Shout

Role: In-house Google Ads Manager

Focus: Google Ad Grants, Paid Search, Performance Max, GA4 & GTM

Objective: Rebuild and optimise Google Ads to increase donations, fundraisers and awareness of Shout's life-saving mental health support.

Outcome: Rebuilt the Google Ad Grant from the ground up, launched new fundraising campaigns and developed a scalable strategy across both Grant and Paid accounts.

2
Google Ads accounts managed

9
NHS partners supported

20+
Campaigns rebuilt and launched

100+
Outdated campaigns audited

Helping more people discover and support the UK's free, 24/7 mental health text service through a strategic rebuild of Google Ads.

The challenge

Shout is the UK's only free, confidential, 24/7 mental health crisis text service. As demand for support continued to grow, Google Ads needed to balance two priorities: helping people discover Shout's services while encouraging supporters to donate and fundraise.

The existing Google Ad Grant account had become difficult to manage, with hundreds of outdated campaigns, limited conversion tracking and little alignment with Shout's current priorities. Alongside this, the paid account required new campaigns to support fundraising, NHS partnerships and public awareness.

The approach

I began by auditing both Google Ads accounts and rebuilding the campaign structure around Shout's current objectives rather than historic activity.

Across the Grant account, I created new donation and fundraising campaigns, introduced conversion tracking through GA4 and GTM, and refined keyword targeting to improve relevance and eligibility.

In the paid account, I worked primarily with NHS partnerships to launch targeted Search campaigns across specific areas of the UK to ensure that people found crisis support when they needed it most. This involved continually optimising bidding, search terms and ad copy based on performance in order to produce new ad groups that resonated with what users were searching.

Throughout the project, I focused on building a scalable account structure that would support future growth while ensuring every campaign aligned with measurable organisational outcomes.

The impact

The project transformed Shout's Google Ads accounts from a collection of legacy campaigns into a focused, data-driven strategy aligned with the organisation's priorities.

Over the past eight months, I’ve:

  • Rebuilt the Google Ad Grant account from the ground up.

  • Delivered new fundraising, NHS partnership and awareness campaigns.

  • Implemented meaningful GA4 and GTM conversion tracking.

  • Improved campaign relevance through ongoing optimisation and search term refinement.

  • Established a scalable foundation for future growth.

"I've had the pleasure of working with Tom on Google Ads campaigns for NHS Integrated Care Boards across the UK. He combines excellent technical expertise with a collaborative, strategic approach, and his recommendations and optimisation work have consistently delivered measurable improvements. I'd have no hesitation recommending Tom to any organisation looking to get the most from their Google Ads campaigns."

Kane Hazard, Shout/Mental Health Innovations