Why SEO attracts bad actors
Results take months, attribution is genuinely difficult, and rankings fluctuate for reasons nobody controls. That combination makes SEO the easiest marketing service to sell badly. A weak agency can look busy for six months before anyone can prove otherwise.
Claims that should end the meeting
- ✓"Guaranteed number one rankings." Nobody can guarantee this. Google says so explicitly.
- ✓"We have a special relationship with Google." No such thing exists. Google Partner status is for Ads and does not affect organic results.
- ✓"We submit your site to 500 directories." This has been useless for over a decade and is mildly harmful.
- ✓Ranking reports for keywords nobody searches. Ranking first for your exact company name plus a suffix is not a result.
- ✓Secret methods. There are no secrets, only execution.
What to ask instead
Show me a client whose traffic went down and what you did
Every SEO programme has a bad quarter, an algorithm update, a migration that went sideways. Agencies that cannot describe one either have not been doing this long or are not being honest.
What would you fix in the first month?
You want technical foundations and existing page improvements. Anyone whose first answer is "publish four blog posts a month" is selling content volume, not SEO.
How do you approach links?
Listen for digital PR, genuine relationships, and content worth linking to. Be wary of purchased placements and private blog networks. Those work until they do not, and the recovery is worse than never having done it.
What will you report on?
Rankings alone are not enough. You want organic traffic to commercially relevant pages, conversions from organic, and impressions data from Search Console. Ask for Search Console access to be shared with you, not just screenshots.
How do you handle AI search?
A current answer should mention AI Overviews, citation, and shifting emphasis toward commercial queries. An agency that has not thought about it is working from a 2019 playbook. Our view is in SEO in the age of AI search.
What realistic looks like
| Timeframe | Reasonable expectation |
|---|---|
| Month 1 | Audit, technical fixes, quick wins on existing pages |
| Months 2 to 3 | Content and structure work, early impression growth |
| Months 4 to 6 | Ranking movement on target terms, traffic growth becoming visible |
| Months 6 to 12 | Compounding returns, authority building, meaningful traffic |
Anyone promising meaningful movement on competitive terms in six weeks is either working on very low-competition keywords or not being straight with you.
Ownership, again
You should own the Search Console property, the analytics account, the content produced, and any accounts created on your behalf. If leaving means losing your content, that is not a partnership.
You can put all of the above to us on the SEO, AEO and GEO page.
Frequently asked questions
How much does SEO cost in India?
Retainers vary widely by scope and seniority. What matters is whether the scope is specific and whether you can see what was done each month. Very cheap retainers usually mean low-value link building and templated content.
How long does SEO take to show results?
Technical fixes can produce movement within weeks. Competitive terms typically need six to twelve months. Anyone promising faster on competitive keywords is either lucky or misleading you.
Should I hire a freelancer or an agency for SEO?
A good freelancer is excellent value for a focused scope. Agencies make more sense when the work spans technical, content, digital PR and development, because those are different skills.
