Search engine optimization
SEO measured in enquiries not rankings
A ranking is a means. The things worth reporting are qualified visits and the enquiries they produce. We work on the three levers that move those — what search engines can crawl and understand, what each page says, and whether the content deserves to win the query — and we tell you which one is actually your bottleneck.
- Scope
- Technical, on-page, content, local
- Reporting
- Monthly, against enquiries
- Link building
- Earned only — never bought
The problem
Most SEO retainers sell activity
The usual package is a fixed number of blog posts, a fixed number of links and a dashboard of keyword positions. It is easy to invoice and almost impossible to connect to revenue. Meanwhile the actual constraint — a site search engines cannot crawl properly, service pages that do not answer the query, or a Business Profile nobody maintains — goes untouched for a year.
We start by finding the constraint. If your technical foundation is fine and your content is the problem, we will not sell you a technical audit. If nobody can find you locally, we will tell you that most of that work happens off your website.
Common bottlenecks we find
- Pages indexed that should not be, and pages missing that should be
- One page trying to rank for five different intents at once
- Service pages shorter and vaguer than every competitor on page one
- No internal linking strategy, so authority never reaches the money pages
- A Google Business Profile with no posts, no photos and unanswered reviews
- Rankings that look fine and traffic that never becomes an enquiry
What is included
What the work consists of
Technical
- Full crawl: indexability, canonicals, status codes, redirect chains
- Index management — what should be in the index and what should not
- Structured data: Organization, Service, Breadcrumb, FAQ, Article
- Core Web Vitals review, with fixes scoped or handed to the speed service
- Log-level crawl behaviour where the site is large enough to warrant it
On-page
- One primary intent per page, mapped across the whole site
- Titles and meta descriptions written for the click, not the character count
- Heading structure that reflects the actual argument of the page
- Internal linking built deliberately toward commercial pages
- Cannibalisation resolved by merging or re-pointing competing pages
Content
- Keyword and intent research tied to what you actually sell
- Gap analysis against the sites currently ranking
- Briefs that specify the argument, not just the word count
- Rewrites of existing pages first — usually faster than new ones
- Updates to pages that have decayed, which beats publishing more
Local & reporting
- Google Business Profile setup, categories, services, posts and photos
- NAP consistency across the directories that matter
- Review strategy — the single biggest local lever for most businesses
- Monthly reporting on enquiries, assisted conversions and visibility
- A rolling priority list, so you always know what is next and why
Our position
Things we will not do
Most of what gives SEO a bad name is still being sold. Being clear about this up front saves everybody a call.
Buy links
Paid link schemes are against Google’s spam policies and the risk sits on your domain, not on the agency’s. We earn links through work worth citing: original data, genuinely useful tools and pages other people want to reference.
Publish bulk AI content
Generating a hundred pages to cover a hundred keywords produces a site that says nothing and competes with itself. We use AI the way a good writer uses a research assistant, and every page still has a human argument and a named expert behind it.
Guarantee rankings
The ranking system is not ours to control, it re-ranks constantly, and it is increasingly personalised. We will commit to the work, the timeline and the reporting. We will not commit to a position.
Hide the work behind a dashboard
You get a changelog of what shipped and when, in plain language. If a month was mostly technical cleanup with nothing visible, the report says that.
Hold your accounts hostage
Analytics, Search Console, Business Profile and Tag Manager are created under your ownership. If you leave, you take everything, including the audit documents.
Sell you SEO you do not need
Several of the businesses that contact us need a better offer, a faster site or a working Business Profile rather than a retainer. We say so, even when it costs us the retainer.
Our process
How an engagement runs
Understand needs
Find the constraint
Technical crawl, content review, competitor comparison and a look at your analytics. The output names the one thing holding the site back, not twelve things of equal weight.
You getAudit with a ranked, costed priority list
Strategize
Map intent to pages
Which query each page owns, which pages are missing, which should be merged. This map is what stops the site competing with itself.
You getIntent map and content roadmap
Create & build
Fix, write, ship
Technical fixes first because they unblock everything else, then on-page work on the pages closest to converting, then new content.
You getShipped changes, logged with dates
Optimize & grow
Measure and compound
Monthly review against enquiries. Pages that are close to breaking through get attention before new pages get written.
You getMonthly report and revised priorities
Honest scoping
Who should invest in SEO
Worth it if
- People actively search for what you sell — there is existing demand to capture
- Your average customer is worth enough to justify a compounding investment
- You can wait months rather than weeks for the first meaningful return
- You can supply subject-matter input; good content needs your expertise
- You are prepared to change pages, not just add new ones
Look elsewhere if
- You need leads this month — that is a paid-traffic and landing-page problem
- Your category genuinely has no search volume; we will check before quoting
- You want guaranteed positions. Nobody controls the ranking algorithm, and anyone promising a position is either guessing or buying something you do not want on your domain
- The site cannot be changed, only added to
Selected work
Projects that used Search Engine Optimization
Questions
Before you ask us
The things people ask about Search Engine Optimization before they get in touch. If yours is not here, ask directly — you will get a straight answer rather than a brochure.
Ask a questionHow long before I see results?
Technical fixes can show within weeks. Content and authority work usually take three to six months to produce a visible trend, longer in competitive categories. Anyone quoting a faster timeline is either working in a very low-competition niche or is not telling you the whole story.
Do you guarantee a number-one ranking?
No, and we would treat any agency that does with suspicion. Search results are re-ranked continuously and vary by location, device and history. What we commit to is a named scope of work, a timeline, and reporting that shows exactly what changed.
Is SEO still worth it now that AI answers so many queries?
Yes, and the overlap is larger than people expect: AI systems lean heavily on the same crawlable, well-structured, credible pages that rank organically. What changes is that being cited matters alongside being clicked, which is what our AI search optimization service covers. The technical foundation serves both.
Do you do local SEO for Seattle businesses?
Yes. For most local service businesses the biggest levers are the Google Business Profile, reviews and consistent citations rather than the website itself — so that is where we start, and we are straightforward that a lot of it happens off your site.
What does SEO cost?
Audits are a fixed fee; ongoing work is a monthly retainer starting at $650 per month, scaled to the size of the site and the competitiveness of the category. We do not sell a fixed number of blog posts per month, because that is a billing model rather than a strategy. Current ranges are on the pricing page.
Can you work with our existing developer?
Regularly. We can deliver prioritised, specific tickets your team implements, or implement directly if you would rather. Either way the recommendations are written to be actioned rather than interpreted.
Find out what is actually holding you back
Most sites have one dominant constraint, not twelve. Send us your domain and the terms you want to win, and we will tell you which one it is before you sign anything.