How to hire a Google Ads specialist: 10 questions to ask

Short answer: To hire a Google Ads specialist well, judge them on how they think, not on promises. Ask how they would measure success for your business, how they set up conversion tracking, who owns the account, how they report, and what they charge in total. A good specialist works inside an account you own, gives you full transparency on cost and results, and never guarantees rankings or ad positions. The ten questions below will help you separate the strong candidates from the risky ones.

Freelancer, agency or in-house: which should you hire?

Before you compare people, decide what kind of help you need. Each option can work. The right one depends on your budget, how many channels you run and how much hands-on attention you want.

What a good Google Ads specialist looks like

• They start with your numbers. Margin, average order value, lead-to-sale rate and how much you can afford to pay for a customer. Without these, nobody can set sensible targets.
• They fix tracking first. Smart bidding learns from your conversion data. If tracking is wrong, every automated decision is wrong too. A good specialist checks this before touching bids. See my guide to Google Ads conversion tracking with GA4 and GTM for what that check covers.
• They can explain trade-offs in plain language. For example, when Performance Max versus Search makes sense, and what you give up with each.
• They talk about business results. Revenue, profit, qualified leads and cost per customer, not just clicks, impressions or click-through rate.

10 questions to ask before you hire a Google Ads specialist

Use these on your first call. Vague answers are a signal on their own.

1. “Whose name will the Google Ads account be in?” The right answer is yours. They should work inside your account through their manager account, or be added as a user. More on this below.
2. “How will you measure success for my business?” Look for a target tied to your economics, such as cost per qualified lead or return on ad spend, not “more traffic”.
3. “What will you check in the first two weeks?” A good answer includes conversion tracking, search terms, campaign structure, budgets, bidding, landing pages and wasted spend.
4. “How do you set up and verify conversion tracking?” They should mention Google tag or Google Tag Manager, GA4, enhanced conversions and testing that values match real orders.
5. “Which campaign types would you use, and why?” The answer should depend on your business. A one-size-fits-all plan is a warning sign.
6. “How do you control wasted spend?” Expect to hear about search terms reviews, negative keywords, brand exclusions, location settings and audience signals.
7. “What will your reports show, and how often?” Ask to see a sample report. It should connect spend to leads or sales, and explain what changed and why.
8. “What is the total cost, including your fee?” Get the management fee, any setup fee, any percentage of spend and any tool costs in writing.
9. “What happens if we stop working together?” You should keep the account, the history, the conversion actions and the audiences. Notice periods should be short and clear.
10. “Who will actually manage my account day to day?” Especially with agencies, ask for the name of the person and how much time they will spend on your account each month.

Account ownership: you must own your Google Ads account

This is the single most important point in the whole hiring process. If the account sits under someone else’s ownership, you can lose years of data, conversion history and audiences when the relationship ends.

Google’s own advertiser guide to working with third parties says an agency must set up a separate Ads account for you, and that you have the right to know the number of clicks, impressions and the total cost of your ads. It also advises you to understand the total cost of your advertising, including any fees your partner charges.

How this works in practice:

• Create the account with your own business Google login and your own billing details.
• Keep at least one person from your company at Admin level. Google lists five access levels: Email-only, Billing, Read-only, Standard and Admin. Admin users control who else has access.
• Let your specialist link the account to their manager account, or give them Standard or Admin access as needed.
• Know that a manager account can hold ownership of a client account. According to Google’s page on ownership of client accounts, users of the client account cannot transfer ownership, but they can always unlink a manager with ownership. Keeping your own Admin user is what protects you.

The same rule applies to everything around the ads: your GA4 property, Google Tag Manager container, Merchant Center account and website. Your specialist should be a user, never the only owner.

What the Google Partner badge does and does not mean

Many specialists and agencies show a Google Partner badge. It is a useful signal, but you should know what it measures. According to Google Ads Help, a company needs to meet three requirements to become a Partner:

• Performance: a minimum optimization score of 70%.
• Spend: 10,000 USD in ad spend across managed accounts over 90 days.
• Certifications: at least 50% of account strategists certified in Google Ads, with certifications in each product area where they spend 500 USD or more in 90 days.

Premier Partners must also rank in the top 3% of participating companies in their country each year.

So the badge tells you the company manages a meaningful amount of spend, keeps its team certified and maintains a decent optimization score. It does not tell you whether they are profitable for clients like you. Optimization score is based on Google’s recommendations, and accepting every recommendation is not the same as growing your business. Treat the badge as a minimum filter, then judge the person on the questions above.

Red flags to walk away from

• Guaranteed positions or results. Google’s third-party guide warns against partners who guarantee specific ad positions. Nobody controls the auction.
• They want to own the account or will not give you Admin access.
• Hidden or bundled fees. If you cannot see what you pay Google versus what you pay them, ask why.
• No questions about your business. A specialist who pitches a plan before asking about margins and customers is guessing.
• Reports full of vanity metrics. Impressions and clicks with no link to leads or revenue.
• Long lock-in contracts with heavy exit penalties before they have proven anything.

Proposal checklist: what a good proposal includes

1. A short summary of your business goals in their own words.
2. Findings from a look at your current account, or a clear plan for a new one.
3. A tracking plan: which conversions, how they are measured and how values are passed.
4. Proposed campaign structure and the reason for each campaign.
5. A realistic first 90 days: what happens in month one, two and three.
6. The metric you will be judged on and how it is calculated.
7. Reporting format, frequency and who you talk to.
8. Total fees in writing, plus a recommended ad budget range. My guide to how much Google Ads costs can help you sanity-check it.
9. Ownership terms: you own the account, data and assets.
10. Notice period and what is handed over if you part ways.

What I recommend

• Shortlist two or three people and ask each the same ten questions, so you compare like with like.
• Ask for a paid audit or a short trial before a long contract. You learn more from how someone works for a month than from any pitch.
• Set up ownership on day one. Your login, your billing, your Admin user. Then invite the specialist.
• Agree on one primary metric and review it monthly. Give new campaigns time to learn before judging, but expect clear explanations from the first week.

Frequently asked questions

Need help choosing or checking a Google Ads specialist?

If you are comparing proposals or want an independent view on how your current account is run, I can help. I offer Google Ads management for businesses that want clear reporting and an account they fully own. You can also request a free ads audit and I will review your tracking, structure and wasted spend before you decide anything.

Sources

• Google Advertising Policies Help: Advertiser guide to working with third parties
• Google Ads Help: How to become a Google Partner or Premier Partner
• Google Ads Help: About access levels in your Google Ads account
• Google Ads Help: About ownership of client accounts