Google Ads audit costs depend on the accounts, campaigns and measurement systems being reviewed, along with the deliverables you receive. When commissioning a PPC audit for 2027, ask for a defined scope. Reviewing four Search campaigns, their conversion setup and two landing pages involves different work from an introductory review designed to identify priorities.
This guide develops an illustrative €1,100 audit, excluding VAT, with clear deliverables. It is a budgeting exercise, rather than a Lead The Mood price or a market average. We also explain how to compare that scope with a free review, what information the analyst needs and which implementation work should be quoted separately.
What are you buying?
An audit should help you make a decision: retain the structure, correct measurement, rethink campaigns or review the offer and its landing page. That requires connecting observations to consequences and priorities. Platform recommendations can be useful, but the buyer needs to understand which ones fit the business and what evidence supports them.
The report should distinguish a confirmed issue from a hypothesis. A duplicate configuration may justify a specific correction; an ad with few results may need more data or a closer look at its message. Not every recommendation requires rebuilding the account. Ask the analyst to explain dependencies, risks and what is worth preserving before proposing a restructure.
Agree who needs to use the document. If you want to brief another provider or work with your current manager, the report should contain instructions that team can understand. A commercial conversation without a handover document serves a different purpose, although either approach can be useful at the right stage.
Published prices need context
References checked on 15 October 2026 show different formats. Villares Studio lists a free account audit, and TMedia Global offers a free review with a report. A free price does not, by itself, establish the depth of the work. Read the deliverables and conditions before comparing it with another service.
On its English pricing page, Meltzer Media displays €420 for a Complete Google Ads, GTM and GA4 Audit, separately from tracking repairs and ongoing management. That is one provider’s offer with its own conditions. It is not an automatically equivalent Spanish service or a guaranteed 2027 fee. The useful distinction is review, repair and continuing operation.
LTM’s pricing page lists a free digital audit. That general entry does not publish a fixed fee for a specialist Google Ads account analysis. Before commissioning work, we establish whether an initial review answers your question or whether a specific diagnostic scope and deliverables need to be agreed.
Define the account and question
Start the brief with what you sell and what the sales team considers a relevant enquiry. Then identify the account, markets, languages and campaigns. A local clinic, a distributor receiving quotation requests and an online retailer need different questions and evidence. Media spend indicates scale, but it does not describe all the analytical work required.
The review period needs enough activity for the question. You might agree to examine the last ninety days and extend the context for seasonality or a major change. Ninety days does not guarantee a sufficient sample. Conversion delay can make recent days appear weaker before their results are complete.
Request a timeline of changes too: a new page, revised goals, pauses, promotions and enquiry-handling problems. Comparing periods without that context can attribute an effect to the campaigns when it came from elsewhere. The report should state which information is missing and which conclusions remain unresolved, rather than presenting every change as a causal finding.
What should the report cover?
The following areas are useful to define in the proposal. They do not all require intervention, and they are not automatically included in every audit. Use them to agree questions and evidence, instead of buying a page count or a generic checklist. The scope should make clear what the analyst can actually inspect.
| Area | Question to resolve | Expected handover |
|---|---|---|
| Goals and measurement | What is counted and how it is used | An action map and data limitations |
| Structure and searches | Which demand each campaign addresses | Observations with dates and available examples |
| Locations and budget | Whether allocation fits the market served | Campaign priorities with reasons |
| Ads and landing pages | Whether message, offer and next step align | Comments on the agreed pages |
| Commercial quality | Which enquiries the business accepts | Definitions and possible sales-data comparisons |
| Action plan | What to address first and who is involved | A prioritised list with dependencies and owners |
Conversions that reflect business activity
Establish whether an action represents a confirmed submission, a recorded call or simply a click. Clicking WhatsApp does not establish that a useful conversation took place. A submitted form is not a sale either. Treating these events as equivalent can hide significant differences in quality behind a single cost-per-conversion figure.
Google distinguishes primary and secondary conversion actions. Their use in bidding also depends on the selected goals, with an exception for custom goals that deserves review. The audit should explain the signals each campaign uses, rather than checking only whether a tag exists somewhere on the website.
A configuration review can identify inconsistencies and outstanding validation. It does not, on its own, replace an end-to-end test through to the CRM. Missing records or an unavailable controlled test should appear as limitations. Implementing and validating changes requires an agreed environment, access, owner and specific checks, which belong in the next scope.
Searches, targeting and allocation
Review the available terms alongside the service, market and observed results. A broad-looking enquiry may begin a long purchase, while another may clearly concern a service you do not provide. Proposed negatives need context. I would not classify every term without a conversion as recoverable money or promise to eliminate every unsuitable enquiry.
The search terms report has privacy-related visibility limits. An audit should acknowledge that coverage and use the information available, rather than claim to identify every paid search. Branded and generic demand may also deserve separate interpretation where the data allows a useful distinction between them.
Check locations, languages, networks and budget allocation against the business’s capacity to serve customers. A bidding change needs a reason and a way to observe it. The platform’s optimisation score can provide suggestions; it does not replace the assessment of enquiries, sales and costs carried out with the business and its commercial team.
Include the landing page journey
The review should follow the message to the agreed pages: what the ad promises, what the destination explains and how someone requests information. Look at service, location, examples and form fields. An unsuitable enquiry may relate to an ambiguous offer or mismatched expectations as well as the searches selected by the campaign.
The NYC Renovation presentation shows a localised service and a visible request for an estimate. We use it as a reference for clarity between offer and next step, rather than evidence of its campaigns or conversion results. Awwwards credits suzanne-thomas as the submitter; we do not assign photographic authorship or LTM results to this example.
Distinguish comments on two pages from a complete redesign. An audit may recommend clarifying a message or checking a field; writing, designing and developing the solution needs another scope. Replacing forms, installing call-tracking software and connecting commercial data also involve work beyond an inspection of the existing journey.
What a finding should demonstrate
Imagine an action named “Call” whose recording is triggered by clicking a telephone link. This fictional report should identify the action, period and configuration observed. The conclusion would be that the record establishes a click, rather than an answered call. Before changing it, check how it is used in goals and whether another source records calls.
The recommendation might be to clarify the event name and define the signal the business actually needs. A technical owner would review measurement options while the commercial team supplies a definition of a useful call. If records are insufficient, the report should say so and propose validation. That detail turns an observation into work someone can assess and scope.
Not every finding needs to promise a saving. It may resolve an ambiguity preventing useful interpretation. Ask for priorities that distinguish urgency, evidence and dependencies. Improving the interpretation of existing data can be a more reasonable first step than launching another campaign without understanding what the account is counting.
A defined audit budget example
Imagine a service business in Spain with one account, four Search campaigns, up to twenty ad groups and two Spanish-language landing pages. The review covers ninety available days, one GA4 property and one web Google Tag Manager container. Its action map includes three existing signals: form submission, call and WhatsApp click.
This scope includes examination of configuration and accessible records, commercial interpretation and recommended priorities. It does not include tests that generate customer enquiries, campaign edits or publishing tags. The €1,100 total below is illustrative, excluding VAT, to show how this particular diagnostic project could be broken down.
| Work | Illustrative scope | Fee |
|---|---|---|
| Initial definition | Objective, inventory and context meeting | €100 |
| Campaign review | Four Search campaigns and up to twenty groups | €300 |
| Measurement review | One GA4 property, one web GTM and three actions | €300 |
| Landing pages | Comments on two existing pages | €150 |
| Report and explanation | Document, priorities and a 60-minute session | €250 |
| Project total | One-off diagnosis without implementation | €1,100 |
One clarification round on the delivered report is included. Another account, additional languages, Shopping, Performance Max, ecommerce, apps or server-side measurement require a revised proposal. New ads, a landing page build, CRM integration, software and media spend are excluded too. Monthly Google Ads management is a separate service with continuing responsibilities.
Agree access and responsibilities
For diagnosis, agree suitable viewing permissions in each tool. Google provides read-only Ads access for reviewing campaigns without managing them. GA4 and GTM require their own access arrangements. The business retains its accounts and decides who can inspect information. A diagnostic engagement does not require handing over account ownership.
The example assumes access is available and uses an aggregated explanation of enquiry quality. It does not require providing a personal contact database to the analyst. If systems or permissions are missing, adjust the review and document its limitations before drawing conclusions. A correction phase needs its own authority, responsibilities and validation arrangements.
From findings to a next step
Imagine €2,400 of media spend and eighty recorded conversions in a month: that is €30 per conversion. If the team recognises thirty relevant enquiries within that set, media cost per relevant enquiry is €80. These are fictional figures, excluding agency, audit and sales costs. They do not forecast future campaign performance.
The contrast explains why definitions should be agreed before judging results. The report may recommend tidying signals, revising the page or improving sales follow-up. Ask for evidence, priority, indicative effort and an owner for each recommendation. An estimate of spending associated with an issue is not a guaranteed saving after it is corrected.
Give the priorities to your current manager or request an implementation proposal. Define the first changes, how they will be checked and when results will be reviewed, taking the conversion cycle into account. Avoid turning every observation into a simultaneous edit. You need a way to understand what happened while preserving continuity in the parts already working.
Request a useful account review
Prepare your commercial objective, account and campaign outline, approximate spend and main question: cost, enquiry quality or measurement. Add the systems you use and who handles incoming requests. That context lets us define a proportionate review, explain the handover and establish whether you need diagnosis, corrective work or ongoing support for the account.
Tell us what you need to understand about your campaigns. At Lead The Mood, we start by clarifying the question and scope. The audit should leave you with a reasoned decision and a next step you can budget for, whether you retain your current management or choose a different working arrangement.