Who owns your Google Ads, analytics and domain? Check before you switch agencies

Your website, domain, ad accounts, analytics and business listings should be in your business's name, with agencies and freelancers given access to them. Not the other way round. It sounds obvious, and it is easy to get wrong without noticing, usually because a supplier set something up quickly at the start and nobody checked whose name went on it.

It matters most at exactly the moment it is hardest to fix: when you want to change supplier. Below is a table of what you should own, how to check each one, which role you should hold, and a plan for switching agencies without losing years of history. If you are still deciding whether to switch, start with how to tell if your agency is doing a good job.

Why it matters

Three reasons:

• History. A Google Ads account holds years of data on what worked. Analytics holds the record of where your customers came from. Starting again means losing it.
• Learning. Automated bidding in ad platforms learns from your conversion data. A new account starts that learning from scratch.
• Leverage. If a supplier holds your accounts, they hold a lot of power over the end of the relationship, whatever the contract says.

None of this assumes bad faith. It is often down to haste rather than malice: someone set up an account under their own login to get started quickly. It still needs fixing.

What you should own, and the role to hold

Each platform names its roles differently, so here is what each one means.

Google Ads

Google Ads has five access levels: Email only, Billing, Read only, Standard and Admin. Admins can give account access, change access levels and accept or remove links to manager accounts. Agencies usually manage clients through their own manager account, which is normal and fine, as long as the account itself is yours and someone in your business is an Admin.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics 4 has five roles: Administrator, Editor, Marketer, Analyst and Viewer. Google describes the Administrator as having full control of Analytics, including managing users. Someone in your business should be an Administrator at account level, not just a Viewer.

Google Tag Manager

Tag Manager has two layers of permissions. At account level, an Admin can create containers and manage users. At container level, the permissions run from Read through Edit and Approve to Publish, which allows changes to go live. Your business should hold Admin on the account.

Google Search Console

Search Console distinguishes owners and users. A verified owner has proved ownership with a verification token; a delegated owner has been given ownership by a verified owner. Only owners can add and remove users and owners, link Google Analytics and change settings. Your business should be a verified owner.

Google Business Profile

A Business Profile can have several owners but only one primary owner. Managers can do most things but cannot add or remove users or remove the profile. Your business should be the primary owner.

Meta

Facebook and Instagram assets are managed through a business portfolio in Meta Business Suite. Your business should own the portfolio and give the agency access to it, rather than the agency holding your pages and ad accounts in its own.

Your domain

The registrant is the person or organisation a domain is registered to. For .uk domains the registry is run by Nominet, and the registrant is recorded there whichever registrar you use. Moving a domain to a different registrar and changing who the registrant is are two different things, so check both: that the registrant is your business, not your web designer, a former employee or a former agency, and that the login to the registrar is yours. If the registrant is wrong, your registrar can tell you how to change it.

Check yours in an afternoon

Work through this list. The ticks are saved in this browser.

• Our domain's registrant is our business, and we hold the registrar login.
• We hold an administrator login to the website and the hosting account.
• Someone in our business is an Admin on our Google Ads account.
• Someone in our business is an Administrator on our Google Analytics account.
• We hold Admin on our Google Tag Manager account.
• We are a verified owner in Google Search Console.
• We are the primary owner of our Google Business Profile.
• We own our Meta business portfolio, and the agency has access to it.
• We own our email marketing account and our customer list.
• None of these depend on one person's personal email address.

That last point is easy to miss: an account set up under a founder's or a former employee's personal login, which then becomes impossible to recover when they leave. Use an address the business controls, and make sure at least two people have access.

The accounts people forget

The table covers the big ones. These are easy to overlook, and just as awkward to recover:

• Email and the domain's email settings. If your email runs on your domain, whoever controls the domain's settings controls where your email goes.
• Tracking phone numbers. If a supplier set up call tracking numbers on your ads or website, find out who owns them. Customers may have saved them.
• Review platforms. Accounts on review sites and directories where your customers leave feedback.
• Social media handles, including ones created for a campaign and then left dormant.
• Stock image and font licences, which are often bought in the supplier's name and may not transfer.
• Website backups. Know where they are and how to restore from one without the supplier.
• Design files. The original, editable files for your logo, templates and key designs, not just the finished images.

Add any that apply to your own checklist.

When a former employee or an old supplier holds an account

This can be fixed, though it takes longer. The approach depends on whether you can still reach the person.

If you can reach them: ask them, in writing, to add someone from your business with the top-level role (Admin, Administrator, primary owner or verified owner, depending on the platform), and then to remove themselves once the handover is confirmed. Be specific about which account and what role.

If you cannot reach them: each platform has its own route for proving a business's right to an account. For a website's Search Console property, for example, you can verify ownership yourself using one of Google's verification methods, which is one reason keeping control of your domain and website matters so much: it is often the key that unlocks everything else. For other platforms, use their support process and be ready to show evidence that the business is yours, such as company details, invoices or access to the domain's email.

Whatever the route, fix one account at a time, write down what you did, and store the new logins somewhere the business controls, not in one person's head or inbox.

If you find something is not in your name

Ask for it to be transferred, in writing, and keep it polite and specific: which account, which role you need, and by when. Most suppliers will simply do it. If they will not, check your contract for what it says about ownership of accounts, content and intellectual property, and take advice from your own solicitor if needed. Each platform also has its own support process for account access, which is worth using before things escalate.

Switching agencies without losing your history

If you are planning to change supplier, the order matters.

1. Before you give notice, check ownership of every asset in the table above, and fix anything that is not in your name. It is much easier while the relationship is still working.
2. Document what exists: take dated screenshots of your ad accounts' settings and campaigns, export your key reports, and note what tracking and integrations are in place.
3. Give notice, and ask for a handover in writing: account access in your name, all logins, all files and content created for you, and a short note of what was set up and changed.
4. Add the new supplier to your accounts with the access they need. Do not let them create new accounts to replace ones you already have, unless there is a good reason.
5. Remove the old supplier's access once the handover is complete and the notice period ends.
6. Check tracking still works with a test enquiry, because tracking is easily broken in a handover.

Writing it into the contract

The easiest time to settle ownership is before any work starts. A marketing contract should say, in plain words, that:

• all accounts created for your business are in your business's name;
• your business owns the content, designs and data created for it, once paid for;
• the supplier will hand over access and files promptly at the end.

It is not legal advice, and your own solicitor is the right person for the wording. But if a supplier objects to any of those three points, it tells you something before you have signed. For more questions to ask first, see questions to ask a marketing agency before you sign.

If you are not sure what you own or whether your tracking is set up properly, our GA4 and tracking fix is a fixed £2,500 and starts by checking exactly that.