What SEO costs: a one-off foundation or a monthly plan

en 2026-09-30 6 min read

SEO foundation at JP Studio is a one-off EUR 450 to 750. SEO growth, the work that continues after it, is EUR 500 to 800 a month.

The first makes sure your site can be indexed, measured and understood, and ends with a plan. The second carries out that kind of plan month by month, adding and improving the pages that earn searches. You can buy the first without ever buying the second.

What each one covers

SEO foundation does not include speed fixes, content writing or link building. Both prices sit on the same ladder as our builds, on the packages page.

What the foundation does, item by item

• Search Console. Your domain is verified as a domain property through a DNS record, the sitemap is submitted, and the page indexing report is read for pages Google has left out.
• Analytics. Visits are measured, and so are the actions that matter to you, such as a form being sent or a phone number being tapped.
• Indexation. Pages meant for search can be indexed. Thank-you pages, test pages and duplicates are kept out.
• Technical hygiene. Broken internal links, redirect chains, missing or duplicate titles and canonical tags are checked and put right.
• Titles and internal links. Each page that matters gets a title written for the search it should answer, and pages that belong together link to each other.
• The plan. The foundation ends with a 3 to 6 month plan: which pages to write or improve, in what order, and why.

None of that is glamorous. It is the part that decides whether any later work can be seen and measured at all. What SEO foundation includes goes through each item in more detail.

What growth does each month

Growth is where a plan gets carried out. It covers technical and on-page work as the site changes, new service and location pages for the searches your business can realistically win, internal links between the new pages and the existing ones, and reporting on what moved.

The reporting worth reading is built on Search Console data: the queries you appear for, impressions, clicks and average position, page by page. A report that cannot point to those numbers is describing activity, not results.

What moves the price

Foundation sits lower in its range for a small site that was built cleanly. It sits higher for a site with many URLs, a history of moves and redirects, or pages in Google's index that should never have been there.

Growth depends on how much the plan asks of each month: how many pages it adds, how many services and locations it covers, and how much technical work the site needs as it changes. A business serving one town with three services asks for less than one serving a region with ten.

What neither can buy

• Links from other websites. Link building is on neither list. Links come from being worth mentioning: suppliers, partners, trade associations, local press, people who write about your field. Content vs backlinks sets out how the two work together.
• A position by a date. Google decides rankings. Anyone who promises a place in the results by a deadline is promising something they do not control.
• Demand. If few people search for what you sell, more pages will not create the searches.
• A better offer. SEO brings people to the page. Whether they get in touch depends on what they find there.

How the two fit into a timeline

On a new site, the foundation belongs at launch, straight after the build: 1 to 2 weeks for a single-page landing, 3 to 6 weeks for a business website at step 03. The sitemap goes in, measurement starts from the first visit, and the plan is written against what the site actually contains.

Then the 3 to 6 month plan runs, carried out by you or through growth. Search results respond on Google's schedule, not on an invoice date, so judge the work against the Search Console baseline rather than against a calendar.

On an existing site, the foundation comes first. Growth work on a site with indexing problems is money spent on pages Google may not show.

When to spend less

• Buy the foundation and carry out the plan yourself. If you or someone on your team can write and publish the pages the 3 to 6 month plan lists, you may not need growth at all.
• Hold off on a monthly plan if the site cannot turn a visitor into an enquiry. More traffic to a page with no clear next step does not turn into more enquiries.
• Skip SEO altogether if your work arrives through referrals and repeat customers, and nobody searches for your service where you operate. That business should not buy SEO from anyone yet.

When SEO is not worth it covers those cases in more depth.

SEO pricing questions

Why is SEO foundation one-off and growth monthly?

The foundation is a fixed list: set up measurement, check indexing, clean up the technical basics, set titles and internal links, write the plan. Once it is done, it stays done until the site changes. Growth is ongoing because it keeps adding and improving pages.

Do we need the foundation before growth?

Growth builds on measurement and indexing being right. Without the foundation there is no reliable baseline to report against and no plan to work from, so it is the logical first purchase.

Can you tell us how much traffic SEO will bring?

No, and be wary of anyone who names a number before looking at your data. After the foundation, Search Console shows your real impressions and clicks, and that becomes the baseline every later report is compared with.

Can the reports show which city our searches come from?

Search Console does not break search data down by city. It filters by query, page, country, device and date. For local work, the queries themselves carry the location when people type one, such as a service followed by a town name.

Does SEO foundation include writing content or fixing speed?

No. SEO foundation does not include speed fixes, content writing or link building. It sets up Search Console and analytics, checks indexation and technical hygiene, sets titles and internal links, and ends with a 3 to 6 month plan.

Tell us your site and what you want to be found for, and we will say whether foundation, growth or neither makes sense: contact the studio.