google-ads-creative-health

name

google-ads-creative-health

description

Scan Google Ads accounts for the TWO creative problems that actually waste money — ads pointing to broken/dead landing pages, and disapproved (rejected) ads/assets that run handicapped. Runs across one account or many and returns a prioritized list of what to fix. Use this whenever the user asks to check ad/landing health, find broken links or 404s in ads, find disapproved/rejected ads, audit creative for wasted spend, or "what's broken in my Google Ads". Deliberately ignores Ad-Strength hygiene (headline counts, char usage, pinning) — those don't reliably move performance (see metric-levers.md). One account at a time; built to loop across an account list.

Google Ads — Creative Health (the needle-mover scan)

Goal (job-to-be-done)

Find the only two creative problems with real, attributable cost, across an account (or a whole portfolio):

1. Broken / dead landing URLs — an enabled ad sends clicks to a 404 / unreachable page = pure wasted spend (and a latent one fires the moment a paused-by-rank ad serves).
2. Disapproved / limited ads — Google rejected the ad/asset, so it doesn't serve (or serves handicapped) = lost reach.

Return a prioritized "what to fix" list. This is the kept scope from the creative metric-levers.md "act on" set; the third needle-mover (message/intent match) is owned by ../../keyword-ad-landing/alignment, not here.

• Who: any media buyer / agency / in-house marketer. When: recurring hygiene, before acting, onboarding a neglected account.
• Decision it drives: fix this URL · resubmit/replace this rejected ad. Concrete, not cosmetic.
• The differentiator: it flags ONLY money-losers. No Ad-Strength vanity, no "write more headlines". Honest, small, high-signal.

Scope

• ✅ Broken landing URLs (enabled ads — incl. latent ones not currently serving).
• ✅ Disapproved / APPROVED_LIMITED ads.
• ✅ Portfolio roll-up across many accounts (run per account, aggregate).
• ❌ Ad-Strength hygiene (counts / char / pinning / callouts / DKI / variety) — descoped, doesn't reliably move performance.
• ❌ Message/intent match → keyword-ad-landing/alignment. ❌ Asset-level disapprovals → optional extension (this scan is ad-level: a whole rejected ad is the bigger loss).

Components

• Tools / data plan: references/tools.md — the one GAQL pull + the live URL check + the multi-account loop.
• Framework / rubric: references/framework.md — what counts as broken / disapproved, urgency, and the caveats.
• Output: references/output.md — the findings JSON (+ portfolio roll-up).
• Deterministic core: scripts/process.py + scripts/query.json.

Operate

Input (per account): the GAQL pull of every ENABLED ad (final URLs + policy_summary.approval_status), and a url_health.json (HTTP status per unique final URL, from the live check). Loop the pull over the user's accounts (list_accounts → per account).

Process: process.py manifest.json — joins each ad's final URL to its HTTP status (broken = 4xx/5xx/no-response) and reads approval_status (disapproved / limited), then aggregates per account and rolls up the portfolio. Deterministic; the model only writes the synthesis.

Emit references/output.md: per-account broken_urls + disapproved_ads, and a portfolio roll-up. Pure data — no emojis/tables/colors. Lead the synthesis with the highest-leverage fix (broken URL on a spending ad).

Foreground only: the GAQL pulls (Porter MCP) and the URL curl must run in the foreground — Porter and Bash are denied to background agents.

Example (illustrative — fictional Acme Insurance)

• Disapproved: old legacy text ads in a retired "Acme_Brand_2019" campaign come back approval_status = DISAPPROVED → rejected, not serving → recommend pause/remove.
• Broken: their final URLs point at a retired microsite (promo.acme-insurance.example/…) that returns no response (dead domain) → broken.
• A newer ad pointing at /term-life-2023-promo/ returns 404 while enabled → latent waste; fix the URL before it serves.