Paid search has one big advantage over most marketing: you can see exactly where the money goes. Yet many businesses run accounts for years without anyone checking whether that spend is reaching people who actually want to buy.
Unmonitored budget leakage compounds every month it’s left alone. Here’s where to look.
Search terms you never meant to target
Broad and phrase match keywords can show your ads for searches that are only loosely related to what you sell. Over a few months, these can quietly take a large share of your budget.
What to check: Open the Search terms report for the last 90 days and sort by cost. Anything irrelevant should become a negative keyword.
Campaigns organised around keywords, not buyer intent
Someone searching “what is X” and someone searching “X price Ahmedabad” are at very different stages. If both land in the same campaign with the same ad and the same page, you’re paying the same for very different value.
What to check: Do your campaigns separate research-stage searches from ready-to-buy searches, with different bids and landing pages?
Conversions that aren’t real conversions
If your account counts page views, button clicks or duplicate form fills as conversions, the bidding system optimises towards the wrong thing, and reports look better than reality.
What to check: List every conversion action in your account and ask of each one: does this represent a real enquiry or sale?
Landing pages that don’t match the ad
A strong ad that sends people to a generic homepage wastes the click. The page should continue the conversation the ad started.
What to check: Click your own top three ads. Does the page you land on immediately confirm you’re in the right place, with a clear next step?
The bottom line
The fix is rarely “spend more”. It’s structuring spend around buyer intent and measuring what actually produces qualified leads. That’s why we audit an account or market before a single rupee moves.
See how our Paid Search & PPC service works, or get an account audit.