Google Ads Optimization — Skaalen (2026-03-11)

Overview

During the weekly performance call on 2026-03-11, Gilbert flagged a significant conversion drop in the Skaalen Google Ads account. Mark ran a live demo of the agentic AI tool (Claude Code) to diagnose and fix the issues in real time. The session surfaced multiple structural problems and resolved them within a single session, producing a PDF report posted to the Skaalen Slack channel.

Meeting context: ^[1]

Problem

Skaalen conversions dropped from approximately 70/month to 23/month in the most recent period. Impressions had also declined sharply. No deliberate keyword or campaign changes had been made by the team.

Diagnosis

The AI audit identified the following root causes:

Issue	Detail
Competitor campaign wasteful	$98 CPA on a single conversion; CPC had risen from ~$2–3 to ~$7 as competitors increased their own bids on their branded terms
Wrong bidding strategy	Both primary campaigns on `Maximize Clicks` despite having sufficient conversion history to use smart bidding
Too many primary conversion actions	6 actions marked primary, diluting the bidding signal sent to Google
Impression share lost to rank	Budget was not the constraint — bids were too low; a budget increase would not have helped
Independent Living ad group	Zero impressions despite having an active RSA
Duplicate conversion action	"Calls — Scallon" and a misspelled variant both active; $19 spent with no conversions

The competitor campaign decline was partly external: competing facilities had begun bidding more aggressively on their own branded terms, crowding out Skaalen's competitor targeting.

Changes Made

All changes were executed directly via the Google Ads API by the AI tool.

Campaign Structure

Paused the competitor ad group (was $98 CPA / 1 conversion)
Reallocated competitor budget to the Brand and Retirement campaigns proportionally based on performance
Brand: $35 → $47/day
Retirement: $20 → $28/day

Conversion Actions

Consolidated primary conversion actions from 6 → 2
Primary (biddable): Submit lead form, Phone call
Demoted to secondary: all others

Keywords

Added 74 negative keywords across campaigns
Categories: competitor names, out-of-area locations, wrong-intent terms (nursing home, adult family home, disability, visually impaired)
Note: "Heights" was briefly added as a negative but reversed after review — Skaalen Heights is a legitimate location modifier
Added 27 location-specific keywords to the Retirement campaign
Driven by search term report showing local city searches converting well but lacking dedicated keywords
Some health-policy-restricted terms (e.g., "memory care near me," "dementia care") were flagged and excluded automatically

Bidding Strategy

Switched both active campaigns from Maximize Clicks → Maximize Conversions
Rationale: account has sufficient conversion data; smart bidding should now optimize against actual goals
Target CPA of ~$40 recommended for addition after 2–3 weeks of data under new strategy

Outstanding Items

Landing pages: Quality scores are a concern. The AI flagged that landing page experience is below average for several ad groups. Mark noted this is likely a bigger driver of long-term performance than any bidding change.
Action: Mark to email Melissa re: landing page improvements → see ^[2]

Output

The AI generated a summary of all changes and posted it as a PDF report to the Skaalen Slack channel automatically at session end.

Action Items

[ ] Monitor Skaalen campaign over next 2–3 weeks to assess impact of bidding strategy change (@Gilbert)
[ ] Email Melissa re: landing page improvements for Skaalen ad groups (@Mark)
[ ] After 2–3 weeks of Maximize Conversions data, evaluate adding Target CPA of ~$40 (@Gilbert)

^[2]
^[3]
^[4]
^[5] — parallel AI audit session from same call