How to price SEO services ?

14 years ago

You should have packages with pricess 397$/month, 497$/month, 697$/month, 997$/month depending on the competitiveness & number of keywords, pages and some other SEO factors.

And yes, you should charge monthly.

best,

Orkhan Azer

Originally Posted by Neil K

Hi All!

I've got to give a quote for a new project that's come through for SEO. The main keywords are "medium" competition on Google Keyword tools, and the first website on the SERPs has about 350 links on Yahoo site explorer.

What do you think we can quote keeping in mind we are an Indian startup (it's an Indian client)? Since content is integral we're going to do the blogging for his site for a month, 20 posts, coming up to $175 odd per month. How do we charge for the other SEO services? monthly? I was wondering if $500 a month for backlink building was good to go. And how much time would it take? 6 months?

I've got someone who works in my office full time doing link building, he's a bit of a noob, and my decent SEO exposure and experience. How much do I charge for this service, and is good link building enough to get a page on to the top of Google? Probably thinking of going for Angela's and Paul's back link packages as well.

Thanks in advance!
Neil

Thanks

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TristanPerry

14 years ago

Personally I'd scout out other SEOs and see what they charge (a decent number have prices on their website, or will give them out to you if you drop them a quick e-mail) and go from there.

Out of interest... what exactly do you mean by your full time staff member is a "noob"? :p

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Neil K 14 years ago

Originally Posted by TristanPerry

Out of interest... what exactly do you mean by your full time staff member is a "noob"? :p

Haha, well he's learning SEO, something of a trainee, you could say. We're not into SEO as a primary service. Our primary service is content writing. I guide him on any projects we take up, such as this one. Of course all the learning comes with experience, and since none of us are gurus, we're all noobs in our own way
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fanatic123

14 years ago

Firstly you don't sound like a SEO company, else you wouldn't be asking such questions. You quote the prices according to the requirement of the job!

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Neil K 14 years ago

We are not an SEO company, which is why I'm asking how this works!
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thealeksandar

14 years ago

I priced according to the requirements so far, I don't have any prepared packages. Althought, some rough price package could save your time with clients who think you could work on their SEO for $20.
The other way is to price per hour, too. And when you see the site and do initial analyze, you could give roughly time needed per month.

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thelastmuse

14 years ago

We're an SEO company and we offer per package pricing, which includes X number of keywords, X number of links, X number of articles, press release, so on. We like to itemize everything since most of our clients like getting what they pay for and they want to know exactly what we did on their website and where we built links or submitted articles.

Thanks

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orvn

14 years ago

Originally Posted by Neil K

Hi All!

I've got to give a quote for a new project that's come through for SEO. The main keywords are "medium" competition on Google Keyword tools, and the first website on the SERPs has about 350 links on Yahoo site explorer.

What do you think we can quote keeping in mind we are an Indian startup (it's an Indian client)? Since content is integral we're going to do the blogging for his site for a month, 20 posts, coming up to $175 odd per month. How do we charge for the other SEO services? monthly? I was wondering if $500 a month for backlink building was good to go. And how much time would it take? 6 months?

I've got someone who works in my office full time doing link building, he's a bit of a noob, and my decent SEO exposure and experience. How much do I charge for this service, and is good link building enough to get a page on to the top of Google? Probably thinking of going for Angela's and Paul's back link packages as well.

Thanks in advance!
Neil

PRO TIPs.

Here in Canada, I charge 1200/month for essentially basic link-building.
I charge more for driving social traffic (2500/month for 100,000+ hits & link-building). Per capita income in India is lower, so I don't expect you to charge this much.

I normally don't waste my money on PPC, unless it's Facebook.

I do local SEO: I look for local clients and usually guarantee first place placement in SERP's. You heard me. I said guarantee. It's not that hard to rank for local search keywords.

IMPORTANT STUFF:
Split clients into four categories,
based on yield (amount of money each customer is likely to spend in the target business)
and volume (amount of customers the business gets).

1) Low yield, low volume.
example: hairdresser

2) Low yield, high volume.
example: restaurant

3) High yield low volume.
example: accountant, lawyer, realtor, interior designer

4) High yield, high volume
examples: household (electrician, roofer, plumber), medical (dentist, optometrist, chiropractor)

You need categories 3/4. Mostly 4, but 3's have a lot of influence. They tend to refer you to many people when you do an awesome job.

Business owners want a good ROI when paying you that 1200 dollars. It's hard to justify giving someone hundreds of dollars up-front when you're a hairdresser. You have to cut a lot of hair to make that money back.

For a plumber on the other hand, that's only a handful of clients. It isn't hard to convince him that he needs to expand to the Internet and get onto a playing field where he can really get some business.

note that retail locations could fall in any category- be selective.

1 out of 3 searches is for a local business.
83% of people search a product online before purchasing it.
46% of US SMB's businesses do not have a website.

It's your ball-game, really.

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Neil K

14 years ago

Originally Posted by orvn

PRO TIPs.

Here in Canada, I charge 1200/month for essentially basic link-building.
I charge more for driving social traffic (2500/month for 100,000+ hits & link-building). Per capita income in India is lower, so I don't expect you to charge this much.

I normally don't waste my money on PPC, unless it's Facebook.

I do local SEO: I look for local clients and usually guarantee first place placement in SERP's. You heard me. I said guarantee. It's not that hard to rank for local search keywords.

IMPORTANT STUFF:
Split clients into four categories,
based on yield (amount of money each customer is likely to spend in the target business)
and volume (amount of customers the business gets).

1) Low yield, low volume.
example: hairdresser

2) Low yield, high volume.
example: restaurant

3) High yield low volume.
example: accountant, lawyer, realtor, interior designer

4) High yield, high volume
examples: household (electrician, roofer, plumber), medical (dentist, optometrist, chiropractor)

You need categories 3/4. Mostly 4, but 3's have a lot of influence. They tend to refer you to many people when you do an awesome job.

Business owners want a good ROI when paying you that 1200 dollars. It's hard to justify giving someone hundreds of dollars up-front when you're a hairdresser. You have to cut a lot of hair to make that money back.

For a plumber on the other hand, that's only a handful of clients. It isn't hard to convince him that he needs to expand to the Internet and get onto a playing field where he can really get some business.

note that retail locations could fall in any category- be selective.

1 out of 3 searches is for a local business.
83% of people search a product online before purchasing it.
46% of US SMB's businesses do not have a website.

It's your ball-game, really.

PURE AWESOMENESS. This is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks so much orvn, really appreciate it!

Thanks
1 reply

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orvn

14 years ago

Originally Posted by Neil K

PURE AWESOMENESS. This is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks so much orvn, really appreciate it!

My pleasure. I've really been getting good at the local SEO lately. I don't think enough people work on this.

Here's something else worth noting:

Local keyphrases are MUCH easier to rank for than global ones. Consider this procedure.

STEP 1
Make almost ALL your keywords local. By that I mean use keyword+geography as your keyword,

Naturally, "plumber bangalore" is much easier to rank for than "plumber".
You might want to check out search volume by locale (neighbourhood, city, town) and then analyze how those keywords match up in terms of competitiveness.

STEP 2
Basic SEO stuff: Throw in METAs, 301 redirect, make sure you have a conversion form, etc.

STEP 3
Add as much info as you can to Google maps (Google maps = local search),
Add ratings for Google maps, get some other people with Gmail accounts to give it a positive review or two.
(NOTE: when giving a google map review, DO NOT just post 10 reviews and ratings at once. Google will know that you're trying to cheat it, instead, wait a few days in between each one).

STEP 4
Build 8-10 links per day for one month to dofollow:
1) blogs (leave comments on relevant blogs)
2) forums (create new username, make a signature, post plenty)
3) look for government sites, .edu forums, wikis and anything with a high page rank where you can leave a message.

One month later you have 240-300 new links. Most of them are high quality.
Within six weeks your client is getting A LOT of business. They're probably on page 1.

Convince them that you're an awesome ROI and keep them going for another year or two (as long as you want really).

Keep building links. Mininum 5/day. Get some cheap data entry labour if your time is needed elsewhere (like getting more clients!)

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phoenix2010

14 years ago

what keyword tools do you use for your local search - and how do you get the search volume by local. thanks

Thanks
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orvn

14 years ago

Originally Posted by eredas

what keyword tools do you use for your local search - and how do you get the search volume by local. thanks

Well, I'm a big fan of Market Samurai. That software is GOLD.

I also use Google trends, Google insights, Microsoft Adcenter labs, etc. for general research.

A "local search" is, by definition = "regular search" + "geographic indicator".
The best geographic indicators are specific ones cities, towns, neighbourhoods and (in some cases) streets.

These are fairly easy to rank for, unlike global searches.
I have NEVER had a problem ranking first page for a local search within 3 months- not yet at least, lol. I guess it could happen.

There's a lot less competition when you throw in your city. Check it out in Market Samurai. You can use their trail version for 30 days, then you'll have to upgrade for $100, but it is EXTREMELY worth it.

Keyword Analysis Tool - Market Samurai

You'll notice that a few days ago, Google local search (which is the same as maps) changed!

Check this article out:
What Does Google Places SERP Update Mean for Local Search?

This is very good news for us, as now, it's even easier to rank.
The formula to getting into the top 20 local google results?

A few hundred constantly built backlinks + good google maps ratings from people in the area + good reviews.

You'll be their before you know it and it won't be hard to convince your client to pay you the same amount, for yet another month.

This is what I do for a living lol, I don't bother with the PPC/Adsense stuff

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opiniones

14 years ago

Originally Posted by orvn

A few hundred constantly built backlinks + good google maps ratings from people in the area + good reviews.

You'll be their before you know it and it won't be hard to convince your client to pay you the same amount, for yet another month.

This is what I do for a living lol, I don't bother with the PPC/Adsense stuff

Do you have a formula for a time estimate on completion of work? I mean if they give you a site and tell you to get it to the first page i'm sure you could do that maybe in a month or 2 working a lot of hours everyday (but that wouldn't be very smart in terms of long term monthly residual income if you get people's pages to the first page too fast now would it?)

I mean how do you measure this stuff? How do you measure how much work to do/how much work not to do, how do you contain yourself from getting them to #1 too soon?

Thanks

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Aaronsmith

14 years ago

Thanks for this question

Thanks

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harro1

14 years ago

Think of quality rather than quantity, lot's of crap work is better than little quality work.

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orvn

14 years ago

Originally Posted by harro1

Think of quality rather than quantity, lot's of crap work is better than little quality work.

Lol, don't you mean it the other way around in the second part of your sentence? :p

Originally Posted by opiniones

Do you have a formula for a time estimate on completion of work? I mean if they give you a site and tell you to get it to the first page i'm sure you could do that maybe in a month or 2 working a lot of hours everyday (but that wouldn't be very smart in terms of long term monthly residual income if you get people's pages to the first page too fast now would it?)

I mean how do you measure this stuff? How do you measure how much work to do/how much work not to do, how do you contain yourself from getting them to #1 too soon?

I usually promise some sort of a jump within the first month, and first or second page guaranteed within the first three months (a season). It's quite easy to get it long before that.

I'm actually quite new at this, but usually, I convince a client to keep paying me month-after-month for at least a year (that's $14,400/client/year!)

You bring up an important point: why would a client keep paying me if I already delivered?

1) Business owners are desperate. We live in a post-recession world. These people know that newspapers and the yellow pages don't do the trick anymore. You are a GODSEND to them. Once they see the results, you'll be their new best friend.

2) You're still building links! Consistently and all the time. These are your assets, you control them.

3) The client is getting incredible ROI for what you're providing. They're giving you a penny for every dollar they make, essentially.

4) Sometimes clients get cocky. If this is the case, show them how much all the business you've given them would cost if it were done using PPC Google Ads.

5) Lastly, you can subtly suggest that you may go to a competitor. Just be subtle and explain that you're still working on the site. Keeping them on #1 with constant link building.

Steps 4 & 5 are drastic and I've only used them once.

Most clients are actually EXPANDING their business by the third month. They'll love you. They'll give you gifts. One of them asked me out once, lol. But that might be because I'm just a handsome devil and she was powerless against my charisma.

ANYWAYS, to answer your question: let's say they get on page 1 in 3 weeks.

Tell them that you're going to make them #1 over the next year and you're going to make sure it stays that way.

They'll probably want other SEO services from you eventually also. Build a blog or do something fun. DESTROY their competitors.

When link building gets to tedious/time-consuming, outsource the work for cheap! (:

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mihu

Banned 14 years ago

[DELETED]

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orvn

14 years ago

Originally Posted by mihu

I think this is very flexible, according to rankings for a fee, require specific identification of the number of keywords and ranking, with sales divided by charge, set into an agreement with the merchants,

Another great payment system is a %age.

X percent off all web generated sales go to you, every month after the first month.

This is easier to implement when you're confident in your abilities to push a local site to page 1.

Thanks

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info02web

14 years ago

SEO Pricing can be done on the following factors

Keyword

No. of pages in the website

Duration for which SEO to be done

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trooperbill

14 years ago

realise you can only effectively manage at most 8 decent size clients which should generate at least double your intended income... if you have more clients who pay a lower fee, they will take up more of your time with chat, reporting, analysis etc so i'd go for larger clients who you can devote a nice portion of time to

if things go well, contract (not employ) someone to assist you (so you can drop them if the bottom falls out of your market i.e. 9/11)

split your fees across the following term types:

single word vanity terms (costs the most)
double word high competitiion terms (medium costs)
double word low competition i.e. regional (lowest costs)

and then work out how your clients fall - this will help you manage their expectations

set a minimum contract length in which time you can gage a fair result i.e. 3 months and stick to it!

i try and only work for clients who have a minimum of £1000 per month to spend on their campaigns, some are more, a small minority are less (friends etc)

the most importnat advice i can give is dont do anyone any favours - they'll expect the same favours for free or at a reduced rate and its a recipe for disaster. if they are serious, they will pay!

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Regards, Mark

###
owner of markrushworth.com

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yanivkalfa

14 years ago

This isnt easy. what i would do is check all the backlinks first check the age of the first places domains. then check the age/pr of the backlinks.

it would give you a rough estimation on how hard it would be to bit the top 10.
then start thinking on how much it would cost you to buy links. to submit links to directories networks, social M, links wheels and so on.

Imo thats how you should work your price. how much work would involve to get enough backlink for your client in- order to beat the competitor.

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