Campaign Audits
Part of Programmatic campaign audits
Writing an actionable programmatic campaign post-mortem
Turn campaign results, setting changes and unresolved findings into a concise post-mortem with owners and closure checks.
Write the post-mortem for whoever must approve the next decision. Lead with the agreed outcome, observed result, what remains provisional and the action requested. A chronology of screenshots or a “lessons learnt” list without owners is hard to use.
Put the decision first
State the campaign’s objective, agreed measure, result and review period in a short opening. Name the currency, cost definition, event and reporting time zone. Date the extract.
If outcomes can still arrive or reports can change, label the figure provisional. Check report freshness and availability before treating an extract as final.
Keep delivery, attributed outcomes and business records separate. Impressions describe reported delivery. A Floodlight conversion depends on the tracked activity, window and counting method. Neither figure alone establishes incremental business impact.
Give each finding an evidence trail
Use one entry for each material finding. Include the affected buying IDs and period, the brief requirement, the observation and its source. State the best-supported interpretation and any competing explanation.
Field / What the next owner needs
- Finding
- A specific difference between plan and observation
- Evidence
- Dated report, setting or change record and its scope
- Interpretation
- Supported explanation and remaining uncertainty
- Decision
- Keep, correct, investigate or test
- Closure
- Owner, date and evidence needed to close the action
“Reach was below plan” is a finding, not an action. An actionable entry names the comparable reach figures, notes whether bought impressions were also below plan, and assigns someone to check the relevant eligibility and auction evidence before the next allocation is approved. It should not present that possible explanation as a diagnosed campaign result.
Use the timeline to explain, not prove
Record material edits to budget, targeting, inventory, creative, destination and measurement, with saved times and approval references. A documented timeline helps establish what changed and when; a chart beside an edit does not prove the edit caused a later result. Note simultaneous changes and missing records.
Prioritise by the campaign’s requirements and the decision’s urgency. A missing required exclusion needs attention even if its observed spend was small. A weak outcome from a tiny placement may need more evidence before a broad block. Separate a trader’s permitted correction from a change to the brief that needs the advertiser’s approval.
Close each action with one owner, a date and a checkable trigger: a saved setting to verify, a report to rerun or an approval to obtain. Leave inconclusive findings labelled inconclusive so the next campaign does not inherit an unsupported assumption.
