The short version

A quarter of the spend, $5,571 of $21,727, went on 38 searches that never converted.

The five fixes, in order

1. 1Add the 38 negatives in negatives.csv. Four carry a note to read first.$5,571 in 90 days
2. 2Show the non-brand ads only to people in the area.Stops the next city
3. 3Stop counting the same phone call twice.Up to 29 of 94 conversions
4. 4Put the phone number in the first screen of two landing pages.$3,140 of spend
5. 5Give workplace harassment its own ads.$400

And one test: pause the brand campaign for four weeks. It spent $1,411 on searches for the firm's own name, where the site already ranks first.

Spend that never converted is measured, not saved. A click you stop buying might have turned into a client later; each task in the action plan says how to check.

Where the $5,571 went

Nearly all of it went on people who were never going to hire a Toronto lawyer.

Search terms report, 5 August 2026 to 2 November 2026. Each search was read and grouped by a person; the totals are the report's own Cost column.

The negatives

38 negatives that block all of it, and nothing that converted.

The 14 costliest of 38. Read its note on page 12 first. "Quotes" is phrase match, [brackets] exact.

Every negative was checked against all 412 search terms the way Google applies negatives, with no close variants. None blocks a search that converted. All 38 are in negatives.csv, ready for Google Ads Editor.

What is working

Ten searches booked 62 of the 94 conversions. Nothing in this report touches them.

Search terms report, conversions as the account counts them. Page 6 explains why that count is too high, and why it does not change which searches never converted.

Two settings

One setting lets waste in. The other makes the results look better than they are.

Ads shown to people who are not in Toronto

Both non-brand campaigns use "Presence or interest", Google's default location option. It shows ads to people who are in Toronto and to people anywhere who show interest in it, so a search for a lawyer in Hamilton can still buy a click. The nine city searches cost $1,388 in 90 days. Their negatives stop those nine; switching the option to "Presence" stops the tenth before it costs anything.

The same call, counted twice

Two conversion actions, "Calls from website" and "Phone number clicks", are both set as primary, and both record a visitor tapping the number on the site. On 33 of the 41 days with a call, they moved together on the same search term. Up to 29 of the 94 conversions may be one call counted twice.

Both campaigns bid with Maximize conversions, so Google is also chasing the duplicates. This does not change the waste figure: counting a call twice only adds conversions to searches that already converted.

Campaign settings as shown in the search terms report's campaign columns, and the report segmented by conversion action. The front desk's call log would settle the real number; the action plan says how.

Quality Score, by who fixes it

$3,140 went on keywords whose landing page Google rates below average.

Keyword report with the Quality Score, Exp. CTR, Ad relevance and Landing page exp. columns, 64 keywords. These are Google's own ratings; the report adds only who can act on each.

Paid and organic

$2,216 bought clicks on searches where the site already ranks in Google's top three.

Search Console Queries export joined to the search terms report on the search itself. Neither test is a saving yet: pausing an ad does not hand you the organic click, and the test is how you find out whether it does.

The action plan

Twelve tasks, each ready to paste into Claude or hand to whoever runs your ads.

1. 1Add "legal aid" as a phrase match negativeWhoever manages the ads$640
2. 2Add the five other free-help searches as negatives, but not "free" on its ownWhoever manages the ads$1,032
3. 3Add the nine city names as phrase match negativesWhoever manages the ads$1,388
4. 4Switch the location option to Presence in both non-brand campaignsWhoever manages the ads
5. 5Add the five job and salary searches as negativesWhoever manages the ads$846
6. 6Add the 14 negatives for forms, courses and government servicesWhoever manages the ads$963
7. 7Add the four calculator and template negatives, after one decisionOwner decides, then whoever manages the ads$702
8. 8Make "Phone number clicks" a secondary conversion actionWhoever manages the ads
9. 9Put the phone number in the first screen of /wrongful-dismissal on phonesWeb developer$2,228
10. 10Do the same on /severanceWeb developer$912
11. 11Give "workplace harassment lawyer" its own ad group and adsWhoever writes the ads$400
12. 12Test pausing the brand campaign for four weeksWhoever manages the ads$1,411

action-plan.md has all twelve in this form. Each task stands on its own, so it can be pasted one at a time.

How this was measured

From three files exported from the account, read by a person before this report was sent.

All three cover 5 August 2026 to 2 November 2026.

Never converted

No conversion in the 90 days, and either 8 clicks or more, or a search no client would make: a job, a form, another province.

Too few clicks to judge

No conversion, under 8 clicks, and could be a client. 313 searches, $864. Left alone.

Hidden by Google

Spend Google reports without the search behind it, for privacy: $1,604, 7% of the total. No report can judge it.

Negative matching

As Google applies negatives: exact means the whole search, phrase means the words in that order, and no close variants.

Not in this report

• Performance Max, Display and YouTube. The search terms report does not cover them, and this account runs none.
• Changes to the account. Nothing was changed; every fix is a task for you or your agency.
• Savings. Spend that never converted is measured; what stopping it saves is what the tasks' checks will show.

Page 12 lists the checks that show, 30 days on, whether the fixes worked.

Appendix

All 38 searches, and the negative for each.

Notes, and the check in 30 days

Six negatives come with a note, and four checks tell you whether the fixes worked.

The six notes

• "severance calculator"Often searched in the week someone is let go. Task 7 of the action plan sets out the choice: block it, or build a calculator page.
• "severance pay calculator"The same reader as "severance calculator ontario". Decide the two together.
• [workers compensation claim form]Exact only: a WSIB claim gone wrong is a case the firm takes.
• [ontario labour board phone number]Exact, not "phone number": that phrase would block people looking for the firm's own number.
• [termination letter sample]Exact only. Someone holding a termination letter may want a lawyer to read it.
• [lawyer cost per hour]Two clicks is thin evidence, and a price shopper can become a client. Add it only if the fees page answers the question.

Decide before adding. The other two are exact on purpose; the note says why.

In 30 days, check four things

The 38 are gone

Export the search terms report for the 30 days after the negatives went in. None of the 38 should appear with spend.

What works is untouched

The ten searches on page 5 should keep their clicks and conversions. If one drops, a negative is catching it: the appendix shows which.

The calls add up

With one call action left as primary, conversions should come close to the calls the front desk logged. If they still run high, the counting has another leak.

Google rates the pages better

Four weeks after the phone number moves up, check the Landing page exp. column for the four keywords on page 7.

The monthly plan runs these checks every week on a connected account. Questions about any figure in this report: reply to the email it came with.