How Much Should SEO Cost?

[Josh]

That is a great breakdown. What I have come to notice is that many people are going around claiming to be SEO experts. They spit a bunch of lingo at you that you don't understand which makes them seem like they know what they are doing. You have to be very careful when choosing someone or a company for SEO. Make sure they have some proven results - and CHECK FOR YOURSELF. Just because someone says they rank someone on the 1st page of Google doesn't mean it is true. Also, look at which keywords they are ranking. I could rank for frog-nosed widget with one blog post, but no one is going to search for that and would be pointless. You want to make sure they can rank for a keyword with high competition. You also have to realize that SEO takes time. A brand new website could take up to a year to achieve ideal rankings. You just have to keep at it.

Now back to the main question in this thread... how much should you spend? Once you find a quality SEO expert, you should be looking to spend at least $1000 per month, because there is a lot of work that goes into it. You should also expect to pay a little bit more the 1st month, as they will probably need to do some on-site optimization - but that should only happen once (with small updates from then on). There are a lot of factors that should determine the price, so make sure you sit down and go over everything.

I'm going to have to disagree with you. I think your goal is to sell SEO services and so that's why you're saying what you are, but I would have to see one hell of a plan before I'd cough up $1k/month for SEO.

 

[AgentProvocateur]

I'd love to be able to hire an SEO expert who could put me at number one with Google nationally for the key words "auto insurance quotes." It's not going to happen.

But I've had SEO people tell me how much they would charge to do it for me. A lot of SEO businesses promise you the moon, but fail to deliver as much as a moon pie.

I don't think you can "buy" your way to number one if your site does not deserve to be there. Even if you do well for a time, you are one Google update from a huge drop in traffic.
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Oh, re-reading my post made me realize you could buy your way to number one on Google -- not necessarily by SEO, but by using Ad Word.

Does anyone think spending $1,000 a month on Ad Word, instead of hiring an SEO professional, is a better use of your money?

 

[Guest]

You always struck me as more of a do it your self guy. I worked with 3 different seo companies all crap. If any of them tell you we will do :

directory submissions
social book markings
social profiles
blog comments
forum comments
article syndication
press release

don't hire them. you can honestly do all that stuff yourself. Contrary to what people will tell you on places like SEOmoz.org even after panda that stuff still works when everyone in your industry does it. I had companies telling me it would take at least a year to rank for certain terms and after 2 months of doing it myself I got 1st page results. I know the difficulty scale is logarithmic but seriously unless you got a couple thousand a month to have quality tv commercial worthy content (cause that's essentially what is considered "good" seo these days) your better off doing it yourself. Take the time to learn it youll be happier.

 

[YouGotMyMoney]

true .....very true....most of those services are automated anyway

 

[Robert1000]

SEO is a longer term solution -- 6 months of consistent work. Of course the SEO people won't tell you that. Let me guess, they'll show that you rank on page 1 of Google using some obscure term that no one searches for, like your business name! If you go with one of them, make them prove you are getting ranked on terms that actually get LOTS of monthly searches (at least 500 per month). Here's how you check --- take the term and go to the "Google Keyword Tool"... type in the term or terms you are high ranked on and see how many searches are done monthly.

Good luck!
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In the long run, you don't want to be paying for SEO. If you do it right, convert your website to Wordpress and install a FREE SEO plugin by Yoast called "Wordpress SEO".

It is the easiest, step-by-step, SEO app out there -- it's FREE and it teaches you the key points of SEO in one day!

 

[CHUMPS FROM OXFORD]

I guess this is a good time to offer my SEO package that already hundreds of Forum members have taken advantage of.

It's quite simple. It will cost you $450 ($900 for non-forum members) and an ongoing maintenance monthly fee of $95.

I GUARANTEE (Yes, that's right) I will place three of your selected search phrases on Google page 10 or better. It may take 60-360 days but it's guaranteed. If I don't do this, I refund 25% of your money.

I'll keep this offer open for about a week or so, or perhaps a few months or longer but act now!

 

[Guest]

Chumps do you accept credit card?

 

[YouGotMyMoney]

In the long run, you don't want to be paying for SEO.

we all have to pay for traffic, whether it's some variant of pay per click, or SEO=link building, online traffic is not " set it and forget it".

even if you have an extremely old site with really quality links from authority sites, you still need to do maintenance link building, since your competition is continually building links too, though the maintenance link building will be quite a bit less expensive, than what would need to be done to get a site initially ranking.

for example, I mentioned in another post I just sold two insurance lead generation sites. the buyers asked me for a quote on maintenance link building, something like that just to keep the sites from dropping in the serps,


I would charge around $1000 a month for that kind of service, to rank those same sites again, obviously on different domains, but to rank for the same keywords and get the same traffic, I would charge about $4-$5000 a month.

 

[vprincipal]

SEO should never cost $1000 a month or more. The truth is that SEO "experts" are simply outsourcing the work to the Philippines or India for pennies on the dollar. To rank local terms, $300 a month should be the maximum and it shouldn't take more than a few months to get on the first page of Google.

If you are looking for national results, you can expect the price to be higher but still far below the $1000 threshold. However, it will take more than one or two months to reach the first page.

What works the quickest? Video. YouTube videos are extremely easy to rank as Google owns YouTube. Every agent should be investing in this avenue of marketing. Video testimonials are especially effective. Type in "Best Ocala Insurance" and check out The McDonald Agency...

Another quickie is a press release. Write one and submit to 20 or 30 press release sites and you will see it appear on the front page very quickly along with a huge boost in your SEO efforts.

And lastly, Facebook pages are free and work like gangbusters. The secret is to keep engaging your users with interesting content, not strictly insurance related things that no one will share or LIKE. I have a local chiropractor up to nearly 3000 LIKES and his business has exploded through his Facebook Page. To easy to ignore!

 

[Guest]

I guess this is a good time to offer my SEO package that already hundreds of Forum members have taken advantage of.

It's quite simple. It will cost you $450 ($900 for non-forum members) and an ongoing maintenance monthly fee of $95.

I GUARANTEE (Yes, that's right) I will place three of your selected search phrases on Google page 10 or better. It may take 60-360 days but it's guaranteed. If I don't do this, I refund 25% of your money.

I'll keep this offer open for about a week or so, or perhaps a few months or longer but act now!

Yall guys oughta reelly take advantage of this offer, even if yer hurtin (financhully, that is), heel work with ya.

Chomps, thanks for takin a few of my gold fillins from my teeth for the down paymint, and I've gotta few more for the maintainance feees. I caint wait to get my terms yanked on a hi page!

Also, I bin wantin amagram fillins anyway, so this werks out jist fine (I ain't jist hurtin financhully now, though, just wanted to letcha know soes you could hurry).

Oh, yeah, sorry bout havin two send a cuple hole teeth, jist couldn git the fillin outta them too, but you got the good part, just smash it out with a hammer!

If it dont workout, just sind em back (I believe thad be 1 outta 4) and I git my good ole redneck cuzzin dat pulled em out ta hammer em back in.

Utherwize, if youre masterfull work is sussessfull like it has been with everbodyelse, I'll have enough money to git some new dintchers. I bin thinkin bout some o dem steal ones, like at big ole dude that plays the bad guy in movies like James Bond. He dont talk alot, but he sure do got an empressive smile! (See them big words in at paregraf? We kinda smart round these parts, beins why I could tell rite off you was a reel strait shitter).

Thanks agin, scuse my spelin my mouth hurts bad, and hurry, I'm drinking and eatin' liquid food with a straw stuck down my throat. The wind hurts too. Hope your done by winter cause I like to eat snow. But I know you gone do a good job on me and my websyte. Thanks and bye for now.

(Patriots cuzzin - he let me use his idee to letchu do youre job on me and my sight.)