Top 4 Most Affordable SEO Services for Small Businesses
Introduction
Search engine optimization (SEO) is an impactful digital marketing strategy with a proven track record for delivering a strong return on investment (ROI). However, that doesn’t mean SEO help is inexpensive—businesses typically pay $1500+ per month for comprehensive SEO services.
Affordable SEO services provide companies with a solution for optimizing costs without sacrificing performance. Learn more about cost-effective SEO, including the most affordable SEO services available in 2025.
Balancing costs and performance, affordable SEO services include solutions such as consulting, audits, and content creation. Ranging from $100+ per hour or $1000+ per month, these services provide a cost-efficient alternative for businesses aiming to leverage SEO benefits without overspending.
Table of Contents
What is affordable SEO?
Affordable SEO services are not cheap SEO. Instead, affordable SEO is a strategic approach to optimizing SEO costs while maintaining SEO performance. The approach can include changing providers, decreasing service deliverables, or revising strategy to focus on high-impact activities.
How much do affordable SEO services cost?
SEO services typically cost $1500 to $5000 per month depending on factors unique to the agency and business, like site size, agency location, and strategy scale. In comparison, affordable SEO services range from $100 to $150 per hour or $1000 to $2000 per month.
Remember, affordable SEO services are not cheap SEO. That means affordable search engine optimization costs more than a few hundred dollars per month or a couple of dollars per hour, which is typical of cheap SEO services that often use black hat techniques that can harm your website.
Is SEO affordable?
SEO is affordable, with businesses of all sizes (from one employee to 500+) investing in search engine optimization. However, affordable SEO services require strategic thinking when setting goals, allocating budget, and prioritizing work based on potential impact.
4 most affordable SEO services
1. SEO consulting
Average cost: $100+ per hour
Deliverables: Optimizations and audits
How to optimize costs: Consultants can become expensive quickly, so focus the consultant’s time on the most impactful areas. For example, to get the most out of SEO consulting services, prioritize their efforts on auditing and optimizing product page rankings in search results.
2. SEO audit
Average cost: $650 per audit
Deliverables: On-page, off-page, and technical SEO recommendations ordered by impact
How to optimize costs: Leverage free tools like Google Search Console to get actionable audits. Some SEO providers will offer complimentary audits, though this tactic has additional considerations to evaluate.
3. SEO content
Average cost: $50+ per page
Deliverables: SEO-optimized content, plus proofreading
How to optimize costs: Provide as much guidance as possible, like keywords to target and content outlines, to ensure the delivered content aligns with brand guidelines and SEO best practices. Source images in-house through free image libraries or graphic generators like Canva.
4. Local SEO services
Average cost: $500+ per location
Local SEO services include custom local SEO strategy with on-page and off-page elements, local listing management, and transparent reporting.
How to optimize costs: Clearly define the number of your business locations, focusing on the most profitable locations first. Start with a small-scale campaign and consider automated local SEO solutions for lower costs.
Affordable SEO tools
| Tool | Cost | Use cases |
|---|---|---|
| SEO Checker | Free | Audits, Analytics, On-page SEO |
| Google Keyword Planner | Free | Keyword research |
| Soovle | Free | Keyword research |
| SEMrush | Paid options available | Audits, Competitor analysis, On-page SEO |
| Ahrefs | Paid options available | Audits, Technical SEO |
| Screaming Frog | Paid options available | Technical SEO |
| Google Analytics | Free | Analytics |
| GTmetrix | Free | Site speed audits |
How to create an affordable SEO budget
No matter your budget, creating a plan for allocating it will set you up for success—especially for affordable SEO services. The following steps can help you get started with creating an effective, yet affordable SEO budget.
1. Outline your goals
First, outline what you and/or your business expects from SEO in the next 6-12 months, such as:
- 10% growth in organic traffic
- 5% increase in qualified lead generation
- 3% increase in online sales
These key performance indicators (KPIs) will determine how leadership measures your performance and influence your future SEO budget. So, ensure these goals are (1) realistic and (2) measurable.
2. Audit your SEO
Audit your SEO with a free tool like Google Search Console or SEO.com’s SEO Checker. From your audit, you’ll have a baseline for where you’re starting in SEO. Your agency or consultant will provide the information and guidance you need to understand which issues need fixing now or later.
3. Benchmark your performance
Now, evaluate your past performance using Google Analytics 4 to understand:
- Organic traffic growth
- Organic traffic quality
- Organic traffic conversions
If organic traffic grew 3% last year while partnering with a reputable SEO company, and you’re looking to grow it 10% this year on a more economical SEO plan, is that really feasible?
Based on this information, you can decide if you need to revise your goals.
4. Build your budget
With your goals and audit completed, you can now plan your SEO budget.
As an example, consider the following scenario:
- Goal: 10% organic traffic growth
- SEO audit: Minimal issues
- Benchmark: 3% organic traffic growth the previous year
- Areas to focus: Backlink profile, SEO content creation, internal linking
When you know where you’ll focus your time, you’ll know where to spend your money.
For example, if you’re not equipped to write SEO content but it’s critical to achieve your goals, then you can allocate some of your budget to affordable SEO services to produce X amount of pages.
How to find affordable SEO services ?
When searching for affordable SEO services, it’s critical to do in-depth research to ensure your business doesn’t partner with a cheap SEO agency. These agencies often charge less but use unethical SEO practices that could jeopardize your SEO performance.
Here are our recommended tips (based on 25+ years of experience):
Determine budget
First, understand what you can (and can’t) afford for SEO. This number will provide immense guidance when researching affordable SEO services and prevent discussions with consultants or agencies outside your price range.
Ask for recommendations
Get recommendations for affordable SEO services from your professional network. Their recommendations can surface trusted agencies without extensive research and expedite resuming SEO efforts.
Read reviews
Next, evaluate providers via reviews and case studies on platforms like Google Business Profile and Clutch and ask questions like:
- What do clients like or dislike?
- What metrics are used to measure success?
- What industries does the agency focus on?
- How recent are the newest reviews or case studies?
Check deliverables
For contacted service providers, ask for deliverables. See what their affordable SEO services include and if those deliverables align with your needs. The deliverables should also include pricing and additional fees (if applicable).
Walk away
Don’t find an affordable search engine optimization option that meets your standards? Walk away.
Don’t risk wasting your budget (or reputation) by partnering with a provider that doesn’t meet your needs or budget. Instead, reconsider using free SEO courses and tools to learn SEO and optimize your site yourself.
Start benefiting from SEO with affordable SEO services
Affordable search engine optimization offers an outlet for accessing the benefits of SEO on a tighter budget. At WebFX (the team behind SEO.com), we provide SEO services tailored to mid-sized businesses’ needs (and budgets).
Contact us online today to receive your custom pricing!
Affordable SEO Services For Small Businesses (2025 List!)
Getting prospects and customers from search engines with a limited budget is challenging but not impossible. The key is finding an agency that offers affordable SEO services that deliver measurable results.
In this article, we’ll discuss what it means for SEO services to be “affordable,” what differentiates them from “cheap” ones, and the various types you can purchase for your website. Finally, we list the top agencies offering affordable services that will help rank your website on top of search engine results pages (SERPs) and how to choose the best one for you.
Why Should Your Small Business Invest in Search Engine Optimization?
The beauty of SEO is its scalability and sustainability. You can monitor the campaign results and analyze which tactics worked and which didn’t. From here, you can make changes to improve your site’s SEO performance. And as long as you keep your website accessible and valuable to users, expect to continue ranking on top of SERPs.
While an effective SEO campaign comes at a price, you don’t have to burn through your marketing budget to launch one. There are cost-effective affordable SEO services you can buy to achieve the results your business needs.
What Are Affordable SEO Services?
Affordable SEO services are agencies and consultants that can enhance your search engine visibility without breaking your bank. They are small business-friendly and offer great value for money—think at around $100 per hour or less. You can expect to see an ROI quickly from such affordable SEO services.
How Much Do SEO Services Typically Cost?
The average cost SEO agencies charge for their services is $134.66 per hour according to industry research. However, their monthly rate depends on the scope and complexity of the SEO tasks. For example, the average hourly rate for local SEO services is $128, which is on the lower side.
So, the fewer and easier the tasks are, the sooner the agency will complete them for you. This also means you don’t have to pay them as much compared to agencies offering more advanced SEO services.
Cheap Vs. Affordable SEO Services
People interchange both words when referring to SEO services, but they have different meanings. “Cheap” refers to SEO services offered at low prices that promise quick results. On the downside, agencies engaged in this type of SEO services use questionable tactics that harm your website’s rankings in the long run.
Meanwhile, agencies offering affordable SEO services use white hat techniques that help websites achieve sustained organic rankings. This service type costs more than cheap SEO services, but Google won’t penalize the websites and decimate their rankings.
Are Affordable SEO Services Effective?
Affordable SEO services don’t work the same way for everyone. For example, this approach is effective if you have a small local business and just need people from your city to start finding you on Google. You might not have strong competition, but there’s a need for technical order, proper structure, and clear pages that answer customer queries. That’s exactly what small business SEO aims to fix.
The option also works great if you’re a startup entering the market and want to get your first organic leads. Or if your site already exists, but it feels like there’s more potential. In such situations, affordable SEO services for small businesses can help identify weaknesses, fix errors, boost visibility, and give a general push.
But if you’re already getting significant traffic, have strong competitors, plans to expand, target new languages and markets, and develop a product with a high customer acquisition cost, basic optimization won’t cut it. You’ll need an SEO strategy, ongoing analysis, regular content, link building, usability, and analytics—all things that go beyond a limited budget.
The Most Common Affordable SEO Services
You don’t need an enterprise-sized budget to see real results from SEO. Many essential services are available at reasonable rates—and when done well, they can generate lasting value. Below are the most in-demand and cost-effective affordable SEO services businesses rely on to grow their online visibility.
FAQs about affordable SEO
Get answers to the most common FAQs about affordable SEO services:
What is the difference between affordable vs. cheap SEO?
The difference between affordable vs. cheap SEO is more than price—it’s the trustworthiness of the service provider. Cheap SEO services often use unethical tactics to try and grow search visibility.
These tactics, however, can result in getting banned from Google’s index according to Google’s spam policies.
Should that happen, you’ll often need professional help resolving the ban, which requires hiring a reputable (and not cheap) SEO service provider. That’s why we advise businesses that if the price seems too good to be true, it likely is and isn’t worth the risk.
Who are the cheapest SEO providers?
Prices change rapidly, so the cheapest SEO providers vary.
Because we believe cheap SEO services are often more harmful than helpful, we won’t be highlighting these companies. Instead, we recommend seeking agencies offering affordable SEO services or continuing to do SEO yourself.
If you’re set on low-cost SEO, consider freelancer hiring sites like Fiverr or Upwork. Both marketplaces have systems and community standards for maintaining marketplace integrity.
Why invest in search engine optimization?
Businesses often overlook affordable search engine optimization and instead focus on removing all SEO investment from their budget. However, this choice carries long-term consequences, like lost traffic, leads, and sales.
You want to continue to invest in SEO because of its benefits, which include:
- Cost-effectiveness compared to other strategies, like pay-per-click (PPC)
- Advanced targeting by using keywords to meet qualified users at the right moment
- Return on investment, which is often higher than other digital marketing strategies
When should I outsource SEO vs. do SEO myself?
Consider outsourcing SEO vs. doing SEO yourself when:
- You don’t have the knowledge to do SEO
- You don’t have the time to do SEO
- You don’t have the resources to do SEO
These pain points often make outsourcing SEO beneficial. An affordable SEO services provider, for example, will have the necessary resources, knowledge, and time to optimize your site for search engine optimization.
How do I do SEO myself?
If you want to do SEO yourself, check out the following resources:
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