Google Ads audit · bolddesk

Headline

The BoldDesk Google Ads account (_bolddesk.com, 5756012005, USD) spent $38,361.19 between 2026-10-15 and 2026-11-11. That is 5.59% less than the prior 28 days, but conversions fell 38.55% (51 vs 83), so cost per conversion rose from $489.54 to $752.18. Targeting hygiene is good: no broad match, Search Partners and Display off, Presence geo, brand negatives on every non-brand campaign and PMax, no auto-applied recommendations, and no disapproved ads. The problems are in what the account bids on and what the ads say. Bidding counts raw sign-ups, demo forms and chat email captures the same as SQLs. The CRM import is erroring (2 of 4 events accepted). One "Max Conversion Testing" campaign paid about $146.65 per click for 2 conversions. And the ads use the 90% automation claim the checklist forbids, plus hard-coded prices.

Score

47 / 100 (7 of 15 checked items passed; a warn counts as not passed; 1 item not checked)

• Pass: 7 | Warn: 3 | Fail: 5 | n/a: 0 | Not checked: 1

Top 3 actions

1. Remove the 90% automation claim and the hard-coded prices from every RSA (C4). Sampled ads say "Automate 90% of Support Tasks", "Handle 90% of Tickets With AI" and "from $99/mo with 500 AI credits". Send readers to the pricing page instead, and have product marketing source or drop the other claims (41,000+ companies, 4.5/5 on G2, up to 70% savings, 3M+ tickets migrated). Owner: product marketing and the paid search lead.
2. Stop the cost blow-out in "US Helpdesk - Max Conversion Testing" (B5, A5). It spent $5,865.99 for 40 clicks and 2 conversions. Single clicks cost $252–$317 ("customer service ai" was $633.50 for 2 clicks). Add a max CPC cap or a target CPA, or end the test and move the budget to the Manual CPC campaigns. Owner: paid search lead.
3. Bid on qualified pipeline (B3, B4). Fix the ADS_DATA_CONNECTOR upload errors (EXPIRED_EVENT, CONVERSION_PRECEDES_EVENT) and find out why only 4 events were uploaded. Then make Sales Qualified Lead and Paid Subscription the primary signals, move Chat - Email Submitted to secondary, and keep only one of the two primary "Signup Completed" actions. Owner: sales ops and the paid search lead.

Findings

Ads account audit: bolddesk, _bolddesk.com (5756012005), 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: 5 | n/a: 0 (also Warn: 3, 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

• 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.
• B4, form click-ID capture: whether GCLID, GBRAID and WBRAID are stored on forms can't be seen from the Google Ads API. It needs a CRM or form check.
• B2, PMax search-term insights were not pulled. The brand check relies on the negatives and brand campaign impression share.
• C2, website buyer-fit audit of the landing pages was not run. It is a separate skill.
• C1 and C4 are based on 8 sampled RSAs (the top-spend ads and the three competitor ads), not every ad.
• B5, target values: the API returned no target CPA or ROAS fields on any campaign. This run read that as "no target set".
• Date range: the checklist default is 90 days vs. the prior 90. This run used the 28-day range pbmaintain supplied (2026-10-15 to 2026-11-11 vs. 2026-09-17 to 2026-10-14).
• Waste estimate: ads.wasted_spend_est is null. Account data alone can't separate wasted spend from zero-conversion but on-topic spend.
• Account choice: pbmaintain gave no customer ID. The account was picked by name: 5756012005 "_bolddesk.com" is the only BoldDesk account among the five accessible accounts.

Proposed changes (need approval)

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

1. All RSAs with the 90% automation claim (for example ads 785487607603, 818923594760, 818967157150, 823789946308, 818917081869, 819090249098): "Automate/Handle/resolve up to 90% ..." → remove. Reason: C4.
2. All RSAs with hard-coded prices (for example 785487607603, 818786769308, 818923594760, 823789946308, 818917081869, 819090249098, 818966472124): "from $99/mo ..." / "Add 1000 AI credits for $40" → remove, and send readers to https://www.bolddesk.com/pricing. Reason: C4.
3. Unsourced claims ("Trusted by 41,000+ Companies", "Rated 4.5/5 on G2", "Cut Support Costs Up to 70%", "Save Up to 70% of the Cost", "3M+ Tickets Migrated Free", "1M+ Freshdesk Tickets Migrated", "30-day money-back guarantee", "6-Month Contract Buyout", "Best ..." headlines) → product marketing sources them or they are removed. Reason: C4.
4. US Helpdesk - Max Conversion Testing (24281518315): Maximize Conversions with no target, about $146.65 per click and 2 conversions → add a max CPC cap or tCPA, or pause the test and move its budget to US - Helpdesk Manual CPC. Do the same review for Europe Max Conversion Testing (24267311167). Reason: B5, A5.
5. ADS_DATA_CONNECTOR offline import: EXPIRED_EVENT and CONVERSION_PRECEDES_EVENT errors, only 4 events → upload within the click lookback window with the CRM conversion timestamp, and check why so few SQL/paid events are sent. Reason: B4.
6. Account conversion goals: form fills, chat email and sign-ups are primary alongside SQL and Paid Subscription → make Sales Qualified Lead and Paid Subscription the primary (or value-weighted) bidding signals, move Chat - Email Submitted to secondary, and keep only one of Signup Completed / Signup Completed - Imported primary. Do this after change 5. Reason: B3.
7. New shared negative list attached to all enabled Search and PMax campaigns: student, students, course, courses, jobs, careers, salary, internship, crack, torrent, tutorial (phrase). Pay particular attention to US - Live Chat and US - AI Agent & Chatbot, which have none of the campaign-level ones. Reason: A3.
8. "free" negatives in Low Intent Negative Keywords: many "free ..." phrases → paid search lead decides whether any of them block free-trial intent. Reason: A3.
9. India - Helpdesk and Europe campaigns: add "internal" (phrase) and non-English negatives such as "plataforma" where those languages aren't targeted. Reason: A5.
10. US - Freshdesk ad 818966472124: "Better Than Freshdesk", "Paying Too Much for Freshdesk?" → factual, sourced comparison copy, after product marketing confirms the trademark use. Reason: C1.
11. "ai customer support" ad groups (US, UK, India, Australia, Canada Customer Support campaigns): final URL /lp/customer-support-software → test /support-agent or an AI landing page. Reason: C2.
12. Paused campaigns 23300605130, 23915327459, 23964059474, 23964137480: geo Presence or interest → Presence before any re-enable. Reason: A4.

Data sources

• Google Ads API through the google-ads MCP server (run_gaql, read-only), customer 5756012005 "_bolddesk.com", currency USD, time zone America/New_York. Queried 2026-11-12.
• Resources queried: customer, campaign, 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/: campaigns.csv (enabled campaigns, paused campaigns with spend in either period, and the four Presence-or-interest paused campaigns; 60+ other paused campaigns with no spend are left out), account_and_conversions.json, negatives.csv (summary of matched negatives and gaps), search_terms.csv (top 50 by spend), ads_landing_pages.csv (top 60 enabled ads by spend), ad_copy_sample.json (8 RSAs). Costs are in micros, as the API returns them. Dollar figures in this summary are micros ÷ 1,000,000, and cost per conversion or per click is cost ÷ conversions or clicks, rounded to cents.
• Checklist: demand-gen/paid/ads-account-audit.md. Pricing reference: https://www.bolddesk.com/pricing.