Google Ads monthly report checklist

Why have a checklist at all?

Reports can look thorough while quietly omitting the one number that matters — whether results match real leads or sales. A fixed checklist stops anything important being left out month to month.

Download the printable checklist (PDF) if you'd rather work through it on paper or share it with a colleague before your next report review.

Measurement, first

Before anything else, confirm the numbers in the report are measuring the right thing.

• Which conversion actions are primary, and what each one actually counts.
• Whether the reported conversion count matches real leads or sales for the month.
• The last-recorded-conversion date for each action.

Spend and where it concentrates

A report should show spend by campaign, not just a single total.

• Total spend for the month, compared with last month.
• Which campaigns are limited by budget.
• Which campaigns spent fully but produced few or no conversions.

Search terms and performance trends

A report that never mentions the search terms report is missing one of the most direct signals of wasted spend.

• The top search terms by cost, and any clearly irrelevant ones found.
• Clickthrough rate, cost per click and cost per conversion, compared against the account's own recent history.
• Any sharp, unexplained change worth a sentence of explanation.

Changes made and what's next

A useful report says exactly what changed in the account and why, plus what's planned next — not just what happened to performance.

• A list of changes made in the account this month, with a one-line reason for each.
• One or two clear priorities for next month.
• Anything that needs a decision from you, flagged explicitly.

Limitations of this guide

• This checklist describes what a report should cover; it doesn't replace reviewing the underlying Google Ads account yourself from time to time.

Frequently asked questions

Related guides and tools

• Questions to ask your PPC agency — Plain-English questions to ask a current or prospective PPC agency about access, tracking, reporting and fees, so you can judge the answers yourself.
• Is my PPC agency wasting money — How to check whether your Google Ads agency is wasting budget: account access, tracking, search terms, reporting and fees — without accusing anyone..
• How to audit a Google Ads account — A step-by-step checklist, in business language.
• Google Ads management cost: agency vs software — How management is priced and what you actually pay for.