SEO Cost - does this sound about right?

[pmarsh]

Hi all,

An SEO guy has consulted with one of my client's and given them his recommendations to improve their website in the search engines. Currently it does not do very well in rankings and does seem to need quite a bit of work.

He is a personal friend of one of the directors of the website and seems to be reputable.

The costs are: he has quoted £9,000 for things to do immediately and £10,000 as one-off costs for a 6-month plan. There is a £1000 management fee and a monthly cost of £700 pounds.

How does that sound?

 

[Samg1]

Well to most people it will sound extremely expensive but SEO can cost anything from a few hundred pounds to thousands. Therefore you would need to provide a more detailed specification of what is on offer for people on the forums to get an idea of what you will be getting for that cost. It also depends what sector he is working within for you, if it is an area that is flooded i.e. Web design, PC Components, DVD's etc it could be a comprehensive amount of work to get rankings up high enough to count. However if the subject is pig farming you would not need that level of SEO.

My company is a Graphic Design/New Media agency but there will be individuals on here that specialise in SEO so post back and I'm sure you'll get some great advice.

 

[Coding Monkey]

Completely depends what area of work you're in. If you're after gambling, that sounds very cheap.

 

[pmarsh]

Hi, it is giftware and household items. The website is dotcom giftshop dot com if that's any help.

There's tons of things in the proposal and it works out at 254 hours of time.

 

[AlphOmega]

If this comapny is established with great track record on ROI (what seo ultimatley does) the this price seems normal.

Is this in your budget, or will you have to go with a cheaper solution.

I will warn from experience, some comapnies are very good and theor prices reflect this, however some are not and their prices are then a rip off.

 

[pmarsh]

Hi Alpho, thanks for your comments. It is within budget, I think I will recommend to them that they do some of it first, give it some time and then do the next, they don't need to pay it all up front, I am sure. Thanks again.

 

[Tin]

How does that sound?

YOWZER! £24,200 is how it sounds to me, unless I've missed something. Even some of the big companies don't charge that.

Obvious things are:
1. Friend of the boss or not, he needs to perform for that price bracket.
2. Solid evidence of established performance in seriously intense market sectors would aid client comfort and expectation. This should have been on the table from the outset if it isn't already.
3. Lastly, but most importantly, what's the client getting for 9K? and 10K? what's the 1K management figure for and ok, I can guess the £700 per month probably relates to link building but a very proven pedigree of lasting performance is what's required first & foremost. That sort of figure demands some sort of transparency from the seo supplier, client contacts, testimonials etc and clearly, all need to be checked out.

As Sam commented, costs for seo can vary wildly. At the cheap end you generally can't expect much but, it's a very funny industry as there's always a newbie starting up somewhere that's kept a sharp ear to the ground, looked, listened and experimented and delivers good results regularly. Equally, the opposite end of the skill spectrum can be just as mixed (as AlphOmega pointed out) probably because client expectation is much higher as it's generally budget driven.

It's an industry which is too often down to 'pot luck' rather than solid performances but all the best with it.

 

[awebapart.com]

With SEO there's stuff you have to do on the website (e.g. keyword density of a page, coding) and stuff you have to do off the website (e.g. getting inbound links).

There's plenty an SEO consultant can do off the website.

Regarding onsite SEO, if an SEO consultant is not allowed to touch your website, i.e. they can only make recommendations on what you should change, then that means you also have to budget for someone else to implement the recommended changes. This could be simple things like changing product descriptions, to more complicated and expensive things like getting your web developer to change how the e-commerce system works, to impossible things like changing an e-commerce system which cannot be changed (e.g. if the system is developed with some closed source tool like Actinic, or some other managed hosted service which you do not have complete control over, or the current architecture simply cannot cope with the change required).

From what I can see there are onsite SEO issues that need to be sorted out, including: 1. the site is .com and is hosted in the US but is targeting the UK audience, e.g. it should be moved to UK hosting, 2. titles not changing on product detail screens, etc.

Overall though, I think the SEO cost is a bit high for this type of shop, and disproportionate to the money that's already been spent on the site so far (it seems as though not too much money has been invested in the shop creation judging by the look and the cheap US hosting - unless the boss got another one of his expensive mates to create it!).

For that kind of spend I would certainly advise that detailed contracts are drawn with the SEO supplier, with detailed breakdowns of what work is to be done and costs (e.g. paying for links from some site), with regular reporting on work carried out, milestones, etc, and I would recommend that the client checks other client references to see that the supplier has successfully SEO'ed similar online shops with similar success in the past. Also for that spend I'd recommend that the client shops around and gets a few quotes.

Getting top in the search engines for a lot of phrases in a competitive field is a difficult task and it can require a lot of work.

 

[sharon25]

My GOD that's very expensive, i think you can put-up a good looking shop in da street Conner for that price and get some good sales for years to come

SEO is a very Vast and complex field, and unless this guy gives you a guarantee that your listing will be placed on top of the all major SE's at least up to 5 years without rank change...then its worth but other wise, its sounds crazy, but the truth is u cannot guarantee any perm placement unless u pay google and use their ad words system which can be very expensive too

 

[AlphOmega]

Like evry industry there is a whole range of prices.

I assume some people will puke at this price

We dont charge anywhere near that ourselves but some comapnies do, and they do because some comapnies pay that price.

If say you did an seo proposal for eg British airways they wouldnt take that quote as it would be "too cheap".

Some companies even employ a whole team of seo poeple in house just to work solidly on their website.

The cost is not important its the ROI ratio that counts.

I do agree with awebapart, does seem strange to spend that cash on this websiet though and maybe money should be spent on the website itself first.

 

[JustOneUK]

I do agree with awebapart, does seem strange to spend that cash on this websiet though and maybe money should be spent on the website itself first.

Agreed, would be better to pay someone to build a good looking website first. They also need to run a spell check through the site.

Looks like they have a problem getting their pages indexed as most are supplemental, might want to take a look at that.

Out of interest,.. Do they run an adwords campaign?

 

[directmarketingadvice]

Out of interest,.. Do they run an adwords campaign?

Not by the looks of it.

And this makes me wonder what's going on.

Are they getting much traffic at the moment?

Have they tested the site properly to find out if it converts?

If they have, why are they not buying instant traffic?

If they've not tested the site, there's a chance that they pay all this money for SEO only to find that the site doesn't convert.

Then, if they have to revamp the site (or the copy) significantly, couldn't that mess up the expensive on-page SEO they've paid for?

It's a bit strange.

Steve

 

[JustOneUK]

Are they getting much traffic at the moment?
Have they tested the site properly to find out if it converts?
If they have, why are they not buying instant traffic?
If they've not tested the site, there's a chance that they pay all this money for SEO only to find that the site doesn't convert.
Then, if they have to revamp the site (or the copy) significantly, couldn't that mess up the expensive on-page SEO they've paid for?

All the same as I was thinking. However, are we just being samaritans?

Go for it, pay for the SEO.

 

[awebapart.com]

It looks like they already have had some SEO/adwords consultancy during 2005/06!

strawberrysoup.co.uk/portfolio/seo_dotcomgiftshop.html

 

Sounds like far too much money to me !!

I would take back the free advice paul and the rest have given you and let the guy have a look. No point in paying this much to SEO a poor site imho.

These guys who get a friend in - bah !!

 

[directmarketingadvice]

are we just being samaritans?

Not me.

I can't offer to do their SEO, but I'd set up an adwords campaign for them.

Go for it, pay for the SEO.

They've got a ton of products, if this guy can get them to p1 for all of them (and keep them there), it could be a bargain.

... assuming the site converts.

I think the site looks ok but , if I owned it, I'd want to test the site with paid traffic, split test a few layouts to find the one that's most profitable so that, once the SEO guy comes in and works his magic, he's working with something that's stable and making money.

(having said all this, I'm no SEO and maybe the sorts of changes I'm thinking about wouldn't affect rankings or require "re-SEO")

Steve

 

[directmarketingadvice]

Oops, was typing when Paul posted.

Looks like they were getting good conversions with the site using adwords.

(though, now I'm wondering why they stopped...)

Steve

 

[mattk]

It looks like they already have had some SEO/adwords consultancy during 2005/06!

strawberrysoup.co.uk/portfolio/seo_dotcomgiftshop.html

Love the screen shot. The search term they rank #1 for is clearly dotcomgiftshop!

 

[mattk]

BTW - I think you should pay the money and then report back on the results. I'd love to know what £24k worth of SEO gets you!

 

[pmarsh]

Hi guys,

Thanks for all your comments, I'm going to speak to them regarding some of the things you've brought up and I'll let you know what happens.

Steve, they get around 80,000 visits a month and stopped buying instant traffic due to the cost against the average profit on a sale in that it was too high and since the website has a good turn around it was not considered necessary any more.

In the SEO roadmap it covered many of the things brought up on this thread, particularly the things awebapart mentioned. As someone else mentioned, the website has a good range of products and it is on this basis that they believe good SEO will really benefit them. As for strawberrysoup, they no longer work with these guys and have no further comment in that regard

Thanks for all for your time, much appreciated.

 

[3rigena]

How does that sound?

Imo, that is robbery.. esp given the lack of track record, although granted I don't know the scope of the project. however, if it includes PPC budgets etc it could be very reasonable..

what sector is this web-site targeting?

 

[welshnoonoo]

As AlphaOmega says there are some companies out there who would charge even more - one of my client's was quoted £15000 per month - but then he did go to the company who do the marketing for a very large british insititution! But, there is a difference between website marketing and SEO and I'd be interested to know if this company are going to come up with strategies on how to get visitors interacting more with this website (which I have visited myself before!!) and then implement them for the same fee etc, etc.

With the site being an online store, and with it being in the giftware industry - then there is going to be a lot of competition.

Is this company going to set up a Google Adword campaign too?

It is a pretty huge budget, and I would be interested to know, if this site is not doing very well in the search engines currently, how are they getting their current customers? I can't help but think that they would have to sell a fair few items to actually get a return on this investment but they know their market place and providing that is what they would get then happy days!

 

[welshnoonoo]

esp given the lack of track record,

I missed this bit! Does the SEO company not have a track record? If that's the case I would have to say that I personally would advise them to part with such sums of cash to a company with no track record. There are plenty of good SEO companies out there with good track record that would probably charge less or at least the same.

 

[directmarketingadvice]

they get around 80,000 visits a month

That's around a million a year and, if this SEO guy can double this, it'll only work out at around 2.5p a visit.

(within the first year and presumably less or nothing in the years to come)

Surely any decent business site can yield 10p a visitor, so a cost of only 2.5p should return a nice profit.

Steve

 

I didnt understand the reference dotcom giftshop dot com!
did you mean www.giftshop.com,

If it is:

I agree with others that I would start on the site, not the SEO!

It is this sort of dorectory/pure advertising site that Google are determined to expunge from the rankings for good: since it adds nothing to the content of the web, and most users get annoyed seeing link farms & pure advertising.

It seems to me that the money would be best spent on market positioning, by which I mean finding some target niches in which search demand/supply (KEI) is better and so engine rankings are a lot easier to come by than generalised gifts - then focussing the online marketing towards those niches.

Then develop some real content , to become an authority site on those niches. That probably means adding markets, and product lines specifically because they can more easily draw SE traffic

The SEO for good niches will be a lot more rapid, and easier, and of course anyone who finds the site is a potential customer for the other product lines.

What I am saying is instead of tackling a huge competitor army head on, the better approach is to take a lot of easy pickings , and then use direct marketing of the customer base so generated to sell the really competitive products out of sight of the competition.

In the end it is all about getting traffic, and hitting the search engines for really competitive keywords can be an expensive and time taking way to go - but at present with the site as it is most people will click away when they realise they have been "conned" by a link farm - so having something valuable to offer customers in order to get the website to convert is more important.

So if that is what the SEO proposal said, that is the way to go.

 

[quantad]

I agree with kimmrunner. There are better ways to spend your money.

Also, I would make sure that your website is getting the highest possible conversions in sales before investing so much in a pure SEO campaign otherwise the risk is that your return on investment will not be good even if you do manage to increase your traffic.

 

[JustOneUK]

I didnt understand the reference dotcom giftshop dot com!
.

This will help then, www.dotcomgiftshop.com

James.

 

If the site already has around 80,000 visits a month - there is the obvious question is how much is that traffic costing: and whether SEO be justified in terms of traffic cost reduction.

It doesn alter the fact that the first thing I would do is start split testing conversion - there are a lot of things that need testing on that site. And it is generally accepted that it is easier (and cheaper) to double conversion than to double traffic

 

[Reef]

I have been looking for SEO companies for the last couple of weeks and I have found that there is no average cost. Do you know if any of this money is being reinvested into the SEO campaign. I have recently been in discussions with a company who charge £3000 pm but they promise to reinvest some of this money for links and listings in directories.

Another company I have spoken to have offered to charge £300 for the initial consultation and £230 pm for the period of a year. The costs vary so much I think it is impossible to say if this is too much or not. I found that posting a thread in the IT and Internet forum requesting any information from people who use UKBF with good/bad experiances extremley usefull.

 

[3rigena]

I think that the best (imo) companies will charge you an initial retainer, and the rest of the cost might depend on results achieved.

I would also consider ask any potential seo company for a list of directories that you will be submitted to as there are a enough scammers out there [in addition to those who know their stuff] - this might indicate whether they are using automated submission software rather than doing any manual submissions..

sometimes these prices are justified due to where the seo company can promote you.. if they are doing a bit of SEM and linking to you from some of their (for example pagerank 8) digital assets - which they could easily "lease" to another client, then the expense may well be justified..


my 10c worth..

 

[clairecastle]

I agree with some of the comments above. I think before you spend that sort of amount of money on getting visitors to a site you should first think about how once you have got them there how you are going to get them to make a purchase and help them though a sales funnel.

I have recently moved and am looking to buy some kitchen bits and bobs. I clicked on kitchen and on the first row of products I am presented with a black wine glass and ice lolly moulds and 11 pages of results. I think some further thought needs to go into product classification to help visitors find what they are looking for, otherwise like me you end up a little lost.

Claire

 

I am considered the Number 1 SEO consultant in the UK,A big claim maybe,but I can say this based on the search engine results I have obtained.As to the cost of SEO ,it would seem to me that most companies out there are taking the public for a ride in various areas.
1 There is no need for a website to be submitted to search engines they will find your site.
2 Once a site has been properly optimized it will usually stay at its high position for a very long period.So whats with the regular submission and reports?
3 Why long term contracts when all that is needed is a watching brief.

4 I never spend more than a week optimizing a site,unless it is very large and needs a complete re design to make it search engine friendly.So where does the £2k to 15k a month come from.
5 SEO is pretty simple once you understand the basics.Not rocket science as some would have you believe.
6 Tip :find a company that has provable results,and not for some obscure search terms like "fish and chip shops in peckham" try things as competitive as "jet ski" or "volkswagen parts" or a major brand name.
7 the proof of the pudding is definitly in the eating in SEO.

 

[3rigena]

I am considered the Number 1 SEO consultant in the UK,A big claim maybe,but I can say this based on the search engine results I have obtained.

You consider yourself #1 it seems - big difference! .
how about posting some of your results so we can judge for ourselves...

 

[AlphOmega]

Is this your website

http://www.whitstablescene.co.uk/books.htm

I am considered the Number 1 SEO consultant in the UK.

Not in a million years!!

 

[3rigena]

Not in a million years!!

Quoted for truth.

 

One of many the proof is in the pudding

 

[3rigena]

if that is one of your puddings, I am not hungry. that page is not optimised well at all, and the pagerank is poor. I won't bother looking at your serp ratings - something tells me that they will also be poor.

cmon, post some of your successful projects...

 

Try "sea doo spares" on google sites 1 2 3 6 7 11 12 are all our sites
don't worry I have "sea doo" "sea doo parts " " jet ski parts " covered I did not mean to seem like a pompous ass but my results say it all.
apparently I can't post the URL's till I have posted 15 times

 

[Astaroth]

surely if you are number 1 in the country you would be with clients wanting keywords such as "cheap insurance" "current account" "books" etc and not "sea doo" let alone "sea doo spares"?

 

you make to much of page rank not as important as most people think.try "vw parts" on google No 2 I know but as a pensioner I am still learning

volkswagenspares.com