I’ve lost count of the businesses that hire an SEO expert, pay good money, and then make it impossible for us to actually do the job.

Hi, I'm Nikki Pilkington. My site is https://nikki-pilkington.com/ and in this episode of SEO F**king What, I’m calling out the ridiculousness I sometimes see when a business hires an SEO. Not you. You wouldn't do any of this, I'm sure. But we'll explore some of the absolute sh*ttery that can go down when one of us SEO experts gets hired by someone who doesn't understand what our role in their business actually is!

If you want fluffy LinkedIn advice, this isn’t the show for you.

But if you’re ready to stop sabotaging your own results and work with an SEO like a grown-up, hit play.

This one might sting a bit — but it’ll make you money, which is all I f**king care about.

Timestamped summary

00:00 Freelancing Isn't Remote Employment

04:26 Clients Restricting Access Harms Results

09:00 Empower Your SEO Expert

10:45 Respect Freelancers for Better Results

This episode is all about helping you ensure your SEO is equipped to do their job properly.

But you'll have even better results from your SEO by having me in your corner, and I offer supervision and set up of these kinds of arrangements as a service - https://nikki-pilkington.com/seo-training-and-development-uk/

Want to check out more episodes? https://seofuckingwhatpodcast.co.uk/

You've hired an SEO expert, you've paid them good money, and

then you spend all your time either breathing down their neck like a

paranoid boss or telling them to stay in their lane.

Either way, you're sabotaging your own results. Let's do

this.

This is SEO fucking one. I'm Nicky. I've been in SEO

for over 30 years before it was even called SEO.

I help people like you make money from your website

by actually getting found in search. And today, we're

tackling something that's been coming up more and more. The two

ways businesses completely fuck up working with SEO

freelancers and consultants.

You either micromanagers, like we're your newest graduate hire

who can't be trusted to make a cup of tea, or you go the opposite

direction and refuse to let us anywhere near the information we

need to do the job properly. Both approaches are costing you

money. And honestly, both are driving good SEO people

away from working with you. Let me tell you about

a client I parted ways with recently.

Every time I asked for conversion data, you know, the stuff that

tells me whether the traffic I'm bringing in is actually doing anything good,

I got told to stay in my lane. Every time I suggested moving

a call to action button because it was buried at the bottom of the page

like a shameful secret, I got the same response.

That's not SEO. Stick to what you know. We've got it under

control. Thanks. We'll let you know if our internal experts need your help.

I get it. You've got departments, you've got territories.

Everyone's got their little kingdom that they're protecting. But this

is what people don't seem to understand. SEO doesn't

exist in a vacuum. It never has. And it

really, really definitely doesn't these days.

Hiring an SEO expert but not letting them look at the bigger picture

is like hiring a plumber to fix your leaky tap. But telling

them they're not allowed to check your water pressure. They might get the tap working,

but you're still going to have problems. And we all know who you're going to

blame when your ceiling falls down. So let's talk about the

two main ways that businesses fuck this up.

First of all, the micromanagement problem.

Treating freelancers like employees, and not even good

employees, more like employees you don't trust to wipe their own

asses. I've had clients who wanted daily check

ins daily for SEO work. What am I going to

tell you every single day? Yep, we're still waiting for

Google to index that page. Same as yesterday and

the day before. See you tomorrow for the exact same

update. And then there's the obsession with making freelancers use

your internal systems. And look, I've been doing this for three decades.

I've got processes that work across multiple clients. I've

refined these systems over years of trial and error. But sure,

let me abandon all of that to learn your bespoke project management

tool that someone's nephew built in 2019 and hasn't

been updated since. And don't get me started on the meetings.

Oh, God, the meetings. Can you join our weekly team?

Catch up? No, No, I cannot, because I

have other clients and I'm not sitting through 45 minutes of Barry

from accounts talking about the new coffee machine when I could be actually

doing the work you're paying me for. Because what businesses don't seem to

grasp is that when you hire a freelancer, you're not hiring

a remote employee. You're engaging an independent

business. Someone who brings expertise from working with

multiple clients across different industries. Someone who's

seen what works and what doesn't across dozens of different

situations. You chose a freelancer

specifically to avoid the management hassle. You

wanted results without the overheads of employment. So why are you

now trying to manage me like I'm fresh out of university and need

handholding through every decision? You're paying for my expertise.

Let me fucking use it. And then there's the

stay in your lane problem. That's the opposite end of the spectrum.

The clients who don't micromanage your process as such,

but do restrict your access to everything you need to deliver results.

When I ask for mobile versus desktop conversion data,

it's not because I'm bored and fancy a bit of one on one spreadsheet action

is because I can see your mobile traffic is bouncing and I suspect

your conversion rates are shite too. That information directly

affects my SEO recommendations. When I suggest changing

your call to action button test from Submit Inquiry,

which sounds like you're filing a complaint with the Council, to some things

that might actually encourage people to click it, that's not

me overstepping, that's me trying to make sure the traffic I bring you does

something useful. And when I ask for heatmap data to see

where people are giving up and leaving your pages, I'm not trying to steal

your UX team's job. I'm trying to understand user

behavior so I can optimize for it. Google's been clear about this

for years. User experience signals matter. If people

land on your site from A search result immediately think sod this

and go back to Google. That tells Google your page wasn't a good answer

to their query. Your rankings will suffer. So when you tell me to

stay in my lane and tell me to only worry about keywords and

rankings, you're asking me to do half a job.

And then you wonder why you're not getting the results you expected.

And there's a real cost of getting this wrong, because let's say your

SEO work successfully doubles your organic traffic

over six months. Brilliant. Except if your conversion rate

is rubbish, because nobody's looking at the user experience.

You've just doubled the number of people who visit your site and fuck right

off without buying anything or booking a call. Or maybe your

conversion rate is fantastic, but your mobile experience is so poor

that Google starts ranking you lower. And all that beautifully

converting traffic disappears. And nobody can figure out why,

because this is what happens when teams work in isolation

or when freelancers aren't given access to the full picture.

You optimize for one metric while accidentally sabotaging

another. You fix one problem, but you create three

more. And I've watched businesses spend thousands on

SEO to drive more traffic, then watch their inquiry numbers

stay flat because nobody thought to check if their contact forms worked on

a mobile. I've seen companies with brilliant

products lose rankings because their developers

optimized the site in ways that confuse search engines.

And nobody thought to involve the SEO person in that decision.

It's maddening and it's completely avoidable.

Okay, so here's the fix you've been waiting for.

So here's the fix you've been waiting for. How do you actually

work with an SEO expert, freelancer or otherwise, in

a way that gets you results. So first of all,

brief, properly up front. Spend time on

detailed project briefs or onboarding calls. Explain your

objectives, your expectations, your deadlines, and how you'll measure

success. Share relevant background about your business, your customers,

your competitors. Freelancers can't read your mind about your company

history or your own state of preferences. Secondly,

establish clear communication from the start. Agree on the

methods and frequency upfront. Some freelancers prefer

email, others use project tools. Some provide weekly

updates, some monthly. Others provide milestone check ins.

Figure out what works for both of you before the project

starts, not halfway through, when everybody's already pissed off.

Set response time expectations both ways. If you need

24 hour responses, discuss that during the talks.

And remember, it goes both ways. If you take two weeks to

approve something, don't expect the freelancer to magically absorb that

Delay. And for the love of all that is holy,

clarify what urgent actually means. If everything's

urgent, nothing is. Define what constitutes a real

emergency versus a standard turnaround time.

Thirdly, give your freelancer access to what they need. Your

SEO expert needs to see conversion data, user

behavior, insights, analytics. They need to understand what's

happening after people land on your site. If you're hiding this

information because it belongs to a different department, you're capping their

ability to deliver results. Let them talk to your developers when

technical changes are needed. Let them see your sales data so they

understand what makes customers buy. Stop treating information

like it's classified government secrets. You're not that important.

And fourthly, respect their expertise. You hired

your SEO because they know things you don't. So when they make

recommendations, don't demand that they justify every single one

with a detailed explanation of basic SEO principles

backed up by exact percentages or data of how much

traffic you'll get. If you want to understand their approach, ask

questions, but let them apply their professional judgment. And

if you disagree with a recommendation, have a conversation about it.

Don't just override them and then blame them when results don't

materialize. And fifthly, trust their

processors. Most good freelancers have systems refined

across multiple clients. These ensure consistent

quality and timely delivery. If you need specific tools or

methods, discuss that during hiring, not mid project, when

they've already set everything up. Don't micromanage their schedule or

ask for timesheets as long as deadlines are met. How they structure their

work time shouldn't be your concern. They might do their best work at

6 o' clock in the morning or still be squirreling away at midnight. It

doesn't matter as long as the work gets done. Freelancing isn't 9

to 5. Sixth and last plan for

success Book your freelancers in advance. Good

ones are scheduled weeks ahead. Plan for potential delays

on your end and factor those into project timelines.

Provide all the necessary resources up front. Passwords,

assets, access to systems, whatever they need to get started.

Nothing wastes time more than a freelancer sitting around

waiting for you to send them the login details you promised three days

ago. The choice here is pretty simple. You can respect your

SEO expert as an independent professional and get excellent results.

Or you can try to manage them like a junior employee while

simultaneously refusing to give them the information they need and

frustrate everyone involved. And good freelancers won't tolerate

either extreme for long. They'll find clients who understand

the value of expertise and independence, and you'll be back on

the market looking for another SEO person wondering why you keep

having the same problems. Your SEO expert isn't trying

to take over your business when they ask for conversion data or suggest

UX improvements. They're trying to make sure the traffic they bring

you actually makes you money. That's the whole point.

If this episode resonated with you, or if you want to share it with

a client who needs to hear it, make sure you're following SEO.

Fucking what? In whatever app you're using so you don't miss the next

episode. And if you've got a horror story about micromanagement

or being told to stay in your lane, drop me a message on

LinkedIn or by email. I'd love to hear it. I might even

put the best ones together for a future episode. Until next

time. Get found, make money. Been on

wanky.