E-Commerce SEO Retainer Scope of Work Template

E-commerce SEO retainers have a unique scoping problem: the work is never "done."

New products launch. Collections change. Seasonal pushes require different keyword strategies. Competitors adjust pricing and content. The client's development team ships features that break canonical tags. A generic "monthly SEO retainer" scope doesn't survive contact with the reality of e-commerce.

E-commerce retainers need structure that accounts for ongoing technical maintenance, catalogue-driven optimisation, seasonal planning, and the constant tension between SEO recommendations and merchandising priorities.

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Component	Monthly effort	Cadence
Technical maintenance	2–4 hours	Monthly
Category optimisation	4–8 hours	Monthly (rotating categories)
Product page optimisation	2–6 hours	Monthly (new products + priority existing)
Content strategy & creation	4–12 hours	Monthly
Link building / digital PR	4–10 hours	Monthly
Reporting & strategy	2–4 hours	Monthly
Seasonal planning	4–8 hours	Quarterly

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• Crawl monitoring (new errors, redirect issues, indexation changes)
• Core Web Vitals tracking and flagging regressions
• New product/collection URL verification (canonical, indexation, schema)
• Structured data validation for new templates or products
• XML sitemap accuracy check
• App or plugin update impact review (platform-specific)
• Log file analysis (quarterly or as needed)

• Category page optimisation ([X] collections per month, rotating)
• New product page metadata ([X] products per month)
• Priority product page optimisation (based on performance data)
• Internal linking updates (new products linked into category hubs)
• Image alt text for new products

• Monthly content calendar (blog posts, guides, landing pages)
• Content brief creation ([X] briefs per month)
• Content optimisation of existing pages ([X] pages per month)
• Keyword research for upcoming products, seasons, or campaigns
• Content performance review (what's working, what needs updating)

• Monthly outreach allocation ([X] hours or [X] placements)
• Link target identification and prioritisation
• Content-led link building (resource creation for outreach)
• Competitor backlink monitoring
• Monthly link acquisition reporting

• Quarterly planning sessions (90-day roadmap)
• Seasonal keyword research and content prep (4–8 weeks before peak)
• Category and landing page preparation for seasonal events
• Post-season performance review and learnings

• Monthly performance report (organic traffic, rankings, revenue, activity summary)
• Monthly strategy call ([X] minutes)
• Quarterly strategy review (90-minute deep dive)
• Ad-hoc reporting available within monthly hour allocation

• Paid search or shopping feed management
• Product photography, copywriting (beyond SEO metadata), or brand content
• Website development or design changes
• Platform migration or major architecture changes
• Marketplace SEO (Amazon, eBay, etc.)
• Social media management
• Inventory or catalogue management in the CMS
• Hours carry-over between months (unused hours do not roll over)

• Monthly hours: [X] hours
• Additional hours: Available at [rate] per hour, pre-approved
• Minimum commitment: [X] months
• Monthly allocation priority: technical maintenance → on-page → content → link building
• Unused hours policy: [do not roll over / roll over up to X hours]
• Scope review: Quarterly, with adjustment by mutual agreement

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Catalogue size	Recommended monthly hours	Focus split
Small (< 500 SKUs)	15–25 hours	30% technical, 30% on-page, 30% content, 10% reporting
Medium (500–5,000 SKUs)	25–40 hours	25% technical, 25% on-page, 25% content, 15% link building, 10% reporting
Large (5,000+ SKUs)	40–60+ hours	20% technical, 25% on-page, 20% content, 20% link building, 15% reporting

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E-commerce retainers are the most complex SEO scopes to assemble — multiple workstreams, seasonal variation, and catalogue-dependent effort levels. Pricing them consistently across clients is almost impossible with templates alone.

With RuleDox:

• Catalogue size and platform set the baseline — hours and components adjust automatically
• Seasonal planning sections appear quarterly — not every month, reducing template noise
• Link building toggles on/off cleanly — if not included, the section and hours disappear
• Exclusions reflect e-commerce reality — "marketplace SEO" and "paid search" always excluded
• Hour allocation tables are pre-calculated — no spreadsheet needed for split estimates

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Should e-commerce retainers include link building? Depends on competitive intensity. In saturated markets (fashion, beauty, electronics), yes — without links, content and on-page work alone won't move rankings for commercial terms. In lower-competition niches, technical and on-page work may be sufficient for the first 6–12 months.

How do I handle seasonal peaks in a flat monthly retainer? Front-load seasonal prep 4–8 weeks before the peak. Use quarterly planning sessions to adjust monthly priorities. Some agencies offer seasonal "burst" hours on top of the base retainer — scope this as an optional add-on.

What's the minimum retainer size for e-commerce SEO? 15–20 hours/month for small catalogues. Below that, you can't cover technical maintenance, on-page work, and content meaningfully. If the client's budget is under 15 hours, offer project-based work (audit + remediation) instead of a retainer.