For a small business in 2026, a realistic SEO package costs roughly €200 to €500 a month for content-led work, €500 to €1,500 a month for content plus technical and link work, and well above that for competitive or multi-location sites. These ranges are our own market read from quotes and public pricing pages, not an official benchmark, and the right number depends far more on what is included than on the headline price.
This guide explains what you should expect at each price point, which line items matter, and how to compare packages that look similar on paper but deliver very different work.
What does an SEO package actually pay for?
Strip away the jargon and SEO work falls into four buckets. Every package, from a freelancer’s €250 plan to an agency’s €3,000 retainer, is a different mix of the same four things.
- Research and strategy: keyword and topic research, competitor review, a plan for what to publish or fix first.
- Content: new articles, landing pages, updates to old pages. This is usually the largest cost and the part that most directly produces new rankings.
- Technical and on-page work: site speed, crawl issues, titles and descriptions, structured data, internal linking.
- Authority building: mentions, citations and links from other sites. This is the hardest to do honestly and the easiest to fake.
A cheaper package usually covers one or two buckets thinly. A more expensive one covers more of them, or does one of them at a higher volume or quality. Knowing which buckets you need is the whole decision.
What do you get at about €200 a month?
At this level you are buying a modest, steady content output and little else. Expect two to four articles a month, some basic on-page optimisation of those articles, and a simple monthly note on what was published. It is not enough to fix a broken website or compete in a crowded market, but it is enough to build a library of useful pages over a year.
The honest limitation: at this budget there is rarely time for deep research, original data or technical clean-up. The package works best when your site is already technically healthy and your competitors publish little. A local service firm in a quiet niche, or a specialist consultancy with a clear audience, can do well at this level because the bar for being the best answer is lower.
What do you get at about €350 to €500 a month?
The middle tier is where content volume and quality start to compound. A realistic package here includes:
- Monthly topic planning tied to the questions your customers really ask.
- Six to eight articles or equivalent page work a month, written to a consistent brief.
- On-page SEO, internal links between new and existing posts, and structured data such as FAQ markup where it fits.
- A light content refresh of the older posts that are close to ranking.
- A short monthly report covering rankings, traffic and conversions, and next month’s plan.
This is the sweet spot for many small businesses because it can produce enough published material for search engines and AI assistants to treat your site as a serious source on a topic. If you are weighing it against writing everything yourself with an AI tool, our breakdown of DIY content with ChatGPT versus a content service shows where the hidden hours go.
What do you get at €1,000 a month and above?
At €1,000 or more, the package can add things that content alone cannot do: a proper technical audit and fixes, digital PR or link outreach, conversion improvements on key pages, and strategic calls. Multi-location businesses, e-commerce stores with hundreds of products, and companies in competitive niches such as finance, legal or software generally need to be here or higher.
Be careful about what “link building” means in a quote. Genuine outreach is slow and the cost per link is high, which is why it is rarely included at low prices. A package that promises dozens of links for a few hundred euros is usually buying low-quality placements that can do more harm than good.
How do these price levels compare?
| Monthly budget | Typical content output | Technical work | Best suited to |
|---|---|---|---|
| €200 to €300 | 2 to 4 articles | Minimal, on-page only | Healthy site, low-competition niche |
| €350 to €500 | 6 to 8 pieces, plus light refreshes | On-page, internal links, schema | Small businesses building topical depth |
| €500 to €1,500 | Content plus conversion pages | Audit and fixes, some outreach | Competitive niches, larger sites |
| €1,500+ | Custom, multi-channel | Full technical programme | E-commerce, multi-location, enterprise-lite |
The output numbers above are illustrative ranges based on our reasoning about typical production costs, not guarantees from any provider.
What questions should you ask before signing?
The price is the least informative part of a quote. These questions usually reveal the real value:
- Who writes the content, and who checks it? Ask whether a human editor reviews facts, tone and sources, and whether AI is used and how.
- What exactly is delivered each month? Numbers of pieces, word counts and turnaround, in writing.
- Do I own the content and the accounts? You should own everything published and have admin access to analytics and search tools.
- How do you measure success? Look for answers about qualified leads and enquiries, not only rankings or impressions.
- What is the minimum term and how do I exit? Anything beyond a three to six month initial term deserves scrutiny, and you should know how to leave.
- Do you optimise for AI answers as well as Google? More buyers now ask an assistant first, so the same content should be structured for both.
Our guide to what a blog content retainer should include goes deeper on deliverables and red flags, and it applies equally to SEO packages that are mostly content.
How long before you see results?
Search engines need time to find, index and trust new content, so most small sites should plan for three to six months before the trend is clear and six to twelve months before the return is obvious. That is a rule of thumb from our own experience, and individual cases vary with competition and site age. A package that promises page-one rankings in weeks is selling hope, not a method. We cover the AI-search side of this timeline in how long GEO actually takes to show results.
How do you decide how much to spend?
Work backwards from the value of a customer. If one new client is worth €2,000 in profit over their lifetime and you want the package to pay for itself within a year, then a €400 monthly package (€4,800 a year) needs to produce about two to three new customers over twelve months. Is that plausible for your market? If your typical enquiry takes several months to close, give the maths a longer window.
It also helps to compare against the alternative. Paid ads stop the moment you stop paying; content stays on your site and keeps working. Many businesses run both, using ads for immediate demand and content to lower the long-run cost of acquiring customers.
Red flags worth walking away from
- Guaranteed rankings or guaranteed traffic numbers.
- No access to reports, analytics or the work itself.
- A fixed list of “50 optimisations” with no explanation of which ones apply to you.
- Bulk links or directory submissions as the main deliverable.
- Content that is generic, unedited and could appear on any competitor’s site.
The short version
Pay for the buckets you need. A healthy site with an unserved topic area needs content, so a mid-priced content package is often the best value. A broken or competitive site needs technical and authority work first, and that costs more. Whatever you choose, insist on written deliverables, ownership of everything produced, and reporting that ties back to enquiries rather than vanity metrics.