# MCP Server for AI Agents: Google Ads Transparency & Ad Spy (`mutualistic_housing/google-ads-transparency-mcp`) Actor

Standby MCP Server (/mcp) and JSON API for AI agents to search live Google Ads Transparency Center creatives, ad copy, headlines, landing URLs, video IDs, and verified advertisers by domain, brand, or advertiser ID without proxies.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/mutualistic_housing/google-ads-transparency-mcp.md
- **Developed by:** [Mutualistic Labs](https://apify.com/mutualistic_housing) (community)
- **Categories:** AI, Marketing, MCP servers
- **Stats:** 1 total users, 0 monthly users, 0.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

Pay per usage

This Actor is paid per platform usage. The Actor is free to use, and you only pay for the Apify platform usage, which gets cheaper the higher subscription plan you have.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-usage

## What's an Apify Actor?

An Actor is a serverless cloud program that runs on the Apify platform. It has two run modes.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.

Apify vocabulary and the platform model are defined once, in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md.

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.

Do not guess an integration path. Every one of them is in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md: the Apify MCP server, Agent Skills with the Apify CLI, the JavaScript and Python clients, the REST API, and the account-free path for an agent with no human to sign in. It also carries the rule on stating cost before the first paid run.

For examples already wired to this Actor's own input schema, see the [API](#api) section below.

Each client library has reference documentation the quickstart does not restate: [JavaScript/TypeScript](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md) (`npm install apify-client`) and [Python](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md) (`pip install apify-client`).

# README

## Standby MCP Server for AI Agents: Google Ads Transparency & Ad Spy

An always-on **Model Context Protocol (MCP) server** and batch Actor that searches the public **Google Ads Transparency Center**
for AI agents (Claude Desktop, Cursor, Windsurf, OpenAI Agents, LangChain) and competitor-research workflows. Look up what a
company is advertising right now: creatives, formats, first and last shown dates, days shown, headlines, descriptions, calls to
action, landing URLs and YouTube video IDs.

No proxies, no browser, no API keys, no logins, no personal data: only the public Transparency Center RPC endpoints and the
public ad preview payloads are called over plain HTTP.

### What you can search

- **By domain** (`domains`): full URLs are accepted and normalized, for example `https://www.stripe.com/pricing` becomes `stripe.com`.
- **By advertiser ID** (`advertiserIds`): `AR` followed by digits.
- **By brand query** (`queries`): resolved to the best matching (preferably verified) advertiser or domain first.
- If all three are empty the example domains `stripe.com`, `shopify.com`, `openai.com` are used.

### Output fields

`uid`, `advertiser_id`, `advertiser_name`, `creative_id`, `format` (`TEXT`, `IMAGE`, `VIDEO`, `UNKNOWN`), `first_shown_at`,
`last_shown_at`, `total_days_shown`, `target_domain`, `transparency_url`, `preview_image_url`, `preview_width`, `preview_height`,
`preview_js_url`, `destination_url`, `visible_url`, `headline`, `long_headline`, `description`, `call_to_action`,
`youtube_video_id`, `video_duration`, `thumbnail_url`, `channel_name`, `region`, `search_target`, `scraped_at`.
Ad copy fields are filled when `includeAdCopy` is true and the preview payload can be read; otherwise they are `null`.

### Input

| Field | Type | Default |
|---|---|---|
| `domains` | string\[] | example domains (when no other target is given) |
| `advertiserIds` | string\[] | none |
| `queries` | string\[] | none |
| `adFormat` | `ALL`, `TEXT`, `IMAGE`, `VIDEO` | `ALL` |
| `region` | `ALL` or a 2-letter code (35 countries) | `ALL` |
| `startDate`, `endDate` | `YYYY-MM-DD` | none |
| `minDaysShown` | integer >= 0 | none |
| `onlyWithVideo` | boolean | `false` |
| `includeAdCopy` | boolean | `true` |
| `maxItems` | integer 0 to 10000 | `100` (20 in MCP tools) |
| `maxTotalChargeUsd` | number or null | no cap |

Invalid input is rejected with `INVALID_INPUT_ZERO_CHARGE` before any network call or charge.

### MCP usage

Standby URL: `https://<user>--google-ads-transparency-mcp.apify.actor/mcp` (authenticate with your Apify API token).

```json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "google-ads-transparency": {
      "url": "https://<user>--google-ads-transparency-mcp.apify.actor/mcp",
      "headers": { "Authorization": "Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>" }
    }
  }
}
```

Tools:

- **`search_ads`**: same arguments as the batch input (camelCase, `maxItems` defaults to 20). Returns `creatives`, `count`, `charged`, `warnings`.
- **`search_advertisers`**: free; `query` (plus optional `maxAdvertisers`, `maxDomains`) returns advertisers (`advertiser_id`, `advertiser_name`, `country_code`, `min_ads_count`, `max_ads_count`, `is_verified`) and matching domains.

```json
{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"tools/call","params":{"name":"search_ads","arguments":{"domains":["stripe.com"],"adFormat":"VIDEO","region":"US","maxItems":20}}}
```

`GET /health` returns `{"status":"ok"}`.

### Pricing

Pay per event: **$0.002 per ad creative returned** (`ad-creative-returned`); the `actor-start` event is free and `search_advertisers`
is free. `maxItems` and `maxTotalChargeUsd` are hard caps enforced in code, and creatives are charged before they are delivered, so a
run never charges more than you configure. Invalid input and empty results are never charged.

### Notes

- Results reflect what the Transparency Center shows at request time and can change between runs.
- A failing target or preview payload is reported in `warnings` and never fails the whole run.

### Related MCP Servers by Mutualistic Labs

| Actor | Covers | Store | Standby MCP URL |
|---|---|---|---|
| Multi-ATS Career Jobs Search MCP | Greenhouse, Lever, Ashby, SmartRecruiters, Workable | https://apify.com/mutualistic_housing/multi-ats-career-jobs-mcp | https://mutualistic-housing--multi-ats-career-jobs-mcp.apify.actor/mcp |
| Google Ads Transparency & Ad Spy MCP | SearchCreatives, SearchSuggestions, `content.js` ad-copy & video metadata | https://apify.com/mutualistic_housing/google-ads-transparency-mcp | https://mutualistic-housing--google-ads-transparency-mcp.apify.actor/mcp |
| Multi-Engine Keyword & Autocomplete MCP | Google, YouTube, Amazon, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Brave + `google:suggestrelevance` & search intent | https://apify.com/mutualistic_housing/keyword-autocomplete-mcp | https://mutualistic-housing--keyword-autocomplete-mcp.apify.actor/mcp |
| Discourse Forum Search & Threads MCP | community.openai.com, discuss.huggingface.co, meta.discourse.org + any public Discourse | https://apify.com/mutualistic_housing/discourse-forum-mcp | https://mutualistic-housing--discourse-forum-mcp.apify.actor/mcp |
| Google Trends Realtime & Entities MCP | i0OFE realtime trends, trending/rss news, Knowledge Graph autocomplete entities | https://apify.com/mutualistic_housing/google-trends-realtime-mcp | https://mutualistic-housing--google-trends-realtime-mcp.apify.actor/mcp |

# Actor input Schema

## `domains` (type: `array`):

Advertiser domains to search (full URLs are accepted and normalized, for example https://www.stripe.com/pricing becomes stripe.com). If domains, advertiser IDs and queries are all empty, the prefilled example domains are used.

## `advertiserIds` (type: `array`):

Google Ads Transparency advertiser IDs (format AR followed by digits, for example AR15750685014863380481).

## `queries` (type: `array`):

Free-text brand or company names. Each query is resolved to the best matching verified advertiser (or domain) before searching creatives.

## `adFormat` (type: `string`):

Restrict results to one creative format.

## `region` (type: `string`):

ALL or a two-letter ISO country code the ads were shown in.

## `startDate` (type: `string`):

Only creatives shown on or after this date (YYYY-MM-DD).

## `endDate` (type: `string`):

Only creatives shown on or before this date (YYYY-MM-DD). Must not be before the start date.

## `minDaysShown` (type: `integer`):

Keep only creatives that were shown for at least this many days (long-running ads are usually the winners).

## `onlyWithVideo` (type: `boolean`):

Keep only creatives that are video ads or reference a YouTube video.

## `includeAdCopy` (type: `boolean`):

Fetch the creative preview payload to extract headline, description, call to action, landing URL and video ID.

## `maxItems` (type: `integer`):

Maximum number of ad creatives to return (and be charged for). 0 returns nothing.

## `maxTotalChargeUsd` (type: `number`):

Hard spending cap for this run; results are truncated so the charge never exceeds it.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "domains": [
    "stripe.com",
    "shopify.com",
    "openai.com"
  ],
  "adFormat": "ALL",
  "region": "ALL",
  "onlyWithVideo": false,
  "includeAdCopy": true,
  "maxItems": 100
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `creatives` (type: `string`):

Dataset items containing normalized Google Ads Transparency creatives.

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    "domains": [
        "stripe.com",
        "shopify.com",
        "openai.com"
    ]
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("mutualistic_housing/google-ads-transparency-mcp").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = { "domains": [
        "stripe.com",
        "shopify.com",
        "openai.com",
    ] }

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("mutualistic_housing/google-ads-transparency-mcp").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{
  "domains": [
    "stripe.com",
    "shopify.com",
    "openai.com"
  ]
}' |
apify call mutualistic_housing/google-ads-transparency-mcp --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,mutualistic_housing/google-ads-transparency-mcp"
        }
    }
}
```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/rBMTPIY88nkIkD804/builds/3E0cbY98o5E1vgf1L/openapi.json