Answer guide · exact numbers, no call required
How Much Does SEO Cost?
SEO is priced in two parts: one-time projects that fix and build, and monthly programs that keep going. At RankOps the diagnosis is the free AI Visibility Map, the first fixes are the $1,225 AI Entity Fix, the done-for-you build is the $4,997 AI HQ Build, and ongoing SEO and AI Visibility Growth is $1,500/month. Shopify stores with complex catalogs can also run the Catalog Control Engine packages. Every price is on the pricing page. No quote call.
What you actually pay for
SEO cost is not one number because SEO is not one job. It splits cleanly in two, and any quote that blurs the line is worth a second look.
- The project. A fixed scope with an end date: fix what blocks crawling and indexing, deploy structured data, build the pages you are missing. It finishes. You own the result.
- The retainer. Ongoing work after the project: new content, new pages, measurement, and reacting to what the data says. It only makes sense once the foundation is not broken.
Paying a retainer before the project is done is the most common way a local business wastes a year of budget. You are renting monthly effort on a site that still cannot be crawled properly.
What the RankOps ladder costs
| What you get | Price | Delivery |
|---|---|---|
| AI Score Check, a baseline you can run yourself | Free | ~2 minutes |
| AI Visibility Map, your score and top 5 fixes, in order | Free | Emailed, usually within about 15 minutes |
| AI Entity Fix, we ship the top fixes from your report | $1,225 | Scoped on a 15-minute call |
| AI HQ Build, the done-for-you deployment | $4,997 | Scoped on the call |
| SEO + AI Visibility Growth, the monthly priority sprint | $1,500/month | Ongoing, cancel before the next sprint |
| AI Citation Tracker, monitoring only | $29/month | Weekly checks |
These are the prices, not starting points. They are the same whether you call on a Monday or a Friday. Two focused paths sit on top of this ladder: Catalog Control Engine for national Shopify stores, and AI Visibility for getting named by AI.
Why not hourly?
Hourly billing prices the effort instead of the outcome, so the incentive runs the wrong way: the slower the work goes, the more it earns. It also hides scope: an hourly rate tells you nothing about what will actually be delivered or when it ends.
A fixed project price makes the scope the thing being agreed. If a budget is tight, the honest move is to cut scope, not the price: fewer pages, a narrower fix, a later phase two.
What moves the number
- The state of the site. A site with no schema, a broken sitemap and a split www/non-www domain needs more work than one that is merely thin.
- How many places you serve. One location is one set of pages. Fifteen neighborhoods is fifteen, see why AI rewards hyperlocal pages.
- Whether you need a site at all. Fixing an existing site and building a new one are different jobs at different prices.
- How competitive the category is. It changes how much content is needed, not the hourly rate, because there is no hourly rate.
How to read anyone else's quote
Three questions make a vague proposal concrete: what exactly gets delivered and by when, what happens to it if I leave, and how will you measure whether it worked? The full version of that checklist is at how to choose an SEO agency, and nine Charlotte agencies are compared at Charlotte SEO agencies compared.
Questions
How much does SEO cost?
SEO is priced in two parts: one-time projects that fix and build, and monthly programs that keep going. At RankOps the diagnosis is the free AI Visibility Map, the first fixes are the $1,225 AI Entity Fix, the done-for-you build is the $4,997 AI HQ Build, and ongoing SEO and AI Visibility Growth is $1,500/month. Shopify stores with complex catalogs can also run the Catalog Control Engine packages.
Why does RankOps not charge hourly?
Hourly billing prices the effort instead of the outcome, so the incentive runs the wrong way: the slower the work goes, the more it earns. It also hides scope: an hourly rate tells you nothing about what will actually be delivered or when it ends.
What makes SEO cost more or less?
Four things: the state of the site, how many locations or neighborhoods you serve, whether you need an existing site fixed or a new one built, and how competitive your category is. Competition changes how much content is needed, not a rate, because there is no rate.
Do I need a monthly retainer?
Not at first. A retainer only makes sense once the foundation is not broken. Paying monthly for ongoing effort on a site that still cannot be crawled properly is the most common way a local business wastes a year of budget.
Is there a cheaper way to start?
Yes. The AI Citation Tracker is free for 14 days with no card, and the free AI Visibility Map emails your score and your top 5 fixes in order. Both are useful even if you never hire anyone, and neither requires a call.