Introduction
Advertising platforms like Google, Meta (Facebook/Instagram), and TikTok often provide “free” account representatives who eagerly offer advice to boost your campaigns. At first glance, this seems beneficial – who wouldn’t want insider tips from the platform? However, many experienced advertisers warn that taking these reps’ advice at face value can be dangerous for your profitability. Their incentives often lean more toward increasing platform revenue than helping you build a scalable, sustainable ad strategy.
Misaligned Incentives: Who Do Ad Reps Really Work For?
Platform ad reps are not strategic consultants – they are salespeople. Their job performance is measured by increased spend and adoption of new features, not your return on investment. Ultimately, the rep’s goal is to make the platform more profitable, not your business.
These reps often manage large account portfolios and rely on scripted, one-size-fits-all advice designed to push advertisers into spending more. The tactics they promote may boost short-term impressions or clicks, but they rarely align with your long-term profitability or strategic goals.
Common Red Flags in Reps’ Recommendations
1. “Increase Your Budget and Broaden Your Targeting.”
Reps often encourage advertisers to expand budgets and use broader match types or audiences. While this may increase reach, it often lowers traffic quality and inflates cost per acquisition without delivering incremental value. In our experience, quality traffic nearly always beats volume in eCommerce.
2. Pushing Unproven Beta Features or Full Automation
Platform reps frequently push the latest AI-driven tools like Performance Max or Advantage+ Shopping, often before these features are stable or proven for your business type. While automation has a place, ceding full control before the system is trained or well understood can lead to budget inefficiencies and poor performance.
3. One-Size-Fits-All Advice
Ad reps typically offer generic suggestions that ignore business model nuances. We’ve seen local-only businesses told to run national campaigns and niche B2B companies advised to use tactics designed for impulse-buy consumer goods. Strategic misalignment like this often leads to disappointing results.
4. “Just Trust the System” (Auto-Applied Changes)
Reps regularly recommend enabling auto-applied suggestions or accepting platform-generated optimizations en masse. These often include expanding match types, enabling all placements, or merging campaigns. In most cases we’ve audited, these changes resulted in degraded performance and less control over spend efficiency.
5. High-Pressure or Conflicting Guidance
Many advertisers report being overwhelmed by rep outreach or receiving contradictory recommendations from different reps. This inconsistent and often aggressive sales approach is a red flag. Trusted advisors don’t push you into decisions; they collaborate with your team and respect your strategy.
Real-World Patterns and Common Outcomes
Many businesses that follow rep advice without vetting it internally experience:
- Rapidly rising spend with little or no lift in revenue
- Cannibalization of organic or branded traffic (paying for conversions they already would have gotten)
- Loss of data clarity due to black-box automation (especially in campaign types like Performance Max)
- Longer recovery times and reduced momentum when bad advice is implemented
These experiences reinforce a key truth: ad platform reps are rarely accountable for campaign outcomes. When things go sideways, the rep moves on, but your business is left cleaning up the mess.
How to Use Rep Advice (Carefully)
1. Filter Their Recommendations Through Your Business Goals
Reps work for the platform. You work for your business. Treat their advice as just one input – validate it against your campaign data, brand strategy, and profitability targets.
2. Test Strategically Before Scaling
If a rep suggests something potentially interesting, A/B test it in a limited scope. Don’t roll out platform-driven changes across your entire account until it’s proven to support your metrics.
3. Prioritize Advice From Those With Aligned Incentives
Your in-house team or strategic agency partners are aligned with your growth. Platform reps are aligned with their employer’s revenue. That matters. Your strategic partners will live with the consequences of their advice; the rep likely won’t.
4. Say No to Auto-Applied Changes
Auto-apply is convenient for reps, but dangerous for you. It’s always better to opt-in to changes manually so you can assess each one on its merit.
5. Set Boundaries
If rep outreach becomes disruptive or unhelpful, it’s okay to set limits. You are under no obligation to take meetings or implement changes just because they’re offered for free.
Conclusion
Advertising reps can occasionally offer helpful reminders or troubleshooting support. But they should not be treated as strategic partners. Their guidance is often misaligned with your goals, biased toward short-term spend increases, and rarely tailored to your specific business.
Trust your own data. Trust your own incentives. And when in doubt, lean on partners whose success is measured by your success – not by how many features you’ve enabled or how much you’ve spent this quarter.
In today’s ad landscape, critical thinking is more valuable than ever. Don’t outsource your judgment to someone who doesn’t share your scoreboard.
