> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.vortexiq.ai/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Zero-Conversion Spend, Microsoft Ads (Bing) > Zero-Conversion Spend for Microsoft Ads (Bing) stores. Tracked live in Vortex IQ Nerve Centre. How to read it, why it matters, and how to act on it. **Metrics type:** [Key Metrics](/nerve-centre/overview#metrics-types-explained) • **Category:** [Ad Platform](/nerve-centre/connectors#connectors-by-type) ## At a glance > Total spend on entire **campaigns** that produced zero conversions in the 30-day window despite running for at least 7 days. Campaign-level cousin of [Wasted Spend](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/microsoft-ads/wasted-spend), one is keyword-level, this is whole-campaign-level. A non-zero number is a hard signal: a campaign that has run a full week without a single conversion either has a tracking failure, a wrongly-targeted audience, or should not exist. | | | | -------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | | **What it counts** | `SUM(Spend)` over campaigns where `Conversions = 0` AND `campaign_age >= 7D` AND the campaign is currently enabled. Aggregates across campaign types: Search, Shopping, Microsoft Audience Network, LinkedIn-targeted, and Smart Campaigns. | | **Why "7 days"** | A campaign needs at least a week of click data to fairly judge zero-conversion. Below 7 days, the campaign is still in initial learning and has likely not received enough clicks for a conversion to be statistically expected. Above 7 days with zero conversions, something is wrong (or the audience is genuinely barren). | | **Cost basis** | Same as Total Spend, gross media cost post-Click-Quality-filter. | | **Currency** | Account currency. | | **Conversion attribution** | UET-based, default last-click cross-device. View-through excluded by convention. A campaign counts as "zero conversion" only if no primary conversions fired during the window. | | **Attribution window** | Default 30-day click + 1-day view for primary conversions. | | **Bot / invalid traffic** | Spend is post-Click-Quality-filter. The clicks here were real human visits that didn't convert. | | **Time window** | `30D`, campaign-level granularity. | | **Alert trigger** | `>$0` on any campaign older than 7 days. Practically, the alert fires the moment any qualifying campaign appears; the action is to investigate, not auto-pause. | | **Roles** | owner, marketing, finance | ## Calculation Calculated automatically from your Microsoft Ads (Bing) data. See the At a glance summary above for what the metric tracks and the worked example below for a typical reading. ## Worked example A US DTC home-goods brand running 12 active Microsoft Ads (Bing) campaigns: 6 Search, 3 Shopping, 2 Microsoft Audience Network, 1 LinkedIn-targeted retargeting. Reading 12 Mar 26, trailing 30 days. | Campaign | Type | Age | Spend | Conversions | In zero-conv set? | | --------------------------- | -------- | -------- | ------- | ----------- | ----------------- | | Brand Search - Branded | Search | 240 days | \$1,840 | 412 | No | | Brand Search - Generic | Search | 180 days | \$2,610 | 38 | No | | Shopping - Top Sellers | Shopping | 92 days | \$4,820 | 92 | No | | Shopping - Long Tail | Shopping | 45 days | \$1,260 | 11 | No | | MAN - Lookalike | Display | 21 days | \$920 | 0 | **Yes** | | MAN - Cart Abandon Retarget | Display | 60 days | \$480 | 14 | No | | LinkedIn - B2B Lookalike | Display | 14 days | \$620 | 0 | **Yes** | | Search - Competitor "X" | Search | 30 days | \$880 | 1 | No | | Search - Competitor "Y" | Search | 18 days | \$710 | 0 | **Yes** | | Search - Seasonal Promo | Search | 4 days | \$310 | 0 | No (under 7d) | | Shopping - New Launch SKU | Shopping | 11 days | \$540 | 2 | No | | Search - Test Audience | Search | 9 days | \$260 | 0 | **Yes** | Card reads \*\*$2,510** ($920 + $620 + $710 + \$260). Three things to notice: 1. **The MAN Lookalike campaign at \$920 is probably a tracking failure or wrong landing page.** Microsoft Audience Network display has lower CTR than Search, but lookalike audiences on first-party data should produce some conversions in 21 days. Check UET tag fires on the landing page first; if tag fires, the audience is too top-of-funnel for the offer. 2. **The LinkedIn-targeted display at \$620 may be cold-traffic learning.** LinkedIn-data targeting via Microsoft Audience Network is genuinely top-of-funnel and slow; 14 days might be too early to judge for a B2B offer with a long sales cycle. Hold for another 2 weeks; if still zero, kill. 3. **The Competitor Y campaign at \$710 is the highest-confidence kill.** Search competitor campaigns get clicks immediately; 18 days with zero conversions on a competitor-keyword campaign means the value prop isn't compelling vs the competitor, or the landing page bounces. Pause and rebuild the offer. ## Sibling cards merchants should reference together Zero-Conversion Spend is a campaign-level kill list. Pair with these to triage: | Card | Why pair | What it tells you | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | [Wasted Spend](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/microsoft-ads/wasted-spend) | Keyword-level cousin (zero-conversion keywords, not whole campaigns). | A campaign in this card may have some converting keywords; Wasted Spend surfaces the within-campaign duds. | | [Worst Campaigns](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/microsoft-ads/worst-performing-campaigns) | The bottom of the campaign league table. | Campaigns in this card almost always also appear in Worst Campaigns; if not, check tracking. | | [Conversion Drop](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/microsoft-ads/conversion-drop-alert) | Trend signal. | A campaign that *was* converting and stopped is a different problem (tracking, landing page, seasonality) than one that never converted. | | [Quality Score](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/microsoft-ads/quality-score-distribution) | Diagnostic for Search campaigns in this list. | Low quality score on a zero-conversion search campaign = ad-relevance / landing-page issue. | | Cross-connector: [Google Ads Zero-Conversion Spend](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/google-ads/zero-conversion-spend) | Sister metric. | If the same campaign concept is failing on both Google Ads and Microsoft Ads, the issue is the offer or the landing page, not the platform. | ## Reconciling against the vendor's own dashboard **Where to look in Microsoft Ads:** [Microsoft Advertising](https://ads.microsoft.com) → **Campaigns**, sort by Conversions ascending, filter `Conversions = 0`, filter `Status = Enabled`, view *Last 30 days*. The closest like-for-like is summing `Spend` across the resulting list. **Why our number may legitimately differ from Microsoft Ads:** | Reason | Direction | Why | | ---------------------------------- | ---------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | **7-day age filter** | Ours typically smaller | Microsoft's UI doesn't filter by campaign age natively; the merchant's manual sum may include very-new campaigns that the card excludes (still in learning). | | **Conversion attribution window** | Either | Microsoft Ads default is 30-day click; some accounts use 7-day or custom windows. If the account override differs from the default, the card may show conversions Microsoft's UI does not (or vice versa). | | **UET tag firing reliability** | Same | Both this card and Microsoft Ads count UET-fired conversions; if UET is misconfigured, both undercount equally. | | **Time zone** | Boundary days | Microsoft Ads UI uses account time zone; card uses UTC. ±1 calendar day at boundary. | | **Smart Campaigns / Auto-managed** | Card includes | Smart Campaigns sometimes show in legacy reports differently; the card pools them with regular campaigns. | **Cross-connector reconciliation:** | Card | Expected relationship | | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | [Google Ads Zero-Conversion Spend](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/google-ads/zero-conversion-spend) | Sister metric. Many DTC merchants run mirrored campaigns on Google and Microsoft Ads; failure on both points to landing-page or offer, not platform. | | [`shopify.unfulfilled_orders`](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/shopify/unfulfilled-orders) | If conversions are fulfilling but Microsoft sees zero, UET tag firing is broken. Cross-check by comparing Shopify orders with `_utm_source=bing` against Microsoft conversion totals over the same window. | ***
Documentation cross-reference (for ad-platform peer comparison) Zero-conversion spend tracking exists on every modern ad-platform connector: * [`google_ads.gads_zero_conversion_spend`](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/google-ads/zero-conversion-spend), the canonical peer card * [`facebook.fb_zero_conversion_spend`](/nerve-centre/facebook/fb_zero_conversion_spend) * [`tiktok_ads.ttk_zero_conversion_spend`](/nerve-centre/tiktok_ads/ttk_zero_conversion_spend)
## Known limitations / merchant FAQs **Microsoft Ads has way fewer total clicks than Google Ads. Should I expect more zero-conversion campaigns here?** Yes, somewhat. Microsoft Ads (Bing + Yahoo + AOL) audience skews older and the click volume per dollar is typically 25 to 40% lower than Google's, so any given campaign needs more days to accumulate the click volume that produces conversions. The 7-day minimum age in this card already accounts for some of this; the more important difference is that Microsoft Ads campaigns generally need 14 to 21 days to reliably judge. **Should I just kill every campaign in this list?** No. Three categories. (1) **Search competitor / brand-defence campaigns** with zero conversions over 14+ days are usually killable; the offer or landing page is broken. (2) **Microsoft Audience Network display campaigns** are top-of-funnel and may take 30 to 60 days to attribute conversions; pause-and-restart is often better than kill. (3) **LinkedIn-targeted campaigns** are slow even by display standards; B2B sales cycles can be weeks. Apply category-specific judgement. **Why does Microsoft Ads have lower CPC than Google?** Lower auction density. Bing has \~3 to 5% of US search market share vs Google's \~85%; fewer advertisers competing for the same query keep CPC down. This is the primary reason Microsoft Ads is in the media mix at all on most brands; lower CPC offsets the lower volume to produce competitive ROAS on shopping and high-intent search. **My UET tag is firing but Microsoft says zero conversions. What's wrong?** Three usual causes. (1) **Conversion goal not associated with the campaign.** Microsoft requires explicit campaign-to-goal mapping; check *Tools → Conversion Tracking → Conversion Goals*. (2) **Conversion category mismatch.** A "purchase" goal won't credit a "sign-up" event. Re-check the goal definition. (3) **Cross-device attribution window** too short for the campaign type; lift to 30D click + 1D view if currently shorter. **The Microsoft Audience Network campaigns always show zero conversions in the first 21 days. Is that normal?** Mostly yes. MAN display is genuinely top-of-funnel; the conversion lag from first impression to purchase is typically 14 to 35 days. The 7-day age filter in the card is too short for MAN; consider tuning the alert to ignore MAN campaigns under 21 days, or wait until they appear in [Worst Campaigns](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/microsoft-ads/worst-performing-campaigns) where the bar is relative. **Smart Campaigns are showing in this card. They're auto-managed; should they?** Yes, the card includes them. Microsoft's Smart Campaigns are auto-bid and auto-target but still consume your budget. A Smart Campaign that hasn't converted in 14 days has the same problem as a manually-managed one: the algorithm hasn't found a converting audience. Microsoft will recommend killing or restructuring; the card surfaces the cost. **LinkedIn-targeted ads on Microsoft are slower to convert. Should I exclude them?** Optional. LinkedIn-data targeting is the most B2B-leaning option in Microsoft's ad surface, and B2B sales cycles can be 30 to 90 days. If the account is heavily B2B, raise the age threshold for LinkedIn-targeted campaigns to 30 days. Search and Shopping campaigns should still be judged at 7 to 14 days. **Why is the alert at `>$0` rather than a meaningful threshold?** Because zero conversions on a campaign older than 7 days is a binary signal: either there's a tracking failure, an audience problem, or the campaign should not exist. The dollar amount sets the urgency; the existence of the alert sets the action. *** ### Tracked live in Vortex IQ Nerve Centre *Zero-Conversion Spend* is one of hundreds of KPI pulses Vortex IQ tracks across Microsoft Ads (Bing) and 70+ other ecommerce connectors. Nerve Centre runs the detection layer; Vortex Mind investigates the cause when something moves; Ask Viq lets you interrogate any number in plain English. [Start for free](https://app.vortexiq.ai/login) or [book a demo](https://www.vortexiq.ai/contact-us) to see this metric running on your own data.