You paid an SEO agency for six months, maybe a year. The invoices arrived on time. The rankings didn’t. And when you asked what you were actually getting for the money, the answer was a PDF full of graphs you couldn’t read and a reassurance that “SEO takes time”.
It does take time. That’s true. It’s also the most abused sentence in this industry, because it buys a bad agency another month of your money every time they say it.
So here’s the honest version: how to work out whether your last agency did anything, and how to pick the next one so you never have to write this cheque off again.
The four ways SEO agencies waste your money
We see the same four failure patterns again and again when a business comes to us after a bad experience.
1. No strategy, just activity. You got a monthly report listing “tasks completed”, but nobody ever told you which keywords you were chasing, which pages were meant to rank for them, or why. SEO without a target list is just busywork with an invoice attached.
2. Thin content. The agency published blog posts, technically. Three hundred words of generic filler that could sit on any website in your industry, written to tick a box rather than answer a question a real customer asks. Google has no reason to rank it, and it never will.
3. Spam links. Some agencies still buy cheap links from directories and link farms because it looks like output. At best those links do nothing. At worst they get your site filtered, and you pay someone else later to clean them up.
4. The wrong keywords entirely. This one stings. The agency ranks you for terms nobody searches, then shows you a report full of green arrows. “Position 1” for a phrase with zero monthly searches is not a result. It’s a decoration.
If your instinct reading that list was “that sounds familiar”, you’re not being paranoid. You were probably right.
How to audit what you actually paid for
You don’t need to be technical to do this. Set aside 20 minutes.
- Ask for the keyword list. Every legitimate SEO campaign has one. If your old agency can’t produce the list of terms they were targeting, that answers the question by itself.
- Check Google Search Console. It’s free and it’s Google’s own data. Look at the last 12 months of clicks and impressions. Flat lines during a paid campaign mean the campaign wasn’t working, whatever the agency’s report said.
- Look at what was published. Find the pages and posts the agency added. Read one as a customer would. Would it convince you to pick up the phone? If it reads like it was churned out to hit a word count, it was.
- Search your own services. Type what a customer would type, like “emergency plumber macclesfield”, and see where you sit. Compare that with what the reports claimed.
If the audit comes back empty, take the lesson rather than the loss: the problem was the supplier, not SEO itself. Businesses in your position rank perfectly well once someone does the work properly.
What honest SEO reporting looks like
An honest monthly report answers three questions in plain English. What did we do this month? What changed as a result? What are we doing next?
Concretely, that means it shows the actual pages worked on, movement on the agreed keyword list, and the numbers that matter to you: clicks from Google, enquiries, phone calls. Not “impressions are up 400%” with no context. Impressions are the easiest number in SEO to inflate and the least connected to revenue.
It should also be comfortable reporting bad months. Rankings wobble. An agency that only ever sends good news is editing, not reporting.
The questions to ask before you sign
Put these to any agency you’re considering, including us:
- “Which keywords will you target, and why those?” You want a reasoned answer based on what your customers search, not a promise to “rank you for everything”.
- “What will you actually produce each month?” Pages, posts, on-page changes, and how many. Vague scope is where budgets go to die. Our own SEO plans publish the scope openly: from a monthly health check and on-page recommendations at £49 a month, up to two optimised pages or posts every month plus a monthly action plan on the Pro plan at £299 a month.
- “How long until I see results?” The honest answer is months, not weeks, and anyone who promises otherwise is guessing with your money. We’ve written a full month-by-month breakdown in our guide to how long SEO takes to work.
- “Do you guarantee rankings?” The correct answer is no. Nobody controls Google. UK advertising rules require claims to be substantiable, and “guaranteed page 1” never is. Treat that promise as a walk-away signal, the same as the ones in our guide to choosing a marketing agency without getting ripped off.
- “Is there a lock-in?” Understand the term, the notice period and exactly what happens to the work if you leave.
What it should cost
Legitimate SEO for a UK small business doesn’t have to mean four figures a month. It does have to mean visible output for whatever you pay. We’ve published our full price breakdown, with what’s included at each level, in our guide to how much SEO costs in the UK, and the plans themselves are on our SEO service page.
The pattern to avoid is paying mid-market money for no visible work. A £49 review-and-recommendations plan that does what it says is worth more than a £500 retainer that produces mystery PDFs.
Been burned before and want a second opinion on what your last agency actually did? Get in touch through our contact page and we’ll tell you straight, even if the answer is “they did fine, keep going”.
Frequently asked questions
How do I know if my SEO agency is doing anything?
Ask for the keyword list they’re targeting and the pages they’ve changed or published, then check Google Search Console yourself for clicks and impressions over the last year. Real work leaves a visible trail of improved pages and gradual growth. If neither exists, the retainer bought you very little.
Why is my website not ranking on Google after paying for SEO?
Usually one of four reasons: no real strategy behind the work, thin content Google has no reason to rank, low-quality links, or targeting keywords nobody searches. Occasionally it’s simply too early, since SEO takes months. An audit of what was actually delivered will tell you which one applies.
Should an SEO agency guarantee first-page rankings?
No, and you should treat any guarantee as a red flag. Nobody controls Google’s results, so “guaranteed page 1” cannot be substantiated, which UK advertising rules require. Honest agencies commit to specific work and transparent reporting instead, then show you the movement that work produces over time.
How much should a small business pay for SEO?
MarketingDone4U charges £49 a month for a light-touch review plan, £149 a month for one optimised page or post monthly with keyword targeting, and £299 a month for two monthly pages plus deeper competitor work. Whatever you pay, the scope should be written down and visible.
Is it worth switching SEO agencies?
If six months of invoices produced no keyword list, no meaningful content and no movement in Search Console, yes. Switching costs less than another year of the same. Keep access to your own Google Search Console and Analytics accounts when you move, because that data belongs to your business.
Want this done for you? See our SEO plans, or compare every service and price in one place.
