A Day in the Life of Adelie Creative

Friends and family always ask me what my working day actually looks like. Fair question. From the outside, "Google Ads management" sounds like it means logging in once a month, moving a slider or checking a report. It doesn't.

So here's a normal day in the life of Adelie Creative, start to finish.

Morning: the scroll before the work

First thing, I check all my socials. Not posting, checking, just to see what's landed overnight and if it needs a reply. A few comments, a message or two. Nothing dramatic, just staying on top of it before the day gets going and I get distracted by ads.

Then it's straight into Notion. Every client has a board, a board unique to them that tells me what's actually due today, not just what's on my mind. If I relied on memory I'd miss things. The board doesn't let me.

Into the accounts

Once I know what's on today, I log into each account. First stop is always Google's own recommendations. Google will happily suggest things that help Google more than they help you, so I go through every single one and decide what's worth actioning and what's getting dismissed.

Next is the search terms report. This is where the real story lives. It shows me exactly what people typed before to trigger an ad. Some of the terms can look spot on. Some of it's a business three postcodes away, so someone searching for something completely different. Either way, it tells me what searches have triggered the ads.

Then it’s off to GA4 (that’s Google Analytics), to see what happened after the ad was triggered. An ad can do a great job and still lead nowhere if the page the person is directed to doesn't hold up. I want to know if people are sticking around after the click. And if not, why not.

Sorting and thinking

With all that info to hand and a cuppa in front of me, I go through the keywords. Some get paused, some get added, some get watched for another week before I make a call either way.

Then I patiently sit with it. This is the bit people don't picture when they think about ads management: actual thinking time. What's this account telling me? Is there a pattern across the last few weeks? Is something worth testing? I'll often talk it through with Claude at this stage, not for the thinking itself, but as a way of checking my logic before I act on it.

Telling the client

Last job of the day: writing it all up on the client's Notion board. What I found, what I changed, what I'm keeping an eye on. Nothing gets buried in an inbox somewhere. If a client wants to check in, it's all there.

That's the day. Not glamorous, but it's the same shape every time, and that consistency is the point.