You’ve set your Google Ads live. Impressions are rising, and clicks are coming in. But the leads? They’re not quite what you expected. Maybe there aren’t enough. Maybe they’re the wrong type. Or maybe you’re drowning in spam and time-wasters.
Whatever the case, the numbers don’t lie—but they don’t tell the whole story either. On the surface, things look fine. CTRs seem decent. Budgets are being used. But behind the scenes, something’s clearly not working.
This blog isn’t about throwing jargon at you. It’s about walking through the key elements of a PPC campaign with fresh eyes—giving you the tools to spot where things might be slipping and how to get things back on track.
Start Here: The Fastest Way to Spot What’s Slowing You Down
This section covers the foundational checks that can quickly highlight if something’s off in your PPC account. These aren’t advanced tactics—they’re simple, high-impact reviews that often reveal surprisingly obvious issues.
So far, you’ve looked at the basics—but even those quick checks can reveal a lot. Now it’s time to go a layer deeper. Let’s unpack some of the more hidden settings that could be quietly undermining your results.
1. Date Range Matters
Start with the last 30 days. It gives a recent, realistic picture—one that isn’t distorted by outliers or seasonal swings.
2. Check Impressions vs. Clicks
If you’re seeing thousands of impressions but only a trickle of clicks, that’s a red flag. Your ads might be showing up for the wrong people.
3. Revisit Your Match Types
Broad and phrase match keywords often catch irrelevant traffic. And with exact match now broader than ever, even tight campaigns can veer off course.
4. Review Your Search Terms Report
This is where intent becomes clear. You’ll often find your budget is being eaten up by terms that were never going to convert.
5. Tighten With Negative Keywords
Cut out the noise. Add negative keywords to stop paying for clicks that go nowhere.
6. Keep It Going—Every Day
Search intent shifts constantly. Monitoring your terms and refining your negatives isn’t a one-time job—it’s the key to long-term efficiency.
Not quite done yet –
So far, you’ve looked at the basics—but even those quick checks can reveal a lot. Now it’s time to go a layer deeper. You’ve tackled the surface-level checks—match types, search intent, and negative keywords—but there are deeper settings in your campaign setup that can quietly chip away at performance without you noticing. These elements don’t always show up in headline stats but can cause real problems if left unchecked.
Are You Targeting the Right Locations?
It’s easy to assume your ads are only showing where you want them to. But unless your location settings are laser-focused, you could be paying for clicks from all over the country—or worse, all over the world.
If your service area is specific, a blanket setting like “United Kingdom” could be draining your budget fast. And Google’s location targeting? It’s good, but not perfect. Relying solely on IP detection can be risky.
Check this: Have you narrowed your target locations to where your actual customers are? More importantly—have you excluded regions you don’t want to appear in? Take five minutes to look now. You might be surprised.
Have You Set the Right Ad Schedule?
Just because your office closes at 5pm doesn’t mean your leads stop searching. But running ads 24/7 isn’t always the answer either. Google will stretch your daily budget across the hours you’re live—so a round-the-clock schedule could be watering down your impact.
The fix? Work out when your customers are actually converting—not just visiting. Then build your schedule around them.
Check this: Are you running ads during your highest-converting hours? Have you looked at hourly performance data in the last month? This one change alone can sharpen up your efficiency overnight.
Still With Us? Let’s Keep Digging
You’ve now performed some key checks that can make a real difference to how your campaigns perform. But PPC has a lot of moving parts, and surface-level fixes only go so far. So let’s unpack a few more areas worth inspecting. Think of this blog as a practical health check—one that helps you spot where small changes could lead to big improvements.
Is Your Campaign Structure Helping or Hurting?
Campaign structure is often overlooked—but it can make or break performance. Everyone structures their account differently, but the one constant Google cares about is relevance. And so do your customers.
When campaigns and ad groups overlap too much, it becomes unclear which ad should show—and that confusion can extend to the user. How often have you searched something only to get a completely unrelated ad? That’s usually a structure issue.
Poor structure causes waste, misalignment, and irrelevant messaging. If you’ve got hundreds of campaigns or ad groups with fuzzy boundaries, it’s time to reassess. Are your campaigns grouped logically? Is every ad group tight and focused around a single theme or intent?
Check this: Review your structure with relevance in mind. The more focused and streamlined it is, the easier it is for Google to match the right ad to the right search—and for customers to connect with what you’re offering.
Wrapping Up
There’s always more we could unpack. PPC is a complex machine, and we’ve only scratched the surface in this blog. Shopping campaigns, Performance Max, conversion tracking, audience signals—they’re all areas worth their own deep dive.
But if you’ve worked through the checks above, you’ve already taken big steps toward better performance.
We’ll be continuing this series via email and LinkedIn, exploring even more of the PPC landscape in practical, no-nonsense ways. Follow Finsbury Media to get the next instalments—or connect with me directly.
— Chris Chapman, Director at Finsbury Media
linkedin.com/in/chris-chapman