Google Ads Report

The story

A month in, three takeaways.

The tracking now has a real conversion behind it, the best ad group is clear, and so is the one holding the account back.

First strategy-call request

On Oct 6 a searcher typed "social media agency near me", clicked the DFW Local ad and submitted the strategy-call form. It is the first conversion since launch, and it proves the tracking works from ad click to form.

11.9%

DFW Local is still the strongest group

The Dallas, Fort Worth and "near me" group clicks at 11.9%, almost three times Management Services, and it produced the only conversion. 32 of the 90 clicks came from here.

$636

Management Services spends most, converts least

It took 864 of the 1,345 impressions and $636 of the spend at a 4.4% click-through rate, with no conversion. One keyword, "social media marketing for businesses", accounts for $452 of it.

Google Ads

Clicks since launch.

Daily clicks against daily spend from the first serving day. The shaded band is the last 7 days, Oct 9 - 15.

Clicks & spend per day

Clicks Daily spend

Window total 90 clicks on $1,549Shaded band = last 7 days

25.4%

Search impression share

Share of eligible DFW searches we showed on

52.8%

Lost to ad rank

Quality Score and bid

21.8%

Lost to budget

Daily spend cap reached

52%

Clicks on mobile

47 mobile, 43 desktop

How to read this chart. Volume is small by design: exact-match keywords on Google Search only, in the Dallas-Fort Worth market only. Clicks have run at zero to six a day since launch, about three on average. The biggest blocker to visibility is still ad rank, not budget: 52.8% of eligible impressions were lost to rank against 21.8% to budget.

Last 7 days

Oct 9 - 15 vs the week before.

More impressions, fewer clicks. The ads showed more often but in weaker positions, and most of the extra showings went to the group that converts least.

373

Impressions

273 prior 7 days (+37%)

Clicks

24 prior 7 days (-29%)

4.6%

CTR

8.8% prior 7 days

Strategy calls

1 prior 7 days (Oct 6)

Metric	Oct 2 - 8	Oct 9 - 15
Impressions	273	373
Clicks	24	17
CTR	8.8%	4.6%
Avg. cost / click	$15.43	$19.25
Spend	$370	$327
Strategy-call requests	1	0
Search impression share	39.7%	28.7%
Impressions lost to ad rank	39.5%	61.1%
Impressions lost to budget	20.8%	10.2%

Management Services 248 impr. · 7 clicks · 2.8% CTR

$142

DFW Local 72 impr. · 6 clicks · 8.3% CTR

$95

Core 53 impr. · 4 clicks · 7.5% CTR

$90

Why the week was softer. Impressions lost to ad rank rose from 39.5% to 61.1%, so the ads that did show sat lower on the page and drew fewer clicks. Management Services took 248 of the 373 impressions at a 2.8% click-through rate, and "social media marketing for businesses" alone drew 183 of them for 4 clicks. The click cap was raised from $25 to $35 on Oct 13 to win back position. Oct 14 then had the most impressions of any day since launch (122), but two days is too little to judge it.

Ad group split

Where the clicks came from.

One campaign, four ad groups, each with its own keywords, ad and landing page. Influencer & Creator has been paused since launch day.

Management Services 38 clicks · 4.4% CTR

$636

DFW Local 32 clicks · 11.9% CTR · 1 strategy call

$551

Core 20 clicks · 9.4% CTR

$362

Influencer & Creator Paused since launch

Ad group	Status	Impr.	Clicks	CTR	CPC	Spend	Conv.
DFW Local Best CTR	Active	269	32	11.9%	$17.21	$551	1
Management Services	Active	864	38	4.4%	$16.75	$636	0
Core	Active	212	20	9.4%	$18.12	$362	0
Influencer & Creator	Paused	0	0	-	-	$0	0
Total		1,345	90	6.7%	$17.21	$1,549	1

Management Services is where the money leaks. 568 of its 864 impressions came from one keyword, "social media marketing for businesses", which has cost $452 for 28 clicks and no conversion. It is also where 13 of the 14 how-to clicks came in. Core has a different problem: its ad still points to the homepage, and "social media marketing agency" carries a Quality Score of 2 out of 10, which drags on ad rank.

Search terms

What people actually searched.

Google shows the search behind 68 of the 90 clicks ($1,184 of the $1,549). We sorted them by intent.

Generic topic 20 clicks · "social media marketing", "smm"

$351

Hiring an agency 19 clicks · "social media agency", "marketing agency"

$339

Local DFW search 15 clicks · "agency dallas", "near me"

$273

How-to / DIY 14 clicks · "how to market a business on social media", "smma"

$221

Search	Intent	Clicks	Spend
social media marketing	Generic	11	$178
social media agency	Hiring	5	$84
social media marketing agency	Hiring	4	$66
social media management	Generic	3	$52
social media manager dallas	Local	2	$44
social media advertising	Generic	2	$42
social media management company	Hiring	2	$41
smm	Generic	2	$40
social media agency near me Converted	Local	2	$38
social media marketing agency dallas	Local	2	$35

Top ten searches by spend, plus the search that converted. Google hides low-volume searches for privacy, so 22 clicks ($366) have no search term attached.

→

Half the visible spend reached people looking to hire, and that half produced the conversion. 34 clicks ($612) came from agency or local DFW searches. The other 34 ($572) went to generic or how-to searches, 32 of them through Management Services. That is still the first place to tighten.

Since launch

What we changed.

Every change made in the account from build day through Oct 15, in order.

Date	Change
Sep 14	Campaign built. One Search campaign, "NAT \| Search \| DFW \| Social Media Services", on Google Search only (no search partners, no Display), targeting people physically in the Dallas-Fort Worth market. Four ad groups (Core, Management Services, DFW Local, Influencer & Creator) with 18 exact-match keywords and one responsive search ad each. Bidding set to maximize clicks. AI Max and auto-generated ad text left off so every line of copy is one we wrote.
Sep 14	Ad extensions added. Sitelinks to seven service pages, a structured snippet and a call button with call tracking.
Sep 14	Paused for a copy review before serving. DFW Local ad copy corrected (a suburb headline swapped for "Single In-House Team In Dallas", "Signed To Shooting" changed to "Signed To Posting", descriptions rewritten). Influencer & Creator ad group paused. Ad group names cleaned up.
Sep 15	Relaunched. Daily budget reduced to pace to the monthly plan. Tracking parameters added to the DFW Local ad.
Sep 15	13 negative keywords added to keep out job seekers and learners: job, jobs, hiring, career, careers, salary, internship, course, courses, certification, template, templates and "how to become".
Sep 15	Bid cap set at $20 per click so no single click could run away with the day's spend.
Sep 15	Ads rewritten for Management Services and Influencer & Creator (15 headlines and 4 descriptions each, landing on the matching service page). Two influencer keywords ("ugc creator", "marketing influencer") paused.
Sep 15	Business name and logo added to the ads.
Sep 21	Bid cap raised from $20 to $25 per click to win more auctions in the DFW market.
Sep 22 - Oct 1	No changes. The campaign was left to gather data.
Oct 2	Six how-to searches blocked as exact-match negatives, based on the search terms report: "how to do marketing on social media", "how to market your business on social media", "how to post on social media for business", "how to grow a business through social media", "learn how to use social media for business" and "how can i do social media marketing".
Oct 3 - 11	No changes to the main campaign. The first strategy-call request came in on Oct 6.
Oct 12	Competitor campaign built, paused. A separate Search campaign for people in the Dallas-Fort Worth market who search for Thrive or LERMA/ by name, on exact-match keywords only, with job-seeker and customer-service searches excluded. The ads never name either agency. It has not served yet.
Oct 13	Competitor campaign finalised and kept paused. Bidding set to maximize clicks with a $35 click cap, one headline swapped and ad assets added, ready to switch on.
Oct 13	Bid cap raised on the main campaign from $25 to $35 per click to win back ad position.

In short: since the Oct 2 report, the main campaign got one bid increase on Oct 13, and a separate competitor campaign was built and is ready to launch on your go-ahead.

What's next

Where we take it from here.

Each move ties back to what the first month showed.

Operating plan

The next window.

Rein in Management Services. Pause or replace "social media marketing for businesses" ($452, 28 clicks, no conversion) and move that spend toward the searches that convert.
Give DFW Local more room. It has the best click-through rate in the account and produced the only strategy-call request.
Finish cutting the how-to traffic. Add "smma" and the remaining how-to searches as negatives. How-to searches have cost $221 so far.
Apply the negative keyword lists already in the account. Nine lists (job seekers, DIY, price shoppers and more) exist but none is attached to the main campaign yet.
Lift Quality Score on Core. Point the Core ad to the Dallas page instead of the homepage, to win back some of the 52.8% of impressions lost to ad rank.
Read the $35 click cap after a full week. If it buys position without lifting cost per click much further, keep it.
Launch the competitor campaign once you give the go-ahead.

90 DFW clicks. First strategy call is in.