Five modules. One waste-math number. Every finding cited.

1. A

   Top decile

   Grade A: Healthy creative volume, clean ad-to-page match, distinct competitive angle, waste under 8%. Keep doing what you're doing and scale spend with confidence.

2. B

   Solid

   Grade B: One or two leaks worth fixing. Most likely creative refresh cadence or a single ad-page mismatch. A focused month of work moves you to A.

3. C

   Leaking

   Grade C: Account is bleeding 15 to 25% of spend on fatigued creative, message-mismatched landing pages, or missed competitive angles. Fix the top three findings this month.

4. D

   Misaligned

   Grade D: Multiple modules failing benchmarks. Funnel skewed, creative starved, or competitors running plays you aren't. The 90-day fix list is the priority.

5. F

   Bleeding daily

   Grade F: Spend going to ads that should have been killed weeks ago, or to landing pages the ads don't match. Fix this week. Strategy call is worth the 30 minutes.

We skip E because the US grade ladder skips E. Most audits land between B and D. F is rare; A is rarer.

1. 01

   Creative Strategy & Testing

   Where you're leaking

   Where you're leaking

   Same hero ad running for 90+ days. Three creative variants tested all quarter. Top performers chewing fatigue and you can feel CTR slipping but not which lever to pull first.

   Industry benchmark

   Industry benchmark

   At least 4 distinct creative angles in rotation. No ad past 200K impressions without a refresh. Top three winners drive 60% or less of total spend.

   Sample finding

   Sample finding

   Activewear DTC brand at $14K monthly spend tested 3 creative variants in 30 days. Vertical median at that band: 12. Estimated waste from under-testing: $3,400/mo, or 24% of spend.

2. 02

   Ad-to-Landing Page Match

   Where you're leaking

   Where you're leaking

   The silent ROAS killer. Ad promises one thing. Landing page H1 says another. Click traffic bounces before form view and you blame the cost-per-click.

   Industry benchmark

   Industry benchmark

   Ad headline, CTA verb, and offer match the landing page within roughly 70% lexical or semantic overlap. Same promise on both sides of the click.

   Sample finding

   Sample finding

   Mid-market skincare DTC ran a top-spend ad with 'first 15% off' in the headline. The landing page H1 said 'shop the bestsellers.' Estimated 31% click-to-form drop-off attributable to that single mismatch: roughly $2,100/mo at $9K spend.

3. 03

   Funnel Structure

   Where you're leaking

   Where you're leaking

   Spend distribution skewed toward TOFU prospecting with no MOFU consideration ads, or BOFU retargeting eating budget that should be funding new audience tests. CTAs all saying 'Shop now' instead of stage-appropriate verbs.

   Industry benchmark

   Industry benchmark

   TOFU 50 to 60% of spend, MOFU 25 to 30%, BOFU 15 to 20%. At least 4 distinct CTA vocabularies across the account.

   Sample finding

   Sample finding

   Outdoor gear DTC ran 87% of spend on TOFU with zero MOFU ads. Every active ad used 'Shop the collection' as the CTA. Funnel collapse to direct response only. Estimated $4,800/mo of spend going to a stage that converts 3x harder than MOFU at this audience size.

4. 04

   Competitive Intelligence

   Where you're leaking

   Where you're leaking

   Two competitors are running plays you aren't seeing. Founder-voice video. Social-proof carousels. UGC repurposes. White space your audit reveals at the angle level, not the surface 'they have more ads' read.

   Industry benchmark

   Industry benchmark

   You occupy at least one distinct angle competitors don't. No major competitor playbook (founder voice, social proof, UGC, comparison) is untouched on your side.

   Sample finding

   Sample finding

   Pet supplement DTC at $11K spend ran zero founder-voice video ads. Both nominated competitors ran 4 to 6 founder-voice variants. The angle compounds trust at MOFU. Estimated white-space opportunity worth $1,900/mo at current spend.

5. 05

   Spend Efficiency

   Where you're leaking

   Where you're leaking

   The headline waste-math number. Dollar quantified across creative fatigue, broken funnel, message mismatch, and missing competitive angles. The single line you forward to your finance lead.

   Industry benchmark

   Industry benchmark

   Estimated waste rate under 15% of monthly spend. At least 80% of spend on creatives within a healthy fatigue band. Stage distribution within range across TOFU, MOFU, BOFU.

   Sample finding

   Sample finding

   Home-fragrance DTC at $22K monthly spend showed 28% estimated waste, or $6,160/mo. Driven mostly by 4 fatigued ads still consuming top-3 spend slots. Recommended kill list of 4 ads recovers $5,200 of that, in week one.

• How does the audit detect ad fatigue?

  Creative Strategy flags ads past 200K impressions without a refresh, plus winner-pattern concentration (top three ads driving more than 60% of spend). Fatigue here means CTR degradation, not literal ad age.

• What benchmarks do you grade against?

  Vertical-specific benchmarks across 16 ecommerce categories, seeded from aggregated industry data. Every finding cites the specific benchmark it failed and your number against it.

• What if my account has fewer than 50 ads?

  The audit still runs. Below about 50 ads, creative diversity and spend efficiency become directional rather than quantitative. Clearly flagged in the report so you don't read precision into a small sample.

• What's the difference between ad-to-page match and a generic landing page review?

  Ad-to-page match compares the headline, CTA, and offer of the specific ad against the specific landing page it routes to. Message-match math, not page-quality grading. A page can be beautifully designed and still fail the match check.

• Why don't you grade my campaign or ad-set structure?

  The audit reads only the public Meta ad library, not your ad account. Account-structure analysis would require Meta business manager access, which would change the zero-credentials promise. We chose the promise.

• What does 'operator-grade' mean here?

  Every finding is a specific play (kill ad X, reallocate spend to MOFU, swap CTA from 'Learn more' to a verb-led variant) with a benchmark-cited dollar estimate. Not a generic SEO checklist. Not a marketing-speak diagnosis.

• Can I see the raw data behind a finding?

  Yes. Each finding cites the specific ad ID or landing-page URL it pulled from. Every claim links to its source so you can verify before fixing.

• Is this the same audit you sell to clients?

  The audit IS the lead magnet. The optional strategy call is the paid follow-on. There is no lite version: the public audit is the full audit.