Solved: Finding a UK Google Ads Expert (See How to Vet Experts)

Hi there,

Thanks for reaching out!

I saw your note about struggling to find a decent Google Ads expert in the UK. Honestly, I'm not surprised. It’s a field full of people who talk a good game but can't back it up with results. Finding someone who genuinely knows their stuff, especially in the UK market, can feel like a nightmare.

I'm happy to give you some of my thoughts on this. I've been in this game a while and have seen what separates the real experts from the charlatans. The good news is there's a clear process you can follow to vet people properly. It’s less about where they are and more about *what* they know and can prove. I'll walk you through how I'd approach it, so you can avoid wasting time and money on the wrong person.

You probably should stop focusing on location...

Right, let's get the biggest myth out of the way first. This idea that you *need* a Google Ads expert based in the United Kingdom is, frankly, a bit of a red herring. I get the impulse. You want someone who 'gets' the market, understands the culture, and maybe is in the same timezone. These things feel comfortable, but they have almost zero correlation with their ability to get you results.

Think about it this way: if you needed complex heart surgery, would you choose the average surgeon at your local hospital, or would you seek out the world-renowned specialist who's two hundred miles away? You'd go for the expert, obviously. Paid advertising is no different. It's a highly technical skill. The difference between a mediocre campaign and a brilliant one isn't a vague understanding of British humour; it's a deep, technical mastery of auction dynamics, keyword strategy, conversion tracking, and audience psychology. These skills are universal.

In my experience, the single most important factor is niche-specific expertise. Have they successfully run campaigns for businesses like yours before? If you sell B2B software, you want someone who lives and breathes SaaS marketing. They'll understand your sales cycles, the importance of a demo vs. a free trial, and how to target decision-makers. We've taken on SaaS clients and got their CPA down from £100 to £7 simply because we understood that specific funnel.

Similarly, if you're a software company, you want someone who understands user acquisition funnels, trial-to-paid conversion rates, and churn. They need to know how to find high-intent users on search without overpaying. For one software client, we used Google Ads to acquire 3,543 users at just £0.96 each because we built a highly specific keyword strategy around their niche. That knowledge is worth a hundred times more than sharing a postcode.

The whole idea of a 'UK market nuance' is massively overstated for 99% of businesses. A good advertiser researches their target market regardless. They'll look at search query data, competitor ads, and landing pages to understand the local landscape. They don't need to live here to do that. The data tells the story. The only time it might matter is for hyper-local service businesses, and even then, the principles of local search campaigns are the same whether you're targeting Leeds or Los Angeles. The tools are the same. The process is the same.

So, my first piece of brutally honest advice is to widen your search. Stop typing "Google Ads expert UK" and start searching for "Google Ads expert for [your business type]". You'll get a much better pool of talent to choose from. Judge them on their skills and track record, not their address. It'll make a huge difference.

We'll need to look at their case studies, not their promises...

Okay, so once you've got a list of potential experts, regardless of their location, how do you sort the good from the bad? Everyone will promise you the world. They'll all talk about "skyrocketing your ROI" and "delivering qualified leads". It's all just noise. The only thing that matters is proof.

This is where you need to become obsessed with their case studies. And I don't just mean looking at the headline numbers. Any agency can get a lucky result and plaster a flashy number on their website. I remember one medical recruitment SaaS we worked with. The headline result was that we took their Cost Per Acquisition from £100 down to just £7 across Google and Meta Ads. It was fantastic, but that single number doesn't tell you about the months of testing, the keyword strategy iterations on search, and the audience refinement on social it took to get there. That's the stuff you need to dig into.

When you look at a case study, you should be asking these questions:

1. Is it relevant to me? As I mentioned, niche experience is massive. If they're showing you a case study for a local plumber and you sell international software, it's almost useless. It shows they can run a campaign, but not necessarily *your* campaign. You want to see that they've solved problems similar to yours for businesses similar to yours.

2. Do they explain the 'how' and the 'why'? A good case study isn't just a results sheet. It's a story. It should start with the client's problem. What wasn't working? What were the specific challenges? Then, it should detail the strategy they implemented. What campaigns did they choose and why? What targeting did they use? What was their thinking behind the ad copy? For instance, when we helped an events and sports app grow, we didn't just report the 45,000+ signups. We explained *why* we used a combination of Google Search Ads to capture high-intent users looking for events, alongside social and Apple Ads to build broader awareness and drive down the overall cost per signup to under £2. The strategy is the valuable part, not just the final number.

3. Are they honest about the process? Real paid advertising isn't a magic button. It involves testing, failing, learning, and optimising. I'm always suspicious of case studies that sound too perfect. "The client came to us, we launched one campaign, and they got a 10x return instantly." That just doesn't happen. A truly confident expert will talk about the challenges. They might say something like, "Our initial interest-based targeting on Meta wasn't working, so we pivoted to a lookalike audience built from their existing customer list, which cut the CPA in half." This shows they can problem-solve, which is what you're actually paying for.

Don't be afraid to ask for more detail. If a case study looks interesting, get on a call and ask them to walk you through it. If they get defensive or can't elaborate on the strategy, it's a huge red flag. It might mean the result was a fluke, or worse, that they weren't actually responsible for it. A true expert will love talking about their work and the strategic decisions they made.

I'd say you need to understand the numbers yourself...

This might be the most important part of this entire letter. You can have the best Google Ads expert on the planet, but if you don't understand your own business's numbers, you are flying blind. You'll make decisions based on fear and gut feelings instead of data, and you'll probably fire a good expert for doing a perfectly good job.

The biggest mistake I see business owners make is obsessing over the wrong metrics. They'll say, "My cost per lead (CPL) is £50, that's too expensive!" My question is always the same: "Is it?" How can you possibly know if £50 is expensive unless you know what a customer is actually worth to you?

This is where you have to get comfortable with two acronyms: LTV (Lifetime Value) and CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost). Your CAC is simple: it's the total cost of your marketing and sales efforts to acquire one new customer. Your ads expert is mainly responsible for this part. But LTV is all on you. It's the total profit (not revenue!) you can expect to make from an average customer over the entire time they do business with you.

Let's do some quick maths. Say you run a subscription business.

• Average Revenue Per Account (ARPA): £100 per month
• Gross Margin: 70% (so you make £70 profit per customer per month)
• Monthly Churn Rate: 5% (you lose 5% of your customers each month)

The formula for LTV is: (ARPA * Gross Margin %) / Monthly Churn Rate.
So, in this case: (£100 * 0.70) / 0.05 = £70 / 0.05 = £1,400 LTV.

Every customer you sign up is worth £1,400 in profit. Now, let's go back to that "expensive" £50 lead. If your sales team converts 1 in 10 of those leads into a customer, your cost to acquire a customer (CAC) is £50 * 10 = £500.

So you're paying £500 to make £1,400. That is an incredible deal. You're getting a nearly 3:1 return on your investment. That £50 lead isn't expensive at all; it's a money-printing machine! You shouldn't be trying to get it lower; you should be asking your ads expert, "How can we spend more to get more of these £50 leads?"

This is the mindset shift that separates businesses that scale from those that stagnate. They stop being scared of ad spend and start seeing it as an investment with a predictable return. A good rule of thumb is to aim for an LTV:CAC ratio of at least 3:1. If you're hitting that, your business model is healthy and ready for advertising.

Before you even think about hiring someone, you *must* do this calculation. Use the calculator below to get a feel for your own numbers. It will change the entire conversation you have with potential agencies. Instead of asking "How cheap can you get my leads?", you'll be asking "My LTV is £X, meaning I can afford a CAC of up to £Y. Can you build a strategy to acquire customers profitably within that target?" That's a question a real expert will love to answer.

You'll need an offer that actually works...

Let me be blunt. You could hire me, or any other top-tier ads expert, and we could build you the most technically perfect Google Ads campaign ever seen. We could target the exact right keywords, write incredible ad copy, and set up flawless conversion tracking. And you could still get zero results.

Why? Because the best advertising in the world cannot sell a bad offer.

This is the part of the equation that 99% of business owners overlook. They think advertising is a magic tap you can turn on to get customers. It's not. Advertising is an accelerator. It takes the existing demand for your offer and puts it in front of more people, faster. If there's no demand for your offer in the first place, all you're doing is accelerating towards a wall.

The number one reason campaigns fail is the offer. It's either not valuable enough, not clear enough, or not aimed at a person with a real, urgent problem.

The worst offender I see, especially in B2B, is the "Request a Demo" button. Think about what you're asking. You want a busy, important person to give up 30-60 minutes of their time to sit through a sales presentation. It's a huge ask with very little upfront value for them. It's high friction. It instantly positions you as just another vendor trying to sell them something. No wonder your conversion rates are terrible.

A strong offer does the opposite. It provides immediate, undeniable value and solves a small part of their problem for free. It gives them an "aha!" moment that makes them want to learn more. It builds trust and demonstrates your expertise before you ever ask for a penny.

What does this look like in practice?

• For a SaaS company: Instead of "Request a Demo", offer a "Free Trial (no credit card required)" or a "Freemium Plan". Let them actually *use* the product. Let the software itself prove its value. Once they see how it solves their problem, the sale becomes easy. We've seen this time and again with our software clients; a compelling free offer is critical for success, especially on competitive platforms like Google Ads. For instance, with the software client I mentioned who we helped acquire users for £0.96 each, that result was only possible because they had a fantastic, low-friction free product that made converting search traffic highly efficient.
• For a service business (like an agency or consultancy): You need to bottle your expertise. Instead of "Book a Consultation", offer a "Free SEO Audit Tool" that finds their top 3 keyword opportunities. Or a "Free 15-Minute Ad Account Review" where you find wasted spend. This is what we do. We offer a free strategy review because it provides genuine value, shows we know our stuff, and builds trust. The person leaves the call with actionable advice, whether they hire us or not.
• For an eCommerce business: The offer isn't just the product. It's the entire proposition. Is there a discount for first-time buyers? Free shipping? A risk-free guarantee? For a high-ticket item, maybe it's a detailed buyer's guide or a free sample. You need something to push people over the edge.

Before you blame Google Ads or your ads manager for poor performance, take a long, hard look at what you're asking people to do when they click your ad. Is it a compelling, low-friction, high-value offer? If not, fix that first. It will make a bigger difference than any campaign optimisation ever could.

You probably should grill them on the intro call...

Right, so you've found a few candidates with relevant case studies, you understand your LTV, and you've got a solid offer. Now it's time to talk to them. This call is not a formality; it's your final and most important test. Your goal here is to cut through the sales pitch and find out if they can actually think strategically.

Most people just ask about pricing and process. That's a mistake. You'll learn nothing. You need to ask questions that force them to demonstrate their expertise on the spot. Tbh if someone asks us for references after we've given them a free account review and shown them our detailed case studies, it's a bit of a red flag. It shows a lack of trust from the start. Your confidence should come from their ability to answer tough, strategic questions.

Here's what I would ask:

1. "Forget my current campaigns for a second. Based on my business model and my goals, what would your ideal campaign structure and testing strategy look like from day one?"
This is a great opening question. A bad answer is vague: "Oh, we'd set up some search campaigns and test a few keywords." A good answer is specific and strategic: "Okay, you're a B2B SaaS targeting finance directors. I'd start with a highly targeted search campaign focused on bottom-of-funnel keywords like '[competitor name] alternative' and 'accounting automation software'. I'd run these alongside a LinkedIn Ads campaign targeting users by job title to generate awareness. For the search campaign, I'd structure ad groups by user intent—problem-aware vs. solution-aware—and send them to different landing pages. We'd test two ad copy angles: one focused on cost savings, the other on efficiency gains." This shows they can think from first principles.

2. "What's the biggest, most common mistake you see companies in my industry making with their Google Ads?"
This tests their niche knowledge. Anyone can give a generic answer like "they don't use negative keywords". An expert who has actually worked in your niche will give a much more insightful answer. For an eCommerce client, they might say, "Most apparel brands just dump all their products into one Performance Max campaign and hope for the best. We find that segmenting PMax by margin or product category and feeding it custom audience signals gives us way more control and profitability." That's an answer born from experience.

3. "Walk me through a campaign you ran that was failing initially. What were the signs it was failing, and what specific steps did you take to turn it around?"
This is my favourite question. It tests for honesty and problem-solving skills. As I've said, every real campaign has problems. An expert who claims they've never had a failing campaign is either lying or inexperienced. You want to hear them talk about data analysis. A great answer sounds like this: "We had a campaign for a client where the click-through rate was high, but conversions were zero. We dug into the Search Terms Report and realised the keywords were too broad and attracting informational searchers, not buyers. We paused the broad match keywords, built out a tight list of exact match commercial terms, and rewrote the ad copy to pre-qualify clicks by including the price. The CPL dropped by 70% in the next two weeks."

4. "What metrics will you be reporting on beyond the basics like CPA and ROAS, and why are they important for my business?"
This separates the button-pushers from the strategic partners. A basic manager will just send you a report with the standard Google Ads columns. A strategic expert will want to talk about business impact. They might say, "While ROAS is important, I also want to track the blended ROAS across all your marketing channels to ensure our ads are lifting everything. I also want to track the LTV of the customers we acquire through Google vs. other channels to make sure we're not just bringing in cheap, low-quality users." This shows they're thinking about your business as a whole, not just their little silo.

Listen carefully to their answers. Are they confident? Are they specific? Do they sound like they've actually done this before? Or are they just reciting things they read in a blog post? Your gut feeling here, backed by these tough questions, is usually right.

This is the main advice I have for you:

Finding the right person is a process of systematic vetting, not luck. To make it easier, I've put the entire process into a table. Think of this as your checklist for hiring a Google Ads expert who won't waste your money.

At the end of the day, paid advertising is a significant investment. Doing it wrong isn't just a waste of ad spend; it's a massive opportunity cost. The time you spend with the wrong agency is time you could have been growing with the right one.

That's why this vetting process is so important. Taking a few weeks to do this properly can save you months of frustration and tens of thousands of pounds. When you find the right partner, they're not just a supplier; they're an extension of your team who is as invested in your growth as you are.

I hope this detailed breakdown has been helpful and gives you a clear framework to move forward. It’s a lot to take in, I know, but getting this decision right is one of the most impactful things you can do for your business.

If you'd like to chat through your specific situation and get a second opinion on your current strategy, we offer a completely free, no-obligation 20-minute strategy session. We can take a look at your business, your goals, and give you some actionable advice on the spot. It's a good way to see if our approach resonates with you and to get some value right away.

Either way, I wish you the best of luck with your search.

Regards,

Team @ Lukas Holschuh