If you are running paid search at scale it is likely you will hand over the running of an account to a third party, which is where things get complicated; but too many advertisers don’t know what their agency is doing. This is where the advertiser needs to insist on full visibility. It is important to have full access to all your SE accounts, ownership of the SE accounts and data, detailed performance reports and access to the specialist search engine teams. This will help you learn to have confidence in your agency; inevitably there will be periods where you lose track, and that’s where you have to trust your agency to keep you up to date with projects that are being undertaken.
It is also important to understand working with an agency is not a black and white model. Using a hybrid of outsourcing technology and strategic services can work well for advertisers with large and complex campaigns. Ask yourself, who is best to control tasks such as bid management, measurement, inventory, forecasting, ad copy, landing pages etc; can you realistically do it all yourself? Use pixel tracking to measure conversions, and use data feeds to send us information about rejections and cancellations - are you able to deliver this information to an agency, and are they able to take it? Clear communication and measurement is the key to a transparent relationship.
At Efficient Frontier we provide different levels of service to ensure that each client gets the correct level of support, from Full Service through to Technology Only - in fact our Technology Only clients have the same dashboard privileges that we do, meaning that they can steer our technology themselves (with guidance).
By following these guidelines, we aim to build on the trust that each client puts in us to run and optimise their search marketing campaigns.
Jimmy Felstead
UK Account Manager
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