Competitor friction

How to switch your Google Ads agency

Switching agencies feels risky. Staying with the wrong agency is riskier. This guide shows you how to transition safely without losing momentum.

A structured six-week transition, with a parallel run period, protects your performance while giving the new agency time to understand your business properly.

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Warning Signs

Signs it is time to switch

If you recognise three or more of these, your agency relationship has likely run its course.

Results Have Plateaued

Your ROAS has flatlined for 6+ months. Your agency says it is market conditions. You suspect it is capability. A good test: have they proposed a single structural change in the last quarter?

Communication Has Dried Up

Monthly calls replaced by quarterly. Reports are templates with no narrative. Questions go unanswered for days. When your agency goes quiet, it usually means they have nothing new to say - or they are avoiding a conversation about declining performance.

No Strategic Input

They optimise bids but never challenge your product mix, pricing, or commercial strategy. If your agency has never asked about your margins, they are not managing your advertising investment - they are managing your ad account. These are different things.

You Cannot See Your Data

They own the accounts. You do not have admin access. You do not know what is really happening. This is the single biggest red flag - and it is more common than it should be.

Self-Assessment

What your current agency should be providing

Score your current agency. Items marked as critical are non-negotiable - if your agency is not providing these, the relationship has a fundamental problem.

Weekly performance updates with narrative (not just numbers)

Critical - non-negotiable

Monthly strategy calls with proactive recommendations

Critical - non-negotiable

Full admin access to your Google Ads account

Critical - non-negotiable

Margin or POAS-based reporting (not just ROAS)

Critical - non-negotiable

Feed optimisation as part of the retainer

Regular search term reviews and negative keyword management

Conversion tracking audits at least quarterly

Structured testing calendar with documented hypotheses

Competitive analysis and market context

Seasonal strategy planning in advance (not reactive)

Worked Example

How ROAS and POAS diverge during a transition

Illustrative example: simplified teaching maths showing the mechanism behind a transition, not a named client's performance.

Illustrative exampleBeauty brand scenario - agency switch after an 18-month plateau

Previous Agency (Last 6 Months)

ROAS

3.2x

POAS

0.9x

Spend

£28k/month

ROAS had plateaued at 3.2x for 6 months. No strategic changes proposed. Monthly reports were template PDFs. When asked about margins, they said 'we optimise for ROAS, not margins.'

Discovery + Review (Week 1-2)

Illustrative review findings: a meaningful share of spend on low-margin products, no brand isolation, PMax overlapping with brand traffic, and feed attributes missing.

Transition (Week 3-5)

ROAS

3.0x

POAS

0.9x

Spend

£28k/month

Parallel run period. No changes to live campaigns. Built new campaign architecture, custom label taxonomy, and margin-banded bid targets in draft.

Month 1 Under Management

ROAS

2.8x

POAS

1.2x

Spend

£24k/month

Spend reduced by pausing loss-making non-brand campaigns. ROAS dropped (because the brand subsidy was removed), while POAS improved.

Month 3 Under Management

ROAS

3.4x

POAS

1.6x

Spend

£26k/month

Non-brand spend reinstated with margin-aware bidding. ROAS recovered above the previous level, and POAS improved further as bidding followed contribution rather than blended revenue.

Simplified teaching maths. Not client performance. Figures are hypothetical.

The Process

How do you switch Google Ads agency safely?

A structured six-week transition that protects your performance and minimises disruption.

Commercial review - 30-minute conversation about your situation and goals.
Commercial review - Review account structure and strategy before committing.
Transition plan - Detailed handover covering access, data, and launch strategy.
Parallel run - 2 weeks running alongside current agency for continuity.
Full handover - Complete control with weekly reporting and proactive optimisation.

Commercial Review

Week 1

A 30-minute conversation to understand your current situation, frustrations, and goals. We will be honest about whether we are the right fit.

We ask about your margins, your products, your cash flow cycle - not just your ROAS target. If we do not think we can improve your commercial outcomes, we will tell you.

Commercial Review Follow-up

Week 2

We review your account structure, bidding strategy, and commercial alignment before you commit.

We will show you exactly what we'd change, why, and the mechanism behind the projected impact - not a sales document disguised as an audit.

Transition Plan

Week 3

We create a detailed handover plan: account access, historical data, and launch strategy.

We document every campaign, every bid strategy, every custom label. Nothing gets lost in the transition. Your current performance is the baseline - we preserve it before we improve it.

Parallel Run

Week 4-5

We run alongside your current agency for 2 weeks to ensure continuity before full handover.

During the parallel run, we shadow the account without making changes. We build our understanding, prepare our restructure plan, and ensure zero performance disruption on handover day.

Full Management

Week 6+

We take full control with weekly reporting, strategy calls, and proactive optimisation.

From week 6, you receive weekly Loom walkthroughs, access to live dashboards, and a named strategist who understands your business. No templates, no generic updates.

Your Protection

How we protect you during transition

We structure every engagement to give you control and flexibility. You should never feel locked in.

You Own Everything

Your Google Ads accounts stay in your name. You have admin access from day one. Your data, your accounts, your assets - always.

Rolling Monthly After Setup

After an initial 3-month implementation period, you move to rolling monthly with 30 days notice. If we stop delivering value, you leave. Simple.

Transparent Reporting

Weekly Loom updates, monthly strategy calls, and full visibility into every change we make. You will always know what we did, why, and what happened as a result.

Commercial Alignment

Fixed-fee pricing means our incentives align with yours: profit, not spend inflation. We earn the same whether your budget is £20k or £80k.

When should you switch Google Ads agencies?

TLDR: Plateau for 6+ months, poor communication, no strategic input, or lack of account access.

Switch when ROAS has plateaued for 6+ months without structural changes, communication has dried up (monthly calls replaced by quarterly), there's no strategic input on product mix or pricing, or you don't have admin access to your own accounts. The last point - not owning your data - is the single biggest red flag.

How long does it take to switch Google Ads agencies without losing performance?

TLDR: 4-6 weeks for a clean transition, with a parallel run to protect performance.

A well-managed agency transition typically takes 4-6 weeks: discovery, a commercial review, transition planning and data handover, then the live switchover with a parallel run. A brief learning-phase dip is possible; the key is maintaining campaign history and not resetting bid strategies unnecessarily.

Questions

Switching agencies safely

A brief dip is possible during the transition - primarily from bid strategy learning phases. A well-managed transition with a parallel run period minimises this. The bigger risk is staying with an underperforming agency - the slow bleed of plateaued performance usually costs more than a brief transition dip.

If you have admin access and the account is in your name, they cannot prevent the transfer. Simply remove their MCC access. If the account is in their name (a red flag), you may need Google's support to transfer ownership - or in worst cases, create a new account. This is why account ownership matters from day one, and why we never create client accounts under our MCC.

Book a Commercial Review. It is a 30-minute commercial diagnosis of where your account is losing contribution, and it shows you exactly what we'd change, why, and the reasoning behind it. If we can't identify a material opportunity, we'll tell you honestly. Ask your current agency for the same level of specificity - the comparison usually speaks for itself.

3 months for the initial implementation phase - this is the minimum time needed to properly review, restructure, and stabilise a new approach. After that, you move to rolling monthly with 30 days notice. We earn your continued business every month. If we stop adding value, you should leave - and we make that easy.

We don't recommend it. The ideal transition windows are January-February (post-peak recovery) or April-May (pre-summer). Switching during Q4 or during major promotional periods adds unnecessary risk. If your current situation is genuinely urgent, we can do a stabilisation-first approach - but we'll always be honest about the risks of transitioning during peak trading periods.

At minimum: Google Ads admin access, Google Analytics access, Merchant Centre access, and any feed management tool credentials. Ideally, we also want historical change logs, previous strategy documents, and any custom scripts or rules they've implemented. If your current agency is uncooperative, we can work with just the platform access.

Deep Dives