We examine what your account delivers, and act where the auction is decided. The result: prioritised actions · your wasted spend quantified in euros, a plan your team can act on immediately.
Quick check: three evidenced findings, in writing · no cost · Full audit from €3,500 · fixed price, named upfront · Read-only access is enough
The mechanics · Search campaigns
What determines your position and your cost per click
Google does not sell to the highest bidder. Your Ad Rank is the product of four factors, and only one of them costs money. This applies to Search campaigns · what takes the place of the three ratings in Performance Max, Demand Gen and YouTube is explained below.
Ad Rank = Bid × eCTR × Ad Relevance × Landing Page Experience
×××
All three quality factors are relative, not absolute.Google rates them above average, average or below average · compared with the other advertisers serving on the same keyword. So there is no fixed target you reach once: what counts as good enough is set by your competitive environment, and that keeps moving. This is why we assess your account against your actual auction competition, not against a benchmark table.
What it means
How to spot a problem
Where we step in
Does this also apply to Performance Max, Demand Gen and YouTube? No · the three ratings exist only for keywords in Search campaigns. In the other campaign types the bid alone does not decide either, but Google does not report quality there as a factor. For Performance Max, Demand Gen, YouTube, Shopping and Display we therefore check what is visible: the ad strength of the asset groups, the split by channel, search-term insights, brand exclusions and the share of delivery without product data. For Demand Gen and YouTube one more question comes in: how much of the reported conversions rests on views rather than clicks. If most of your budget sits in Performance Max, we tell you upfront which parts of the audit apply there and which do not.
Google publishes no weighting for the three factors · which is why we deliberately give no percentages. The figures in circulation come from third-party reverse-engineering of the visible 1–10 Quality Score. That score is a historical average: in the auction, quality is recalculated for every single query, including context such as device, location and time of day.
Each category comes with a specific finding and evidence taken straight from your account.
Account structure & campaigns
Cleanly separated by goal, brand and match type · or subsidising one another?
Conversion tracking & data quality
Are micro signals and real conversions mixed together? Are values, fallbacks and consent correct?
Search terms & negative lists
Which queries burn budget without effect · and are the right exclusions missing?
Bidding strategy & budget pacing
Does the strategy match your target CPA or ROAS? Where is budget over- or under-allocated?
Performance Max & cannibalisation
Is PMax absorbing traffic you could have won more cheaply? How is the channel split?
Shopping feed & Merchant Center
Feed quality, item IDs and custom labels by margin · the basis for profitable Shopping. First we count which products are not served at all because of disapprovals.
Lead quality & CRM feedback
Do MQL and SQL signals flow back into bidding? Is Google optimising for leads or for pipeline?
Audiences & signals
Real prospecting or just automated signals? How clean is the audience data?
Ad assets & Ad Strength
Are there enough assets and variants for the systems to optimise meaningfully?
Landing pages & relevance
Which pages tie up budget without converting? Does the promise match the page?
Form flow & lead capture
Where do prospects drop off? Are fields, multi-step and qualification built correctly?
Competition & auction dynamics
Who is taking your impressions · and where is displacing them realistic?
Insights
The insights you can expect
The questions that usually go unanswered in day-to-day operations.
How much budget is wasted?
Wasted spend as a hard euro figure and a percentage, not a gut feeling.
Is the conversion data sound?
Or is the account long since optimising on distorted signals and wrong values?
Where do channels cannibalise each other?
Are you paying for traffic you would have won anyway?
What target ROAS makes sense?
Derived from margin and order value, not from a wish.
What may a Sales Qualified Lead cost?
What does a qualified lead cost you today?
Which campaigns deliver volume only?
Leads that never become opportunities, yet still tie up budget.
Which landing pages cost the most?
Without converting, ranked by the budget they absorb.
Who are you losing the auction to?
And in which segments is displacing them realistic?
What is possible with more budget?
A scenario, including the point where efficiency starts to break down.
04a · E-commerce focus
From feed to contribution margin
What decides profitability in a shop · beyond the campaign interface.
The feed is the foundation
Titles, attributes and item IDs decide whether Shopping serves at all.
Custom labels by margin
Not every product deserves the same bid · steer by contribution margin.
Protect the brand
Win brand traffic cheaply through Search instead of buying it expensively through PMax.
Weigh CLV against new customers
Repeat buyers are worth more, growth needs new customers · the balance depends on your business model.
04b · Lead gen focus
From click to pipeline
What happens between the ad and the deal · and where pipeline is lost.
Form flow
Every required field costs enquiries · build multi-step and qualification properly.
Lead scoring
Not every lead is worth the same · score before handing over to sales.
Enhanced Conversions for Leads (ECL)
Real SQL signals back into bidding · Google optimises for pipeline instead of form fills.
Closed-loop reporting
Measurable end to end from click to close · straight out of the CRM.
Patterns
Typical findings
What we see again and again, as a range and not a promise.
E-com & lead gen
30–40%
of search-term spend without a single conversion
E-com & lead gen
> 40%
of spend against landing pages rated below average
E-com & lead gen
One bucket
Micro-signals and real sales counted together · any ROAS on top of that is worthless
E-com & lead gen
Mixed groups
Researching, comparing and buying in one ad group · the ad matches no intent precisely
E-com & lead gen
Empty by noon
Daily budget exhausted before the strongest buying hours begin
E-com & lead gen
One window
Attribution window shorter than the real decision path · the model never sees the end
E-commerce
Brand
Brand traffic bought expensively via PMax instead of cheaply via Search
E-commerce
No margin
Feed without custom labels · every product gets the same bid
E-commerce
Returning = new
Repeat buyers bought at new-customer prices · no exclusion, no separate messaging
E-commerce
Feed half blind
Part of PMax delivery runs without product data · Shopping without its steering
Lead gen
Form as the goal
Google optimises for submissions instead of closings
Lead gen
No feedback
No SQL signals in bidding · the automation learns from the wrong half
Lead gen
One value for all
Every lead counts the same · bidding cannot tell small from large enquiries
Lead gen
One role
Practitioners, procurement and leadership get the same ad
Lead gen
Form as a hurdle
Required and optional fields not separated · neither low friction nor real pre-qualification
Real case · anonymised
What we found inside one shop account
One account from our practice, anonymised. All eleven findings come straight from the account, over a 90-day window.
96.0%PMax traffic from Search & Shopping
69.0%PMax spend without a conversion
43.5%Spend against weak landing pages
11Findings in total
01Channel overlap96.0%
PMax bought traffic from Search and Shopping · clicks the account would have had anyway. YouTube, Discover, Gmail and Maps went practically unused.
02Waste37.5% / 69.0%
Share of Search and PMax spend that ran on search terms without a single conversion.
03Steering metricROAS distorted
Micro signals and real conversions sat in one conversion bucket, a newsletter sign-up counted like a purchase. Bidding followed the wrong number.
04Feed control55.3%
Share of PMax delivery without product data · Shopping without the control it is built for.
05Margin steering0 labels
No custom labels by contribution margin: products at 8 and 48 percent margin ran on one bid.
06Brand protectionno exclusion
Brand traffic was bought expensively through PMax instead of won cheaply through Search and standard Shopping.
07Customer economicsno split
New and returning customers ran in the same campaigns · repeat buyers bought at new-customer prices.
08Remarketingnot separated
Cart abandoners and product viewers were never addressed separately · the cheapest audience in the account went unused.
09Landing pages43.5%
Share of spend against pages rated below average. That hits twice, on Quality Score and on conversion rate.
10Landing page match3 of 9
Campaigns led to category instead of product pages · intent and destination did not match.
11Purchase intent1 stage
Problem, solution and purchase stages ran in one campaign at one bid.
No promise of results: these are findings, not outcomes. What comes of them depends on execution and market.
Typical pattern · not a single account
What we find in advanced lead-gen setups
The problem is rarely missing tracking, most accounts have that. It is the layers above: differentiated lead values, modelling, attribution windows and value rules. There is no single case here by design · sales cycles, deal values and CRM setups differ too widely.
1 for 6One lead value for six lead types
30 vs. 74Attribution window against sales cycle, in days
0 of 3Levels in the value rules
12Patterns in view
01Goal definitiontwo target metrics
Campaigns optimise for MQL, sales measures SQL. Two target metrics that never meet.
02Value steering1 instead of 6
One lead value for six lead types · bidding cannot tell a €5k from a €500k enquiry.
03Conversion weighting1 weight
Whitepaper download and demo request count the same · hard and soft conversions not separated.
04Timeline30 vs. 74 days
Attribution window shorter than the sales cycle · the model never sees the close.
05Bid balancemicro dominates
Small signals outweigh the offline import. Bidding follows volume, not closings.
06Value rules0 of 3 levels
Region, device and new versus returning customer do not enter the bid.
07Form flowfriction, no return
Required and optional fields not separated · built for neither minimal friction nor pre-qualification.
08Spam protectionno honeypot
No field validation, no honeypot · bot submissions count as conversions.
09Buying committee1 message, 6 roles
Practitioners, procurement and leadership see the same ad.
10Channel qualityDisplay unfiltered
PMax delivers cheap form fills via Display that go nowhere in sales.
11Deal support0 stages
Live deals without their own messaging · no audiences from CRM stage, no support through to signature.
12After the closeneither out nor in
Existing customers neither excluded nor addressed for expansion · the cheapest revenue in the account is left untouched.
Illustrative values drawn from several accounts, not figures from a single case. The audit shows which of them apply to your account.
The findings become a sequence · including the quality factors that bring your cost per click down.
Foundation
01
Targets from the economics
Target ROAS or CPA derived from margin, order value and close rate.
Foundation
02
Account structure, in stages
What demonstrably works keeps running for now. Rebuilds happen step by step, handing budget over rather than switching things off.
Foundation
03
Signals & bids
Conversion hygiene, correct value passing, a staged path to tROAS/tCPA.
Foundation
04
CRM feedback into bidding
Enhanced Conversions for Leads and offline import deliver real SQL signals.
Quality
05
eCTR & ad relevance
Ads that match search intent · the cheapest lever on cost per click.
Quality
06
Landing Page Experience
Deliver on the promise, load time and structure · feeds straight into Quality Score.
Channels
07
Channel mix & brand protection
Brand exclusion in PMax, separate Shopping for brand traffic.
Growth
08
Testing roadmap
A/B tests on bids, creatives, audiences and pages · in a clear order.
Growth
09
Budget scaling
Growth in stages with milestones and a scenario for each spend level.
Growth
10
Reporting that counts
Steering on contribution margin or pipeline value instead of clicks.
No overhaul in one go.Every structural change resets learning phases, so we never change more than necessary and never everything at once. What measurably works stays in place. Rebuilds run in stages, with parallel delivery and a gradual handover of budget · and every stage has a checkpoint. If a step falls short of expectations, we step back rather than push on.
Deliverables
What you receive
Audit report
Findings per category, each with evidence from the account.
Wasted spend in euros
Quantified · not “there is potential here”.
Prioritised actions
Ranked by impact × effort, in a clear sequence.
Growth plan
Structure, signals, channel mix and budget path including a scenario.
Flat-fee proposal
Transparent, with no percentage markup on your ad spend.
Walkthrough call
We go through everything together, pushback expressly welcome.
The audit report is complete: every finding with evidence, your wasted spend in euros, and every action described so concretely that your team can implement it without us. Working with us afterwards adds no withheld knowledge · it adds the execution: we build the structures, manage the learning phases and keep steering · on request as part of our ongoing Google Ads management.
Free quick check, full audit at a flat fee
Two stages, so you never buy blind.
No cost · real substance
The quick check
We go through your account beforehand with read-only access and check the places where budget is most often lost. In the call you get three concrete findings from your account, each with the exact place we found it and a first estimate of the scale behind it.
You get the findings in writing, on a single page · with the place we found them and their scale, so you can pass them on internally. They are yours to keep, even if you commission nothing afterwards. The difference to an intro call: we don’t talk about your account, we have looked inside it.
Every finding backed by evidence straight from the account, every measure prioritised and described so concretely that your team can implement it without us. For Search campaigns it also states what share of your budget runs on keywords with below-average expected CTR, ad relevance or landing page experience. The fixed price starts at €3,500 net, depends on account size and is set before we start. If you start ongoing work within three months, we credit it in full against the first month. Results typically within a week of access being granted.
Very little, and nothing that puts you under obligation.
Read-only access
Read-only access to Google Ads, optionally GA4. We change nothing without your approval. Before any access we sign a confidentiality and data processing agreement (Art. 28 GDPR) with you · including for the free quick check.
30 minutes of your time
A short conversation about goals, margins and where you stand.
Basic economics
Margin, or the value of a qualified lead, without it any ROAS statement is worthless.
What prospects want to know before the quick check
There is none. The quick check costs us preparation time inside your account · worth it to us, because we see for ourselves whether there is enough leverage for a full audit. If there isn’t, we say so openly · and you keep the three findings either way, in writing. We also only take on audits where the leverage we find clearly exceeds our fee.
One page with the three findings: what we found, where exactly in the account, and the scale behind it · plus our assessment of whether the full audit is worth it. Deliberately short enough to forward internally without having to explain anything.
Twelve areas: account structure, conversion measurement, search terms, bidding strategy, Performance Max, shopping feed, lead quality, audiences, ads, landing pages, forms and competition · each backed by evidence straight from your account.
A fixed price from €3,500 net that depends on account size and is set before we start · it does not change afterwards. We name the exact amount in the free quick check. If you start ongoing work within three months of the audit, we credit the audit fee in full against the first month.
No · the fixed price quoted is a net price. Tulos is an EU company based in the Republic of Cyprus, so we invoice businesses holding a valid VAT ID without VAT: under the reverse-charge procedure the tax liability shifts to you. You declare the VAT and reclaim it as input tax in the same step · so nothing is added on top for businesses entitled to input tax deduction. In Switzerland it comes out the same way, via Swiss acquisition tax.
The quick check: 30 minutes. The full audit: typically within a week of access being granted.
Read-only access to Google Ads, optionally GA4 · two minutes of effort, revocable with two clicks. Before any access we sign a confidentiality and data processing agreement · including for the free quick check.
It pays off for running campaigns with a few months of data history, ahead of budget decisions, or around an agency switch. It doesn’t pay off yet for brand-new accounts without reliable data or mid-rebuild · we tell you that openly in the quick check too.
No. Read-only access can be revoked with two clicks and there are no follow-up obligations. Whether you commission the full audit after the quick check is entirely your decision.
Book the free check
Ready for a look inside the account?
Get your Google Ads account checked: the quick check is diagnosis, not sales · at the end you hold three evidenced findings from your own account. Reply within 24h on business days.
Prefer writing? Send an enquiry
Briefly describe your account and goals · reply within 24h on business days.
Lukas Tippmann and Jordi Moll · the two of us look into your account, nobody else.
Both founders available · you grant read-only access up front, we come to the call with three evidenced findings instead of slides. You receive the summary in writing afterwards. We name the flat fee for the full audit here — transparent and with no surprises.
