Google Ads consultant, UK
A Google Ads consultant reads the account first and sells nothing until it is read
A Google Ads consultant is one person who looks at your account, works out where the money is going and tells you in writing what to change. With Pay Per Click Management that person is Daniel Stoychev: the audit costs £150, comes back within 5 working days, and lists the changes in the order to make them, whether your own team makes them, we make them for a one-off fee, or we run the account for a flat fee from £249 a month.
Consultant, agency, freelancer or in-house
Four ways to get help with Google Ads, and which one fits which account
The word consultant gets used for all four. They differ in who holds the login, how the fee moves with your spend and what happens when the engagement ends.
| What they do | How they charge | Who holds the account | Fits when | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Consultant | Reads the account, writes the plan, coaches whoever makes the changes | By the job or the day | You | You have someone to do the work and want a second, independent read |
| Agency | Runs the account day to day and reports monthly | Usually 10 to 20 per cent of spend | Often the agency | Nobody in the business has the hours, and spend is above about £1,000 a month |
| Freelancer | Runs or advises, depending on the person | Hourly or a small retainer | Varies, ask | Small spend, one campaign type, a short project |
| In-house | Runs it as part of a marketing job | Salary | You | Spend is large enough that one person's time is cheaper than a fee |
| PPC Management | All of the first row, and the second if you want it | £150 audit, £199 setup, or £249 to £599 a month flat | You, always | You want the person who wrote the advice to be the one accountable for it |
What the consulting job is
Six weeks, in order, from the first read to the handover
This is the shape of a consulting engagement on an account that is already spending. On a new account the first fortnight is replaced by the account setup, and the rest is the same.
- 1
Week 1: the read
Ninety days of the Search Terms report, the change history, every conversion action and its source, the bid strategies and their data, impression share by campaign, the landing page of each ad group on a phone. Nothing is changed. The output is the written audit, within 5 working days of access.
- 2
Week 2: the plan on a call
One hour on a shared screen going through the audit in order: the changes that stop waste this week (negatives, presence targeting, display expansion off, auto-apply off), the changes that need a decision (campaign structure, brand bidding, Performance Max), and the ones that wait for data (a target CPA once tracking is clean).
- 3
Weeks 3 and 4: the changes
Either your team makes them with the list open, or we make them from your account for the setup fee. Conversion tracking is fixed first, because every later decision is only as good as the numbers it reads. Every change goes in the change history under a name you can see.
- 4
Weeks 5 and 6: the second read
A shorter read of what moved: search terms after the negatives, cost per lead against the baseline, whether Smart Bidding now has the thirty or so conversions a month it needs before it is given a target. Then the decision: your team carries on with a written routine, or the account moves to flat-fee management.
Where a consultant earns the fee
The five findings that pay for the audit on most accounts
The same faults appear in most accounts we read, because most were built by the campaign wizard and then left. Location targeting on “presence or interest”, so a Bristol removals firm pays for clicks from people abroad who once searched for Bristol. Search partners and display expansion switched on inside a Search campaign. Page views or engaged sessions imported as conversions, so the bidding learns to chase visits. Broad match keywords with no negative lists, so the Search Terms report reads like a list of other people's businesses. And a Maximise Conversions strategy with no target, spending the whole budget by definition.
None of those is hard to fix. What they need is someone who has read the account rather than the dashboard, and who has no reason to leave them in place. A consultant paid by the job has none.
What to ask any consultant
Seven questions, and the answers you want
- Will the account stay in my name? Yes, always. Anything else is a hostage.
- Who exactly will read it? A name, with their certifications and the dates they were taken.
- What do I get in writing? The audit as a document, with each change and its expected effect.
- How is the fee calculated? By the job or the spend band. Never a percentage of what you spend.
- Will you apply Google's recommendations? Only the ones the data supports, declined in writing otherwise.
- How will I know the changes were made? The change history in your own account, under their name.
- What happens at the end? A written routine your team can follow, and read access removed on request.
Fees
Priced by the job, credited if you carry on
The written audit is £150, within 5 working days. The account setup or rebuild is £199 one-off, and the audit fee comes off it. Management is a flat £249, £399 or £599 a month by spend band with a 3-month minimum, described on the pricing page. A one-off consulting project outside those three, such as training an in-house team or restructuring a large account, is quoted after the audit, in writing, as a fixed figure.
Not sure the account needs a consultant?
The free Google Ads check reads six settings in your account from the customer ID alone and comes back in writing within 72 hours. If the six are clean, we say so and there is nothing to buy. The should-I-run-it-myself answer covers the hours the routine takes if you keep it in-house.
Related
Where this connects
PPC audit
The written audit in full: what is read, what comes back, £150.
Google Ads management
The weekly and monthly routine if the account moves to us.
Reading the Search Terms report
The report a consultant opens first, and how to read it yourself.
Get a quote
Your spend and sector; the fee and the first findings in reply.
Questions businesses ask before booking a consultant
What is the difference between a Google Ads consultant and an agency?
A consultant is one named person who reads your account and tells you, in writing, what to change and why; you keep the account and can make the changes yourself. An agency takes the account over and runs it. Here the two are the same person: the consultant who writes the audit is the one who would manage the account if you asked, so the advice is never written to sell the management.
How much does a Google Ads consultant charge in the UK?
Day rates from freelance consultants run from about £300 to £800, and many charge by the hour on top of a retainer. Ours is priced by the job: the written audit is £150 and comes back within 5 working days, the account setup or rebuild is £199 one-off, and ongoing management is a flat £249 to £599 a month by spend band. The audit fee is credited against the setup if you go ahead.
Can you consult on an account my own team runs?
Yes, and it is the most common way we work as a consultant. Your team keeps the login, we take read access, the audit lists the changes in the order to make them with the expected effect of each, and we go through the list on a call. Most in-house teams then make the changes themselves and book a second read after a month.
Do you need access to my Google Ads account for the audit?
Read-only access to your customer ID, granted from your own account, is enough. We never ask you to move the account into ours: the account, the history and the conversion data stay in your name whatever happens afterwards.
Are you Google certified?
The certifications held by the person who reads your account are stated in writing on request, with the dates they were taken, so you can check them against Google's own records. We do not display a Partner badge on this site because the badge measures an agency's total spend and optimisation score across many accounts, not the quality of advice on yours.
Can a consultant help before I have spent anything?
Yes. If the account does not exist yet, the consulting job is the setup: structure agreed in writing, conversion tracking installed and tested, negatives seeded from your sector, the ads written, and the settings Google switches on by default switched off. That is the £199 account setup, and you can run it yourself afterwards or hand it to us.
Where are you based, and does it matter?
We are in Wrexham, and it does not: every account is read from a browser and every call is held over a shared screen, so a business in Aberdeen gets the same read as one in Wrexham. The only thing that changes with distance is whether we have met.
Send the customer ID and the audit starts
Read access from your own account, the written audit within 5 working days, and the changes in order. The account stays yours whatever you decide.