How much do you need to spend on SEO to get real leads?
I had a prospective client recently ask me “will I get leads from your SEO service?”
We were discussing my one-time audit and strategy, my SEO Growth services, and doing monthly SEO with other providers.
He was a high-end consultant with a handful of clients looking to use SEO to drive leads and book many more. While he was serious about his investment and interested in my data-driven approach, he is in the early stages of his business and budget was a factor.
My honest answer to him about how much you need to invest in SEO to get leads, was “it depends”.
While this is never what anyone really wants to hear, it’s often the truth.
It depends on the following:
How competitive the niche is
If you are going after local SEO traffic or national or global traffic
What kind of foundation you already have in place
How well your website is already converting
If your brand positioning is clear
If you have off-site SEO in place already or not
And more factors, such as AI SEO and Google updates that may affect your results long-term
Plus more
I’ve had clients spend under $1,000 and get results. I’ve also had clients spend well over $15,000 before getting the results they were after.
This article is meant to provide some context. For privacy I’ve left out some client names and exact budgets spent, but these case studies should help provide a look at some standard cases, and a few edge cases.
For privacy reasons, I’ve left out exact budgets and some client names, but the general range of budgets and service-types should serve as a solid reference. All of these examples were from real clients I’ve worked with in recent years.
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Should I invest in SEO?
SEO can be an incredible marketing tool for some businesses. You invest initially, and then the work compounds.
I have many clients that invested up-front in website design and SEO services, and even though we discussed long term SEO Growth services, we never proceed to that step. They get enough leads out of the gate, their business grows, and they make back the money they spent, and continue to make a ton more.
There have also been businesses I have advised to skip SEO. For example, mom and pop an e-commerce clothing company that wanted to generate leads from Google but were competing against national brands such the Gap. I suggested social media marketing for them.
Sometimes organic SEO marketing just isn’t a good fit, but when it is, it can be one of the best investments you ever make!
SEO Investment Calculator
Is SEO a good fit for your business? Answer the three questions below to find your competition level and see whether the investment makes sense for you.
1. Google your main service the way a customer would. How many other businesses show up before yours?
2. On that same search, do you see any sponsored/paid ads?
3. What's your typical profit on one service or project?
Answer all three questions above, then tap "Get my recommendation."
Disclaimer: This tool is just a calculator that works with assumed competition levels vs profit margins to determine a general range. The results are not intended to replace a real quote. How much you might choose to invest in SEO vs the number of leads and results you might can vary greatly based on a number of factors outside of this widget. Please speak with myself, or another SEO expert, to verify your investment vs ROI.
Case Study 1 (Standard Case): My own website
In 2024 I did a massive overhaul on my own SEO. I started out targeting my local market. A year later, in 2025, I shifted over to a global market.
The initial work was probably valued under $2,500. I was targeting my local area, which I’d consider “medium competitive”. I had a substantial increase in leads and was booked out within 6 months.
When I began targeting a national and global audience, this was a bit more complicated. There was far more competition for “Squarespace designers”. This second round of organic SEO took about 6 months and included quite a bit of off-site SEO for AI search engines (which were already starting to lead the industry).
This second round was for a “highly competitive” niche and it was valued around $8,000 in services. However, my goal was to reach folks outside of my geographical region so I could work with larger business and charge higher prices (for high-value work).
While $8k may seem like a large investment, 6 months later, I received my first high-ticket client. Someone who was not local wanting to pay $8,000 for a website + SEO project. My investment was paid back. And immediately following that lead, I had many more, which were all “in the black”.
At the time of writing this article, it’s been a year (now 2026), and while I’m embarrassed to admit it, I’ve barely worked on my organic SEO this past year, and I have so many leads coming in (still) that I’m booked out 6 months.
THAT is the power of organic SEO.
It compounds over time.
Case Study 2 (Edge Case): Local business in Buena Vista who grew their business on a small SEO investment
This is an edge case, but it proves you aren’t locked into high fees to be successful.
K-9 Haven is a doggie day-care facility. They came to me when they had just opened their doors. We did a one-time consult. The overall investment was well under $1,000.
Their business has flourished after that. In fact, they just hit over 100 Google reviews and are booked out as well.
Why were they able to do so well on such a small investment?
They are in a small town with “low competition”
They are a local business and the strategy was very straight forward
They implemented everything I recommended (and I mean everything!)
They did a fantastic job running their business
They have a service people need in that area
[Read the full K-9 Haven case study]
Case Study 3: Local businesses with “medium” competition
I have worked with a ton of local businesses in my area, Durango Colorado. Many of them have what I would consider “medium” competition. They have some competition, but they aren’t trying to compete against national brands or dozens and dozens of other companies in the area.
Many of these businesses have paid me an overall average investment of around $5,000. This includes website design (where we are focused on brand positioning/copy, conversions, etc) plus and SEO add-on where we address strategy, keywords, and off-site implementation.
More then once, I’ve started a project thinking we would need long term growth services, but the results from the website redesign and initial SEO were enough for my clients to get leads.
Within a month of launching, I often have clients email me to let me know they’ve started seeing leads come in from Google and AI search engines.
This is a good example of what a local business with “medium” competition needs to invest to get results. Likely around the $5,000-$7,500 range.
I’ve seen this over and over again!
Case Study 4 (Standard Case): Local businesses trying to compete in higher competition areas with a budget under $2,000
A couple of times now, I’ve worked with local service providers who had a small budget and weren’t able to move the needle under $2,000.
The Acupuncturist in a High-Competition Niche
Many years ago, I worked with an acupuncturist that wanted to get leads from Google to grow her business. In this area, there are dozens and dozens of acupuncturist. While she was a “local” client, in this case, it was a very high competition niche.
She was also on a tight budget and was only making (I assume) $75/service. We did an SEO sprint that was under the $1,000 range, which at $75/service, was going to take a while to “make back”.
This SEO service worked, in that it got her from position 19 to position 8 for many money-making keywords, but because we never got her on page 1 of Google, she never saw an uptick in leads (at least not enough to really grow her business).
My only regret on that on was not being more transparent upfront on expected results.
[Read the full acupuncturist case study]
The Personal Trainer in a Medium-Competition Niche
Another example was a personal trainer who never quite made it to position 1. The budget was under $2k and included website updates, design updates for conversions, a little copy re-writing, and SEO.
We were squeezing in a lot for a small budget, so we essentially touched on a set of priorities.
His results were as expected. Better conversions and an increase in visibility, but not enough to truly move the needle. Last we touched base, his business was growing via referrals, but not as much via organic search.
I believe the investment was sound, as the conversion aspect likely played a critical role, but because there are several other gyms and personal trainers in the area, that budget wasn’t enough to move the needle in the search engines.
Case Study 5: The design-build firm in a highly-competitive area
One of the most challenging SEO projects I’ve worked on was for a design-build firm in the LA area. They were in a very geo-targeted region with half a dozen competitors all spending money on SEO and online marketing.
This is an example where you need to spend over $10,000. And they did.
We spent a lot of time on brand positioning, especially. Another firm had implemented some service pages with “expected keywords”. These were driving traffic, but not results.
They were not getting leads from the right customers.
After a few months of tweaking their brand positioning to target their ideal customer, and continuing to build their SEO and AI SEO foundation, they finally received their first 2 million dollar lead.
This is another example of high ROI. While they spent a large budget on SEO, the return is highly profitably for their business model, making a SEO marketing investment a smart choice.
Conclusion
Understanding when organic SEO marketing is or isn’t effective can be a bit tricky. It depends on many factors.
If you are a business that has high profit margin on your services or products, organic SEO/AI SEO might be an excellent choice for you. Even if you are in a highly-competitive market, if you can easily make your money back with one or two sales, it’s well worth it.
For example, spending $8,000 on SEO might feel like a lot, but I you charge $4,000 per client project, you only need to book 2 clients (who found you on Google or AI Search) to make that investment back.
However, if you have low profit margins and are selling services at $100/service, or a product at $30/piece, it is going to take a lot longer to make your money back.
In that case, if you are in a low-competition niche and don’t need to spend too much to get some traction, SEO might still be a good fit, but if you are in a high competition niche (like the folks who were going to be competing against the Gap), then SEO is not the right marketing strategy for you.
If you want some guidance on if SEO marketing services are right for your business, please feel free to contact me!
