Is It Out of Scope? — SEO & marketing
Is adding local SEO for a new business location out of scope for an SEO retainer?
Usually yes. A new location means a new Google Business Profile, new local listings, and often a new location page to optimize — a parallel setup effort beyond the retainer's original scope.
The retainer was scoped around the client's existing location(s). A new location opening is genuinely good news for the client, and it's natural for them to assume the existing SEO retainer just extends to cover it.
Is it out of scope?
Usually yes, for the setup phase. A new Google Business Profile, citation building across local directories, and a new location page all need to be created from scratch — real setup work, not an incremental extension of ongoing optimization for existing locations.
Clause typically implicated
Clause typically implicated
Out-of-scope clause→ — Defines the retainer's scope by location count — a new location's setup work is outside that count until the scope is formally expanded.
Example contract wording
Example contract wording (illustrative, not legal advice)
Congrats on the new location! Getting it set up for local search — Google Business Profile, citations, a location page — is real setup work outside the current retainer's scope. I can quote that as a one-time setup fee, and we can talk about whether the ongoing retainer should expand to cover both locations going forward.
How MarginFlow flags it
MarginFlow checks the number of locations named in the request against the contract's extracted location count and flags requests naming an additional, unscoped location as outside_scope, with a suggested charge based on typical local-SEO setup pricing.