There are two costs in running Google Ads, and a lot of quotes blur them together. One is the money you pay Google for clicks. The other is what you pay someone to make those clicks worth having.
This post is about the second one: how agencies and freelancers in the UK charge for management, what each model rewards, and what to look for before you sign anything.
Ad spend and management are separate things
Ad spend is what Google charges when someone clicks your ad. It goes to Google, and ideally it goes straight from your card to Google, in an account you own.
The management fee is for the work: building the campaigns, choosing keywords, writing ads, setting up tracking, checking the search terms, and fixing what isn't working.
If a quote gives you one number for both, ask for them split out. You want to know how much of your money is buying clicks and how much is paying for the person. Some agencies run your ads through their own account and bill you a single total, which makes it very hard to see either figure, and harder still to leave.
The three ways people charge
A flat monthly fee
You pay the same amount each month for the management, whatever you spend on clicks. This is the simplest model to understand and to budget for.
The risk is a fee so low the work can't be done properly. Managing an account well takes time every week. If the fee only covers an hour a month, that's roughly what you'll get.
A percentage of ad spend
The agency takes a set percentage of whatever you spend with Google, usually with a monthly minimum on top.
It sounds fair, because a bigger account is more work. The problem is the incentive. Under a percentage model, the agency earns more when you spend more, not when you get more enquiries. Cutting wasted spend, which is often the single most useful thing anyone can do in a new account, makes them less money.
Most people working on percentage are honest, and plenty will tell you to spend less. But you're relying on them acting against their own fee, and it's better to choose a model where you don't have to.
Hourly or day rate
Common with freelancers and consultants. It suits one-off work, like an audit or a rebuild, better than ongoing management. For a monthly retainer it makes the bill unpredictable, and you end up wondering whether a quiet month means a well-run account or one nobody looked at.
What it typically costs
We won't quote market statistics we can't stand behind, so here are honest generalities rather than survey figures.
- Very cheap management, the low hundreds of pounds a month or less, usually means a template account, automated reporting and very little hands-on time. Sometimes that's enough for a tiny account. Often it isn't.
- A proper flat fee for a local business tends to sit in the few hundred pounds a month range, sometimes with a setup charge for the first month.
- Larger accounts, with lots of campaigns, products or locations, cost more because they genuinely take more time.
A setup fee isn't a red flag in itself. The first month is usually the heaviest: restructuring the account, fixing conversion tracking, and building a landing page that matches what people searched for. It's reasonable for that to be priced separately, as long as the quote says what it covers.
What a reasonable ad budget looks like
The management fee only makes sense against a budget big enough to learn from. If you spend £200 a month on clicks and £300 on management, most of your money is going on the person, and there won't be enough data for them to improve much.
For most local businesses, around £750 a month in ad spend is a sensible minimum. Below that, you often get so few clicks that it's hard to tell a good week from luck. It varies by trade, since some searches are much more expensive than others, but if your budget is well under that, it's worth asking whether SEO or Google Ads should come first.
Questions to ask before you sign
- Whose account is it? It should be yours, in your name, with your card on it.
- Is the fee flat or a percentage? If it's a percentage, ask what happens to their fee when they cut waste.
- What does setup include? Tracking, landing pages, account structure, or just "onboarding"?
- What do the reports lead with? Enquiries and cost per enquiry, or impressions and clicks?
- Is there a lock-in? A long minimum term mostly protects the agency.
How we charge
Our Google Ads management is a flat fee and never a percentage of spend.
- £600 for the first month, which covers building or restructuring the account, fixing the tracking and designing and building the first landing page in house.
- £300 a month after that.
- Both plus VAT.
Your ad spend is separate and goes straight to Google, in your own account. You own it, and you keep it if you leave. In our experience the obvious waste stops within the first fortnight, and the genuine improvement takes six to eight weeks.
If you'd like a second opinion before committing to anyone, we do a free Google Ads audit and write the findings down whether or not you go further. There's more on how we work as a PPC agency in Leicester, or get in touch and we'll take a look.
