SEO Consulting: Expert Strategy for Businesses That Execute In-House
Not every business needs a full SEO agency. If you have an in-house developer, a marketing team, or a content writer — what you often need is not more execution. You need direction. A clear picture of what is wrong, what to fix, and in what order.
Who This Is For
| Team In-House Marketing Teams You have writers, a developer, and someone managing the site — but no one with deep SEO expertise. You need a structured strategy and a prioritised action plan your team can execute against. | Agency Dev Agencies and Freelancers You are building or redesigning a client’s ecommerce store and want SEO input during the build — URL structure, technical setup, keyword mapping — before launch, not after. | Owner Store Owners Evaluating SEO You have tried one agency, or you are about to start SEO for the first time, and you want an independent expert to tell you honestly what your store needs — before you commit to anything ongoing. |
What We Cover in a Consulting Engagement
Every consulting engagement is scoped to what you actually need. The most common areas:
Technical SEO Review
A structured review of your store’s technical foundation — crawlability, indexation, site speed, canonical configuration, and mobile performance. We identify what is suppressing your rankings at the infrastructure level and document each issue with a specific recommended fix. You or your developer implements. See our dedicated technical SEO service if you need us to implement as well.
Keyword Strategy and Opportunity Mapping
A keyword research deliverable built around your catalogue and your market — clustered by topic, intent-classified, and mapped to specific pages. Includes a gap analysis showing which queries you should be ranking for but are not. Your team uses this to prioritise content creation and on-page optimisation.
On-Page Recommendations
A prioritised on-page audit of your key pages — title tags, H-tag structure, meta descriptions, product copy, category content, internal linking. Delivered as a structured brief your developer or content team can implement directly. No jargon, no vague guidance — specific changes for specific pages.
Competitor and Gap Analysis
A review of who is ranking for your target queries and why. Backlink profile comparison, content gap mapping, and category structure benchmarking. Gives you a clear picture of the gap between your store and the top 3-5 competitors — and a realistic assessment of what it takes to close it.
How It Works
| 01 Scope Call 30-minute call to understand your situation, your store, and what you need. We define the scope and confirm what the engagement will cover. | 02 Analysis We analyse your store, your competitors, and your market. Depending on scope, this takes 3-7 business days. | 03 Delivery and Walkthrough You receive a structured document with all findings and recommendations. We walk through it together so you know exactly what to do and in what order. |
What You Get
Every consulting engagement produces a concrete deliverable — not a presentation of observations.
| Scope call | 30-minute discovery call to define the engagement. No charge. |
| Audit or analysis document | A structured audit report or analysis document — specific to the agreed scope. Every finding tied to a specific page and a specific recommended action. |
| Prioritised action plan | Issues and recommendations ranked by impact. What to fix first, what to tackle next, what to deprioritise. |
| Implementation guide | Every recommendation written for your team to execute — specific enough to hand to a developer or content writer without further interpretation. |
| Walkthrough session | A 60-minute call to walk through the deliverable, answer questions, and clarify anything that needs context. |
| 30-day follow-up | A follow-up check-in 30 days after delivery to see how implementation is progressing and answer any questions that have come up. |
| “The difference between a consulting engagement and a full agency engagement is who executes. The analysis, the strategy, and the direction are the same. You keep control of implementation.” |
Frequently Asked Questions
| Question | Answer |
| How is SEO consulting different from your other services? | In a full SEO engagement, we handle both strategy and implementation. In a consulting engagement, we provide the strategy, the audit, and the direction — your team handles implementation. It is the right fit when you have execution capacity but need expert input on what to do and in what order. |
| How long does a consulting engagement take? | A scoped consulting engagement typically takes 3-7 business days for the analysis, plus a delivery call. The scope call happens first and defines the timeline. Some engagements — particularly where we are reviewing existing SEO work — can be completed faster. |
| Can consulting lead to an ongoing engagement? | Yes, and it often does. Many clients start with a consulting engagement to understand what their store needs, then move into an ongoing SEO engagement once they have a clear picture of the scope and the opportunity. |
| Do you work with clients who have an existing in-house SEO person? | Yes. In this case, the consulting engagement typically focuses on areas outside their expertise — often technical SEO or platform-specific issues — or provides a second opinion on strategy and priorities. |
| What if my team cannot implement the recommendations? | We can scope a full implementation engagement instead. Most of our services — technical SEO, on-page optimisation, link building — are available as standalone or ongoing engagements. Consulting is one entry point; implementation is another. |
Work With MarTraff
| If you are not sure what your store needs — a consulting engagement is the right first step. Tell us about your store and your situation. We will tell you honestly whether consulting is the right fit or whether a different engagement makes more sense. Book an SEO Consultation → Scope call is free. No obligation. |