Linking a Google Ads Manager Account (MCC)

Learn how to link your Google Ads Manager account to Shape as a data source.

What is a Google Ads Manager Account (MCC)? 

A Google Ads Manager Account, formerly known as My Client Center (or MCC) account, is a Google Ads account that lets you easily manage multiple Google Ads accounts from a single location.

MCCs are helpful if you manage multiple advertising accounts for your company or for advertising clients.

What are the benefits of utilizing a Google Ads Manager Account (MCC)? 

A manager account allows you to: 

• Access and easily navigate across multiple Google Ads accounts.
• Implement permissions for your PPC team, coworkers, and clients. You can limit their views to all, some, or individual accounts and MCCs.
• Login, view, and edit all your managed advertising accounts with a single login (instead of creating a new email per account).
• Compare performance across all accounts.
• Run reports for multiple accounts at once.
• Use consolidated billing to get one monthly invoice for all of your managed accounts.
• Use alerts to monitor all of your linked accounts efficiently.
• Create and link Google Ads accounts from within your manager account.
• Apply for Google Partner Status.

Why do I have to link accounts in a Google MCC? Why can't I link individual accounts?

Software tools such as Shape rely on APIs (or application programming interfaces) to send and receive data to and from advertising platforms.

Google will only allow Shape to send and receive data on behalf of our customers if they link an MCC account as a data source.

Shape cannot pull in advertising accounts that are housed outside of an MCC. For directions on setting up an MCC, please see the link above.

How do I link my MCC to Shape? 

1. Log in to your MCC in Google Ads

2. Log in to Shape and navigate to the Data Sources screen.

3. Select "Sync New Data Source" at the top of the page. 

4. Click the Google Ads icon on the following screen.

5. Accept the access requests that appear to integrate the Data Source.

6. Your Data Source is successfully linked when you see your email and the current date in the sync date column.

Note: If you are notified that your data source did not link properly, please get in touch with our support team at support@shape.io.

I linked my MCCs to Shape but I do not see a few of my accounts. Why?

There are a few reasons your accounts may not immediately appear in Shape after you link your Data Source. Some possible reasons and solutions are outlined below:

• I just linked my MCC: Depending on the number of accounts housed in your Google Ads MCC, it may take several minutes to pull in all of the accounts and campaigns associated with your MCC. If you don't see all your accounts/campaigns at first, refresh Shape after a few minutes.

• I have multiple tiers within my MCC structure: Google allows you to have up to 5 tiers of MCCs under your top-level MCC. Accounts that are housed directly under the MCC you have synced to Shape will automatically import. However, if you have accounts that fall into MCCs that are in sub-MCCs, Shape may not automatically import these. You can either link the sub-MCC directly as a data source or reach out to support@shape.io for further assistance to remedy the issue.

I linked my MCCs to Shape and am now seeing duplicates of each of my accounts. Why?

You will likely see duplicate accounts/campaigns in Shape (when you add a new campaign to a Budget for example) if you link multiple MCCs with access to the same accounts.

For example, let's say you have two team members who each have their own MCCs and share management responsibilities for the same Client. They both add their MCC accounts to Shape. When a team member goes to add campaigns from the account to a Budget, Shape will display the account and campaigns twice. 

To solve this, we recommend that your company institute a single corporate-level MCC account and link that account to Shape. Sub-accounts (for example, analyst MCCs in the example above) can be associated underneath the corporate-level MCC if you want to maintain strict account hierarchies and permissions. 

Adding a single corporate-level MCC creates one link (instead of two or more). The corporate-level link will automatically pull in any new accounts/campaigns as they are created (instead of requiring a new data source to be added anytime an account/client is created under a new MCC). 

Helpful Links

• Setting up an MCC (Google Support)
• MCC Benefits (Google Support)
• Google Partners (Google Support)
• Data Sources (Platform)