SEO & search
How to evaluate SEO partners without falling for guarantees
Rankings promises are a red flag. Here is how to brief SEO work with transparency, baselines and business outcomes.
By Nirmal Lashkari6 min read
No ethical team can guarantee page-one rankings or a fixed number of leads. Search results move with competition, algorithms and your own site quality.
Ask for a system, not a slogan
- Baseline of technical health, content gaps and conversion paths
- Prioritised roadmap with impact vs effort
- Clear ownership between strategy, content and engineering
- Reporting that separates vanity traffic from qualified opportunity
Red flags
- Guaranteed rankings in a fixed number of days
- Secret tactics that cannot be explained in writing
- No discussion of page experience or conversion
- Identical strategy for every industry
A healthier success definition
Define success as improved discoverability for commercial intent, cleaner technical foundations, and more qualified enquiries over time—measured against a documented baseline.
#seo#procurement#measurement