Clicks, no enquiries

Google Ads not working: how to tell whether it is the account, the website or the market before you pay another month

When Google Ads shows clicks and spend but the phone does not ring, the cause is almost always one of four things: the searches the ads are matching, where and when they run, the page people land on, or the way results are measured. You do not need to log in to find out which. Three numbers and one report, requested from whoever runs the account, will tell you in half an hour, and Google's own pages set how long "still learning" is allowed to last.

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Messages this guide covers: Learning, Conversions, Invalid clicks, Invalid activity, Limited by budget, Eligible (limited).

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What to ask for, without logging in

Owners often feel they cannot judge a Google Ads account because they do not understand the interface. You do not need to. Ask the person running it for three numbers for the last 30 days and one export, and read them the way you read a bank statement.

1. Spend and clicks

Total cost and total clicks for the period, by campaign. This tells you what you bought. Google's budget page says a campaign may spend up to twice its average daily budget on a given day and no more than 30.4 times that budget in a month, so compare the month, not a single day.

2. Conversions, and what they are

The number of conversions and, more importantly, the list of conversion actions being counted. If "page view" or "button click" is on that list, the conversion number is not enquiries. Google's conversion data page explains that the "Conversions" column counts whatever actions are set as primary, and that this is the column Google bids on.

3. Enquiries you actually received

Your own count of calls, forms and emails that came from the ads, from your inbox, phone log or CRM. The gap between this number and number 2 is the measurement problem, and it is usually the first thing I fix.

The one export is the search terms report. Google's search terms report page describes it as the list of actual searches that triggered your ads, as opposed to the keywords someone typed into the account, and notes that terms without enough query activity are omitted for privacy. Ask for it as a spreadsheet sorted by cost. If whoever runs the account hesitates to send it, that is itself an answer.

What a healthy search terms report looks like

Read the top 20 rows by cost. In a healthy account for a UK service business, nearly every row is something a paying customer would type: the service, the town, a problem the service solves, a "near me", a competitor you would be happy to be compared with. In a sick account the expensive rows are jobs ("plumber vacancies"), training ("how to become"), DIY ("fix boiler myself"), the wrong country, or famous brands you do not sell. Google's keyword matching page says broad match is the default match type for every keyword and that it may show ads on searches "that don't contain the direct meaning of your keywords". That one default explains most sick reports.

Account, website or market: the half-hour verdict

With the three numbers and the report in front of you, the diagnosis falls out.

It is the account if the expensive search terms are wrong, if the campaign runs outside your area or your hours, or if conversions are counting things that are not enquiries. Clicks are being bought from the wrong people. Nothing on your website will fix this.
It is the website if the search terms look right, the clicks land on your site, and you still receive nothing. People wanted what you sell, arrived, and left. The page is the problem: slow, no phone number above the fold, a form that fails on mobile, a price that frightens, or a homepage where a service page should be.
It is the market only if the search terms are right, the page is sound, the measurement reconciles with your inbox, and the cost of each enquiry is still more than an enquiry is worth to you. This is the rarest of the three in UK small-business accounts, and it is the only one where stopping is the correct answer.

"It is still learning" belongs to none of these categories. It is a status, not a diagnosis, and the next section shows how long Google itself allows it to last.

The four usual causes in UK small-business accounts

In the accounts I audit for UK businesses, the same four causes account for nearly every "Google Ads is not working" conversation. Each has a sign the owner can see without logging in, a question to ask, and a Google page that settles the argument.

Cause	Sign you can see	Question to ask	Official reference
Search terms	Expensive rows in the search terms report that no customer would type.	"Which match type are the keywords on, and when were negatives last added?"	Broad match is the default and can match searches without the keyword's meaning: keyword matching. Negatives exclude searches but do not block close variants: negative keywords.
Location and schedule	Enquiries from the wrong part of the country, or calls arriving when nobody answers.	"Is the location option Presence or Presence or Interest, and what time zone is the account set to?"	Two location options exist, and Google recommends Presence or Interest on Search: location targeting. Ad schedules follow the account time zone: ad schedules.
Landing page	Right searches, clicks arriving, nothing in the inbox.	"Which page does each ad land on, and have you tested the form on a phone this month?"	Google's destination requirements policy also disapproves ads whose page does not work or whose phone number is unverified.
Measurement	The conversion number and your inbox do not agree in either direction.	"Which conversion actions are primary, and when did the tag last record a real enquiry?"	Reporting lags run 24 to 48 hours and the Conversions column is what bidding optimises towards: conversion data.

The measurement row deserves a word. When the tag counts page views as conversions, Google's bidding chases page views and reports success while the business gets nothing. When the tag is broken and counts nothing, the bidding has no target and spends blindly. Either way the account looks like it is "not converting" when the truth is that it is not measuring. The conversion tracking page describes how I rebuild that layer so the number in Google Ads is the number in your inbox.

What "still learning" really means, in Google's words

"Learning" is a real status. It is also the most overused excuse in paid search. Google's About Smart Bidding learning page says the Learning status "never lasts more than seven days" and that ads keep running normally during it. The same page lists only three triggers: a new or reactivated bid strategy, a composition change where campaigns, ad groups or keywords are added or removed, and a significant change to the conversion goals being optimised. It then states that changes to budgets, targets, creative or targeting settings never trigger a Learning status.

So when you are told that a budget change or a new ad "put the campaign back into learning", that is not what Google says happens. Google's guidance on judging results is also specific: allow one to two conversion cycles for the system to converge on a new goal, then evaluate over two conversion cycles or a two-week window, whichever is longer. Its Smart Bidding page adds that performance should be judged over periods with at least 30 conversions, and that Target ROAS wants around 50. A campaign producing three enquiries a month is not "learning", it is starved, and Google's own learning page notes that very restrictive settings such as low daily budgets slow the ramp-up.

The practical rule I give owners: a Learning status older than a week, or a learning excuse offered for the third month running, is a sign that nobody has looked at the search terms.

Spam and fake leads: what Google publishes about invalid traffic

A different complaint is clicks that convert into junk: forms filled by bots, calls from overseas call centres offering "SEO services", enquiries from people who clearly never searched for you. Two separate things are going on, and Google only takes responsibility for one of them.

The first is invalid clicks. Google's invalid traffic page defines them as clicks and impressions that do not reflect genuine user interest, including intentionally fraudulent traffic and accidental or duplicate clicks, and says "You won't be charged for invalid clicks or impressions". Detected clicks are filtered before billing and credits appear as "Invalid activity" under Adjustments in the Billing summary. You can add the "Invalid clicks" column to campaign reports to see how many were filtered, according to Google's invalid clicks definition. If you suspect clicks Google missed, the same page says the click quality form accepts investigation requests about "invalid clicks, poor quality form submissions, clicks outside location targeting or sudden short-term cost increases", and the invalid traffic page says investigations cover the past 60 days and take several working days.

The second is spam that arrives after a real click, or through your website without any click at all. A bot that fills your contact form found the form, not the ad, and Google will not credit you for it. The fixes are on your side: a form that validates, a spam filter on the form, a phone number that is not scraped, and a conversion set-up that only counts an enquiry when a human has submitted something sensible. The click quality form explicitly includes poor quality form submissions, so when junk clearly follows ad clicks it is worth filing, but the lasting fix is to stop counting junk as a conversion so Google stops optimising towards it.

Two owner-level checks catch most fake lead problems. Ask where the enquiries say they are, and compare that with the location setting. Ask what time they arrive, and compare that with the schedule and the account time zone, which Google's time zone page says cannot be changed on a standard account once set.

Pause, change who runs it, or stop

Once you know which of the three it is, the decision is simpler than it feels.

Pause when the measurement does not reconcile with your inbox. Spending while blind is the one case where a pause costs nothing, because you were not learning anything from the spend anyway. Fix the tracking, then restart. Pausing to "save money" when the search terms are the problem only delays the same fix.
Change who runs it when the search terms report is bad and the person responsible either did not send it or defended it. A report full of job seekers and DIY queries after three months is not a learning problem. Ask for a written plan with dates before you move, so the handover is judged against something.
Stop only when the account, the page and the measurement are all sound and the cost per real enquiry is still above what an enquiry is worth. That verdict needs clean data for at least the window Google itself uses to judge bidding, two conversion cycles or two weeks, and in my experience most owners who reach it discover they never had clean data to begin with.

If you cannot tell which of the three applies, a short independent review of the account is cheaper than another month of spend. That is exactly what a PPC audit is for, and it is written for the owner rather than for the person who built the campaigns.

Questions to put to whoever runs it before paying another month

These are the questions I would want to be asked if I were running your account. The answers should be specific, written and quick.

Send me the search terms report for the last 30 days sorted by cost. Which of the top 20 rows would you remove today, and why have they not been removed?
Which conversion actions are set as primary, and what did each of them count last month? How does that reconcile with the enquiries in my inbox?
What location option is the campaign on, what time zone is the account set to, and what is the schedule?
Which page does each ad land on? When did you last submit the form from a phone?
Which bid strategy is in use, when did it last show Learning, and what triggered it? Google says the status never lasts more than seven days and is not triggered by budget or target changes.
How many invalid clicks were filtered last month, and have you filed a click quality request for the junk enquiries I forwarded?
What will be different in the account thirty days from now, and how will we both know?

Anyone competent can answer these in an afternoon. Anyone who cannot is telling you where the problem is. The Google Ads management page sets out how I report these same points every month, in writing, so that the question never has to be asked.

Keeping it working once it works

Read the search terms report monthly, even if someone else runs the account. It is the one document that cannot be dressed up.
Reconcile conversions against your inbox or CRM every month. The two numbers should move together.
Treat any change in your trading area, opening hours or phone handling as a campaign change and tell whoever runs the account the same day.
Keep one landing page per service, and submit its form yourself after any website update.
Judge results over the window Google uses, two conversion cycles or two weeks at minimum, and never on a single day's spend.

Official sources used in this guide

More guides for when something breaks

Study: what UK advertisers measureWe read the sites of UK businesses running Google Ads today. Most count visits, far fewer count enquiries.Conversions not trackingWhat Unverified, Tag inactive and No recent conversions mean, how to tell a dead tag from a quiet week, and why bidding goes wrong when the tag dies.Financial services verificationWhat Google asks a UK firm to prove before financial ads run, and why applications fail.Google Ads invoice and VATWhere the Google Ads invoice is, why it shows no VAT, what the 2% UK DST Fee is, and why the total never matches the campaign screen.Ads not showingWhat each campaign and ad status means, why searching for your own ad proves nothing, and when more budget is the wrong fix.Local Services Ads verificationWhat Google checks before a UK trade or firm can run Local Services Ads: registration, insurance, licences, the London pilot, and how long it takes.

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Questions people ask before hiring

Why is Google Ads not converting for my business?

In UK small-business accounts the cause is usually one of four: the ads are matching searches no customer would type, the campaign runs in the wrong place or at the wrong hours, the landing page loses people who did want the service, or the conversion tracking counts the wrong things. Ask for the search terms report and the list of conversion actions and you will usually see which one it is.

How long does Google Ads take to work?

Google's own page on Smart Bidding learning says the Learning status never lasts more than seven days, and that results should be judged over two conversion cycles or a two-week window, whichever is longer. If you are told an account is still learning after several months, the explanation is not learning.

Does Google charge for spam clicks and fake leads?

Google says you are not charged for clicks it detects as invalid, and credits appear as Invalid activity in the Billing summary. Spam that arrives through your website form after a genuine click, or with no click at all, is not covered, so the fix is on your side: form validation, spam filtering and not counting junk submissions as conversions. You can also file a click quality request, which covers poor quality form submissions and clicks outside your location targeting.

Is Google Ads worth it for a small UK business?

It is worth it when the cost of a real enquiry is below what an enquiry is worth to you, measured with tracking that reconciles with your inbox. Most accounts that look unprofitable have never been measured properly, so the honest answer requires fixing measurement first and then judging over at least two weeks of clean data.

Should I pause Google Ads if it is not working?

Pause when the conversion data does not match the enquiries you actually receive, because spending blind teaches you nothing. Change who runs it when the search terms report is poor and nobody is acting on it. Stop only when the account, the page and the measurement are sound and the cost per enquiry is still too high.

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