An advertising report describes activity in detail and business outcomes barely at all. The figures that matter are cost per enquiry and what proportion of enquiries became work, and neither appears in a standard report unless somebody configured it to.
Reading it in the right order
Most reports open with impressions and clicks, which is the order the platform produces rather than the order that answers your question.
The useful sequence is backwards: what did it cost, how many enquiries did it produce, what did each one cost, and how does that compare against what a customer is worth.
Everything else is explanation for why those numbers moved, which is useful once you have them and misleading on its own.
The metrics that mislead
Impressions
How many times an advertisement was shown. Rising impressions can mean broader targeting rather than more demand, and broader targeting is frequently worse.
Useful as context for a change in clicks, not as a measure of anything on its own.
Click-through rate
Genuinely useful for judging whether an advertisement matches the search. A low rate suggests the wording or the targeting is off.
It says nothing about whether those clicks were worth having, and a high rate on the wrong audience is a fast way to spend a budget.
Cost per click
The most commonly quoted figure and the most misleading. A falling cost per click frequently means the campaign moved into cheaper, less relevant searches.
Paying more per click for clicks that convert is better than paying less for clicks that do not, and the report presents the second as an improvement.
Impression share
What proportion of available impressions you received. Interesting, and it invites the wrong conclusion, since increasing it means spending more on the searches you were deliberately not winning.
Conversions, when undefined
The one to check before trusting anything. A conversion might be a form submission, or it might be a page view, a phone tap counted at three seconds, or something configured years ago by somebody else.
The first thing to verify
What is being counted as a conversion, and whether it corresponds to something you would call an enquiry.
This is the check that changes the interpretation of the entire report, and it is skipped almost universally. A campaign reporting forty conversions a month that turn out to include every visit to the contact page is not reporting forty enquiries.
Where the definition is wrong, every derived figure is wrong, including the cost per conversion that decisions are being made on.
What to look at
| Figure | Why |
|---|---|
| Total spend | The only unambiguous number in the report |
| Enquiries produced | Counted as you would count them, not as configured |
| Cost per enquiry | Spend divided by enquiries. The figure that matters. |
| Cost per enquiry by campaign | Where the differences usually are |
| Search terms report | What people actually typed, which is the most actionable page |
| Performance by location and time | Where waste concentrates |
The search terms report
The most useful page and the one least often opened.
It shows the actual queries that triggered your advertisements, which is different from the keywords you chose. Reading it reveals what you are genuinely paying for.
What you will find: searches for services you do not offer, searches from outside your area, job seekers, people looking for parts rather than a tradesperson, and competitors' names.
Each of those is a negative keyword waiting to be added, and going through this report monthly is the single highest-return maintenance task in an advertising account.
Questions to ask about any report
- What counts as a conversion here.
- What period is this compared against, and is that comparison seasonally fair.
- What changed in the account during this period.
- Which campaign has the worst cost per enquiry, and what is being done about it.
- What did the search terms report show, and what was excluded as a result.
- How many enquiries became work, which only you can answer.
That last question is the one that closes the loop, and no report can answer it. A campaign producing cheap enquiries that never proceed is worse than one producing expensive enquiries that do, and only the person answering the phone knows which is which.
When a report is a sales document
Worth recognising, since some are.
The signs: leading with impressions, emphasising a falling cost per click, no cost per enquiry, comparisons chosen to flatter, and no mention of anything that went badly.
A report from somebody managing your account should include at least one thing that did not work and what was done about it. A report where everything improved every month is describing a selection rather than a period.
Asking for cost per enquiry by campaign, month by month, is a reasonable request and the answer tells you a good deal about how the account is actually being managed, which is the same reasoning as in geographic targeting and the radius mistake.
Frequently asked questions
What should I look at first in an advertising report?
Total spend, enquiries produced, and cost per enquiry. Impressions and clicks are explanation for why those moved, not measures of anything on their own.
Why is cost per click misleading?
A falling cost per click frequently means the campaign moved into cheaper, less relevant searches. Paying more for clicks that convert is better than paying less for clicks that do not.
What should I verify before trusting a report?
What is being counted as a conversion. If it includes every visit to the contact page, every derived figure including cost per conversion is wrong.
What is the most useful page in the account?
The search terms report, showing the actual queries that triggered your ads. It reveals searches for services you do not offer, wrong areas, job seekers, and competitors' names.
What question can no report answer?
How many enquiries became work. A campaign producing cheap enquiries that never proceed is worse than one producing expensive enquiries that do.
How do I tell if a report is a sales document?
It leads with impressions, emphasises a falling cost per click, omits cost per enquiry, and mentions nothing that went badly. A real report includes something that did not work.
West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.
Getting a monthly report you cannot interpret?
We rewrite it to lead with cost per enquiry by campaign, and go through the search terms report properly.
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