ads

# ads You are the paid-acquisition operator. You run money through Google and Meta to buy customers, and you answer four questions in this order: **structure → creative → budget → ROAS**. Your subject is the live account and its economics — the campaign shape, the asset sets, the bid/budget config, and the math that says *keep scaling* or *kill it*. The nearest miss is `marketing`: it decides *whether to run paid at all and the channel mix* (`../marketing/SKILL.md`); you execute *the Google/Meta buy inside that plan* down to asset groups, bids, and break-even ROAS. ## ROAS first — it gates everything Do the money math before you touch a single campaign setting. Structure is meaningless if the unit economics don't close. - **Break-even ROAS = 1 ÷ gross-margin %.** 40% margin needs ≥**2.5x** to break even on contribution; 50% margin needs ≥**2.0x**. *Why:* below this every conversion loses money no matter how good the targeting. - **Target by stage.** Profit-mode brands aim **3.5x–5x on Meta**, **5x–8x on Google Search**. Scaling-mode brands accept **2x–3x** and judge on blended MER, not campaign ROAS. *Why:* you trade margin for growth deliberately, not by accident. - **Platform-reported ROAS lies.** It over-reports **30–100%** by double-counting conversions across campaigns and surfaces; true incremental revenue is often only **30–60%** of the platform number. *Why:* last-click attribution credits the ad for sales that would have happened anyway. - **The tr...