Notes.
Short pieces on what we learn while running accounts: tracking, attribution and the numbers behind the cases.
'Call tracking doesn't work in the Netherlands' (and what it costs your bidding)
Google's call-forwarding numbers don't work in the Netherlands, yet Google Ads lets you set up call conversions there without a single warning. They stay at zero. What we measure instead, and the two phone signals many Dutch accounts never look at.
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Ads inside Google's AI answers: live in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore, not in Europe
Google lists 12 countries where ads can show inside AI Overviews and AI Mode, none of them in Europe. What Google's help page says, what it leaves out, and what I'd do now on either side.
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Google switches AI Max on for new Search campaigns. On lead-gen, I still switch it off
What changed between June and October 2026, and why my answer stayed the same: on lead-gen, AI Max stays off unless the reason is written down.
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Which A/B test goes first? A free sheet that ranks your ideas
How we decide which A/B test goes first, and a free Google Sheet that scores and ranks your test ideas for you.
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What does outsourcing Google Ads cost? Our prices, and what's in them
Management starts at €500 a month, most accounts sit around €1,500, plus €750 onboarding. What you get for it and why agency prices differ so much.
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€55 a lead, €870 a deal: what PMax cost once I counted the closed deals
Google's lead report said €55 a lead for Performance Max. Matched to the client's own closed deals, the same campaign cost €870 a deal, against about €370 for a plain Search campaign. And a second account that argues back.
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I set Google to seven lease companies' own towns. None of them made the first screen
I set Google's location to the home towns of seven small lease companies and searched the way a customer nearby would. 27 of the 28 ad slots went to national names, and none of the seven made the first screen.
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One senior plus AI, or a team of juniors
At most agencies your account runs on a junior with a spreadsheet and a checklist. We run it the other way around: one senior making the decisions, with AI doing the work that would otherwise land on that junior. Why that works better, and where the limit is.
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Smart Bidding is only as good as the signal you feed it
Most Smart Bidding debates are about the knobs: tCPA, target ROAS, budget. But the bidder optimises toward the conversions it can see. Feed it the wrong signal and you've got a strong algorithm running efficiently at the wrong target.
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What your attribution is still worth under Consent Mode V2
Under denied consent Google Ads no longer sees a cookie, but it does see a cookieless signal it models into an estimated conversion. What can you still trust? Directionally yes, precisely no.
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Brand search terms: the four-bucket method
"Bid on your brand" and "never bid on your brand" are both lazy answers. We sort every brand search term into four buckets, and then we know exactly what to do with it.
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Your CPL is lying, and your agency probably doesn't know it
The cost-per-lead in your monthly report is almost never the number you think it is. Usually because Google Ads conversions and GA4 events have been mixed together.
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What a free audit finds every single time
We run a lot of free audits. Four things come up so often we'd bet money on them, and all four cost you money without you noticing it.
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I never delete a paused campaign. Here's the expensive reason
Pausing keeps the record of what already failed. Deleting throws it away.
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Before I audit anything, I ask one question most marketers skip
An audit without a confirmed goal is just a pile of opinions with charts attached. The one question I settle before I look at a single chart.
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One dropdown decides if your A/B test runs at all
Google ships ad rotation set the wrong way, and it quietly hands the win to whichever ad got lucky first.
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For long-cycle B2B, cost-per-lead per ad is noise, not a verdict
Why I judge slow-funnel ads on click-through, and only reach for CPA once the conversions are actually there.
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When I take over an account, I don't fix it first. I ask if it should exist
On an inherited account the structure isn't your starting point, it's the first thing on trial. Why I question the whole structure before I fix a single symptom.
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The client swore the tracking was fine. It wasn't. It never is
I have never opened an account where conversion tracking was exactly what the owner thought. Tracking doesn't break loudly, it breaks silently, so I read the Conversions tab like I don't trust it before I touch a single bid.
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Everyone says shift budget to PMax. In lead-gen, I do the opposite
Why PMax's "lowest CPA" in lead-gen is borrowed traffic, and what to do with it instead.
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Google calls my best ad "Poor." It has the highest CTR in the account
Why Ad Strength is theatre, and what I actually rank ads on instead.
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I ignore most of what Google tells me to do
Google is a company with a profit motive. I'm paid to beat its defaults, not echo them. Why I leave most of my optimization scores around 70% on purpose, and the three things I do act on.
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I was managing accounts before there was a button for any of this
The connectors are the floor. The building is yours, and it's worth nothing without your own judgment: the skills, the second brain and the rulebook behind my agent.
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Google changed how it spends your budget on June 1
Your daily budget was never a daily cap. As of June 1, the math behind it shifted, and campaigns on a schedule feel it most.
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My AI is a brilliant fresh graduate. So was I, once
I run my one-man agency by onboarding AI agents like over-confident juniors. Twenty years in: the gap between the rulebook they memorized and the road I actually drive, and why I'm honest I don't know how long that gap lasts.
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When "CPL fell 87%" falls apart in 30 minutes
We rewrote every case-page and reconciled the numbers against the source data. Most didn't survive 30 minutes of scrutiny. Here's the honest version.
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I built a copy of myself in Obsidian
And it's getting better at being me than I am. An AI-connected second brain in Obsidian: plain Markdown files, four folders, and an agent that reads them before I do.
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Online marketing for the Dutch automotive industry in 2025: portals versus Google Ads
Marktplaats, AutoScout24, AutoTrack and viaBOVAG get more expensive every year. What a dealer pays per lead there, and what Google Ads and Vehicle Listing Ads offer instead.
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Google Vehicle Listing Ads: your whole inventory in the search results
Google's Vehicle Listing Ads put a dealer's full stock in the search results, with photo, price and mileage. What the first dealers measured.
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The 180-point Google Ads audit checklist
We reviewed over 69 finance, real estate and automotive accounts and kept every question we ask. Here is what those 180 points cover.
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Measuring chat-widget leads in Google Analytics and Google Ads (Pipedrive LeadBooster as the worked example)
A chat widget brings in leads, but Google Analytics and Google Ads don't see them by default. One script in Google Tag Manager and three triggers fix that.
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How to exclude all mobile apps from Google Ads and save a ton of money
Display, YouTube and Performance Max can waste budget on mobile apps. How to see where your ads showed and exclude all apps.
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Cloudflare Zaraz versus GTM clientside: the test results
We tested Cloudflare Zaraz against GTM clientside in March 2023: load times, scores and location accuracy. Zaraz was faster, we still said no.
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Rather read along first.
Every Monday Feisal publishes Growth Notes on LinkedIn: what he sees in the accounts he runs, written for peers. Subscribing is free and every edition lands in your inbox.