Is your AdWords account manager doing his/her job?

One of the most common things I hear when talking to adwords advertisers is that they are concerned their account manager isn’t doing a good enough job managing their account.  Considering the average monthly check they write, I can’t say I blame them.

If you’re wondering if your account manager is doing a good enough job for you, here are 5 quick & easy tips you can quickly use to evaluate their performance.

1. Are they regularly monitoring your account? If your account manager is claiming to monitor your account daily, a quick way to make sure they’re doing so is to use the “check changes” log. Google monitors every change that is made to your account and logs it.  To verify that that is actually happening, simply log into your AdWords account, and visit the “view change history” link.  If there isn’t a long list of changes to the account, and your account manager is telling you he is working on your account day in and day out, he may be misrepresenting the job he’s doing for you.  
2. Are they actually tracking conversions? One of the most powerful features of driving online traffic is that every sale, call, or lead can be tracked. Any advertiser who isn’t tracking the effectiveness of every dollar they spend online is losing out. Not only could she be spending 5x to 10x as much as necessary on the wrong keywords, but she’s also missing out on the right keywords.  I’ve seen accounts get 15x more out of their advertising dollar by simply using the tracking tools that are available for free through Google AdWords, and then turning up the profitable traffic, and turning down the less profitable traffic.
3. Are they targeting the right keywords, or just running Google on auto-pilot? Google has a few settings that, when enabled, give Google the ability to substitute terms that they think might be relevant when they’re actually terrible keywords.  More often than not, it means drastically increasing your spend on worthless traffic. To see if your account manager is bidding on keywords you actually want, don’t look at the terms they are bidding on; Look at the terms Google is actually delivering traffic for. To do this, log into your account, then go to “Keywords” > “Search Terms” and sort by cost.  If some of your most expensive terms aren’t even being bid on (and aren’t bringing in conversons), but are being accidentally delivered by simply putting Google on auto-pilot, you may want to look for an account manager who does a little more than run your account on auto-pilot.
4. Are they blindly advertising on sites other than Google?  Google uses something called “The Display Network”, which can deliver anywhere from 10x to 1000x as much traffic as traffic from the Google search engine itself.  That traffic is often 20% to 50% cheaper than search engine traffic too. Unfortunately, it’s rare that it converts anywhere near as well as search engine traffic (even at a lower cost). Anyone who is blindly advertising on the display network without knowing exactly how well those advertising dollars are being spent is losing serious money. Sometimes, they’re losing as much as 90 or 95 cents on the dollar. To check out how much of your budget is being spent on the display network, log into your account, go to the “Campaigns” tab > “Segment” > “Network (with Search Partners)” > Scroll to the bottom of the page & click “Total: All Campaigns.” Check & see how much is being spent on the Display Network. If you’re measuring conversions, compare how well it’s converting. If you’re not measuring conversions, I’d be willing to bet turning that traffic off will reduce your budget without dropping sales at all. Here is a video example of an account where we cut expenses by 90% with no drop in sales whatsoever doing nothing but cutting out the display network.
5. Are they treating computer, tablet & mobile phone traffic equally?  In some markets, computer traffic is a gold mine and mobile/tablet traffic is worthless. In other markets, it’s the reverse. One thing is for sure: No matter what the industry, all types of traffic convert differently and should be adjusted for accordingly.

If your account manager is doing 4 or 5 of the above best practices, you’re probably doing just fine.  If they’re only doing 2 or 3 of them, it may be worth interviewing a couple other account managers to see what they can do for you.  If they’re not doing any of the above (or just one), run as fast as you can. You’ll be better off managing the account on your own. (Heck, read a couple chapters of “Google AdWords for Dummies” & you’ll be way better off.)

If you’d like a free review of your adwords account, let me know. I can be reached via email or phone: joel(at)2020ppc.com or 303-906-8790

PS – If your account manager won’t let you see  your account, you should contact Google. If you are the one paying the bill, Google terms of service state that you are entitled to be able to see that account. (The only exception is if you are buying leads instead of paying for traffic.)