The questions to ask an SEO agency matter less than the answers, and the answers matter less than whether you can check them. Twelve questions settle most of it: the first 90 days, measurement, ownership, fees, and what happens if nothing moves. Ask all twelve of every provider, in writing, then score the answers the same way.
TL;DR
- Ask the same twelve questions of every provider, in writing, within 24 hours. The differences show up in the answers.
- Score each answer from 0 to 3 and weight five criteria. Fit and strategy, and evidence and measurement, carry the most points.
- A guaranteed first-place ranking is a red flag, not a selling point. Google states plainly that "No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google".
- Settle ownership and exit before you discuss fees: who owns Search Console, Analytics, the domain and the content, and what notice period applies.
- Run the UK checks a pitch will not cover: Companies House, VAT, insurance and cancellation rights.
- Some businesses should not hire an agency yet: the honest options are an agency, a freelancer, in-house, or nothing at all.
The twelve questions that change the decision
- What work have you done for a business like ours, and can I speak to a reference?
- What will you do in the first 90 days, and what would make you say we are not a fit?
- How will you measure progress, and which numbers will you report against?
- What does success look like at 90 days, six months and twelve months?
- What happens if performance stalls, and what would you change first?
- What does your technical audit cover, and who fixes the problems?
- Who owns and manages my Google Business Profile?
- How do you measure visibility in AI answers, and can you guarantee it?
- Who does the actual work, and who will I deal with?
- What will the monthly call cover, and how do I get my own copy of the data?
- What is included in the monthly fee, and is the price fixed?
- Who owns my accounts, domain, content and links, and how do I leave?
How to use this framework
Send the same twelve questions to every provider on the same day, and write the answers down as they arrive. Score each answer:
- 0 — no answer, or an answer that flags a problem.
- 1 — vague. It could apply to any client in any sector.
- 2 — clear and specific, but nothing you can check afterwards.
- 3 — specific, verifiable, and tied to a named commitment, date or person.
A simple rule
If a provider cannot answer in writing within 24 hours, treat the silence as the answer.
Fit and strategy
Weight: 6 points of 36.
1. "What work have you done for a business like ours, and can I speak to a reference?"
Strong answer: named clients, what changed, and what the client measured.
Red flag: "a leading retailer" with no name, or a refusal to share clients.
Check: ask the reference what they complained about in month two.
2. "What will you do in the first 90 days, and what would make you say we are not a fit?"
Strong answer: a 90-day plan with weeks attached, naming what gets changed and measured.
Red flag: "we will start with a comprehensive audit", or deliverables with no measurement attached.
Check: ask for the plan in writing first.
Evidence and measurement
Weight: 9 points of 36.
3. "How will you measure progress, and which numbers will you report against?"
Strong answer: Search Console and Google Analytics 4 as the sources of truth, reporting on enquiries, calls and revenue.
Red flag: ranking-only reporting, or dashboards you cannot access.
Check: ask for a report from a similar client and try to reproduce its numbers; our lead tracking guide lists what to ask for.
4. "What does success look like at 90 days, six months and twelve months?"
Strong answer: targets tied to your baseline, measured in leads, calls or revenue.
Red flag: a guarantee of page-one positions by month three. Google is blunt: "No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google".
Check: ask for the milestones in writing, then ask what happens if they are missed.
5. "What happens if performance stalls, and what would you change first?"
Strong answer: a diagnosis order, with tracking and indexation checked before content.
Red flag: "we would wait and see", or "we would publish more content".
Check: ask how they would tell a tracking fault from a real decline.
Technical, local and AI search
Weight: 9 points of 36.
6. "What does your technical audit cover, and who fixes the problems?"
Strong answer: a named scope covering crawlability, page speed, internal linking, structured data and mobile rendering, plus who implements the changes.
Red flag: a free audit that turns out to be a PDF of scanner output.
Check: ask for the audit checklist in advance; our SEO audit guide shows what a real one covers.
7. "Who owns and manages my Google Business Profile?"
Strong answer: you remain the owner, with the agency working through you or with access you control.
Red flag: a request to be made primary owner of your profile.
Check: open your Business Profile and confirm the owner is still you; our guide to local SEO services explain why this causes disputes.
8. "How do you measure visibility in AI answers, and can you guarantee it?"
Strong answer: prompts tested on named models (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity), and Search Console's Generative AI performance report, which has shown AI Overviews and AI Mode impressions worldwide since 31 August 2026.
Red flag: a promise that you will be cited by AI tools, or an llms.txt file sold as a requirement.
Check: ask them to demonstrate the tracking in your own Search Console. Google states there are "No additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary", and that llms.txt is ignored. See our guides to AI visibility agencies and GEO agencies.
Delivery and communication
Weight: 6 points of 36.
9. "Who does the actual work, and who will I deal with?"
Strong answer: the name and role of the person doing the work, and your point of contact.
Red flag: "the team", or work handed to subcontractors with no supervision described.
Check: ask to speak to that person before signing, and whether any work is subcontracted.
10. "What will the monthly call cover, and how do I get my own copy of the data?"
Strong answer: a fixed format covering what was done, what changed, the numbers, next month's plan, and any decision they need.
Red flag: "we send a report every month", or a video library instead of a call.
Check: ask to sit in on a reporting call with another client, or for a redacted example report.
Money, ownership and exit
Weight: 6 points of 36.
11. "What is included in the monthly fee, and is the price fixed?"
Strong answer: a written breakdown of what is included and excluded, whether VAT is added on top, and when the price can change.
Red flag: one price on the website and another on the proposal, or extras billed as overages.
Check: ask for the fee in writing including VAT and check for a price-rise clause; our guide to SEO costs covers the pricing models.
12. "Who owns my accounts, domain, content and links, and how do I leave?"
Strong answer: you own the domain, the analytics and Search Console properties, the Business Profile and any content written for you, with a stated notice period.
Red flag: the agency registering your domain and refusing to transfer it, or a twelve-month term with a heavy exit fee.
Check: ask them to confirm the registrar and account emails are yours and to point to the exit clause. Phone and online contracts carry a 14-day cancellation right.
The scorecard
Copy this table and fill it in as answers arrive. The weights are our own framework, not a standard.
| Criterion | Questions | Weight (points) | Provider A | Provider B | Provider C |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fit and strategy | 2 | 6 | |||
| Evidence and measurement | 3 | 9 | |||
| Technical, local and AI search | 3 | 9 | |||
| Delivery and communication | 2 | 6 | |||
| Money, ownership and exit | 2 | 6 | |||
| Total | 12 | 36 |
Every question is worth up to 3 points, so each criterion has a maximum: Fit and strategy has two questions, so 6 points are available. Divide the points earned by the points available and multiply by the weight. The same arithmetic runs down the column — 6, 9, 9, 6 and 6 — for 36 points in total.
Comparing two or three providers side by side
Scoring one provider tells you little. Keep one grid per proposal round.
| Provider A | Provider B | Provider C | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Named client in our sector | |||
| Reference offered | |||
| First 90-day plan | |||
| Who does the work | |||
| Fee including VAT | |||
| Notice period and exit terms | |||
| Who owns accounts and domain | |||
| Score out of 36 |
Ask every provider for the same seven things in writing: the proposal, the scope of work, the fee including VAT, the named contact, the notice period and exit terms, an ownership statement, and the milestone dates. If two providers finish within two points, the tie-breaker is who handled the awkward question best.
What your score means
- 30 to 36 points — shortlist confidently, then complete the UK checks.
- 24 to 29 points — viable, but get the gaps answered in writing and made contract conditions.
- 18 to 23 points — significant gaps. Put your questions in writing with a deadline; if no answers arrive, look elsewhere.
- Under 18 points — the answers, not the price, are the problem.
Some answers disqualify a provider regardless of the total:
- Any guarantee of a first-place ranking or specific position. Google states that "No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google", and that it "doesn't evaluate or endorse third-party SEO tools".
- Anything described as Google-approved. No such approval exists.
- Bulk links sold without explaining how they are qualified. Buying or selling links that pass ranking credit is link spam. Links should carry a
relattribute:rel="sponsored"for paid links, which Google prefers, orrel="nofollow". - Refusal to work inside your accounts, or a request to own your Business Profile outright.
- A twelve-month term with no exit clause, or a contract that cannot be cancelled.
- Any promise of being cited by AI tools. Google asks that content be "created primarily for people, and not to manipulate search engine rankings", and mass-produced pages that add nothing breach its scaled content abuse policy.
The UK checks to run before you sign
Four of these take twenty minutes and are rarely covered in a pitch.
- Companies House. Look the company up and read its filing history, accounts and directors. Late accounts are a signal.
- VAT. Ask whether the fee includes VAT or it is added on top, and ask for the VAT number to check on the HMRC register.
- Insurance. Ask for a current public liability and professional indemnity certificate, and check it covers the service.
- Cancellation and notice. Read the notice period, exit fee and price review clause. Phone and online contracts are distance contracts with a 14-day cancellation right; if the provider starts work early at your request, you pay for what is done.
On data, ask who gets access to your site and analytics, request read-only access where possible, and ask who acts as the data processor. If cookies are used, the ICO's position is plain: "You must tell people if you set cookies… get the user's consent." On reviews, buying, incentivising or concealing them is a banned practice: fake or concealed incentivised reviews are automatically illegal and can be fined by the CMA.
When not to hire an SEO agency
Some of the money you are about to commit is better spent elsewhere.
- Not yet, because there is no website. Visibility needs pages to be visible.
- Not yet, because nobody searches for it. Content cannot create demand that is not there.
- Not yet, because the budget is short-lived. Search compounds over months; a two-month budget buys only a partial audit.
- In-house, if someone will own it. A small site with a steady content rhythm can be run by one person, if the work is closer to publishing than technical SEO.
- A freelancer, if the work is straightforward. Our comparison of agency, freelancer and DIY shows which suits which business.
- Not an SEO agency at all, if the website does not convert. If visitors leave without enquiring, traffic is not the problem.
The same questions, answered by us
We sell SEO and GEO retainers, so we are not a neutral referee. We answer the same questions against our published terms, which anyone can check on our pricing page.
On fit and strategy. A site audit covering Google and AI optimisation, keyword research and SERP-based clustering, then publishing, link placements and social posting. If search is the wrong spend, we say so first.
On evidence. Your Search Console and Analytics 4 stay in your accounts. Reports cover leads, calls and revenue from organic search, with a dashboard for AI prompts and mentions.
On technical and AI search. Every plan includes a site audit for AI and Google optimisation, plus AI prompt tracking: ten prompts across ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini on Visibility, fifty on Crowd.
On delivery. Visibility publishes thirty articles a month with weekly social posts; Crowd runs four times that scale across four languages, with daily posts and a dedicated specialist. Publishing is automated into WordPress, Shopify, Webflow and eight more platforms.
On money. Fixed published pricing: £399 a month for Visibility, £899 for Crowd, and £400 for the Bundle of website, hosting and Visibility SEO. Cancel any time.
On ownership and exit. Your domain, accounts, data and content stay yours. Leaving is a matter of telling us, with a handover of access.
On what we will not promise. No ranking, AI citation or lead guarantees. The 90-day money-back guarantee is about our service, not where you appear.
How The Super Shoppe can help
If the scorecard has cleared two or three providers and you want to see how a fixed-price, cancellable arrangement looks next to them, our SEO & GEO plans and pricing are on the website, not behind a form. The Visibility and Crowd plans show what each month includes.
The £400 a month website, hosting and SEO Bundle is the option if you also need a website built, because a page cannot appear in search before it exists.
A project with us runs like this:
- A short conversation about your business, your competitors and what a useful result looks like.
- A plan for the first 90 days with named deliverables and dates.
- Monthly reporting from your own Search Console and Analytics accounts, and a call about what to change next.
Pricing is fixed and published, there are no long-term contracts, you can cancel whenever you like, and every plan carries a 90-day money-back guarantee about our service, not rankings.
Sources
- Do I need SEO? - Google
- Third-party SEO tools - Google
- Google's spam policies
- Qualify outbound links
- Creating helpful content
- AI features and your website
- Optimising for AI search
- Generative AI performance report
- Consumer Contracts (Distance Contracts) Regulations 2013
- Cookies: the PECR guide - ICO
- Reviews and endorsements - GOV.UK