The problem with choosing a PPC management company
Most businesses only find out their PPC management wasn't up to scratch after six months of disappointing results and wasted budget. By then you've paid management fees, your Google Ads account has been restructured (often not well), and disentangling yourself is more complicated than it needed to be.
The good news is that most bad PPC agencies and consultants give themselves away before you sign anything, if you know what to look for. After 20 years of managing Google Ads accounts, here's what separates genuinely good PPC management from the kind that costs you more than it makes you.
I've audited accounts where clients had been paying a well-reviewed agency £900 a month for over a year. When I looked at the account, the search terms report hadn't been reviewed in four months. There were 47 irrelevant queries, including job searches and competitor brand names, spending budget every week. The Quality Scores were below 4 on the core keywords. The agency's monthly report showed impressions, clicks, and CTR. Nothing about conversions. The client had no idea. This isn't unusual. It's the norm with agencies that have too many clients and too little process.
8 signs of good PPC management
1. They ask about your business before talking about their service
A good PPC consultant or agency starts with questions, not a pitch. What do you sell? Who are your best customers? What's your average order value or client lifetime value? What have you tried before and what happened?
Without understanding your business economics, it's impossible to give you a meaningful proposal. If a company skips straight to pricing or a standard "packages" slide, they're selling a generic service, not a solution to your specific problem.
2. They talk about leads and revenue, not clicks and impressions
Clicks are not results. Impressions are not results. Leads, calls, sales, and revenue are results.
A good PPC management company talks about what matters to your business, cost per lead, return on ad spend, revenue generated, not about how many people saw your ads. If their pitch is heavy on reach, visibility, and impressions, ask them directly: "What does success look like in terms of leads or sales?" Watch how they answer.
3. They explain what they'll actually do each month
Good PPC management is ongoing, active work. Keyword analysis, search term reviews, negative keyword updates, bid adjustments, ad copy testing, Quality Score monitoring, landing page recommendations. A good manager will be able to describe this work specifically.
Vague answers like "we'll optimise your campaigns" and "we use proprietary technology" are not answers. Press them: what does optimisation mean, in practice, in my account, every month?
4. They give you access to your own account
This is non-negotiable. Your Google Ads account belongs to you. Any PPC management company worth working with will manage your campaigns in your own Google Ads account, not theirs. You should be able to log in, see your campaigns, and access all your historical data at any time.
Agencies that run your campaigns in their own account, and therefore take your data with them when you leave, are creating a dependency that benefits them, not you.
5. They're clear about what they charge and what it covers
Transparent pricing is a basic requirement. You should know exactly what the management fee is, what it covers, and how it's separated from your ad budget. Management fees and ad spend should never be bundled together. Your advertising budget goes to Google, and your management fee goes to your agency or consultant.
If a company is vague about pricing, adds percentage-of-spend charges, or suggests that management fees include ad spend, get it clarified in writing before you proceed.
6. They set realistic expectations
If a PPC company promises you top position, guaranteed results, or a specific ROI before they've seen your account, that's a red flag, not a selling point. Good Google Ads management involves uncertainty: testing, learning, and improving over time.
A good manager will give you realistic expectations based on your budget, your industry, your competition, and your current setup. They might tell you something you don't want to hear: "Your website needs work before your ads will convert." That honesty is worth more than a guaranteed promise that can't be kept.
7. They report on what actually happened and why
Monthly reports should tell you what happened, what it cost, and what changed as a result. They should explain the decisions made: why a keyword was paused, why a bid strategy was changed, what the test results showed.
Reports that are just dashboards full of numbers without interpretation are not useful. You should be able to read a monthly report and understand whether things are improving and what's being done about the things that aren't.
8. They're accessible
When you have a question about your campaigns, you should be able to ask it and get a sensible answer within a working day. Not from a ticketing system, not from an account manager who needs to check with the person actually doing the work.
This is why many businesses do better working with an independent PPC consultant than with an agency. Agencies have layers. You want the person managing your account.
5 red flags that should make you walk away
If they promise top position, walk away. Nobody can guarantee top position in Google Ads, it's an auction. Companies that promise it are lying to get your business.
If they want a 12-month minimum contract, that's a problem. Legitimate PPC management doesn't require locking you in for a year. If results are good, you'll stay. A long lock-in is a sign they know you might want to leave.
If they can't explain your Quality Score, they don't know what they're doing. Quality Score is fundamental to Google Ads performance and cost.
If they mark up your ad spend, charging you for ad budget and keeping a percentage, that's a conflict of interest. Your entire advertising budget should go directly to Google, not through your agency first.
If they don't ask about your conversion tracking in the first conversation, that tells you something. Without knowing what's converting, there's no way to know if Google Ads is working. Any serious PPC manager asks about this immediately.
Why Google Partner status is not a quality signal
Many businesses treat Google Partner or Premier Partner status as a mark of quality. I'd be careful with that. Google Partner status is partly based on ad spend managed, which means agencies with large client portfolios can qualify regardless of the results they produce for individual clients. Some of the worst-managed accounts I've audited belonged to clients of Premier Partner agencies. The badge tells you the agency spends a lot. It doesn't tell you they spend it well. Client case studies, specific results, and access to whoever will actually work on your account are more reliable indicators than certification.
What good PPC management looks like in practice
When I take on a new Google Ads client, the first month is always an audit and rebuild. I look at what's been running, identify the waste, restructure around buyer intent, fix conversion tracking, and establish clean baselines before we start optimising.
From month two onwards, it's weekly reviews, monthly reporting, and a continuous cycle of testing and improvement. The goal is always the same: more qualified leads or sales for the same or less spend. One example: a good manager will test whether your branded search campaigns are actually needed or just burning budget rather than leaving them running on autopilot.
Before you get to that point, it's worth reading 5 Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Digital Advertising Agency: those questions will help you separate the good from the bad in any initial conversation. And if you're trying to decide whether it's even the right time to outsource, When Is the Right Time to Outsource Your PPC Management? covers exactly that.
If you're based in North Wales or anywhere in the UK and want an honest assessment of your current PPC management, or lack of it, I offer a free account audit with no obligation.
