How much does SEO cost in the UK? (2020)
Crawlers and bots, short-tail and long-tail keywords – it’s all a bit confusing and the pricing of SEO services in the UK can be too. If you want to hire an agency or a marketing consultant like me, you’re going to want to start by finding out how much SEO costs in the UK.
By Kirsty Nelms
From my research in 2020, I’ve found that some individuals charge as little as £50 per month for ‘SEO’, with no explanation of what that work involves. #SeemsLegit. On average, SEO costs in the UK by professional marketers can be between £500 to £7,000 or more per month for SEO services and to be honest I’d be very wary of paying less than £500 per month for SEO content marketing.
Why should you hire a freelance copywriter for SEO services?
Increased SEO costs can be avoided in the long run by using a professional copywriter. Part of the challenge in appearing high in search engine results pages (SERPs) is writing content which basically indicates to search engines that your website has the ‘good stuff’.
But what exactly is the ‘good stuff’? Have you ever read that little paragraph under a Google result and thought that page was exactly what you were looking for, only to click through and find complete irrelevant waffle? Frustrating isn’t it? Search engines know this, and they look for certain indicators like that to separate the waffle from the wonderful.
Things like high domain authority through credible backlinks, page loading speed, meta descriptions, heading tags and generally relevant, easily shareable content will tick those boxes, and more importantly – won’t waste people’s time or your money.
With SEO content created by a professional copywriter, your customers will find interesting, valuable information, right when they’re already looking for it. Whether you need a complete website re-write, some decent product descriptions, or a well-written landing page, my SEO services can help.
How much do my UK SEO services cost?
I specialise in helping SMEs, so my services may not be the best fit for a large company with a more generous budget.
I have developed a UK SEO pricing package which includes two stages. Month one involves all the initial research and the development of an SEO marketing strategy.
The remaining months involve regularly monitoring the keywords, identifying new opportunities and making content improvements. This also includes either two SEO-friendly blog articles per month, as generating fresh content is highly important, or one blog and one press release (scroll down to read why I do this).
What’s included in my SEO for small
businesses package?
Audit, research & set up
Everything you need to get a good SEO strategy in place-
Full SEO site audit
Includes checking through the content of every page and the coding of your site to identify immediate issues. This also includes things like identifying ways to improve responsiveness and loading times of your website, integrating Google Analytics etc. -
Identifying website goals
Such as increasing quality traffic by 15% per month or generating x amount of leads per month, setting up tracking on lead actions with Google Tag Manager and establishing communications with your sales team. -
Customer research
Target audience, industry research and developing personas. Identifying the customer journey and what they need to know. -
Identifying keywords
Researching competitors and keywords, finding attainable search queries and keywords. -
Immediate fixes
Deciding what can be fixed quickly and making those changes. -
Long-term fixes & SEO strategy
Identifying what will be fixed in the long-term (6-12 months) with an SEO content marketing strategy.
Do you have a really tight budget?
You could reduce the new content (blog or press release) to one blog per month. This would take you longer to achieve the desired results, which is why I recommend at least two forms of fresh content per month.
If you’re just interested in getting the right first steps in place, you could purchase the initial month’s work and then try to do the rest of the upkeep yourself for free.
If it’s just SEO-friendly blog posts you’re after and you’re planning to do the keyword monitoring and optimisation of the rest of the content yourself, there is also the option of purchasing stand-alone blog posts. Depending on how much keyword research is involved to write the blog post, I charge between £315 and £420+VAT.
How can press releases help with SEO?
When you think of press releases you may think of newspapers, but newsrooms are becoming increasingly more digital. This works in your favour for a few reasons:
- The article will likely have a link back to your website (this is important because it tells Google that your website must have some top-notch content for a reputable media publication to be linking to it)
- The article can be shared easily, increasing reach and impressions
- Your article is seen by more people, who have easier access to it
As a qualified journalist, I know the impact of a good news story, so I’ve included the option of having either two blog posts per month or one blog and one press release per month (depending on when I spot that you have something newsworthy). This is a great deal, because some journalists charge £700 to £800 for a press release.
My press releases include research, interviews, writing, pitching, distribution to bespoke media lists, and tracking. Depending on how much research, how many people I need to interview and how long I think it will take to go through the process, I charge between £315 and £420+VAT for a press release, but you’re getting this included in the above package.
How to improve your SEO with no budget
If you have the time to spare, you can always try doing it yourself. There are plenty of handy tips to get you started right here in Moz’ Beginners Guide to SEO.
SEO costs in the UK – conclusion
I hope this article has helped to give you an idea of the average SEO costs in the UK. If some pricing seems too good to be true, it probably is, and a poor SEO strategy can do more harm in the long run. If you have any questions about my services, please contact me.
