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Free check · 7 items · 5 minutes

Are you choosing between options, or running a supplier bake-off?

Hire, buy, build. If two of those three columns are empty, the decision was made before the shortlist existed. This check prices the comparison and tells you what to put in the contract.

7 items Three columns priced Corpus of 29 postings No email

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The Managed SEO Procurement Check

Answer before the shortlist, not after. Item 1 is the one that decides whether this is a decision or a bake-off.

Item 1

Have you written a number against all three columns — hire, buy, build — before shortlisting anybody?

Two empty cells means you are comparing suppliers, not options.

Item 2

Have you counted how many distinct specialisms your problem actually needs?

Count them in the box below, then read that against what employers ask one person to carry.

Item 3

Can every supplier name the data source behind their AI numbers, in writing?

In writing, in the contract, not in the pitch deck.

Item 4

Does the reporting break down per engine, with a stated sample size and date?

A single blended AI visibility number can hide a spread of tens of points.

Item 5

Are server logs in scope, and is it written down who parses them?

Client-side analytics record zero AI agent fetches. If logs are out of scope, that traffic is unmeasured by anyone.

Item 6

Is the first substantive review scheduled at 45 days, not 30 — with written agreement that a click decline alongside a citation rise is acceptable?

The second half of that sentence is the one that gets negotiated away.

Item 7

At termination, is it written down who holds the log pipeline, the prompt panel and the citation history?

If the apparatus leaves with the supplier, you were renting the measurement.

Your three columns (optional)

Leave a column blank if you have not priced it — the check will say so, because an unpriced column is the finding.

Your result
Read the method
What you are being scored against

Our own numbers, from a 29-posting corpus and our own panel

What one lead search hire is asked to carry, read from public job requirements, alongside the measurement facts that decide whether you will be able to audit whatever you buy.

MeasuredWhat it is
median 8, range 4–12Specialisms demanded of one lead search hire17 of the 29 postings demand 8 or more. 10 of those 17 name no team at all. · Indexable job-req corpus, n = 29 public postings, June–August 2026
$176K–$221KMedian advertised band for the equivalent internal hire16 of the 29 postings disclosed a band. Public postings only, mixed geographies and seniorities: it shows what employers ask for, not what the market pays. No employer is ever named. · Indexable job-req corpus, n = 29 public postings, June–August 2026
57.4 pointsHighest-to-lowest engine share of voice, same day58.57% on Copilot against 1.17% on Gemini for one brand on one day. Claude was excluded as a 1.0/0.0 small-response artefact, and the exclusion stated. · Indexable, 7 September 2026, 106 custom prompts, US, 6 engines
zeroAI agent fetches recorded by client-side analyticsAgent requests do not execute your JavaScript. They exist in server logs or they exist nowhere. · Osmani, 2026
14 of 17Top-10 pages with zero AI citationsOur own estate: 17 pages ranked in Google's top 10 (average position 10 or better), and 3 of them were cited by an AI engine. · Indexable, 7 September 2026, n = 223 pages

The corpus is self-selected: public postings only, mixed geographies and seniorities. It shows what employers ask for, not what the market pays, and pay against scope in it is not a benchmark. No employer is ever named.

Fix the measurement gaps before signature, not at renewal

Every item on this list except the first is a sentence in a contract. They cost nothing to add before signing and are close to impossible to add afterwards.

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