SEO Pricing: How Much Does SEO Cost, and What Should a Monthly Fee Include?

You collected three SEO proposals. One is a small fixed monthly fee, one is several times higher, and the third promises "guaranteed first-page rankings". All three call it "SEO services", and none of them says exactly what will be done each month.

Short answer: Our monthly SEO packages start at TRY 22,000 (excluding VAT), scaling with the number of target keywords and the content workload. What any SEO costs depends on your site's size, competition, technical condition, content needs, target locations and languages, and link building. Below are our packages by budget, followed by the five jobs every SEO retainer should include. To get a proposal directly, see our SEO services.

SEO pricing by budget: monthly packages

Packages differ by the number of target keywords and the monthly content workload; the five jobs described further down are carried out at that scale. Prices are starting prices in Turkish lira (TRY), excluding VAT. Multiple languages, large e-commerce catalogs or heavy competition increase the scope.

If you only need your site kept technically healthy (hosting, security, updates), technical maintenance starts at TRY 4,500 per month. Prices valid as of October 2026.

Prefer to talk now? Use our contact form or call +90 212 982 57 24. We reply within 1 business day.

What's missing from the cheap SEO package

Low-priced SEO packages tend to lack the same thing: a job description. They list headings like "keyword research", "on-page optimization" and "backlinks", but never say how many pages, which technical fixes or how many quality links will be produced each month.

Without that, you cannot measure what you are paying for. Six months in, all you have are screenshots of rankings, with no evidence that those rankings brought in a single lead.

The three complaints we hear most often:

• Reports that only show rankings for terms nobody searches for
• Months of fees without a single new page or piece of content on the site
• Rankings that drop as soon as the contract ends, because nothing lasting was built

The 6 factors that decide how much SEO costs

The same monthly SEO price means very different work for two different businesses. These six factors set the price:

1. Site size: Maintaining a 10-page company site and an online store with thousands of products are different jobs.
2. Competition: How strong the sites already on page one are for your target searches. Competitive terms need more content and more links.
3. Technical condition: A slow site, broken redirects or pages Google won't index need repair before anything else.
4. Content needs: If no page on your site answers the searches you want to win, new content has to be produced every month. This is usually the largest line item.
5. Locations and languages: A business serving one neighborhood and a company selling into several countries need very different scopes.
6. Link building: Earning quality links from industry publications, directories and partners takes time and effort.

The 5 jobs a monthly SEO fee must include

In a monthly SEO retainer, each of these five jobs should be visible and reported. If one is missing from a proposal, ask why.

Technical audit: Speed, indexing, broken pages and redirects are checked every month, so a new problem is caught before it costs traffic.

Content: Pages that answer real search terms are written and older pages are refreshed. Most of SEO's lasting value builds up here.

Link building: Links come from quality, relevant sites. Bought link packages break Google's spam policies and put the site at risk.

Local SEO: For businesses with a physical location or a defined service area, showing up on the map matters as much as organic rankings. See how we build it on our local SEO services page.

Reporting: Rankings alone are not the result. The report should show the forms, calls and WhatsApp messages that came from organic visits.

SEO pricing models compared

SEO is priced in four ways. Each has its place; the mistake is using the wrong one for your situation.

For most businesses the right order is a project-based technical audit and repair first, then a monthly retainer for content and link building. Publishing content on a site with unresolved technical problems is like filling a leaking bucket.

How long does SEO take: rankings, traffic, then leads

SEO results arrive in three stages, and each one is measured differently:

1. Rankings: Technical fixes and new content show up in rankings first. For long-tail, low-competition searches, the first movement often starts within weeks.
2. Traffic: As rankings settle on page one, organic visits rise. For competitive searches this stage can take months.
3. Leads: Whether organic visits turn into forms, calls and messages depends on how the pages are built for conversion.

The exact timeline depends on competition, your site's history and how quickly content is produced. Ask the agency for a written target and when it will be measured.

Guaranteed SEO and other red flags

As Google puts it in its own guide to hiring an SEO: "No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google." Be careful when a proposal includes:

• "Guaranteed first page" or "guaranteed #1"
• Volume-based link packages such as "1,000 backlinks a month"
• Working without access to your Search Console or Analytics
• Reports that show rankings but never traffic or leads
• "Secret methods" with no explanation of what is being done

Example: why e-commerce, a local clinic and a B2B firm pay different SEO prices

E-commerce store: Thousands of product pages, filter pages and category structure make technical SEO the largest item. Category pages also need significant content and links. See our e-commerce websites page for how we handle it.

Local clinic: Target searches include a neighborhood and a treatment name. A large share of the budget goes to Google Business Profile, reviews and treatment pages. Clinics that attract international patients also need multiple languages; our health tourism page explains how that is structured.

B2B manufacturer: Search volume is low but every lead is valuable. Content means technical product pages, application guides and industry resources. The goal is not traffic; it is the right buying team finding you.

Hiring an SEO agency in Turkey

If your site serves several European markets, an agency in Turkey can be a practical choice: rates are often lower than in Western Europe or the US for comparable work, Istanbul shares most of the European working day, and multilingual SEO is everyday work for agencies whose local clients export. The questions that matter are the same everywhere: a written monthly scope, every account registered to you, and reports that show leads as well as rankings. Our guide on how to choose a digital marketing agency lists the questions to ask before signing.

Analyze, build, measure

Package prices point you in the right direction; the right package and scope become clear once we have reviewed your site. Every engagement starts with three steps:

1. Analyze: We review your site's technical health, your competitors and your target searches. Output: a prioritized task list and a realistic target.
2. Build: Technical fixes, the content plan and measurement (GA4, Search Console, conversion events) are put in place.
3. Measure: Every month you get rankings, organic traffic and organic leads in one report, compared with the previous month.

Who this approach is for

• Businesses that want a steady flow of leads from Google without paying per click
• Decision makers who want to see SEO spend turn into leads, not just rankings
• Teams looking to reduce their dependence on ad budgets

Who it is not for

• Anyone expecting the top spot within a month
• Businesses that won't allow new content or changes on their site
• Anyone shopping only for the lowest monthly fee

Check your own SEO in 10 minutes

Run these checks before you ask for proposals. The answers show what should come first:

• Search Google for site:yourdomain.com: are your key pages listed?
• Search your main service plus your city: are you on page one, and on the map?
• Open your site on a phone: does it load in about three seconds?
• Do you have a Search Console account, and whose name is it in?
• How many new pages have been published in the last six months?
• Are forms and calls from organic visits being tracked?

Send us the SEO proposals you have received and we will read them impartially against your site's priorities. We reply within 1 business day and deliver the free SEO audit within 48 hours: request a free audit. Having that report in hand before you decide on SEO pricing lets you compare proposals on what they actually deliver.

Frequently asked questions

How much does SEO cost with Premium Dijital? Monthly SEO starts, excluding VAT, at TRY 22,000 for the Essential package (10 keywords), TRY 32,000 for Advanced (20 keywords) and TRY 45,000 for Pro (30 keywords plus 4 articles a month). Annual payment saves 15%.

How much does SEO cost? SEO pricing depends on the size of your site, how competitive your market is, your site's technical condition, how much content you need, the number of locations and languages you target, and link-building needs. The same monthly fee can be plenty for a local business and far too little for a competitive e-commerce site.

What should a monthly SEO retainer include? Ongoing technical audits and fixes, content creation and updates based on real search terms, quality link building, local SEO and Google Business Profile management where relevant, and a monthly report covering rankings, organic traffic and organic leads.

How long does SEO take to work? Technical fixes can show an effect within weeks; stable rankings for competitive terms and a steady flow of organic leads usually take months. The timeline depends on competition, your site's history and how fast content is produced, so ask for a written target before you start.

Can an SEO agency guarantee first place on Google? No. Google's own guidance states that no one can guarantee a number one ranking. A guarantee usually means targeting easy, worthless keywords or using tactics that break Google's rules.

How much does SEO cost for a small business? A small business serving one area usually needs a narrower scope: technical fixes, a handful of service pages, local SEO and reporting. That makes it cheaper than national or e-commerce SEO. Ask for a fixed monthly scope rather than a vague package name.

Is it worth outsourcing SEO to an agency in Turkey? It can be, especially for multilingual or Europe-facing sites. Rates in Turkey are often lower than in Western Europe or the US for comparable work, and Istanbul overlaps with European business hours. Judge the agency on its written scope, account ownership and reporting, not the rate.