What Does SEO And SEM For Small Businesses Really Cost?

SEO business expenses, what no one really talks about

A common concern that many businesses approach us with is the overall cost of their SEO and SEM marketing efforts.  Through due diligence, the owners or managers have already contacted several SEO or SEM companies or consultants for quotes to find out that not only is there a huge disparity in prices, but also that SEO/SEM companies or consultants offer vastly different services.

What most have in common is that a monthly service fee ($275 – $1500) is involved and no guarantees on results are made.

You can’t game Google for the long term. If your SEO/SEM consultant doesn’t understand this, then they could be using methods and tactics that violate Google’s TOS and cause your site to become de-indexed, or, no longer ranking for any keyword.  SEO/SEM consultants that understand this, also understand the relation long term and lasting keyword rankings have with consistent, qualitative, and authoritative content.

Since we creatively tailor our SEO/SEM solutions to each business and vertical we work with, we spend a lot of time explaining and educating them on what our services are, and what they can realistically expect.  The following should assist you in evaluating the costs of SEO and SEM, as applied to your business

Do Local Businesses Really Need SEO and SEM?

Using SEO and SEM to promote local businesses is still a relatively new form of marketing, however, within the last three years it’s become mainstream. Quickly.  It offers the following advantages over traditional forms of marketing:

• Ability to track marketing adspend and ROI (you can establish as many KPI’s and metrics as you’d like)
• More levels of social interaction with current and potential clients/customers (and we should all still remember that every interaction with a customer is a form of marketing)
• Costs less than traditional forms of advertising (yellow pages, television, radio)

Does your SEO/SEM Consultant make this distinction?

One clear distinction that any SEO/SEM consultant should make for you, without smoke and mirrors is that  SEO (Search Engine Optimization)  is work done on your website to make it easier for the search engines to index your site while SEM (Search Engine Marketing) is all the work done off of your website to promote it.  Understanding this one distinction should make it easier for any business owner to more accurately gauge the prices they are being charged.

SEO can be automated using Content Management Systems (WordPress or Joomla) and certain plug-in’s or extensions.  It’s far less  expensive to pay a SEO consultant a one time fee to convert your website to a CMS and have your SEO automated than it is to maintain a static website.

SEM is manhour intensive as it involves actively promoting your website for the targeted keywords.  Successful SEM is done on a consistent and daily basis and is generally not automated with software tools unless they can be scheduled, humanized, and appear natural.

SEO is not SEM.  SEO alone does not drive traffic to your website, SEM does.  SEM does not optimize your website, SEO does.  While not codependent, better results can be obtained by using both SEO and SEM.  When SEO and SEM are done correctly, your business has better chances of generating local leads online.  The more leads your business has will have a direct impact on the number of sales made.

What does local Search Engine Marketing and Online Lead Generation really cost?

Rather than focus on the initial cost and outlay it’s best to focus solely on ROI.  This is the best part of SEO/SEM- the measured and demonstrable ROI to your business.  Any SEO/SEM consultant should address this main factor in their presentation or project estimate.  If not, then maybe they really don’t understand SEO and SEM as marketing tools. At the very least, they should be tracking your keyword’s rankings in organic search as compared to the volume of daily searches performed for that keyword.  Additionally, they should be tracking number of visitors to your website, bounce rate (and whether PPC or CPV efforts are contributing to this), converted sales, call tracking (using kall8 or ringcentral) and whether they’re using a mobile platform.

To know your ROI implies you also know what the value of a customer is to you.  Of course, the value is relative to the vertical your business is in.  For instance, one client of ours, a plastic surgeon in DC averaged his client value to be at least $2780.92.  If his online lead generation efforts (through SEO/SEM) generate enough leads that only one new client per month is achieved, then he would have generated an additional 33371.04 per year.  Our SEO/SEM project, with site redesign, competitive intelligence, keyword research and content creation was $14,700.00 for six months.  He averages six new clients, or, $16685.52 in additional revenue per month now, making the $2450.00/month for six months money well spent.  He’s happy to continue to pay us to maintain those rankings for him, at only $980.00/month.

If you look at your SEO/SEM budget solely in terms of ROI, it forces your SEO/SEM consultant to produce demonstrable results.

What should be considered when estimating a SEO/SEM project for local businesses?

The basic factors involved when looking at the costs of any SEO/SEM project:

• Number of keywords targeted
• Current levels of competition for your keywords
• Content (who’s creating it?)
• Number of backlinks being created per month
• Estimated ROI
• SEO/SEM Consultant’s business model
• Experience level of SEO/SEM consultant
• Geographical location
• Is PPC/CPV involved?

Number of keywords your SEO/SEM efforts are targeting: Many SEO/SEM companies charge based on the number of keywords being promoted.  For each keyword, content must be developed and then promoted.  Accounts and profiles need to be created on Web 2.0 sites to distribute your content.  And then other forms of promotion, like bookmarking, pinging, RSS feeds, etc. need to be used.  Depending on competition, expect to pay about $200 – $300, per month on each keyword you are targeting. As you achieve rankings for each keyword, ensure that your SEO/SEM consultant places these keywords on a ‘maintenance phase’, usually at a 60-70% reduction.  The reason?  It costs much more to achieve keyword rankings than it does to maintain them.

Current levels of competition for your keywords: If your keyword has over 50 million competing pages, chances are it’s one that is highly competitive.  Generally the more competitive the keyword, the longer it may take to organically rank your site for that keyword.  Be leery of any SEO/SEM consultant that says otherwise.  Sure, short term results can be achieved using borderline black hat methods, but as stated above- you can’t game Google for the long term.  A local D.C. bank could not realistically compete for the short keyword Mortgage Loans, but they could compete for D.C. mortgage loans. With competition analysis comes keyword research.  If you have never done this yourself or don’t know how to, ensure your SEO/SEM consultant does.  You want to target keywords that your customers or clients use to find your business online.  Often, what you think your keywords should be are different than what your customers are using.  Thorough keyword research should include demographics as well as levels of search volume attached to that keyword.  You can rank for a keyword that only has 2 searches a month, but would that really generate more leads to your business?  Typically, we charge $750 for a thorough and complete keyword evaluation, to include research and competitive analysis.

Content (who’s creating it?): This will be something any business owner will need to pay close attention to.  Who will develop the content, you, or your SEO/SEM consultant?  What content will be developed- videos, articles, press releases, podcasts? Will the content be outsourced?  Will the content be made available for review before distribution and syndication?  Will the content be spun and repurposed? Finally, who owns the content?  Ensure you retain data rights to the content and that this is reflected in your contract. As an example, through our pool of native english speakers, we offer authoritative articles and white papers, 1000 – 1500 words to our clients for $40.00.  They retain the data rights.

Number of backlinks being created per month?: If your business website has been online for several years and has relatively few backlinks to it, chances are that if your SEO/SEM consultant drops 5000 backlinks to it in one month that these links will be seen as spam and not natural growth. Ideally, any backlink building strategies should be done daily, consistently, and slowly.  Backlink Packets can be used, but you’d only be dropping links at the same time and place as 100′s if not 1000′s of others.  (ed. note- the first site to come up in that search obviously has some security flaws when it allows the backlink packet to be seen by the search engines….)  Is your SEO/SEM consultant using backlink packets or building your backlinks manually?  We charge $275.00/month to manually create 250 backlinks.

Estimated ROI: The single most important factor.

SEO/SEM Consultant’s business model: Many times, the price of the SEO/SEM project is dependent on the business model that the SEO/SEM consultant is using.  Are they consulting and advising you on the services and products needed, basically instructing you on how to do what they would for you?  Are they performing the work themselves or is the work being outsourced?  Are you using an Agency that is white labeling an SEO/SEM expert at an industry standard of 15%?  The differences are important.  For instance, if they are doing the work themselves and have multiple clients, then chances are they won’t be readily available to speak with you and will prefer communication through email.  They usually burn out due to the involved workload, or, are using strictly automated tools and services.  If the work is being outsourced and they are managing the project, especially the content creation, you’ll need to review the work done several times per month.  We offer consultation services starting at $197/hr; outsource management and team creation starting at $5000; and done for you solutions starting at $750/month.  We have US based project managers and account reps, and a staff of highly trained outsourcers.

Experience level of SEO/SEM consultant: Having experience with SEO/SEM does not immediately mean they understand LOCAL SEO/SEM. For about the last 18 months there has been a massive focus on targeting local businesses with SEO/SEM.  Usually, they are internet marketers expanding their own business assuming that the same SEO and SEM tactics that worked on a national level or for time based offers or sales will also work with local businesses.  They don’t.  Demand at least two years of professional LOCAL SEO/SEM experience.  If you don’t chances are you could be hiring someone that paid several thousand for a make money online course.

Geographical location: a) Generally, larger cities have more customers, and greater competition. If you’re market share is in a major metroplex there will probably be more competition for your keywords. b) SEO/SEM consultants in larger cities will usually charge more.  Does your SEO/SEM  consultant need to be in the same city as you?  Is a face to face meeting a business requirement for you?  You can often find less expensive SEO/SEM consultants in nearby towns.  

Is PPC/CPV involved? Pay Per Click advertising, Facebook Ads, Cost Per View advertising… these are all forms of online marketing that require a daily adspend. They generate paid traffic.  SEO/SEM generate free traffic. A PPC expert may not necessarily be the one you want performing your SEO/SEM marketing campaigns.

Final Considerations For Your SEO/SEM Project:

SEO/SEM are long term investments.  Rankings can not be guaranteed, but can be achieved within a few months (depending on levels of competition).  Prices should reflect the costs involved in ranking a keyword, and then maintaining those rankings.

Measure your SEO/SEM results solely in terms of ROI.

Will your SEO/SEM Consultant transfer the links or web 2.0/social media properties to a competitor once you stop paying them?  Who owns the data rights to the work being done on your behalf- yourself or your SEO/SEM consultant.  Think of it this way- unless you retain data rights your SEO/SEM consultant could offer these links and properties to your competition, at a cost, if you stop paying them.  Unethical? Yes, but it’s happening more than you would think.
Guarantees are worthless. No SEO/SEM consultant can *ever* really guarantee the results, or, that your site won’t be deindexed through their efforts.  Search Engines alter their algorithms consistently- and what may have worked before in helping promote your business online may not work later.  Also, what recourse do you have should your site become deindexed through your SEO/SEM Consultant’s efforts?
Are quotes an expense?  Will this expense be deducted if you choose to use their services?
Is your SEO/SEM consultant offering parralel marketing opportunities such as mobile marketing?  Can this person really help your business grow and do they understand marketing and lead generation?  Hire them as if you were hiring an employee.

Want to know how using SEO/SEM can help your business grow?  Call us now at 540.322.3570 or contact us for a free Google Domination consultation.

Tags: Advertising Locally Online, Local Search Engine Marketing, SEM Costs, SEO, Small Business Marketing