How to Tell If Your SEO Company Is Working

Learn how to tell if your SEO company is working based on my years of hands-on agency experience, with real performance signals to track and red flags to avoid.

For most business owners, SEO feels like a black box. You pay a monthly fee, get a report full of charts you don’t understand, and just hope it’s all working. It’s a common and frustrating spot to be in.

The truth is, good SEO takes time and the work is complex. This creates a perfect gap for bad SEO companies to hide in. 

Not every SEO agency is bad (some do excellent work), but it’s shocking how often I see SEO companies doing way less than they should. 

Sometimes they keep themselves busy with meaningless tasks, and sometimes they don’t do anything at all—other than sending you a pretty report once a month.

Nearly every client who hires me has already had a bad experience with an SEO agency. They usually come to me for one of two reasons:

1. To clean up the mess left by a previous provider.
2. To play detective and figure out whether their current SEO company is actually doing its job.

And honestly? Many times I can tell in the first five minutes of looking at a website whether the SEO company is working or not. 

Other times, it’s obvious as soon as I open a “monthly report” that looks like it was slapped together in 30 seconds. If the highlight of your agency’s work is a colorful PDF with vague numbers and recycled text, that’s not SEO—it’s theater.

I wrote this guide to give you a clear way to judge your SEO agency’s work.I spent more than seven years inside SEO agencies, so trust me when I say—I’ve seen it all. 

TL;DR: How to Tell if Your SEO Company Is Doing a Good Job

Not everyone has time to read a full breakdown, so here’s the short version. If your SEO agency is truly doing the work, you’ll see proof in both the numbers and the way they work with you. 

• Early signs (leading indicators): more indexed pages, rising impressions in Google Search Console, keyword movement that actually matters.
• Business impact (lagging indicators): steady growth in organic traffic, conversions from organic visitors, and clear ROI.
• Good communication matters: proactive reports, quick replies, honesty when things go wrong, explanations in plain English.
• Strategy over templates: they ask questions about your business, adapt to data and Google updates, and propose new ideas—not just “checklist SEO.”
• Real deliverables: audits, keyword research, on-page fixes, content, and monthly reports that connect actions to results.
• Client reality check: even the best SEO company can’t do miracles with a shoestring budget or no access to your site.

Just remember: none of these signals are set in stone—SEO results depend on factors like your site’s history, budget, competition, and how much you (the client) make implementation possible.

👉 If you’re not sure whether your SEO company is working, consider bringing in an independent SEO detective (like me) to investigate before you waste more money.

What You Need to Know About How SEO Agencies Work

Disclaimer: I’ve seen the below-described practices in action many times, but not all agencies work this way. I’ve also come across agencies that do amazing work. The same goes for SEO consultants; there are both great and not-so-great ones.

After seven years on the agency side and years of cleaning up after agencies as an independent consultant, I’ve noticed a few laws of SEO agency physics. They’re not written in stone, but they explain a lot about why so many businesses feel like their SEO company isn’t working.

1. Small budgets = small priority
If you’re a small client with a small budget, you’re not going to be a top priority. Cruel? Yes. Logical? Also yes. Agencies will naturally focus on bigger clients who pay them more. The issue is when this happens at the expense of smaller clients, who end up stuck in the “monitor only” lane.

2. Big client fires take all the oxygen
When a big client has an SEO emergency, agencies often throw every available hand on that project. Smaller clients get quietly placed on “autopilot.” Translation: someone checks your rankings once a month and makes sure your site still loads. That’s about it.

3. Tiny budgets can tie hands
This one’s uncomfortable but true. If your budget only allows for 10 hours of SEO a month, it doesn’t matter if your consultant knows exactly what you need—there simply isn’t enough time to execute it. Treating SEO as an expense instead of an investment is a recipe for frustration.

4. The bigger the agency, the thinner the attention
At large agencies, SEO specialists can have 20, 30, 60—or even 100 clients—on their plate every month. Do the math. That might mean your business gets zero attention in a given month, or maybe two rushed hours at best.

5. Cheap labor comes at a cost
Many agencies cut costs by hiring low-wage offshore “SEO specialists.” Some are fantastic, but too often, they have little actual SEO knowledge. For the agency, this makes perfect sense: low costs, high margins, and if a client leaves, who cares? There’s always another one in line.

6. Small agencies can overload too
Ironically, even tiny agencies (two or three people) sometimes take on the workload of a 50-person team—by outsourcing to cheap remote workers. The result? Thin, inconsistent SEO work done by people learning on the job—your job.

7. Junior SEOs learn at your expense
If you’re a lower-priority client, your account may be handled by a junior SEO who’s still figuring out the basics. Great for their resume, not so great for your business.

And here’s the kicker: your business is your lifeline. Your family depends on it. But to a big SEO agency, you might just be client #72—easy to ignore when bigger fish are paying the bills.

Why Do You Want to Know If Your SEO Company Is Working?

Before you grab the pitchfork, pause for a second and ask yourself why you’re even asking this question. 

Is it because you’re unhappy with the results? Because your agency is slow to respond? Or maybe because there’s zero transparency and you feel like you’re paying for a mystery box?

When I’m hired as the “SEO agency detective” (yes, that’s a thing), my first step is to tell clients to actually talk to their agency. Spell out your doubts, frustrations, and fears. Sometimes the problem isn’t that the SEO company isn’t doing its job—it’s that they aren’t explaining what they’re doing. Clear communication can fix that.

But here’s where it gets messy. I’ve seen plenty of situations where a client is ready to fire their SEO company, furious that “nothing is being done,” while forgetting one small detail: they’ve been sabotaging the work themselves.

How? By not giving their agency access to the website. By ignoring or delaying implementation of recommendations. By questioning every piece of advice until nothing gets done. Or by “improving” things on their own and accidentally tanking their rankings.

So yes, sometimes bad SEO companies are the problem. But sometimes the problem is… the client.

So Is Your SEO Company Actually Working—or Just Pretending?

Let’s get to the big question: is your SEO company actually working, or just pretending to do so?

Over the years, I’ve spotted clear signs that separate a quality SEO company from one that’s simply burning through your budget. These observations come from both sides of the table: my years inside agencies and my years helping clients recover from bad ones. And yes—most of my clients come to me after very painful experiences with SEO providers.

There are three main groups of signs to look at when you’re trying to figure out if your SEO company is doing its job:

1. Early signs (leading indicators) of SEO progress
   These are the first signals that things are moving in the right direction, even before traffic or revenue changes show up.
2. Business impact (lagging indicators) of SEO
   These are the big results—more organic traffic, better rankings, and actual money in the bank. They take longer, but they’re what you ultimately care about.
3. Beyond the numbers – signs of a good SEO partner
   Because it’s not just about metrics. Communication, transparency, and trust matter just as much as rankings.

And one more thing: every example I’m about to share comes with a giant “it depends” sticker. Results depend on your website, your industry, your willingness to act on recommendations, and—of course—whether your SEO agency is actually doing the work they say they are.

Is My SEO Agency Working? Here’s How to Tell From the Numbers

You need to see the story in the data. Different numbers tell different parts of the story. Early signs show whether you’re on the right path; business impact proves it.

One reality check before we start: most of these signals take time—weeks to months (and for a brand-new site built from scratch, 12–18 months isn’t unusual). What you see depends on how long your SEO company has worked on the site, what existed before, and how easy you’ve made it to ship changes. 

Ask yourself: Am I making it difficult for my SEO company to provide results?
No access, no implementation, no approvals = no progress.

Early Signs (Leading Indicators) – Is Your SEO Company Moving the Needle?

If you’ve been with your provider 8–12 months, you should already see results—or at least clear, specific explanations for delays. Early signs usually appear within 1–3 months after actual SEO optimizations have been made on the website. They don’t mean you’re making money yet; they mean the engine is turning.

• Indexed pages (GSC → Indexing/Pages).
  More indexed pages means Google knows more of your content exists. Context matters—quality beats bloat—but a healthy rise in the right pages indexed is a positive signal.
• Organic impressions (GSC → Performance).
  Impressions rise before clicks. A steady, contextual increase in organic impressions is often the first sign of life. Impressions first → clicks next.
• Keyword rankings (for mapped, valuable queries).
  Rankings bounce—don’t panic. What you want is movement on keywords that your customers actually use, not vanity phrases. Track mapped targets, not random “garbage nonsense.”
• Total queries you rank for (breadth).
  Seeing more keywords in GSC can indicate expanding topical reach. Caveat: more keywords ≠ better business. The goal is qualified visibility, not a big number for its own sake.

Friendly warning: I’ve seen bad SEO companies chase super-easy keywords just to pump traffic charts. It looks good in a report and does nothing for revenue. 

A quality SEO company will connect these early signals to your plan, show what’s next, and explain how today’s gains lead to tomorrow’s conversions.

You can check all of the above in Google Search Console. However, resist the urge to jump to conclusions after one bad day or one good week. Patterns beat snapshots.

Business Impact (Lagging Indicators) – Is Your SEO Company Making You Money?

Early signals are nice, but let’s be honest: what you really care about is whether SEO is making money. These lagging indicators connect SEO work directly to sales, leads, and revenue. Just keep in mind that big changes here usually take six to twelve months of consistent work (and even longer if you’re starting from zero).

• Organic Traffic → This is the number of people landing on your site from search engines for free. It’s not the only metric, but it’s usually the first one clients ask about. What you want to see is a clear, long-term upward trend. Short-term spikes don’t count—those could be random or seasonal.
• Organic Conversions → Traffic means nothing if it doesn’t convert. A conversion is when a visitor does what you actually want them to do: buy something, sign up, book a call. More conversions from organic search prove that your SEO company isn’t just driving traffic—it’s driving the right traffic.
• Return on Investment (ROI) → Here’s the ultimate test: are you making more money from SEO than you’re spending on it? To borrow a line from Google’s John Mueller: you know SEO is working when you can say, “When I started doing SEO for my website, I made so much more money.” That’s the endgame.

Now, before you pop the champagne: don’t assume every revenue jump is thanks to SEO. Maybe you sent out a killer discount newsletter. Maybe your paid ads went wild. 

Always separate other factors before giving your SEO company all the credit (or all the blame).

Beyond the Numbers – Is Your SEO Company a True Partner?

The numbers tell you what is happening. The relationship with your SEO agency tells you how and why. 

A reliable SEO company isn’t just someone who sends you reports—it’s a partner. And the biggest clue is how they communicate with you.

Here are the signs of good communication from an SEO company:

• Proactive reports. They send reports on time, explain what the numbers mean, and connect their work to your results instead of just throwing charts at you.
• Strategic meetings. Calls aren’t just “report-reading sessions.” They’re discussions about strategy, priorities, and performance.
• Honesty. When something goes wrong, they don’t hide it. They explain what happened and how they’ll fix it.
• Clarity. They explain SEO in simple terms so you actually understand what’s going on. No jargon walls, no smoke and mirrors.
• Responsiveness. They reply to your emails and calls quickly—usually within a business day. If they go dark for days or weeks, that’s not strategy, that’s ghosting.
• Transparency. When you ask what they’re doing, they give you clear, detailed answers instead of dodging the question or hiding behind automated reports.

If your SEO company ticks these boxes, you’re dealing with a partner. If not, you’re probably just paying for a ghost with a knack for copy-pasting charts.

Strategic Depth – Does Your SEO Company Have a Real Plan or Just a Template?

One-size-fits-all SEO doesn’t work. Every business is different, and a good SEO agency knows that. A real partner takes the time to learn about your business before they start talking about keywords or rankings. 

Here are the signs your SEO agency has a real strategy (and not a dusty template):

• They Ask “Why?”
  They want to understand your business model, customers, and goals. They ask questions, clarify details, and check in with you regularly. Curiosity is a good sign—they’re thinking, not just ticking boxes.
• They Explain Their Work.
  Every recommendation comes with reasoning. They tell you why something matters and what they expect to happen. No “just trust us” answers.
• They See the Big Picture.
  SEO doesn’t live in a bubble. A good agency will ask about your other marketing—social media, paid ads, email—and look for ways to align efforts.
• They Adapt.
  SEO is not set-and-forget. They adjust based on data, test results, and Google updates. A rigid plan is a dead plan.
• They Propose New Ideas.
  An engaged SEO partner is always looking for new opportunities to grow—fresh strategies, experiments, or changes based on what’s working (and what’s not).

If your SEO company never asks questions, never explains themselves, and just hands you a cookie-cutter checklist, you don’t have a strategy. You have a template—and templates don’t grow businesses.

SEO Deliverables – What Are You Actually Paying For?

At the end of the day, you’re not paying your SEO agency for “effort” or “time spent thinking about your site.” You’re paying for actual work that should move your business forward. 

That means you should be able to see proof of what’s being done. If your agency can’t show you what they’ve been working on, that’s a giant red flag.

Here are the types of deliverables a good SEO company should provide:

• A thorough initial site audit.
  This is the foundation. A real SEO project starts with an audit that identifies technical issues, on-page gaps, and content opportunities. It should include a clear list of fixes, not just a generic PDF exported from a tool.
• Keyword research tied to your business.
  Not a random list of words with search volume. I’m talking about real research that looks at what your customers are searching for, how competitive those terms are, and which keywords can actually make you money.
• On-page changes you can point to.
  Things like improved page titles, meta descriptions, internal links, schema, and updated content. These are tangible edits that you should be able to see live on your site.
• Content deliverables.
  This could be content briefs, optimized articles, or new landing pages. SEO without content is like going to the gym and only stretching—you won’t get far.
• Monthly reports that mean something.
  A good report isn’t just a pile of graphs. It should show data and summarize what was actually done that month. Even better, it should connect actions to results and outline what’s planned for next month.

If your SEO company is delivering these things consistently, you’re probably in good hands. 

Are You a Good or a Bad SEO Client?

Time for some honesty. 

As someone who has been on both sides of the fence—working inside agencies and now cleaning up after them—I need to raise a not-so-popular point: sometimes the problem isn’t the SEO agency. Sometimes it’s the client.

Even the best, most honest SEO company on the planet can’t deliver miracles if you give them six hours a month to fix your website. SEO isn’t alchemy; it’s work. And like any business, agencies need to make a profit. They can’t go bankrupt just to grow your business.

Let me give you an extreme example. I once worked with a client who was expecting a big government grant to fund SEO for a full year. They had four totally dead websites—no traffic, no content, nothing. Each needed SEO from scratch: keyword research, strategy, technical fixes, on-page work, and brand-new content.

The grant was supposed to be substantial, so I thought: fine, I can actually move the SEO needle here if I dedicate enough hours. We signed the agreement, all ready to start January 1. Then, on December 30—surprise!—the grant ended up being 10% of the expected amount.

The client still wanted me to do everything for all four sites within that budget. And like a fool, I agreed. Big mistake. That left me with about 10 hours per month for four websites. Do the math. That’s 2.5 hours per site, per month. Good luck ranking anything with that.

What happened? Predictably, I couldn’t deliver meaningful SEO results. 

So here’s the blunt truth: if you treat SEO as an expense and starve it of resources, don’t be shocked when it doesn’t work. Sometimes it’s not the agency that’s “bad”—it’s that the client is sabotaging their own results by refusing to invest properly.

Final Thoughts – The Reality of Working With an SEO Company

SEO isn’t magic dust you sprinkle on a website. It’s work. Sometimes it’s messy, sometimes it’s slow, and sometimes it doesn’t go according to plan. 

But when you’re with the right partner, you’ll know it—not just in the numbers, but in the way they communicate, plan, and adapt.

The tricky part? A lot of businesses don’t realize they’re stuck with an agency that’s either doing the bare minimum or flat-out ghosting them. 

So if you’re feeling unsure about your SEO company, trust that instinct. Better to ask tough questions now than to keep paying for months of “busy work” that never moves the needle.

Do You Need an SEO Detective?

That’s where I come in. I’ve seen it all—seven years inside SEO agencies, and now years of investigating them from the outside. If you want an independent SEO detective to figure out whether your agency is actually working, I can help.

Fair warning: I’m usually overbooked, so it may take me a moment to respond. But if you want me to take a real look at your site, your reports, and your SEO situation, reach out. Sometimes the truth is brutal—but it’s always better than throwing money into a black hole.

P.S. I am thinking about doing an initiative “Show me your SEO reports, I will tell you what your SEO company is doing”. 😉