Should I hire an AdWords agency or do it myself?

It’s a question many small to medium businesses ask.

They wonder if it is worth spending money to have someone actively manage their AdWords campaign.

I know paying someone else to manage a campaign can sometimes feel more like an expense than a benefit. I get it – I’ve even been there myself with other services that I use.

One critical thing to consider is the number of changes and innovations that Google introduce into AdWords.

According to Lucinda Barlow Google’s Marketing Manager for Australia and New Zealand,  over 1,000 changes were made to the AdWords platform in the last year.

Think about it – that’s almost 3 changes a day!  That’s a lot of change for any business to understand let alone manage.

Do you really have time to keep up to date with the changes? Do you log into your account regularly to see whats going on? Or do you just sit there and let it drift along?

I know for a fact that in most cases, a client will start of with the best intention to manage it themselves only to find that work gets in the way.

By the time they come back to us, they haven’t logged into their account for months (until something happens).

So they come back for a health check or for us to manage their campaign again.

As you can see there is a false economy in managing it yourself – not only is there a time cost of keeping up to date with changes and implementing changes, there is a monetary cost. In addition, keeping track of performance is often one of the last things on their mind.

And that’s where I see the key benefit of dealing with a specialist Google AdWords agency like ourselves to manage your campaign.

Not only do we stay up to date with all the changes, we have a systematic process to manage your campaign so it doesn’t get left on the shelf to expire.

Dramatic words?

Maybe.

I know from experience that, most clients who leave eventually come back because they realise they don’t have time to focus on it after all and when they do, it absorbs too much of their time.

I’m not going to lie, staying up to date with all the changes is challenging. Sometimes we struggle to understand the implications straight away. Some innovations that we don’t think will impact an account do.

The point is that it is checked and adjusted regularly.

As a Google certified partner we are evaluated by Google to ensure we meet best practices. We also get an insight into different trends which may also impact your campaign. Things that impact your campaign are picked up early and adjusted.

So let’s explore what’s involved in managing an Adwords campaign:

  • Regularly logging in to your Adwords account & adjusting  a campaign to improve performance.
  • Make small (and sometimes big) changes to your campaign. Key changes include adjusting bids, adding negative keywords, changing keyword match types and adjusting your ad copy.
  • Review your ad extensions so your ads get more real estate in Google
  • Ensure conversion tracking is set up and that it is checked regularly – its amazing how often we find small changes to a website have a big impact on a campaigns performance
  • Keep an eye on your competitors and their actions – sometimes new competitors can have a massive impact on a campaign’s performance
  • Monitoring your quality score and fixing any issues with quality score
  • Implementing the many changes and new features that become available in AdWords that you most likely aren’t aware of
  • Review your impression share and make recommendations on budgetary changes
  • Analysing the data to see where tweaks can be made with scheduling, bidding by device
  • Reporting on your results so you see if they are improving

Like many professional services, managing an AdWords campaign is a skill that takes time  to learn.

If you don’t have the time to learn how to do this well, or have the tools to evaluate whether or not your campaign is working, then you’re missing opportunities to get more pound from your advertising dollar.

I like to think of an AdWords service like a financial planning service.

Sure I could do a financial plan myself, but researching all the available options and doing the financial modelling would take me weeks (if not months). If I left my financial plan to myself, I’d start off with gusto but it would take a long time for it to happen.

As much as I’d hate to put myself in the category of a financial advisor, paying someone to managing an AdWords campaign is kind of like that. You are investing in a service to help grow your business.

The only difference is that I don’t get paid a commission or rebate from Google and our fees aren’t nearly as high as the financial plan I recently paid for.

Want an experienced opinion on your Google Ads Campaign?

Why not contact us? We are Google AdWords Partners and offer a range of services – from AdWords health checks to full service AdWords management.