In my first marketing agency job, I asked a lot of questions. Like, a lot of questions…
I knew about marketing theory, but not about the actual application. I wanted to learn all I could.
Everyone was busy, of course, and nobody had the time to answer all of my questions.
“Google it” became the default response.
Needless to say, I learned very little from asking questions, and a whole lot from listening, observing, and from outside resources.
When I left that job, I knew enough about how to run a good PPC service to consult with agencies who were just starting to offer the service. The problem, however, was that I didn’t really know that much about managing ads.
I started taking on clients and quickly learned that it wasn’t as cut-and-dry as it looked on the surface.
Every day brought new challenges, new problems, new fires, and new Google Ads UI layouts (that’s onlykind of a joke).
I knew I needed to learn more to stay ahead of the avalanche, and not just about Google Ads.
9 years later, I have been through a shocking number of ups and downs with Paid Search.
I’ve been an account manager, sales & strategy rep, ad manager, paid search director, director of client services, VP, coach, trainer, consultant, and agency owner, and I’ve learned a silly amount about psychology, neuroscience, analytics, conversion rate optimization, relationships, operations, communication, sales, leadership, machine learning, and more.
The most impactful lesson I’ve learned, though, is the value of knowing where and how to find answers when I need them.
Paid Search Directors
The days of “Google it” are long gone.
The internet is an ocean of information. An ocean full of bait. And sharks. And a trigger happy coast guard.
It’s a bunch of people telling you the EXACT method to make all of your problems disappear, but when you pay them and learn all the stuff, it doesn’t work for you.
If you pay enough people and spend enough time learning, you can get the pieces you need to solve the problems, but you have to dig deep for the real pros and know what to ignore along the way.
As any real pro will tell you, experience is the most valuable asset an ad manager can have.
Certifications are worthless because they’re about theory and you can often Google the answers.
Courses are nice because experts teach you how to do the thing, but they rarely teach the principles and strategy a specialist needs to solve their own problems. One variation in the process comes along and you’re sunk.
The “how” is actually pretty easy with most Google Ads stuff.
It’s the “what”, “why”, and “when” that trip you up.
Knowing the answers to these questions only comes from experience and in the agency world, that experience needs to be both broad and deep.
To solve this problem, agencies tend to hire a Paid Search Director.
A Paid Search Director is usually a Google Ads veteran of 5-7+ years of agency experience.
After 5-7+ years of managing ads and working with other ad managers, they’ve usually seen hundreds or thousands of different accounts (or at least dozens) across different industries, seen tons of different strategies, account structures, and experiments, and have troubleshooted thousands of problems.
They know the struggles an ad manager will go through and they know how to solve it (or how to find the solution quickly, which is just as valuable).
They know how to inspire and motivate a team of ad managers, how to manage time, how to leverage tools and scripts to improve performance, and how to increase efficiency and bandwidth.
Not everyone with experience is cut out for the role, though.
I’ve had to fire ad managers with 10 years of experience because they wouldn’t learn, grow, and adapt (a MUST for this industry).
Many who excel at ad management don’t want to lead a team. They want to do the work.
I’ve found that you need to find the right blend of behavioral style, motivation, flexibility, adaptability, empathy, strategic thinking ability, vision, and desire to improve.
It’s really hard to find someone with enough ad experience in an agency with the qualities above, but they can be a game changer if you’re willing to put in the work to find (or cultivate) them.
The clincher, though, is that they tend to set you back $80,000-$120,000+ per year. I’ve seen some estimates of $220,000/yr+ for average Paid Search Director salary.
I’ve never been paid more than $160,000 for this position, though the size of the agency and team will make a difference.
This role is immensely valuable, but $6,700-$13,000 a month?
Not every agency can swing that.
How can you get the value a Paid Search Director can provide if you’re struggling to justify paying $13,000/mo (or less) between two ad managers and an account manager?
Let’s look at a list of responsibilities PSDs tend to help with and see if there are more cost-effective alternatives.
Alternative Options
What does a Paid Search Director actually do?
The role differs a bit depending on the agency, the agency’s clients, and how you run your PPC service, but most PSDs help with some or all of the following:
- Team Leadership (Training, coaching, accountability, morale, etc)
- New Hire Qualifications (interviews & vetting)
- Sales Assistance (Sometimes leveraged as a SME to close larger accounts)
- Account Strategy (What are we doing and why)
- Ad Management (Usually a few key accounts)
- Firefighting (Troubleshooting account or client relationship problems)
- Client Communication (Putting out fires, providing value, QA, etc)
- Budget Management (Optimizing allocation between campaigns)
- Account Audits (Performance and/or Strategy)
- Reporting (Usually internal, but may report to key clients)
- Client or Prospect Research (Opportunities, keywords, competitors, strategy, etc)
- Monitor & Teach Industry Trends (Learn and keep the team/clients updated)
- Inter-departmental Collaboration (Make PPC part of a comprehensive growth strategy)
- Testing & Experimentation (Drive testing initiatives in accounts and in operations)
- Tool Management (Test, utilize, and train on effective use of PPC management tools)
That’s a lot of work!
There are, honestly, no alternatives that cover all of these areas. However, there are some ways to get some of these benefits without dropping 6 figures on a Paid Search Director.
Here are a few alternative options:
DIY
It’s not scalable, but it is probably your best option in the earlier stages of your agency. If you’re the most experienced PPC expert in your agency, you’ll probably have to train, coach, inspire, and otherwise lead your team. You’ll provide the strategy, you’ll put out the fires, you’ll run advanced audits, etc. It takes a lot of time, which makes it more expensive in terms of opportunity cost, but it is the easiest place to start if you have the chops for the role.
Virtual Assistants
This is 100% not an alternative for the training and other high-skill responsibilities of a Paid Search Director, but it can be a stop-gap solution for any of the more repetitive tasks that are easy to train. This would free up the time for your more skilled specialists to take on some of the higher-value tasks until you can put a leader over the team. Just be sure to clearly define your tasks and how you want them done or you may spend more time managing VAs than you save by hiring them.
PPC Management Tools
Similar to the above option, you can’t really replace experts with tools, but they can help with a lot of valuable tasks like reporting, audits, task automation, testing, budget management, research, and similar PPC management duties. They range quite a bit in pricing, but you can pay for several tools for a fraction of the cost of a Paid Search Director, just know that your team has to use them for the investment to be worth it, and it can be time consuming to manage 3-5 tools, despite the time they help you save.
PPC Communities
This is a solid alternative for some of the training, coaching, and troubleshooting responsibilities of a Paid Search Director. Some communities are full of experienced PPC professionals sharing their knowledge and insights and they are often run by brilliant experts who teach advanced strategies and tactics. Some are free, but the good ones tend to cost about $99/mo or so. Well worth the investment. The tradeoff is that you can’t really share sensitive client information and you’re at the mercy of the call schedule or the willingness of the community to answer your questions.
A Fractional Paid Search Director
Easily the best solution (I’m completely unbiased), a Fractional PSD is a Paid Search Director who helps multiple agencies part-time, rather than working exclusively for you full-time. You get virtually all of the same responsibilities, with the primary focus being on training and coaching your team, directing account strategy, account audits, sales assistance, client communication, and improving your PPC team’s efficiency and effectiveness. Pricing for a Fractional Paid Search Director varies wildly, but I charge $1.5k/mo, $3k/mo, or $5k/mo, depending on how much help you need.
You could, of course, choose multiple alternatives, or hire a Paid Search Director full-time and maintain some of the other options with the PSD in charge of their effective and efficient use.
Which Is Right For You?
Knowing which option is right for you depends on a few factors:
Team Size
Number of Accounts
Available Budget
Honestly, if you have one ad manager and fewer than 10-40 accounts, you could probably get by with a decent tool and a solid checklist to stay organized. You’d be looking at $500/mo or less in additional expenses, totally optional at this size. The main scenario that would call for paying money at this level would be if you, as the owner, don’t know much about PPC and your ad manager is also pretty inexperienced. The support would help you improve your service well enough to retain your existing clients and close more, growing your PPC revenue.
If you’ve got 2-3 ad managers and 40-80 accounts, it would make sense to get out of the DIY phase and use a Fractional Paid Search Director. You could also benefit from Communities and Tools at this stage. You’ll really want to make sure you’re organized with your processes and that your team has everything they need to do a great job, from training to troubleshooting resources.
If you’ve got 4-5 ad managers and 80-130 clients, you’re getting into the territory where a PPC leader is much more important. A Fractional Paid Search Director is still probably a more reasonable hire for you than one who is full-time, but it would depend heavily on your average retainer and the skill of your most senior ad manager. If the skillset is there, you may be able to promote someone from your team into the position.
At 6-10 ad managers and beyond, you’ll generally want a full-time Paid Search Director to lead your team. You can still hire a Fractional Paid Search Director to coach your in-house team leader if they’re a bit less experienced, but having a dedicated leader becomes much more important as your team grows.
Conclusion
It’s hard to find good help for your agency. Finding a good leader for your PPC team is even harder.
Great leaders are expensive, but well worth it if you have the means to pay what they’re worth.
If you can’t justify the cost yet, there are some alternative options to handle some of the duties a Paid Search Director would normally handle.
You can run the team yourself until it becomes cost prohibitive, you can hire Virtual Assistants and have your team manage the VAs, you can pay for tools to help you manage PPC accounts at scale, you can join communities to help your team learn and crowd-source some of the challenges they face, and you can hire a Fractional Paid Search Director.
The best option for you depends on the size of your team, the number of accounts you manage, and your margin. You’ll often benefit more from a combination of these options and some of the options are still helpful when you’re able to hire a Paid Search Director full-time.
If you’ve been with me for the last 46 weeks of this newsletter, you know some of the value I can bring to the table. If you want that value and a lot more on-demand, solving your team’s specific challenges, and helping them reach their full potential while improving the results you deliver to all of your clients?
Check out PaidSearchDirection.com or Book A Call with me to talk about how I lead PPC teams as a Fractional Paid Search Director for the cost of a Virtual Assistant on a month-to-month basis.
If you’re curious about how I work with agencies or if you’re frustrated with your agency’s profitability or retention of clients or employees, feel free to reach out to me and I’ll see how I can help. I never charge for the first consultation and if I can solve it in 30-minutes, there’s no reason to pay for my services and you walk away happy.
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