21 Ads Audit Global

Ads Audit (Global) — Health Score & Action Plan

> Difference from 03-performance-eval-global:

> - 03 evaluates current performance (CPM, ROAS, funnel) — diagnoses symptoms.

> - 21 audits account configuration (setup, structure, tracking, creative) — scores 0-100 and finds systemic issues.

>

> Insight before numbers. Lead with judgment; illustrate with metrics.

For Newbies — Start Here

What is an ads audit?

A structured review of your ad accounts (Meta, Google, TikTok) to find leaks, misconfigurations, and missed opportunities. The output is a Health Score (0-100), a list of Quick Wins, and a 7-day Action Plan.

When do you need one?

• ROAS dropped suddenly (>20% week-over-week).
• New account inherited from another agency or in-house team.
• Spending >$5K/month with no clear performance review process.
• Pixel/CAPI showed errors or duplicate events.
• About to scale spend by 2-3x and want to verify foundation.
• Dropshipping store with attribution confusion (Shopify vs Meta vs Triple Whale numbers don't match).

What you'll need before starting:

• Read access to ad accounts (or screen-share / data export).
• Last 30 days of spend, impressions, clicks, conversions, ROAS.
• Pixel/CAPI status (Events Manager, GA4, TikTok Events).
• Region context (US, EU, SEA, LATAM) — benchmarks differ widely.
• Business model (DTC e-com, B2B SaaS, lead gen, dropshipping) — optimization rules differ.

How long does it take?

• Quick audit: 2-3 hours (Health Score + Quick Wins).
• Full audit: 6-10 hours (Health Score + 84 checkpoints + 7-day plan + creative review).

Step 0 — Read Context + Select Region Variant

Before audit, pull two contexts:

• Product context — call product-marketing-context-global if not already in conversation. This gives the auditor: pricing, target CAC, business model, current channels.
• Region variant — load the appropriate file:

| Region | File | Currency | Key benchmarks |

|--------|------|----------|----------------|

| US / North America | variants/01-us.md | USD | Meta CPM $7-12, Google CPC $1-3, ROAS 3-5x |

| EU / UK | variants/02-eu.md | EUR / GBP | Meta CPM €5-10, Google CPC €1-3, ROAS 3-4x |

| SEA (VN, TH, ID, PH, SG, MY) | variants/03-sea.md | USD-equivalent | Meta CPM $1-2, Google CPC $0.30-1, ROAS 2-3x |

| LATAM (BR, MX, AR, CO, CL) | variants/04-latam.md | USD-equivalent | Meta CPM $0.50-1.5, Google CPC $0.20-0.80, ROAS 2-3x |

> Why region matters: A $5 CPM is excellent in US but terrible in Vietnam. Audit grading without regional context produces false positives or false negatives.

Information Gathering

Ask up to 4 questions:

• Which platforms? Meta / Google / TikTok / multi-platform — and what % of total ad spend each represents.
• Industry + business model? (DTC e-com, dropshipping, B2B SaaS, lead-gen, local service, course/info-product.)
• Monthly ad spend + region? (e.g. "$15K/month, 70% US, 30% Canada".)
• Can you share data? Either paste tables, share a Looker Studio link, or grant view access to the ad account.

Auto-pull via MCP (if connected)

If user has connected an MCP server, pull data directly:

| Platform | MCP recommended | Key tools used |

|----------|-----------------|----------------|

| Meta Ads | Meta Official MCP (mcp.facebook.com/ads) | ads_insights_anomaly_signal, ads_insights_auction_ranking_benchmarks, ads_get_dataset_quality, ads_get_opportunity_score |

| Google Ads | Google Official MCP | GAQL: campaign performance, search terms, quality score |

| TikTok Ads | AdsMCP / tiktok-ads-mcp-server | Performance reports, creative library |

| Cross-platform | Adspirer ads-mcp | Unified analytics across 175+ tools |

Sample Meta Insights fields when MCP unavailable:

fields=spend,impressions,clicks,ctr,cpc,cpm,actions,cost_per_action_type,
       purchase_roas,frequency,reach
date_preset=last_30d
level=adset
breakdowns=age,gender

Sample GAQL query for Google audit:

SELECT campaign.name, campaign.status, campaign.bidding_strategy_type,
       metrics.impressions, metrics.clicks, metrics.cost_micros,
       metrics.conversions, metrics.cost_per_conversion,
       metrics.search_impression_share
FROM campaign
WHERE segments.date DURING LAST_30_DAYS
  AND campaign.status != 'REMOVED'
ORDER BY metrics.cost_micros DESC

Health Score Framework (0-100)

Formula

Health Score = Σ(Check_pass × Severity_weight × Dimension_weight)
             / Σ(Check_total × Severity_weight × Dimension_weight) × 100

Severity weights

| Severity | Multiplier | Meaning |

|----------|-----------|---------|

| Critical | 5.0× | Active money/data loss — fix today |

| High | 3.0× | Major impact — fix within 7 days |

| Medium | 1.5× | Best practice gap — fix within 30 days |

| Low | 0.5× | Optimization — fix when possible |

Grade scale

| Score | Grade | Meaning |

|-------|-------|---------|

| 90-100 | A | Excellent — maintain & scale |

| 75-89 | B | Good — a few improvements needed |

| 60-74 | C | Average — needs serious investment |

| 40-59 | D | Poor — significant performance leaks |

| <40 | F | Critical — likely losing money in real time |

6 Dimensions

1. Account     (10%) — billing, permissions, BM/MCC structure, account warnings
2. Campaign    (15%) — objectives, separation (cold/warm/retarget), budget allocation
3. AdSet/AdGroup (20%) — audience, budget, scheduling, exclusions, learning phase
4. Ad/Creative (25%) — diversity, freshness, hook quality, format mix
5. Tracking    (20%) — pixel/CAPI/server-side, event quality, attribution model
6. Optimization (10%) — bid strategy, ML signals, budget pacing, automation rules

84 Checkpoints (Universal Core)

> Region-specific benchmark numbers live in the variant files. The checkpoint logic is identical worldwide.

Dimension 1 — ACCOUNT (12 checks, weight 10%)

| # | Check | Severity |

|---|-------|----------|

| A01 | Business Manager / MCC structured (single source of truth) | High |

| A02 | Account billing healthy (no failed charges in 30d) | Critical |

| A03 | No active account warnings or restrictions | Critical |

| A04 | Domain verified (Meta) or website verified (Google/TikTok) | High |

| A05 | iOS 14.5+ Aggregated Event Measurement configured (Meta) | High |

| A06 | Brand safety / suitability set (Meta + Google) | Medium |

| A07 | User access roles minimized (no over-permissioned users) | Medium |

| A08 | Spending limit set per account (prevents runaway charges) | Medium |

| A09 | 2FA enabled on all admin accounts | High |

| A10 | Conversion API token rotated within 12 months | Low |

| A11 | Account currency matches market currency | Low |

| A12 | Tax/VAT configuration correct for region | Low |

Dimension 2 — CAMPAIGN (14 checks, weight 15%)

| # | Check | Severity |

|---|-------|----------|

| C01 | Cold / warm / retarget campaigns separated | High |

| C02 | Campaign objectives match real business outcome | Critical |

| C03 | No more than 3-5 active "core" campaigns | Medium |

| C04 | Campaign Budget Optimization (CBO) used appropriately | Medium |

| C05 | No overlapping audiences across active campaigns | High |

| C06 | Brand vs non-brand campaigns separated (Google) | High |

| C07 | Search vs Performance Max separated (Google) | High |

| C08 | iOS / Android segregation when economics differ | Low |

| C09 | Budget allocated proportionally to ROAS-by-funnel-stage | High |

| C10 | Naming convention consistent (Brand_Funnel_Geo_Date) | Low |

| C11 | Campaign-level frequency caps set (where supported) | Medium |

| C12 | Holiday/promo campaigns tagged & sunset-dated | Low |

| C13 | Negative geo / language exclusions set | Medium |

| C14 | Brand keywords campaign exists with good QS (Google) | High |

Dimension 3 — AD SET / AD GROUP (16 checks, weight 20%)

| # | Check | Severity |

|---|-------|----------|

| S01 | Daily budget ≥ 5× target CPA per ad set | Critical |

| S02 | Not editing ad sets currently in Learning Phase | High |

| S03 | Audience size 1M-50M for cold prospecting (Meta) | High |

| S04 | Audience overlap between ad sets <25% | High |

| S05 | Lookalikes built from quality seeds (purchasers, not clickers) | High |

| S06 | Negative keywords list maintained (Google) | High |

| S07 | Match types appropriate (Broad+Smart Bidding, or Phrase/Exact) | High |

| S08 | Search term report reviewed within 14 days | High |

| S09 | Exclusion of past purchasers from acquisition campaigns | Critical |

| S10 | Placement: Advantage+/automatic where appropriate | Medium |

| S11 | Ad scheduling matches actual peak-conversion hours | Medium |

| S12 | Bid strategy matches account stage (Lowest Cost early, Cost Cap mature) | High |

| S13 | Demographic restrictions justified by data (not prejudice) | Medium |

| S14 | TikTok-specific: SmartTargeting tested vs manual | Medium |

| S15 | Quality score average ≥6/10 (Google) | High |

| S16 | Ad set count per campaign ≤5 (Meta) for ML efficiency | Medium |

Dimension 4 — AD / CREATIVE (18 checks, weight 25%)

| # | Check | Severity |

|---|-------|----------|

| AD01 | At least 10 truly different creatives per active ad set | High |

| AD02 | No single creative running >21 days continuously | High |

| AD03 | Frequency <3.5 on cold audience | High |

| AD04 | All 3 formats present (video / image / carousel) | Medium |

| AD05 | Videos have sound/music (TikTok-critical) | Critical |

| AD06 | First 3 seconds hook tested (Hook Rate >25%) | High |

| AD07 | Captions / on-screen text present (sound-off viewing) | High |

| AD08 | UGC / review-style creative present (≥1) | Medium |

| AD09 | CTA explicit in creative (voice or text) | High |

| AD10 | Vertical 9:16 used for Stories/Reels/TikTok | High |

| AD11 | Resolution ≥720p (1080p preferred) | Medium |

| AD12 | RSA: ≥8/15 headlines, ≥4/4 descriptions filled (Google) | High |

| AD13 | Asset strength "Good" or higher on RSA (Google) | Medium |

| AD14 | Sitelink / callout / call extensions present (Google) | Medium |

| AD15 | Landing page load time <3s on 4G | High |

| AD16 | Landing page mobile-first design verified | Critical |

| AD17 | Creative-to-LP message match (no bait-and-switch) | High |

| AD18 | Compliance: no policy violations (alcohol, health, financial) | Critical |

Dimension 5 — TRACKING (16 checks, weight 20%)

| # | Check | Severity |

|---|-------|----------|

| T01 | Pixel/Tag installed on all relevant pages | Critical |

| T02 | Purchase / Lead / KeyEvent firing accurately | Critical |

| T03 | Conversion API (CAPI / Enhanced Conversions) deployed | High |

| T04 | Event Match Quality ≥6.0 (Meta) | High |

| T05 | No duplicate events (deduplication ID set) | Critical |

| T06 | UTM parameters present on all paid links | Medium |

| T07 | GA4 linked to Google Ads + GA4 linked to BigQuery | High |

| T08 | Conversion windows aligned across platforms | High |

| T09 | Server-side tracking layer (GTM SS, Stape) considered | Medium |

| T10 | Triple Whale / Hyros / Northbeam reconciled vs platform (DTC) | High |

| T11 | TikTok Pixel + Events API both firing | High |

| T12 | View-through and click-through windows documented | Medium |

| T13 | Cross-domain tracking working (multi-domain checkout) | High |

| T14 | First-party data collection (email/phone) for CAPI matching | High |

| T15 | Cookie consent compliant (GDPR / CCPA / LGPD) | Critical |

| T16 | Bot/spam traffic filtered from conversion data | Medium |

Dimension 6 — OPTIMIZATION (8 checks, weight 10%)

| # | Check | Severity |

|---|-------|----------|

| O01 | Automated rules in place (pause low ROAS, scale winners) | Medium |

| O02 | Budget pacing reviewed weekly | Medium |

| O03 | Creative refresh cadence set (≥30% new every 14 days) | High |

| O04 | A/B testing framework defined (one variable at a time) | Medium |

| O05 | Reporting cadence: daily skim, weekly deep-dive | Low |

| O06 | Diagnostics tab reviewed (Quality, Engagement, Conversion) | Medium |

| O07 | Performance reviewed by funnel stage (TOFU/MOFU/BOFU) | High |

| O08 | Stop-loss thresholds defined per campaign | High |

Quick Wins Decision Tree

After scoring, surface the top 5-10 actions a user can do today (<15 minutes each).

START → Is any Critical check failing?
        ├─ YES → Fix in next 24 hours (account-level issues first)
        │        ├─ A02/A03 (billing/warning) → fix immediately
        │        ├─ T01/T02/T05 (tracking broken) → fix before any more spend
        │        ├─ S01 (budget < 5× CPA) → increase budget or pause
        │        └─ AD18 (policy violation) → revise creative
        │
        └─ NO → Score Critical/High Quick Wins by impact:
                 ├─ Pause "wasted spend" keywords / ad sets (>$200 spend, 0 conv)
                 ├─ Add exclusion of past purchasers from cold campaigns
                 ├─ Refresh top-frequency creative (>3.5 freq)
                 ├─ Enable CAPI / Enhanced Conversions
                 ├─ Add UTM parameters to untagged ads
                 └─ Connect GA4 ↔ Google Ads if not linked

Each Quick Win must include: action, expected impact, time required, owner.

Dropshipping Audit Checklist (Special Section)

> Dropshipping has unique audit needs: high creative volume, thin margins, attribution opacity, and compressed test cycles. This section augments — not replaces — the 84 universal checkpoints.

1. Creative Testing Velocity (the #1 dropshipping killer)

| Check | Pass criteria | Severity |

|-------|---------------|----------|

| New creatives launched per week | ≥10 (winning store benchmark) | Critical |

| Creative-to-spend ratio | 1 winning ad funds 4-5 tests | High |

| Hook variations tested | ≥3 hooks per product | High |

| UGC creator pipeline active | ≥2 UGC creators delivering weekly | High |

| Cycle time from brief to launch | <72 hours | High |

> Failure mode: A store running 2-3 creatives "until they die" instead of testing 10+/week is starving Meta's algorithm and ad fatigue compounds. Fix: build a creative ops calendar (see 06-ugc-egc-brief-global).

2. CBO vs ABO Setup

| Check | Pass criteria | Severity |

|-------|---------------|----------|

| Testing layer uses ABO (Ad Set Budget) | ≥3 ad sets, $20-50/day each | High |

| Scaling layer uses CBO (Campaign Budget) | Top winners only, single CBO | High |

| Budget reallocates within 3-7 days of clear winner | Document rule + execute | Medium |

| No mixed CBO with non-comparable ad sets | Audit campaign structure | High |

3. Pixel + CAPI Dual Tracking (post-iOS 14.5 critical)

| Check | Pass criteria | Severity |

|-------|---------------|----------|

| Pixel + CAPI both firing on Purchase event | Verified in Test Events | Critical |

| EMQ ≥7.0 (dropshipping should beat 6.0 floor) | Events Manager | High |

| Email + phone + first-name + last-name passed via CAPI | Backend integration | Critical |

| Server-side tracking via Stape/GTM SS for AOV>$50 stores | Verified deployment | High |

| iOS attribution gap reconciled with Triple Whale or Hyros | Compare last 30 days | High |

4. Landing Page CRO Signals

| Check | Pass criteria | Severity |

|-------|---------------|----------|

| Mobile load time <2.5s (LCP) | PageSpeed Insights | Critical |

| Add-to-Cart rate ≥6% (sessions → ATC) | GA4 / Shopify | High |

| Checkout conversion ≥40% (ATC → Purchase) | GA4 / Shopify | High |

| Hero matches winning ad (creative-LP message match) | Manual review | Critical |

| Trust badges, reviews, return policy visible above fold | Manual review | High |

| Exit-intent + abandoned cart sequence active | Klaviyo / equivalent | High |

5. Attribution Accuracy

| Check | Pass criteria | Severity |

|-------|---------------|----------|

| UTMs use consistent schema (utm_source/medium/campaign/content) | URL builder doc | High |

| Triple Whale / Hyros / Northbeam connected | At least one MMP active | High |

| Platform-reported revenue vs Shopify revenue gap <15% | Reconciliation report | High |

| Post-purchase survey ("How did you hear about us?") active | Order form / KnoCommerce | Medium |

| Customer LTV tracked, not just first-order revenue | Cohort report quarterly | High |

6. Profit Margin Tracking

| Check | Pass criteria | Severity |

|-------|---------------|----------|

| Net margin per order calculated (after COGS, ad spend, fees) | Spreadsheet or Lifetimely | Critical |

| MER (Marketing Efficiency Ratio = total revenue / total ad spend) tracked daily | Dashboard | High |

| Break-even ROAS documented and visible | Operations dashboard | Critical |

| Refund/chargeback rate <5% | Shopify reports | High |

| Profit-per-customer rising or flat (not declining) | 90-day cohort | High |

> Dropshipping cross-reference: When auditing dropshipping accounts, also call 29-dropshipping-mastery-global for product-fit and supply-chain audit beyond ad-account scope.

Output Structure

# Ads Audit: [Brand / Product]
Audit date: [YYYY-MM-DD]
Region: [US / EU / SEA / LATAM]
Auditor: [Agency / In-house]
Spend audited: [$ — last 30d]

## Executive Summary

| Platform | Score | Grade | Top issue |
|----------|-------|-------|-----------|
| Meta Ads | [n]/100 | [A-F] | [1-line] |
| Google Ads | [n]/100 | | |
| TikTok Ads | [n]/100 | | |
| **Aggregate** | **[n]/100** | **[Grade]** | |

## Critical Issues (fix in 24 hours)
[List failed Critical checks with remediation steps]

## Quick Wins (today, <15 min each)
[Top 5-10 actions, sorted by impact]

## By Dimension

### 1. Account — [score]/10
[Pass/fail per check, with screenshots if MCP-pulled]

### 2. Campaign — [score]/10
[...]

[Continue for all 6 dimensions]

## By Platform

### Meta Ads — [score]/100
[Breakdown by dimension]

### Google Ads — [score]/100
[...]

### TikTok Ads — [score]/100
[...]

## Dropshipping Audit (if applicable)
[6 sub-sections from Dropshipping Checklist]

## 7-Day Action Plan

| Day | Action | Platform | Owner | Expected outcome |
|-----|--------|----------|-------|------------------|
| Day 1 | [Quick wins + Critical fixes] | | | |
| Day 2-3 | [High priority] | | | |
| Day 4-5 | [Tracking + creative] | | | |
| Day 6-7 | [Setup + test deploy] | | | |

## 30-Day Forecast
[Realistic improvement estimate if all Critical/High fixed]

## Appendix
- Raw data exports
- Screenshots
- MCP query logs (if used)

Cross-references

| When you need | Call skill |

|---------------|-----------|

| Diagnose current KPIs and funnel | 03-performance-eval-global |

| Deep data analysis (descriptive→prescriptive) | 13-data-analysis-global |

| Refresh creative after audit finds fatigue | 05-ad-copy-global + 06-ugc-egc-brief-global |

| Reverse-calc budget after fixing tracking | 10-reverse-kpi-calc-global |

| Dropshipping product/supply audit | 29-dropshipping-mastery-global |

| Set up A/B test for fixes | 19-ab-test-setup-global |

Quality Checklist (before delivery)

• [ ] Region variant loaded and benchmarks contextualized
• [ ] All 84 checks scored (no skipped)
• [ ] Health Score calculated per platform AND aggregate
• [ ] Critical issues separated and fix-in-24h flagged
• [ ] Quick Wins ≤15 min each, sorted by impact
• [ ] Dropshipping section included if business model = dropship
• [ ] 7-day Action Plan with owner + expected outcome per row
• [ ] 30-day forecast realistic (not over-promise)
• [ ] No "improve creative" without specifying WHICH creative + WHY
• [ ] No scaling recommendation when Critical tracking fails
• [ ] No edits suggested for ad sets in Learning Phase
• [ ] Cross-references called when needed (e.g. 06 for creative)

Region Variant References

Load the appropriate file before scoring:

• variants/01-us.md — United States, Canada
• variants/02-eu.md — European Union, UK
• variants/03-sea.md — Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia
• variants/04-latam.md — Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Chile

Each variant contains: healthy CPM/CPC ranges, ROAS targets per business model, common red flags, region-specific compliance gates, and tracking platform peculiarities.