I have been managing Google AdWords accounts for a while now. Previously, I was lucky (unlucky?) enough to look after between 2 and 4 accounts at a time.
So, I had plenty of time to set up, review, optimise and report for each of the accounts. On the one hand it was really cool, but on the other hand it became pretty boring as I was doing similar stuff every day.
With a larger portfolio you have an opportunity to work with different verticals, different sized clients and various budgets. More things to change, improve, analyse, review, more opportunities to make the clients happy. In a nutshell – more fun.
Those are the highlights.
But, as with everything in life, there is a dark side (or, I would prefer to say, a challenge to overcome) when you manage the large portfolio of the clients accounts. The number one is limited time resources. With the same number of hours available each week, you have to cope with the bigger number of tasks to deal with – and to deal with effectively.
I spent quite a lot of time trying to figure out the most efficient way to manage my time. After a couple of months (yes, a couple of months) of trying and testing various tools and features I went back to basics and my old friend, Mr Excel.
Here is my story…(month by month)
I started with managing 6 accounts in my first month here at Broadplace – pretty cool, nice and smooth introduction to the digital agency world.
A typical morning at Broadplace (honest!)
In months 2 and 3 my portfolio doubled up to 12 clients – still ok, but more challenging in terms of the time spent over the phone or email.
Month 4 – Great! More accounts to look after and I started asking myself, “Do I have enough time to deal with them?”
In May, after being introduced to couple of new accounts I realized, that without a well-designed time management system I would “sink”. And I wanted to “sail” through the Google AdWords world and enjoy it.
I tried several tools including my email (reminders), calendar print-outs (weekly planners), some nice looking Chrome extensions (ToDist), but after initial excitement I felt none of them were working for me.
Then I had one of those “genius” moments of my life and… Eureka! I made it simple.
I created the Excel spreadsheet with the list of all of my clients, their budgets, management fees, reporting days. Which was very important as sometimes I wanted to discuss the data with clients. So I sorted the list by the client size by budget, fee – whatever is more relevant to you as the account manager.
Then, I added all days of the week (Monday to Friday) and I was pretty much there.
The next, and the final step, was to allocate how many minutes I could allocate per client. And, this could be spread across the whole week, just added to one day only.
At the bottom I applied the total minutes per day (Google Account Manager Tip: If you divide it by 1440, it will give you the total in hours:minutes). This allows me to see straight away if I have enough spare time on that day to deal with the client.
All on one page, everything to see at a glance, filters easy to apply and sort by – I love it.
I know, this solution is very basic, but it works surprisingly well for me. Better than other popular systems! Sometimes going back to basics works better than over-complicating things.
So, I encourage you to try this solution – it has got the potential to get you organised 🙂 Check back for more Google Account Manager tips coming soon.
Good luck,
Michal
Account Manager, Broadplace Advertising Ltd.
