How to price local SEO services for small businesses

By 67Leads Team · Published 11 Nov 2026 · Updated 11 Nov 2026 (US Central) · 5 min read

To price local SEO, add up the hours you will spend each month and what you pay for tools, divide by the share of your revenue you want as costs, and quote a fixed monthly retainer for a written scope, not an hourly rate or a promised ranking. As of 12 Nov 2026, the 67Leads warehouse shows who needs the work: 39,032 sellable US businesses have 9 reviews or fewer, 27,378 list no website and 692 are rated under 4 stars on 50 or more reviews. This guide gives a method, not market rates, because a rate quoted without your costs is a guess.

Shortcut: the agency pricing calculator works out the retainer from your hours, costs and margin, the local SEO proposal generator turns it into a document, and the local SEO and review agencies page lists businesses to quote.

Why not just copy a competitor's price

A competitor's price reflects their costs, their tools, their client mix and whether they are trying to fill a pipeline. If you copy it you inherit their margin problem, or underprice an offer you scoped more carefully. You can use public prices to check that you are in the neighbourhood, but you should derive your own first.

Step 1: Define the scope in plain words

A local SEO retainer is a list of recurring jobs. Write them down:

• Google Business Profile: categories, services, photos, posts, Q&A, hours.
• Reviews: a request routine and replies to every review.
• Citations and name, address and phone consistency. The NAP consistency checker shows the problem on a client's listings.
• On-page: service and location pages, title tags, a fast mobile site.
• Reporting: a monthly note with calls, direction requests and rank for the agreed terms.

Each one is a line the client can see. If a job is not on the list, it is not in the price.

Step 2: Estimate hours per line

Time yourself on two real clients before you guess. Add set-up hours, which you spend once, to monthly hours, which recur. A common mistake is pricing only the recurring work and giving the onboarding away. Quote the set-up as a one-time fee or fold it into the first months.

Step 3: Add your costs

Include what you pay each month for the client: rank tracking, listing tools, a review platform seat, a reporting tool, any contractor. Divide shared tools across your client count honestly, not by the number you hope to have.

Step 4: Use a formula, not a feeling

The formula the agency pricing calculator shows is:

1. Monthly labor cost = hours per month multiplied by your hourly cost.
2. Add monthly tool and contractor cost per client.
3. Divide the total by one minus your target margin to get the price.

Because the margin is on the price, a 40% target margin means dividing by 0.6, not adding 40%. Run it for one client, then for 5 and 10 clients to see what your month looks like. If the number is lower than you feel you are worth, the fix is a narrower scope or a more specific niche, not a vaguer retainer.

Step 5: Price by value, then check against cost

Cost-plus gives you a floor. The ceiling is what the work is worth to the client. A roofer or plumber who books a handful of extra jobs a month from a stronger listing has a lot of room above your floor. Ask what a new customer is worth to them. Their answer is theirs; never quote a figure you cannot back for their business. If their number is much higher than your floor, quote higher.

Step 6: Do not sell rankings

Do not promise a position, a number of calls or a date. Search results are not in your control (Google's own guidance on local ranking says rank depends on relevance, distance and prominence), and an agency that guarantees them is selling a claim it cannot keep. Promise what you control: the work in the scope, delivered on a schedule, with a report.

Step 7: Put it in writing

A one-page proposal: scope as a bulleted list, monthly price, set-up fee if any, minimum term, how to cancel, and what you need from them such as listing access. The local SEO proposal generator produces one from the agency name, client, trade and fee. Our guide on how local SEO agencies find clients covers where the quotes come from.

Step 8: Find the clients who need it

Pricing is useless without conversations. Prospects with an obvious gap are the easiest to quote:

• Few reviews. See how to pitch Google review services and the few-reviews pages.
• Low rating, many reviews. See the low-rated pages.
• No site or a dead site. See the no-website pages and dead websites.

Run the GBP audit on each one before you send a quote, so the price is attached to named gaps.

How 67Leads fits

67Leads is a search over public business listings and company websites, graded so each row is the trade you asked for. Counts are free with contacts masked, your first 67 leads export free, and after that credits start at $6.70 per 1,000. Work out your retainer in the agency pricing calculator and write it up with the local SEO proposal generator.

Questions

How much should I charge for local SEO?

Work it out from your own hours, tool costs and target margin, then check it against what the work is worth to the client. A price copied from someone else's website does not include your costs. The agency pricing calculator does the arithmetic.

Should I charge hourly or monthly for local SEO?

Monthly, for a written scope. Hourly billing rewards slowness and makes clients nervous about contacting you; a retainer ties the price to a deliverable.

Should I guarantee rankings?

No. Rankings depend on factors you do not control. Promise the work in the scope and report on results honestly.

Which businesses are the easiest to sell local SEO to?

Ones with visible gaps: few reviews, a low rating with many reviews, or no working website. As of 12 Nov 2026, that is 39,032, 692 and 27,378 businesses respectively in our data.

No card. Search is free with contacts masked.

Sources

1. https://support.google.com/business/answer/7091