A Suncoast real estate adjacent brand spent $12K/month on Google Ads for two years. When we audited, 30% of clicks came from search terms with zero buying intent. That is $43,000 wasted annually on irrelevant traffic.

The search terms report told the whole story. Broad match keywords matching informational queries. "What is" and "how to" searches from people researching, not buying. No negative keyword lists. No search term exclusions. The automated bidding was optimizing for clicks because nobody configured it to optimize for qualified leads. $3,600 per month in wasted clicks. Over two years, that compounds to real money.

The agency managing the account checked ROAS on the dashboard and adjusted budgets. They never pulled a search terms report. They never reconciled leads against actual closed business. The dashboard showed acceptable numbers because it counted every form fill equally — whether it was a qualified prospect or a student doing research.

We rebuilt the account. Tight keyword targeting. Aggressive negative lists. Conversion tracking weighted by lead quality. Real cost per qualified lead dropped 42% in 60 days. GOSH Digital manages paid media for Sarasota businesses with one standard: qualified results, not just clicks.