Should I run Google Ads myself or hire someone?

Run it yourself if your budget is small and you'll genuinely invest the hours; hire management when the monthly waste from a self-run account exceeds the management fee — which happens earlier than most owners expect, because the platform's defaults are tuned for Google's revenue, not yours.

The common self-run account: broad match keywords, auto-applied recommendations accepted, no negative keyword discipline, display network quietly on, and conversion tracking counting page views. Each is a silent leak.

A fair middle path: pay for a one-time professional build and tracking setup, run it yourself with guardrails, and move to management when scale makes the math obvious.