Amazon PPC Agency Pricing Calculator
Percentage of spend, flat retainer or hybrid? Put in what a client actually costs you to run and see which fee keeps your margin, today and as the account grows.
At today's spend
| Option | Fee / month | % of spend | Margin | Per hour |
|---|
As the account grows or shrinks
Modelled delivery margin at each spend level. Hours scale with your growth assumption.
The fee is half the margin. Hours are the other half.
Marketplace Ad Pros connects each client's Amazon Ads and Seller Central data to Claude, ChatGPT or our in-app chat, so reporting and review passes take fewer hours. Time one client's month with it and put the new hours in above.
Connect one client brand freeSigning up and connecting accounts is free. When you're ready to run a client's reviews through it, two weeks of the Launch plan is $20.
Runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you type gets sent anywhere. Defaults are illustrative, not market rates.
Price the work, then pick the structure
Most fee structures bill on ad spend, but what a client costs you is hours. Work out the fee the hours need first, then check that the structure you quote stays above it when the account doubles, or halves.
On the defaults, a $30,000-a-month client taking 16 hours at $60 an hour costs $960 to serve, so a 50% margin needs $1,920. All three options clear that today. At four times the spend the account takes 24 hours, the 10% fee has grown to $12,000, and the $2,500 retainer has slipped to a 42% margin. That's the point to have the pricing conversation, and it's easier to have if the contract already says when it happens.
Three ways to charge, and where each one breaks
None is wrong. Each one fails somewhere different.
Percentage of spend
Grows with the account without renegotiating, which suits clients who are scaling. It breaks at the bottom, where a small account's fee falls below the work, so it needs a minimum. Some clients also push back that the agency earns more when they spend more.
Flat retainer
Predictable for both sides and easy to sell, with no question about incentives. It breaks at the top: the account grows, the work grows with it, and the fee doesn't. Tie it to spend bands or a scope, and review it on a date written into the contract.
Hybrid
A base covers the fixed work every account needs, and a smaller percentage covers growth. It holds up across the widest range of spend, at the cost of a proposal with two numbers in it. Set the base from your small-account hours, not from a round number.
What this can't see
It prices one average month of one client. Four things sit outside that.
Onboarding
The first month takes far more hours than the sixth. Charge a setup fee, or expect the first month to run below your target margin.
Scope creep
Listings, a new marketplace, a DSP test. If it isn't in the hours you entered, it isn't in the margin. Write the scope down and price additions separately.
Performance fees
Bonuses on sales or ROAS aren't modelled. They depend on attribution and on things you don't control, like stock and price, so price the base to stand on its own.
Overhead and sales
Margins here are delivery margins. The cost of winning the client, the office and the owner's non-client time come out of what's left, unless you add them to the cost per hour.
Lower the hours, keep the fee
Every option in the table gets better when a client takes fewer hours. Marketplace Ad Pros connects each client's Amazon Ads and Seller Central data to Claude, ChatGPT or our in-app chat, one brand at a time, so the data work in reporting and review passes happens there and your team keeps the decisions.
- Per-brand reports and dashboards for the client review.
- Daily AI recommendations per brand, which your team approves, edits or rejects.
- A flat subscription with no percentage of your clients' ad spend, and unlimited team seats.
- See how many more brands the saved hours make room for in the capacity calculator.
Onboarding a new client?
Before you can price the hours, you need into the accounts. Our guide covers the Amazon Ads console, Seller Central and Vendor Central invites, which access level to ask for, and how to connect tools without anyone sharing a password.
Read the access guideFrequently Asked Questions
Start from your own cost, not a market rate. Multiply the hours a client takes each month by what a delivery hour costs you, then divide by one minus your target margin. A client that takes 16 hours at $60 an hour costs $960 a month to serve, so a 50% margin needs a fee of $1,920. Then choose the structure, percentage of spend, retainer or hybrid, that keeps you at or above that number as the account changes.
Neither wins everywhere. A percentage of spend grows with the account, which suits clients who are scaling, but needs a minimum fee for small accounts, and some clients object that the agency earns more when they spend more. A flat retainer is predictable for both sides, but its margin shrinks as the account grows and takes more work. The calculator shows both at four spend levels so you can see where each one stops paying.
A fixed base fee plus a percentage of ad spend. The base covers the work every account needs whatever it spends, such as reporting, calls and routine optimization, and the percentage pays for the extra work a growing account brings. In this calculator the percentage applies to all spend; some agencies only charge it above a spend threshold, which works out the same as a larger base with a lower rate.
Because hours are what a client costs you. Ad spend decides what most fee structures bill, but two accounts with the same spend can take very different time: one marketplace or five, a tidy catalog or a messy one, a client who reads the report or one who wants a weekly call. Pricing from spend alone hides which clients you are losing money on.
At or above the fee that hits your target margin for the hours a small account still takes. Reporting, calls and a basic optimization pass do not shrink much when spend does, so a percentage-of-spend fee on a small account can fall below what the work costs. Put a small account's hours into the calculator and use the target-margin fee as your floor.
They are illustrative starting points, not market rates or benchmarks. The 25% extra hours each time spend doubles is a planning assumption too. Replace every default with your own: your real loaded cost per delivery hour, a fortnight of logged time on the client, and the fees you actually quote. Margins here are modelled delivery margins and leave out sales, overhead and anything not entered as delivery cost.
Find out what one client really takes
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