The short versionMonthly SEO should be a list of real work you can see, not a vague promise. Ask for a plain-English summary every month, and keep ownership of your own Google accounts.
Monthly SEO is easy to sell and hard to picture. You pay every month, but it is not always clear what you are paying for. I would rather you knew exactly what happens, so here it is.
First, what SEO is for
SEO is the work that helps your business show up when someone searches Google for what you do in the area you serve. For a local business, that mostly means three things: your website pages, your Google Business Profile, and the signals around them, like links from other sites.
Start with the foundations
Before any monthly plan, a website needs the basics in the right place. My one-off SEO Setup is £150, and it is included free with every website build. It covers:
- Keyword research based on what customers actually search
- Page titles and meta descriptions
- Google Search Console setup
- Google Business Profile setup and optimisation
- Handover notes explaining what was changed
The three core monthly plans
Once the foundations are there, the monthly work keeps things moving. Each plan builds on the one before it.
| Plan | Price | What is included each month |
|---|---|---|
| Essentials | £145 | Google Business Profile posts, a monthly rankings check, one page improved each month and a simple monthly report. |
| Growth | £185 | Everything in Essentials, plus one new blog post or page, local links and citations, and clear next steps each month. |
| Full Visibility | £245 | Everything in Growth, plus two blog posts or pages, an advanced backlink strategy, a technical audit every quarter and priority support. |
A fourth option: AI Visibility
More customers now ask tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google's AI Overviews who to hire. My top plan, AI Visibility, is £345 a month and includes everything in Full Visibility plus work aimed at those tools: schema markup, citations and consistent business details, review generation and content written around the questions customers ask.
It also adds a monthly test. I run an agreed set of real customer questions through the main AI tools, write down whether you are mentioned, cited or missing, and report back in plain English. Nobody can promise a mention, but you will know where you stand and whether it is improving. There is more in my guide to AI search for local businesses, and the full list on the SEO page.
What you should see every month
A short, plain-English update that says what was done, what it was for, and what happens next. No padding, no charts you have to decode, and no false urgency.
If you are paying for SEO and cannot tell what changed, that is worth raising.
How long does it take?
Months, not days. A technical fix can help quickly, but real visibility builds as Google sees useful content, accurate business information and genuine signs of trust.
And nobody can guarantee first place. Anyone who promises a fixed position is promising something they do not control.
Which plan suits you?
- Essentials suits a business that is already doing fine and wants its Google presence kept active and checked.
- Growth suits a business that wants to climb, and is happy to add fresh content each month.
- Full Visibility suits a business in a busy local market that wants steady content and a stronger link-building effort.
- AI Visibility suits a business that wants to be found when customers ask AI tools as well as Google, and wants a monthly check on what those tools say.
Things to watch for with any SEO provider
- Promises of a guaranteed ranking
- No regular reporting
- Your Search Console and Google Business Profile set up in someone else's name instead of yours
- Long contracts with no clear list of what is delivered
Where to start
If you are not sure what your website needs, I can take a look for free and tell you honestly whether monthly SEO would help yet. Sometimes the answer is to fix a few basics first.
Want me to take a look?
Tell me about your business and I will tell you plainly what I would do, and what you can skip. It is free.
Get in touch