Question
What does a Manchester PPC agency cost?
Our management fee is £249 a month for ad spend up to £1,000, £399 up to £3,000 and £599 up to £8,000, plus a one-off £199 setup when an account is built, with a £150 written audit and a free 72-hour check for accounts already spending. Across the Manchester market the same work is priced three ways, and the model matters more than the headline number, because a percentage of spend pays the agency more every time you spend more.
Answered by Daniel Stoychev, Webso Digital · 5 September 2026
Our fees, in one table
| What | Fee | Covers |
|---|---|---|
| Starter management | £249 a month | Ad spend up to £1,000 a month |
| Growth management | £399 a month | Ad spend up to £3,000 a month |
| Scale management | £599 a month | Ad spend up to £8,000 a month |
| Account setup | £199 once | A new or rebuilt account, tracking proved, first campaigns live |
| PPC audit | £150 once | A written review in 5 working days, credited against setup |
| Free Google Ads check | Free | Six checks on a live account, a short note within 72 hours |
Prices exclude VAT, with a 3-month minimum and then monthly. The ad spend goes to Google on your own card and never passes through us, so the fee is the whole cost of management.
The three ways a Manchester agency charges
| Model | How it is worked out | What it rewards |
|---|---|---|
| Percentage of spend | Ten to twenty per cent of what you give Google each month, often with a minimum | Recommending a bigger budget, because the fee rises with it whatever comes back |
| Flat fee by band | A fixed monthly sum that steps up only when spend crosses into the next band | Nothing about the spend; the agency is free to tell you to cut it |
| Hybrid with a minimum | A base fee plus a percentage above a threshold, or a minimum that overrides the percentage on small accounts | Keeping you above the threshold; on a small account the effective rate can be far above the headline |
Why the city-centre firms will not quote a small budget
Most of the agencies with a Manchester office start their management fees somewhere between one and two and a half thousand pounds a month and set a minimum ad spend to match, because a Deansgate or Spinningfields lease has to be paid before the first account is opened. That is arithmetic, not a criticism, and it means a business spending eight hundred pounds a month on Google is not the customer they are built for. It is the one we are built for, and having no office in the city is a large part of why the fee can be what it is.
Before you compare fees, look in your own account
- Open the change history for the last ninety days. A quiet month is a month nobody managed, whatever was invoiced.
- Open the Search Terms report for the same period, sorted by cost, and count the rows that could never have bought from you: that is the waste the fee should remove.
- Check whose name is on the billing and whether you can remove the agency's access yourself. A fee that leaves you with no account when you leave was not a low fee.
- Ask what the monthly report leads with: cost per enquiry is management, clicks are a screenshot.
Two agencies quoting the same figure can be a long way apart on those four answers, and the cheaper fee is the one attached to the account that leaks less.
Where this leads
The service this question belongs to is Pricing, and the longer read is our guide Choosing a PPC agency in Manchester.
Follow-up questions
- Does the fee change if my Manchester campaign does well?
- No. The fee follows the spend band and nothing else. An account whose cost per enquiry halves pays the same next month, which is why our reports recommend cutting spend as often as raising it.
- Is there a minimum ad spend?
- No. The Starter tier exists for accounts spending under £1,000 a month. What we will say is when a budget is too small to learn from in a dear sector, before you commit to it.
- What happens if I leave?
- After the 3-month minimum, a month's notice. The account, the negative lists, the tracking and the landing page changes stay with you, because they were always in your name.