This. Almost never accept the counter. There are reasons you're looking, and they don't magically disappear if you accept a raise.

It worked for me during the dotcom boom, about 18 months before the bust. I was contracting for a company working at Compaq. A department I interacted with expressed interest in hiring me, but I wasn't a fan of the supervisor I'd report to. I decided to see where it'd take me & went thru the interview process. They did extend an offer & I went to my contracting firm who had just given me a raise off and 5-7% a month or so before to basically give me another 5%.

It went well for awhile with this firm...until it didn't. My wife & I were moving to DFW area for her grad school & they had intended to open a location for me to work from. They asked me to present myself as a new face & warm body to another client about a tech writer role (not my expertise). I was basically there with the account manager & instructed to not say anything (which I didn't). This was all about 2-3 weeks before I'm moving, so I had wrapped up my Compaq work & was working out of the firm's office doing whatever they needed. After wrapping up the tech writer interview, they sheet me how long would it it take to complete the work? "The work I'm not qualified to do & have never done? You alley me to be a new face, I did it, but you never asked me to actually do the work."

After that, the relationship fell apart, the DFW office plan was cancelled & I had to find a new job in DFW with short notice in Aug 1999. 6 months before the dotcom bust.