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My campaign isn't live yet

You clicked Create campaign, saw the confirmation screen, but the campaign isn't actually serving impressions. A few possible causes, in order of likelihood.

It's still in Google's review queue​

Every new campaign goes through Google's automated review before serving impressions. Most reviews complete in under a day. Some take up to two business days.

How to check:

  • Open Google Ads.
  • Find the campaign.
  • Look at the campaign status column.

Statuses you might see:

  • Eligible. Approved and live. If it shows eligible but you're seeing zero impressions, see "It's approved but not getting impressions" below.
  • Under review. Google is still reviewing. Wait. Don't make changes; edits restart review.
  • Limited. Approved but with restrictions (specific countries, specific audiences). Click for details.
  • Disapproved or rejected. See Ad copy or sitelinks rejected by Google.

It's approved but not getting impressions​

The campaign is eligible but no one has seen the ad yet. Common causes:

Budget too low to compete​

If your daily budget is tiny relative to the cost per click in your cluster, you may win very few or no auctions. A cluster with $5 average CPC running on a $5 daily budget will get one click on a good day, zero on most.

Check the cluster's CPC range and make sure your budget can support meaningful click volume.

Bid too low for the keywords​

Hero Marketer creates campaigns with sensible default bids. If those defaults are below the cluster's competitive range, the auction won't show your ad. The bid issue often surfaces as "limited by bid" in Google Ads.

Increase the bid in Google Ads or switch to a different bidding strategy (Maximize Clicks for early stage, Target CPA once you have conversion data).

Keywords too narrow​

Some clusters are valid but very low volume. A handful of searches per month means most days will have zero traffic, even with a healthy budget.

If you've waited a week with little to no impressions:

  • Try a broader cluster.
  • Add more keywords to the existing cluster.
  • Combine with another related cluster in a separate campaign.

Ad strength too low​

Google rates each ad's "Ad Strength" as Poor, Average, Good, or Excellent. Poor ad strength reduces how often Google chooses to show it. Open the ad in Google Ads and follow Google's improvement suggestions.

Tracking template or final URL issue​

If the landing page URL is broken, redirects in unexpected ways, or fails Google's quality check, the ad won't serve. Open the URL directly. Make sure it loads, doesn't redirect to an unrelated page, and matches Google's policies.

It's serving impressions but not the ones I expected​

The campaign is running, just not the way you wanted:

  • Wrong location. Check geo targeting in Google Ads. Make sure you targeted by physical location, not just by interest.
  • Wrong language. Default is English; if your audience speaks another language, set it explicitly.
  • Wrong device. Google serves on all devices by default. Adjust device modifiers in Google Ads if you need.

Still nothing after a few days?​

If the campaign has been "eligible" for more than 48 hours with zero impressions and you've checked budget, bids, and ad strength:

Contact support. Include the campaign name, the Google Ads customer ID, and what you've already checked.