Google Ads campaigns can only be optimised if they are continually analysed. The most important key performance indicators for campaign analysis and how these can be interpreted is explained here.
The analysis of an ad campaign is indispensable
If you launch a Google Ads campaign, you certainly want to know if the financial investment is worth it. Which is why it’s essential to continually monitor the performance of individual ads. Enabling you to achieve this are numerous indicators which, when viewed all together, can cause confusion rather than clarification for many people. On top of it, it’s often the case that measures for optimisation of a particular figure lead to the worsening of others.
Therefore it’s important to consider ahead of time which parameters make sense to measure for the individual campaign and what the purpose of the ad should be. The aim would be to monitor, analyse and optimise over the long term your SEA efforts in Google in a transparent way.
The most important indicators for campaign analysis
With these five indictors, you can extensively analyse the performance of your Google Ads campaigns to date:
- Number of clicks: Many clicks on the ad are generated by many visitors to the advertiser’s website. But this traffic alone does not help. Only when the number of clicks leads to an increase in the number of conversions is the campaign a success. But by taking a look at keywords with the most clicks, the advertiser gets a good first impression of the campaign’s potential.
- Click through rate (CTR): The CTR says more than the absolute number of clicks, as it measures the percentage of how many displayed ads actually lead to clicks. If the CTR is low, there could be two reasons for this: the ads appear, for instance due to a low number of keywords, too far down the hits list or the text in the ad does not animate the viewer to click.
- Cost per click (CPC): With the CPC, you can measure what an individual click costs you on average. Generally speaking, the stronger a keyword is advertised, the more expensive it is. But relatively high CPCs can also be caused by a low Quality Score or the maximum bid for a single keyword is unnecessarily high.
- Conversion rate (CR): The share of clicks is measured that have led to a conversion, or the actual goal of the advertising campaign (sales, downloads, etc.). For example, if an ad has 1,000 clicks and ten of these lead to a sell, then the CR is one per cent. If the CR is relatively poor, this can be due to an unsuitable URL to which the viewer is led or an offer that does not match up with the promise in the ad.
- Cost per acquisition (CPA): The CPA value is calculated using the sum of all campaign costs divided by the sum of all targeted conversions. Decisive for a good CPA is a landing page tailored to the needs of the customer.
- Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): The ROAS value shows the profits actually earned per ad spend. It also shows which ads brought in how much sales turnover.
- Impression share: This is the share of the potential impression in the search network. For example, if a keyword is searched for 100,000 times on a day, and a Google Ad is displayed 10,000 times as a result of this search, the impression share is 10 per cent.
Whether the indicators defined are good or bad cannot be determined in general. The analysis always depends on the target group, the industry and the individual value of the new customer. In the B2B segment, which often involves high prices and long-term customer loyalty, significantly higher CPAs are the rule, for instance, more so than in the B2C segment. In this case, the intra-company comparison of the CPAs from various campaigns makes more sense.
How to measure indicators
The use of the analysis tool Google Analytics is the best way to analyse Google Ads campaigns. Your Google Analytics account simply has to be connected with Google Ads. The most important basic KPIs are already available in Google Ads, but the analysis with Google Analytics is significantly more insightful. For instance, you can determine with pages were viewed following a click on the ad, or how often and at what position in the sales funnel Google Ads made a contribution. The data also shows where the visitor possibly stopped the purchasing process. The analysis tool also lets you compare how the Google Ads traffic performed compared to organic traffic from the Google search.
When changes over the course of the campaign attract attention, the tool automatically sends notifications and reports upon request.
Find out in the guide “Google Analytics: the market leader in Web analysis” how you can set up Google Analytics.
