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Google Wants Proof Your Leads Are Real

September 18, 2026

Google put out an Ads Decoded episode on "data strength": what it is, how to build it, and why lead gen campaigns need it. Translation: the algorithm is about to start asking for receipts.

Here's the part that should get your attention. Performance Max and Search have been optimizing off whatever your CRM sends back as a "conversion." If that feed is a mess of duplicate form fills, dead numbers, and leasing agents fat-fingering statuses, Google's been happily optimizing toward garbage. Data strength is Google's way of saying it can tell the difference now, and it's going to reward accounts that feed it clean signal and quietly starve the ones that don't.

So the actual move isn't waiting for a rep to explain it in your next QBR. It's auditing your lead feed this week. Are you passing back real outcomes, toured, applied, leased, or are you passing back "form submitted" and calling it a day? Is your CRM deduping before it fires the conversion event, or is every recycled prospect showing up as a brand-new lead?

That last one matters more than people admit. Your CRM is doing improv and filing it as data, and now Google's using that improv to decide who gets your next dollar of budget.

If you don't know the answer to any of the above, that's the audit. Not next quarter's audit. This week's.

Source: Google, September 18, 2026