Is It Out of Scope? — SEO & marketing
Is load testing before a major launch out of scope for an SEO retainer?
Yes. Simulating traffic load is a technical exercise with no connection to search strategy.
This comes up when a big organic-traffic push is expected — a viral content piece, a major PR moment — and the client asks the SEO team to also confirm the site can handle the resulting load.
Is it out of scope?
Yes. Flagging the expectation of a traffic spike from a campaign is reasonable retainer context; running the actual load test is a technical exercise outside search work.
Clause typically implicated
Clause typically implicated
Exclusions clause→ — Load testing and performance verification is technical work excluded from an SEO retainer's scope.
Example contract wording
Example contract wording (illustrative, not legal advice)
Given the campaign, it's worth confirming the site can handle the spike — but running that load test is a dev/infrastructure task outside this retainer.
How MarginFlow flags it
MarginFlow flags load-testing requests outside_scope on SEO contracts, keeping retainer time on search strategy rather than infrastructure verification.