Understanding
the Many, Many Variables
First off you have to
understand the marketplace dynamics which affect SEO success and
pricing. How competitive is your industry? How competitive are the
areas you serve?
For example, an SEO
website tune-up for a chiropractor in a small suburban town might shoot
the site to the top of local rankings, while the same tune-up for an
identical practice in a major metropolis might only improve rankings
slightly.
Furthermore, the value
of improving rankings can vary dramatically from business to business
and the amount of available traffic in a particular market. For some
local businesses, being on the first page of Google results leads to a
dramatic increase in leads and revenue while others only a marginal
difference.
Next comes considering
the starting position of a business’ complete digital presence. How
large is the website? Is the site structure well for SEO? How much
keyword-rich content does the site hold? How many technical SEO issues
does the site have? How many links and referring domains are pointing
to the website? Is the business listed accurately on local listing
sites? The list goes on.
For example, it is not
uncommon for an outdated and slow website to rank higher than a
technically-perfect newer website because the older site has a robust
and hard-earned back-link profile. No site’s SEO is perfect. The
entirety of the digital presence has to be taken into account and then
you can develop a strategy that addresses important weaknesses.
Common Pricing
Models
Back in late 2011, SEO
powerhouse MOZ conducted a survey of over 600 agencies in order to
understand variations in SEO services pricing models. While this survey
is now over a decade old and MOZ admits the survey isn’t perfectly
scientific, it does provide a solid general understanding of how most
agencies price this type of work.
Some key takeaways from
the survey:
- Project-based pricing
is by far the most popular model. Around 70% of the agencies
surveyed said it’s their most commonly used scheme with projects
falling into the four price ranges: $1,001-$1,500, $1,501-$2,500,
$2501-$5,000 and $5,001-$7,500.
- Monthly retainer
pricing models, specifically the monthly rate, vary radically from
agency to agency. The two most common were $251-$500/month and
$2,501-$5,000/month.
- Most
agencies offer project-based, retainer-based and hourly based
pricing models in order to fit the diverse needs and budget of
clients. It is a competitive marketplace and it seems agencies are
very willing to adjust their systems to retain clients.
Main Street
ROI’s SEO Pricing
Over the years working
with hundreds of SEO clients, we’ve learned how to tailor our SEO
services to the unique needs of each client, and we tailor our plans to
our clients’ budgets.
We determine a scope of
work by breaking down factors such as:
- How
big is the website? How many pages need optimization?
- How
much content development is needed, particularly if the site is
obviously lacking important pages?
- How
many technical issues need to be fixed?
- If
it’s a local business, are there multiple locations requiring
business profile listing setup or edits?
- How
many backlinks does the website have? If there are not many, we’ll
allocate more budget to focus on building a stronger link
foundation.
- How
strong is the competition?
- Are
there aspects of the work that our client can handle on their end?
For a typical small
business website, we often recommend a budget of around $1,000/month.
In month 1, we focus on conducting an SEO audit, analyzing the
competition, and optimizing the top 10 priority pages. Then, beginning
in month 2, we resolve technical issues from our audit and continue to
optimize more pages, build out content, and build links and citations.
For larger websites,
we’ll often recommend a higher initial fee of $2,000 – $3,000, and at
those budget levels we would be optimizing 30-50 pages in the first
month vs 10 pages. And then at higher monthly SEO budget levels of
$2,000 – $3,000 per month, we’re devoting more resources to content
development, technical auditing and fixing, and link-building work each
month.
At the same time, a
major factor in pricing our SEO services is the client’s budget. We
understand that most small businesses have SEO budgets in the hundreds
of dollars versus thousands. That’s why we also provide reduced scope
options at budget levels below $1000 per month, such as $500/month and
$750/month.
With reduced monthly
SEO reduced fees, we have fewer hours to invest in the work, so we
execute our strategy at a reduced speed and with a reduced scope of
work. In practice, this means it may take us an additional month to
complete the initial optimization of some priority pages, and we’ll
develop less content per month and build fewer links per month on an
ongoing basis.
We also offer one-time SEO
projects for clients who are interested in getting SEO help but aren’t
yet ready to commit to ongoing monthly SEO services. And those projects
are priced based on the number of pages we’re optimizing (for example,
$1,000 for 10 pages, $1,500 for 20 pages, etc).
The Bottom Line
A successful SEO
strategy involves evaluating many variables and forging a path forward
within the client’s budget. ‘How much does SEO cost?’ will always be a
tricky question, but it’s important to recognize that — with the right
strategy — progress can be made at nearly every price point.
In our experience, SEO
is one of the best marketing investments you can make — and the faster
you begin, the sooner you can start reaping the rewards. So, even if
you only have a limited budget to start, it’s always better to get
started rather than putting it off.
Need Help with
SEO?
Contact us today to request
a quote for SEO services
|
No comments:
Post a Comment