How to Choose an SEO Agency or Specialist: Questions to Ask
Basics4 minInnovialabs editorial team
In short
A good SEO contractor starts with an audit and a prioritized plan, reports on traffic and leads rather than just positions, never guarantees first place and leaves all accounts and results in your ownership.
The short answer
Choose the contractor who explains what they will do, in what order and why, and who can show how their work turns into traffic and leads. Avoid anyone who sells guaranteed positions, cheap bulk links or "secret methods". SEO is slow, cumulative work, so the contractor's process and transparency matter more than the sales pitch.
What a sensible first month looks like
The first month is mostly diagnosis. A professional contractor usually:
- Requests access to Google Search Console, Yandex Webmaster, analytics and the CMS, and works inside your accounts rather than their own.
- Runs a technical audit: indexing, crawl errors, redirects, duplicates, page speed, mobile version, sitemaps and robots.txt.
- Researches demand: which queries your customers actually use and which pages should answer them.
- Reviews competitors that rank for your key queries and explains why they rank.
- Agrees on goals and metrics with you: which pages, regions and actions (calls, forms, orders) count as success.
- Delivers a prioritized plan: what to fix first, who implements it (their team or your developers) and the expected effort.
If the first month ends with only a report full of generic recommendations and no priorities, that is a warning sign.
Red flags in promises
| Promise | Why it is a problem |
|---|---|
| "Guaranteed top 1 in two weeks" | Nobody controls search engine rankings. Guarantees usually rely on rare queries nobody searches for. |
| "Hundreds of links per month" | Bulk purchased links violate search engine guidelines and can lead to sanctions. |
| "Our secret method" | Legitimate SEO techniques are well known. Secrecy often hides risky tactics. |
| "We will register the accounts for you" | You lose control of data and history if you part ways. |
| "Pay only for positions" | It pushes the contractor toward easy, low-value queries instead of traffic and leads. |
| "No need to touch the site" | Most results come from changes to the site itself: structure, content, speed. |
Questions to ask before you start
- What will you do in the first month, and what will I receive at the end of it?
- Who on your team works on my project, and who implements technical changes?
- How do you build links, and can you show examples of placements?
- Which metrics will you report on, and how often?
- What do you need from my side: access, developers, content, approvals?
- What happens to the content, links and accounts if we stop working together?
- Can I talk to a current or past client with a similar site?
Pay attention to how the answers sound. Specific, calm answers with caveats are a better sign than confident promises.
How to read SEO reports
A useful report connects work to results. Look for:
- Organic traffic to target pages, not just to the site overall.
- Conversions from organic search: calls, forms, orders.
- Positions for an agreed set of queries, grouped by topic and region, with clear tracking settings.
- Indexing status: how many important pages are indexed and what is blocking the rest.
- A list of completed tasks and next steps, with links to the changed pages.
Be cautious with reports that show only rising positions or visibility scores without traffic and leads. Ask the contractor to explain any drop as well as any growth.
What to fix in the contract
- Scope of work: audit, content, technical tasks, links, with clear deliverables.
- Ownership: accounts, analytics, content and purchased placements belong to you.
- Prohibited methods: no link buying or other risky tactics without your written consent.
- Reporting: format, frequency and the metrics included.
- Responsibilities: who implements changes on the site and how fast your side must respond.
- Termination and handover: notice period, transfer of access and work materials.
- Metrics as goals, not guarantees, so expectations stay realistic for both sides.