The short answer
The entry plans on four UK agency price pages we read on 2 November 2026 cost £300 and £395 a month plus VAT, £500 and £1,300 a month, and guides written for trades put a single-town trade at £500 to £1,200. Our plans start at £100 a month including VAT, month to month.
How much does SEO cost? For a trade business in the UK, the honest answer is a range: the entry plans on four UK agency price pages we read on 2 November 2026 ran from £300 plus VAT to £1,300 a month, and two guides written for trades put a single-town trade at £500 to £1,200 a month. The number matters less than three other things: what is done each month, how long you are tied in, and who owns the work if you stop.
We sell SEO to trades, so we have an interest, and our own prices sit in this guide beside everyone else's. Every figure below was read on the provider's own page on the same day. Where a price is quoted before VAT, the table says so, because a business that is not VAT registered cannot reclaim it.
How much does SEO cost in the UK in 2026?
These are the published prices we could find from UK agencies that rank for SEO price searches or sell to trades, read on 2 November 2026:
| Provider | Entry price a month | Higher tiers | What the page says you get | VAT | Contract |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Outrank (its page for roofers) | £300 plus VAT (£360 with VAT) | £500 and £750 plus VAT | Keyword research, on-page and technical SEO, link building and content in the starter plan | Excluded | Not stated on the page |
| Web Design and SEO Company | £395 plus VAT (£474 with VAT) | Quoted | One day's work a month | Excluded | "No minimum terms, no contract required" |
| First Place SEO | £500 | £1,000 and £1,500 | Up to 10, 20 or 30 hours of work; links charged separately | Not stated | "Monthly plans, no long contracts" |
| LOCALiQ UK | £1,300 to £2,000 | £2,000 to £2,750, then £2,750 or more | A dedicated client success manager, a six-month strategy document, monthly reporting | Not stated | Not stated |
| Us | £100 a month | £200 a month and £350 a month; SEO Authority from £650 a month | Set out in the table further down | Included | Month to month |
Guides on the first page of results give wider ranges. LOCALiQ puts freelancers at £50 to £500 a month and agencies at £500 to £5,000 or more, with hourly work at £75 to £200 an hour. Dandy Marketing says the average is between £500 and £6,000 a month (updated 12 September 2026), and says in the same breath that a plumber does not need to pay £6,000. The top of those ranges is for bigger targets: Dandy names online shops, and LOCALiQ describes its highest tier as for multi-location brands and national campaigns.
The guides written for trades come out much closer together. Media Village puts most single-location trades businesses at £500 to £1,200 a month. Trade Pixels says entry-level SEO for plumbers typically starts at around £500 to £700 a month in a less competitive area, and £800 to £1,000 where competition is stronger. First Place SEO says a local tradesperson might spend around £500 to £1,000 a month for a solid start.
What do UK SEO packages include?
SEO packages are sold in three ways, and it helps to know which one you are being offered:
- By time. Web Design and SEO Company's entry package "includes one day per month". First Place SEO sells 10, 20 or 30 hours. You know the effort, not the output.
- By a list of tasks. Outrank's starter plan lists keyword research, on-page optimisation, technical SEO, link building and content. Ours list the work by plan, below.
- By the team on your account. LOCALiQ's tiers include a dedicated manager and a six-month strategy document, priced for bigger firms.
Google's own page on hiring an SEO lists what a useful one does: a review of your site's content and structure, technical advice, content, keyword research and knowledge of your market and area. For a trade, that comes down to five jobs: a Google Business Profile that is complete and kept current, a page for each service and each town you want work in, reviews arriving steadily, the same business details on every directory, and links from local and trade sites.
Two questions sort the packages quickly. Is link building included, or charged on top, as First Place SEO does? And who writes the pages: the agency, or you?
Why do SEO prices vary so much?
Because the work varies, even for two firms in the same trade.
- How many towns and services. One town and two services is a short list. Ten towns and eight job types is a lot of pages, and every one has to be worth reading.
- How hard the searches are fought over. A rough guide is what advertisers pay per click for your customers' searches: about £5.29 for "roofer near me", £3.38 for "builders near me" and £6.01 for "house extension" (DataForSEO, November 2026). More competition means more work to move.
- The state of the site. If the website is slow, thin or broken, it needs fixing before monthly SEO can do much. That is a one-off cost, often quoted separately.
- Who does the work. A freelancer, a small agency and a large agency with a team per account are priced differently for the same hours.
What should a trade business expect to pay?
For an owner-run trade covering one or a few towns, the evidence above points to somewhere between a few hundred pounds and about £1,200 a month, not thousands. A city with long-established competitors, or a long list of towns and job types, costs more because there is more to build.
Our own plans are priced for trades, and this is exactly what each one includes:
| Plan | A month | What it includes |
|---|---|---|
| SEO Foundations | £100 | Technical health: speed, indexing, structured data, fixes; Google Business Profile set up properly and kept accurate; Search Console monitoring and a plain-English monthly report |
| Local SEO Growth | £200 | Everything in Foundations; Google Business Profile management and posts; Local citations and NAP consistency work; Reviews and profile optimisation; Backlink acquisition; A new SEO, service or location page every month |
| SEO Growth Partner | £350 | Everything in Local SEO Growth; More content each month, targeting more services and towns; Stronger authority building: more links, digital PR outreach; Quarterly strategy review against calls and enquiries |
| Terms | Month to month: cancel at the end of any paid month. Your site, content and Google Business Profile stay yours. | |
| Other options | Need a more aggressive campaign? SEO Authority runs from £650 a month, priced against the territory you're going after. Already happy with your rankings? Monitoring from £50 a month keeps watch without the growth work. | |
How the price moves differs by trade. For a roofer it is mostly the number of towns and roofing jobs on the list, which our page on local SEO for roofers sets out. For a building firm it is the job types, extensions, loft conversions or fit-outs, and how contested each one is in your towns: see SEO for construction companies.
How long does SEO take to pay off?
Months, not weeks, and anyone promising otherwise is guessing. Changes to a Google Business Profile can show in the map for your nearest towns within weeks. Pages for a job and a town take months to rank, and longer against firms that have been online for years.
Google's page on hiring an SEO gives no timescale of its own. It tells you to ask: "What kind of results do you expect to see, and in what timeframe? How do you measure your success?" One agency on the first page for SEO prices tells its clients to "allow at least 6 months before you start seeing results" (Web Design and SEO Company). Six months is a fair point to judge it, on calls and enquiries rather than positions.
Is SEO worth it for a small trade business?
It is worth it when the extra jobs it brings in pay for the fee with room to spare. The sum is simple. A year of our Local SEO Growth plan is £2,400. If it brings two extra jobs a month, each one has cost half a month's fee; set that against the profit on a typical job. If it brings none after six months, it is not worth it, and on a month-to-month plan you stop.
It is usually not worth it yet if you are booked solid for the year, cannot answer the phone during the day, or your website needs rebuilding first. Fix those before paying for rankings.
The fair comparison is with what you pay for work now. Put a directory's fee and your own numbers in below, and see how many jobs a month a website with local SEO would need to match it over three years:
If Checkatrade is the directory you pay now, our guide to whether Checkatrade is worth it does the same sum for it.
How do you spot SEO that is not worth the money?
Google's own page on hiring an SEO is blunt, and it is the best checklist there is:
- Guarantees. "No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google." Google says that if an SEO guarantees first place, "find someone else". Be wary too of claims of a "special relationship" with Google.
- Cold emails. "Be wary of SEO firms and web consultants or agencies that email you out of the blue."
- Too much access. For an audit, give an SEO read access to Search Console only, not the right to change it.
- Secrecy. Ask what they will change and why. If they will not explain it, walk away.
- Links to them. "You should never have to link to an SEO."
Add three of your own before you sign: how long the contract is and what notice you give, whether link building costs extra, and who owns the website, the pages and the Google Business Profile if you leave. Ours: month to month, links included from the Local SEO Growth plan up, and the site, content and profile stay yours.
Can you do SEO yourself?
Much of it, yes. Google's page says: "If you run a small local business, you can probably do much of the work yourself." The free jobs are the ones to do first:
- Claim and complete your Google Business Profile. If it is not showing up, our guide on a Google Business Profile not showing finds the cause.
- Ask every customer for a review. Our guide on how to get Google reviews has the wording, and the free review QR code generator makes the link.
- Use the same business name, address and number everywhere. The listings that matter are in our guide to free business directories.
- Write a page for each service you sell, with photos of your own jobs and the towns you do them in.
What is harder on your own is writing those pages well, earning links, fixing technical problems and keeping it all going every month while you are on the tools. That is the part people pay for, and it is the part to judge any quote against.
How much should SEO cost?
For a trade covering one town, the guides written for trades that we read on 2 November 2026 put it at £500 to £1,200 a month (Media Village) or around £500 to £1,000 for a solid start (First Place SEO). Three of the four agency price pages we read started at £300 to £500 a month, two of them plus VAT, and the fourth at £1,300. Ours start at £100 a month including VAT. A fair price is one where you know what is done each month, can leave without a long notice period, and keep the pages and profile.
How much is SEO per month in the UK?
Every UK agency price we read was a monthly fee. On the providers' own pages on 2 November 2026: Outrank from £300 plus VAT, Web Design and SEO Company from £395 plus VAT for a day's work a month, First Place SEO £500 to £1,500 for 10 to 30 hours, and LOCALiQ from £1,300. LOCALiQ's own guide puts freelancers at £50 to £500 a month and agencies at £500 to £5,000 or more. Check whether the figure includes VAT, which a business that is not VAT registered cannot reclaim.
What SEO packages are available in the UK?
They are sold in three ways: by time (Web Design and SEO Company's entry package is one day a month; First Place SEO sells 10, 20 or 30 hours), by a list of tasks (Outrank's starter plan lists keyword research, on-page and technical work, links and content), or by the size of the team on your account (LOCALiQ). Whichever you are offered, ask what will be done in the first three months, whether link building costs extra, and who owns the pages afterwards.
Can I do SEO on my own?
Much of it, if you run a small local business. Google's own page on hiring an SEO says 'If you run a small local business, you can probably do much of the work yourself', and points to its SEO starter guide. The free jobs come first: a complete Google Business Profile, a review from every customer, the same name, address and number everywhere, and a page for each service you sell. What is harder alone is writing those pages well and keeping it going every month.
How long does SEO take to work?
Changes to a Google Business Profile can show in the map for your nearest towns within weeks; pages for a job and a town take months to rank, longer against firms that have been online for years. One agency on the first page for SEO prices tells clients to 'allow at least 6 months before you start seeing results' (Web Design and SEO Company, read 2 November 2026). Google's own advice is to ask any SEO what results to expect, and in what timeframe, before you sign.
Written by Janusz Wozniak, Founder & Lead Developer. Guides are updated when prices or platforms change; the dates above say when.