“We strongly recommend that any user who can edit campaigns should be certified,” Google.
A lot of changes are coming – changes to the Google Partners program eligibility requirements that agencies aren’t very happy about. There is a requirement includes that at least 50% of the eligible users listed in their manager account are going to have to earn Google Ads certification. This is up from a single certified user with standard or admin access. The new requirements are set to take effect by the end of June. This news was announced last week.
It doesn’t seem that certifications are regarded as week indicators of a user’s proficiency with Google Ads products to create value for clients. The issue about the new threshold is that the list of eligible users in manager accounts often includes numerous client representatives as well as others who aren’t at all involved in campaign management. Because of this, Google added a bit more around the eligible user requirements on the help page late last week.
According to the new requirement, “A company needs to have at least 50% of its eligible users earn updated certifications from Skillshop. A company must also have at least 1 user certified in each channel they have spent in.”
There are three reasons Google gave that client accounts may be included in the eligible user count:
- They use personal email accounts. If clients or others “have personal email domain addresses” to access your manager account. Google recommends agencies “replace all personal email accounts in the Ads Manager account registered to Google Partners with company domain email accounts.”
- They use email addresses with your company domain. If you’ve created client emails on your agency domain, you’ll likely see them showing on this list. Google says to “ask your clients to use their own company email domain address.”
- Many users still have access. It may just be that you’ve given many client representatives access to your Ads Manager account, lower-level manager accounts or serving accounts and need to do some housecleaning. Google also notes that read-only and email-only users aren’t counted as eligible users, so this may be an option for some on your list.
- Finance and legal team members. Google acknowledges that legal and finance team members often need admin access to manager accounts. That, it says, is why just 50% of eligible users need to be certified: “We understand other users, such as finance or legal teams, will need Admin access, and therefore they will be in the other 50% of users.”
So, how do you check your manager account’s list of eligible users? If your agency is currently in Google Partners program, from the left-hand menu in your manager account, click “Partners program.” Under the “Badge status” section, click “View details.” In the second column of the “Certifications” section, click the hyperlinked sentence indicating how many users have current certifications. Then you’ll see the “Users that count toward the Partners certification requirement” listed at the top of the page. A second list of “Users that don’t count toward the Partners certification requirement” is below that.
f you want to make changes to your user permissions after reviewing this list, click the “Tools & Settings” tab in the menu at the top of the page. Click “Account access” under the “Setup” dropdown.