Let’s start with the cost. Most agencies charge somewhere between $1,000 and $5,000 a month, with some of the big players charging much more.
Clients are told these fees cover the cost of advanced SEO tools, expert staff, and “strategies” that include everything from site audits to keyword analysis.
But once they’re locked in, many clients start to feel that the price tag just doesn’t add up. It’s not that the agencies aren’t doing anything – they’re just doing way less than you’d expect for the price.
1. Retainers: Big Bucks, Small Effort
When an agency takes on a new client, there’s typically an initial flurry of activity. They’ll do an audit, spruce up the website’s metadata, run some keyword analysis, and maybe even add a new blog post. But once that’s done, the pace slows down fast.
They’ll run their automated tools, slap together a basic report, and consider the month’s work complete. So what are you really paying for? A whole lot of “monitoring” and not much actual optimisation.
2. Those Pretty Monthly Reports
Every month, the agency sends a report full of colorful charts and graphs that supposedly show progress. But here’s the thing: these charts don’t actually do anything for your rankings.
They’re just a distraction – a way to make it look like there’s action happening behind the scenes when, in reality, it’s all just data points and summaries.
Without significant, strategic changes, those reports are more for show than actual results. If there aren’t big improvements to show, a bunch of charts and graphs won’t change that fact.
3. The Automation Illusion
A lot of the work you’re paying for in that retainer? It’s automated. Agencies use tools to run routine site audits and spit out a list of “critical issues,” but these lists are often the same month after month.
Sure, some automated tasks are helpful for spotting small issues or getting a quick ranking snapshot, but they’re hardly worth thousands of dollars a month. The irony is, most of these tools are accessible to clients directly – and for a fraction of the cost of a retainer. So what is the agency actually doing with all that time?
4. The Myth of the “Custom Strategy”
When you sign up for a monthly SEO retainer, you’re promised a custom strategy designed to push your site up the rankings. But once the initial audit is done, many agencies quickly go into “maintenance mode.”
They keep the basics going, maybe adjusting a keyword here or there, but there’s often very little strategic work happening on an ongoing basis.
The strategy that was presented at the start might not actually evolve much month over month, leaving clients to wonder if there’s any fresh thinking happening behind the scenes at all.
5. Where Are the Links?
One of the biggest factors for SEO success is link building. Strong, relevant backlinks are a tried-and-true way to boost site authority and search rankings.
But link building is also time-consuming and resource-intensive – and it doesn’t fit neatly into the “set it and forget it” model many agencies prefer.
Instead of ongoing link-building efforts, some agencies either ignore it entirely or resort to cheap, low-quality links that might actually hurt your SEO more than help it.
Not to mention, many SEO agencies charge exorbitant fees for a single link placement. I’ve personally seen agencies charging clients as much as $350 for a single backlink on certain blogs.
But here’s the kicker: that exact same link placement on the same blog can often be bought from a freelancer on Facebook for just $10.
The huge markup goes straight into the agency’s pocket, while clients end up paying premium prices for something that could easily be sourced for a fraction of the cost.
The retainer model has now devolved into a joke
The SEO retainer model has devolved into what many in the industry now see as a joke – a setup that’s less about genuine client success and more about squeezing out commissions through middlemen and resellers.
These days, SEO retainers seem less focused on actually improving clients’ websites and more on feeding a pipeline of freelancers and agencies all looking to cash in by pushing businesses into bloated, long-term contracts.
The game has shifted: instead of building meaningful relationships with clients, many agencies are investing in reseller programs that incentivise freelancers to bring in new business, regardless of whether those clients truly benefit.
1. SEO Reseller Programs: Where’s the Focus on the Client?
What’s the point of an SEO retainer? Ideally, it’s to provide the client with ongoing support, consistent growth, and adaptable strategies tailored to their website’s needs. But in today’s market, that original mission has been hijacked by reseller programs.
Agencies now offer lucrative commission structures to freelancers or smaller “white label” SEO firms to sell their retainer packages.
This way, freelancers take on the role of sales agents, incentivized to find new clients for the agency rather than focusing on the actual success or satisfaction of those clients. So, instead of being client-centered, these retainers have become little more than a lead-generation game.
2. Freelancers as Middlemen: SEO Retainers as a Commodity
Once an agency signs on a reseller or white-label partner, the focus is squarely on volume. These resellers act like middlemen, looking for clients they can steer towards an agency’s retainer plan, not because they’re passionate about the client’s business but because they’re chasing a commission.
The agency pays these freelancers a flat fee or a percentage of the retainer for every client they bring in.
So, SEO services – which are supposed to be nuanced, personalised, and based on a deep understanding of each client’s website – have become a one-size-fits-all commodity, churned out assembly-line style, all in the name of profit.
3. The Client Experience: An Afterthought in the Reseller Model
Clients are lured into these retainers with lofty promises made by resellers who, let’s be honest, may not fully understand the intricacies of SEO themselves.
Their role is simply to get the client to sign the dotted line, after which the agency takes over. But once the client is handed off, they’re often left with a one-size-fits-all approach that has little flexibility and even less transparency.
The client thinks they’re getting a custom SEO experience, but in reality, they’re being plugged into a pre-existing template, designed more to meet the agency’s internal efficiencies than to address the client’s actual needs.
4. Agencies Prioritising Sales Over Service
The focus on reseller-driven retainers has shifted agencies’ priorities. Instead of investing resources into hiring or training SEO experts, refining their strategies, or developing new tools to genuinely help clients rank, agencies now pour money into sales and lead acquisition.
They create branded white-label services, promotional materials, and support systems for freelancers – all to make it easier for resellers to sell retainer packages.
As a result, the actual SEO work becomes a secondary concern, outsourced or simplified, to allow more energy to go into recruiting yet more resellers.
5. The Sad Reality: Retainers No Longer Serve the Client
At this point, SEO retainers are so entangled with reseller programs that clients are often left wondering what, if anything, they’re actually paying for.
In many cases, these clients might receive sporadic updates and superficial changes while being charged top dollar. Meanwhile, they may never hear from the original “freelancer” who sold them on the service in the first place.
The sad truth is, SEO retainers have shifted from a tool designed to help websites thrive to a profit machine for agencies and resellers – one that capitalises on long-term contracts and cookie-cutter strategies to drive revenue instead of results.
6. The Reality No One Wants Talks About
Here’s the reality no one wants to talk about: Website optimisation, for most sites,are actually pretty simple and don’t require endless hours of painstaking effort.
SEO is often dressed up to sound like rocket science by people who stand to profit from keeping it mysterious, but the truth? Most SEO fundamentals are straightforward, easy to implement, and don’t take nearly as much time as agencies would like you to believe.
Let’s break it down: at its core, SEO is about a few key tasks. You find the right keywords, use them naturally in your content, make sure your website loads quickly, and optimize your titles, headers, and meta descriptions.
Now, sprinkle in a handful of quality backlinks, make sure your site is mobile-friendly, and boom – you’re already ahead of the game!
These are not complicated tasks. With the right tools and resources, a single person can do all of this in a few hours for most small-to-medium-sized websites.
But agencies will have you believe you need months of “strategic planning,” endless “site audits,” and constant adjustments, all of which conveniently justify their high monthly retainers.
The SEO industry thrives on making things sound complicated so they can keep charging for them.
In reality, unless you’re dealing with an enterprise-level site, many SEO tasks are set-it-and-forget-it. Once you’ve optimized your on-page elements, built some quality links, and ensured a good user experience, you’re largely done.
You don’t need an entire team working every day, month after month, to keep rankings up – yet that’s what so many agencies claim. It’s an illusion designed to make easy tasks look labor-intensive.
And then there’s the myth of “constant content updates” and “daily optimization.” Sure, fresh content is good, but you don’t need to publish new material every day to stay relevant.
You can refresh old content with a few updates and be just fine. But instead, agencies turn it into this never-ending cycle of tweaks, adjustments, and “data analysis” to make it seem like they’re constantly working their magic.
In the end, most SEO isn’t difficult – it’s deliberately overcomplicated by people who benefit from keeping it that way.
Simple, focused efforts can drive real results, but that doesn’t support the industry’s habit of locking clients into big monthly retainers for tasks that could be done with a bit of initial setup and occasional maintenance.
Are Retainers Really Worth It?
Businesses sign up for SEO retainers hoping for measurable, steady progress. They imagine a team of experts working behind the scenes every month to drive traffic and improve visibility.
But all too often, they end up with a passive service that barely moves the needle. Instead of getting hands-on, in-depth optimisation, they get routine, automated audits, and pretty charts that don’t actually drive results.
At the end of the day, if an SEO agency isn’t delivering real, ongoing improvements in your traffic, rankings, or conversions, then that retainer is little more than a costly line item.
For many businesses, a more focused, project-based approach or a short-term contract would be far more effective than a bloated retainer.
If you’re paying for “ongoing optimisation” but aren’t seeing substantial results, it’s time to ask tough questions – and, if needed, to find a better approach.
