diagnose-underperformer
SkillDev toolsDiagnose why a specific Google Ads or Meta Ads campaign / ad set / ad is underperforming and prescribe the next concrete action. Use when the user says something like "why is X not converting?", "this campaign is wasting money", or "why are impressions so low?". Read-only, no changes are made.
Available today. Use it from your connected AI after setup.
No other account needed.
Add ahel to your AI once: Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Claude Code or Codex. Then ask it to use this.
Then ask your AI: use the diagnose-underperformer skill
What this skill tells your AI
The instructions your AI receives, as published by markifact/markifact-mcp in plugins/hermes/markifact/skills/diagnose-underperformer/SKILL.md and read by ahel’s review.
Goal
Pull the right report, walk a structured decision tree, and hand the user a ranked list of likely causes with the specific next op to call to fix it. No writes — diagnosis only.
Inputs to confirm (batch)
- Account name (substring) — required.
- Target — campaign / ad set / ad name or ID — required.
- Date range — default last 14 days; if the entity is < 14 days old, use its lifetime.
- Comparison window (optional) — previous 14 days, for trend.
- Primary KPI — conversions / ROAS / CPA / CPL — required if the entity has a conversion goal.
Workflow
- Discover ops. For Google Ads:
gads_select_accounts,gads_list_report_fields,gads_get_report,gads_get_account_history. For Meta:meta_ads_select_accounts,meta_ads_list_report_fields,meta_ads_get_report,meta_ads_get_account_history,meta_ads_get_adset_settings,meta_ads_get_campaign_settings. - Inspect with
get_operation_inputs. Always call*_list_report_fieldsbefore*_get_report— never guess metric/dimension names. - Resolve account with substring match.
- Pull the report at the right granularity (campaign / ad set / ad). Required metrics:
- Spend, impressions, clicks, CTR, CPC, conversions, conv rate, CPA / ROAS, frequency (Meta), search impression share + lost-to-budget + lost-to-rank (Google Search).
- Pull settings/history to check for recent edits that could have triggered the dip:
- Google:
gads_get_account_historyfiltered to this campaign — look for budget changes, bid strategy switches, status flips, asset changes. - Meta:
meta_ads_get_campaign_settings/meta_ads_get_adset_settingsfor current state,meta_ads_get_account_historyfor recent changes.
- Google:
- Walk the decision tree below and rank the matching diagnoses by likelihood + impact.
- Present: top 3 diagnoses, evidence from data, and the exact next op to call (or the matching slash command). Do not run any write op.
Decision tree
Branch A — Low impressions / low spend (entity not delivering)
| Signal | Diagnosis | Next action |
|---|---|---|
| Google: search impression share lost to budget > 20% | Budget-capped | Raise daily budget or use /markifact:negative-keyword-sweep to free spend |
| Google: search impression share lost to rank > 30% | Bid / Quality Score too low | Raise CPC bid (manual) or improve ad relevance (Quality Score components) |
Google: campaign status LIMITED (account history) | Eligibility / policy / payment / learning | Inspect gads_get_account_history for the cause; route based on subtype |
Meta: ad set status IN_REVIEW or REJECTED | Policy | Check creative against Meta policies; replace creative |
| Meta: estimated audience size < 500K and CBO is on | Audience too narrow + CBO starved it | Widen audience or move to ABO with fixed budget |
| Meta: > 4 ad sets in same campaign with CBO | Auction overlap, CBO concentrating spend on one | Consolidate ad sets or split into separate campaigns |
| Both: budget set but daily spend << budget | Bid too low for the auction OR audience tiny OR creative not eligible | Inspect bid + audience size + creative status |
Branch B — Spending normally, low CTR
| Signal | Diagnosis | Next action |
|---|---|---|
| Meta: frequency > 3.5 + CTR dropping WoW | Creative fatigue | /markifact:rotate-creative |
Google: RSA ad strength Poor / Average | Weak asset variety | Add more headline variety, re-create RSA |
| CTR way below industry baseline (Search < 3%, Meta feed < 0.8%) and frequency low | Wrong audience or weak hook | Tighten targeting; try a new creative angle |
| Branded search CTR < 5% | Competitor bidding on brand or weak ad copy | Check gads_ads_transparency for competitors; strengthen brand copy / pin brand headline |
Branch C — Good CTR, low conversion rate
| Signal | Diagnosis | Next action |
|---|---|---|
| Bounce rate high in GA4 / time on page short | Landing page mismatch | Send fresh LP variant; consider /markifact:edit-meta-creative to swap URL |
| Conversion event firing but CVR < 0.5% | LP friction / wrong offer / wrong audience intent | Audit funnel; consider gating with a softer CTA |
| Conversion not firing at all in last 7 days | Pixel / tag broken | Meta: meta_ads_check_capi_health and meta_ads_get_pixel_stats; Google: check conversion action import from GA4 |
| Mobile CVR << desktop CVR | Mobile LP problem | Fix mobile LP; consider device bid adjustment |
Branch D — Good CVR, low overall conversions
| Signal | Diagnosis | Next action |
|---|---|---|
| Spend capped (see Branch A signals) | Budget-bound winner | Raise budget incrementally (≤ 20%/day on Smart Bidding) |
| Audience small + saturated (Meta freq > 4) | Audience exhausted | Build lookalike from converters; expand interests |
| Strong perf only on weekends | Schedule misalignment | Adjust ad schedule / bid by hour |
Branch E — Sudden performance drop
| Signal | Diagnosis | Next action |
|---|---|---|
| Account history shows a bid strategy switch in the last 14 days | Bid strategy reset learning | Either revert or wait 14 days; warn about future switches |
| Budget cut > 30% recently | Underfunded learning | Restore budget or accept slower learning |
| Creative replaced recently with major change | Soft learning reset | Wait 7 days before judging |
| Seasonal / industry-wide | Compare to category trend | Note and move on; not a config issue |
Platform-specific rules the model MUST respect
list_report_fieldsfirst. Field names differ per platform; never guess.- Account-name substring match for
select_accounts. - Frequency is a Meta concept — not directly comparable on Google.
- Search impression share is a Google Search-specific metric; PMax has its own (search-categories report).
- Don't propose changes that need to wait. If the entity is < 7 days old or made a major change in the last 7 days, say "still in learning, don't touch yet."
- Read-only. This command never calls a write op. Recommend the right write command instead.
Output to user
Top diagnoses for <entity>:
1. <Diagnosis> — confidence: high/medium
Evidence: <numbers>
Next: run /markifact:<command> OR call <op_id>
2. ...
3. ...
Other observations:
- ...
End with: "Want me to do any of these? I won't make changes without your go-ahead."
Signals
- GitHub stars
- 48
- Forks
- 8
- Last commit
- Sep 2026
Advanced
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diagnose-underperformer- Source
- github.com/markifact/markifact-mcp