Which stages to send to Google Ads, and what each is worth.

Which stages should I send, and with what value?

Send two or three stages, each to its own conversion action: a qualified stage like SQL or opportunity, valued at your average deal times its close rate, and Closed won with the deal’s real amount. Bid on one of them and keep the others Secondary, for reporting. Google’s advice is to upload consistently for one to two conversion cycles before an action counts for bidding, so start it Secondary and switch later.

Why does bidding care what you send?

Because it optimizes for exactly that. Google: “Maximize conversion bidding will attempt to generate the most conversions for a given budget, regardless of the value of the conversions. Maximize conversion value bidding will attempt to generate the most conversion value for a given budget.”

Send form fills, and bidding finds more form fills, including the ones sales never calls back. Send qualified leads and closed deals with values, and it has a reason to prefer the clicks that turn into revenue.

When is a fixed value enough?

Google lists two ways to set values. One value for every conversion is “easier to set up but may be less representative of different values of each transaction”. A different value per conversion fits “if each of your sales or leads has a different conversion value”.

So a fixed value is enough when your deals are about the same size. It’s also how Google suggests telling stages apart: same-value conversions can “roughly distinguish several conversion actions from each other”. That’s the idea behind a stage ladder.

What does a stage ladder look like?

One conversion action per stage, each with its own value, and the real amount only where you have one:

Take each rate from your own HubSpot reports, and work it out again every quarter.

Google recommends exactly this split: “It’s best practice to create a separate conversion action for each stage of the funnel”, and “Usually, you would only want to bid to one stage of the lead funnel, to do this, the stages need to be separate conversion actions.”

Where the stages come from matters in HubSpot. Its built-in Google Ads events fire on lifecycle stage changes and form submissions, and new lifecycle events send a fixed value (what the help page says now), so a lifecycle ladder (MQL, SQL, Customer) works there. Deal stages, and Closed won with the deal’s amount, need a deal workflow that sends to Google: custom code, or a workflow action from an app.

Primary or secondary?

Google’s definitions:

• Primary actions “are reported in the ‘Conversions’ column in your reports and used for bidding”.
• Secondary actions “are for observation only. They are used for reporting in the ‘All conversions’ column in your reports, but not for bidding”.

Start every new action as Secondary, compare it with what HubSpot shows for 2 to 3 weeks, then promote the one you’ll bid on. Google warns that Smart Bidding has “a standard 7-14 day learning phase” and that changing conversion goals during it resets the learning window, so promote once, not back and forth.

How many conversions do I need?

The Google help pages I read don’t give one minimum for value bidding on Search. They give conditions instead:

• Upload at least daily, and “upload all conversions and assign values to use Target CPA, Target ROAS or Max conversion value bid types”.
• Wait one to two conversion cycles. Google: “Consistently perform daily uploads for at least one but up to 2 conversion cycles before including the conversion in the ‘Conversions Column’.”
• For Target ROAS, give it six weeks. Google: “include the new values in the ‘Conversions’ column and wait 6 weeks for your campaign to receive conversion values at a similar rate”.

The one number Google does give is for Demand Gen campaigns: Maximize conversion value needs “At least 50 Demand Gen conversions with value within the past 35 days, including a minimum of 10 conversions with value within the past 7 days”, or 100 across all Demand Gen campaigns.

If you close a handful of deals a month, bid on the SQL or opportunity action and keep Closed won Secondary until it fills up.

What if the sales cycle is longer than 90 days?

Google takes a conversion with a GCLID up to 90 days after the click, and one matched on email or phone up to 63 days. A deal that closes in month five can’t be tied to the click.

The ladder handles this. SQL and opportunity happen earlier, so they’re far more likely to fall inside the window and give bidding something to learn from, and Closed won still counts whenever it lands inside.

Maximize conversions, Maximize conversion value or Target ROAS?

• Maximize conversions if you send stages without values, or every conversion is worth about the same.
• Maximize conversion value if you send real values and want the most value for your budget. Before you switch, Google notes it “tries to fully spend your average daily budget” when no target is set.
• Target ROAS if you have a return you need to hit. Google: “If you have a specific ROI goal, use the Target ROAS bid strategy.” Since June 2026, Google labels “Maximize conversion value with a Target ROAS” as “Target ROAS”.

Whichever you pick, Google says to wait “1-2 conversion cycles” after you start reporting values before adopting a value strategy.

I built Ledion to send each stage from a HubSpot contact or deal workflow to its own Google conversion action, with the deal’s amount on Closed won (how it sends to Google Ads). Setting up one conversion per stage there: Create a conversion. Building it yourself instead: what that involves.