Client reporting
Three reports, and only three. Every client gets all three.
| Format | When | Audience | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly | Slide deck, sent to the WhatsApp group and emailed | The client's own billing cycle | Client |
| Weekly | WhatsApp message | Every Monday | Client |
| Ad hoc | Whatever is fastest | The moment it happens | Client |
Monthly
A slide deck, Google Slides is fine, PDF not required. It does two things and stops:
- what happened last month
- what we are doing next
A monthly report takes fifteen to twenty minutes. Twenty in a day has been done. If it is taking longer, the report is too technical, not too thorough.
What goes in:
- the date range, always, on every report
- spend last month against spend this month
- cost per lead last month against this month, and the movement
- how many creatives were tested in each month
- conversations or appointments started, where the automation tracks it
The billing cycle is the client's, not the calendar's. Some run from the 1st, some from the 16th. Keep a list of cycle dates and report against each client's own.
Weekly
A WhatsApp message on Monday. Informal on purpose: it tells the client somebody is watching the campaign without the weight of a formal report. Spend and lead count is enough. The account manager usually sends it; the media buyer supplies anything specific.
Monday is also the point of the weekly report. It forces a proper look at every account once a week.
Ad hoc
Account banned, payment failed, ads stopped, something broke. Send it immediately, in whatever form is fastest. There is no format.
Write the answer, not the metrics
The client is asking one question: did this make me money, and what do we do now. A report full of appointment volumes, response times and conversion percentages with no conclusion has not answered it.
Two things to avoid, both learned the hard way:
- Do not recommend work that creates work nobody agreed to. Suggesting landing page changes, SMS reminders or urgency stacking can trigger development the client did not ask for, and often the landing page already does it. Check first.
- Recommendations must match what the client actually wants. A client chasing lead quality and higher order values does not want a small cost per lead reduction. Read the goal before advising.
Two narratives, always
Every month has an external version and an internal one.
- External, to the client: honest, but framed. Lead with the outcome and what happens next.
- Internal, to the account manager: unfiltered. If an account is going badly, the account manager must know before the client does.
The account manager cannot read Ads Manager. If the media buyer does not tell them, nobody has.