What is it that makes PPC a winner amongst many business owners across the globe?

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Duncan Parry, Co-founder of </span><a href="https://www.wordtracker.com/academy/pay-per-click/getting-started/ppc-facts"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Steak Digital</span></a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> once said that, “PPC is like a cross between Scrabble and Sudoku”.</span>

Your location targeting may be constricted, but your choice of keywords is practically endless.

<span style="font-weight: 400;">In fact, last year it was reported that 41% of clicks go to the top 3 paid ads on the search results page. And according to </span><a href="https://economicimpact.google.com/about/#/?sections_activeEl=methodology"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Google's Economic Impact Report</span></a><span style="font-weight: 400;">, businesses are currently making an average of $2 in revenue for every $1 they spend on AdWords.</span>

Not convinced?

In the mid 2000’s, a group of businessmen decided to make a change.

They were troubled by the environmental impact of traditional five-gallon water coolers.

They set out to protect the planet, and designed a bottomless water cooler that would have a minimal effect on the ecosystem.

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Cleverly, they named their product </span><a href="http://quenchwater.com/"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Quench</span></a><span style="font-weight: 400;">, and business was slowly on the rise up until 2009.</span>

In a bid to maximise their returns, they decided to focus on Google AdWords as a source of revenue.

From 2009 to 2011, Quench received these results:
<ul>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">100% growth in revenue</span></li>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">75% expansion in employee base</span></li>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Growth in the market, from 15 to 35 local stores.</span></li>
</ul>
<span data-offset-key="7ma3j-0-0">As it stands, 2/3's of sales </span><span class="passivevoice"><span data-offset-key="7ma3j-1-0">are generated</span></span><span data-offset-key="7ma3j-2-0"> online.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">All because they made the decision to adopt sponsored search advertising into their marketing approach.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">You may be thinking, ‘why pay someone to do my PPC campaign, when I can potentially do myself’?</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Well, outsourcing your PPC campaign to the right agency is a solid investment.</span>

It allows you to free up your time and resources, meaning you can focus on what matters the most.

<span style="font-size: 25px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">Business growth.</span>

<img class="aligncenter wp-image-2657" style="padding-bottom: 50px;" src="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/What-to-look-for-when-choosing-a-PPC-agency-www.ruleranalytics.com_.gif" alt="What to look for when choosing a PPC agency - www.ruleranalytics.com" width="750" height="562" />

<span class="hardreadability"><span data-offset-key="48sn2-0-0">Not only will they take responsibility for time consuming tasks, but they will achieve levels of success that are hard to come by on your own</span></span><span data-offset-key="48sn2-1-0">.</span>

Even though there’s an ocean of choice, making the right decision isn’t easy.

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Trust me, I’ve been there.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">PPC is an industry that suffers from many afflictions. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Whether it be a misunderstanding from the client’s perspective or overselling from the vendors. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">The technical nature of PPC is not something people have an intuitive understanding of.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">With that said, it’s easy for the bad eggs to use this as a way of fooling clients into paying them for lousy work.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">However, these people shouldn’t put you off your search when trying to find a PPC agency. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Luckily, once you know what to look for, they’re easy to spot. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Below we’ve outlined a few red flags that you should bear in mind, when it comes to choosing a PPC agency.</span>

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 30px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">More Salespeople Than Strategists/Specialists
</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">I don’t think there’s an industry in the world that’s more blighted with snake oil salesmen. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Personally, I am aware of too many churn and burn agencies who use the mystique of something unknown to pull the wool over someone’s eyes.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">In the SEO industry, they’re easy to identify.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">If someone is offering you a guaranteed 1st page placement on Google...</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">...TURN AWAY IMMEDIATELY!</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Any 1st page placement worth ranking for is very difficult to achieve.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Instead of getting traffic and customers from an organic source, you’ll end up with ranking for a shoddy term that no one searches for and empty pockets.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Most PPC agencies usually offer SEO services alongside. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">How confident are they that they’ll get you to the first page?</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">It simply goes against intuition. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">In this case, the less confident an agency is, the better the choice.</span>

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 30px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">All Talk, No Action
</span>

The Cambridge Dictionary defines the old idiom ‘the gift of the gab’ as:

<img class="aligncenter" style="border: 1px solid grey;" src="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/What-To-Look-Out-For-When-Choosing-a-PPC-Agency-www.ruleranalytics.com_-1.png" alt="What To Look Out For When Choosing a PPC Agency - www.ruleranalytics.com" width="751" height="188" />
<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 14px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_r;">"The <a href="http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/gift-of-the-gab">ability to speak easily and confidently</a> in a way that makes people want to listen to you and believe you:
She's got the gift of the gab - she should work in sales and marketing".
</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Some people are great at talking the talk, but lack the ‘doing’ part.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Thankfully, there’s a very simple way to diagnose whether an PPC agency is backing up their chit-chat with actions. </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Simply log into your Google AdWords account (if you don’t have access to this, you should. If they don’t let you, leave them.)</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">In the top menu go to ‘Tools’, dropdown and select ‘Change History’.</span></p>
<img class="aligncenter" style="padding-bottom: 50px;" src="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/What-To-Look-Out-For-When-Choosing-a-PPC-Agency-www.ruleranalytics.com_.jpg" alt="What To Look Out For When Choosing a PPC Agency - www.ruleranalytics.com" width="755" height="238" />
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Here, you’ll be able to see every change that was applied to your account, when they were made and who made them.</span></p>
<img class="aligncenter" style="border: 1px solid grey;" src="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/What-To-Look-Out-For-When-Choosing-a-PPC-Agency-www.ruleranalytics.com_.png" alt="What To Look Out For When Choosing a PPC Agency - www.ruleranalytics.com" width="750" height="312" />
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Bing Ads has a similar feature, also called Change History, but this time it’s located within the Campaign and Ad Group sections.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><img class="aligncenter wp-image-2663" src="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/What-To-Look-Out-For-When-Choosing-a-PPC-Agency-www.ruleranalytics.com_.gif" alt="What To Look Out For When Choosing a PPC Agency - www.ruleranalytics.com" width="750" height="343" /></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 16px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">Image source: <a href="http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2012/03/28/google-adwords-change-history-tool">Wordstream</a>
</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">For your PPC campaign to grow profitably, you must expect changes on a regular basis to your account. </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">If you sign up to a PPC agency and don’t see changes, then you may need to ask some questions as to why.</span></p>
&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 30px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">They’re Reactive
</span>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Being reactive is one of the easiest ways to become mediocre, in your marketing, in your life, and beyond. </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">If you only hear from an agency when they’re prompted, then there’s a good chance you’re not going to receive the service you deserve.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;">A good agency will let you know what steps they’re putting in place to improve your campaigns.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span class="hardreadability"><span data-offset-key="9tles-0-0">Any barriers they’re attempting to maneuver, plus mistakes they’ve made that could </span></span><span class="adverb"><span data-offset-key="9tles-1-0">potentially</span></span><span class="hardreadability"><span data-offset-key="9tles-2-0"> impact your business before it’s too late</span></span><span data-offset-key="9tles-3-0">.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">You can spot a reactive agency in how they communicate with you;</span></p>
<span style="font-weight: 400;">“I can’t…”
</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I have to…”
</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">“If only…”</span>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Reactive agencies don’t take responsibility for their actions, it’s never their choice and there’s always something else to blame. </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Instead, look for an agency that says; </span></p>
<span style="font-weight: 400;">“we can…”
</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">“we will…”
</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">“we prefer…” </span>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: 400;"> When discussing how they will tackle your challenges.</span></p>
&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 30px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">Riding The High Horse
</span>

Most clients aren’t as knowledgeable as the agencies employ - why would you employ someone to help you with something you already know?

For some reason, a few agencies are abusing their position of knowledge.

You’re well within your rights to ask questions.

If you don’t ask questions, how are you meant to understand how things work?

If an agency is as good as they as they are, then it shouldn’t take them more than a few moments to form a reasonable answer.

<strong>It’s like the popular mantra says:</strong>

<img class="aligncenter wp-image-2664" src="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/What-To-Look-Out-For-When-Choosing-a-PPC-Agency-www.ruleranalytics.com_-1.jpg" alt="What To Look Out For When Choosing a PPC Agency - www.ruleranalytics.com" width="749" height="421" />

&nbsp;

<span style="font-weight: 400;">“If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough”.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">If an agency refuses to explain things to you, that tells me that they don’t understand it well enough. </span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">Or they don’t value the importance of human communication.</span>

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 30px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">No Domain Experience
</span>

<span class="veryhardreadability"><span data-offset-key="7fk05-0-0">An agency may be able to explain the technicalities of AdWords in extreme detail.</span></span>

<span class="veryhardreadability"><span data-offset-key="7fk05-0-0">But, do they have experience working with other businesses in your industry</span></span><span data-offset-key="7fk05-1-0">?</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">All of these factors will have a huge impact on how your campaigns are assembled.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">If an agency can’t back up their technical knowledge with industry experience, take your business elsewhere.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">With some things, there really is no experience without knowledge - unless you want to play the part as guinea pig in their experiment?</span>

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 30px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">No Focus on Unit Economics
</span>

A PPC agency might think that their job is to spend your budget on as many <a href="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/blog/online-marketing/your-lead-generation-goals-are-dead/">clicks and conversions as possible</a>, but they’re wrong.

Their work should be to make your pay-per-click campaign a self-perpetuating investment machine.

Money in, money out, at a ratio that fits your business.

This may seem a little complicated, but an agency should always aim to be acquiring customers at a percentage of what those customers are worth.

Companies look to acquire new customers at 20 - 80% of the customer’s lifetime value.

This however depends on where your growth priorities lie.

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 30px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">Metrics: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
</span>

<img class="aligncenter wp-image-2665" src="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/What-To-Look-Out-For-When-Choosing-a-PPC-Agency-www.ruleranalytics.com_-1.gif" alt="" width="748" height="324" />

<span style="font-weight: 400;">If you’re a results driven person like me, metrics will be the lifeblood of your work.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">PPC is an incredibly data-rich practise. However, just because the data is there doesn’t mean it’s being utilised properly.</span>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">We’ve outlined the 3 phases of reporting that tends to happen.</span>

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 25px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">The Ugly: we got 500 clicks from paid search.
</span>

<strong>What’s dreadfully wrong with this?</strong>

If you walked into a shop and tried to buy something with a click someone would call the police on you. A click has absolutely zero value in isolation.

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 25px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">The Bad: we got 100 conversions from £5,000 spend.
</span>

<b>What’s wrong with this?</b>

<span style="font-weight: 400;">OK, we’re getting better, but we’re still dealing in arbitrary terms. What exactly is a conversion? Has someone joined my newsletter mailing list, or has a fortune 500 company taken out a yearly contract at £100,000 per month?</span>

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 25px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">The Good: we generated 212 customers who are worth/estimated to be worth
£10,500 in revenue over the next 12 months, representing a 2x Return on Ad Spend.
</span>

<strong>What’s right with this?</strong>

Now we’re talking in terms of what matters - <a href="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/case-studies/leading-law-firm-masters-marketing-measurement-ruler-analytics/">revenue</a>! Marketing is an investment and should be treated as one. It’s important for you to make sure the money you’re putting in is creating more value or you simply don’t have a business on your hands.

With this format, you know exactly how much more money you expect to realise on your bottom line from the investment you’ve made.

Including, timescales and forecasts allows you to budget more effectively.

&nbsp;

<span style="font-size: 25px; font-color: #45474d; font-family: proxima_nova_alt_rg;">What Have We Learnt?
</span>

Sadly, just like any other industry there are people out there who only care about making a quick dollar.

Even if it’s at the expense of someone else.

Just remember, you’re in control, you’re the boss. If something doesn’t sound right, question it!!

Stay focused, the purpose of finding a PPC agency is to help your <a href="https://www.ruleranalytics.com/blog/ppc/you-probably-arent-measuring-your-ppc-campaigns-properly/">business grow profitably</a>.

I hope I have inspired you to make the right choices when it comes to choosing your PPC agency.

…and maybe I'll see your PPC ad in a search engine near me soon.

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