Consulting · Retainer
Fractional head of organic growth.
An ongoing partnership. We own the roadmap, hold the standards on execution, and act as the senior organic operator inside your leadership team — peer-to-peer with your CEO or COO.
The engagement
Not an SEO retainer. Not a content package.
This is a leadership-layer engagement. The senior operator assigned to you sits inside your organization's planning cadence — in the roadmap conversations, the board-prep conversations, and the hard trade-off conversations about where to invest.
What sits underneath — the technical work, the AEO groundwork, the content pipeline, the automation — runs through Leaf, Harvest, your in-house team, or a mix. The retainer is what makes those parts compose into a channel instead of a stack of deliverables.
What we own
The full stack of an organic growth function.
Strategy
Quarterly organic roadmap aligned to your business goals — pipeline, retention, brand, or all three.
Prioritization
What gets built, in what order, and why. We hold the line on the roadmap so your team doesn't re-litigate every quarter.
Measurement
A reporting layer that ties organic traffic, AEO citations, conversion, and pipeline to revenue — legible to your leadership and board.
Delivery orchestration
Coordinating Leaf, Harvest, in-house teams, and any existing partners under one plan. One accountable owner across vendors.
Standards
Technical SEO, AEO, content, and reporting baselines the whole delivery layer works against. Non-negotiable, kept current.
Growth leadership
Board-level reporting cadence, hiring frameworks, and the fractional presence of a senior organic operator inside your leadership team.
Cadence
Predictable rhythm. Async by default.
Weekly
60-minute working session with leadership
Monthly
Written report + async check-ins
Quarterly
Business review + roadmap refresh
Always
Async access on Slack and email
Investment
Retainer pricing.
Fractional retainer
$7,500
/month, starting
- · Weekly leadership working session
- · Monthly reporting + async access
- · Quarterly business review
- · Delivery orchestration across Leaf, Harvest, and your teams
Quarterly minimum. Scope tunes to the shape of your growth function.
Book a callWhat's included
Everything above the delivery layer.
Strategy, roadmap, prioritization, measurement, standards, and leadership presence. Delivery work — the actual monthly SEO, AEO, content, or automation — is quoted separately through Leaf, Harvest, or your existing partners.
This split keeps the retainer honest: you never pay senior consulting rates for executional hours.
FAQ
Questions before signing.
Do you write briefs and manage delivery, or just set strategy?
Both. Strategy without a written brief is a suggestion. We write the briefs, define the specs, and hold delivery to them — through Leaf, Harvest, or whatever team is executing.
What if we have an in-house SEO or growth team already?
That's often the ideal setup. Clover slots in as the leadership layer above your team, not as competition to it. Your team gains a peer they can bring hard problems to.
How do you work with our other agencies?
We coordinate them. Most retainer partnerships have at least one existing agency on the roster. Our job is to give them a single roadmap and consistent standards to work against, so their delivery compounds instead of fragmenting.
Can we test-drive before a quarterly commitment?
The fixed-scope project is the intended trial. It runs 6–8 weeks, ends with a defined deliverable, and credits toward the first quarter of retainer if you convert.
Do you subcontract the work?
No. The senior operator on your account is on our team, full-time. Where execution requires productized delivery, we route through Leaf or Harvest — never through anonymous subcontractors.
Every quarter is a decision to renew.
We only keep partnerships where both sides can point at what compounded. Start with a 20-minute call.