One of the top things I can do to help a small business owner, is to save them money. There are enough costs in just running your business, with rent/lease, inventory, insurance, phones, payroll, etc. To add SEO (Search Engine Optimization) on top of it, can be hard to manage.
So…What Does Search Engine Optimization Cost?
According to Forbes Magazine, the typical cost of a BASIC SEO campaign for a small business runs around $750/month. And FULL SERVICE SEO runs anywhere from $2500/month to $10,000/month or more.Granted the later is for larger companies, but there are small businesses paying around $1000/month for SEO services.
Additionally, most SEO’s and Agencies will try to get you to sign a 12-month contract but the least they’ll accept is usually a 6-month contract.
So…
A 6-month contract at $750 a month…would equal a total cost to you of $4,500 over the course of the contract. A 12-month contract at $1000/mo, would end up running you $12,000.
Not exactly chump change. Many don’t have that extra in their budget as they are just trying to get their business off the ground. But if you did have that extra money; what if you could do some of this work yourself and save 70% to 80%? What would and could you do with the extra cash, to grow your business in other ways?
There are two key reasons why pricing and contract length for SEO have been set up like this.
1) Front Loaded
First off, to do SEO right…there is a decent amount of work and analysis that has to take place at the very beginning. A trained SEO has to review the pages of your site and look for issues, errors, and deficiencies that can cause problems with your site not showing up in Google search aka organic rankings, for keywords and search phrases you’re hoping your potential customers will find you for. Additionally, they will (should) check your Google Analytics and Google Search Console (formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools), to tweak or set them up for you, if they are not already set up.
This first analysis alone will often run through the first month’s budget but they need to do keyword research and optimize title tags, meta descriptions, and content based on the keywords the business owner is trying to target. In a very short period of time, they have spent more money on the site, versus what they have actually received from the client. Add to that, the cost to do business as an SEO agency is SIGNIFICANT. I have a whole breakdown of it here. But the short of it is that they are in a position where they really HAVE to get a longer term commitment from their potential client in order for it to make sense for them and in order for them to turn a profit.
2) It Takes Time
“The Day You Plant The Seed Is Not The Day You Eat The Fruit”
Google is the biggest search engine in. the. WORLD.
To think that anyone is going to make a few (or a lot) of changes and suddenly be #1 in search is not only unrealistic, it’s quite humorous. For websites that have been around for awhile, you could see some results a little faster than a brand new site but even at that, it is going to take 45 to 60 days to start seeing some results.
Optimizing your site and SEO is a lot like planting a tree. First, nothing will happen until you at least get the seed in the ground and then start watering it. Then…it’ll start to grow. Slowly but surely and it’ll get bigger and bigger and more branches will continue to reach out into new space that it wasn’t able to get to before. So it is imperative that you get the seed planted sooner than later.
So Why Do It?
Well, because over 4 BILLION people are actively connected to the internet and its content, daily. So, when you are able to increase your website’s rankings, and website presence online, TRAFFIC will come to your site/store.
There is no doubt that a site that employs both online marketing efforts and traditional marketing efforts is going to be more successful than a business just doing one or the other. Additionally, and as you probably already know…EVERYONE has and uses their smartphone as a resource.
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There are so many potential customers on their PC’s, tablets, and smartphones, it is simply foolish to not have some sort of web presence and attempt to grow your customer reach online. I can assure you that your competition is doing it.
Before SEO could be cost prohibitive. But now you can start and do it at a fraction of the cost.
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