Google Ads Management Retainer
Ongoing Google Ads management with search term work, testing, and reporting done monthly. Includes the tracking maintenance most management retainers quietly leave out.
What's included
Weekly
- Search term review with negative keyword additions
- Budget pacing checks against monthly targets
- Bid strategy monitoring and learning phase status
- Disapproval and policy issue resolution
- Anomaly review on spend, conversions, and cost per acquisition
Monthly
- Ad and asset testing with results read at proper significance
- Landing page and message match review on the pages taking spend
- Audience and exclusion list maintenance
- Structural changes where the data supports them
- Competitor and auction insight review
- Reporting with commentary, covering what changed and what it did
Ongoing tracking work
- Conversion tracking verified monthly rather than assumed
- Offline conversion imports monitored for silent failures
- Reconciliation between Google Ads, GA4, and your CRM
- New conversion actions added as your funnel changes
Platform change management
- Auto-applied recommendations kept off unless you want them
- New features and beta rollouts assessed rather than adopted by default
- Advance notice on platform changes that will affect your account
How it works
- Named person on your account, not a rotating pool
- Monthly call plus an async channel for anything urgent
- Change log so you can see what was done and when
- No long lock-in, since work that has to be contractually enforced isn't worth keeping
Why it matters
Most management retainers become reporting retainers. Someone pulls numbers, writes a summary, and the account itself gets touched twice a quarter. The tell is a search terms report nobody has opened in six weeks and a negative list that stopped growing last year.
The other thing usually missing is tracking maintenance. Conversion setups break, offline imports fail silently, and a management retainer that never checks is optimizing an account on data that stopped being true in March. Verifying it monthly is unglamorous and it's the difference between managing an account and watching one.
What clients say
“One of the best SEM, advertising and analytics minds in the business! A great addition to any team looking to solidify or enhance their digital marketing efforts!”
Chris Brewer
“Finding SmartMetrics was a real relief – as a research and education institute with a somewhat unconventional focus within Google Analytics, we previously struggled to find an online training program or consultant that could help us. SmartMetrics helped us to review our entire GA4 setup, and finalized multiple dashboards that addressed our subdomain website complications and redesigned our PDF download tracking. Tomas was clear, communicative and efficient, and took time to provide helpful advice at every stage of the project. We would definitely choose SmartMetrics again for future GA4 improvements.”
Micah Greyeyes
Yellowhead
“Wow! I can't say enough about the team at SmartMetrics! They are super fast, intelligent, and helpful in understanding and addressing your problem. I have worked with them multiple times on different accounts. I highly recommend them! I will continue to use them going forward! Big shout out to Tomas for all his help!”
Anna Crowe
What clients say
“Tomas at SmartMetrics has been fantastic to work with. He consistently delivers high-quality work quickly, communicates clearly and proactively, and makes even complex implementations feel straightforward.”
Gray Digital Group
5.0 on Google · All reviews“A huge difference to the business, and we know where the next dollar goes.”
Blitzy“We can scale spend now without guessing what is actually working.”
PermitFlow“Extremely knowledgable & capable!”
Dj Haer Jr
Work with Tomas
Founder, San Diego, CA
20 years in marketing, CRO, CRM, and analytics. Now building the systems AI runs on.
You work with me directly, from scope to delivery. No account managers.