Is your SEO company actually working? 12 checks you can run today.

Most business owners judge their SEO company by the monthly report the SEO company writes. That is like letting a contractor inspect his own work. These twelve checks need no logins and no technical skill, and most take a minute or two each.

The 12 checks

1. Search your business name like a customer

   Open a private browser window and search your business name. If your business has a Google Business Profile, check its details wherever Google shows it: hours, phone number, photos and website. If any of it is wrong, every other SEO tactic is leaking.

2. Search the three phrases that pay your bills

   Search your main service plus your city, still in a private window. Write down where you appear for each. If the results differ, ask which location, device, date and search terms the report measures.

3. Ask what the report is measured against

   Traffic and rankings are inputs. Ask your SEO company to show leads, calls and booked revenue next to them. If they cannot connect their work to money, nobody is managing the outcome.

4. Find out who owns your accounts

   You should own your domain, your Google Business Profile, Google Search Console and Google Analytics, with the agency added as a user. If the agency owns them, leaving gets expensive.

5. Call every phone number on your site

   Every one. Old numbers survive on footers, contact pages and location pages for years. In one audit, a dead number sat on the online application portal, where people were ready to act.

6. Submit every form

   Fill out each form with a real email address. Did the inquiry arrive? Did anyone follow up, and how fast? A form that silently fails turns paid traffic into nothing.

7. Run a mobile speed test

   Put your homepage and your top service page into Google PageSpeed Insights on mobile. A poor score flags performance problems worth investigating. Check the Core Web Vitals, then compare real engagement and conversion data before concluding people are leaving.

8. Look at what was actually built

   Ask for a list of every page, post and fix delivered in the last 90 days. Activity is not proof of value. If the report lists no delivered work, ask what was completed and what it produced.

9. Watch for copy-paste city pages

   Dozens of near-identical “Service in City” pages are a common shortcut. Near-identical city pages that add no useful local information are a warning sign. Ask whether they help visitors or mainly exist to rank.

10. Ask ChatGPT who the best is

    Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google’s AI Mode: “Who is the best [your service] in [your city]?” More of your customers ask this every month. Track the same questions over time. If you are rarely named, look at the pages and sources behind those answers. One missing mention proves nothing on its own.

11. Compare reviews with your top three competitors

    Count reviews and note how recent they are. Recent, genuine reviews help a local profile, though local rankings also depend on relevance, distance and prominence. Compare reviews alongside those factors.

12. Check the path from search to sale

    Start from a Google search and try to buy, book or call, on your phone. Count the steps. Every unnecessary step costs you customers your SEO already paid to attract.

What to do with what you find

Prioritize what you find by severity and commercial impact. A single broken form can matter more than several minor issues. Take the list to your SEO company and ask them to respond in writing. How they answer tells you as much as the checks did.