How to explain a bad month to a client (and keep their trust)

Key takeaways

• Diagnose before you explain. Check tracking, conversion delay, seasonality, auction pressure, the offer and the website, in that order.
• Separate what you control from what you don’t, and own your part plainly.
• Lead with the number, then the cause, then the fix with a date. Put it in writing after the call.
• Trust breaks when clients hear bad news late, or hear it from someone else first.

Leads dropped. Cost per lead jumped. The monthly report is due Friday, and you already know the client will open it and pick up the phone. Knowing how to explain bad results to a client is part of the job, and most of us learned it the hard way.

A bad month rarely ends a client relationship. A vague explanation, a surprise, or a fix with no date often does. This article walks you through how to find the real cause, how to structure the call and the follow-up email, what to put in writing, and the mistakes that cost you the account.

All examples here are hypothetical, and all numbers are illustrative.

What should you check before you explain bad results to a client?

Check whether the drop is real before you explain it. Confirm tracking still works, then account for conversion delay, seasonality, recent changes, auction pressure, the offer and the website. Many “bad months” are a broken tag or incomplete data. You want one clear cause, backed by evidence, before you pick up the phone.

Work through this list in order. The early items are the most common, and the quickest to rule out.

1. Tracking. Did conversions drop to near zero overnight? That usually points to a broken tag, a new form, a site redesign or a consent banner change, not to the ads. Compare platform conversions with the client’s CRM or inbox. If the numbers in GA4 and Google Ads disagree, our explainer on why GA4 and Google Ads numbers don’t match will help you tell a real drop from a reporting gap. For consent and tag set-up, see our guide to conversion tracking in Canada.
2. Conversion delay. Google Ads can report conversions up to 90 days after the click, depending on your conversion window. Cost shows up right away, so the last week or two can look worse than it will end up. Google suggests segmenting by Conversions > Days to conversion to see your typical lag.
3. Recent changes. Open Campaigns > Change history. It logs budget, bid, keyword and status changes for up to two years and shows who made each one. Look for changes by you, the client or “Google Ads system”, such as auto-applied recommendations.
4. Explanations. In Google Ads, hover over a blue, dotted-underlined number in the campaigns table and select View explanations. Google lists likely causes such as budget changes, bid target changes, conversion reporting delay, auction shifts and day-of-week effects. Explanations only cover the last 90 days and don’t work if the date range includes today.
5. Seasonality. Compare with the same month last year, not just last month. Canadian calendars matter: Thanksgiving in October, Family Day (not observed in every province), Quebec’s Fête nationale in June, and construction or moving season for home services.
6. Auction pressure. Use Auction insights on Search, Shopping or Performance Max campaigns to see whether a competitor’s impression share or overlap rate jumped. Your campaign needs enough activity in the date range for a report to appear.
7. The offer. Did a promotion end? Did prices go up? Did a competitor launch a better deal?
8. The website and sales team. Slow pages, a broken form, a phone line that went to voicemail, or leads that sat for days before anyone called back.

Google’s own troubleshooting guide for performance fluctuations covers a similar list, including billing and account issues, policy status changes and narrow targeting. Skim it if nothing above explains the drop.

How do you separate what you control from what you don’t?

Sort every cause you found into three buckets: things you control (bids, budgets, keywords, creative, set-up), things the client controls (offer, prices, website, lead follow-up) and things nobody controls (competitors, seasonality, platform changes). Then own your bucket first. Clients forgive mistakes they hear about from you.

Cause	Who controls it	How to frame it
Broken tag after a site update	Shared	“Tracking broke on the 12th when the new form went live. Here’s what we missed and what we’ve fixed.”
Bid target set too tight	You	“I lowered the target CPA too far and volume dropped. I’ve reset it.”
New competitor in the auction	Nobody	“A new competitor now shows up in about half our auctions. Here’s how we respond.”
Promotion ended	Client	“Lead volume fell when the spring offer ended. Here’s what a new offer could do.”
Slow lead follow-up	Client	“Leads came in, but fewer booked. Can we look at response time together?”

Pointing at the client’s side is fair when the data shows it. Bring the evidence and ask a question rather than assign blame.

How should you structure the call or email?

Use a simple order: the result, the cause, what you’ve already done, what you’ll do next and by when, and what you need from the client. Say the bad number in the first minute. Keep the explanation short and plain. End with a dated next step, not a promise.

Here’s the structure we use, with a hypothetical example for a Halifax dental clinic.

1. The result, first. “October brought 38 booked consults, down from 61 in September. Cost per consult rose from $82 to $131.”
2. The cause, with evidence. “Two things. The booking form stopped sending conversions on October 9 after the site update. And a new clinic two blocks away started bidding on our main keywords.”
3. What’s already done. “We fixed the form tracking on the 20th and confirmed it with test bookings.”
4. What’s next, with a date. “By November 15, we’ll launch new ads that lead with your evening hours, and shift budget to the keywords where we still win most auctions.”
5. What you need from them. “Can you confirm the evening hours are staying through December?”
6. How you’ll know. “We’ll review cost per consult on November 30 and tell you whether it’s working.”

Call first if the drop is large or the client will be anxious. Send the email right after. If your client works in French, send the written summary in French too.

What should you put in writing?

Put the numbers, the cause, the fix, the date and any decision the client made in a short follow-up email. Written notes stop the story from shifting later, protect you if the client’s boss asks, and give you a clear checkpoint. Keep it to one screen.

A follow-up checklist:

• The key metric this month and last month (and the same month last year if seasonality matters).
• The cause in one or two sentences, with a link or screenshot.
• What you fixed and when.
• The next action, the owner and the date.
• Any budget or offer decision the client agreed to.
• The date of your next check-in.

How do you propose a fix the client will trust?

Propose one specific change, explain why you expect it to help, give it a date and a measure, and say what you’ll do if it doesn’t work. A dated test with a clear success measure is more believable than a list of ideas. Avoid promising a number you can’t control.

Good fixes are small and testable. “We’ll launch a Search experiment with the new landing page and judge it on cost per booked consult after four weeks” beats “We’ll optimize the campaigns.” If the fix is a bigger budget, show the maths. Our Campaign Planner can help you model what a budget change might mean for leads before you put a figure in front of the client.

Don’t rush to rebuild everything. Smart Bidding needs time to adjust, and stacking changes makes it hard to see what worked. If a short sale or event is coming, Google’s seasonality adjustments are built for events of about one to seven days. Google notes Smart Bidding already handles regular seasonal patterns, so don’t use them for normal swings.

What are the mistakes that destroy trust?

The biggest ones are hiding the bad number, blaming the algorithm, overwhelming the client with metrics, making changes in a panic, and promising a quick recovery. Each one makes the next bad month harder to explain. Clients stay with people who tell them early and plainly.

• Burying the number. Leading with impressions and click-through rate when leads fell looks like spin.
• “The algorithm changed.” Sometimes true, rarely useful. Say what changed and what you’re doing about it.
• Waiting for the report. If you saw the drop mid-month, flag it mid-month.
• Panic changes. Changing bids, budgets and ads all at once to show action. It resets learning and muddies your data. Our article on broad match and Smart Bidding explains why one controlled test beats several edits.
• Guarantees. “We’ll be back to normal next month” is a promise you can’t keep.
• Blaming the client without evidence. Ask about lead follow-up. Don’t accuse.

Frequently asked questions

Should I tell a client about bad results before the monthly report?

Yes, if the drop is large or likely to continue. A short mid-month note such as “leads are down this week, here’s what we’re checking” turns a surprise into a shared problem. Clients rarely mind hearing early. They do mind finding out from their own sales team or bank account before they hear it from you.

How do I explain rising cost per click to a client?

Show it, then explain the likely driver with evidence. Auction insights can show if a competitor’s impression share or overlap rate increased. Change history shows if a bid target changed. Then shift the focus to cost per lead or cost per sale, which matters more than cost per click, and say what you’ll test to protect it.

What if the bad month was my fault?

Say so, early and plainly. Explain what happened, what it cost if you can estimate it, what you’ve fixed and what you’ve changed so it doesn’t happen again. Owning a mistake is uncomfortable, but it builds credibility. If the error wasted spend, consider offering a credit on your fee.

How long should I wait before judging whether a fix worked?

Wait at least one full conversion cycle, since recent conversions may still be coming in. Check your typical lag with the Days to conversion segment in Google Ads. For many lead generation accounts that means a few weeks. Agree on the review date with the client up front so nobody judges the fix too early.

Sources: About explanations, Google Ads Help · Troubleshoot performance fluctuations and changes in Google Ads campaigns, Google Ads Help · About change history, Google Ads Help · Find out how long it takes for your customers to convert, Google Ads Help · Use auction insights to compare performance, Google Ads Help · About seasonality adjustments, Google Ads Help

Platform details as of November 2026.