Online advertising agencies look similar in a pitch and differ enormously in how accounts are staffed. Some are run by senior practitioners, some by a pooled junior team with a senior reviewer, some largely by automation with a checker. All can be legitimate at the right price, and the buyer should know which they are getting.
Ask what changed last month
The single most revealing question. A managed account has a change history: search terms excluded, budgets adjusted, creative tested, tracking checked. Ask to see it rather than a summary report. Accounts that are reported on but not managed are common and are invisible in a monthly dashboard.
Creative is the lever that remains
Targeting is increasingly automated, so what the advertiser still controls is the creative, the offer and the landing page. A retainer with no production line plateaus as audiences tire. Establish how many new assets are produced each month and by whom, because that line is frequently absent.
Fee structures and their incentives
A percentage of spend rewards spending more. A flat fee is neutral. Performance pricing aligns interests where attribution is clean and transfers unmanageable risk where it is not. Ask for the fee in absolute terms at your intended spend, whichever structure is used.
Account ownership, settled first
The advertising accounts, conversion tracking and audiences should be yours with the agency granted access. Accounts built inside an agency's container take the spend history and learning with them, and that history is worth more than most advertisers realise until they try to leave.
Questions people ask about online ad agencies
How do I tell a managed account from a reported one?
Ask for the change log for the last month. A managed account has one; a reported account has a dashboard and little else.
Is a specialist better than a full service agency?
For a single platform usually. Where several channels need coordinating, one team holding the picture is worth the breadth trade-off.
Should the agency own the ad account?
No. You own it and grant access. It is the most common avoidable dispute at the end of a relationship.