How to audit Google Ads Performance Max campaigns (checklist included)

Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) are a new way for advertisers to access all Google Ads inventory from a single campaign across YouTube, Display, Search, Discover, Gmail and Maps. Performance Max (PMAX) uses Google AI to help drive growth in conversions and value through bidding, targeting, creatives, and attribution. It’s designed to perform across a wide range of marketing objectives and media channels.

Due to the complexity of the inventory and the opacity of the reporting, Performance Max (PMAX) does require some time in order to audit.

Performance Max (PMAX) audit checklist (ecom)

Due to its enormous size, I have broken down the PMAX checklist into 5 parts.
The order of the checklist is based on realistic scenarios eg the access a PPC specialist will have in a new Google Ads Account. The checklist is heavily skewed in auditing PMAX campaigns for ecom purposes.
Also, the checklist applies on both Shopify and non-Shopify eshops.

That said, a Performance Max (PMAX) audit checklist should involve the following:

Campaign level

Audit the realistic additional value for new customers
Audit the results between feed-only vs fully-fledged PMAX campaigns
Audit the conversion action (purchases)
Audit the advanced location targeting
Audit ad schedule
Audit assets groups
Audit headlines
Audit long headlines
Audit descriptions
Audit (lifestyle) images
Audit videos
Audit call to action
Audit display path
Audit extensions
Audit the customer-match audience of existing customers
Audit the custom segment audience of converting search terms
Audit in-market audience segment
Audit if URL expansions are disabled
Audit the dedicated (dynamic) remarketing campaign next to PMax
Audit the bidding strategy
Audit the target of the bidding strategy
Audit seasonality adjustment
Audit if assets or extensions are disapproved
Audit if prices remain competitive
Audit low-performing products
Audit if low-performing user locations
Audit “Zombie” products
Audit budgets for campaigns with best performing products
Audit audience insights
Audit asset groups for best-performing audiences
Audit ‘suggested trends’
Audit asset groups for relevant trends
Audit cannibalisation in GA4
Audit increase/decrease of bidding targets
Audit increase/decrease of budgets
Audit poor assets
Audit campaign insights
Audit PMAX networks’ performance
Audit user location report
Audit ‘new vs returning visitors’ segment
Audit new customers reporting column
Audit conversions values (purchases)
Audit PMAX brand exclusions
Audit PMAX search terms
Audit PMAX search themes
Audit the UTM parameters in the asset groups
Audit Auto-applied recommendations
Audit if Auto-applied recommendations are disabled
Audit PMAX brand restrictions
Audit Feed-only PMAX campaigns (ecom)
Audit Feed-only PMAX campaign budgets (ecom)
Audit the results of the test of Full-fledged PMAX campaigns against Feed-only PMAX campaigns (ecom)
Audit URL exclusions
Audit Performance MAX fluctuation in results
Audit PMAX impression changes by network
Audit changes in traffic destination

Feed level

Audit dynamic remarketing in Merchant Center (ecom)
Audit if the product id matches the feed id in Merchant Center (ecom)
Audit the connection of Merchant Center with Google Ads
Audit the optimisation of the product feed
Audit the optimisation of product titles
Audit the optimisation of product descriptions
Audit the optimisation of product short descriptions
Audit the optimisation of product images
Audit the optimisation of product lifestyle images
Audit images in multiple dimensions (landscape, square, vertical, etc)
Audit custom labels for products based on profit margins
Audit custom labels for products based on seasonality
Audit custom labels for products based on stock levels
Audit if the feed is updated hourly
Audit supplementary feeds with “zombie products”
Audit supplementary feeds with best-performing products
Audit supplementary feed with custom labels
Audit Paid product performance in Merchant Center
Audit Organic product performance in Merchant Center
Audit shipping in Merchant Center
Audit if the shipping values found in Merchant Center and the Website are matching
Audit if the shipping values found in Merchant Center and the product pages are matching
Audit returns in Merchant Center
Audit if the return values found in Merchant Center and the Website are matching
Audit if the return values found in Merchant Center and the product pages are matching
Audit if top-selling products are disapproved
Audit if top-selling products are out of stock
Audit stock fluctuations
Audit stock levels

Account level

I do need to caution you on this because Account level chances will affect all campaigns inside the Google ads account and not just Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns

Audit enhanced conversion tracking
Audit enhanced conversions
Audit conversion actions
Audit if attribution is set to data-driven
Audit if GA4 (Google Analytics 4) is linked to the Google Ads account
Audit Performance Max segment in GA4
Audit lead quality and automatically send value updates to Google (leads)
Audit mobile app categories exclusions
Audit content keywords exclusions
Audit sensitive content exclusions
Audit parked domains exclusions
Audit youtube live streams exclusions
Audit account-wide negatives
Audit negative keyword lists
Audit conversions Delay
Audit time to conversion
Audit Data exclusions
Audit seasonality adjustments
Audit active scripts
Audit paused scripts
Audit active Automated Rules
Audit paused Automated Rules
Audit AAR (Auto applied recommendations)
Audit changes in customers lists
Audit active experiments in the account
Audit ended experiments in the account
Audit conversion value adjustments
Audit Value rules adjustments
Audit changes in Page feed
Audit changes in Business feed
Audit offline conversion uploads
Audit account changes by other users
Audit account changes by Google
Audit CRM integration issues

Website level

Audit gtag.js
Audit Google Ads conversion tracking code
Audit hashed email (data layer)
Audit the the new_customer parameter to your Google Ads conversion tracking code (data layer)
Audit the customization of ad_personalization_signals to comply with EU regulations
Audit consent mode modeling (EU)
Audit if the website is mobile friendly
Audit if the product pages are mobile friendly
Audit if the checkout page is mobile friendly
Audit if the landing pages load fast in your target location
Audit if the forms and/or checkouts are working
Audit the lead fraud prevention tactics
Audit the payment fraud prevention tactics
Audit if the Schema property of the product pages (Website)
Audit if the Schema property of the product pages in Google’s Search Console
Audit the shippingDetails field of the Schema property (product page)
Audit the hasMerchantReturnPolicy field of the Schema property (product page)
Audit the image field of the Schema property (product page)
Audit changes to plugins
Audit changes to page design
Audit changes to checkout design
Audit changes to payment options
Audit hosting provider changes (if applicable)
Audit fluctuations in content views
Audit fluctuations in add to carts
Audit fluctuations in checkout
Audit fluctuations in payment
Audit changes in payment choices
Audit fluctuations in traffic from other marketing channels (eg META)

Enviroment Level

Audit sales of the competition
Audit promotions of the competition
Audit shipping costs of the competition
Audit Product pages of the competition
Audit payment options of the competition
Audit negative reviews off the website (eg Google Business Places)
Audit demand in Keyword Planner
Audit trend in Keyword trends
Audit the appearance of the website’s URLs in Google Search Results
Audit fluctuations of the general economic situation in your target location

Best Practices

Best practices in Google Ads refer to widely-accepted methods, processes, or approaches that have consistently demonstrated superior results in achieving specific objectives. These practices are grounded in industry expertise, empirical evidence, and lessons learned over time. They serve as benchmarks and guidelines for Google Ads PPC specialists to enhance efficiency, reduce risks, and optimize performance, ultimately contributing to the competitiveness and success of the advertising account. In brief, Performance Max (PMAX) best practices contain but not limited to the following:

Feed optimization
Conversions
budget
time
funnel
branded keywords
Asset groups
Assets
Experiment
Audience signals
bidding strategy
Ad extensions
Product exclusions
Scripts
Insights
Remarketing

Feed Optimization

When you are running Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns for eshops, you should have a product feed approved in Merchant Center. This means that the product feed needs to meet the basic requirements dictated by Merchant Center. The optimiztion starts after the feed has been approved. Eg are my titles matching the user’s queries?

That said, in order to optimize the feed, you will have to optimize the data required which are the following:

Title
ID
Product data specification
Description
Link
Image link
Mobile link
Additional image link
Cost of goods sold (COGS)
Expiration date
Price
Sale Price
Sale Price effective date
Unit pricing measure
Unit pricing base measure
Installment
Subscription cost
Loyalty points
Google product category
Product type
Google Search index link
Brand
GTIN
MPN
Identifier exists
Condition
Adult
Multipack
Bundle
Energy efficiency class
Age group
Color
Gender
Material
Pattern
Size
Size type
Size system
Item group ID
Product length
Product detail
Product highlight
Ads redirect
Custom label 0–4
Promotion ID
Excluded destination
Included destination
Excluded countries for Shopping ads
Pause
Shipping
Shipping label
Shipping weight
Shipping dimensions
Ships from country
Transit time label
Handling time
Tax
Tax category

Asset Groups

In the “Asset Groups” tab, you will be presented with the assets and the audience signals of the ad group.
Do note that Ad groups are renamed Assets groups in Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns.
Open the Assets in order to audit the titles, descriptions, long descriptions, images, logos, and videos [autogenerated or otherwise].
If the videos are autogenerated then you should check to see if the slideshows have a good flow between the sentences or, even worse, are not factual at all.
You can view everything by clicking on the ”View Details’.

Audience Signals

Do note that Audience signals are not audience targeting.
Audience signals are a way of letting Google know about your ideal customer.
You could supplement your targeting by adding lower funnel audiences e.g. customer lists.

Listing Groups

The listing groups are the products associated with that specific group. You should audit how many products are ready to serve and how many are not eligible to serve.

Extensions

Extensions should be present in the campaign and/or ad group.
Locations and Promotions tend to perform exceptionally well.

Settings

Goals
Here you should be seeing the appropriate goal
e.g. Purchases.

Customer acquisition
Unless you have an explicit order from the account holder about acquiring new customers, you should leave the box unticked.

Merchant Center feed
You should see a feed attached if the account is running eCommerce based ads.

Country of sale
You can’t change that since it is inherited by the Merchant Center

Budget
The campaign(s) should have an adequate budget in order to perform.

Bidding
You choose the appropriate bidding strategy depending on the data and the account goals.
Maximize conversions and/or Maximize conversion value are, usually, the best options.

Campaign settings

Locations
Here you should check if the location settings are correct. The simplest way to find out is to ask the account holder about the area of delivery or the countries they are serving.

Languages
You should be targeting the appropriate language based on the feed and the offerings of the ad account.

Final URL extension
Here you have 2 options.
“Send traffic to the most relevant URLs on your site” is the best option for most accounts.
If you want complete control, you should choose the
“Send traffic to provided URLs only”
This will allow you to provide specific URLs for the campaign.

Tips on Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) Final URL expansion

Note: Opting out of Final URL expansion isn’t recommended as it may limit the ads served by your campaign.

Time

Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns need 2 days in order to get approved and as long as 8 weeks in order to exit the learning phase. It is recommended to let Performance Max (PMAX) run for at least 6 weeks in order to allow Google AI time to ramp up and curate sufficient data to compare performance.

Scripts

Even though scripts are not mandatory, it is recommended to use some if possible. Some of the best scripts that will help you with your Performance Max (PMAX) audit are the following:

Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) search-categories

Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) visibility script

Price competitiveness

Placement report

Placements are something that isn’t transparent in Performance Max (PMAX). That said, you should use the following script in order to better understand the placements that Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) is serving and the efficiency of said placements.

Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) - Platform Network Breakdown

Insights

Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) insights can be a source of valuable information that will inform you about alot of things such as

search categories
Consumer spotlight
Audience insights
Asset insights
Performance changes
Auction details
Overall performance

This will help you with your audit of the Performance Max campaigns (PMAX) campaign and its overall effectiveness.

Branded Keywords

Branded keywords are search terms that are associated with a brand’s products and services. Sometimes you will want to exclude your own brand terms for reasons such as budget restraints and/or advertising efficiency

You now have the option of excluding such terms if you find it necessary for the success of the Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns.

To create a brand exclusions list in Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, follow these steps:

Click on a Performance Max campaign and go to settings.
Scroll down until you see ‘Brand Exclusions’.
Create a new brand list
exclude specific brands from your Performance Max campaigns

When auditing Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, you will have to examine if excluding branded traffic is the right approach, as it can impact the visibility of your campaigns when customers search for your brand.

Learn more about brand suitability features in Performance Max

Competition keywords and search terms

Competitors’ keywords and search terms are keywords and search terms that are associated with your competition. It is advisable to add such keywords and search terms to PMAX campaigns if the products found inside the account can’t match the offerings of the competition.

There are 2 options for excluding such keywords and search terms

Campaign level brand exclusions
Account level brand exclusions

1 To create a brand exclusions list in Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, follow these steps:

Click on a Performance Max campaign and go to settings.
Scroll down until you see ‘Brand Exclusions’.
Create a new brand list
exclude specific brands from your Performance Max campaigns

2 If you want to exclude said search terms from the account you can do so by contacting your Google rep by clicking the help icon from inside your Google Ads account.

When auditing Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, you will have to examine if excluding such traffic is the right approach, as it can impact the visibility of said campaigns.

Remarketing

Performance Max (PMAX) remarketing is something that it is not required to have in your funnel since a proper audience signal already includes visitors. That said, if you find a standalone Performance Max (PMAX) remarketing campaign when auditing an account, you should ascertain the effect it has on the overall account’s performance.

Scaling

To boost the impact of your Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, you’ve got to be strategic. Start by bumping up your campaign budget to broaden your reach and engage potential customers. It’s essential to load up on assets in your Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, giving the algorithm more chances to showcase the right ad at the right moment. Choosing a smart bidding strategy and using ad extensions are key to getting the most out of your ad spend. Don’t forget about supplementary campaigns like DSA campaigns—they’re there to back up your efforts.

Make sure your asset groups are well-organized and optimised, and leverage customer acquisition features while keeping a close eye on your campaign’s performance. Website optimisation is crucial too, showing how your online presence ties into the effectiveness of your campaign. By weaving these carefully thought-out strategies together, business owners and freelancers can confidently navigate the ins and outs of Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, creating an environment where impactful advertising initiatives can truly scale up.

in brief in order to audit the scaling possibilities of the Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns found in the account you will have to

Review the budget
Review all the previous attempts of increasing and decreasing the budget
Examine if the assets are adequate for the algorithm
Review the bidding strategy
Review the Assets (ex ad extensions)
Review the supplementary campaigns
Review the asset groups for errors
Review customer acquisition strategies
Review the adjusting attempts
Review some of the destination pages (landing pages)

Scaling mistakes

When scaling Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, steering clear of common pitfalls is crucial for optimal performance. Here are the most common ones

Lack of Clear Goals: Setting actionable goals before launching a Performance Max (PMAX) campaign is fundamental for achieving desired outcomes. This can be everything from CPA to ROAS.
Inadequate Data Provision: Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns heavily rely on relevant data for optimisation. Insufficient data can impede performance, emphasising the need for ensure access to ample and pertinent information. There are two types of data when it comes to Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns. The first is audience data and the second is conversions data. You need the latter more compared to the former.
Underutilising Assets (Ad Extensions): Overlooking the potential of ad extensions is a missed opportunity. Incorporating ad extensions enhances the overall appearance and performance of ads, making it a mistake to neglect them in Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns. As always, you will need to review whether the assets are functional, active, and whether they are active when they shouldn’t be.
Inconsistent Performance Monitoring: Regularly tracking the performance of Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns is essential for pinpointing areas that require improvement and making timely adjustments. The monitoring should not only involve metrics such CPA, ROAS, and costs.
You should also be monitoring product performance such as impressions, clicks, and conversions (for ecom).
Mismatched Bidding Strategy: The success of Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns hinges on selecting an appropriate bidding strategy. Even though there are not many options available (compared to other campaigns), you should be aware that there is a distinct difference between conversions and conversions value when it comes to ecommerce.

In addition to these, adopting a gradual scaling approach, exercising patience during the optimisation process, and experimenting with various settings are key considerations to maximize the efficacy of Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns.

Metrics

The most important things to keep an eye on in Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns are:

Conversions: Check how many times people take the actions you want. This tells you if your Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns are working as intended.
Revenue or Conversion Value: Examine how much money or value you get from Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns. This shows how they affect business results.
Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): Examine how effective spent is compared to revenue.

Video (autogenerated)

If video is not provided, Performance Max (PMAX) will use display assets to create a video that looks like a slideshow. This is to be avoided because the video generated leaves a lot to be desired. That said, if you run full-fledged Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns you will have to provide videos in order to avoid autogen videos. If you run feed-only Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, you don’t have to worry about autogenerated videos. Thus you need to examine if the autogenerated videos create more harm than good when it comes to the efficiency of the campaign. My advice is to always provide full-fledged Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns with good-quality videos.

More than one Performance Max (PMAX) campaign

Running multiple Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns can be beneficial in certain situations, such as targeting different geographic regions, product brands, product categories, product types, best-selling products, or “zombie” products.

However, it is essential to consider the potential drawbacks and challenges when managing multiple campaigns

Advantages

Targeting different products or services
Targeting different geographic regions
Testing different strategies

Drawbacks

Campaign overlap
Insufficient data
Data Feeding and Budgeting
Campaign Structure
Overlap
Asset Groups optimisation
Increased management complexity

That said, when reviewing you will have to examine if multiple Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns will increase the conversions of the account while avoiding significant overlap.

Zombie products

The term refers to products or SKUs that have not received any impressions in a given period, typically 28 days. These products are considered “dead” and can negatively impact the overall performance of the campaign.

That said, when reviewing Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns (for ecom) you will have to investigate if there are product IDs that can be considered ”zombie products” inside the assets groups.

More info about “Zombie” products in PMAX campaigns

Negatives

In Google Ads, the term ”negatives” refers to anything that can reduce the targeting options of a campaign. The problem with Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns is that there aren’t a lot of negative targeting options compared to the rest of Google Ads campaigns.

A somewhat effective workaround is the ”Content suitability” section in ”Tools and settings” tab. The drawback is that the choices anyone makes inside that section will affect all of the campaigns inside the account.

There is also the option of contacting your Google rep but not every business owner has access to that.

When reviewing the negative targets of Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns you will have to examine if said targets affect the Google Ads campaigns (and the account in general) in a way that does more harm than good.

Search themes

Search themes are a relatively new thing in Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns. They allow marketers to provide better signals to Google Ads about which search queries are likely to be relevant to their product, service, or business. The less broad the search theme is the better the Performance Max (PMAX) campaign will perform.

When reviewing Performance Max (PMAX) search themes inputs, you will have to decide how positively or negatively the search themes affect the Performance Max (PMAX) campaign.

More info and Guidance about search themes in Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns

Feed-only vs Full-fledged Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns

The “Performance Max (PMAX) feed-only” approach involves running a Performance Max (PMAX) campaign with only the assets from the product feed, while the “full-fledged Performance Max (PMAX)” campaign includes all available assets. For lead based outcomes Google Ads accounts, full-fledged Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns are the only option. For ecom Google Ads accounts, feed-only Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns can be the only option if the advertiser has little to no media to test.

When you audit Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, you will have to examine what approach will yield the best results for the account.

Price(s)

Product pricing has a direct impact on the sales and profitability of resellers. If your Google Ads account resells products that people can easily find anywhere, then price monitoring and adjusting can be what increase the profitability of you Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns.

When it comes to price reporting, the price competitiveness report, found inside Merchant Center, will provide you with benchmarks about your prices. It will also provide you with info about the competitiveness of your bids.

That said, when you audit the price competitiveness of the products found inside the feed, you should always visit the price competitiveness report in Merchant Center. This should give you a clear answer if the products meet the price benchmark defined by the market.

More info on the price competitiveness report in Merchant Center

Worth

The effectiveness of Performance Max (PMax) campaigns, feed-only or full-fledged, can vary based on various factors such as campaign setup, campaign structure, budget, assets, signals, price competitiveness, and industry competitiveness. When managed correctly, Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns can significantly boost Google Ads account performance and reach audiences beyond the search network.

When it comes to auditing, you will have to examine not the effectiveness of the Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns found inside the Google ads account but if the Google ads account really needs such campaigns.

Additional resources

Performance Max (PMAX) Audit project template (Notion)

How to improve Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns

Performance Max (PMAX) specifications

Free Performance MAX project template

Free Google Ads Audit template and Guide

Documentation

Learn more about Performance Max (PMAX) optimisation