FAQ
SBPO Consulting: questions we get asked, answered properly
Including the ones that are awkward for us. If your question is not here, ask it — and if it is a good one it will end up on this page.
01
Working with us
What kind of projects do you take on?
Work that spans more than one discipline — where design, engineering and search all have to agree on the same decision. A marketing site that must also rank, a web application that must also be accessible, a store that must also be fast. Single-discipline work is often better and more cheaply served by a specialist freelancer, and we will tell you when we think that is the case.
What do you need from us to scope a project?
The problem, the constraint and the deadline. Access to analytics and Search Console if they exist. A single named decision-maker. Beyond that, less than you think: a polished requirements document is not necessary and is often actively unhelpful, because it usually encodes a solution somebody has already chosen rather than the problem they are trying to solve.
Do you work with in-house teams or other agencies?
Regularly. The thing that determines whether it goes well is deciding early who owns each interface — the design system, the content model, the deployment pipeline — and writing it down. Ambiguity about ownership between two capable teams causes more damage than a genuine gap in capability.
What happens if we want to end the engagement early?
You get everything produced up to that point, in a usable state, with a handover. That is in the engagement agreement rather than being at our discretion. We do not hold work, accounts or credentials as leverage, and we do not have exit fees.
02
Cost and time
Why are there no prices anywhere on this site?
Because any number published without knowing the scope would be either meaningless or misleading. The honest cost drivers for most of what we do are the number of genuinely distinct templates or screens, whether research is required or existing evidence is sufficient, whether a design system is being built or extended, how many integrations exist, and whether content already exists. We scope against those in writing before quoting.
How long will our project take?
Content and approvals set the calendar far more often than production does. The two most reliable predictors are whether there is a single decision-maker and whether the copy is written. A project with both moves several times faster than one with a five-person committee and a content plan that has not started. We agree review windows in the schedule so that dependency is visible from day one.
Do you charge for proposals or discovery calls?
No. The first conversation and the scoping document that follows it are free. Where a project genuinely cannot be scoped responsibly without investigation, we will propose a paid discovery phase with its own defined deliverable — rather than quoting the whole project and quietly pricing in the uncertainty.
Do you work on retainer?
Where there is ongoing work that genuinely needs doing — an organic programme, a paid account, a product under active development. We will not propose a retainer to cover a site that does not need monthly attention. If your build is finished and stable, a support arrangement you call on when needed is usually the honest answer.
03
Standards and ownership
Who owns the work when it is finished?
You do. Source code, repositories, design files, design tokens, documentation and account access transfer to you at handover, with no licence conditions. Analytics and advertising accounts are created under your organisation from the start rather than ours — account ownership used as commercial leverage is one of the most common disputes in this industry and it is entirely avoidable.
Do you guarantee first place on Google?
No, and neither can anyone else. Nobody controls the ranking algorithm, and any agency guaranteeing a position is either defining "first place" so narrowly that it is meaningless, or is about to use tactics that will eventually cost you. What we will commit to is a documented method, honest reporting against measures agreed before the work starts, and telling you when a target is not realistic.
Is accessibility included, or is it extra?
Included, as a constraint agreed before design starts rather than an audit at the end. This is not idealism — retrofitting accessibility after a build costs several times what designing to it costs, and we would rather clients spent that money on something else. Our own conformance is documented on the accessibility statement, including the limitations we know about.
Do you use AI to produce work?
We use AI tools in research and drafting, and we say so rather than pretending otherwise. A human decides what a piece of work is for, verifies every factual claim against a primary source, edits it, and is accountable for what ships. What we do not do is mass-generate pages to occupy keywords — that is a spam policy violation and, more to the point, it does not work. The full position is on the editorial policy page.
04
About the company
Is SBPO Consulting the same company as other similarly named businesses?
No. SBPO Consulting is a digital and IT services agency operating at sbpoconsulting.com. It is a distinct and independent business, unaffiliated with any similarly named company. If you were looking for a different company, this is almost certainly not it. Our only website is sbpoconsulting.com — anything published elsewhere under a similar name is not us.
Why is there no client list or logo wall?
Because we publish client work only with written permission, and we will not fill the gap with invented projects or logos we have no right to display. Ask us for a reference and we will connect you with a client who had a comparable problem — a conversation you control, with someone we cannot edit, which is worth considerably more than a logo grid.
Where are you based and who will I be working with?
Company registration details and location are published on the contact page as they are confirmed; we would rather leave a field blank than fill it with something unverified. On the second question: you work with the people doing the work. There is no account layer translating your problem into a brief and then translating the result back.
FAQ
Ask us something this page does not cover.
Genuinely — the awkward questions are the useful ones, and the answers usually end up here.