Working With a Google Ads Expert
What You Get When You Hire a Specialist
I started Enlightened Media in 2011 and I still manage every client account myself, roughly 100 of them. That is the whole model. Below is what I actually do in an account each week, how a specialist compares with a freelancer or a large agency, and the questions I would ask if I were the one hiring. Use them on me or on anyone else you are considering.
Who Actually Manages Your Account
At most agencies the person who sells you is not the person who runs your campaigns. The senior strategist leads the pitch, and after the contract is signed the account goes to a coordinator or junior buyer juggling dozens of clients. That is not a moral failing. It is how the economics of large agencies work, and it is why so many accounts stall after the first few months.
Here, the person on the sales call is me, and I am also the one logging into your account, writing your ads, and answering when you call 504-229-0603. I keep the client count at a level one person can genuinely manage, which is a big reason retention sits at 96%. You never have to re-explain your business to someone new.
What a Specialist Does Day to Day
Most of the work is search terms and negatives. I read the actual queries people typed, add negative keywords for job seekers, DIY searchers, wrong services, and competitor names you do not want, and split out queries that deserve their own ad group and copy. On accounts using broad match or Performance Max this review matters even more, because Google's matching is looser than most advertisers realize.
Beyond that: adjusting bids and budgets as cost per lead shifts, testing responsive search ad headlines, reviewing auction insights when a new competitor shows up, checking that ad schedules match when your phones are staffed, and pausing anything that spends without converting. None of it is dramatic. It is consistent attention, which is the first thing to disappear when an account is one of forty on someone's list.
Tracking and Landing Pages Come First
Automated bidding is only as smart as the conversions you feed it. Before scaling anything, I verify that each conversion action is a real lead or sale: a qualified phone call over a set duration, a submitted form, a completed purchase. Page views and clicks on a phone number link come out of primary conversions, because counting them teaches Google to find people who browse rather than buy.
Landing pages get the same scrutiny. If an ad promises same day service and the page buries the phone number below three paragraphs, the click is wasted no matter how well the keyword was chosen. I will point out what is hurting conversion rate, and Enlightened Media also builds landing pages when the existing site is the bottleneck. Fixing the page is often cheaper than buying more clicks.
Specialist vs Freelancer vs Big Agency
A freelance Google Ads consultant can be excellent and inexpensive, and you usually get direct access. The risks are capacity and continuity: one illness, a full-time job offer, or too many clients, and your account goes quiet. A large agency offers depth and process, but you trade access for layers, and the experienced people rarely touch smaller accounts after onboarding.
What I offer sits between the two. You get one experienced person accountable for your results, backed by an established agency with Google Premier Partner status, Microsoft Ads accreditation, and 15+ years of history. There are no setup fees and no long-term contracts, so you are never locked in while you find out whether the fit is right for your business.
How to Vet a Google Ads Expert
Start with credentials you can verify. Partner and Premier Partner status can be confirmed in Google's own Partners directory, so do not rely on a badge image pasted onto a website. Individual Google Ads certifications are worth having, but they are free online exams, so treat them as a minimum rather than proof of skill. Partner status carries requirements Google sets and reviews at the agency level.
Then ask practical questions. Who will log into my account each week? Can I see how you review search terms? How do you define a conversion? Will the account be in my name with my billing? Who answers when I call, and how fast? A real expert answers these without hesitating. Vague answers about proprietary systems usually mean nobody is looking closely.
What the First Weeks Look Like
It begins with a free audit of your current account, or a review of your site and market if you are starting fresh. I look at search terms, conversion setup, match types, bidding strategy, and location settings, then explain plainly what I would keep, fix, and stop. If Google Ads is a poor fit for your business, I will tell you that too.
Once we agree to move forward, campaigns go live within 7 days of onboarding. The first weeks focus on clean tracking and aggressive search term cleanup, because early data shows where money is leaking. From there the work is steady refinement. I do not promise specific numbers in advance, since results depend on your market, offer, and budget, but you will always know what changed and why.
