Independent SEO Consulting

Sometimes you need the expertise, not the agency around it

This is direct senior SEO consulting for teams who can execute but need someone who has seen the problem before. No account manager, no onboarding deck, no minimum retainer dressed up as a partnership. You get judgement, a roadmap, and someone to argue with when you’re about to do something expensive.

Replies within one business day. Consulting is capped by availability, so we’ll say if we’re full.

“We have a team, we just need direction.”

That’s exactly what this is. You execute, we decide what’s worth executing. See the plans

“We got contradictory advice from two agencies.”

A single paid opinion with reasoning attached is cheaper than picking wrong. Book a roadmap call

“We’re about to spend heavily on a migration.”

One review before a replatform costs less than recovering from a bad one. See how it runs

“We want someone to do the work, not advise.”

Then you want the managed services instead, and we’ll point you there. Read who this isn’t for

Track record

18
Years building for the web
850+
Clients served
90+
Notable brands
2,000+
Projects delivered
104%
Year-over-year growth

These figures cover every Gatilab service, not this one alone. We’d rather say that plainly than imply a per-service record we haven’t published.

Brands we’ve delivered work for

  • IBM
  • Adobe
  • HubSpot
  • Canva
  • Monday.com
  • IATA
  • FreshBooks
  • Acer
  • Asus
Three ways in

Buy judgement by the call, the month, or the sprint

Consulting is capacity-limited, because it’s the same person every time rather than whoever is free. If we’re full, we’ll tell you rather than hand you to someone junior.

Start here

You need one good answer, quickly

For a specific decision: a migration, a penalty, a replatform, or a strategy you want challenged.

$450 one-time

90-minute call · written follow-up

  • Pre-call review of your site and analytics
  • 90-minute working call, recorded for your team
  • Written roadmap with prioritised actions
  • Named risks and what to avoid doing
  • Two weeks of follow-up questions by email
Book a call

If we can’t add anything useful, we’ll say so on the call and refund it.

Embedded

You want senior SEO inside the team for a while

For a defined project, a replatform, an expansion, or covering a gap while you hire.

$3,800 per month

Typically 3 to 6 months

  • Regular presence in your standups and planning
  • Hands-on specification and review work
  • Direct work with your developers and writers
  • Hiring support if you’re recruiting for the role
  • Documented handover when the engagement ends
Discuss embedding

The goal is making us unnecessary. We’ll say when that point arrives.

How it runs

How a consulting engagement actually works

Consulting fails when it produces advice nobody can act on, so every stage ends in something your team can pick up.

  1. 01

    Read before talking

    Before the call

    We go through your analytics, Search Console, and site before any call, so the time gets spent on judgement rather than on you explaining your setup out loud.

    You leave with: A call that starts at the actual problem, not at introductions.

  2. 02

    Argue it out

    The call

    The useful part is disagreement. We’ll challenge assumptions, name what we think is a waste of money, and say when we’re uncertain rather than performing confidence.

    You leave with: A recorded call your team can rewatch and quote.

  3. 03

    Write it down

    Within 3 days

    A prioritised roadmap, in writing, with reasoning attached to each item so your team can defend it internally without you being in the room.

    You leave with: A written roadmap, prioritised, with the reasoning included.

  4. 04

    Stay reachable

    Ongoing

    Advice that arrives once and then goes quiet is worth little, because execution raises questions the roadmap didn’t anticipate. Follow-up access is part of every tier.

    You leave with: A route back to the same person, not a ticket queue.

Honest fit

Worth booking, or worth looking elsewhere

This service is deliberately narrow. Two of these are reasons we redirect people elsewhere.

Worth booking

  • You have people who can execute, or budget to hire them.
  • You want your assumptions challenged, not validated.
  • You can share analytics and Search Console access.
  • You’d rather have one senior opinion than a team of juniors.
  • You want to end the engagement when it stops paying.

Look elsewhere

  • You want the work done, not advised on. Buy the managed SEO services instead. Consulting a team that doesn’t exist produces a roadmap nobody executes.
  • Your budget is under $450. That’s the single-call floor. Read the blog, which is free and reasonably good, and come back when the decision is bigger.
  • You want someone to sign off on a plan you’ve already committed to. If we agree we’ll say so, but you’re paying for an honest opinion and sometimes that’s an expensive no.
  • You need a guaranteed ranking outcome. Consulting improves your decisions, and decisions are not guarantees.
  • You need us available daily. Consulting is capacity-limited by design, and pretending otherwise would degrade it for everyone.
Before you ask

The questions that decide it

Something not covered? Ask directly and you’ll get a straight answer, not a calendar link.

Why is this called freelance if Gatilab is an agency?

Fair question, and the honest answer is that it’s the term people search for. What’s actually on offer is direct access to senior consulting without the agency wrapper: no account manager, no onboarding deck, no minimum retainer. If you’d rather the full managed service with a team behind it, that’s the other services on this site.

What happens if you tell us to do nothing?

You’ll have paid $450 to avoid a much more expensive mistake, which is a good trade. It happens. Some sites are already doing the right things and their problem is patience, not strategy. We’d rather say that than invent work to justify a retainer.

Can you talk to our developers directly?

Yes, and it’s usually where consulting earns its money. Translating SEO requirements into terms a developer can actually implement is a specific skill, and a lot of SEO advice dies because nobody did that translation. The embedded tier exists for engagements where this is most of the work.

Do you sign NDAs?

Yes, routinely. Send yours. We also won’t take on a direct competitor of an existing consulting client in the same market without telling you first, because the value of an outside opinion drops if it’s shared.

Is the monthly plan a real no-minimum, or is there a catch?

A real one. Stop any month. The reason we can offer it is that consulting has almost no setup cost, unlike managed services where the first month is largely onboarding. If a month produces nothing useful, we’d rather you leave than resent the invoice.

How is this different from a free discovery call?

A discovery call is a sales conversation where the incentive is to find you a problem worth a retainer. This is paid, so the incentive is to be useful in ninety minutes and be told you were worth the money. Those produce different conversations.

Next step

Tell us what decision you’re stuck on

Describe the actual problem, whether that’s a migration, a traffic drop, or two agencies telling you opposite things. If a ninety-minute call can’t move it, we’ll say so before taking your money.

Replies within one business day. Consulting slots are limited and we’ll say if we’re full.