The short answer
An owner is asking one question: did this produce work worth more than it cost. Reports that lead with impressions and click rates are answering a different question.
Lead with spend, qualified enquiries and outcomes. Everything else is supporting detail.
What belongs at the top
| Metric | Why it belongs |
|---|---|
| Spend | The question starts here |
| Qualified enquiries | Not raw form submissions |
| What happened to them | Quoted, won, still open |
| Cost per qualified enquiry | Comparable month to month |
| Change from last month, explained | Direction matters more than level |
The third row requires talking to whoever handles enquiries. That conversation is what turns a marketing report into a business one.
Explain an uncertain month honestly
- Say what happened, including if it was poor.
- Say what you think caused it, and how confident you are.
- Say what you changed or will change.
- Say what you will know by next month.
- Avoid presenting noise as a trend.
Point five is where trust is lost. Explaining a random fluctuation as the result of an optimisation works until the next month contradicts it.
Leave the platform detail out of the summary
Impressions, click rates and quality scores matter for managing the account and rarely help an owner decide anything. Keep them available and out of the first page.
Where a platform metric does matter, explain why in a sentence rather than presenting it without context.
Say what you need from them
- Feedback on enquiry quality, specifically
- Outcomes on enquiries from previous months
- Notice of anything changing in the business
- A decision where one is needed
- Any complaints or feedback they heard directly
Enquiry quality feedback is the single most valuable input, and it needs asking for every month rather than waiting for it to be volunteered.