The numbers to lead with
Pick the few metrics that map to money for your business, and put them at the top against the target agreed at the start.
- Lead generation: spend, leads, cost per lead, and qualified leads or site visits
- E-commerce: spend, revenue, ROAS, orders, AOV
- Amazon: spend, ad sales, ACoS, TACoS
- All accounts: conversion rate, and the change since last period
The three questions it must answer
Numbers without interpretation leave the client to guess. Every review should say, in plain words:
- What worked, and why we think it worked
- What didn't, and what we learned
- What we are changing next, and what we expect it to do
What to cut
Impressions, reach and clicks on their own say nothing about whether the business made money. They are useful for diagnosing a problem, so keep them in the dashboard for the marketer, but they should not lead the client report.
Honest reporting
If a campaign underperformed, the report should say so and explain what is being done about it. A report that only shows good news trains the client to distrust every number in it.
In the accounts I run, reporting is a dashboard built around CPL, ROAS, ACoS, conversion rates and revenue, plus regular reviews with straight answers on what worked, what didn't and what I'm changing next.