Reading an agency proposal and its reports

Proposals are written to persuade, so they rarely line up. One leads with creative, another with process, a third with a price. Your job is to translate them into the same shape.

Put proposals in one table

Use one row per item and one column per agency:

• What is included, and what is explicitly excluded.
• Who will do the work, and how much of their time your account gets.
• The fee, how it is calculated and how often it is charged.
• Advertising spend, and who controls it.
• The minimum term and the notice period.
• What you receive each month, and what you receive if you leave.
• How success is defined and measured.

A blank cell is information. An agency that has not said what is excluded has not yet decided, and you will decide it with them later, when you have less leverage.

Fees, ad spend and VAT

Keep three numbers apart: the agency’s fee, the amount that goes to the advertising platforms, and VAT. The UAE Federal Tax Authority gives the standard rate of VAT as 5 percent^[3]. Some quotes are stated with VAT and some without, so convert them to one basis before you compare. If you can reclaim VAT as a registered business, ask your accountant which comparison is the one that matters to you.

I have deliberately not put typical price ranges on this page. I have no source for a figure I could stand behind, and a number I cannot source would only anchor you.

How success is defined

Google defines a conversion as an ad click or other interaction that leads directly to a behaviour valuable to you, such as a purchase or a phone call^[2]. The word valuable is doing the work. A form submission, a click on a phone number and a completed sale are all conversions on that definition, and they are worth very different amounts to your business. Ask which one the agency will report, and ask to see how it is tracked.

Reading the reports

• Can you trace each reported figure to your own account? If not, you are trusting the agency’s summary.
• Are the figures compared with a period before the agency started, using the same definition?
• Does the report separate enquiries from qualified enquiries, and from sales?
• Does it say what will change next month, and why?

Mistakes to avoid

• Comparing a fee that includes ad spend with one that excludes it.
• Reading a badge as a recommendation. Google’s guidelines say a Partner badge cannot imply Google endorses the company^[1].
• Accepting a report whose headline number nobody has defined.
• Leaving ownership of the accounts until after the work has started.

When you have the table, enter your answers in the scorecard. The method around it is in how to choose a marketing agency in the UAE, and account ownership is covered in who should own your ad and analytics accounts. If you would like a second pair of eyes on a proposal, I offer a free ads audit, and I say plainly that I sell the services it leads to.