How much shall I ask for PPC?

[didi]

Hi all,

I was working as an inhouse SEO before I have just begun working on my own. I am responsible from an adwords account for a US company.I have to prepare a proposal and I do not know very well pricing about PPC.

Could you please tell me how the pricing is done for PPC managements?

The account I am working on has 30.000 $ per month.
They want to increase to 45.000$ per month.

As far as I know, agencys take a percentage from the budget.
What is the percentage in general? %7, %5?
Are there some flat rates as well?How much?

Thanks in advance

[AussieWebmaster]

I would look at between 5-10% but you need to provide value beyond set up and adding nre krywords,,, analytics reports, ad and landing page testing - watching organic search for new keywords and ppc for suggested long tail terms to optimize for... add alternative captures beyond the straight conversion... it is a multifaceted job... the more you offer the more you can charge

[AndrewMiller]

Hey Didi, I was the in-house SEO at a large company before going out on my own as well. Like you, I started managing some PPC accounts and usually charged between 5% and 10% of monthly spend. The actual rate depended on the client's budget, reporting requirements, optimization schedule, etc. If it was a smaller budget I charged a nominal account setup fee if they needed to set up a new Adwords account, install analytics, etc.

One warning, the level of effort required to properly manage (beyond the initial setup) a PPC campaign is enormous and was not justified for small accounts since I spent just as much time managing a $500 monthly budget as I did a $5,000 monthly budget. I was actually losing money on the smaller accounts because the commissions I was earning were so small. Since then I have stopped publicly offering PPC management but still provide the service for existing clients that spend more than $5,000 a month.

Hope this helps. Good luck, and don't be afraid to politely say no to clients if they aren't spending enough or able to pay you what you are worth. Don't sell your services short.

[Discovery]

Andrew makes a very important point business owners looking for an agency should understand.

Most SEMs or agencies who are worth their salt will not touch an account under 5k ad spend. Which means businesses looking to outsource need to question somebody who is willing to take on a $1k/month client. Are they any good or will they put the time into it, or just set it and forget it?

At such a small ad spend I would recommend companies take on the advertising themselves. At minimum they would come to understand the basics of SEM and PPC and when they grow beyond a 5k adspend they will fully understand the value a large qualified agency can and should bring to the table.

Discovery

[AussieWebmaster]

I do some for small ammounts but have little twaeking apart from checking conversions and adding new ads and dropping or adding occasional words and negatives - depends on number of hours a week you put in

[Discovery]

True Aussie, some accounts are an easy set up and knock down. The dynamics don't change very often. I do some QPQ work with a dental practice and outside of the initial set up and reporting its simple monitoring and tweaking. Perhaps an hour a week.

Not only do I enjoy helping a great SMB owner, but its a good experience seeing what I can deliver on a small budget. I do the same with some local charities.

Discovery