Google Ads Management: What to Do If You Just Don’t Have the Time? 

There are some jobs that seem to stay on the to-do list. Checking in on your Google Ads campaigns is often one of them. 

You might find a spare half hour to log in, only for a customer to call or something else to need your attention. Before you know it, checking the ads has slipped into next week again. 

The problem is that the clicks and costs don’t stop while you’re busy elsewhere. Money can still be going out without you knowing how much of it is coming back in enquiries or sales. 

So, how much attention does Google Ads management really need? And what are your options when you genuinely don’t have the time? 

How much of your time does Google Ads actually need? 

Good Google Ads management isn’t about diving into the account every day and tweaking things for the sake of it. Campaigns need time to run, test, and gather useful data, but they also need regular enough attention that you can spot when something needs changing. 

How much attention they need depends on what you’ve got running. A few ads for one straightforward service are going to be easier to keep an eye on than an account covering several services, products or locations. If you’ve just started something new, you’ll probably want to check in more often too, at least until you know it’s reaching the right people. 

Then there’s what’s happening in the business. You might get booked up for one service and want to push another instead. Prices change, offers end and some enquiries are worth a lot more to you than others. If your ads don’t change with the business, you can easily end up spending money on things you don’t particularly need to promote. 

Instead of looking for a magic number of hours to put in the diary, check the account often enough to know whether it still makes sense for the business. If nobody can quite remember when that last happened, it’s probably time to check in. 

What gets missed when Google Ads keeps slipping down the list?

Nothing has to go spectacularly wrong for an account to start wasting money. It can just be a few smaller things that go unnoticed. 

Are your ads showing for the right searches? 

Google’s search terms report shows you what people searched for before your ad appeared. Some will make perfect sense. Others might have you wondering why on earth your ad showed up at all. 

If the wrong searches are sneaking in, some of your budget could be going on clicks from people who were never going to buy from you.

Where do people end up? 

Next, have a look at where your ads are sending people. Is it the right page? Does it match what the ad promised? Can people easily find what they need when they get there? 

It’s also worth checking that you’re still advertising the services, products and offers you actually want to promote. None of these is a huge disaster on its own. But they can all chip away at your budget if nobody spots them.

And after the click? 

If you want calls, forms, bookings or sales, you need to know whether you’re actually getting them from your ads. That gets tricky if nobody quite trusts the conversion tracking or knows what it’s recording. 

Without that, you can see the clicks and the spend, but you’re missing the bit that tells you whether those clicks were worth paying for.

But doesn’t Google Ads automate most of this now? 

Quite a lot, yes. Google Ads now uses automation and AI for plenty of jobs that once needed more manual input. Automated bidding can adjust bids according to the goals you set; for example, Performance Max uses Google AI to decide where ads appear and which combinations of images, headlines and other assets to use. Google can also make recommendations for your account, with the option to have certain types applied automatically. All of that can save you time. 

What Google doesn’t know is what’s going on outside the account. It wasn’t in your Monday morning meeting when you decided you’re booked solid for one service until February but could really do with more enquiries for another. 

It can only work with the goals, budgets, conversion data and other information it’s been given. So yes, automation can take care of some of the fiddly bits. But it can’t make every decision for you.

“I do check it. I just don’t really know what I’m looking at.” 

You can open Google Ads every Friday morning, look at the graphs, percentages and recommendations, then close it again none the wiser. Finding another hour in the week won’t fix that. What will help is knowing which numbers are worth your attention and what they’re telling you about the enquiries or sales your ads are bringing in. 

If you’ve got someone who understands the business and doesn’t run screaming at the sight of a Google Ads dashboard, keeping it in-house can work well. They don’t need to know everything from day one. If knowledge is the missing bit, some focused digital marketing training can help them understand how the account works, what to look out for and when they need to step in. 

The question is whether they actually have time to do it. Giving Google Ads to somebody whose to-do list is already spilling onto a second page just moves the problem to another desk. Whoever takes it on also needs to know it’s their job to keep on top of it. If responsibility is a bit vague, it’s very easy for everyone to assume somebody else is checking.

When does bringing in a Google Ads specialist make more sense? 

Sometimes there genuinely isn’t anyone in the business who can take it on. Or maybe it’s just one job too many. The campaigns might have become more complicated as the business has grown, or you might have reached the point where you’d rather put them in the hands of a Google Ads specialist. Either way, outsourcing can take the day-to-day management off your plate. 

You don’t need to disappear from the process, though. Whoever manages the account still needs to know which services you want to push, what a decent enquiry looks like and when your priorities change. 

What should you expect when you outsource your Google Ads? 

Outsourcing should make Google Ads easier to deal with, not give you another person to chase. 

You want a specialist who knows the system inside out, stays on top of the account and spots things before you have to ask. That means keeping you informed, explaining what they’re doing without drowning you in jargon and coming to you when they need input from the business. 

The idea is that you know how your campaigns are doing without having to spend your own time digging around in the account.

Make Google Ads one less thing to worry about 

If you want to keep Google Ads in-house, we can give your team the digital marketing training to get more confident with it. Or, if you’d rather leave it to us, our Google Ads specialists can manage your account for you. 

Not sure what would work best for you? Have a no-obligation chat with us. We’ll find out what you need and help you find the right solutions for your business.

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