This is one of the most common versions of the question I get, and it usually arrives sounding a bit apologetic. Something like: we hired an agency, they send reports, the reports look fine, and I have no idea whether any of it is working. Who’s supposed to be checking?
It’s a fair question, and the honest answer is that most agency agreements assume somebody on your side owns the strategy. Not the campaign settings, the strategy: what you’re trying to grow, what a lead is worth to you, what gets cut when something isn’t working. Agencies are generally set up to execute well against a plan. The plan is supposed to come from you. In a company where the owner is also running crews, quoting jobs and handling payroll, that seat is usually just empty, and nothing in the process points it out.
What agency oversight actually involves
When I do this for a client, they keep their agency. I’m not there to replace anyone or to run the ads myself. The work breaks into a few pieces:
- Setting the target. One agreed definition of a lead, a cost per lead we’re managing to, and a cost per booked job we’d like to reach. Written down, so every later conversation refers to the same numbers.
- Verifying the measurement. Before judging results, confirming the tracking counts real leads once, and that phone calls, forms and Google Business Profile calls all land somewhere visible.
- Reading the reporting critically. Not rewriting it. Asking what the numbers mean, what’s missing, and what changed month to month.
- Running the monthly call. A standing agenda: what happened, what we learned, what we’re changing next month and who owns it.
- Keeping decisions from drifting. Following up that the three things agreed last month actually happened.
- Translating for you. So you can read your own account and don’t have to take anyone’s word for it, including mine.
The last one matters more than it sounds. My favorite outcome is a client who opens their own dashboard, sees impression share lost to budget at 40 percent, and knows immediately that their daily budget ran out mid-day rather than that customers chose a competitor. That’s a five-minute lesson that pays for itself every month afterward.
Signs the seat is empty
Rather than a list of failures, here are the questions I’d ask yourself. Neutral, and quick to answer:
- Do you know your cost per lead and your cost per booked job this month, without opening an email?
- Has anyone confirmed in the last six months that your lead tracking is recording every lead once?
- When you read the monthly report, is there a section you skim because you’re not sure what it means?
- Do the same three recommendations appear month after month?
- If you asked your agency to stop doing the least productive thing in the account, would you know what to point at?
If most of those land on no, it isn’t a sign anything’s been handled badly. It’s a sign that the oversight work hasn’t been assigned to anybody, which is the normal state of things. The reports these platforms produce are built to show activity, not to help an owner decide what to do next.
Doesn’t the agency do this?
Partly, and the good ones do more of it. But there are things an agency structurally can’t do for you. It can’t tell you that the channel it’s paid to run is the wrong place for your next dollar. It can’t set your target cost per booked job, because it doesn’t know your margins. And it usually can’t see past the lead, which is where your economics actually live. An agency sees 60 leads. You know 18 of them booked.
That’s why I like the arrangement where the agency stays and someone independent owns the strategy. The agency gets clearer direction, which they’re generally glad about, and you get someone whose only job is your outcome.
What it costs, and how to compare
You’ve got roughly four options for filling that seat.
- Do it yourself. Cheapest in dollars, most expensive in your hours, and it’s the first thing to slide in a busy month.
- Hire a full-time marketing director or manager. Best if you’ve got enough volume to keep them busy, but that seat is easily six figures once you add benefits, and a strong hire will want a budget to command.
- Promote someone internally. Works when they have the time and the interest. It often means learning on your budget.
- Bring in a fractional CMO. Senior oversight a few hours a month, for a fraction of a full-time salary, with your existing agency staying in place.
The way I’d size it up is as one all-in monthly investment: what you spend on media, plus what you spend on management and oversight, against what that produces in booked work. To make that concrete, imagine a company spending $8,000 a month on ads with a couple of thousand in management and oversight on top. If oversight moves cost per booked job by even 15 percent, it’s covered itself before you count anything else. That’s a hypothetical, not a quote, but it’s the shape of the math I’d want you to run.
What the first 90 days look like
So the answer isn’t theoretical: month one is diagnosis. I get access, verify the tracking, read the last twelve months, and tell you plainly what I find, including the parts that are working. Month two is agreeing targets and a short plan with the agency, and cutting whatever is clearly not earning. Month three is cadence: a monthly call that always covers the same numbers, and you reading them yourself with growing confidence.
There’s usually one uncomfortable finding in month one. A campaign running for months on an outdated goal, a tracking field never filled in, two Google Business Profile listings competing with each other. I’d rather surface it early, and I’d point out that none of those things announce themselves. Nothing in these platforms prompts you to revisit a setting once it’s saved.
If you just want a second opinion first
Plenty of people aren’t ready to add anyone, they just want to know whether things are broadly okay. That’s reasonable, and it’s why my free account audit exists. I look at your ad account, your tracking and your Google Business Profile, and send you a plain summary of what I’d change and what’s fine as-is. No obligation, and you’re welcome to hand it straight to your current agency.
If you’d rather start by reading your own numbers, begin with the numbers that tell you whether your Google Ads are working. It’s the same checklist I use on the first call.