Free Google Ads audits are a sales pitch in disguise

"Free Google Ads audit. No obligation. Find out where you're wasting money."

You've probably seen the offer. Maybe you've taken one up. And fair enough: an expert looking at your own account, for nothing. What's not to like?

Here's the thing. A free audit isn't free advice. It's the first step of a sale.

Nobody works for free

A proper look through an account takes time. If someone's offering to do it for nothing, they're expecting to get paid somewhere else. Usually by you, for management, once the audit has done its job.

That's not a crime. It's marketing. But it's worth being clear about what you're looking at.

An audit built to sell will always find problems

Every account has something that could be better. Every single one. So an audit designed to win you as a client will always find problems, and the more alarming they look, the better it works.

Look out for:

• A big "wasted spend" figure. Often worked out in a way that makes it look as large as possible.
• A long list of issues. Some important, some trivial, all presented with the same urgency.
• Scores and red warnings. A traffic-light dashboard looks serious. It doesn't tell you what matters most.
• The conclusion that you need help. Funnily enough, from them.

Some of it might be right

None of this means the audit is wrong. It might spot real problems. But it's hard to tell a real problem from a sales point when they're in the same report, written by someone who wants your business.

Questions to ask if you get one

• Which three things on this list would make the biggest difference, and why?
• How did you work out the wasted spend figure?
• Is anything in my account working well? (An honest audit will say so.)
• What exactly would you do in the first month?

The answers will tell you more than the report.

Why I don't do them

I'd rather be upfront. If you want help, we have a quick chat about what's going on, I give you a price, and I go in and get started. The checking is the first part of the work, not a separate product dressed up as a favour.

I've written more about how that works in why I don't do Google Ads audits.

No pitch disguised as advice. Just a price, and the work.