If a vender is pitching a product - let's say social - and charges a management fees (flat or %%), but then won't give you at least read access to the advertising account.... RUN.
One case in point (of several over the last couple weeks) - dealer had me look into their advertising. One vender was charging $499/month for management of the Facebook spend budget (as stated in contract). With $3000 in spend - I was like "not great but not bad". It' ~16% for those bad at math. However, vender was VERY hesitant to give access to view the ad account - dealer also wanted to verify set-up, targets, etc,etc.
When we did finally get access - found the vender was just doing a radius target (bad due to natural boundaries for this dealer - mountains). The bigger find was that the actual ad spend was only 20% of the budget. So, they were actually charging $499/flat PLUS 20% of spend. So total "fee" was $1,099, for $2,400 in media spend. Long story short, after a few heated phone calls, vender credited back the 6 months the dealer was on the program for the reduced ad spend ($3600 credit).
Now, if in your contract and you agree to the vender charges of a management PLUS a %% of spend - then no worries. However, if you are not verifying what the vender promised - then shame on you.
For those of you that wonder -- you should be able to get at least read access to: Google Adwords, Facebook Advertising, LinkedIn Advertising, Twitter - and a plethora of others. If the vender claims they use a "3rd Party Tool" to serve ads, etc... then request read access to that tool.
Just my 3 cents (inflation)
One case in point (of several over the last couple weeks) - dealer had me look into their advertising. One vender was charging $499/month for management of the Facebook spend budget (as stated in contract). With $3000 in spend - I was like "not great but not bad". It' ~16% for those bad at math. However, vender was VERY hesitant to give access to view the ad account - dealer also wanted to verify set-up, targets, etc,etc.
When we did finally get access - found the vender was just doing a radius target (bad due to natural boundaries for this dealer - mountains). The bigger find was that the actual ad spend was only 20% of the budget. So, they were actually charging $499/flat PLUS 20% of spend. So total "fee" was $1,099, for $2,400 in media spend. Long story short, after a few heated phone calls, vender credited back the 6 months the dealer was on the program for the reduced ad spend ($3600 credit).
Now, if in your contract and you agree to the vender charges of a management PLUS a %% of spend - then no worries. However, if you are not verifying what the vender promised - then shame on you.
For those of you that wonder -- you should be able to get at least read access to: Google Adwords, Facebook Advertising, LinkedIn Advertising, Twitter - and a plethora of others. If the vender claims they use a "3rd Party Tool" to serve ads, etc... then request read access to that tool.
Just my 3 cents (inflation)