The Paid Advertising Audit reviews how effectively paid media is being used to capture existing market demand, and whether current spend is aligned with genuine commercial opportunity.
The audit typically focuses on Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising, and where relevant extends to paid social activity across platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Findings are assessed in the context of the wider market and competitive landscape, drawing on insights from the Market Analysis and Competitor Analysis reports to avoid evaluating performance in isolation.
The aim is not simply to judge performance, but to identify where spend is working, where it is being diluted, and where opportunity exists to improve efficiency and returns.
The audit assesses paid activity across applicable platforms, which may include:
To ensure accuracy, the review requires access to relevant dashboards, typically including:
Access is read-only and used solely for audit and analysis purposes.
Paid activity is reviewed to understand:
This allows paid performance to be assessed against what the market will realistically support, rather than against arbitrary benchmarks.
The audit highlights:
Where paid social is in use, the role it plays within the wider acquisition mix is considered, including whether it supports awareness, demand capture, or conversion.
The Paid Advertising Audit provides:
This report is designed to answer a practical question:
Is paid advertising currently being used in the most effective way to capture demand — and if not, where should it change?
It provides a grounded, evidence-led view of paid performance, informed by market and competitor context, with implementation or optimisation work available separately where required.
While the Market Analysis and Competitor Analysis reports focus on understanding demand, opportunity, and competitive position, the Paid Advertising Audit looks at how effectively existing demand is being captured through paid channels.
Rather than assessing whether the market is attractive or who leads it, this audit examines how current budgets are being deployed in practice, whether spend aligns with proven opportunity, and where inefficiencies or missed opportunities exist within live advertising accounts. It is therefore complementary, not overlapping — translating market insight into a practical evaluation of paid execution.