Thinking about offering SEO services but don’t have the team, time, or tools? You’re not alone. Many marketing agencies, web designers, and consultants face the same challenge. Building an in house SEO department is a massive investment in both money and expertise. This is where white label SEO outsourcing comes in. It’s a partnership model where your agency hires a third party provider to handle SEO work for your clients, which you then present as your own. This offers a powerful way to scale your services, delight your clients, and grow your revenue without the overhead.
This guide breaks down everything you need to know. We will cover what it is, how it works, what services you can outsource, and how to choose the right partner to help you succeed.
What is White Label SEO?
White label SEO is a partnership where an agency hires a third party provider to handle SEO work for their clients. The agency then presents this work to the client under its own brand. Think of it like a ghostwriter for SEO. The provider does all the heavy lifting behind the scenes, from keyword research to link building, but your agency gets all the credit. To accelerate ideation, here are the best AI keyword research tools to consider.
This model, also called SEO reselling, allows you to instantly add a full suite of professional SEO services to your offerings. You can fill skill gaps, meet growing client demand, and become a one stop shop for digital marketing without having to hire a single new employee. It’s a win win: you expand your business, and your clients get expert SEO work from a brand they already trust.
How White Label SEO Works
The process is built on a simple, discreet partnership.
You Find the Client: Your agency continues to do what it does best, which is building relationships and closing deals. You onboard the client, understand their goals, and define the scope of the SEO work.
You Partner with a Provider: You choose a white label SEO outsourcing partner and agree on the services and pricing. You then pass the client’s information and goals to them.
The Provider Executes: The white label team gets to work. They perform technical audits, create content, build links, and manage the entire SEO campaign, all while remaining completely invisible to your client.
You Deliver the Results: The provider sends you all deliverables, like performance reports and content drafts, with your agency’s branding. You review the work, add your own insights, and present it to the client as if your team produced it.
The client only ever interacts with you. This seamless process makes the provider feel like a true extension of your own team, giving you the power of a full SEO department without the headaches.
Roles and Responsibilities in the Partnership
A successful white label SEO outsourcing partnership depends on clear roles.
The Agency (You): Your primary role is client facing. You own the client relationship. This includes sales, account management, communication, and strategy. You are the one who fields questions, presents reports, and ensures the client’s overall marketing goals are being met.
The Provider (Your Partner): The provider is the fulfillment engine. Their responsibility is to execute the SEO tasks agreed upon. This includes the technical work, content creation, link building, data analysis, and organizing topics into keyword clusters to strengthen topical authority. They focus purely on performance and delivering high quality work on time.
By splitting responsibilities this way, each party can focus on its strengths. You concentrate on client satisfaction and growth, while your partner concentrates on SEO execution.
Why Use White Label SEO? The Benefits are Clear
Agencies turn to white label SEO outsourcing for a few game changing reasons.
Massive Cost Savings: Building an in house SEO team is expensive. You have to account for salaries, benefits, training, and costly software subscriptions. Outsourcing can slash these costs significantly. In fact, studies show that outsourcing can reduce costs by 30% to 70% compared to hiring full time employees. For price benchmarks and vendor options, see our guide to low-cost SEO services.
Instant Scalability: What happens when you land a huge new client? With an in house team, you might have to scramble to hire, which takes time. With a white label partner, you can scale your services up or down almost instantly. You can handle any amount of work without the constraints of hiring and firing.
Access to Expertise: SEO is a complex and ever changing field. It’s tough for a small team to master everything from technical SEO to local citations. A specialized white label provider gives you on demand access to a team of experts who live and breathe SEO and are always up to date on the latest algorithm changes.
Focus on Your Core Business: Outsourcing the time consuming execution of SEO frees up your team to focus on what you do best, whether that’s web design, client strategy, or winning new business. You can grow your agency without getting bogged down in the weeds of every single task.
Common White Label SEO Services
So, what exactly can you outsource? Here are some of the most common services offered through white label SEO outsourcing.
On Page SEO
On page SEO involves optimizing individual web pages to rank higher and earn more relevant traffic. This includes optimizing title tags, meta descriptions, headings, and content. A white label provider can systematically work through a client’s site, ensuring every page is perfectly tuned for its target keywords. This is crucial because Google’s own guidelines emphasize creating pages for users with clear, valuable content. For a step-by-step process, use our on-page SEO checklist.
Technical SEO
Technical SEO focuses on the website’s infrastructure. This includes things like site speed, mobile friendliness, crawlability, and security. These tasks are highly specialized and can have a huge impact on rankings. For example, 53% of mobile visitors will leave a page if it takes longer than three seconds to load. A white label partner can diagnose and fix these complex technical issues, ensuring the site provides a great experience for both users and search engines. Before you dive in, run a comprehensive technical SEO audit to uncover quick wins and blockers.
Link Building
Backlinks, or links from other websites, are one of Google’s top two ranking factors, alongside content. They act as votes of confidence, signaling to search engines that your client’s site is authoritative and trustworthy. However, quality link building is incredibly time consuming and requires a specific skill set. White label link building services handle the outreach and content creation needed to earn high quality links, boosting your client’s domain authority and search rankings. Not sure where to start? Compare the top link building services and approaches for 2025.
Content Writing
Content is the foundation of any modern SEO strategy. Businesses that consistently publish high quality blog content get 55% more website visitors than those that do not. But creating a steady stream of optimized content is a huge challenge. A white label content service can act as your content engine, producing well researched, professionally written blog posts and articles under your brand.
For agencies looking to truly scale content, solutions like Rankai’s AI-driven platform can be a game changer. Instead of just a few articles, you can deliver 20 or more fully optimized pages every month for your clients, helping them see results faster. If you’re scaling to hundreds or thousands of pages, explore programmatic SEO approaches.
Local Citation Building
For local businesses, local citations (mentions of their name, address, and phone number on directories like Yelp and Yellow Pages) are critical for ranking in local search results. Building and managing these citations is tedious work. A white label provider can handle the entire process, ensuring your client’s information is consistent and accurate across hundreds of directories, which boosts their visibility in Google’s Map Pack.
SEO Audits and Reporting
An SEO audit is a deep dive into a website’s health, identifying technical issues, content gaps, and other opportunities for improvement. White label providers can generate comprehensive, professional audits with your logo on them. They also handle ongoing reporting, creating easy to understand monthly reports that show progress on keyword rankings, traffic, and other key metrics. This demonstrates the value of your work and keeps clients happy.
How to Choose the Right White Label SEO Outsourcing Partner
Choosing the right partner is the most important step. Here’s what to look for during your evaluation.
Reviews and Case Studies
Start by checking for social proof. Look for reviews on third party sites like G2 or Capterra, not just the curated testimonials on the provider’s website. A good provider should also have detailed case studies that show real results, like “increased organic traffic by 200% in six months” or “ranked 10 new keywords on page one.” This proves they can deliver on their promises.
Website Quality
A provider’s own website is their business card. If their site is slow, poorly designed, or doesn’t rank for their own keywords, it’s a major red flag. They should be able to demonstrate their expertise on their own domain. A well optimized, professional website suggests they practice what they preach and will treat your clients’ sites with the same level of care.
A Transparent Process and Ethical Practices
Trust is everything. A good partner should be completely transparent about their methods. They should be willing to explain their link building strategies and content processes. Avoid providers who are secretive or promise “proprietary magic.” This can sometimes hide the use of black hat techniques that could get your client’s site penalized. Insist on a partner who follows Google’s guidelines and operates ethically.
Communication and Support
Since your provider is an extension of your team, communication needs to be seamless. They should be responsive, easy to reach, and proactive in providing updates. Many top providers assign a dedicated account manager to be your single point of contact. Poor communication from your provider will reflect badly on you, so make this a priority.
Understanding Pricing Models
White label providers structure their pricing in a few different ways. Understanding these models is key to managing your own profitability.
Monthly Retainer
This is the most common model. You pay a fixed fee each month for a predefined set of services, like a certain number of articles or backlinks. Retainers provide predictable costs and ensure continuous, ongoing work, which is ideal for SEO. A flexible partner like Rankai offers a simple, flat rate monthly plan that you can cancel anytime, reducing your risk.
Hourly Rate
With this model, you pay for the hours worked. This can be good for small, specific tasks or consulting, but it can be hard to budget for and may lead to unpredictable costs for larger campaigns. SEO consultants typically charge around $75 per hour on average in the US.
Project Based
Here, you pay a flat fee for a specific, one time project, like a website audit or a technical SEO overhaul. This is great for finite tasks where the scope is clearly defined. You know the exact cost upfront, making it easy to mark up for your client.
The Business of Reselling SEO
Once you have a partner, you need to manage the business side of white label SEO outsourcing effectively.
Brand Alignment and White Label Reporting
Your partner must remain completely invisible. This means all deliverables, especially reports, must be 100% white labeled with your agency’s logo, colors, and branding. The client should never know a third party is involved. This maintains your brand integrity and strengthens your client relationship.
Integration and Onboarding Process
A good provider will have a smooth onboarding process to get new projects started quickly. They should have a clear system for gathering client information, getting access to necessary accounts, and defining the initial strategy. This ensures everyone is aligned from day one and minimizes delays.
Quality Assurance for Outsourced SEO
Since your name is on the work, you are responsible for the quality. Before passing anything to a client, review it yourself. A good provider will have its own internal QA process, but you should always be the final checkpoint. Build a feedback loop with your partner to ensure their work consistently meets your standards.
Scalability and Capacity Planning
Choose a partner that can grow with you. If you plan to double your client base, can your provider handle the increased workload? A scalable partner will have the team and systems in place to manage fluctuating demand, allowing you to take on new business confidently.
Profit Margin and Reseller Packaging
The goal is to be profitable. White label providers typically offer their services at wholesale rates, often 30% to 50% lower than standard agency prices. This gives you room to add a healthy markup. Package the services into your own offerings (e.g., Bronze, Silver, Gold plans) and price them to cover the provider’s cost, your management time, and a solid profit margin.
Client Management and Relationship Ownership
This is the golden rule of white label partnerships: you always own the client relationship. All communication, strategy discussions, and reporting should be handled by your agency. The provider is your silent fulfillment partner. This ensures you remain the trusted advisor in your client’s eyes, building long term loyalty and retention.
Conclusion
White label SEO outsourcing is a powerful strategy for any agency looking to grow. It allows you to offer expert SEO services, scale your operations, and increase your revenue, all while strengthening your client relationships. By choosing the right partner and managing the process effectively, you can unlock new opportunities and build a more resilient, profitable agency.
Ready to see how a scalable SEO solution can transform your agency? Explore how Rankai combines AI and human expertise to deliver more content and faster results for your clients, all under your brand.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What is the main benefit of white label SEO outsourcing?
The main benefit is the ability to offer expert SEO services and scale your agency without the high costs and logistical challenges of building an in house team. It provides instant access to expertise, is cost effective, and allows you to focus on client relationships.
Is white label SEO legal and ethical?
Yes, it is completely legal and a common business practice in many industries. As long as your provider uses ethical, “white hat” SEO techniques that comply with search engine guidelines, the practice is perfectly ethical. Transparency with your provider is key.
How do I price white label SEO services for my clients?
Typically, you will take the wholesale price from your provider and add a markup. A common gross margin to aim for is 50% or more. Package the services into tiers or custom proposals that provide clear value to the client while ensuring profitability for your agency.
What’s the difference between white label SEO and a referral partnership?
In a white label partnership, you resell the services under your own brand, and the provider is invisible. You own the client relationship. In a referral partnership, you send a client to another company for a commission, and that company manages the client directly.
Can I use white label SEO for just one part of my campaign?
Absolutely. Many agencies use white label SEO outsourcing to fill specific skill gaps. You might handle on page SEO and content strategy in house but outsource the more specialized tasks of technical SEO and link building.
How do I ensure quality when using a white label provider?
Vet providers carefully by checking reviews and case studies. Ask about their internal quality assurance processes. Most importantly, establish your own review process to check all deliverables before they are sent to the client, ensuring they meet your agency’s standards.