Hermes Agent is Nous Research’s always-on agent. It lives on a cheap VPS or your own machine, talks to you on Telegram, Discord, Slack and the CLI, and keeps working after you close the laptop. That is a different shape from Claude Code. Claude Code is a conversation you sit in. Hermes is a worker you leave running.
The missing piece, for SEO, is live search data. Hermes can browse and extract pages. It cannot see keyword volume, difficulty, or who ranks on Google unless you give it a data source. ContextBolt SEO is that source: a hosted SEO MCP server you add as one HTTP block.
Add it in config.yaml
Official Hermes docs put remote MCP servers under mcp_servers with a url key. Open ~/.hermes/config.yaml and add:
mcp_servers:
contextbolt-seo:
url: "https://seo.contextbolt.app/mcp/YOUR_TOKEN"That is the whole config. No command, no npx, no Authorization header. The token is already in the path. Restart Hermes or run /reload-mcp, then ask it what SEO tools it has. Hermes prefixes MCP tools as mcp_<server>_<tool>, so you will see names like mcp_contextbolt-seo_keyword_research.
You can also use the catalog installer for Nous-reviewed servers (hermes mcp install). ContextBolt SEO is a hosted URL you already have, so the YAML block is the faster path.
Treat the URL like a password. Hermes will call it from whichever machine the agent runs on, which is what you want, and it is also why the file should not land in a public repo.
The longer how-to, with the weekly workflows and the honest limits, is SEO with Hermes. For the wider picture, including Grok Bot and OpenClaw, start at SEO for agents.
How to connect ContextBolt SEO to Hermes Agent
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Subscribe and get your MCP URL
Subscribe to ContextBolt SEO ($35/month for 1,000 lookups). Your private MCP URL arrives by email and looks like https://seo.contextbolt.app/mcp/YOUR_TOKEN. Keep it private, like a password.
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Add the server to config.yaml
Open ~/.hermes/config.yaml and add a remote HTTP server under mcp_servers. Use the url key, not command. Hermes supports stdio and HTTP in the same file. Save the file.
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Reload Hermes and check the tools
Start Hermes or run /reload-mcp, then ask 'what SEO tools do you have?'. You should see keyword research, SERP overview, and the rest listed as mcp_contextbolt-seo_* tools.
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Connect Search Console (optional, free)
Ask 'connect my Google Search Console', approve read-only access on Google's consent screen, and Hermes can read your real clicks and positions. Those tools never spend lookups.
Example prompts for ContextBolt SEO + Hermes Agent
Once connected, try asking Hermes Agent. Every one of these is copyable.
Every weekday at 9am, pull Search Console for the last 7 days. Flag any query that dropped more than 10 positions with at least 20 impressions. Uses Hermes's built-in scheduler plus the free Search Console tools, so a drop report lands in Telegram without spending a lookup.
Research five keywords around this topic with volume, difficulty, and intent. Save the shortlist before you draft anything. Calls keyword_research so a draft starts from real demand, not a guess.
Who ranks in the top 10 for this query, and can we beat them? Chains serp_overview and keyword_difficulty so the agent sees the live page one and a difficulty score before it writes.
Who links to our closest competitor but not to us? Rank the prospects. Calls backlink_gap and returns a spam-scored outreach list. Backlink calls cost three lookups each.
What you can do with ContextBolt SEO in Hermes Agent
Run keyword research in plain English from Telegram, Discord, Slack, or the CLI
Score how hard a keyword is to rank for before the agent drafts
See who ranks in Google's top 10 for any query
Size up any domain's traffic, keywords, and authority
Find the keywords a competitor already ranks for
Spot backlink gaps: who links to rivals but not you
Connect your own Google Search Console, read-only and free
Schedule the same research to run while you are offline
Get a shareable SEO Board that fills itself with your research, free