How to Fire an SEO Agency Without Losing Rankings

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How to Fire an SEO Agency Without Losing Rankings.
Table of Contents

In short: Before you give notice, get owner access to every account, record your current rankings and traffic, then hand over in a set order without deleting pages or changing URLs.

Key takeaways

  • Proper SEO results start from around month 3, so judge the agency by the work it shows, not one month of traffic.
  • Make sure your domain and hosting are in your business's name before you give notice.
  • Export your rankings, traffic and list of published pages while access is still easy.
  • Deleting pages or changing URLs in a hurry is what usually costs rankings after an agency leaves.
  • Choose a next agency that tells you what you own, reports monthly and lets you approve changes.

You’re paying every month, you can’t see what the money buys, and you want out. What stops most owners is the worry that leaving will undo the work, or that the site will slide down Google the week after.

Your rankings come from pages on your own site and from accounts that should be in your name. Take control of those first, and leaving becomes a careful piece of admin, not a gamble.

I run an SEO agency, and I’d give you these same steps for leaving mine. I’ve also tested 15 Kenyan SEO agencies and spoken to their past clients, so I know what a fair handover looks like.

By the end, you’ll know whether to leave now and the order to do it in.

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Step 1: Check that the agency is the problem

Three questions to answer first

Say you run a furniture shop in Nairobi and you’ve paid an agency for eight months. Before you give notice, answer three questions:

  • Do you get reports you can understand?
  • Do you know what was done each month?
  • Can you see the work on your site, such as new articles or changed page titles?

What you should see is a yes to all three, even when the results are still small. For the furniture shop, that means monthly reports in plain words, a list of pages written or fixed, and those pages live on the site.

Is it a slow start or no work at all?

Many owners judge their agency by last month’s traffic. That’s understandable, because traffic is the number you can see.

But proper SEO results start from around month 3, so one quiet month tells you little. You may see movement before that.

If you’re in month 1 or 2 and the agency can show you the work, you’re probably early, not badly served. Eight months with no reports, no list of work and nothing new on the site is a different story.

Ask the agency in writing for a list of what it has done. Its answer tells you more than any traffic graph.

Goes wrong most often: owners leave over one bad month, or stay a year with no evidence of work. Judge by the work shown and the trend over several months.

Step 2: Find out what you own before you say a word

Read your contract for notice and ownership

Open your contract and find two things: the notice period, and any clause about who owns the content and the accounts. What I give you here is a plain reading, not legal advice.

If a clause is unclear, ask a lawyer before you act. It’s far easier to sort out before you give notice than after.

List every account and whose name it’s in

Next, write down every account the agency touches. Beside each one, note whose name it’s in: your business’s or the agency’s.

  • Google Search Console, which shows how your site appears in Google searches
  • Google Analytics, which counts your visitors
  • Google Business Profile, your listing on Google Maps
  • Hosting, the service that keeps your site online
  • Domain name, your website’s address
  • Website admin login, used to edit your site
  • Content files, such as articles and images

You should end with a list showing what you control and what you still need access to. Domain and hosting matter most, because together they decide who can switch your site on or off.

Goes wrong most often: the domain sits in the agency’s name, often for convenience when the site was set up. Ask politely, in writing, for it to move to your business before you give notice.

Can your agency take your site down when you leave?

Anyone with admin access can change or remove things, whether that’s your agency, a developer or you. That’s why ownership comes before notice, as good practice, not because you expect trouble.

The work itself isn’t tied to the agency. Articles, page fixes and links sit on your website, so they stay there unless someone removes them.

Our complete SEO checklist for Kenyan businesses shows what that work usually covers, so you can spot it on your own site.

Don't delete pages or change URLs in anger.
Hasty changes after an agency leaves do more harm than the exit itself.

Step 3: Take a snapshot of your rankings and traffic

Record where the site stands today, while access is still easy. If anything drops later, this snapshot lets you measure it and show what changed.

What to record

  • Write down your rankings for your 10 to 20 main search terms.
  • Note your monthly visits from Google.
  • List your top pages by visits.
  • List every article and page the agency published, with its address.

How to export it

In Google Search Console, open the search performance report, pick the last 12 months and export it by search term and by page. In Google Analytics, export your visits from Google for the same dates.

Save the files in a folder you own, such as your own Google Drive, with today’s date in the file names. For example, the furniture shop’s snapshot might show 1,200 visits a month from Google, with “office chairs Nairobi” as its top search.

Goes wrong most often: owners skip this step, and later can’t tell a real drop from normal movement.

Step 4: How to fire the SEO agency step by step

Work through this checklist in order. Each line depends on the one before it.

  1. Secure owner access. Make sure you hold owner-level access to every account from Step 2.
  2. Export your content and reports. Download every article, page and monthly report.
  3. Give written notice. Follow the notice period in your contract and keep a copy.
  4. Ask for a handover. Request a list of work done, plus the redirect and link records.
  5. Freeze site changes. Agree that nobody changes your site’s structure during the handover.
  6. Confirm the last invoice. Get the final amount in writing, so nothing is left open.
  7. Remove the agency’s access. Once the handover list arrives, change the passwords and check who can still make changes.

What a fair handover looks like

You should end with owner access to every account, your files saved, a copy of your notice and a written handover list. A fair handover covers what was done, which redirects exist and which links were built.

A redirect sends anyone who visits an old address to a new one. Without the redirect record, you won’t know which old addresses still need one.

What really costs rankings

Many owners fear the agency’s exit most. But the damage that hurts rankings usually comes from changes made in a hurry after the agency has gone.

Don’t delete pages or change URLs in anger. Google has learned those addresses and the links pointing to them, and removing them throws that away.

Will your rankings drop when you change agencies? They can, and nobody can promise they’ll hold, but keeping your pages and addresses as they are gives them the best chance.

Goes wrong most often: cutting off the agency before the handover list arrives. Keep line 7 last.

Leaving your SEO agency. Before: Accounts in the agency's name; No record of where the site stood. After: Every account in your business's name; A dated snapshot of rankings and traffic.
Taking control before you give notice keeps the handover calm and measurable.
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Step 5: Watch the site after the agency is gone

For the first few weeks, check the site once a week against your snapshot. Set a calendar reminder, because this is the step owners forget.

  • Click through your main pages and look for broken links.
  • Test that old addresses still redirect.
  • Use URL inspection in Search Console to see whether Google has indexed each key page, meaning it’s included in search results.
  • Check that page titles are unchanged.
  • Open Search Console and look for new errors.

A small dip or a real problem?

A small dip after a handover is common and often settles. Say the furniture shop’s 1,200 visits fall to 1,100 one week and come back the next: that’s normal movement.

Worry when the drop keeps growing week after week, or when it lines up with a clear error, such as key pages missing from Google or redirects that fail. I can’t give you a timing, because it depends on your site.

When you find an error, fix that one thing first. Then check again the following week.

Step 6: Choose what comes next

What to look for in a new SEO agency in Kenya

Don’t jump to the cheapest offer. A low fee can cost more once you pay to fix what was missed, as I explain in why a cheap SEO agency in Kenya costs more in the long run.

Ask any agency you speak to these four questions:

  • What will I own?
  • What will you send me each month?
  • Am I locked in?
  • Who approves changes to my site?

The full list is in questions to ask before hiring an SEO agency in Kenya. You can also compare an SEO agency vs a freelancer for your Kenyan business.

Do you need a lock-in contract?

No. You can choose an agency that lets you leave whenever the work stops paying off, so it has to earn your money every month.

Our Managed SEO works that way. It’s one plan, from KES 80,000 a month, with no lock-in contract.

Nothing goes live on your site until you approve it. You get a plain-language report every month and a monthly call with me, so you always know what you’re paying for.

Start with a free look at your site

Before you sign with anyone, find out where your site stands today. Our free SEO analysis is instant and needs no call.

A call is optional afterwards, if you’d like to talk the results through.

Your exit in order: Check the agency is the problem; Find out what you own; Take a snapshot of rankings and traffic; Hand over in a set order; Watch the site every week.
Follow these steps in order to leave an SEO agency safely.

Frequently asked questions

Is SEO still worth it after an agency that didn’t deliver?

It can be. SEO brings you people who are already searching for what you sell, which is why those visits often turn into enquiries.

Our guide to what SEO is in Kenya explains how it works, so you can judge your next agency on the right things.

Should I tell the agency why I’m leaving?

A short, polite reason in your written notice is enough. It keeps the handover calm, and calm handovers tend to arrive complete.

What to do today

Start today with the account list from Step 2. It tells you how much control you already have before you say a word to the agency.

Then get your free SEO analysis, so you know exactly where your site stands on the day you hand over.

Additional resources

Where does your site stand today? Get an instant, free SEO analysis with no call needed. Button: Get my free analysis.
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