In 2024, U.S. businesses spent over $190 billion on paid search advertising. With such noteworthy investments, it’s pivotal to ensure that every penny spent is effective. A PPC audit helps identify areas where ad spend is wasted. This will allow better targeting and an improved ROI. Via regular PPC Campaign Analysis and creating better campaigns, businesses can stay competitive and make the most of their advertising budgets. 

PPC advertising faces challenges like ad blockers, with over 912 million users using them, reducing ad visibility. A Pay per Click audit identifies such hidden issues by analyzing campaign data. It helps campaign managers spot underperforming ads and wasted spend. PPC Account Audit provide actionable tips to optimize ad copy, targeting and budget allocation by:

• Detecting click fraud or suspicious clicks that waste ad spend.
• Identifies poor ad copy relevance and landing page experience affecting rankings.
• Confirms all leads and sales are accurately recorded.
• Highlights if automated or manual bidding is costing more than necessary.
• Compares ad performance with market trends for better positioning.

This process enhances performance and maximizes return on investment. 

What is the Purpose of the PPC Audit?

A PPC audit is a review of your PPC Campaign. Your PPC campaign can be  to find out what’s working and what’s not. Suppose you are running a fashion online store. Amid the vast competition in this arena or any other sector, running ads on Google or social media can be challenging. Here’s how PPC audit help you solve your problems:

• It Stops You From Wasting Money on “Guesswork” Campaigns
• It Exposes Your Blind Spots (Yes, You Have Them)
• It turns data into actionable fixes, not just fancy reports
• It Future-Proofs Your Strategy (Because Algorithms Change…Fast)

• Your ads may not reach the right customers
• You may spend too much on ads with low sales (eg. no or low Ad Copy Relevance like US ad shown in India) 
• A Google Ads audit checks for ideal keywords, correct audience targeting, a customized ad copy as per audience and demographics along with checking your budget.
• It helps find underperforming ads and fixes them. 

So not just for a fashion store, even for any kind of e-commerce or more business done online, your ads will perform better. They will reach more suitable consumers and give you better returns, making every ad dollar count.

When to Conduct a Pay Per Click Audit?

There are few things to determine if it’s time to audit your PPC advertising campaign or not. When you notice a dip in your ad performance or after any important changes to your business strategy, reviewing your ad campaign will be a wise choice. If your conversion rates, click-through rates (CTR) or return on ad spend (ROAS) are decreasing for the campaign you are running, you can review your campaign to check what are the reasons? Are they because of poor user experience, boring design or so on.

When you launch new products, entering new markets PPC Audit can really save cost and produce  efficient results for you, because you will regularly audit your PPC account every 2 months so that you are aligned with the business goals and the market trends that do help save the cost.

Finally, after the major PPC audit rolled out after a major PPC update or a seasonal shift, it is very important to adapt quickly with the new changes. 

When the performance of your campaign drops and you don’t know the exact reason, auditing your PPC account helps you find and understand the root cause.

How to perform a Pay Per Click Audit

1. Ensure the Tracking Setups are Correct

First step in pay per click audit is to verify that all tracking tools are installed correctly on the e-commerce site. Check if the Google Ads conversion tracking tag is on the ‘Thank You’ page after a purchase. This is because you can track your important metrics properly. Without accurate tracking, you can’t measure which ads are driving conversions. Check tools like Google Analytics and ensure they are linked to PPC campaigns. Inaccurate setup leads to missed data and poor campaign insights, which directly affects ad optimization and ROI.

2. Account Hierarchy Review Along With Product Name

A clear account structure helps you manage PPC campaigns more easily. Each campaign should have relevant ad groups targeting specific products. Let’s take an example of an electronic store running PPC campaigns, be specific with your ad targeting and create ad groups like ‘Smartphones’ and ‘Laptops.’

Make sure you give a descriptive name to your campaigns and ad groups, so that you can avoid the confusion during account hierarchy review. One pro tip is, you should organize by product or service to make sure your ads appear on relevant keywords.

3. Review Keywords and Targeting Settings

Keywords are the most important thing in PPC. If you’re not targeting the right and relevant keywords according to your products or services your ad performance dip. Even if you get more reach, conversion will not be relevant or will not generate revenue. 

For example, if you are selling wireless headphones, specific keywords like ‘best wireless headphones for gym’ will get you the correct customers. While doing PPC Campaign Analysis, remember to add negative keywords, like ‘free,’ if you sell premium products, to prevent showing ads to the wrong people. Regularly update and refine your keyword list based on performance to ensure you are attracting traffic that will likely lead to sales. This helps you avoid wasting money on clicks that won’t convert.

4. Analyze Campaign Performance Within Data Range

PPC Campaign Analysis here means to review how well your campaigns performed within a specific time frame (last 30 days or an exact time segment).

Next, compare this data with the previous period. If performance has dropped, analyze why. Scan CTR (Click-Through Rate) and CPC (Cost-Per-Click) to identify underperforming ads or keywords. By improving ad copy relevance or text or changing targeting, you will be able to bring campaigns back on track for better returns.

5. Review the Basic Campaign Settings

When checking your PPC account, first look at where your ads are showing. If your customers are in the U.S., make sure your ads only run there – you’re wasting money showing ads to people in other countries who can’t buy from you.

Next, think about your budget. If you’re selling expensive items, You’ll probably need to spend more to reach serious buyers.

Also check when your ads are running. Show them when your customers are actually online. Most people shop in the evenings and on weekends, so run your ads then.

Quick tip: Your settings are super important. Small changes can save you money and get better results. If you ignore this stuff, you’ll burn through cash showing ads to the wrong people at the wrong times. Stay on top of it!

6. Review the Ad Copy Relevance & Landing Page Content

Always check your ad text. It needs to match what people are looking for.

Your landing page is just as important – it should deliver exactly what your ad promised. If someone clicks on your “cheap running shoes” ad, they should land on a page that shows affordable shoes, not expensive ones or other products.

When there’s a disconnect between your ad and landing page, you’ll lose potential customers. They’ll get frustrated and leave your site quickly, which means fewer sales for you.

I’ve seen this mistake cost businesses thousands in wasted ad spend. Remember, every click costs you money, so make sure you’re sending people to exactly what they expected to find!

7. Analyze Bidding Strategies

For Pay Per Click Audit, it is important to align your bidding strategy with your targets. 

• For any kind of online business, if you want more sales, use Target CPA (Cost-Per-Acquisition) or ROAS (Return on Ad Spend). 
• If brand awareness is your target, then Maximize Clicks will be a better strategy.
• Regularly evaluate if the current bidding strategy is helping you reach desired outcomes. 
• Adjust bids based on performance data, increasing bids for high-converting products or lowering for underperforming ones. This maximizes your ad spend.

8. Inspect Ad Extensions

Review the  ad extensions like sitelinks, callouts or structured snippets. For example, if you’re selling shoes online, price extensions can show a discount or price range directly in your ad. This makes your ad stand out and can increase clicks. During Pay Per Click audit, make sure the extensions lead to the right product pages or sales, so customers get exactly what they expect when they click. 

9. Test and Review the Ads Script

Suppose you have an online store that sells eco-friendly water bottles. You have set up an automated script to pause ads that aren’t performing well (like ads for specific bottle designs that aren’t getting clicks).

Now, you need to test and review that script to make sure it’s doing its job. Check if the script correctly pauses ads for a design that’s getting no sales and is costing too much.

If you don’t review it regularly:

• You could end up spending your budget on ads that don’t work, like showing ads for that unpopular design at peak shopping times. 
• Misconfigured scripts might make you run ads when the audience is low or waste money by boosting poorly-performing ads. 
• By testing and adjusting the scripts, you ensure that the right ads are always active and you’re spending on ads that convert.

10. Analyze the Important Data (CTR, CPC, Conversion Rates)

In a PPC audit, you check three key numbers: CTR, CPC, and conversion rates. For example:

• If your ad for a fitness app has a low CTR, it means people aren’t clicking on the ad. 
• If your CPC is high, you are paying too much for ad clicks that don’t bring value. 
• Conversion rates show how many clicks turn into sign-ups. If they’re low, your landing page or checkout might need fixing. 

PPC account audit is not just about checking the issues but also fixing these. Change your ad copy, adjust your bids or improve your landing page. 

11. Check Your Remarketing Audiences

Coming to the last three steps of how to do a Pay Per Click audit, you will now have to evaluate your remarketing campaigns. In this step you have to target users who previously visited your site but didn’t buy from you. For an e-commerce store, create segments like ‘cart abandoners’ or ‘product viewers’ to captivate those users again. Find out what products they liked, and accordingly adjust your remarketing ad copy (eg. try a special discount). An effective remarketing strategy ensures higher conversion rates and a better ROI from previous traffic.

12. Analyze Cross-Channel Impact

Pay per click audit also involves how your PPC campaigns are affecting other channels like social media, email, and organic search. Use Google Analytics to track cross-channel conversions and assist in optimizing campaigns. This helps you understand the full impact of your PPC efforts beyond immediate clicks and sales. 

13. Spy on Your Competitors’ Ads

Look at what your competitors are doing with their PPC campaigns. If competitors are ranking for keywords you haven’t targeted yet, consider adding them to your own campaigns. We are sharing a few tools towards competitors PPC Campaign Analysis. 

iSpionage is offering insights into competitors’ keywords, ad copy and landing pages. 

Ahrefs is well known for its comprehensive SEO capabilities. It also offers very strong data on competitors’ PPC ads, including keywords and ad performance.

Kompyte is an AI-driven tool that automatically tracks competitors’ digital activities, including website changes, content updates and PPC ads.

• If their ads are more engaging, analyze how you can improve yours. 
• Identify opportunities or gaps in your campaigns, fill them.

What are the deliverables of PPC Audit?

A PPC audit delivers a comprehensive analysis of your paid advertising campaigns. PPC campaign analysis involves identifying areas for improvement and maximizing ROI. A detailed PPC audit report provides a roadmap for optimizing your PPC campaigns to maximize your ROI on ad spend. If you’re opting for PPC audit services, you should at least expect the following deliverables from the providers: 

• Required account structure
• Keyword analysis
• Ads account audit like ad copy effectiveness
• Landing page experience
• Targeting precision of ad copies
• PPC bidding strategies
• And performance metrics like CTR, conversion rate and ROAS 

1. The report also analyzes competitor strategies and ensures policy compliance.  
2. Crucially, the paid search audit provides prioritized recommendations and an action plan towards creating an edge above the competitors. 
3. It also shares ideas for implementation, outlining specific steps, timelines and resources needed.  

Depending on the audit’s scope, additional deliverables will include:

• A revised campaign structure
• Expanded keyword lists
• Optimized ad copy suggestions
• Landing page improvement recommendations
• A detailed competitor analysis

Spend Your Ad Budget Efficiently With PPC Audit

A PPC audit reveals where your budget is leaking, helps you target the right customers, and protects your campaigns from algorithm changes that could tank your results overnight. From fixing broken tracking to fine-tuning your strategy, every improvement makes your ad dollars work smarter.

Don’t waste another dollar on underperforming ads. Our audits deliver detailed insights of your campaign that amaze everyone. CONTACT US to get your free basic audit today!