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How do you vet SEO Experts if you don’t have the time and your new to SEO
Posted by on November 7, 2025 at 5:55 pmI’m not an SEO expert at all. I know a few basics, but that’s about it. I started lurking here and it quickly opened my eyes to how much help my wife’s website really needs. She’s a real estate agent who gets most of her business from referrals, and I can tell her site needs serious SEO work.
I work full time in tech, mostly in ML and AI, so I don’t have the time to manage this myself. I’d rather invest in proper SEO than keep paying for print ads that don’t bring any traffic.
The problem is the price range for SEO services is all over the place. I’ve seen quotes from $800 to $6,000 a month for full service. ( cleaning up the content on the website, technical SEO side , making sure to follow a key word strategy, help doing outside postings for backlinks, posting using publishers)
I’m just trying to educate myself before hiring anyone. I know to ask about portfolios and past results, but what else should I be looking for? How do you find or vet someone trustworthy, and what’s a reasonable cost range per month. Is this a set and done thing?
Thanks again.
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1 Reply
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* Industry Experience
* Portfolio
* Results & Customer Success Stories you can speak to
* Understandable KPIs
* An SEO Strategy you understand
* No long term lock in contracts
* Must have a website that ranks
* Must be able to demonstrate work
* Must show progression to your goal -
If they say you need x blogs posts a month run. Look for someone with industry experience and Local SEO focus. Focus should be on GMB optimization, Website that validates what you say in your GMB, and local backlinks.
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There might be a few good ones here, just make sure you’re not suckered into paying for BS line items that sound futuristic, I’ve seen some clients of mine get quotes on that same range and its mostly vaporware.
Since you’re new, copy their SOWs into ChatGPT and ask it to translate what each item actually means. you’ll instantly spot the fluff. Good luck!
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SEO isn’t great for RE agents because most of the content e.g., home listings, reside on syndicated data network such as MLS. Can SEO be done? Yes. Knowing what I know about SEO, personally, I would focus on brand building via Social instead of SEO.
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I would ask business owners in your area for a rec and be sure to check references!
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Ignore the alphabet salespeople (GEO AEO AI SEO) it’s all SEO.
Ask them about SEO myths, bounce rate, dwell time, schema having a direct impact on search engine ranking, LLM.txt.
Hang up the phone on anyone who promises you number 1, get you into AI overview or generative answers or any of those garbage promises.
Read what u/WebLinkr wrote
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The only thing you should judge your SEO on is how much content he will create or optimize, and how many legit links he can establish to that content.
A good post takes 3 hours to create with multimedia assets, 30 mins to analyse, 1 hour to optimize, and can take anything from 30 mins to 6 hours to create a link to it.
I would start small. Get a company that works on 1 page per month, given the above, and then you can gauge if you want to proceed with them, and to what you can scale to.
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You ask them the dreaded show me some sites you’re currently ranking with question.
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Appreciate the feedback so far. I agree local SEO is where we would focus on , I know there a few markets that we would like to touch as well because of the changing political nature that makes people move to the area. I was even looking at buying paid google ads to help
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For real estate, the biggest thing is proof of outcomes, not fancy talk, when you talk to someone, ask them to show before vs after on a similar local business , not e-com, not a blog / another agent)
Also ask:
How they track leads? (not just vanity metrics and traffic)
How they pick keywords tied to actual buyer intent in your area?
What they’ll do in the first 30 days (if they are solid they should make a clear plan)
And one tip: if they can’t explain their process in simple terms you understand, they probably don’t understand it either.
You don’t need to know SEO to spot clarity and honesty. And truly avoid the SEO/AEO/GEO/LEO/ XYZEOs and all fancy terms most smoke sellers are using nowadays.
Best of luck 🤞🏼
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Don’t trust anyone who “promises” a #1 position.
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You certainly don’t ask on r/seo
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