Google Ads is a great way to get your message out in front of people but the question is whether it’s better to do it yourself or to hire a professional. Here are some things to think about.

Pros and Cons of Running Google Ads Yourself vs Hiring a Professional

There’s no question that the Google Ads Platform is a great way to advertise your business. The best way to go about it, however, takes a little more thought.

If you do it yourself, it’s easy to get started, you can create an account and set up an ad that will run almost immediately. Your business might show up on Google searches and websites all over. You might get found for bunches of keywords. People might flock to your website and the money might start pouring in. Maybe. But without experience, how will you know if you’re getting the best results possible?

Managing an AdWords campaign isn’t just looking at the reports once a month and making a couple of changes. You need to know exactly what’s happening in the account day to day and be able to dedicate enough time each week to check key reports, make adjustments and apply new opportunities to maximize traffic and revenue. If you’re in a competitive industry, this will require daily check-ins and adjustments to bids, just to maintain the ad position and level of traffic to your website.

While there’s nothing stopping you from running Google Ads yourself, here are some more things to consider.

• It’s Complicated – The Google Ads Platform is very complex. If you want to go the DIY (Do It Yourself) route, there’s a huge learning curve. In order to get the most out of the platform, the training will take months (if not years). You’ll want to get Google Ads certification, and even with certification, you’ll want to start really small to really learn it well. All of that will require a lot of time, energy, and commitment that you’ll have to take away from the other aspects of your business.
• It’s On-Going – Once you’ve learned how to use Google Ads and started your campaigns, you’re not done. Your Google Ads campaigns will need to be constantly monitored and optimized.
  • Optimization – If you want results, you can’t just set up the campaigns and forget about them, or simply leave them be. A dedicated professional will monitor keyword performance and set up your campaigns so you are continuously getting the best results for your Google Ads marketing budget.
  • Data-Driven Decisions – You’ll have to know how to find the data that will give you the most insight into your campaigns and how to interpret that data.
  • • Can you segment data by device and tell which devices lead to the cheapest conversions?
    • Do you know which days of the week attract more active buyers?
    • Do you know how many searches your ads didn’t show for due to budget restraints?

Beyond finding and interpreting data, you’ll need to know what actions to take to improve your click-through rate, reduce your ad spending, improve your landing page experience, and more. Some of this comes from knowing the ins and outs of how AdWords works and some of it comes from experience. A professional will make decisions and adjustments to your campaign based on data. They may even provide you with a continuous report on how well your campaigns are performing, where they could be improved, and where your marketing dollars are being spent.

Still not sure if it’s better to run your own Google Ads campaign or hire a professional? Consider these questions.

• Are you comfortable with popular web technologies like HTML and JavaScript?
• Do you have the technical skills to properly set up conversion tracking, goals and events, and other analytics-related features on your website or mobile application?
• Can you dedicate at least 2 hours a week to check in and pull together key reports?
• Can you identify key reports that will give you the most insight into your campaigns?
• Are you comfortable interpreting the data in your account and knowing what actions to take to optimize your campaigns?
• Can you explain key AdWords data such as Ad Rank, Search Impression Share, Quality Score, and Interaction Rate?

If you answered yes to these, you might be okay running your own Google Ads campaign. If you answered no to any of them, however, you should probably hire an expert who can do it for you. Hiring an expert will save you time, money, and energy that you can put into other parts of your business that need them.