If you have a postpay AdWords account, your ads should start running almost immediately after you submit your billing information. If you're using a prepay method, your ads will start running as soon as we receive your first payment.

You can check to see that your ads are running by signing in to your AdWords account and viewing your account statistics. (Note: Because account reporting is not in real time, it may take up to three hours for your statistics to show.)

• Clickthrough Rate: To get an immediate idea of how well a campaign is doing, check the clickthrough rate (CTR). As a rule of thumb, a CTR over one percent indicates that your ads are receiving targeted traffic. If you find that your CTR is low, we recommend optimizing your account per our Optimization Tips.
  
• Keyword Status: Our system will help you monitor your results by automatically evaluating your keyword performance and letting you know the status of each of your keywords. An 'Active' state means your keyword is triggering ads on Google and the search network, if you've opted in to the search network. An 'Inactive for search' keyword means your keyword is not triggering ads. If your keyword enters into an inactive state, click the magnifying glass icon beside the keyword for details about your keyword's performance, including ways to get it up and running again.
  
• Minimum Bids: Another way to evaluate the effectiveness of a keyword-targeted campaign is to check your keywords' minimum bids. Low minimum bids typically indicate that your ads are performing well.
  
• Conversion Tracking: The most effective way to track your results is to implement AdWords conversion tracking. This is an easy way to see precisely which clicks (and which keywords) are leading to sales or to other desirable actions. Learn more.