How to Vet an SEO Consultant (And When to Outsource the Busywork)

[Mary Petterd]

Hey TGF community,

I see a lot of people in the Money Making and Affiliate Marketing sections looking to hire SEO consultants to scale their sites. Finding the right fit is tough, there are a lot of "gurus" out there who just run a basic audit tool and charge a fortune.

When you're looking for an SEO consultant for hire, you really want to look for three things:

1. Data-driven case studies (not just screenshots of traffic spikes, but actual conversion numbers).

2. A clear strategy for technical SEO vs. just on-page content.

3. Transparency in how they build links.

One major bottleneck I’ve run into when hiring high-level consultants is that their hourly rates are too high to have them doing basic tasks like keyword tracking sheets, fixing broken meta descriptions, or basic formatting.

To maximize your budget, it's often better to have the consultant handle the high-level strategy, and then hire a dedicated virtual SEO assistant from a team like Invedus to handle the heavy lifting and daily execution. It keeps your costs down while keeping your strategy sharp.

For those of you running affiliate or crypto blogs here, what’s your biggest struggle when hiring SEO help? Do you prefer independent freelancers or agencies?