A marketing agency should report six things every month: the one money number you agreed before any work started, what you spent to get it, how that compares with last month and the target, which content and ads drove the result, what the agency changed and why, and exactly what it will do next month. If a monthly report covers those six in plain English on the first page, everything else is supporting detail. If it opens with impressions and a chart of follower growth, you are reading a report designed to look busy.
I write these reports for our own clients, so this is the standard I hold myself to. Use it to check ours or anyone else's.
Page one: the money number, against a target
Every report should open with the number the business actually cares about. For an online store that is return on ad spend or revenue from paid and organic social. For a practice it is cost per booked consult. For a service business it is cost per qualified lead. The important part is that this number and its target were agreed before the first dollar was spent, so nobody can choose a flattering metric after the fact.
Next to it you should see the spend that produced it, last month's figure and the target. When Dr. Zoumalan's Meta ads returned $24,500 in revenue from $1,837 in spend, that is the line that went at the top: 13.3 times return, against the target we had set. When Dead Soxy moved from 2.23x to 4.64x return on ad spend, the report led with the same comparison every time, so the progress was impossible to miss and just as impossible to fake.
If you want the reasoning behind which numbers belong here, I wrote a longer piece on the social media metrics that matter and one on how to work out social media ROI from what a customer is worth to you.
Page two: what drove it
Once you know whether the month worked, the report should explain why. That means naming the specific posts, videos and ads that did the heavy lifting, with their numbers, and naming the ones that were switched off.
The stakeholder report we sent Calculated Industries in October is a good example. Instagram views were up 809% from June to October against the previous period, and Facebook and Instagram together passed 1.75 million views. The report did not stop at the totals. It showed that Reels drove about 90% of Facebook views and that jobsite demos and creator videos were the formats pulling the growth, which told the team where the next round of filming should go. You can see what changed in the Calculated Industries case study.
Page three: what changed and what happens next
This is the section most monthly reports skip, and it is the one that tells you whether anyone is actually managing the account. You should see a short list of what the agency changed during the month (new creative, new audiences, budget moved between campaigns, landing page edits) and the reason for each.
Then the plan for next month, written as specific actions with an owner. "Test two new hooks on the consult offer, move budget away from the weakest ad set, film four patient question videos." If the plan reads the same every month, nothing is being learned.
When the number is below target, the report should say so on page one and explain what is being done about it. I would rather tell a client a month was weak and why than bury it under reach charts. Clients forgive a bad month. They do not forgive finding out on their own.
What belongs in the appendix
Reach, impressions, follower counts, engagement rate, click-through rate and cost per click all have a place. They help explain why the money number moved. They just belong after the result, not in place of it.
It should also include a tracking note: whether the pixel, Conversions API and conversion events were firing correctly all month, and whether ad-reported sales or leads roughly match your store or CRM. If tracking broke for a week, the report should say so, because every number after that is suspect. Our ad account self-audit checklist covers how to check this yourself.
Monthly report or weekly report?
For paid ads, monthly is too slow on its own. Budgets move and creative fatigues within days, so we send a weekly note on paid accounts with the money metric first, and use the monthly report for the bigger picture: trends, what we learned, and the plan. Organic social and SEO move more slowly, so a monthly view is the right rhythm for them. How the weekly side works is set out on our paid social agency page.
Our clients also get their own dashboard that pulls Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, Meta Ads and Google Ads into one place straight from the platforms, plus a one-page executive report written for the person who signs off the budget. The dashboard means you never have to wait for a PDF to check a number. The report and the note are where the numbers get explained.
Red flags in an agency report
The report changes which metrics it shows from month to month. That usually means the agency is choosing whatever went up.
There is no target anywhere. Without one, every result can be presented as good.
Spend and fee are blended together, or spend is missing. You should always be able to see what went to the platforms and what went to the agency.
Nobody can walk you through it. If the person on the call cannot explain why a number moved, ask who can. That question also features in my guide to how to choose a social media agency.
Questions people ask
What should be in a monthly marketing report?
The money metric you agreed with the agency, the spend behind it, a comparison with last month and the target, the content and ads that drove the result, what was changed and why, and a specific plan for next month. Reach, impressions and engagement go in an appendix as supporting detail.
How often should a marketing agency report?
Weekly for paid ads, because budgets and creative need attention within days, and monthly for the overall picture across paid, organic social and SEO. You should also be able to check live numbers in a dashboard between reports.
What KPIs should a social media agency report?
Lead with return on ad spend, cost per booking, cost per lead or revenue, depending on your business. Then the supporting signals that predict those results, such as conversations started, video watch time, saves and shares. Followers and likes are context, not goals.
Should I get access to my own ad accounts and data?
Yes. Your ad accounts, pages and analytics should be in your name, with the agency working inside them. That way you can verify any number in a report yourself and you keep your history if you ever change agencies.
What if my agency report only shows reach and impressions?
Ask for the report to start with the one number that pays for the work, plus a target for it. If the agency cannot connect its activity to bookings, sales or leads, that is worth knowing before the next invoice.
Let's talk
If you are getting monthly reports you cannot make sense of, email one to me at info@robbp.com with the number you actually care about, and I will tell you what it is and is not showing. It is the same review we do in our free audit, and you keep it whether or not we work together.
