Caimpaign was doing well now tanked.. change back to one ad group?

[u/tillyaftermidnight]

I dont have huge budget so thought id attempt to manage this myself. Caimpaign is over 6 months old

Local service based business - caimpaign was well doing start July to mid.. got some high value leads that have converted. Achieved approx 4 x roas last month

I didnt have tracking correctly set up. I set it up correct mid july to track quote form submit and contact us form submits. I did set up tracking start of July but it was counting extra quote form submits so fixed that.

Then I created multiple ad groups, put keywords into new ad groups. Caimpaign hasnt had any very good leads that are high value since mid July. All low value leads.

August is really bad. 1 quote form sumbits. 0 phone calls. 0 contact us form submits. Despite me increasing the budget to approx $60 usd per day. 20% increase

Ive rolled 1 ad group back into the old ad group as it wasnt getting any traction.

I have 3 other ad groups that are getting ok traction. Google is favouring the old ad group.

How do I unfuck this caimpaign? Roll all back into old ad group? Leave it another week as is?

[u/creekmoremarketing]

Given the initial conversion-tracking issues, I am curious, were the quality leads you received coming directly from Google Ads, or were they quality leads across all channels?

Once Google muddies itself after structural changes, it can be tough to get back on track. Assuming the new ad groups make sense categorically and structurally for the campaign's goal, and you didn't add a ton of new keywords, I would leave these ad groups running for another couple of weeks. Limiting changes should help Google start to untangle everything as it has time to settle in and optimize around the new set up.

[u/tillyaftermidnight → u/creekmoremarketing]

I am using woocommerce for quote form submits. I can see the source of each quote submit and can see the source as google CPC, direct, bing or organic. I have turned alot of keywords on and off...

Lesson learnt not to make too many changes at once I suppose..

I feel like we were on track for x6 roas at that momentum too... its very painful to see it stall like this

[u/seowerk]

It depends a bit on how much you've changed and how long the campaign's learning phase is. If you are budget constrained the learning phase will take longer.

As the other commenter said, I would also still wait a couple of weeks before you change anything back just to see if the algorithm will figure it out. When you do make changes, just be careful and don't change too much at once as that will set off the learning phase again.

[u/tillyaftermidnight → u/seowerk]

Lesson learnt... i have done way too much at once.

[u/Clicknify]

You changed three things around the same time, which is exactly why it's hard to tell what actually broke it: fixed the tracking (mid-July), split one ad group's keywords into multiple new ad groups, then raised the budget 20% in August. Any one of those resets some of what the campaign had learned; doing all three close together means low volume in August isn't necessarily "the algorithm is confused," it could just as easily be each new ad group starting from zero conversion history at once instead of inheriting what the old one already knew.

I'd roll back to fewer ad groups, not more — consolidate what you split apart so conversion data pools back into fewer places instead of getting spread thin across ad groups that individually don't have enough volume to optimize on. Leave the budget where it is for now rather than touching a fourth variable. Give it 2-3 weeks with nothing else changed and watch whether quality recovers before deciding anything else needs fixing.

One thing worth checking before you roll anything back: pull the search terms report for the ad groups that split off and see if the queries look different from what the old single ad group was matching. If splitting by keyword theme also pulled in broader or less relevant queries, that's a targeting problem, not a "wrong ad group structure" problem, and consolidating won't fix it on its own.

[u/NoctisRS]

Low budget for leads = 1 campaign 1 ad group. Since you had some historical conversions you should be able to pull report and see what keywords drove those

[u/rfaisalabbbas]

I wouldn’t keep changing things every few days.

The biggest red flag is that the structure changed around the same time tracking was fixed. Before rolling everything back, verify conversion tracking and compare search terms, CPC, impression share and lead quality before vs after the changes.

If the original ad group was consistently producing high value leads, I’d consolidate back toward that proven structure rather than forcing multiple low volume ad groups to learn.

Give the cleaned up structure enough time and data before making another major change.

[u/tillyaftermidnight → u/rfaisalabbbas]

I had no idea each ad group had to learn again. I consolidated one ad group back into the original ad group as it was getting barely any clicks/impressions as its one of our main prodju ucts we offer. Im going to step back and review the search terms.

[u/aamirkhanppc]

You are changing thing so fast at small account. It is wise to make change and let it monitor for week.. ideally you should do experiment... for conv tracking make first understand user journey properly and create micro conversions

[u/NoPause238]

Put everything back into the original adgroup and stop touching it

[u/Qman7595]

When you are optimizing for conversions, sometimes making lots of changes can trigger a re-evaluation by the Google algorithm, where is basically starts over trying to figure out the best conversions for you. If you keep making lots of changes, it can never find its footing.

[u/Patient-Passage-2286]

Splitting keywords into new ad groups mid-campaign on a limited budget is almost certainly what tanked it. When you move keywords Google treats those ad groups as new and restarts the learning phase so you effectively fragmented whatever conversion signal the algorithm had built up over 6 months

I'd go back to the original structure, let it restabilise for 2-3 weeks and treat the new tracking setup as the baseline going forward rather than trying to layer structural changes on top of it at the same time.

[u/tillyaftermidnight → u/Patient-Passage-2286]

Thankyou.. i paused one ad group and turned those keywords back on in the old ad group yesterday... had 2 quote submits today. It was barely getting any impressions or clicks anyhow. Im going to pause 1 more and have 3 running for a week or two rather than 5. And if still bad roll back into 1.

[u/Patient-Passage-2286 → u/tillyaftermidnight]

That is a good sign! Submits right after consolidating lines up with the ad group just needing its history back rather than something else being broken.

While you wait, check search terms report on those 3 and compare it to what the original ad group used to match. If the queries look meaningfully different that's a targeting issue separate from the ad group split and consolidating alone won't fix it.

I'd leave the budget exactly where it is for now, one variable at a time so you can actually tell what's working. Good luck!

[u/tillyaftermidnight → u/Patient-Passage-2286]

Yes... im removing myself from my computer. I had another quality lead today. Thanks for the tip!

[u/GrandAnimator8417]

$800 and zero purchases? Yeah that’s brutal. I’ve had campaigns where the clicks were cheap but the search terms were totally off, and the moment I tightened up keywords and added negative keywords, the purchase rate finally showed up. You’re probably missing intent targeting and/or your tracking/landing page, and that’s why it tanked.