Switching Amazon agencies: the handover that protects your account history

Changing agencies should not require losing the evidence that explains how the account works.

Before the new operator starts rebuilding campaigns, make sure the brand controls its access, understands its current settings and has a usable record of the decisions already made. The goal is continuity, not a dramatic first-week transformation.

This is an operational checklist. Contract terms, ownership rights and notice obligations should be checked against your actual agreement rather than assumed.

Confirm what the brand controls

Make an access inventory covering the relevant Amazon accounts, reporting tools, creative files, shared drives, automation platforms and billing relationships.

For each system, record:

• Who owns the account or workspace.
• Who administers access.
• Which people and applications have access.
• Whether any automation can make changes.
• What happens when the current engagement ends.

Use named access rather than shared passwords where the service supports it. Review application grants as well as human logins. Removing one person's access does not necessarily disconnect a separate integration.

Do not revoke access before you understand the operational dependencies. Equally, do not leave former providers connected indefinitely because no one owns the offboarding checklist.

Request a working account map

Campaign names alone are rarely enough.

Ask for the structure and purpose of important campaigns, their products, targeting approach, budget logic, negatives and automation rules. Add known exceptions: a product intentionally held back, a campaign tied to a stock issue, or a test still waiting for enough evidence.

A useful handover explains why the settings exist. An export tells the next operator what exists, but not necessarily why.

Preserve a baseline

Save a dated snapshot of:

• Current campaign settings and enabled states.
• Recent and longer comparable performance periods.
• Product-level price, margin and inventory assumptions.
• Promotions and catalog issues.
• The current action list and unresolved tests.

Keep the reporting definitions with the data. If the old provider uses one attribution field and the new provider uses another, the first comparison can manufacture a performance change that did not occur.

Do not rely on every platform retaining every historical view indefinitely. Export what the brand is entitled to keep while access is available.

Identify overlapping automation

Two systems editing the same campaign can make the change log difficult to interpret.

Before the transition, identify which rules or applications can modify bids, budgets, targeting, product status or reporting. Decide which remain active, which are paused and who verifies the result.

Ask the new operator to demonstrate the first proposed change before applying it. The proposal should identify exact objects and settings, not simply promise to “restructure for scale.”

If a mass rebuild is recommended, request the problem it solves, the alternative considered, the risks and the way historical comparability will be preserved.

Use the first week to establish control

A sensible initial sequence is:

1. Confirm access and account identity.
2. Reconcile important report totals.
3. Check buyability, stock and obvious operational issues.
4. Review existing tests and constraints.
5. Prioritize urgent corrections separately from optional improvements.
6. Agree the first limited set of changes.

This is not an argument for ignoring a clear problem. It is a way to avoid replacing one opaque management style with another.

Decide how success will be judged

Before the new team starts, agree the reporting cadence, business priorities and review process. Set realistic expectations for what can be learned immediately and what needs more data.

A change in agency is often accompanied by pricing, stock or promotion changes. Record those so that neither side claims every subsequent movement as proof of its own performance.

Use the weekly account review framework for accountability. Ask for a visible decision log, including the decisions to leave something unchanged.

Finish the offboarding properly

Once the handover is verified, review and remove access that is no longer needed through the relevant service controls. Confirm the status of recurring tools and charges under the applicable agreements. Keep a record of what changed.

Do not send credentials around in a handover document. Access should be granted through the supported account process, with only the permissions needed.

If you are still choosing the next provider, use the agency evaluation scorecard. For a hands-on, owner-led approach, read about AMZAdvantage's management service.

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