SEO Services: What They Include and How to Compare Two Quotes
The six services sold under the SEO heading, what a deliverable looks like in each, how retainers are priced, and the questions that separate a real scope from a package name.
Published by AI Knows Us · Updated 12 October 2026
SEO services are the work a business buys to make its website appear when people search for what it sells. The term covers six distinct services that are usually sold under one heading: a technical audit and fixes, keyword and market research, on page and content work, link acquisition and digital PR, local search and map listings, and reporting. A credible quote names which of those six it includes, says what gets produced each month, and says who does it. A vague quote names a tier instead, which is why two "SEO packages" at the same price can contain completely different amounts of work.
This page sets out what each service actually contains, so that you can read a proposal and know what you are getting before you sign anything.
The six services, and the deliverable to ask for in each
| Service | What it does | The deliverable that proves it happened |
|---|---|---|
| Technical SEO | Makes the site reachable, renderable and indexable | A prioritised issue list with before and after status, plus the tickets or commits that closed each one |
| Research and strategy | Decides which searches are worth winning and what page each one needs | A keyword map: one row per target query, assigned to one URL, with intent and current position |
| On page and content | Produces and improves the pages that answer those searches | Named pages published or rewritten, with the brief each one was written from |
| Links and digital PR | Earns references from other websites | A list of live links with the URL, the page linked to and how it was earned |
| Local search | Wins searches that have a place attached | Profile changes made, listings corrected, reviews responded to, map pack positions by location |
| Reporting and analysis | Tells you what changed and what happens next | A monthly document with the decisions in it, not just charts |
Read that table against any proposal in front of you. If a service is named in the proposal but has no deliverable attached, that line is an intention rather than a commitment. Our technical SEO checklist is the same list a good provider works through, and what earns links now explains how to judge the link line specifically.
What a competent first ninety days looks like
The shape of the early work is the clearest signal of whether a provider knows the job. Good programmes front load the discovery and the blockers, because nothing else pays until those are cleared.
- Weeks one to three. Access to analytics, Search Console and the site itself. A full crawl. The indexing picture. The keyword map drafted and agreed with you. A baseline recorded, so that later arguments about whether anything changed have a reference point.
- Weeks four to eight. The technical blockers fixed, in order of how many pages each one affects. Titles and internal links corrected across the money pages. The first new or rewritten pages published.
- Weeks nine to twelve. Content cadence established. Link and PR work underway with named targets. The first report that compares against the baseline and proposes the next quarter.
A provider who spends month one producing a slide deck and month two asking you to approve blog titles has not started the work. Our page on how long SEO takes to show results sets out what genuinely moves in which month, which is the best defence against both impatience and excuses.
How SEO services are priced
There are four pricing models in common use, and each one fits a different situation.
- Monthly retainer. The standard for ongoing programmes. You buy a fixed amount of capacity each month. It suits work that needs continuity, which most SEO does.
- Project fee. A defined piece of work with an end: a technical audit and remediation, a site migration, a content build for one product line. Best when the scope is genuinely bounded.
- Hourly or day rate consulting. You have a team that can execute and you need direction, review and decisions. The cheapest way to buy senior expertise.
- Performance element. Part of the fee tied to an agreed outcome. Workable when the metric is one both sides influence, such as qualified enquiries, and when the baseline is documented in writing before the work starts.
What drives the number up is scope, not quality: the number of pages, the number of locations, the number of languages, how competitive the category is, and whether content production is included. A ten page local business and a twenty thousand page retailer are not buying the same service at a different price, they are buying different services. Our guide to SEO pricing breaks the number down line by line, and how to read a monthly package tier shows how to convert a bronze, silver or gold label into an actual deliverable list.
The eight questions that settle a shortlist
Ask every provider the same eight questions and compare the answers side by side. The differences will be stark.
- Who will do the work day to day, and can I speak to them before signing?
- Which of the six services above are in scope, and what is specifically out of scope?
- What will I have in my hands at the end of month one, month two and month three?
- How do you decide which pages to work on first?
- What happens to the accounts, the content and the data if we stop working together?
- Who approves and who publishes content, and how many revisions are included?
- How is link work carried out, and will you show me the live links?
- What would make you tell us to stop spending on SEO and spend it elsewhere?
That last one is the most revealing question in the list. A provider who has never advised a client against SEO has probably never advised a client. The ownership question is the most expensive one to get wrong: accounts, property and content should be in your name from day one.
What Google publishes about hiring an SEO
Google maintains its own documentation for businesses considering SEO help, and it is worth reading before any sales call. Two points from it are especially useful.
First, Google states plainly that no one can guarantee a number one ranking in Google. Treat a ranking promise the way you would treat a promise about tomorrow's weather, and ask instead what work will be done.
Second, Google advises asking for examples of previous work and for references, and it warns against anyone unwilling to explain clearly what they intend to do. That is a reasonable standard to hold any supplier to, and it costs nothing to apply.
Google's documentation also describes the three stages of search, crawling, indexing and serving, which is the reason the technical service comes first in any sensible plan. Pages that are not indexed are not competing for anything.
In house, freelance or agency
| Option | Best when | Watch for |
|---|---|---|
| Agency | You need several skills at once and have no internal capacity | Who actually does the work, and how many clients they carry |
| Freelancer or consultant | The scope is focused and you can execute changes yourself | Capacity limits, and what happens during holidays |
| In house hire | Search is a primary channel and the work is continuous | One person rarely covers technical, content and links equally well |
| Consultant plus in house doers | You have writers and developers but no search direction | Making sure somebody owns execution, not just advice |
Plenty of strong programmes are a hybrid: a consultant sets direction, an internal person owns execution, and specific pieces such as technical remediation or PR are bought as projects. Our pages on choosing an SEO company as a small business and what a monthly report should contain cover the selection and the management side.
Services you can run without paying for them
Several parts of this list are owner level work, and doing them yourself makes every pound you do spend go further.
- Verifying the site in Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools, and reading the indexing report monthly.
- Claiming and completing your Google Business Profile, and replying to reviews.
- Correcting your business name, address and phone number everywhere it appears wrong.
- Writing the honest answers to the questions your sales calls get asked, which is the highest value content most sites are missing.
If you serve a geography, the complete local SEO method is a programme a determined owner can run alone.
The SEO Services questions worth an answer
What is included in a typical SEO service?
A technical audit and fixes, keyword research and a page level plan, on page optimisation, content production or editing, link acquisition, local listings where relevant, and monthly reporting with analysis. The proportions shift with the site: a new site needs content, a large old site usually needs technical work and consolidation first.
How long should an SEO contract be?
Long enough for the work to be fairly judged and short enough to leave if it is not being done. Three months is usually too short to see content and link work land. Twelve months with no exit is more commitment than a new relationship needs. A common and fair structure is an initial period of three to six months followed by a rolling arrangement with notice.
Is SEO better than paid advertising?
They do different jobs. Paid search buys a position while you pay, and it tells you within a week which queries convert. SEO earns a position that persists and keeps working without a click cost. Running paid first to learn, then building SEO around what converted, is the sequence that wastes the least money.
Can I buy just a technical SEO audit?
Yes, and for many sites it is the right first purchase. A bounded audit with a prioritised fix list, bought as a project, tells you whether a bigger programme is even the constraint. Ask for the fixes to be specified clearly enough that your own developer could implement them.
How do I check the work is actually being done?
Ask for evidence rather than summaries: the live URLs published, the live links earned, the tickets closed, and a Search Console view you can open yourself. A monthly report built on screenshots of a third party tool, with no named work in it, is the thing to question.
What should I do before I contact anyone?
Write down the ten searches you want to win and what a new customer is worth to you. Those two pieces of information turn a sales conversation into a scoping conversation, and they let you compare quotes on the same basis.
This page covers what SEO services contain and how to compare them. For the detail on what the number on a quote is made of, see our SEO pricing guide linked above.
One service almost nobody is quoting for yet
If you are buying search visibility in 2026, there is a second surface to put on your checklist. A growing share of buyers now ask an assistant rather than a search engine: they type "best commercial cleaning company in Bristol" into ChatGPT, Gemini or Perplexity, and get one answer with two or three names in it. Those names come from sources the model can read, which means the same technical and content work feeds into it, and it means a provider can be doing everything right on Google while the assistant recommends somebody else entirely. Worth asking any shortlisted supplier what they know about it, and worth checking the answer for your own business first. AI Knows Us runs the question across the main assistants and shows which sources each answer was built from.