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SEO Retainers Explained: What UK Agencies Include (and What They Don’t)
For many UK businesses, SEO is something you invest in month without fully understanding what goes on behind the scenes. This is where SEO retainers come into play. Retainers ensure consistent and ongoing optimisation over quick fixes. The challenge is that not all agencies include the same services. When you have an understanding of what is often included in a retainer, and what usually isn't, it helps you make informed decisions, avoiding the risk of paying for something you do not need.
SEO retainers usually include the following:
Technical SEO requires consistent monitoring and adjusting as your website grows and changes. Retainers usually include regular technical SEO audits, fixing any crawl errors, making improvements to indexing, along with on-site speed checks. It may include structured data maintenance, ensuring Google Search Console health.
At the same time, major improvements or full website rebuilds are additional projects that are not included in the SEO retainer.
This is the major part of most SEO retainers and includes keyword research updates, meta titles and descriptions, improving content for clarity and relevance, optimising headers, URL's alt text, and internal links, while refreshing old content. On-page SEO requires ongoing optimisation to stay competitive.
Most UK agencies include content creation in the SEO retainer, though the volume may vary depending on the retainer level. This includes content calendars, SEO blogs, optimised landing pages, FAQ content, along with topic recommendations. It may include copy writing services, while some agencies may provide a brief if you have an in-house team of writers.
Most of the reputable UK agencies will include ethical link acquisition, such as digital PR outreach, guest posts, brand mentions, and local citations. At the same time, link building is resource intensive, therefore basic retainers may only include one or two links monthly, with larger campaigns being offered at an additional cost.
A strong SEO retainer will include monthly performance reporting, updates on keyword movements, traffic and conversion analysis, competitor tr4acking, and strategy reviews. Some agencies will provide a written summary, while others may offer a video update. What you need is a UK agency that offers clarity, transparency, and actionable insights.
Most UK agencies do not include the following in their SEO retainers:
If you have a broken link or a small technical issue with your website, that is often covered by the SEO retainer. But if you require a full website redesign, platform migration, speed optimisation that requires development work, or a new template build, that will not be included and will be charged for separately.
Many UK agencies will include ongoing content as part of your SEO retainer, at the same time, big undertakings are not included. Should your website requires a full rewrite, you have large knowledge hubs, or you require a multi-page service, or in-depth white papers or ebooks. These are standalone projects that are time and resource intensive, often quoted on separately.
Very seldom will paid advertising be included as part of a SEO retainer. Paid media is a separate service, even though it works together with SEO.
UK agencies may recommend content ideas, supporting social engagement. If you choose a full social media management service that includes posting, scheduling, and engagement, this will not be included in your SEO retainer.
A good SEO retainer is flexible, transparent, and aligned with your business goals. Before you sign, always ensure you have a clear understanding on the scope of work involves and what deliverables are included. Ask the UK agency for a roadmap for the first three to six months, examples of their reporting, along with what is not included. This way you always know what you are investing in and whether the UK agency you are using is the right long-term partner for measurable growth. Genie Crawl is a boutique UK-based agency offering reliable and professional SEO services. Contact us today to find out more.
Genie Crawl carried out a detailed SEO audit for my tutoring website and explained everything in a clear and understandable way. I hired them straight away and since then I have seen a noticeable improvement in the traffic and leads coming to my website.
Awesome service, Tony and the team have been great with completing our website and meeting all the deadlines we set. They have lots of bright ideas and created so much value to our business. Our search engine rankings are now on the first page of the Google! We wouldn't have managed this without you guys!
Excellent service and great results with our Google Ads account. They are always there at the end of the phone when we need them and they are a friendly bunch of people to deal with. We are very happy with the results.
Genie Crawl has helped massively with my rankings as a business owner using SEO. My business is doing very well now, all thanks to them!
Genie Crawl is a very efficient company to work with; they were clear on what they felt they could offer and assisted me in improving my SEO rankings.
GenieCrawl was recommended to me for their SEO optimisation services and they have been great to work with. Our traffic jumped straight away and our business has gone from strength to strength thanks to their support.
I was really struggling to get my SEO ratings higher for my business, and my website noticed on google. Thanks to GenieCrawl and their excellent service and SEO knowledge, I was able to increase my rankings sufficiently and am now reaping the benefits of their optimizations. I would highly recommend their service if you are struggling with SEO rankings as I was.
As a new business start up we needed help driving traffic to our website. In all fairness this was an area we were all pretty clueless on. Genie Crawl have been invaluable to us and undoubtedly have been a driving force to increasing sales. They are always there with helpful advice when we need them. Thanks!
I was a little skeptical about hiring a company to help with the SEO for my website, but I am over the moon with my decision to work with Genie Crawl. They have really increased the traffic to my website and I would highly recommend them to everyone!
Fantastic company. They've been essential in getting us the business that we need. Would completely recommend. We've really found that our rankings have gone through the roof. SEO experts for sure! A+
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