I have always been a believer in collaboration. In our small, but ever-growing, tight-knit PPC community, I have met lots of people along the way who think differently than I do, who manage accounts differently than I do and I love it! I feel constantly challenged to evaluate the way I do things and work to be a better account manager. One of the best ways I’ve found to keep that type of vital communication going is through regular group account reviews. At Clix, we feel it’s important that all of our employees understand each account and its goals, whether we are directly part of managing that account on a daily basis or not.
Our Group PPC Account Review Process
To get started with regular group account reviews we had to answer two important questions:
- Which account do we start with?
- How frequently can everyone commit to these reviews?
We decided to kick off this process with an account that was having some performance issues, was struggling to establish hard goals and wanted ideas for how to reach a younger audience. As for frequency, everyone on our team said they could commit to one account review per month.
From there, we created a Google Doc which has a tab for each account and the following columns within each tab:
- Account Overview — since not everyone on our team works on every account, an overview column is vital. This section includes an overview of the client’s product/service, target demographic, channels campaigns are running in and any specific goals.
- Current Problems/Pain Points — if the account is struggling, this is where to let loose about how it’s struggling: performance isn’t meeting goals, client is having trouble establishing goals, poor client communication, etc.
- Recent Optimizations — these are imperative to list so that there isn’t overlap between changes you’ve already recently made and your teammates’ recommendations.
- Improvement Ideas Client Rejected — I think we’ve all been here before; we make a recommendation to help an issue at hand but the client isn’t on board for one reason or another. It’s important to list these as well so that your teammates don’t waste time recommending something you know the client won’t agree with.
- Additional Notes — anything else you think is vital for your teammates to know about the account.
- Teammates — then we have a column for each person to submit their recommendations. It’s great having a working document like this to, again, help avoid overlap in suggestions.
The account lead fills out the doc one week before our group review to give everyone enough time to read through the info and submit their recommendations. We have a monthly call on everyone’s calendar and I update the description to include the latest account we’ll be reviewing, and I send out a reminder a few days before. Then we all take an hour on the review day to share and discuss our ideas.
Collaboration is Key
I firmly believe that accounts can be more successful when multiple people provide analysis, insight and ideas. The group account reviews have been great for us in many ways, but the following are three big advantages we’ve found by employing our brain trust.
Fresh Eyes
The longer you’ve had an account the more important it is to have fresh eyes take a look. As legacy managers, we can be quick to write off an idea that maybe hasn’t worked super well in the past or overlook easy wins, so it’s important to refresh your perspective by having others review and analyze your account.
Knowledge You Don’t Have
I have been hard pressed to find an account manager who has experience with every possible campaign type in every possible channel. Chances are there is someone on your team who has more experience with a certain campaign type or channel than you do. Group account reviews are a great way to batch your questions, pick their brain and give them a chance to help you troubleshoot any issues.
Cross-Account Idea Generation
One thing I especially love about the group reviews is the suggestions that can be applied to more accounts than just the one being reviewed. Maybe a channel is mentioned that might work well for one of your own accounts, or maybe an optimization suggestion is made that you hadn’t thought to try for your account. By analyzing and brainstorming for one account, multiple accounts can also be improved.
Ultimately, by going it alone in your accounts you deprive yourself of expanded knowledge and your accounts of potential improvement. If you have teammates at your disposal, rally the troops and start coordinating some group account reviews! If you don’t have teammates, here’s a way to audit your account without them.
Have you had great success with group account reviews? We’d love to hear about your strategies in the comments below!
