Question 1

What is the Visibility Grader?

Accepted Answer

The Visibility Grader is a free SEO audit tool that runs the checks Google actually uses to rank local businesses — on-page fundamentals, real-user site performance, and Google Business Profile signals — and returns a scored report explaining what is working, what is not, and what to fix in what order. It runs in under a minute, does not gate the report behind a signup wall, and is free with no obligation.

Question 2

How is this different from a Lighthouse or PageSpeed report?

Accepted Answer

Lighthouse tells you how fast your site loads. That is one input into local ranking, and the Grader includes it (using Google's own PageSpeed Insights data), but it is not the biggest lever for a local business. The Google Business Profile signals — categories, review count and recency, photos, hours — often decide whether you appear in the map pack at all, and no site-only tool measures those. The Grader is built around what actually moves local rankings, not just what a page-speed tool can see.

Question 3

Is my email used for anything beyond the report?

Accepted Answer

The email you enter is used to send you a copy of the report. We do not sell it, share it, or add you to a mailing list. After the audit runs, we send one follow-up email — a real message from a person, checking whether you would like a hand with anything the report surfaced. That is it. No automated drip sequence, no repeated pitches, no algorithm deciding when to bother you again.

Question 4

Does this work for businesses outside Nanaimo?

Accepted Answer

Yes. The Grader is market-agnostic. It works for any business, in any city, with a website and a Google Business Profile. The Google Business Profile signals are pulled from Google's global Places index, so a business in Vancouver, Toronto, Nantes, or Tbilisi runs the same checks and returns the same report.

Question 5

What if my business does not have a Google Business Profile yet?

Accepted Answer

The Grader will tell you so — the GBP dimension will show 'listing not found' as the top failing item, because for a local business the profile is the single largest visibility lever. The on-page and performance sections still run and score normally. The recommended first step for any business missing a profile is to claim one at business.google.com — it is free, takes about ten minutes to verify, and produces more local visibility than most six-month SEO engagements do.

Question 6

Why does the report include recommendations, not just scores?

Accepted Answer

A number by itself is not useful. A '42/100' with no explanation leaves the owner staring at a dashboard, deciding they need to hire someone to interpret it, which is exactly the pattern most SEO tools rely on. The Grader writes a plain-English recommendation for every failing or warning check, so the owner can either fix the item themselves or take the report to whoever handles their site with clear direction. If the tool is only useful once you have hired us, it is not really free.

Question 7

How often should I re-run the audit?

Accepted Answer

Once a quarter is enough for most businesses. The signals that change month to month — new reviews, new photos, changes to your site — are things you already know about. The signals that change quietly and matter — Google Business Profile category shifts, a broken structured-data change from a plugin update, a Core Web Vital regression from an image the marketing team added — are what a quarterly audit catches. Running the audit more often than that is usually a sign of anxiety rather than useful measurement.

Question 8

Is there a paid version with more detail?

Accepted Answer

The Grader itself stays free. What we sell separately are the human engagements a report might make sense to trigger: a $500 CAD written strategy that turns the report into a prioritised plan, a $950 CAD one-off Google Business Profile setup, or a monthly SEO engagement starting at $2,800 CAD. All three are optional. Some businesses run the Grader, take the recommendations, implement them themselves, and never speak to us — that is a fine outcome and one the tool is designed to allow.

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