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Been thinking about this a ton lately as I recently stepped into a similar situation with my mom’s business. The agency was not doing anything wrong, but it had become more monthly maintenance than real driving of marketing ops and strategy.
And in coming in to initially help “middleman” the agency relationship – I quickly kind of saw that their work was not worth the $xxk a month they were charging with % of spend, never mind trying to upsell an audit just for us to talk conversion tracking in more depth.
I think a lot of companies hit this weird middle stage where they do not just need “someone to manage Google Ads,” but they also may not be ready for a full in-house team,
If I were in your shoes, I would look for someone who can explain how they would improve the system around the account, not just the account itself. Search is moving more in that direction anyway. Search terms, ad copy, landing pages, conversion paths, lead quality, CRM feedback, reporting, and even organic / AI visibility all start to connect. The best partner should be able to think across that full picture.
