How to Check Google Ads Course Reviews: 7 Checks

I do not start with the stars on a Google Ads course review. I start with a path I can follow: when the person studied, what they changed in the account, and whether I can write to them.

If that path is missing, the review is a feeling. Below are seven checks. I use them to separate a useful review from bought praise and from a case about a business nothing like yours.

Why course reviews are hard to trust

The school chooses which reviews stay on its own site. A warm note that says “thank you, I liked it” can be sincere. It proves nothing for your budget if the text never shows work inside an account.

On audits I set aside a review that has a rating and no time period. A screenshot with no dates and no sense of spend looks convincing. You cannot tell whether the ads ran for a short window or a long stretch, or whether the spend is close to yours.

The distrust can be measured. In the BrightLocal Local Consumer Review Survey 2025, a survey of US consumers, 42% said they would think a review is fake if it looks paid or incentivized. The Trustpilot Trust Report 2025 says the platform removed 4.5 million fake reviews in 2024, and 90% of them were caught by automated detection. And in the FTC’s civil penalty adjustments, published in the Federal Register in January 2025, the maximum civil penalty for a knowing violation of an FTC rule, including the rule on fake reviews, is $53,088 per violation in the US. These are US figures, and figures about reviews in general, not about Google Ads courses.

Official Google training sits next to paid courses, and the two are not the same. Skillshop, in Google’s help page, is a training center. It used to be called Academy for Ads. With a Skillshop account you get a library of free online courses designed by Google product experts. You go at your own pace. The courses mix strategy and tactics and are built on real-world case studies and common business scenarios. That is not work in your account.

So “I took a Google course” in a review may mean Skillshop, not a paid school program. Skillshop is good for the basic concepts. It does not show how a decision lands on your money. If you are still deciding whether a Google Ads course is worth it when Skillshop, YouTube, and ChatGPT are already there, answer that first. Reviews help after that answer, not instead of it.

7 checks before you pay

I go down the list in order. An open item stops me before I look at stars. Together the seven items catch both a bought paragraph and an honest review with the context cut out.

1. Date. When the review was written, and the period of the ads it talks about.
2. Account screenshot. You can see the period, the campaign type, and the business result columns (conversions and cost per conversion, not only clicks and impressions), not a picture cropped at the edge.
3. A graduate you can contact. You write to the person yourself. You do not only read the text the school collected.
4. Budget and niche. The spend and the kind of business are close to yours, not a speech about ads in general.
5. What was actually done. The review names actions in the account, not a general compliment to the teacher.
6. The teacher’s own practice. The person who teaches still runs ads, and does not only record lessons on other people’s examples.
7. An independent place. You can find the same review somewhere the school does not edit.

Check the teacher’s practice with one question to the graduate: did the teacher show a decision from a live account, or only a slide? A lesson built on someone else’s example does not prove the teacher still runs ads.

The table turns what you see into a pay or wait decision.

How to read a case: budget, niche, and time

A case is proof only when you recognize your own scale. A plumbing company and a dental office do not make the same choices in the account. An HVAC contractor and a law firm do not either. If the niche is missing, you are reading someone else’s story.

The budget in a review is a scale, not a boast. I want to know whether the spend is close to your month of ads and whether the review names how long that work ran. Without those two facts, any mention of leads tells you nothing.

Time is part of the proof. A short note about the first days and a story about a long stretch of work describe different experience. Ask for the period. If it is missing, I do not apply that case to your business.

Google’s guide for advertisers says it is not possible to guarantee a specific ad position on Google.com search results. The auction sets the position, and it changes with every new search. A partner who promises the top spot on every search misrepresents how Google advertising works. I do not treat that same promise in a course case as proof that the program taught anyone.

The page for the Magic of Google 5.0 course lists 9 modules, 1 year of access to the lessons, and question and answer sessions. It also says the course cannot guarantee profit, and it does not fix a weak product, website, or business model. Knowing the interface without working on real campaigns does not build optimization skill. A review that offers profit as a guarantee argues with that limit. I do not take that text as proof.

What to ask a graduate

Three questions are shorter than any review on a sales page. Ask the person who did the work, not the manager who is selling a seat.

1. What did you change in the account in the first month, and how many hours did it take?
2. What did not work, and what did you remove after that?
3. Was the budget close to mine, and did you do the work yourself or did someone else do it in your account?

A useful answer is specific. The person names an action, the time, and what failed. A blanket “I liked everything” sends you back to the stars. The most useful review is often not an excited one. It shows what was done in the account and how long it took.

If the answer leans on a certificate, unpack what that document is. Google’s page on Google Ads certification sets the bar: at least 80% correct, and 75 minutes for the assessment. You cannot pause the timer. If you close the window, the time ends, and the next attempt is one day later. The certificate stays valid for one year. After that you need to pass again. You may call yourself certified only if you personally passed, and only while the certificate is still valid. A coworker’s certificate, or an agency badge, does not stand in for yours.

The same page lists the certification in 22 languages. If someone says they passed it in a particular language, check that language against the published list. The list can change, so open it yourself. The exam shows product knowledge. It is not a report of leads. A Google Partner badge belongs to a company. A person earns the certificate. Those are different marks, and neither one replaces a case in your niche.

Where to look for an independent review

Start on the school’s site and do not stop there. A collection on the site shows what the school chose to keep. An independent trace is a reply the person sends you, or a public profile where they themselves say they took the program.

Reviews of my courses sit on their own page. Run the same seven checks on them. I am not asking you to trust them because they are mine. The date, the screenshot, the contact, the budget, the action, the practice, and the place are either there or they are not.

If a review passes these checks, a different question remains: is this a course for an owner, or for someone who wants a new job? The checks for that choice are in how to choose a Google Ads course. Practice on your own account, and whether you have time to apply the lessons, matter more than a long list of topics.

A wall of ratings with no person behind them proves nothing. You need a graduate you can write to.

When this does not apply

The seven checks do not fit if you are choosing a contractor who already runs your ads, not a course. The questions are different then: who owns the account, and whether anyone promises you a specific position in search. A review of lessons does not answer that.

The checks also do not settle the decision if you have no ad budget yet and no date to start. The honest answer is simple: a course is early for you. Start with Skillshop. It is free, Google built it, and you pay a school nothing until you have money to spend on ads.

One more limit. If the text is a review of a tool, a YouTube channel, or a single webinar, do not run it through these checks as if it were a course review. The seven items are for the decision to pay for training, not for rating a video.

If the reviews pass all seven checks, check me the same way: the step-by-step version of how I teach owners to run ads on their own budget is in my book on Google Ads for business owners.

Questions and answers

How do you tell that a review is real?

Real, for a payment decision, means you can check it. There is a date, a period of ads, an account screenshot, and a person who can say in their own words what they changed. You do not need an identity document. You need a path you can match.

What if the school shows only video testimonials with no last names?

A video the school picked itself belongs to the same collection as the text on its site. Ask for the person’s contact or a link to their public profile, and put the three questions from the list above to them. If there is no contact, count the video as stars: it shows a feeling, not work in an account.

Which case counts as proof?

Proof names the niche, the scale of spend, the time period, and an action in the account. Stars, a certificate with no actions, and a promise of a fixed position in search are not proof. The auction sets the position. A page where the school itself says it cannot guarantee profit is closer to reality than a case that promises the top spot.