Procurement
SEO RFP template
Six sections covering everything a rank tracking or enterprise SEO platform vendor needs to quote accurately, plus the commercial questions that decide the three-year cost. Copy it, cut what does not apply, and send it. There is no form and nothing gated.
Written by Deepak Shukla, founder of Pearl Lemon, the London SEO agency that builds and operates LemRank
1. Organisation and scope
Set the facts the vendor needs to quote accurately. Vague scope produces a vague price.
- Company, sector and the brands or domains in scope.
- Number of domains and subdomains to be tracked.
- Number of keywords, and how many require daily rather than weekly checks.
- Markets, languages and whether local or mobile results are required.
- Number of users, split into practitioners and read-only stakeholders.
- Existing tools in the stack and which the new platform would replace.
2. Tracking requirements
This is where vendors differ most and where quotes most often fail to compare.
- Which search engines and AI answer surfaces are covered, and at what extra cost.
- Refresh frequency available per keyword, and how frequency affects price.
- Device and location granularity, including postcode or city-level tracking.
- SERP feature reporting: featured snippets, AI overviews, local packs, shopping.
- Competitor tracking: how many, and whether they are billed separately.
- How position history is stored, for how long, and whether it is capped.
3. Reporting and integrations
Ask for what the reporting must deliver to your stakeholders, not what the demo shows.
- Scheduled reporting: formats, recipients, white-labelling if required.
- Google Search Console and analytics integration, and how data is reconciled.
- BI and warehouse connectivity — direct connector, scheduled export, or API only.
- API access: is it included, rate-limited, or charged separately?
- Bulk export of all historical data in a documented, machine-readable format.
4. Commercial terms
The questions that decide the three-year cost rather than the first invoice.
- Full price breakdown by module, seat and keyword allowance.
- One-off implementation, onboarding and training fees.
- Overage policy when keyword or crawl limits are exceeded.
- Contract length, renewal uplift cap and notice period for exit.
- What happens to our data on termination, and in what format it is returned.
- Reference customers of comparable size and scope.
5. Security, compliance and support
Procurement will ask for these anyway. Asking early removes weeks from the process.
- Security certifications held, and the date of the most recent audit.
- Data processing agreement, sub-processor list and data residency options.
- Single sign-on, role-based permissions and audit logging.
- Support model: named contact, hours of cover and response commitments.
- Uptime commitment and where incident history is published.
6. Evaluation and timeline
Say how you will decide. It disciplines both sides.
- Scoring weights across capability, cost, support and security.
- Whether a proof of concept on our own keyword set is required, and its scope.
- Key dates: questions deadline, response deadline, demo window, decision date.
- Named contact for clarification questions.
Want this answered rather than sent?
Send us the template and we will answer every section in writing, including the questions where our answer is “no”. We would rather lose a bid early than win one on a capability we do not have.