How do you choose a digital marketing agency in Saudi Arabia, and what goes in the contract before you sign?

Three agency proposals sit on your desk. The monthly prices are far apart, yet all three promise the same "full management" of your Google, Meta and Snapchat accounts, with design work and a monthly report. You're expected to sign this week.

Pick the proposal that answers four questions in writing. What number will you hold it to? Who, by name, will work on your account? Whose name will the ad accounts be in? How do you get out if it doesn't work? Price comes after those answers, not before.

The usual way of choosing looks elsewhere: price, portfolio, follower count, the Google Partner badge. Each says something about the agency, nothing about your account. My view: read a proposal the way I read the money path, from the ad to the lead, the sale and the revenue that reached your bank. Pay for work tied to a number you can check, such as qualified leads or collected revenue, not for reach and clicks.

What does a digital marketing agency's monthly fee cover?

Usually four kinds of work sit behind "full management". The ad budget is normally separate: you pay it to the platforms.

• Planning: who the campaigns target, on which platforms, with what message.
• Content and design: posts, ads and short videos, a set number each month.
• Ad management: launching and watching campaigns, adjusting targeting and bids.
• Reporting: what was spent, what it brought in, what will change.

The common habit is to compare the monthly price alone. Split it into two numbers first: the agency's fee, and what you pay the platforms directly. A proposal can also look cheaper because it leaves out photography, or runs two platforms instead of three. So ask each agency to list what the price includes and what it doesn't, with quantities.

What sets the price?

What a digital marketing agency charges depends more on the written scope than on its name. The main drivers:

• How many ad platforms are managed.
• Content volume, meaning designs and videos a month.
• Languages: Arabic and English means two versions of every ad.
• Landing pages and store work, if they're part of the job.
• Reporting depth, from platform screenshots to ads tied to sales.
• Who your account manager is, and how much of their time is yours.

Each of the three common fee models has a cost:

Fee model	What's good about it	What you pay for it
Fixed fee by scope	You know the cost in advance, and whoever executes gains nothing from you spending more	Not tied to results on its own, so you need a written number to hold them to
Percentage of ad spend	Grows with the size of the accounts managed	The fee grows when spend grows, not when revenue does
Pay per result	Looks fairest, since you pay per lead or sale	Everything hangs on how a result is defined, and a loose definition brings lots of weak leads

A hypothetical example with round numbers: the fee is 10% of ad spend. You spend SAR 20,000 a month, so you pay SAR 2,000 in fees. Raise spend to SAR 40,000 and the fee becomes SAR 4,000. The agency's fee has doubled. Nobody has asked whether sales did.

I work for a fixed fee set by scope, not a share of the client's ad spend. That's how I price, one option among several, not a market rule.

Whatever the model, write next to it the number you'll hold them to. If you pay per lead, define a qualified lead before you sign. I explain how in how to measure lead quality.

10 questions to ask a marketing agency before you sign

Send these to every agency before the meeting and ask for written answers.

Question	Reassuring answer	Worrying answer
1. What number will you report against?	Qualified leads or collected revenue, next to spend	Reach, engagement, clicks, or "we'll set that later"
2. Who will work on my account, by name?	Names and roles, including who runs the ads	"A full team", no names
3. Whose name are the ad accounts, pixels, GA4 and design files in?	Your company's name and email, Admin access with you, open design files handed over	"We'll set them up our side and give you view access"
4. What happens in month one?	Reading the data, fixing tracking, a baseline before any target	A sales figure promised before they've seen your account
5. How often does the report come, and what's in it?	A fixed date, with spend, leads, what changed and why	Platform screenshots, no explanation
6. What's the minimum term and notice period?	A clear term, written notice of reasonable length	A long commitment that renews itself, no exit clause
7. What isn't included in the price?	A written list, such as ad budget, photography, store changes	"Everything's included"
8. What do you do in a month when results drop?	What they'll check first, and they tell you before you ask	Raising the budget is the first suggestion
9. Can I talk to the person running the ads?	Yes, at least in the review meeting	Everything goes through the account manager
10. What do you need from me?	A specific list: profit margin, order or CRM data, someone to approve designs	"Nothing, leave it to us"

Short of time? Questions 1, 3 and 6 weigh most: what you hold them to, what stays yours, and what leaving costs if you chose wrong.

On question 4, here's how I work. I split the first 100 days into three phases: diagnose, build, launch. I fix no target until I've checked the baseline, meaning the number your account starts from today.

What goes in the contract?

Everything agreed in the meeting, because the contract stays when the account manager changes. The clauses I ask to see:

1. Scope and deliverables. What gets done each month, with quantities and dates, and what the price doesn't cover.
2. The number the work is judged by. Qualified leads, or collected revenue after cancellations and returns. Where you sell by phone, I prefer the ads to learn from a qualified booked call confirmed in the CRM, not from every form filled in. The gap between the platform's number and revenue is in what ROAS leaves out.
3. Ownership of accounts and files. Ad accounts, pixels, GA4 and the store, all in your company's name, on its email and its payment method. Admin access sits with two people in your company, and whoever executes works with access you grant. On Meta, the ad account lives in your company's Business Portfolio, not the agency's. Open design files are part of the deliverables.
4. Term and notice. The minimum term, how many days' notice ends it, and whether it renews automatically.
5. Handover at exit. What you receive in the final month, such as files, reports and a campaign list, and when access is removed.
6. Confidentiality and data. Who sees your sales figures and customer data, and that they're used only for your work.

Clause 3 is the hardest to fix after signing. In Google Ads, only an Admin can give account access and change access levels. If the agency creates the account from its manager account (MCC), Google says the manager automatically becomes the owner.

I'm not a lawyer, and these are working terms, not legal drafting. Have someone qualified review the contract before you sign.

What does a Google Partner badge tell you, and what doesn't it?

It tells you the agency meets Google's requirements, measured across the accounts it manages. It tells you nothing about results in yours.

The Google Ads help page sets three requirements, checked daily:

• Performance: a company-level optimization score of at least 70%, calculated across the accounts it manages.
• Spend: at least USD 10,000 of ad spend across its managed accounts over 90 days.
• Certifications: at least half its account strategists hold a Google Ads certification. Plus one certification in each product where spend passed USD 500 over 90 days.

Premier Partner status goes each year to the top 3% of participating companies in each country.

None of these requirements measures your sales, and spend is itself one of them. So the badge tells you the agency runs real spend on Google. That's useful, but it answers none of the ten questions.

Where do I fit in this?

I'm not a digital marketing company or an agency. I'm one person you hold to account, and I lead an execution team that runs ads, design, content and online stores. Ask me the same ten questions. My fee is fixed and set by the written scope, and the accounts stay in your company's name from day one. The details are on digital marketing execution with a team I lead.

Not sure yet whether you need someone to execute or someone to decide? Start with marketing agency or consultant?.

This week, send the ten-question table to all three agencies and ask for written answers. Compare the answers first. Then look at the prices.

Want your team trained on this? Corporate training programs.