ASI · Paid media · 2026 · paid media scope only
Paid media, judged by closed revenue
February through July 2026 was the best six-month paid media run in ASI history. I tied each campaign to what closed in the CRM and moved money toward what won.
- Clean MQLs in July 2026, an all-time record
- 467
- Won opportunities in July, up 96% year over year
- 53
- Paid search cost per new member, year to date against 2025
- −24%
Problem
The agency reported on form fills and platform cost per acquisition. Sales cared about members won. The two views did not line up, and the budget had drifted toward channels that looked fine in the ad dashboards.
Move
I built a campaign-level view from CRM exports: leads, qualified leads, opportunities and wins, by channel. Search ran two to three times better than social on qualified rate and about 2.7 times better on cost per new member. Budget moved back toward search.
On one broad-match campaign the agency reverted Google's AI Max test because platform cost per acquisition rose. In the CRM, leads from the test window converted to won at 10.8%, against 1.0% before. That is one campaign and about three weeks, so a small sample. It still showed the agency's report was missing the layer that matters.
Spam fell to about 15% of paid leads in June 2026, from 44% the June before.
What went sideways
Meta got more budget early in 2026, and those leads turned out to be too far up the funnel. Leads marked "does not qualify for membership" climbed from about 154 a month to about 263. I traced it to prospecting campaigns and a few ebooks that end buyers could download but never qualify for. The paid media director cut the worst spend and shifted money toward retargeting.
Result
In July, qualified leads were up 106% and won opportunities up 96% against July 2025, while total leads grew 21%. Year to date, paid search cost per new member is down about 24% against 2025, at similar spend. Fewer wasted leads, more members.
July 2026 vs July 2025, change
Paid media only. CRM data, counted by close date.
Lead-to-won rate, one broad-match campaign
Test window Feb 23 to Mar 16, 2026. Small sample.
Clean MQLs have an MQL date and exclude leads marked Spam or Does Not Qualify for Membership. Qualified leads carry the status "Qualified". New members are approximated with won opportunities from the CRM. Paid media figures cover paid search and paid social only. Member names and raw account data are left out of this page.