How to Choose a SaaS SEO Agency

Choosing an SEO agency for a SaaS business is not the same as hiring an SEO agency for your growing e-commerce business or your local estate agents. It requires a specialist set of skills based on experience and repetition.

Many SaaS companies have long sales cycles, complex products, multiple buyer personas, and growth goals that go far beyond traffic. Yet many still hire agencies that optimise for rankings and blog output, then wonder why SEO never impacts pipeline or revenue.

In this guide we break down how to choose a SaaS SEO agency, using clear, practical criteria so you can avoid wasted budget and build a channel that actually compounds. You can of course browse our vetted list of B2B SaaS agencies.

If you want a quick call checklist you can download The SaaS SEO Agency Call Checklist.

Why SaaS SEO is Different

SEO for SaaS isn’t about chasing volume keywords or publishing endless blog posts. The true success of SEO for a SaaS company is whether or not the strategy improves inbound lead generation and generates new business. 

SaaS SEO needs to support:

• Non-branded demand capture
• Education-led buying journeys
• Product-led or sales-led motions
• Category creation and positioning
• Multiple ICPs and use cases

A generic SEO agency may increase traffic. A SaaS SEO agency should increase qualified demand.

Step 1: Be Clear on Your Own Goals First

Before you speak to any agencies, get clear internally.

Ask yourself:

• Are we optimising for pipeline, sign-ups, demos, or revenue?
• Are we early-stage, scaling, or enterprise?
• Do we have the ability to ship content and technical changes consistently?

SEO works best when it’s aligned with business reality. If an agency doesn’t ask these questions early, that’s your first red flag.

The Core Criteria for Choosing a SaaS SEO Agency

1. Proven SaaS Experience (Not Just “SEO Experience”)

Many agencies claim to have SaaS experience but few understand SaaS deeply and/or have experience of working in-house at scaling SaaS companies. Also be wary of an agency that works across SaaS and other verticals.

What to look for:

• Experience with B2B SaaS specifically, not just eCommerce or local SEO
• Understanding of buying committees, not just single users
• Examples that show why something worked, not just charts going up

Red flag: Case studies that focus only on traffic growth without any commercial context.

2. Their ability to tie SEO to Revenue

Rankings and traffic are inputs. Revenue is the output. We’re not saying you shouldn’t care about rankings, rankings are the first leading indicators of success and naturally higher rankings should lead to more revenue - the challenge is what you are ranking for.

A good SaaS SEO agency should:

• Map keywords to funnel stages - not just broad terms
• Prioritise opportunities based on business impact and relevance
• Understand how SEO supports sales, product, and lifecycle marketing

3. Strong understanding of SaaS lead generation

Most SaaS businesses (as you know) have CTAs such as Sign Up or Book a Demo etc. There are also lots of opportunities to provide buyers with useful templates and resources to help them on their journey - a good SaaS SEO agency will be able to help you create these lead magnets as part of your SEO and Inbound marketing strategy.

Common SaaS lead generation

• JavaScript frameworks (React, Next.js)
• Headless CMS setups
• App subdomains and documentation sites
• Large numbers of auto-generated pages

A SaaS SEO agency should be comfortable:

• Working with developers
• Writing clear technical requirements
• Prioritising fixes based on impact, not theory

Red flag:
An agency that sends long technical audits without explaining what actually matters.

4. A Clear, Repeatable Content Strategy

“Publishing two blogs a week” is not a strategy. Content is the fuel of an Inbound Engine and at the end of the day content is what improves SEO the most. The real skill comes in deciding a) what content to produce and b) how you produce and publish it.

Strong SaaS SEO content focuses on:

• Topic clustering and search intent
• Pillar pages and supporting content
• Product, use-case, and comparison pages
• Content that supports sales conversations

You should be able to understand:

• Why each piece of content is being produced
• How it fits into a wider system
• How it compounds over time
• How it is being produced (which AI tools)

5. Understanding of Product Marketing and Positioning

SEO doesn’t exist in isolation. Especially with the rise of AI and AEO your market messaging and positioning are very important. In fact SEO cannot fix poor positioning and this is something y

The best SaaS SEO agencies understand:

• Positioning and differentiation
• Messaging consistency across pages
• How to support category narratives

This is especially important for:

• Alternatives pages
• Competitor comparisons
• Category and solution pages

If an agency can’t talk confidently about your product and market, they won’t create content that converts.

6. A Clear Process and Way of Working

This might seem obvious but if an agency doesn’t display a clear way of working or process it can be a sign they are not very organised and they don’t have a repeatable process or framework in place - this can mean they haven’t done it enough, or they are just poorly organised.

What to Look for:

• A structured discovery phase
• A prioritised roadmap (not a wish list)
• Clear ownership and accountability
• Reporting that focuses on insight, not dashboards

Good SEO feels calm, methodical, and deliberate.

Questions to Ask Your SEO Agency Before You Hire

Asking the right questions can reveal a lot about an agency. Here are some of the questions we would recommend asking if we were in your shoes.

Use these questions to cut through the noise:

• How do you prioritise SEO work in the first 90 days? Look for a clear approach to discovery, prioritisation, and sequencing, not a generic checklist or pre-packaged plan - every discovery should really be bespoke.
• How do you use AI in your SEO strategies? Strong agencies use AI to support research and efficiency, not to replace strategy or flood your site with low-quality content.
• How do you work with our internal experts on content? The best SaaS content combines SEO expertise with product, sales, and customer insight, not outsourced writing alone.
• What is your approach to link building and citations? You want relevance, credibility, and transparency, not guaranteed links or one-size-fits-all link packages.
• How do you measure success and adapt when something isn’t working? Good agencies tie SEO to business outcomes and are comfortable changing direction based on results.

The quality of the answers matters more than the polish of them.

You can also use our SEO agency call checklist to help you run through questions on the calls.

Common Mistakes SaaS Companies Make When Hiring an SEO Partner

Yep, unfortunately mistakes are made when it comes to hiring. To be completely honest it is not always the agency's fault when a partnership doesn’t work out. As a business you should be aware of the following common errors:

• Hiring based on brand or awards (these are usually pay-to-play)
• Optimising for traffic instead of demand
• Focusing too much on web traffic rather than conversions
• Treating SEO as separate to your website design / strategy
• Expecting short-term results from a long-term channel

When You Might Not Need a SaaS SEO Agency

You know what, SEO isn’t always the right move for every company. Sometimes you're in a space where it just doesn't make as much sense as other channels. There are a few common scenarios where SEO agency isn’t going to help your much:

You may want to pause if:

• You don’t have a product–market fit - SEO won’t work without it (sorry!)
• Positioning is unclear - Without good positioning it’s difficult to weave your angle in
• You can’t ship content or website changes consistently

In these cases, you made some help with strategy and value proposition - the foundations - rather than jumping into SEO.

A Simple Checklist

To recap, here is a short and simple checklist you can use to 

Before you sign:

• Do they deeply understand SaaS?
• Can they explain how SEO drives revenue?
• Are they strong technically and strategically?
• Is their process clear and realistic?
• Do you trust how they think?

If the answer isn’t “yes” across the board, keep looking, or check out our list of the top SEO agencies for B2B SaaS companies.

Final Thoughts

The best SaaS SEO agencies don’t feel like vendors.

They think like:

• Product marketers
• Growth strategists
• Engineers building a system that compounds

Choose a partner who understands your business  not just your keywords - good luck.