Below are some of the key tricks agencies use to win your business in an audit that should raise red flags.
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Cropped screenshots. What are they leaving out? For example, on LinkedIn, I saw a post where someone used the following in an audit with pride that they were catching the current agency sleeping. The problem here? This is all campaigns, all ad groups, and all ads, even if they are paused. Of course there will be disapprovals for pages not working, especially if the account is older. Think about how many landing pages you have tested with unique URLs, pages for old sales you ran, parts of your website you updated. All of this still lives in the account and Google still monitors it. This doesn’t mean anything in this format. If they crop the top part with filters out too - that is a giveaway that this is what is happening. “Correcting” this won’t actually change performance at all if the ads are all not running.
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They make statements about lower performance, but don’t include or ask for context that may be critical. For example, they say conversions declined 40% in August and have remained low. There are many reasons that this could be that are not an error. For example: Previously they counted another event as a primary conversion in addition to the one they are used now, but they no longer count that other event. This could also be a swing in the goals they were provided. Perhaps at one point, they were maybe too efficient, and they shifted budget away from branded to let organic take some. Context and questions are key for both sides. There is always a storyline.
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Overly focused on quality score, ad strength, and optimization score. This is Google lingo. The optimization score is based on the Google recommendations tab, which the main purpose of this, is to help suggest more ways for you to spend more. A lower score here is not necessarily a bad thing. When it comes to quality score, it has to be understood that even on branded terms you may get a 9 out 10. Or 10 out of 10. Typically nonbrand queries can land anywhere between 3-7 depending on the scope of the keyword. Ad strength is another area where the labeling can be very misleading. Of course, everyone wants an “Excellent” as the score, but the truth here is, if you have to pin a headline to make sure that it will show (sale, new customer offer as examples of times this may be used), you will automatically drop to an Average.
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They frequently/seemingly over promise on the impending performance based on changes they may make, but they do that without substance. For example, saying “We’ve seen X type of conversion action work with brands like yours” is just words without data, and frequently, that is just a lie to give you comfort. This usually just leads to a re-arrangement of how your orders are coming and often not leading to an uptick. Plus when broad sweeping account changes happen, that can buy a marketing group at least a month of “since we made changes the account needs to learn/adjust/etc”.
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They don’t have any test ideas prepped. Suggesting at least one test during an audit is essential. Every single account behaves differently and tests are crucial to finding what works best for your account and brand specifically. Leaving this out can indicate they use the same strategy across every single account in order to just save time OR that they don’t have any new ideas and/or lack in strategy.
Want the full picture? Don’t miss Parts 1: What an Audit Should Actually Be (Before It Starts)
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Background:
Evan Padgett - 16 years operating in house media teams for JustFab, ShoeDazzle, and Thrive Market. 5 Additional years as COO of an ad agency managing at peak, about $10MM a month in media. Hired and worked with Kim for several years. Over $1B in media managed over a 23 year career.
Kim Wright - SEM focused media buyer with 13 years of in platform experience and approximately $500M in total SEM managed media. Heavy experience in DTC ecommerce and automobile.
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