If you’re ready to truly maximize the ROI from your Google Ads spend, putting your campaigns in the capable hands of the best AdWords agency in town is a no-brainer.
But how do you know which Google Ads agencies are the best? What separates the top-notch ones from the so-so ones? And what are the red flags you need to look out for that tell you an agency should be avoided?
In this post, we’ll not only provide you with a curated list of the best AdWords PPC agencies, but we’ll tell you how to evaluate them and the benefits of hiring one.
Note: Google AdWords rebranded to Google Ads in 2018, but many people still use the old name, so we’ll use them interchangeably here.
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Top 5 Google Ads Agencies in 2023
1) Single Grain
Specializes in: Full-service Google Ads management
Top 3 Clients:
- Amazon
- Salesforce
- Intuit
Pricing: $$$
Single Grain is a full-service digital agency that specializes in Google Ads campaigns focused on increasing your CTRs, conversions, ROAS and predictable revenue. A certified Google Premier Partner, Single Grain has established a solid reputation as one of the industry’s leading Google Ads agencies by steering clear of the one-size-fits-all, cookie-cutter approach adopted by other companies, and instead customize a campaign for each individual client.
They have a team of marketing experts who excel at creating Google Ad campaigns that maximize your ROI while maintaining a good ROAS.
Their custom Google Ad strategies tackle all aspects of creating an effective campaign, from initial research and planning through to smart bidding and target CPA bidding to ensure maximum ROI, designing and launching both dynamic and display ads, A/B testing to continually improve your ads, and conversion tracking to give you the peace of mind of knowing exactly what you’re paying for.
This bespoke approach has earned Single Grain an enviable name as the go-to Google Ads agency for a long list of high-profile clients, including Amazon, Airbnb, Uber, and countless others, a distinction that speaks volumes about their ability to generate results.
2) Disruptive Advertising
Specializes in: Eliminating ad-spend waste
Top 3 Clients:
- Adobe
- Guitar Center
- ConocoPhillips
Pricing: $$$$
Do any amount of research into the best Google Ads agencies, and it won’t be long before you come across the name Disruptive Advertising. The company originally made its name thanks to its game-changing Facebook advertising campaigns, and has since proven itself to be every bit as successful with Google Ads.
Boasting one billion dollars of ad spend experience, what makes the company so successful is that they carry out a detailed audit of your existing ad spend to identify waste and ineffectiveness. They then create campaigns designed to strengthen any weaknesses in your Google Ads game plan and maximize ROI.
If you’ve already been experimenting with Google Ads but find you’re not getting the results you need, the team of AdWords experts at Disruptive Marketing may well prove to be the right one for you.
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3) Thrive
Specializes in: E-commerce PPC
Top 3 Clients:
- Ready Seal
- Seismic Audio
- Image 3D
Pricing: $$
Thrive is an award-winning marketing agency with offices across the United States that specializes in helping online retail businesses make the most out of Google Ads.
They are a well-established e-commerce PPC agency, with over 15 years of experience in offering scalable, measurable solutions designed to boost qualified traffic and convert passing visitors into paying customers.
One of the more cost-friendly services out there, Thrive may be your best choice if you’re a new or small-scale e-commerce business looking to take your store to the next level on a limited ad budget.
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4) JumpFly
Specialize in: Flexible, month-to-month contracts
Top 3 Clients:
- Battery Mart
- Window Design Group
- AED Market
Pricing: $$$
If you’re new to paid search advertising and aren’t sure if it’s the best approach for your brand, or if you’re a new start-up that lacks the resources to invest in long-term advertising solutions, then the kind of lengthy, fixed-term contracts offered by other agencies may be enough to put you off PPC altogether.
JumpFly is an AdWords agency that understands this all too well, which is why they eschew the fixed contract approach in favor of a month-to-month approach that offers all the freedom and flexibility you might need. This approach ensures that the company has to work hard for you right from day one. After all, if they don’t produce results in any given month, you’re unlikely to go back to them.
Much like Single Grain, JumpFly is a Google Premier Partner committed to delivering custom strategies that start with defining realistic goals and then designing, implementing, and testing ad campaigns to help you achieve those goals.
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5) Metric PPC
Specializes in: Data-driven strategies, tracking, analytics
Top 3 Clients:
- Bridger Orthopaedic
- Pulsara
- Hudson Solar
Pricing: $$
When it comes to advertising with Google Ads, every penny counts, so it’s vitally important that you know exactly how your money is being spent and what kind of results its generating. This is where Metric PPC’s work really shines.
Taking a technology-focused approach, the PPC agency has carved out a niche as a data-driven agency that gets results for its clients and provides deep insights and a wealth of easy-to-understand data that shows exactly what those results are.
If you need to convince upper management, investors, or other stakeholders to sign off on partnering with a PPC agency, the company’s cost-effective solutions and dedication to providing all the data you could need to prove the effectiveness of your campaign may just do the trick.
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What Is an AdWords Agency?
In a nutshell, an AdWords agency is a marketing company that specializes in helping brands drive traffic and increase revenue through the use of Google Ads, and are certified Google Premier Partners.
If you’ve ever carried out a Google search (and let’s face it, who hasn’t?), you’ve undoubtedly noticed paid ads mixed in with the organic search results. Businesses and individuals can launch their own campaigns, but there’s every chance that at least some of those ads were put together by a Google AdWords agency.
These professional agencies work with brands to plan, implement and manage Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising campaigns on Google that are tailored to the unique goals of each client. Even if they are a full-service digital agency, they should specialize in Google AdWords.
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How AdWords Agencies Work
To create these campaigns, the right agency will begin by first getting to know you, your company, and the goals you hope to achieve from PPC advertising.
They’ll customize a tried-and-trusted approach to help you generate results, first by doing effective SEO keyword research to help you target your ads to the right audience, then by creating captivating copy and compelling visuals for the ads themselves.
Finally, they’ll bid on ad placements on your behalf, ensuring that each ad is tailored to achieving your desired goals, and manage your ad spend to make sure you’re getting that all-important maximum ROAS.
Once your campaign is live, the best agencies will monitor and manage it, sending regular progress reports to you so that you can be confident your agency is doing its best to help you boost traffic, sales, engagements or revenue.
The Benefits of Hiring a Google Ads Agency
There’s nothing to stop you from signing up for a Google Ads account and creating your own campaigns, so why outsource that work to an agency?
In our opinion, there are five key benefits to hiring an agency rather than doing it yourself.
1) Invest More Time and Effort in Meeting Customer Needs
If you just read through our description of what a Google AdWords agency does, you’ll notice that there’s a lot of work to be done to plan and execute a successful campaign.
All this work takes time, especially when you consider that Google Ads isn’t the easiest platform for newcomers to navigate, despite being open and available to all.
So, while you could choose the DIY approach, all the time that it takes to first learn how to use Google Ads and then put together an effective campaign is time that is perhaps best spent working on your business and delivering the kind of five-star products or service that will help you to grow.
2) Take Advantage of PPC Expertise
The best AdWords companies have been around the block on more than one occasion. Not only do they understand the ins and outs of Google Ads as a platform, but their experience in working on a host of different campaigns for different brands and industries means that they truly know what works and what doesn’t.
They know which keywords are likely to reap the rewards for your brand. They know how to make the most of bidding on Google Ads and, perhaps most importantly, they know how to create ads that capture your audience’s attention and drive them to your platform.
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3) Stay on Top of the Latest Trends and Developments
Much like SEO and influencer marketing, the world of PPC advertising is an ever-evolving landscape.
As a platform, Google Ads is constantly being tweaked to help businesses generate the best possible results. At the same time, the constantly changing algorithms that influence organic search results can also influence the way campaigns are set up and managed.
In other words, what worked a few years ago, or in some cases even a few months ago, may not be the best solution right now.
This is where the expertise of experienced AdWords specialists can prove invaluable. Those working in top agencies constantly stay up to date on the latest developments in both search and digital advertising to ensure that your campaigns are optimized.
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4) Define and Achieve Realistic Goals
Just as experienced agencies know what works and what doesn’t, they also know which goals are genuinely possible to achieve with Google Ads and which goals are just a little too unrealistic given your budget, industry or other determining factors.
That’s not to say that a reputable agency won’t go all out to deliver the best results possible. Rather, they can help manage expectations about what those results are likely to be and how long your investment in Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is going to take to pay off. Beyond that, they’ll keep you informed of how well your ads are performing with clear, easy-to-understand reports.
Combined, these two factors can help you enjoy the confidence that comes from knowing you’re getting the best from your investment.
5) Enjoy Better Integration with the Rest of Your Digital Marketing Efforts
Finally, it’s worth noting that some of the industry’s leading AdWords companies are also home to experts in other digital marketing disciplines such as SEO, social media marketing, and content optimization.
While you could work with different agencies for each of these, hiring the same company to manage both PPC and SEO can result in a more streamlined strategy with everything working in harmony for maximum effect.
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What to Look for When Hiring an AdWords Agency
So, you’ve considered all the benefits of hiring an AdWords agency, and you’re more convinced than ever that it’s the right move for your business, but with Google returning millions of results for terms like “Best Google Ads Agency,” how do you know which companies you can trust and which you’re better off avoiding?
We’ll go over the key factors that we used when considering this list of the top five agencies currently plying their trade in the PPC space and why each of these factors should be a prime consideration when it comes to choosing which agency to work with.
1) Clear Understanding of Your Industry and Business
The best marketing agencies understand that while one campaign may have been particularly effective for their recent high-profile B2C client, that same approach may not yield the same results for your new B2B start-up. They also understand that what works in one industry may not work in another and, as such, will customize their strategies and solutions to suit your particular venture.
What’s more, some agencies will even specialize in working with clients from your particular industry, whether that’s technology, SaaS, e-commerce, hospitality, or anything else.
Even if an agency doesn’t have a particular specialty, they should, at the very least, be willing to take the time to get to know you, your industry, and your specific business needs and invest in research to ensure that they can best help you connect with your target audience.
If they don’t, or if they try to offer you a one-size-fits-all package that isn’t tailored to your needs, that’s a good sign to look elsewhere.
2) Google Ads Expertise and Experience
Previously, we discussed the fact that some companies which offer Google Ads management will also offer services for other types of marketing campaigns as well.
While there’s certainly nothing wrong with that in theory, working with an agency that offers multiple services is only a smart move if that agency has AdWords specialists on hand who really know the platform inside and out and can put their expertise and experience to work for your business.
In other words, if you’re working with an SEO agency that offers to also manage your PPC activities despite having little in the way of AdWords-specific expertise, you’re unlikely to get the same results that you would if you hired a dedicated specialist or specialist marketing team.
3) Simple Language and Clear Communication
Does your preferred agency explain their approach in simple terms that you genuinely understand, or do they try to bamboozle you with technical jargon you’re unlikely to understand in order to make the whole process seem more complex and mysterious than it actually is?
If it’s the former, that’s a good sign that you can trust that agency to act with honesty and integrity throughout your working relationship. If it’s the latter, that may be a big red flag that they’re trying to justify charging a higher price than necessary.
4) Realistic Goals
Let’s get one thing clear: No truly reputable agency will make firm guarantees about specific numbers or results that they can deliver.
Although they should always make Google Ads marketing sound as simple as possible, the truth is that the whole nature of search – including paid ads – is a vast, ever-evolving ecosystem with multiple factors influencing the outcome of any given campaign. In other words, your preferred agency should absolutely help you to set goals, but those goals should be realistic.
Your PPC agency should also be clear that an investment in paid ads may take some time to start paying dividends, meaning it’s best to avoid any company that makes claims about increasing your traffic by 75% within a week, as chances are there’s no way for them to know for certain that they’ll be able to back up these claims.
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Ready to Hire the Best Google Ads Agency?
Realistically, a case could be made for any one of the companies above to be considered the best AdWords agency of 2023, but which one should you actually work with to ensure that your brand is utilizing paid ads to their full potential?
As with most things in business, the answer to this question all depends on what you prioritize the most. If campaign tracking, analytics, and access to in-depth data are going to make all the difference to your ability to invest in Google Ads, then Metric PPC may prove to be your ideal PPC partner. If you’ve already tried using AdWords but aren’t seeing the results you want, investing in an ad-spend audit from Disruptive Advertising could be a smart move.
However, if you simply want to enjoy the confidence of knowing that your brand is in the safe, capable hands of an established Google Ads agency with a proven track record of achieving impressive results through Google Ads strategies tailored to your goals, look no further than Single Grain.
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