Agency vs freelancer for ecommerce ads: which should you hire?

Agency vs freelancer for ecommerce ads: what really differs

On paper the difference is simple. An agency is a team with processes, a project manager and someone to cover holidays. A freelancer is one person: direct contact, fewer layers, usually a lower fee because there is no office and no account managers to pay for.

In practice the line is blurrier. Some agencies are three people. Some freelancers quietly pass work to subcontractors. So I would not start with the question "agency or freelancer". I would start with "who will touch my account every week, and what will they be judged on".

One example: Villa Cotton, a US home-textile brand, came to me after a Russian agency, an American agency and several freelancers. They had tried both formats, and Meta ads were still running at a loss.

When an ecommerce ads agency is the better choice

I'm not an agency, but here are the cases where one is simply the right call.

• You run many channels and need creatives at scale: Meta, Google, TikTok, Pinterest, Amazon, email, plus shoots, UGC and video editing every week. One person can't go deep in all of that.
• Your business can't afford a pause. If the specialist gets sick for two weeks, someone has to step in on day one.
• Your company needs formal procurement (a legal entity, contracts, NDAs, several stakeholders in reporting), and the budget is large enough that a full team pays for itself instead of eating your margin.

When a freelance PPC specialist fits better

The risk is obvious: everything depends on one person. Ask what happens during holidays, and how many other shops this person handles. A cheap freelancer with too many clients ends up spending ten minutes a week on your account.

• One or two channels drive most of your revenue, for example Meta Ads plus Google Shopping.
• You want direct contact and fast changes without a chain of managers.
• You can produce creatives yourself or already work with a designer.
• Your budget is limited, and you'd rather pay for hands-on work than for coordination.

The trap: the senior sells, the junior runs your account

On the sales call you talk to the founder or the head of performance with ten years behind them. After you sign, your account goes to someone who joined last year, and an account manager in between relays your wishes. You pay for the senior and get a game of telephone.

Not every agency works like this, and juniors aren't bad by default. The problem is that you often don't know who is in your account. Freelancers have their own version: the person you hired outsources the routine work and only shows up for the monthly call. The fix is the same for both. Ask for names and check whose changes appear in the account history.

6 questions to ask before hiring an agency or freelancer

Google writes part of this into its own third-party partner policy. A partner must give you your Google Ads customer ID on request, report Google costs as the exact amount Google charged without their own fee, and disclose a separate management fee in writing before the first purchase and on every invoice. If a candidate is vague on these points, that tells you a lot.

• Who exactly will work in my account every week? Name, experience, and can I message that person directly?
• Who owns the ad accounts? The right answer is you. Ad accounts, pixel, Merchant Center and analytics sit in your business; the contractor gets access. In Google Ads that's a link to their manager account, in Meta it's partner access in your business portfolio.
• How do you report: revenue and profit, or clicks and reach? Ask for a sample report. If the first page shows CTR and impressions but not orders and ad cost share, you already know what they'll optimise for.
• What's the minimum contract and the notice period? Read the termination clause and check it with a lawyer before signing.
• How many clients do you handle right now, and how many per specialist?
• Is your fee separate from the ad spend, and do I pay the platforms directly?

A third option: a senior specialist who owns the whole funnel

There is a format between the two. A senior specialist who takes few projects and looks beyond the ad account: offer, product pages, email, margin. Because the reason ads don't pay off often sits outside the ads.

That's how I work. I take no more than 3 projects at a time and run each one myself, without juniors, so it's my name you'll see in the account's change history. Ad accounts and data always stay with you. The first 7 working days are a funnel diagnosis: where and how much money the shop is losing. If the diagnosis doesn't convince you, tell me within 3 days and I'll refund the month. After that it's a 3-month contract, then month to month. I work in writing and with recorded video walkthroughs instead of calls, so you can rewatch any explanation.

It's not for everyone. If you need a full creative production team across five channels, an agency is the better fit, and I'll tell you so.

When everything sits with one person: a museum without reports

Museo de la Imaginación is an optical-illusion museum in Málaga. In September 2024 the previous ads specialist had left. The ads "seemed to bring sales", but there were no reports and the analytics were set up wrongly, so nobody could check. That's the solo-contractor risk in practice: the person left, and the owner didn't have a single report on sales from ads.

I started with tracking: the Meta pixel, Google conversions, web analytics. Then I rebuilt the campaigns. From 1 to 6 October 2024 Google Ads brought 1 ticket sale; from 7 to 13 October, 15. Numbers and screenshots are in the museum case.

Villa Cotton is a different story: there the work covered the whole funnel, from weekly promotions and creatives to email flows and the product feed. How the numbers moved is in the Villa Cotton case.

How to decide in one evening

• Count the channels that actually bring revenue. One or two: a solo specialist is enough. Five plus heavy creative needs: look at agencies.
• Check whether you can supply creatives yourself.
• Decide how critical backup is for you.
• Send the six questions above to every candidate in writing and compare the answers.
• Ask for a case with screenshots from the store platform, not just from the ad account.