Get started with AdScanner: your first scan

How-to guidesLast verified:

New to AdScanner and wondering where to start? Start here. Go from opening AdScanner to a competitor's ads in a PPC Ad Editor preview in a few minutes. You need to be signed in to PPC Ad Editor.

  1. In PPC Ad Editor, open AdScanner in the left menu, then Scans. The AdScanner home page opens.
  2. Click into Advertiser domain or Transparency Center ID. Type the competitor's website domain, or their advertiser ID from the Ads Transparency Center. An advertiser ID starts with AR.
  3. Leave Format on All and every Channel off to scan everything. Or narrow the scan first.
  4. Click Capture ads. The button reads Searching… and a line tells you what AdScanner is doing, with a seconds counter. A search can take up to a minute.
  5. When the green result line appears, click Open job.
  6. On the job page, the ads are grouped as Search, Display and YouTube. Each group lists the longest-running ads first.
  7. Click an ad card, or its Add to Studio button, to pick it. Picked ads appear in the Selected ads panel on the right.
  8. Under Dashboard, choose where the preview should go. Then click Send N to Studio, where N is the number of ads it can send.
  9. When the button reads Sent to Studio, click Open the preview. Your competitor's ads open in PPC Ad Editor.

Prefer a file? In step 8, click Download N as .xlsx instead. You get the PPC Ad Editor bulk-upload spreadsheet.

See whether AdScanner is Lite or Pro

Look at the AdScanner row in the left menu. The chip on that row shows whether AdScanner is Lite or Pro for your account.

If your first scan looks wrong

  • The left menu chip shows the AdScanner plan on your account, Lite or Pro.
  • On Lite, a job stops at 5 ads. The result line tells you when the advertiser is running more than that.
  • If the AdScanner home page says You are signed out, click Sign in and come back.
  • If the Selected ads panel asks you to open a PPC Ad Editor workspace, open the workspace you want the preview in, then return to the job.
  • If the home page says Server search is paused, your AdScanner subscription is past due.

Still stuck? Contact support.