Guaranteed SEO Services in India: We Read 66 Agency Websites and Their Refund Policies

"Guaranteed SEO" is easy to promise and hard to check. An agency says your website will reach Google's first page or you get your money back, which sounds like the agency is taking the risk. To see whether it really does, we read the websites of 66 Indian SEO agencies on 13 November 2026: their SEO pages, their guarantee pages and, the part almost nobody opens before paying, their refund policies and terms.

Two groups went into the study. The first is the 48 agencies that showed on Google's first page for Delhi searches like "seo company in delhi" when we searched from West Delhi on 13 October, which is the shortlist a Delhi business owner actually sees. The second is 18 agencies around India that sell "guaranteed SEO" outright, on a dedicated page. Below is what they promise and what their own refund policies say about it.

Half of Delhi's first page never answers the question

For each of the 48 Delhi agencies we read the homepage and up to 12 more pages: SEO service pages, pricing, any guarantee page, FAQs, refund policies and terms. Then we sorted every agency by what it says about guarantees anywhere on those pages.

8 of the 48 agencies (17%) make some kind of guarantee about results. Only 2 name a position, such as "Top Rankings or We Work for Free!" or "We promise to rank your website in the top 10". The other 6 use softer wording like "100% Guaranteed SEO Results", "guaranteed growth" or a guarantee to "increase ranking and visibility". A promise like that is close to impossible to break, because it never says how much growth, on which searches, or by when.

20 agencies (42%) say in plain words that rankings cannot be guaranteed. The most common place for it is an FAQ answer such as "No agency can honestly guarantee a specific ranking position". Several put it in their terms instead, where a client would only see it after signing.

Half the sample, 24 agencies, says nothing either way. That leaves the question to the sales call, and a promise made on a phone call is the hardest kind to hold an agency to later.

A guarantee on one page, a disclaimer on the next

4 of the 48 agencies say both things. One Delhi agency's SEO page offers "Guarantee #1: Top Rankings or We Work for Free!" and promises that if the site is not on Google's first page within 90 days, "you don't pay a dime". The FAQ on its own homepage says that "any agency that promises a guaranteed #1 ranking isn't being straight with you". Another tells readers on one page that "No reputable agency should guarantee a #1 Google ranking" and on another that "we guarantee you consistent ranking, traffic and growth".

Most of these sites have dozens of city and service pages written at different times, so the copy drifts. The page you landed on is not the agency's whole position, so read the FAQ and the terms too.

Positions do change. One agency that wrote "We guarantee results" and promised to "secure top positions on Google" when we first read its site on 13 October had replaced that by 13 November with "No agency can honestly guarantee a specific position".

What a "guaranteed SEO" offer actually covers

The Delhi sample shows how often guarantees appear. To see what they promise, we read the 18 Indian agencies that sell guaranteed SEO on a page of its own. 12 of them promise a ranking position for your keywords. The terms around that promise follow a clear pattern.

• About half your keywords. 7 sellers publish the share they guarantee, from 20% to 60%, and three of them use 50%. One entry plan targets 10 keywords and guarantees 2. A guarantee met on half the list says nothing about the other half, which may be the searches that bring customers.
• The top 10, not #1. Even sellers whose headline says "#1 ranking" define success as the top 10 in the terms. Some plans fall back to the top 20, 25 or 30.
• Any search engine. 4 of 18 let a ranking on Yahoo, Bing or a "desired search engine" meet the target. Google handled 98.06% of searches in India in October 2026, Bing 1.11% and Yahoo 0.35% (StatCounter)
• Any single day. One seller's guarantee is met if the keywords reach the top 10 "at any stage during the campaign tenure". A keyword that touches page one for a day and drops back counts as delivered.
• Work first, money later. 4 of 18 promise more free work before any refund, three extra months in one case, and one refunds only "in direct proportions to shortage in our keyword delivery".

The cleaner offers are the ones that promise less. 3 sellers give a 30-day refund if you are not satisfied, with no ranking condition, and one agency in this group guarantees only the work itself: written deliverables and milestones, with its terms stating that "no ethical agency can guarantee specific rankings". 8 of the 18 guarantee sellers also say somewhere on their own site that rankings cannot be guaranteed.

The refund policy is where the guarantee ends

A money-back promise is only as good as the refund policy behind it, and that policy is usually a separate page linked from the footer. We read every one we could find.

Across all 66 websites, 4 promise money back on a sales page while their own refund or terms page refuses it. Among the guarantee sellers, 7 publish a refund policy we could read, and 5 of those 7 say SEO fees are not refunded, at least once work has started.

The Delhi sample shows how common this is. 25 of the 48 agencies publish refund or cancellation terms. 19 of those 25 keep the money for any work already started, and 8 say payments are not refunded under any circumstances. Two of these Delhi agencies and one guarantee seller use near-identical wording, "there is no provision for any kind of full or partial refund", which reads like a template passed between agencies.

Of the 8 Delhi agencies that promise guaranteed results, 4 have refund terms that say fees are not returned, and the other 4 publish no refund terms at all. So none of the 8 publishes a refund policy that backs its guarantee. Plenty of service businesses don't give refunds, which is fair enough, but here the guarantee exists on the sales page and nowhere in the terms.

Why ranking guarantees are so easy to "meet"

Google's advice for people hiring an SEO says: "No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google." It also tells you to "beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a 'special relationship' with Google, or advertise a 'priority submit' to Google" (Google Search Central).

Ranking on the first page for searches people make is hard. When Ahrefs checked a million random pages first seen in September 2023, only 1.74% reached Google's top 10 for any keyword within a year. For pages with real English content the figure was 6.11% (Ahrefs, May 2025).

So a seller that guarantees top 10 rankings has to control the variables, and the fine print shows how. It picks keywords that are long and specific enough to have little competition, often with your brand or a small locality in them. It counts half the list. It accepts Yahoo or Bing. It measures on its own report, from its own location, on the best day. A business can then hold a report full of "page one" keywords and still see no new enquiries, because the searches its customers make were never on the list.

Google Partner badges add to the confusion. Five of the 48 Delhi agencies mention Google Partner status on their sites. That programme is for companies that manage Google Ads, and its requirements are about ad spend and Ads certifications (Google Ads Help). It says nothing about SEO.

There is also a legal side in India. The Consumer Protection Act, 2019 defines a misleading advertisement to include one that "gives a false guarantee" to consumers (section 2(28), Gazette of India). We are not lawyers, but if an agency's guarantee page and refund policy say opposite things, keep screenshots of both, with the date.

Questions to ask before you sign a "guaranteed" SEO deal

• Which keywords, exactly? Ask for the full list before you pay, with the monthly searches for each. If the agency picks them, check them yourself in Google's Keyword Planner.
• What percentage of the list is guaranteed, and in what position? "Top 10 for 50% of keywords" is a very different promise from "page one for all of them".
• On Google only? Ask for that in writing. In India, Yahoo and Bing together handle under 2% of searches.
• Measured how, and when? On which date, from which location, with which tool, and does a single day in the top 10 count?
• What happens if it is missed? Free months, a part refund or a full refund, and within how many days?
• What does the refund policy on your website say? Read it, and if it disagrees with the guarantee, ask which one goes into the contract.
• Who owns the website, Search Console and Business Profile access? Everything should be in your name from day one, so leaving costs you nothing.
• What will you do each month? A good agency can list the fixes, pages, links and review requests, and show a dated work log.

What we put in writing instead

We don't offer a ranking guarantee or a money-back clause, and we don't publish a refund policy either. What we commit to is narrower and easier to check. Every retainer runs month to month, so you can stop at any time. The website, Search Console, Analytics and Google Business Profile stay in your name. Each month you get a log of the work done and a report that starts with leads rather than rankings.

Our SEO services in Delhi page shows what that work includes, and its section on ranking guarantees has the first read of this study. Prices for every plan are on our pricing page, and if you are comparing quotes, our guide to digital marketing costs in Delhi shows what agencies charge.

Questions people ask about guaranteed SEO