I recently read a very good article by Jayson DeMers over at Search Engine Land (How Much Should You Spend on SEO Services? May 13, 2013). I think he gave a good and comprehensive set of tips about shopping for SEO consultants. The part of that equation I’d like to focus on is price. DeMers rightly points out that you should be suspicious of costs lower than $750 per month. I would probably put the warning light on at anything under $1000, but that’s a quibble.
However it’s amazing how many “SEO” firms are still convincing people that $250 per month can purchase them real SEO. For example, one of my clients just received a solicitation that included this tantalizing offer:
Cheap SEO? Sure we have it. It’s in the box at the back of the tent.
Our Starter SEO plan details:
Cost: $250 USD per month.
Reporting Hours: 40 per month
Keywords: 10Note: Discounts closing on 30th April.
Here you have it. SEO at Walmart prices. And an ambiguously worded offer at that. What does “Reporting Hours: 40 per month” mean? If it means that they are offering you 40 hours of SEO services per month, that would be an hourly rate of $7.50 per hour. In other words it’s either unbelievably low or it’s outsourced to India. (No offense to India, which is a technologically robust country, but in this age of quality content and informed link-building, I have yet to see an Indian SEO mill produce anything like quality work. Certainly there are Indian companies doing just this, but I doubt if even they are doing it for $250 per month).
Additionally, who gets to select the “10 keywords”? Naturally it doesn’t take much effort to rank a website for the client’s company name, or an obscure, low-traffic, low-conversion, long tail keyword phrase (think “flaming hot pink golf shoes” as an example). Essentially this is a meaningless feature.
Typically once we take students through our Master SEO Class, they come out on the other side with a new level of respect for what contemporary search engine optimization and marketing entails. I don’t think there’s a student who’s graduated at any level from the Search Engine Academy who would be willing to quote a price of $250 on a genuine Internet Marketing project. For one thing, because it would be dooming the hopeful client to disappointment.
If you’re a business person who is shopping for SEO services, I would recommend that you take DeMers advice, and mine, and beware of the low-ball price. A decent SEO program will require a monthly investment of $1000, $2000, $3000 or more per month. And at the same time, that’s still a far sight less than traditional advertising, and usually more effective. So bite the bullet, pay for what you need, and resist the temptation to go cheap.
If you’re interested in consulting an SEO professional but are still unsure about what exactly they do, read more about the services they typically offer here.
Are you serious? $1 to $3k for SEO? I would like to know what prescriptions drugs your dr gave you because I want some. For that much money my phone had better ring off the hook 24/7 and generate me a minimum of $5k per month in sales. If what you are saying is correct than I would certainly pay that and more if I could be guaranteed I could generate enough sales to break even on the SEO alone. I am spending about $485 taxes included for my SEO and I still find that price outrageous. That is for 6 keywords and I have not had the amount of calls that I thought I would have for that much. I think this whole SEO business is like selling a pig in a poke. I do recognize the fact that websites do have to be ‘found’ by search engines, but certainly a good web programmer could put something into the website to ‘attract’ search engines.
I welcome your thoughts Ross.
cheers,
master
Sorry it took so long to reply, Master. I think the prescription drugs are unnecessary if one is able to deal with reality without them. I agree, if you pay $1k per month on SEO it should generate, depending on your profit margins, several times that in added revenue. One of the things an ethical SEO will do when they first evaluate your project is tell you whether it seems that your business model warrants it. For example, when individual real estate agents ask me about SEO, I tell them frankly that I don’t think it will probably pay off for them.
The problem is that SEO, if done properly, is still time consuming and resists automation. This is primarily because Google has designed it that way. For the type of professional search marketing project that I was referring to in the post I would imagine that a business should be generating at least $500k per year in gross sales.
Otherwise, with the proper knowledge, business owners can do many things to optimize on their own a little bit at a time. Even that would be more than the majority of business owners do. This is, of course, why we offer training, namely to empower business owners and their employees to be able to do in house what they can’t afford to hire done.
By the way, if you’d like to see whether my post was the product of pharmaceutical excess, prescription or not, you might be interested in the latest fees survey conducted by Moz, here: http://moz.com/blog/seo-pricing-costs-of-services
I concur with this. It seems like in the past 3-4 years a million new “SEO Experts” have sprung up out of no where. Everyone from the graphics designer to their next door neighbor now (supposedly) knows exactly what it takes for a business to be ultra successful online. And they all charge next to nothing (or whatever they can get for your signature and a check). This is problematic for those of us who have been doing this for 10+ years. I have people call me to pick my brain and say “I’ll get back with you.” When they don’t call back I give them a courtesy call; they typically reply, saying that they found someone who could do what I described to them for much cheaper.
I guess ultimately they will get what they paid for and then sit around scratching their heads wondering why what I described to them isn’t working. It’s because you picked an experts brain for free then didn’t hire them to execute the plan silly. I like what Ayn Rand says about this, “So, you think it is expensive to hire a professional? Just wait until you’ve hired amateurs.”
Thanks for a good read Ross.
Thanks for the comment Robert. The basic problem here is what Harry Beckwith called “Selling the Invisible.” It’s a problem with most service businesses, and especially professional knowledge businesses. I plead guilty. I’m always wondering if my accountant is really worth the money. I suppose the only way to find out is to try and do my own taxes and see what sort of a mess I’m in in 5 years. Uh, no thanks.
Ross – thanks for discussing this super important but often overlooked topic in SEO. I personally think that’s why the Search Engine Academy is such a great solution for many business owners. Maybe they don’t currently have the budget to hire an SEO company or consultant – but they do want to learn how to make a difference in their online marketing.
It’s about return on investment, technical knowledge, and in-house staff. Maybe they have someone in-house who can take the class, learn the basics and help move the online marketing needle. For a smaller, local business that may be the best solution – at least to get started.
Definitely better than paying $250 a month for basically no services.
I agree, Beth. I personally think that $250 per month SEO is the true rip-off.
I could not agree with you more Robert. Though I used to look at SEO much like Master does, Conversions, Authority, Traffic, Optimization, Content, etc.. Are all words I was familiar with, that is until I was introduced to the wonderful, anxiety ridden world of Search Engine Optimization. I tried building a website and implementing SEO on my own. I read several books, sought advice from anyone who would give it, and ended up seeing just how complicating, time consuming, difficult, and most of all “Essential” SEO is to a business.
Master, I would recommend doing yourself, and your business a favor and finding an SEO introductory workshop. You will see just how amazingly crucial to not only yours, but every business looking to succeed.
Great post Ross!
I agree, Buth. I personally think that $250 per month SEO is the true rip-off
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The part of that equation I’d like to focus on is price. DeMers rightly points out that you should be suspicious of costs lower than $750 per month.
I agree. I believe it’s possible to do work for less than $750, but not much of it. So unless the client’s expectations are very, very low the relationship will not end well.
For local SEO, first you should select local niche keyword and done meta work and then start doing local business listing it will be good for your local business.
Nice Article! Thank you for sharing this informative post.