How much does a Google Ads audit cost, and when is it worth it?

These are indicative ranges, not an automatic price list. The price depends mainly on the number of active campaigns, the complexity of the structure, the state of analytics, and the number of markets-not only on the level of advertising spend.

Type of audit	Typical scope	Indicative price
Basic diagnosis of a small account	4-5 hours	240-300€ net
Audit of a small or medium-sized company account	6-10 hours	360-600€ net
Extensive e-commerce / multiple markets	12+ hours	from 720€ net

Rate: 60€ net/hour. I do not price an audit solely based on the number of campaigns-the time required also depends on the account’s change history, the number of conversions, data quality, the number of markets, integrations, and how the account has been managed to date. I provide an exact quote after briefly reviewing the account-I do not apply one price to all cases.

I do not compete on the lowest price in the market. The price is intended to reflect a real analysis of the account, measurement data, and business context-not merely the generation of an automated checklist.

Is an audit necessary if the ads “sort of work”?

Clicks in the dashboard are not the same as profitability. A campaign may generate traffic and reported conversions, and yet it may still be unclear whether it produces profitable sales or whether the measurement is so leaky that the reported numbers do not fully reflect reality or are not comparable with business data. These are two different problems: an audit can check both the configuration and reliability of measurement, as well as the indicators suggesting campaign effectiveness. However, a full profitability assessment requires additional business data.

What exactly is an audit?

An audit is a one-off, in-depth diagnosis -not ongoing optimization and not a guarantee of results. The outcome is not a change in the account, but a list of specific problems and recommendations that you receive in writing. What you do with it-yourself, through your agency, or through me-is a separate decision.

In short: a Google Ads audit is not meant to answer only the question of whether the account is configured correctly. It is meant to show which problems may affect performance, how important they are, and what should be done first, so that you do not make budget decisions based on incomplete data.

What I check in the account

Measurement and data

• conversion configuration and data import into Google Ads,
• data consistency between Google Ads and GA4,
• Consent Mode-whether consent signals are being passed and set correctly, whether the implementation is consistent with the CMP being used, and whether tags fire under the correct conditions. Consent Mode is not the same as a cookie banner: the banner collects the user’s decision, while Consent Mode passes its status to Google tags and services and affects their behavior. It is an element of measurement, not a guarantee of full conversion observability, and it will not fix missing data on its own. When configured properly, Consent Mode can also support conversion modeling in Google Ads, but it does not reconstruct individual sessions or guarantee full recovery of lost data.
• whether the configuration causes event duplication, incorrect conversion attribution, or unnecessary data loss.

Campaigns and budget

• the campaign structure-it limits results if it prevents separate management of budget, different intents, markets, product categories, or differences in the profitability of products or services (it is not about the mere fact that it is “old”),
• budget allocation across campaigns,
• unused delivery opportunities and budget constraints: I check whether the budget limits campaigns with potential and whether it is directed toward campaigns aligned with business priorities.

Bidding strategies

• whether the strategy matches the campaign objective,
• whether the campaign has enough regular and reliable data for the given strategy to learn, and whether the target is not set significantly below past results.
• whether the selected conversions are appropriate for optimization,
• whether tCPA or tROAS targets are realistic in relation to historical data, margin, conversion volume, and the strategy’s learning phase,
• whether the strategy limits scale more than would be justified by target profitability and business priorities.

Traffic and messaging

• search terms-whether they match the offer, user intent, and campaign assumptions, and which are worth keeping, limiting, or using as new advertising directions.
• negative keywords in Search campaigns-whether they effectively eliminate irrelevant queries (I analyze keyword match types, the search terms report, and negative keyword lists),
• the specifics of Performance Max-I verify brand exclusions available for the given account and campaign type, account-level or campaign-level negative keywords, and audience signals,
• whether exclusions are applied at the correct level and in the campaigns they actually concern; the mere presence of a list in the library does not make it active,
• whether terms treated as branded actually refer to your brand-the name or abbreviation may be shared with another company,
• exclusions of apps, content, and placements-where they are available for the given campaign type.

Ads and alignment of messaging with the offer

• their alignment with user intent,
• the offer and landing page,
• the quality of messaging,
• the completeness, relevance, and quality of assets available for the given campaign type and their impact on the message and results, rather than merely mechanically “filling in all fields,”
• their contribution to generating valuable conversions, not just clicks,
• landing pages-alignment with the ad and user intent, visibility of the most important information, calls to action, mobile usability, and basic elements that may affect conversion (the audit does not replace a full UX audit, CRO audit, or technical website audit).

Targeting settings and segments

• the correct locations and their alignment with the actual customer service area,
• the targeting setting based on users’ presence in a location or interest in that location,
• ad schedule,
• languages,
• devices,
• partner networks, if applicable,
• audiences and audience signals,
• results by location, device, audience, and time of delivery.

E-commerce and shopping campaigns

• the product feed and its consistency with the offer on the website,
• Merchant Center,
• product disapprovals and warnings concerning product data,
• the quality of titles, descriptions, prices, availability, and other key feed attributes,
• shopping campaigns and Performance Max, if they apply to the account,
• results by product, category, and assortment group,
• product, placement, and app exclusions, if applicable.

Account change history, automated recommendations

I check what modifications have been made in the account, whether they were related to changes in performance, and whether Google’s recommendations are justified in the context of the business objective, rather than merely technically possible to apply.

AI and automation features in campaigns-I check whether automated mechanisms support the campaign objective and business effectiveness, and whether they do not broaden traffic in a way that conflicts with the assumptions.:

• in Search: Broad Match powered by AI and Smart Bidding,
• in Performance Max campaigns: Final URL Expansion,
• in creative: Automatically Created Assets.

Outcome: a list of problems organized by impact and urgency, plus a recommendation on what to fix first, what to address later, and what not to touch.

I divide recommendations into critical issues, optimization actions, and hypotheses to test, because not every suggestion has the same level of certainty or potential impact.

As part of the standard scope, I verify data from GA4 or another analytics system. If such a system is not available, I can prepare a limited Google Ads audit, but conclusions regarding profitability and measurement completeness will be less certain. If analytics is not available or requires configuration from scratch, I agree on that scope separately before starting work. In addition to access to both accounts, I also need several pieces of information from you about the business context-see point 7 below.

If the main problem is measurement itself rather than the campaigns, it is worth separating the Google Ads account audit from the GA4 audit. These are related but not identical services, with separate scope and pricing. A Google Ads campaign audit can be part of a broader account audit or a separate service if you want to check only a selected type of campaign.

What the audit does not include (unless we agree on it separately): ongoing account management, implementation of all recommendations, preparation of an entire marketing strategy, creation of new ads, configuration of the server, CMP, or analytics from scratch, or a guarantee of a specific ROAS, CPA, or number of leads.

Example: the account generates traffic, but it is unclear what it actually sells

Imagine an online store that spends 1,000€/month on Google Ads. The Google Ads dashboard shows 40 conversions in a month. GA4 records 28 purchase events. For simplicity, we assume that we are comparing the same event type, the same date range, the same time zone, and data without mixing native conversions with imported ones.

Such a difference does not necessarily mean an error. It may result from:

• a different attribution model,
• different conversion windows,
• different conversion attribution dates,
• differences in identifying users and sessions,
• importing only selected conversions into Google Ads,
• lack of consent to store or use specific advertising and analytics identifiers,
• differences in the definition of purchase events, the number of transactions, and the way revenue is reported, as well as filters or restrictions on data visibility in reports.

However, the difference is a signal worth explaining: the audit determines whether it results from legitimately different reporting rules or from a real problem with measurement configuration-before someone makes a decision (e.g., about budget) based on the wrong number. You can find a detailed explanation of where discrepancies between GA4 and Google Ads come from in the guide to discrepancies between these systems.

What you can check on your own

You can perform these four checks yourself, without buying an additional tool. For a simple account, they will take a dozen or so minutes; for a larger one-appropriately longer. They will not replace a full audit, but they will show whether the topic is worth investigating at all:

1. Zero conversions with sufficient traffic or unusually repetitive values are a signal to check the configuration, date range, conversion goals, and reporting delay.
2. Is your customer acquisition cost increasing month over month, and can you explain what is driving that change? An increase in CPA is not always a problem-it may result from scaling up, seasonality, or a change in the product mix.
3. Whether conversion settings or the main campaign goals have been changed recently.
4. Whether your exclusions are not blocking valuable traffic, for example due to overly broad matching. Also check the search terms report regularly to identify irrelevant queries and assess whether the exclusion list needs changes. In some accounts, exclusion lists are too broad and may accidentally cut off high-purchase-intent queries or phrases that generate high margins. The search terms report does not include all queries, so the absence of a given term in the report does not mean it did not occur.

Free Google Ads audit-when it helps and when it is not enough

It is worth separating three different things that are often referred to online by the same term:

1. An automated report from a script-detects basic configuration gaps.
2. A free initial review-helps assess whether it is worth speaking with a specialist at all.
3. A paid diagnostic audit-analyzes data, business goals, account structure, and priorities for changes in a specific context.

A free review can be a good starting point, but it usually has a limited scope. It will not replace a full audit if you need to assess whether campaigns are profitable, not just whether the account contains technical shortcomings. It is worth checking how a free report is created. Some free audits are based on scripts that quickly detect basic problems, but they do not account for margin, lead value, seasonality, or company priorities. Such a report can be a useful starting point, but on its own it will not assess the significance of the detected problems in the context of your business.

In my audit, of course, I use AI and automation to analyze large datasets, quickly detect anomalies, and find non-obvious areas for optimization. I treat AI as an assistant, but I do not hand over the controls to it. I verify every recommendation in the context of account data, measurement, business goals, and my experience.

One caveat in the other direction: margin, customer lifetime value, and seasonality are crucial for assessing profitability, but they are not always included in the scope of the Google Ads audit itself, because the specialist may not have access to the company’s full financial data. For the audit to be able to assess real profitability, and not only configuration correctness, it is worth preparing in advance:

• margin or target profitability level,
• average order value,
• information about returns and cancellations,
• lead value,
• sales cycle length,
• seasonality,
• priority products or services.

Without this data, the audit will still assess the correctness of the configuration and the effectiveness of the campaigns-but it will be harder to answer reliably whether the result is truly profitable for your business.

When an audit pays off (and when it is premature)

7.5% of a monthly budget of 4,700€ is exactly 360€ -the amount the audit costs in this example. If the audit and implementation make it possible to reduce spending without losing greater sales value or margin, the cost of the audit may be covered. This is only an illustration of the way of thinking, not a promise of results: the audit itself does not optimize anything, and the outcome depends on the quality and implementation of the recommendations.

An audit makes sense when:

• the account spends an amount that is significant for the company,
• results are unstable or difficult to explain,
• the company is changing agency or freelancer,
• you are taking over the account from someone else,
• campaigns have clicks, but it is unclear whether they generate valuable results,
• you plan to increase the budget,
• the offer, store, market, or measurement method is changing,
• you suspect a conversion problem.

An audit may be premature when:

• the account has only just launched, has not yet collected enough data, and the more urgent step is correct measurement and campaign configuration,
• the offer or landing page is not ready,
• you cannot provide data or business context,
• the problem is a lack of demand, not ad configuration.

What you receive after the audit

Not just a list of “what is wrong,” but a specific document with findings: for each problem identified-evidence in the data, potential impact, priority, recommended action, and information on who can implement it (you, your agency, or me). The audit price also includes a short meeting, during which we discuss the most important problems, priorities, and questions regarding implementation.

Check the cost of auditing your account

You do not have to decide on a full analysis right away. Send basic information about the account: monthly budget, campaign type, number of markets, and the main problem you want to clarify. After receiving the information, I will get back to you with an answer on whether an audit is justified at this point, what scope I propose, and what the indicative cost will be.

Check how much auditing your account will cost →