How to Choose the Right SEO Company for Your Business

4 min readSep 11, 2021

Selecting a full-service SEO agency is no easy task — choosing a good SEO company is even harder. It’s tough to find a company you trust with something as valuable as your web presence, but, there are a lot of great firms out there!

If you’re now wondering how to choose an SEO company, don’t worry. We’ve done the research on how to choose the right SEO company.

At Clutch, a platform for reviews of SEO and digital marketing services companies, we recently analyzed our review data to understand what methods companies use most frequently to find their SEO partners.

Explore how businesses like yours choose SEO agencies, plus get advice for what to look for in an SEO company, below. You can make the research and vetting process even easier by browsing our tips for how to find the best SEO company too!

*This post has been updated by the WebFX team since its original publishing.

How do companies choose an SEO company?

How do companies choose an SEO company? In our review interview and data collection process, one of the questions we ask is, “What was your selection process, and why did you select this company to work with?”

While not highly scientific, we were able to categorize these qualitative responses into a few main buckets. (Note: Some respondents stated more than one reason.)

Factor 1: Referrals and previously established relationships

Referrals and previously established relationships turned out to be a key reason, cited by 45% of reviewers. This makes sense, as companies may not be experienced with SEO services, and they, therefore, rely on the experiences of friends and colleagues they trust.

Factor 2: SEO company knowledge and processes

The second-largest factor in choosing an SEO company is company knowledge and processes.

This includes customer service, thought leadership, staff experience, reporting, and transparency. These are all attributes that can help make a company successful for their clients, as they were mentioned by 43% of reviewers.

Factor 3: Case studies, client references, and online reviews

Closely related to company knowledge and processes, past performance includes specific evidence, such as case studies, client references, and online reviews, all of which indicate previous success. About 14% said this was a deciding factor in their decision.

Are businesses choosing SEO companies the right way?

In the process of digging into our reviews, we also noticed that 19% — almost one in five companies — had a negative experience with an SEO firm in the past before finding the right fit.

This tells me a couple of things:

Great agencies still have work to do in educating potential clients on what a successful SEO strategy and partnership should look like.
Businesses need to take more time vetting their prospective partners along with many criteria to find the right fit.

To be more specific, the companies that select an SEO firm based primarily on factors such as location, price, or culture fit, as opposed to company knowledge and performance, are not doing enough homework before entering into a partnership.

How to choose a good SEO company

When it comes to choosing an SEO company, you want to go about it in a smart and logical way.

If you rush into the process, you’ll probably sign with an agency that doesn’t meet your expectations, which can lead to a frustrating experience that doesn’t help you drive traffic, leads, or sales from search.

Learn how to choose an SEO company (and avoid the above scenario) with these three steps:

1. Look at the SEO agency’s past performance

Performance matters for not only SEO agencies but also businesses like yours.

People look at what your company’s done to determine if you can deliver. You should do the same when choosing an SEO company. Look at their past performance, whether through portfolio examples, case studies, industry awards, or client testimonials.