How to Choose an SEO Company： 8 Steps for Success [Data]

The palms sweat, the knees weaken, the arms feel heavy.

You’re on the brink of selecting an SEO firm, and your entire team is relying on you to identify an agency capable of delivering everything you—and leadership—hope to achieve through search engine optimization (SEO).

Prepare to take the plunge with this evidence-based guide, covering:

Choosing an excellent SEO company in 2024

How businesses are selecting SEO in 2024

3 common missteps smart businesses make when selecting an SEO company

Top SEO companies worldwide

Continue reading to discover how to select an SEO company that will meet your business’s demands.

Discover how to choose an excellent SEO company in 2024 with these eight essential tips:

Selecting an SEO agency begins with identifying your stakeholders and their outsourcing requirements, such as:

Budget: What is your company’s budget for SEO?

Goals: What outcomes does your company aim to achieve through SEO outsourcing, and by when?

Involvement: How much workload does your team wish to delegate to the SEO provider?

Point of contact: Who will act as the primary contact for the SEO campaign?

Location: Does your team prefer to collaborate with a local agency?

Time zone: Would your team prefer a provider in the same or similar time zone?

Specialization: Are you seeking general SEO assistance or something more specific, like local SEO?

Miscellaneous: What unique aspects of your business, such as past outsourcing experiences, should be considered?

Once you understand your team’s expectations from hiring a search engine optimization firm, you can:

Efficiently filter through potential agencies

Provide candidates with accurate information regarding your expectations, timeline, and SEO strategy

Identify the ideal SEO marketing company for your team

This process saves time, money, and effort for you, your team, and your business.

Next, invest time in researching what constitutes a “good” SEO company. Notable features include:

Case studies: Demonstrations of the service provider’s ability to meet or surpass client expectations.

Certifications: Distinctions like Google Premier Partner, awarded to the top 3% of agencies.

Reviews: Insights into the client experience, both positive and negative.

Awards: Recognitions of an agency’s outstanding performance in results, service, or approach.

Transparency: A commitment to openness, from publishing prices to documenting SEO work.

Experience: A track record of several years or decades in the most reputable SEO companies.

Reporting: Regular updates on completed work, progress, and more.

Team: A diverse group of specialists to deliver a comprehensive SEO solution.

Client ratio: A lower ratio to ensure your account receives the necessary attention.

To standardize your vetting process for selecting an SEO company, consider creating a sheet with columns for the above features (case studies, certifications, reviews, and awards), and add your notes or observations in the appropriate row. This will serve as a reference for all your research.

Once you know what to look for in an SEO agency, you can make the process of finding one more efficient and streamlined.

To establish a baseline for what makes an SEO company a great SEO marketing company, begin researching potential agencies. Our research indicates that businesses rely on several outlets for discovering agencies, including:

Referrals

Online search

Social media

Industry conferences or events

Referrals are an excellent starting point and often lead you to a reputable SEO agency.

If you don’t find what you’re looking for through referrals, move on to online search next.

When searching online for an SEO company, consider how you search. For instance, if your focus is on finding the cheapest SEO agency possible, you’ll likely search for agencies advertising SEO services for a few hundred dollars each month, which won’t meet your needs for a reputable provider.

Typically, you’ll find third-party review sites and agency websites when researching SEO experts. Using the insights gained from our earlier tips on how to find an SEO marketing company, you can narrow this list of firms and then evaluate them using the following steps.

Case studies are invaluable when selecting an SEO company.

When assessing a search engine optimization firm’s case studies, look for the following:

Objectives: What were the client’s and agency’s goals?

Metrics: What metrics were measured, and did they align with the client’s objectives?

Timeframe: How long did the campaign last, and what timeframe was used to measure change?

Testimonials: What does the client say about their experience?

You can further investigate case studies by taking a few additional steps, such as:

Verifying the existence of the client

Checking the featured client’s website using tools like Screaming Frog

These steps can help you verify the case study’s credibility. If you found the search engine agency through a referral, your friend or colleague’s recommendation is likely enough to validate the agency’s work and its case studies.

Overall, your research will help you understand:

Whether the agency adapts to client needs or uses a cookie-cutter SEO strategy

How the agency measures success, like focusing on revenue vs. rankings

How the agency’s SEO process works, including how it executes SEO strategies

What types of companies the agency works with, like B2B

You’ll also better understand whether the firm is the right SEO company for you.

Next, spend some time reading client reviews on:

Google Business Profile

Third-party review sites like Clutch

Bing Places

Social media sites like Facebook

While reading online reviews, consider the following questions:

Are the reviews detailed or generic?

What is the balance between positive, neutral, and negative reviews?

What are the most common positive and negative things reviewers say?

How does the client respond (if supported by the platform) to reviews?

Also, think about the factors other businesses consider when selecting an SEO company, such as:

Overall reputation

Price

Reputation in a specific industry

Experience and expertise

Customer service

SEO rankings

While many companies focus on the agency’s reputation, price, and experience, they often de-prioritize customer service. When you read client reviews, look for what people say about the customer service, like response times, communication, and reporting.

From reading reviews, you can better understand:

Where the agency excels

Where the agency falls short

How the agency handles feedback

Once you have your insights, consider them from your company’s perspective.

For example, if your business places a high value on reporting and this agency receives consistent complaints about its reporting, you may want to reconsider choosing that SEO company. Conversely, if the SEO firm receives high marks for its reporting, you might be inclined to explore it further.

When you start speaking with past or current clients, you’re getting close to selecting an SEO company.

For this tip on how to find an SEO company, you’ll need to contact the agency. Most SEO agencies will want to speak with your team before providing a client list. These conversations help you and the agency determine if you’re a good fit for one another.

If you and the SEO firm align, they’ll provide a client list when requested.

When it comes to what you do next, Shirey recommends the following: “Make sure that you call maybe three to five current clients of a particular SEO vendor to vet them. Ask them how they like working with that particular company.”

Additional questions you can ask include:

How long have you worked with this SEO company?

What were your goals when you hired the SEO agency, and have you achieved them?

How fast do they return your calls or emails?

How much of your time is spent working with the agency?

What is one thing the SEO firm could do better?

Would you recommend them? Why or why not?

If the agency refuses to provide a client list or can’t compile at least three to five current clients, reconsider choosing that SEO company. Likely, they don’t have any raving fans—or don’t have a large enough client base.

Deliverables are your best friend when shopping for SEO agencies, as they outline the what, when, and how of SEO services. From the deliverables, you’ll learn what the agency will do for you, when they’ll do it, and how much it will cost you.

Most SEO companies do not publish their service deliverables online (WebFX is an exception), so you’ll need to contact the agencies for this step. Again, the agency will likely want to speak with you to determine if you’re a good fit for their marketing services before sharing their deliverables.

Once you have the deliverables, check if they include the following:

SEO audit

Keyword research

On-page optimizations

Off-page optimizations

Technical optimizations

Regular reporting

Dedicated point of contact

If you spoke with the agency, see if the deliverables include anything specific to your discussions. While not required, this additional touch can show the agency listened to your SEO needs and is invested in working with your business.

The final step in how to choose an SEO company involves meeting your potential agencies.

Before you sign with an SEO agency, you want to meet them. Whether you meet in-person or virtually, like through a video conference, that face-to-face meeting can help your team determine if they are the right SEO agency for you.

Come to the meeting with questions, too.

Examples of questions you can ask include:

How much time will you need from my business?

When should we expect to see results?

What experience do you have in our industry?

How much do your services cost?

How do you execute SEO strategies?

For the best meet-and-greet, brainstorm various questions with your team and company leaders. While your team may have questions about strategy and reporting, your decision-makers may have questions about pricing and return on investment (ROI).

Make sure you also feel comfortable with the agency. You want to feel like you can ask questions, voice concerns, and more. If you don’t, it can lead to problems with developing a long-term partnership, which is critical as SEO is a long-term, ongoing strategy.

Before compiling our advice on choosing an SEO agency, we wanted to understand how organizations choose an SEO company today. So, we polled 500 U.S.-based marketing and sales professionals to understand their motivations, process, and satisfaction with their pick.

Companies are hiring an SEO agency for one big reason: Their expertise.

From our conversations, we learned that 61% of businesses hire an SEO firm because the business doesn’t have the expertise to do search engine optimization in-house. For smaller companies, a lack of results was the