Scope Creep Examples — SEO & marketing
Ad hoc strategy requests after the retainer has ended
The SEO retainer ended and the account was formally offboarded. The client keeps forwarding keyword and competitor questions by email as if the retainer were still active.
The retainer ended at the client's request three months ago — final report delivered, account access handed back, engagement formally closed. Since then, occasional emails have kept arriving: "quick question, should we be targeting this keyword?" or "can you take a look at what this competitor is doing?" Each is framed as a small favor from a past relationship rather than a new engagement, but answering them properly takes real research time.
Clause typically implicated
Clause typically implicated
Termination clause→ — Confirms the engagement formally ended on a specific date — useful to point back to when a former client treats the relationship as still active.
Suggested change-order wording
Suggested change-order wording (illustrative, not legal advice)
Good to hear from you — since the retainer wrapped up in [month], I want to make sure I give this the research it deserves rather than a quick guess. I can put together a proper answer as a one-off consulting engagement at [rate], or if these questions are coming up regularly, it might make sense to talk about restarting a scaled-down retainer. Which sounds better?
How this usually resolves
A pattern of "quick questions" after a retainer ends is often a genuine signal the client still needs the service, just at a lower level than before — framing the response as a chance to discuss a smaller retainer, rather than only as a billing correction, sometimes turns a lapsed client back into an active one.
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