UIlyticsGoogle Ads + Yandex Direct: one reporting view or two?
In most CIS markets you run both Google Ads and Yandex Direct. They are the two biggest search engines by share, they split the audience, and both need ongoing optimization. But their reporting tools live in different worlds — different currencies, different attribution windows, different notions of "click."
This post walks through what we've learned from customers running unified reporting across both.
The short answer
You want one reporting view. Two dashboards means two meetings, two sets of numbers, and two stakeholders asking you why the totals don't add up. A single cross-engine view is both more accurate (because you see the blend) and dramatically faster to maintain.
The tricky bits when blending the two
Currencies and VAT
Yandex Direct typically bills in RUB with VAT included. Google Ads bills in the currency of your Google Ads account with VAT separate. To compare spend honestly, you have to normalize — pick a display currency, strip or include VAT consistently, and apply the same exchange rate.
Attribution
Google's default attribution is data-driven. Yandex's is last-click. A conversion that both engines see will be counted by both at different weights. When comparing ROAS across engines, anchor to one source of truth — either GA4 or Yandex Metrika — and treat the engine-reported conversions as signals, not truth.
Campaign types
- Google Ads has Search, Display, Shopping, Video, Performance Max, Demand Gen.
- Yandex Direct has Search, Advertising Network (РСЯ), Smart campaigns, Master of campaigns.
When you build side-by-side comparisons, map the closest equivalents:
| Google Ads | Yandex Direct |
|---|---|
| Search | Search |
| Display | Advertising Network (РСЯ) |
| Shopping | Smart campaigns (for e-commerce) |
| Performance Max | Master of campaigns |
Search terms
Both engines expose search-term data — but keyword normalization differs. Russian morphology means many stemmed variants map to the same intent. Don't try to join on raw strings; aggregate at the ad-group level.
What metrics to prioritize
For the CFO / weekly review, keep it simple:
- Spend (normalized currency, same VAT treatment)
- Clicks and CTR
- Conversions (single source: your web analytics, not the ad engine)
- CPA and ROAS
Skip impression share and quality-score-style metrics in the blended view — they don't translate cleanly between engines.
Practical workflow
- Connect both engines to your analytics tool and let it normalize the currency.
- Connect Yandex Metrika and/or GA4 — use that as the single source of conversion truth.
- Build one weekly view: spend + CPA + ROAS across both engines, same date range, same currency.
- Let AI flag the anomalies. Don't hunt for what changed — get alerted when CPA on Search drifts more than 20% week over week.
- Export a branded PDF for stakeholders who don't need to log in.
Summary
Running Google Ads and Yandex Direct separately is technically possible but practically exhausting. A single unified view — with normalized currencies, a single source of conversion truth, and cross-engine AI alerts — cuts weekly reporting overhead by 70–80% for most teams we've worked with.
If you want to try this with UIlytics, connect your Google Ads and Yandex Direct integrations and you'll see them side by side from day one.