How to Use DashThis to Report Paid Media Across Platforms

The short answer: for one client on Google Ads, Meta Ads and GA4, DashThis needs 1 dashboard and 3 of the 15 sources in its Individual plan at $54 a month (pricing page, checked on 26 October 2026), and that single dashboard can show combined spend and a cost per key event across all three. The steps: connect the three integrations, create a monthly periodic dashboard from the PPC template, add the sources, merge the two spend widgets, build a calculated cost per key event, apply your mark-up if you bill one, have Claude write the recap into a comment box, then schedule the email on "This month".

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Before the first widget:

1. Work out which limit bites first. For example, five clients with three sources each use 5 x 3 = 15 sources, exactly Individual's cap, but they also need five dashboards, two more than Individual allows, so Professional at $164 a month is the plan (pricing page).
2. Last month's numbers, from the platforms themselves. Write down Google Ads cost, Meta Ads amount spent and GA4 key events for last month, each read in its own tool. They are your test data.
3. The two checks. The merged spend widget must equal Google Ads cost plus Meta amount spent for that month, and the calculated widget must equal that sum divided by key events.

What DashThis includes and costs is in the DashThis glossary entry.

Have these ready

• A DashThis trial or plan; the trial gives 10 dashboards for 14 days with no card (homepage).
• Logins for Google Ads, Meta Ads and GA4.
• For step 7, a paid Claude plan, which DashThis says adding a custom connector requires (Claude connection article).

Step 1: Connect the integrations

In the integrations menu, choose the platform and click Add (connection article). GA4 adds its data sources on its own; where a pencil icon appears beside an account, add the data source by hand. Connecting costs nothing against your plan, because a source only starts counting once it is added to a dashboard (source usage article).

Step 2: Create a monthly periodic dashboard

Click Create Dashboard and pick the PPC preset template or a blank dashboard, choosing the periodic type, which follows calendar periods and lets you browse back through past months (periodic report article). Set the name, a monthly period, the language and the currency (dashboard article). The currency follows the language and region you choose, so set the region with care.

Step 3: Add the sources and their widgets

Add the Google Ads account, the Meta ad account and the GA4 property. Integrations that belong to the template create their widgets automatically; the rest you add from Preset Widgets (template article). Give every widget a title, because the MCP connector calls unnamed ones "Untitled widget" and cannot tell them apart (MCP limitations).

Step 4: Merge the spend widgets

Duplicate the Google Ads Cost widget first, because a merge cannot be undone. Then click Edit Widget, Merge Widgets, and select the Meta Ads Amount Spent widget (merge article). Both must use the same graph type, and filters must be set before merging, since they are locked afterwards. If you merge CTR, DashThis recalculates it from combined clicks and impressions instead of adding the two rates.

Step 5: Build the cost per key event

Click Calculated Widget, add Google Ads Cost, type +, add Meta Ads Amount spent, wrap the pair in brackets, then divide by GA4 Key events (calculated widget article). Set the format to Money and the fluctuation type to "Less is good", so a falling cost shows as an improvement. The feature is in beta, so compare the result with your own sum from the list above.

Step 6: Apply the mark-up, if you bill one

On a cost widget, open Edit widget, then Markup Options, and enter a percentage or an absolute value (mark-up article). Some preset widgets ship with a 15% mark-up already applied, so check every cost widget against the fee in your contract. One mark-up covers the whole widget; different rates need separate widgets.

Step 7: Have Claude write the recap into the dashboard

Add a comment box from Static Widgets first, since the assistant can fill one but not create it (comment article). Connect Claude from the DashThis page in Claude's directory and approve "Create and change dashboards & data" (Claude connection article). Then ask: "Write a September recap for my [client] paid media dashboard in DashThis. Context: budget moved from Meta to Google on the 12th." Nothing lands on the dashboard until you approve the draft, and Claude asks before replacing a comment already there. Read every figure in the draft against the widgets before you approve it.

Step 8: Schedule the email

Click the sharing icon, choose email, add the recipients and set the frequency (sharing article). For a report sent on the 1st, pick "This month", not "Last month": DashThis periods end on the last completed day, so on 1 October "This month" shows September. Attach the PDF if the client prefers a file to a link.

Four traps in DashThis's own articles

• Merges are permanent. Keep an unmerged copy of each widget (merge article).
• A skipped recap carries forward. On a fixed-period dashboard the last comment shows in later periods until one gets its own, so a month without a new recap mails the old text beside new numbers (comment article).
• Comments do not survive cloning. Templates and clones copy the widget structure, not the text (comment box article).
• Expired sources stop updating. Some platform tokens lapse; click Renew in the integrations section to restore the data (expired sources article).

Run it once on the trial, then size the plan

The 14-day trial is enough to build this report and pass both checks from the list above without paying. Tidy up before you subscribe. A source counts against your plan from the moment it sits on a dashboard, with or without a widget, and at the cap DashThis greys out Add source until you remove one or upgrade (source usage article), so a test account left on a trial dashboard quietly spends next month's headroom.

The merged spend is exact. The key events beside it are GA4's count, and each ad platform claims its own share of them. Later, if you want those claims tested against what the ads caused, a causal attribution tool such as Causality Engine does that, and I founded it, so read this as a disclosure as much as a suggestion.

FAQ

Can one widget combine two clients' Google Ads costs?

Yes. Merging works across different sources of the same integration, for example Google Ads cost for Client A plus Client B (merge article).

Does the client need a DashThis login to open the dashboard?

No. Anyone with the link opens it in View Mode in any browser, and the link stays valid for the life of the dashboard (sharing article).

How far back can Claude read through the MCP connector?

Exact dates reach back two years, and nothing past yesterday is read (MCP limitations).