A high click-through rate feels good, but it does not pay salaries. These are the numbers we actually watch.
Many ad reports focus on the same things: impressions, clicks, click-through rate. All nicely charted. What is often missing is the one number that matters, which is how many of those clicks became paying customers.
Here is what we track instead, and why.
Cost per real lead
Not every form fill is a lead. We tag spam and wrong enquiries so we know what a genuine one costs.
Lead to sale rate
We ask clients to share, even roughly, which leads turned into business. It changes everything. A campaign with expensive leads that close well is often better than one with cheap leads that never buy.
Return on ad spend
For online stores this is straightforward. For service businesses we estimate it from average order value and closing rate. It does not need to be perfect to be useful.
Once these numbers are in place, decisions get much easier. We stop debating which ad looks nicer and start moving money towards what actually brings in sales.