The SEO Checkup

Independent SEO Provider Review

Most of the time,
it turns out fine.

I've looked at more than a hundred of these over fifteen years, and more often than not the provider was doing the work and describing it badly. Either way, you get to stop wondering. Send your contract, your last three reports and your last three invoices, and five working days later you'll have a straight answer.

Start a review — $297

Five working days · everything by email · nothing scheduled

5
Working days
7
Documents you send
2
Documents you get back
0
Calls or logins
The most common conclusion I reach is that your provider is doing the work and reporting it badly. That is the one I write most often.

What I actually do with it

Everything that can be checked, gets checked.

Not a glance and an opinion. This is the same process the kit teaches, run properly, by somebody who reads these documents every week.

  1. Your agreement, pulled apart into every individual commitment
  2. Each commitment against what the reports say happened, month by month
  3. Every page address given, opened, and compared against what was described
  4. Every link reported, opened, and checked for a live link to your site
  5. Your Google Business Profile activity against the dates claimed
  6. Directory listings, checked for details that match your website
  7. Every figure in the reports, and what each one does and does not state

Opening every link is the part nobody does. It is also the part that most often produces something concrete, in both directions. Links that are live and relevant are a real credit to your provider, and I say so as plainly as the reverse.

What lands in your inbox

Two documents. Only one is for sharing.

Document one · built to be forwarded

The Record

Your agreement, what the reports state against it, an evidence log of what could be confirmed, and questions written for you to send. No conclusions, no adjectives, nothing about anybody's conduct. It is written so you can forward it to your provider exactly as it stands, and most people should.

Document two · private

The Assessment

My read of the record. What I would take seriously, what I would not read much into, one of four conclusions, and what I would do next. This one is for you and page one explains why.

And nothing else

No call, nothing to attend

Both documents arrive by email with a short note saying which is which, what the conclusion is, and what I would do next. Nothing to schedule and no calendar link at the end of it.

Stated in advance

Every review ends in one of four conclusions.

You should know the possible outcomes before you pay for one. Here they are, roughly in the order I actually write them.

Conclusion one

The work looks solid and is well documented

Nothing to do. I tell you what good looks like so you can hold the standard, and you leave your provider alone.

Conclusion two

The work may be fine. The reporting is not.

The most common result. Send the questions, ask for the reporting to change, and do not change provider over it.

Conclusion three

Contracted work appears to be missing

Send the questions, then ask for a corrective plan covering the next thirty days. Your provider gets a fair chance to fix it.

Conclusion four

There are substantial problems

The rarest. A full audit before any decision either way, and your provider gets the chance to respond to the Record first.

Where this comes from

Twenty years doing SEO. Fifteen reading other people's.

These are from client work, not from this review, because the review is new and I would rather say so than let you assume otherwise. They are here because what this service actually asks you to trust is that I read carefully, write plainly and come back when I said I would.

His approach is 100% white hat and ethical. He obtains great quality links and the results of his research and work are very impressive.

Search engine rankings improved for 99 percent of all keywords we are targeting. He managed to take our site to the top 3 for a number of competitive keywords. We also hold the top position for an increasing number of keywords.

He precisely followed any instructions we gave but also brought excellent ideas to the table which were easy and invaluable to implement. His work is transparent and he provides regular reports on actions and progress.

We usually got a detailed response to any of our messages within 12 hours, even on weekends.

Ongoing SEO, six months, 515 hours

Wonderful to work with, communicated well, and extremely prompt and responsive.

Written audit of a website's SEO

Very professional, great communication and extremely thorough and methodical.

Full site SEO, Shopify store

Verified client reviews from my Upwork profile, quoted as written except where the name has been replaced by a pronoun. Clients are described by the work rather than named, because the platform publishes the review and not the company. The ranking results described above came from ongoing SEO work over six months, not from this review. Nothing here is a claim about what a review will find for you.

Read this before you order

I also provide SEO services. If this review finds significant problems you might ask your current provider to fix them, hire someone else, or ask me about working together. But the review does not assume that changing providers is the right answer, and usually it isn't. Over fifteen years I've looked at more than a hundred of these, and more often than not the provider was doing the work and describing it badly. The most common thing I end up telling people is to stay where they are.
Why this sits above the price and not below it

The whole thing

One payment. Five working days.

Nothing scheduled, nothing to attend $297

Delivered by email

  • Your contract read properly, every commitment extracted
  • Three months of reports mapped against it, line by line
  • Every reported page and link opened and checked
  • The Record, written so you can forward it
  • The Assessment, with one of four conclusions
  • The questions to send your provider, written for you
Start a review — $297

If I can't produce a useful review from what you send, I'll tell you and refund it rather than pad it out.

Questions answered

The things people actually ask.

What exactly do I need to send?

Your proposal or contract, your three most recent monthly reports, your three most recent invoices, your website address and your Google Business Profile link. If you have a backlink report, send that too. If the contract is missing I'll ask for it before starting.

Will you tell me to fire my SEO company?

Probably not. I've looked at more than a hundred of these over fifteen years and more often than not the provider was doing the work and describing it badly, which is a reporting problem rather than a performance one. In that case I tell you to keep your provider and fix the reporting. Substantial problems are the rarest of the four conclusions.

Can I show this to my provider?

The Record, yes, and it is built for exactly that. It contains no opinion, no adjectives and nothing about anyone's conduct. The Assessment is the one I would keep to yourself, and page one of it explains why.

Do you need access to my analytics?

No, and I won't ask. The whole review is deliberately built to work from documents and public sources. It means there are things I cannot confirm, and I say which ones rather than guessing.

Will you talk to my provider for me?

No. That is in the terms and it is not negotiable. The conversation is between you and them, which is why the questions in the Record are written for you to send in your own words.

What if I want the technical side looked at too?

That is a bigger piece of work with a different price, and I'd rather do this first. If the review turns up something that genuinely needs a crawl, I'll say so and explain what it involves. There is no obligation to use me for it.

What if I'd rather do it myself?

Sensible, and cheaper. The $47 kit walks you through the same process with a guide and nine worksheets, in about half an hour. Details here.

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Stop guessing about
your own invoice.

You do not have to become suspicious, and you do not have to learn SEO. Send seven documents you already own and let somebody who reads these every week tell you plainly what can be confirmed, what cannot, and what to ask for next.

Start a review — $297

Five working days · refund if I can't do it justice

Start a review — $297