Google Ads audit · bold-bi

Headline

The Bold BI Google Ads account (Bold BI, 2545735992, USD) did not serve at all from 2026-10-15 to 2026-11-11: $0 spend, 0 impressions. In the prior 28 days it spent $2,405.20 for 113 clicks and 3 conversions, and its last day with impressions was 2026-09-23. Every campaign is paused except "Bold BI | Embedded Analytics | Experiement | LP 1". That campaign has status ENABLED, but its serving status is ENDED. So this audit mostly checks configuration that will apply when the account is relaunched.

Targeting hygiene is good: exact and phrase match only, Presence geo, Search Partners and Display off on recent campaigns, theme-matched /lp/ landing pages, and no disapprovals. The problems are bidding on raw form fills alongside the CRM import, no brand negatives in non-brand campaigns, and ad copy with unsourced claims, including a "$200K+ a year" customer saving.

Score

50 / 100 (7 of 14 scored items passed; a warn counts as not passed; 1 item n/a and 1 not checked are excluded)

• Pass: 7 | Warn: 4 | Fail: 3 | n/a: 1 | Not checked: 1

Top 3 actions

1. Fix conversion goals before any relaunch (B3). Make the CRM import ("Google Ads - BI - Offline Conversions") the primary goal under a qualified-lead category, and set the web form fill ("Google Ads - Common Goal") to secondary. Both are now primary and counted in the same SUBMIT_LEAD_FORM goal, so one lead can count twice. Owner: paid search lead and sales ops.
2. Source or remove ad claims (C4, C1). The claims to check are "One customer saved $200K+ a year…", "Rated 4.4/5 on G2", "4.9/5 on Capterra", "SOC 2, HIPAA & GDPR Compliant", "140+ sources" and "Best Tableau Alternative". Owner: product marketing.
3. Add a brand negative list to every non-brand campaign (B6). In the prior period, "bold bi" matched in Embedded & White Label for $108.93 with 0 conversions. Decide at the same time whether a brand campaign should run on relaunch.

Findings

Ads account audit: bold-bi, Bold BI (2545735992), 2026-11-12

Period: 2026-10-15 to 2026-11-11 (28 days), compared with 2026-09-17 to 2026-10-14 | Run by: Claude

Score

• Pass: 7 | Fail: 3 | n/a: 1 (also Warn: 4, Not checked: 1)

Proposed changes (need human approval before applying)

See "Proposed changes (need approval)" below.

Remember to add these results to the team's shared results log (location TBD).

Not checked

• Live performance (all items): the account had no impressions from 2026-10-15 to 2026-11-11. A1, A2, A4 and B5 were judged on current settings. A5 used the comparison period (2026-09-17 to 2026-10-14). Its last serving day was 2026-09-23.
• A6 Audience Network (Microsoft Ads): no Microsoft Ads data source was connected. The Microsoft Ads half of B1 was not checked for the same reason.
• B1 change history: the Ads API only returns the last 30 days of change events (2026-10-14 onward).
• B2 brand impression share: both brand campaigns are paused, so there is nothing to compare.
• B4 form click-ID capture: whether GCLID, GBRAID and WBRAID are stored on forms needs a CRM or form check.
• A3/B6 negatives: only targeted lookups were run against the 5 shared lists attached to recent campaigns. The large "Exclude Globally" lists (more than 4,000 terms each) were not read in full.
• C1, C3, C4: based on ads in the 7 recent and enabled campaigns. Ad copy came from 7 sampled RSAs. Ads in the older paused campaigns were not reviewed.
• C2 buyer-fit audit of the /lp/ pages was not run. It is a separate skill.
• Date range: the checklist default is 90 days compared with the prior 90. This run used the 28-day range pbmaintain supplied.
• Waste estimate: ads.wasted_spend_est is null. There was no spend in the period, and the prior-period terms flagged ($202.96 combined) are not a monthly waste estimate.
• Why the account is paused: this can't be told from account data. It may be intentional.

Proposed changes (need approval)

None of these has been applied. Each one needs approval from the paid search lead in chat.

1. Conversion settings: "Google Ads - Common Goal" (form fill) and "Google Ads - BI - Offline Conversions" (CRM import) are both primary in SUBMIT_LEAD_FORM → move the CRM import to a qualified-lead goal and make it the only biddable primary. Set the form fill to secondary. Reason: B3.
2. RSA copy (ads 822377190631, 822377442625, 822410973025, 823873386684, 823830608337 and any others like them): unsourced customer-savings, rating, compliance and count claims → source them or remove them. Replace "Best Tableau Alternative" unless it is sourced. Reason: C4, C1.
3. New shared list "Bold BI brand" (bold bi, boldbi, bold bi pricing, bold bi login): not present → create it and attach it to all non-brand Search and PMax campaigns. Reason: B6.
4. Brand coverage: both brand campaigns are paused → paid search lead decides whether to re-enable "Bold BI | Brand Campaign | US | Manual CPC" when the account relaunches. Reason: B6, B2.
5. "General Negatives" list: student, students, careers, job and courses are missing → add them as negatives. Decide whether to keep the broad "free" negative, given the free trial. Reason: A3.
6. Negatives for flagged terms: add "dashboard for computer" and competitor-vs-competitor patterns ("vs microstrategy", "power bi vs tableau") to the Power BI Alternative and General campaigns, or route them to comparison ads. Reason: A5.
7. Paused Search campaigns 21990029422, 23121886784, 23121953486, 23122497300, 23122793889 and 23345986229: Search Partners on → turn it off before re-enabling. Reason: A2.
8. Paused campaigns 23122793889, 23336940957, 23487762224, 23639788257, 21868027126, 21985086914, 22221338605 and 23663331314: Presence or interest → switch to Presence before re-enabling. Reason: A4.
9. PMax 23639788257: no brand exclusion → add one before re-enabling. Reason: B2.
10. Bidding on relaunch: Manual CPC with no targets, and old $25 and $150 target CPAs → set separate targets for embedded/white-label and self-service/cloud once change 1 is live. Reason: B5.

Data sources

• Google Ads API v24 through the google-ads MCP server (run_gaql, read-only), customer 2545735992 "Bold BI", currency USD, time zone America/New_York. Queried 2026-11-12. The other accessible accounts (syncfusion.com, _bolddesk.com, boldsign.com, boldreports.com) were identified but not audited.
• Resources queried: customer, campaign, campaign_budget, keyword_view, ad_group_criterion, search_term_view, shared_set, shared_criterion, campaign_shared_set, campaign_criterion, conversion_action, customer_conversion_goal, offline_conversion_upload_client_summary, change_event, recommendation_subscription, ad_group_ad.
• Raw exports in raw/: account_and_conversions.json, campaigns.csv, keywords_prior_period.csv, search_terms_prior_period_top50.csv, negatives.csv, ads_landing_pages.csv and ad_copy_sample.json. Costs are in micros, as the API returns them. Dollar figures here are micros ÷ 1,000,000. Cost per conversion is cost ÷ conversions, rounded to cents.
• Checklist: demand-gen/paid/ads-account-audit.md.