I don't know now, but some time ago Google consultants told me that I should create an ad that displays when someone searches for my brand name. It was very odd because without it, my page ranked obviously first for the brand name. It may be the case it looks good in ads reports to see paid conversion.

What definitely made me realize what ads are about was when I have installed user interaction tracking on my website. I was able to see what paid ads users was doing.

90% of the traffic was generating users that behaved like bots.

But there is a big marketing and a lot of money for everyone. No one really cares about results. You can find tons of articles how to optimise campaigns that are aimed at SMB.

But no one will mention most of such advice are for companies that spend tens of thousands of dollars per month. Otherwise there is too little data for ROAS or even CPC and CPM optimization. Comparison results for smaller campaigns are just not statistically signifant.

I must agree with the article it is all about perfect crime. No one , including clients, are not concerned about real results. It is like let's throw money into the fireplace and enjoy it is warmer.