Outsource SEO
You can outsource SEO and still keep control, as long as you know which parts you hand over. 21x takes on the technical work, the measurement and the monthly follow-up, for Google and for AI systems such as ChatGPT. Your own team keeps what only it knows: your customers, your expertise and your reviews.
Outsource SEO to 21x and you hand over technical work, measurement and monthly follow-up for Google and AI systems. Your expertise, customer contact and reviews stay in-house.
Technical work and measurement handed over · Reviews stay with your team · An owner for every task · Direct contact with the founder
Source: Google Search Central, Do you need an SEO?Updated:
The split
A provider that claims to take over everything is promising something it cannot deliver. Part of the work depends on knowledge and contacts that only your company has.
You outsource to 21x
Technical SEO, from crawling and indexing to speed and structured data, plus access for AI crawlers such as GPTBot and ClaudeBot. Consistent company details across platforms. A fixed monthly plan, the measurement and a monthly report.
Stays with your team
Your expertise: what you know that competitors do not. Contact with your customers, including asking them for reviews. Final approval of every page, and decisions about your offer and prices.
This split keeps you in control of what is published under your name. It also keeps the cost down, because you do not pay a provider to learn what your team already knows.
When not to outsource
Outsourcing is not always the right choice. In three situations it is better to wait, or to do the work yourself first.
Your site is about to be rebuilt. Technical SEO on a site that will be replaced in three months means paying twice. Involve an SEO specialist in the rebuild instead, so redirects and structure are right from the start.
Nobody in-house can approve content. Every page an outside provider writes needs a check by someone who knows the subject. Without that person, work stalls or inaccurate claims go live under your name.
You expect a guaranteed position. Google states in its own guidance that nobody can guarantee a first position in its results. A provider that promises one is promising something it cannot control.
Before you sign
Ask these in the first call. A provider that knows its work answers them without hesitation.
Ask whether the person in the sales call stays your contact once the work starts. At many agencies an account manager sits between you and the specialist. At 21x you work directly with Stan Vreuls.
Rankings alone no longer show whether customers find you, because AI systems answer many questions before anyone clicks. Ask how the provider measures visibility in AI answers, in which systems and how often.
A provider that claims to do everything often does much of it superficially. Ask which tasks stay with your team. The answer shows whether the provider understands where results come from.
In a controlled study published at KDD 2024, stuffing pages with keywords lowered their visibility in AI answers. Ask whether the plan is built on page counts or on what a measurement showed.
Ask who owns the work once you stop. At 21x, everything built on your site and in your accounts stays yours, and you can stop after any phase.
What a month looks like
Example with fictitious data. Each task has an owner and a status, so you can see what 21x does and what your team does.
This is the split from the comparison above, applied to one month. You approve, 21x carries out the work, and the monthly report shows both.
Question
Month two for a fictitious engineering firm in Bristol
Tasks owned by 21x
4 of 6
The other two need your team: only you can approve expert content and ask your own customers for a review.
What it costs
You can outsource classic SEO on its own or start with a measurement of your visibility in AI answers. In both cases you know the cost before the work starts.
Know where you stand
Insight into 9 areas, 3 to 5 priorities and advice on your next step.
€295one-off
excl. VAT
5 to 7 working days
Discuss BasecampFix the foundation
Basecamp plus implementation of the most important improvements to your website.
€695one-off
excl. VAT
10 to 14 working days
Discuss ClimbTake a bigger step
A complete improvement round for your most important pages, with an agreed scope.
€1,995one-off
excl. VAT
3 to 6 weeks
Discuss SummitKeep climbing
Digital PR, monthly measurements and upkeep of the information about your business.
€695/ month
excl. VAT
Minimum 3 months
Then cancel monthly
You do not need to start with both SEO and the audit. In a call you hear which comes first in your situation.
Where the visits come from
Three figures explain how 21x divides the work between classic SEO and AI visibility.
>87%
of all search referrals to websites came from Google in July 2026
0.9%
of search referrals came from ChatGPT in the same month
-8%
visibility in AI answers after keyword stuffing, in a controlled test with ten thousand queries
Bron: Aggarwal et al., GEO: Generative Engine Optimization, KDD 2024
Google remains the largest source of visits, so SEO remains the base of the work. Referral share does not show how often AI systems name you, so that is measured separately. And keyword volume for its own sake works against you.
Who you work with
When you outsource SEO and GEO to 21x, you agree the plan with Stan Vreuls himself. Together you settle which tasks 21x carries out, which pages your team approves and what the monthly report covers. There is no account manager in between.
Stan has eleven years of experience in search engine optimisation and has also focused fully on AI visibility since January 2026. You meet at his office in Maastricht or online, in English if you prefer.
Questions
That depends on the size of your site, the competition in your market and the technical state of the site. The work covers technical health, pages and local visibility, with a fixed plan and a monthly report. The options are set out in the packages on this page.
Yes, and that is often the most efficient split. 21x handles the technical work, the plan and the measurement. Your writer keeps writing, because they know your subject better than any outside provider.
That depends on your site, your market and your competitors, so 21x does not promise a fixed term. You do get a monthly report showing what was done and what moved. If nothing moves, the report shows that too.
That depends on whether your customers ask AI systems for advice before they buy. The audit does not track your customers, but it shows whether AI systems name you when such questions are asked. GEO work only follows if that matters for your market.
Everything built on your site and in your accounts stays yours, including redirects, page changes and aligned company details. You can stop after any phase without losing that work.
Yes. SEO and the AI visibility audit can be started separately. Because Google still sends most search referrals, SEO is often the logical place to begin. The audit can follow once you want to know whether AI systems name you.
Next step
Stan Vreuls, Founder of 21x
In a call you hear which parts of your SEO are worth outsourcing and which are better kept in-house. If outsourcing makes no sense for you yet, you will hear that too.
stan@21x.nl