Paid Media & Performance Marketing

Nothing on this page works without tracking the whole team believes. Every engagement starts with a conversion specification: which actions count, what each is worth, where it is recorded and how each platform receives it. One document, implemented by every channel.

In practice that means GA4 key events designed once and mirrored to Google Ads, Meta, TikTok, LinkedIn and Yandex; enhanced conversions and Consent Mode on the Google side (Google Ads Help documents both); the Conversions API with event deduplication on the Meta side (Meta Business Help); and offline conversion import wherever a lead becomes a customer in a CRM days later. Consent is part of the design, and reports state what is modelled versus observed.

The tracking audit is also where double counting is caught. A purchase event firing on refresh, or browser and server events without a shared event ID, inflate every platform's numbers and make a weak channel look strong. We fix the layer first, then run campaigns on it.

Attribution is the rule that decides which touchpoint gets credit for a conversion. Last click gives everything to the final click, which flatters search and retargeting and undervalues whatever created the demand. Data-driven attribution distributes credit from observed conversion paths, but each tool sees different paths: in Google Ads it covers only Google's own ad interactions (Search, Shopping, YouTube), while GA4 credits every channel whose clicks reach your site but cannot see a Meta, TikTok or LinkedIn ad that was viewed and never clicked.

Every platform measures itself generously by default, so adding platform-reported conversions together always exceeds what happened. We make an explicit decision per account: which model and window each platform is set to, which single source drives budget decisions (usually GA4 or the CRM, with platform numbers as diagnostics), and how the gap between them is reported.

We also say what attribution cannot do: it cannot prove a conversion would not have happened without the ad, it degrades as consent rules remove identifiers, and it is weakest where upper-funnel channels are strongest. It is one input to budget decisions, not the only one.

Incrementality is the difference between what happened with the advertising and what would have happened without it. Attribution assigns credit; incrementality tests whether the credit was deserved. The cleanest version is a geo test: comparable regions are split, one group receives the change, the other does not, and the difference in outcomes is the measured lift.

Platform holdout studies (conversion lift on Meta, brand lift on YouTube) answer a narrower question within one channel. Marketing mix modelling answers the broadest one but needs long histories and stable spend, so for most accounts it is a concept to plan toward.

We propose a test when a decision is large enough to justify it: adding or cutting a prospecting channel, or shifting a material share of budget between Google and social. Each test has a pre-registered hypothesis, a minimum duration and a decision rule.

Budget allocation is a recurring decision, not a line in the annual plan. We start from the funnel: how much demand already exists to capture (search, shopping, Yandex), how much has to be created (YouTube, Meta, TikTok prospecting) and how much is retargeting that would partly happen anyway. The split is adjusted monthly against marginal cost per outcome per channel, with a written reason each time money moves.

Pacing is the daily discipline underneath: spend tracked against the month's plan per channel, caps on campaigns still learning, floors on campaigns carrying proven demand, and triggers that pause or scale when cost per outcome leaves its range. Performance Max and Advantage+ automation are used where they perform, but automation optimises within the goal it is given; choosing the goal and the budget between platforms stays a human job.

Seasonality, inventory, clinic capacity and sales availability enter the pacing plan. Leads a clinic cannot schedule, or orders a store cannot ship, are not a success in our reporting.

How an agency is paid shapes what it is tempted to optimise. A fee that grows with advertising spend rewards a bigger budget, whether or not the budget is working; a flat fee rewards staying out of trouble; an incentive tied to an outcome rewards that outcome, including whichever corners the definition leaves open. No structure is neutral, so the useful question for a CMO, founder or procurement team is not which model is best but which conflicts of interest a structure creates and what has been agreed to contain them.

We do not advertise performance-based fees and do not promise ROAS, cost per acquisition, lead or revenue outcomes. The models described here explain common agency compensation structures to help you assess any agency's proposal, ours included; they are not a contractual offer from SEO Evaluate. For information about our paid media services and commercial terms, contact our team.

The rewarded measure decides behaviour, so it should sit as close to business value as the data allows. Clicks and platform-reported conversions are the easiest to count and the easiest to inflate. Qualified leads, cost per acquisition (CPA), customer acquisition cost (CAC), contribution margin and the quality of revenue (repeat purchase, refund rate, margin by product) are harder to measure and harder to game.

Reported ROAS needs particular care. It is revenue the platform attributes to ads divided by ad spend, and platforms credit themselves under their own attribution windows, so adding them together exceeds real revenue and part of what is credited would have happened without the ad. ROAS is a useful bidding signal and a poor sole basis for a fee. Our attribution section above explains why we treat platform numbers as diagnostics next to one agreed source of truth, and incrementality tests are the way to check how much of the credited result the advertising actually caused.

An incentive is only as fair as the measurement under it. Before any variable component is discussed, both sides need the same tracking: events defined once, consent handled as designed, and a CRM connection so that a lead is judged by what it became, not by the form it filled in. Our analytics and data service covers that layer.

Agree four things in writing before launch: the baseline period and how it was measured; the targets, set jointly from that baseline rather than from a platform forecast; the measurement window, because a long sales cycle means outcomes arrive weeks after spend; and who owns the data, with the client holding the ad accounts and analytics properties so the numbers can be audited by either side.

Whichever agency you assess, ask for the fee model in writing, with the definition of every rewarded measure, the baseline, the exclusions and who owns the accounts and data. If the conversion data cannot support an incentive yet, the sensible first step is fixing the measurement rather than writing the incentive.

Our advertising account review looks at the tracking, attribution and budget you already have, which is the groundwork any fee conversation depends on. For information about our paid media services and commercial terms, contact our team; this page does not commit SEO Evaluate to any compensation model.

Creative is one of the largest levers in social and video advertising, and it is often left to chance. We run it as a system: a backlog of hypotheses (angle, format, hook, offer, audience), a weekly production and launch rhythm, a fixed holding period before judgement, and a log of what was tested and learned. Winners are iterated, not just scaled; losers are retired with a note on why.

The system is channel-aware. A hook that works on TikTok rarely works as a LinkedIn sponsored post; a Search ad is tested on responsive asset combinations rather than visuals. Dynamic creative tools accelerate combinations, but the hypothesis still comes from a person who understands the offer and the audience.

Testing has a cost, so we size it: a fixed share of each channel's budget is reserved for tests, reviewed when fatigue indicators (rising frequency, falling click-through, rising cost per outcome) appear in the weekly report.

We are an official Meta partner, a Google Partner and a TikTok Marketing Partner. A partner status does not tell you which platform is right for you; that decision comes from the channel map and the measurement, and we document it.

Measurement comes first because it is the only part that cannot be fixed retroactively. A campaign can be restructured next month; a quarter of mis-attributed spend cannot be re-measured. This is why the entry point is an advertising account review rather than a proposal, and the first deliverable a specification rather than a campaign.

We report on one source of truth and show the gap to platform numbers instead of hiding it. We do not promise cost-per-acquisition or return figures. What we commit to is a documented channel plan, verified tracking, a testing cadence that actually runs, and budget decisions with reasons attached.