Pricing
What SEO costs, and what decides the number
We do not publish a rate card, and we will explain exactly why rather than leaving you to guess. What follows is how the number is actually built.
Most SEO companies in Perth either hide pricing entirely or publish three tiers that mean nothing. We are doing neither. There is no price on this page, and here is the reasoning, so you can decide whether it is good reasoning.
A price is only meaningful attached to a scope. The same monthly figure could be generous for a small local site and nowhere near enough for a store with thousands of products and a migration to plan. Publishing one number would mislead one of those two businesses, and probably both.
What we can do is be completely transparent about the mechanics: what moves the number, what the wider market charges, and the questions that expose a quote built on nothing.
What drives the number
- Site size and complexity. A catalogue that generates fifty thousand URLs is a different job from a thirty page site, before anyone writes a word.
- Competition on your terms. Reaching page one in Perth for a niche service is a smaller job than the same term in Melbourne. The work scales with who you have to displace.
- Starting condition. A site with sound technical foundations needs less remedial work. A site carrying a decade of redesigns needs more before anything else can happen.
- Who implements. If your developer makes the changes from our briefs, the engagement costs less than if we do it. Many clients prefer that, and it is usually cheaper.
- Pace. Doing everything in one quarter costs more than doing it across three. Search rarely rewards the rush, so this is often the easiest place to save money.
What the market charges
For context rather than as our quote: published figures for Australian SEO agencies commonly place entry level monthly retainers around the one thousand dollar mark, with mid-market work substantially above that and enterprise engagements higher again. Project work such as audits and migrations is usually quoted separately.
Quotes far below that range are worth interrogating. The hours do not exist at that price, so something is being cut, and it is usually either the seniority of whoever touches your site or the safety of the tactics used on it.
Questions worth asking any SEO agency in Perth
- What exactly will you do in the first month, and who does it?
- What happens to the work if we stop paying? Do we keep it?
- How do you build links, specifically, and can you name recent examples?
- What will you report on, and is it enquiries or impressions?
- What would make you tell us to stop?
That last one is the most revealing question on the list, and the one most likely to be answered badly.
How we quote. After the free audit, in writing, with the scope attached to the number. Nothing starts before you have that, and the quote does not change partway through unless the scope does and you agree to it.
Common questions about SEO pricing
Why do you not publish SEO prices?
Because a number without a scope is meaningless, and the honest version changes with the site. A store with four thousand products and a five page brochure site are not the same job, and a single figure on a page would mislead one of them. We quote after the audit, in writing, before any work starts.
What does SEO cost in Perth generally?
Published market figures for Australian agencies commonly start around one thousand dollars a month for entry level retainers and rise substantially from there. We are describing the market rather than quoting ourselves, and you should treat any quote well below that range with real suspicion about who is doing the work.
Do you charge monthly or per project?
Both exist. Audits and migrations are fixed scope and quoted as projects. Ongoing work is monthly. Which fits depends on whether the problem is a one-off or a standing competitive position.
Do you lock clients into contracts?
No. Long lock-ins protect the agency. We would rather you stay because something is happening, and know early if it is not.
Is cheap SEO worth it?
Below a certain point the arithmetic stops working. If a retainer does not cover enough skilled hours to do anything meaningful, the money buys reporting rather than results. That is the most common way businesses conclude SEO does not work.
Want to know what is holding your site back?
Thirty minutes with your site on screen, and a written list of what we would fix first. If search is not the right investment for your business, we will tell you that instead.