable conversion values. Target CPA needs steady conversion volume.
Targets that reflect real economics, not a number picked at launch and never revisited.
Campaigns limited by budget that are also profitable. That is often the cheapest growth in the account.
Budget pacing understood. Google says a campaign can spend up to twice its average daily budget on a given day, but no more than 30.4 times the daily budget across the month.
How often bids, targets and budgets are changed. Constant edits make it harder for Smart Bidding to settle.

Performance Max settings

Performance Max now has far more controls than at launch, and an audit should check they are used. Google's Performance Max visibility and control update lists most of them:

Brand exclusions, so Performance Max is not quietly taking credit for branded searches your Search campaign would have won anyway.
Campaign-level negative keywords and shared negative lists.
The search terms report, now available for all Performance Max campaigns.
Final URL expansion, and whether it is sending people to pages that should not be ad landing pages.
Asset reporting, to find and replace weak images, videos and headlines.
Search themes, up to 50 per asset group, and audience signals, which are hints rather than hard targeting.
Device and age controls, where there is a genuine business reason to use them.

If the account uses AI Max for Search campaigns, review its search term matching, text customisation and final URL expansion with the same care.

Ads and assets

Responsive search ads using the space available: up to 15 headlines and 4 descriptions, with real variety rather than reworded copies.
Pinning used sparingly. Google says pinning is not recommended for most advertisers and can affect ad strength.
Ad strength read as a guide only. Google says it is not used in Ad Rank or auction wins.
Sitelinks, callouts, structured snippets, images and call assets set up and current.
Quality Score components (expected click-through rate, ad relevance and landing page experience) used as a diagnostic to find weak ad groups, not as a target in itself.

Landing pages

The page matches the promise in the ad and the intent of the keyword.
It loads quickly and works properly on a phone.
The form or checkout asks only for what you need.
Phone numbers, forms and checkout all trigger conversions that match what the account records.

Audiences

Remarketing and customer lists added to Search campaigns in Observation mode, which Google recommends for Search, so you learn how they perform without restricting reach.
Existing customers excluded from acquisition campaigns where you only want new customers.
Audience lists still populating and large enough to use.

Recommendations and change history

Check whether auto-applied recommendations are switched on and which types. Some are harmless. Others can broaden keywords or change bidding without anyone deciding to. The change history shows who changed what and when, which often explains a sudden shift in performance.

Reporting that reflects the business

Finally, check that reporting answers the questions the business actually asks. Are leads reconciled with the CRM? Is cost per qualified lead or profit visible, not just cost per conversion? Does someone read the numbers weekly and act on them? An audit should end with a prioritised list of fixes, ordered by likely impact, not a long list of observations.

Paid Media

SEO & AI Search

Strategy & Data

Lifecycle & Web

Plan and compare

Professional services

Health and clinics

Property and local

Brands and growth

Your industry