PPC report: what a good monthly report should show, and the red flags
A good PPC report answers one question: did last month's spend produce customers, and what changes next? It shows spend against plan, leads and qualified leads from your CRM, cost per result at each stage, and what was changed and why. It also says which conversions are being counted.
Many business owners I speak to get a PPC report every month and still cannot say if their ads work. The report has pages of charts, a click-through rate going up and a cost per click going down. What it does not have is the number of people who became customers.
This guide is for the person who receives the report and pays the invoice, not the agency that builds it: what a monthly report should show, how to tell if its conversion numbers are real, and how to check them yourself in about 15 minutes.
What a PPC report is for
A PPC report exists to help you make one decision each month: keep the spend, change how it is used, or stop it. Everything in it should feed that decision.
So the report has to start from your business numbers, not the platform's. Impressions, reach, clicks and click-through rate help the person running the account find where a problem sits, but they are not results. A campaign can double its click-through rate and send you worse leads.
For lead generation in the UAE, where the sale usually happens later on a call, on WhatsApp or in a showroom, the result you care about sits outside the ad platform. A form fill starts the funnel; it does not end it.
What a good monthly PPC report shows
A useful monthly report fits on one or two pages and covers seven things, in this order, per platform.
- Spend against plan. Spend on Google and on Meta against the agreed budget. A big gap either way needs a reason.
- Leads, and what happened to them. Platform leads, then your CRM: how many were qualified, booked a consultation or viewing, and bought.
- Cost per result at each stage. Cost per lead, cost per qualified lead and cost per sale. Cost per lead on its own can fall while the cost of a customer rises.
- Which conversions are counted. The conversion actions behind the numbers and how each is counted (see below).
- Where the results came from. A short breakdown by campaign and, for Google, the search terms that spent the most.
- What changed and why. Budget moves, new ads, paused campaigns, bid strategy changes, with the reason for each.
- The plan for next month. What will be tested or cut, and what you need to do, such as marking lead quality in the CRM.
Impressions, reach and click-through rate can sit in an appendix. In my experience, when they lead the report, the business numbers are weak or missing.
Which conversions are being counted
In Google Ads, the "Conversions" and "All conv." columns count different things, so one campaign can show two very different totals, as Google's help page on All conversions explains.
- Conversions shows your primary conversion actions, the ones Google's automated bidding (Smart Bidding) uses.
- All conv. adds everything else: secondary actions tracked for observation only, some phone calls, store visits where available, and view-through conversions, which Google keeps out of the Conversions column.
If your report quotes All conv. as "leads", the number may include page views, button clicks, or people who saw an ad and never clicked it. Ask which column the report uses and which actions are primary.
The counting setting matters too. Google lets you count every conversion after an ad interaction, or only one conversion per ad click. Its conversion counting page recommends "Every" for sales and "One" for leads, because "usually only one, unique lead per ad click likely adds value". A lead form set to "Every" counts the same person twice if they submit twice.
On Meta, check the attribution setting. Each ad set has one, and Meta's attribution settings page lists the options: 1 or 7 days after a link click, 1 day after an impression (view-through), and 1 day after a non-link click (engage-through). A lead counted on a 1-day view came from someone who saw the ad but did not click it.
Why Google, Meta and your CRM never match
Google, Meta and your CRM each count conversions by their own rules, so their totals will not match. Three things cause most of the gap.
- Different dates. Google's standard columns credit a conversion to the day of the click, not the day it happened. In Google's own example, a click last week that converts this week is counted last week. So last month's numbers can rise after the report was sent. The "Conversions (by conv. time)" columns use the day it happened, which is easier to match with your sales records.
- Different credit rules. Each platform claims the conversions that fall inside its own window. One person who saw an Instagram ad and later clicked a Google ad can be counted by both, so adding the two totals together overstates your leads.
- Modelled results. Meta says it may use statistical modelling where conversion data is missing or partial, and Ads Manager marks those results with a note.
None of this means the platforms are wrong. It means the CRM is the referee: show each platform's numbers separately, with the CRM's leads and sales next to them.
In UAE lead-gen accounts, the biggest gap I see is WhatsApp. Many enquiries start on WhatsApp and never touch a form, so the platforms cannot see them unless someone records them. If a report shows 40 leads and your sales team handled 90 conversations, both numbers can be true. The fix is to log every enquiry in the CRM with its source, then send the qualified ones back to the platforms. On one full-funnel account, rebuilding CRM lifecycle stages and syncing them to Meta and Google, plus CAPI and offline conversion tracking, was a core part of reaching a 780% ROI.
Red flags in a PPC report
These signs suggest a PPC report is built to look good rather than to help you decide. One on its own may have a good reason; several together mean you are not seeing the full picture.
- No cost per result. Reach, engagement and clicks, but no cost per lead, per qualified lead or per sale.
- "All conversions" sold as leads. Or one combined "conversions" total for Google and Meta.
- No CRM numbers. Platform leads only, with nothing on how many were qualified or bought.
- No change log. Results moved, but nothing says what was done in the account.
- Screenshots only. You have no access of your own. If the campaigns run in the provider's account, you can lose the data and history when you leave (more in freelancer or agency).
- Every month is a win. Nothing was tested and failed. Real accounts have bad weeks, and a good report says so.
How to check your PPC report in 15 minutes
You can check most of what a PPC report claims yourself, with read-only access to the ad accounts and your CRM open next to them. In Google Ads, read-only access lets you view campaigns and run reports without being able to edit anything.
- Get your own access. Ask for read-only access in Google Ads and view access to the Meta ad account.
- Open the conversion actions in Google Ads. Go to Goals, then Conversions, then Summary. See which actions are primary and whether lead actions count "One". Compare the Conversions column with the number in the report.
- Read the change history. Google's change history lists changes from the past two years, with the email of the person who made each one. If the report says "optimised bids and tested new ads" and the history is empty for the month, ask why.
- Check the Meta attribution setting. Open each ad set and see whether its attribution setting includes view-through. Meta notes that results cannot be compared in the Campaign Overview table across ad sets with different attribution models.
- Match leads to the CRM. Count how many of last month's platform leads appear in your CRM, how many were qualified and how many bought. That tells you more than the rest of the report.
- Look at the search terms. For Google Search, scan the search terms that spent the most. If they are not what you sell, money is leaking. My Google Ads audit guide shows where to find them.
Weekly or monthly reporting?
Monthly is the rhythm for decisions; weekly is the rhythm for problems. A month gives enough leads to judge cost per qualified lead, especially in property and clinics, where the sale can take weeks.
A short weekly update, with spend, leads and anything that went wrong, catches what cannot wait: a campaign that stopped spending, a broken form, a jump in cost per lead. The management I offer includes weekly reporting across Meta and Google Ads for this reason, and my guide to what performance marketing costs lists what else a monthly fee should cover.
What to ask for this month
If your PPC report does not do this job, you do not need a new dashboard. Send your provider the seven points above as the structure you want, and add two requests:
- CRM numbers next to platform numbers, with WhatsApp enquiries included, so you can see leads turn into sales.
- Read-only access to every ad account, in your name, so you can check any number yourself.
If the numbers then show that leads are not turning into sales, the problem is usually tracking or lead quality, not the report. Start by sending sales back to the platforms with offline conversion import, or fix your ad tracking first. And if you would rather someone else did all of this, that is what PPC management should include.
Frequently asked questions
What should a PPC report include?+
How often should I get a PPC report?+
Why don't my Google Ads and Meta numbers match my CRM?+
What is the difference between Conversions and All conversions in Google Ads?+
Related
Not sure what your report is telling you?
Apply for a free strategy call. We'll go through your last report next to your ad accounts and CRM, and show you which numbers to trust.