The interactive audit needs JavaScript to score your answers and show
you which band you land in. Below are all twelve questions with the same
explanations the interactive version surfaces when you answer
“no.” Read through them, count your “no”
answers, and use the score guide at the bottom.
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Question 01 of 12 · Ownership
If you wanted to log into your website's hosting account tonight (Cloudflare, GoDaddy, WP Engine, whoever runs your site), could you do it without calling your agency?
If you answered no: Your agency controls where your website lives. If you leave, they control whether your site comes with you, or whether it just disappears.
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Question 02 of 12 · Ownership
Do you own your domain name that's registered in your name for your website? If you don't, your agency probably owns it.
If you answered no: If your agency owns your domain, they own your address on the internet. Walking away means starting over with a new URL and losing every search ranking you've earned.
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Question 03 of 12 · Ownership
If you fired your agency tomorrow, could you take a working copy of your website with you and hand it to any developer?
If you answered no: You're paying every month for something you can't take with you. That's renting, not owning.
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Question 04 of 12 · Ownership
Does all your business data, such as your customer email signups, form submissions, blog content, sales records, and analytics, land in accounts you own?
If you answered no: The data your website generates is some of the most valuable property your business owns: customer relationships, sales records, the content you've published, the analytics that prove your traction. If your agency holds even one of the accounts where this data lives, leaving means losing assets you can't replace. The right answer is that every account, for every kind of data, is in your name.
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Question 05 of 12 · Transparency
Are your agency's prices published on their website for anyone to see? In other words, they don't hide behind "contact us for a quote."
If you answered no: Custom-quote pricing is how agencies price-discriminate. The same site can cost one customer $500 a month and another $1,500, based on what the salesperson thinks the buyer will pay rather than what the work is worth. Published pricing is the only way to know you're getting the same deal as everyone else. Every TechTailors service has its price on the website. Always has, always will.
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Question 06 of 12 · Transparency
Does your monthly invoice show a line-by-line breakdown of what you're paying for, like hosting and software?
If you answered no: A single-line invoice is the easiest place in the world for an agency to hide a markup. If you can't see where the money goes, you can't tell whether you're paying $20 a month or $200 a month for the same hosting. You also can't tell whether your last price increase was a real vendor cost or just margin.
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Question 07 of 12 · Quality
When you pull up your own website on your phone, does it load in under three seconds and look as clean as it does on a laptop?
If you answered no: More than 60% of your potential customers see your site on a phone before they ever see it on a laptop. If it's slow or broken there, you're losing them before you ever know they showed up. Ask your agency for a Google PageSpeed score on your homepage. If they hesitate, you have your answer.
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Question 08 of 12 · Quality
When someone Googles your business name, does the result show the essentials: your star rating and reviews, address, phone number, hours, and links to your main pages?
If you answered no: That block of extras is two things working together. The rating and reviews come from a claimed Google Business Profile. The hours, address, phone, and page links come from structured data on your site that tells Google what your business does and when it's open. Miss either half and you're a plain blue link while the competitor who has both fills far more of the screen at the exact moment a customer is deciding who to call. Every site we ship gets over 23 types of structured data and a managed Business Profile.
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Question 09 of 12 · Quality
If you asked your agency a handful of these questions, would you have real answers within 48 hours, and not a brush-off like "you can find the terms in your contract for review"?
If you answered no: A good agency answers your questions like a partner, not a billable opportunity. If your agency points you at your contract or takes a week to respond, the relationship has already broken down. They just haven't told you yet. We answer real questions in plain English within two business days, every time, and there's never a billable line item for explaining things you should already know.
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Question 10 of 12 · Risk
Has your agency ever tested your site for accessibility by hand, not just with an automated scanner? That means a person actually getting through your main pages with a screen reader, with a keyboard and no mouse, and with the text enlarged. And if they did test it, did your site pass?
If you answered no: Automated scanners catch only a fraction of real barriers, so a clean scan is not a pass. More than 60 million American adults live with a disability, and for many of them it shapes how they use the web. If your site doesn't work for them you're turning away customers, and you're exposed to the ADA-style claims that have hit thousands of small businesses since 2020. Accessibility isn't a nice-to-have. It's a basic professional standard your agency should have met before launch.
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Question 11 of 12 · Risk
Can your agency confirm that your website automatically blocks hacking attempts, like a fake payment form or a phishing link injected into one of your pages?
If you answered no: The defense is a Content Security Policy, a rule set that blocks injected content before a single visitor sees it. Most small-business sites don't have one. If yours doesn't, your customers' next visit could be the one a hacker uses to steal from them. And if your agency can't give you a straight answer either way, that is your answer.
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Question 12 of 12 · Risk
If you cancelled your contract with your agency tomorrow, would your website keep running with you in full control of everything?
If you answered no: If you're not sure, you're in a more vulnerable position than you think. Every month you stay locked in is another month your business runs on someone else's terms.
Count the questions you answered “no” or “I’m
not sure” to. Your total maps to one of three bands:
