Before you run digital ads: five steps to prepare your business

Before you run ads, set one result you can count, choose channels that match how your customers buy, prepare the landing page and set up conversion tracking. Once all four are in place, run the ads on a small budget. This order decides whether your first report supports a decision or only lists clicks.

The reason is simple. Google Ads' guide to ROI says conversions must be measured before you can know your ROI. Without measurement, you know how much money goes out but not what comes back.

The market is large. DataReportal's Digital 2026: Indonesia report counted 230 million internet users in October 2025, or 80.5 percent of the population, and 180 million social media user identities. The report cautions that identities do not necessarily represent unique individuals. A number this large also does not tell you whether your buyers can be reached at a cost that still leaves a profit. Only testing answers that.

Step 1: set a result you can count

Google Ads describes a conversion as a customer action that you have defined as valuable to your business, such as a purchase, a sign-up or a phone call. So you have to decide for yourself what success means.

Answers like "to get busier" or "to be better known" cannot be counted in the first month's report. Choose one or two results for the first three months, then write down how you will record them.

Type of business	Main result	How to record it
Services or B2B	Consultation form submitted	Event on the thank-you page
Online shop	Purchase completed	Purchase event
Local business	Phone call or WhatsApp click	Call tracking or a button click event

Read WhatsApp clicks with care. The number shows that people opened a chat, not that they sent a message, let alone bought anything. Also keep a spreadsheet of how many conversations continue, so you know how many clicks actually became prospective buyers.

Impressions, followers and visits are still useful for diagnosing problems. They are a poor choice of main result because they can rise while nobody buys.

Step 2: choose channels that match how customers buy

Start with one question: are people already searching for your product? If they are, search channels capture demand that already exists. If your product still needs to be introduced, social media is better suited to building interest. A business serving customers near its location has another route: local search.

Channel	Suits you when	What to prepare
Search ads	People already type in what they need	A page that matches the keywords
SEO	The topic is searched for steadily	Useful content, and time
Social media	The product needs to be introduced or explained	Several versions of the ad creative
Google Business Profile	Customers come from around your location	A complete, verified profile
Marketplace	You sell physical products people already search for there	Your margin worked out after platform fees
Email or CRM	You already have a customer list	Clean contact data

SEO and search ads reach the same people at a different cost and on a different timescale. Google's SEO guide says some changes show within a few hours, while others can take several months. The guide also states that no method automatically ranks a site first. A new site can use search ads to appear sooner while its organic pages are being built.

If you run a local business, check your Google Business Profile first. Google names three main factors in local ranking: relevance, distance and prominence. A complete, verified profile helps with the first, and customer reviews also affect the third. We cover how to fix this in our article on local businesses that do not yet show up on Google.

Start with one or two channels. Each channel needs enough data before it can be judged, and a small budget split across five places usually produces too little data in any of them.

Step 3: prepare the landing page

You still pay for a click that lands on a confusing page. Before the ads go live, check the landing page against this list.

• The page headline matches what the ad says.
• The price or price range is stated. If the price depends on the customer's needs, explain what determines it.
• The product or service details are enough for a first decision.
• There is one clear main action, for example submitting a form or starting a chat.
• There is real proof, such as testimonials, a portfolio or customer reviews.
• The page opens quickly on a phone. You can check this with our guide to diagnosing a slow website on mobile.
• You have tested the form and the WhatsApp button yourself, end to end.

If you do not have a dedicated page yet, read our comparison of a landing page and a company profile website to decide which one you need. A fuller technical check is in our business website launch checklist.

Step 4: set up measurement before the ads go live

At least one conversion must already be recorded before the first rupiah is spent. Google provides Google Ads conversion tracking and Google Analytics for this. Work in this order.

1. Install Google Analytics on the site, then make sure the event you need is being recorded.
2. Mark that event as a key event. Standard reports can take up to 24 hours to show it, and the marking does not apply retroactively.
3. Link Google Analytics to Google Ads, turn on auto-tagging, then create a conversion from that key event.
4. If you advertise on Meta, install the Meta Pixel and record the same action there.
5. Carry out the action yourself: submit the form or click the button, then make sure it was recorded.

The last step takes only a few minutes. Without it, you learn the tracking is broken only after the budget is spent.

Step 5: test with a small budget

Write two or three versions of the message from different angles, such as price, quality or warranty. Change only one variable per test. Meta recommends running an A/B test for at least 7 days, because shorter tests can be inconclusive.

Google Ads can spend more than the daily budget

The daily budget in Google Ads is an average. On most campaigns, one day's spend can reach about twice that budget, with a monthly limit of about 30.4 times the daily budget. If you set IDR 100,000 a day, one day's spend can come close to IDR 200,000, and the monthly limit is about IDR 3,040,000. Work from the monthly figure when you set aside money for testing.

Meta's learning phase needs a certain number of results

On Meta, every ad set goes through a learning phase. Meta's documentation says this phase stabilizes after at least 50 events in 7 days. Significant edits restart it, for example pausing the ad set or changing the optimization event, the audience or the ad creative. A change to the budget or bid can count as well, depending on its size.

This affects how much budget you need. Suppose, as a made-up example, that your cost per lead is IDR 40,000. To get 50 leads in a week, you need IDR 2,000,000 a week, or about IDR 286,000 a day. With a budget far below that, the ad set will probably show the Learning limited status. Meta stresses that this status is not a penalty. The options Meta suggests include combining ad sets, widening the audience, raising the budget or choosing an event that happens more often.

Meta also notes that regular creative testing helps prevent creative fatigue, where the audience tires of seeing the same ad and costs go up.

A weekly report you can make decisions from

One spreadsheet is enough. Every week, fill in four things: cost per channel, the number of main conversions, cost per conversion, and how many conversions turned out to be valid or became transactions. The fourth number is usually missing from the ad dashboard, so fill it in from your sales records.

In the made-up example above, IDR 2,100,000 in spend brings in 30 leads, so the cost per lead is IDR 70,000. Only 12 of those leads are valid, and 3 of them buy. The cost per transaction comes to IDR 700,000, far above the figure the dashboard shows. If your margin per transaction is below IDR 700,000, this campaign loses money, even though the report shows plenty of activity.

When reading the report, remember two things. Google Ads data is not real time, and conversions can be reported up to 90 days after the click, depending on the conversion window setting. The figures for the last few days can still grow. We explain what each metric means and how to read it in our guide to reading CPC, CPM, CTR and ROAS.

Mistakes to avoid in the first three months

• Running ads before the conversion is defined. Traffic goes up, but there is no number to judge it by.
• Too many channels at once. The budget is split and no channel gets enough data.
• Too many changes at once. You cannot tell which change moved the results. Meta suggests combining changes so they trigger only one learning phase, but admits this makes it harder to read what caused what.
• A slow or unconvincing landing page. You still pay for the clicks.
• Counting only leads and not checking how many actually bought.

Decisions after three months

By the end of the third month, you should be able to answer three questions from your own data: which channel brings in transactions, which message is the most efficient, and which audience gives the best lead quality. Raise the budget on channels whose cost per transaction is still below your margin, and stop the rest.

On Meta, raise the budget in steps, because a large budget change can restart the learning phase. For help setting up the measurement and campaigns, see our digital marketing service.