SEO ROI calculator
Estimate leads, customers, revenue and return from organic traffic, month by month.
Use ToolFree tool · Calculator
Estimate the SEO effort your situation needs.
Answer seven questions about your business and site. You get a monthly effort range split across technical, content, local and authority work, with the weighting table in plain view.
Your inputs
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Updates when you run the toolFill in the inputs and run the tool to see results here.
How it works
What the tool does.
Size the monthly SEO effort your business needs, split by workstream, with the weights shown.
- Each answer adds hours to one or more workstreams: technical, content, local and authority.
- The business type sets the starting hours for each workstream. Your other answers add to or scale those hours.
- The result is a low and high band of hours per month, plus which workstreams carry most of the work.
- If you enter an hourly rate, the tool multiplies the hours by it to show an illustrative budget range you can change.
Methodology
The rules behind the result.
Nothing is hidden. These are the exact rules the tool applies.
- Starting hours come from the business type (shown in the weighting table on the page).
- Site size and geographic scope multiply technical and local hours, because more pages and more locations mean more to audit and maintain.
- Competition multiplies content and authority hours, because stronger competitors take more and better pages and more links to match.
- Maturity adds or removes a one-time-style catch-up load on technical work, spread across the month.
- Content and authority needs add hours directly to those workstreams.
- The low band is the computed total × 0.8 and the high band is × 1.25. The range reflects normal variation in how efficiently work gets done.
| Question | Answer | Effect on hours |
|---|---|---|
| Business type | Single-location local service | Starting hours: technical 4, content 8, local 8, authority 4 |
| Multi-location business | Starting hours: technical 6, content 10, local 14, authority 6 | |
| Ecommerce store | Starting hours: technical 10, content 12, local 0, authority 8 | |
| SaaS or software | Starting hours: technical 6, content 16, local 0, authority 8 | |
| B2B or professional services | Starting hours: technical 5, content 12, local 2, authority 6 | |
| Site size | Under 25 pages | Technical and local × 0.8 |
| 25 to 200 pages | Technical and local × 1.0 | |
| 200 to 2,000 pages | Technical and local × 1.5 | |
| Over 2,000 pages | Technical and local × 2.2 | |
| Geographic scope | One city or metro | No change |
| Several cities or a state | Content × 1.15, local × 1.4 | |
| Nationwide | Technical × 1.1, content × 1.25, local × 0.6, authority × 1.2 | |
| Several countries | Technical × 1.35, content × 1.4, local × 0.6, authority × 1.3 | |
| Competition | Low: small or weak sites rank | Content and authority × 0.8 |
| Medium: established local or niche sites | Content and authority × 1.0 | |
| High: strong regional or national players | Content and authority × 1.4 | |
| Very high: major brands dominate | Content and authority × 1.8 | |
| Current SEO maturity | Starting from scratch | Technical + 8 hours |
| Some basics done | Technical + 4 hours | |
| Basics solid | No change | |
| Mature program in place | Technical − 2 hours (minimum 2) | |
| Content needs | Maintain existing pages | Content + 2 hours |
| 2 to 4 new or rewritten pages a month | Content + 10 hours | |
| 5 to 10 pages a month | Content + 22 hours | |
| More than 10 pages a month | Content + 40 hours | |
| Authority needs | Minimal: reviews and citations only | No change |
| Moderate: a few earned links a month | Authority + 6 hours | |
| Significant: ongoing outreach and PR | Authority + 14 hours | |
| Aggressive: competing with major brands | Authority + 24 hours |
Reading the result
What the result means.
- Hours per month is a rough size of the job, not a quote. Two agencies can deliver the same hours with very different quality.
- The workstream split tells you where the effort should go. If content carries most of the hours, a proposal that is mostly technical audits is a mismatch.
- Any dollar figure is simply hours × the rate you entered. It is illustrative. Rates vary widely by provider and region.
Example
How someone might use it.
Comparing proposals from two providers
A two-location dental practice with 40 pages, regional scope, medium competition and partial basics gets an effort range that is weighted toward local and content work.
One proposal they received is mostly technical audits; another spends most hours on location pages, reviews and content. The effort profile helps them ask the first provider why local work is missing.
Limitations
What it cannot tell you.
Every tool has blind spots. These are this one’s.
- The weights are our working assumptions from running SEO programs, not industry data. They are shown so you can disagree with them.
- It cannot see your site, rankings or competitors. Two businesses with the same answers can need very different work.
- It does not include one-off projects such as a site migration or redesign.
- The dollar range is not a price from us or anyone else.
Questions
Frequently asked questions.
Why does this show hours instead of a price?
Price depends on who does the work and where. Hours are a more honest way to compare proposals, because they describe the size of the job. You can enter any hourly rate to turn hours into an illustrative budget.
Where do the weights come from?
They are our working assumptions from planning SEO programs for local, ecommerce, SaaS and B2B businesses. They are not survey data. The full table is shown so you can check each one.
What is a reasonable hourly rate to enter?
Use the rate in a proposal you have received, or your in-house cost per hour for staff time. The tool uses whatever you enter and does not suggest a market rate.
Does more hours always mean better results?
No. Hours spent on the wrong workstream add cost without adding much. That is why the tool shows where the effort should go, not only how much.
Privacy
What we collect
No forms, no email gate. The results are yours.
- Everything is calculated in your browser. The numbers you type are not sent to our server.
- Nothing is emailed, and you do not need an account.
- We record anonymous usage events (for example, that the tool was used) without any of the values you entered.
Understand the terms behind this tool.
Keyword mapping
Keyword mapping is assigning related search queries and their intent to specific website pages. The purpose is to give each page a clear role in the search journey.
Content gap
A content gap is a missing or inadequate answer in a website's coverage of its audience's needs. Competitor coverage can suggest gaps but cannot prove that every topic deserves a page.
Backlink audit
A backlink audit is a structured review of incoming website links, their source context, destinations, and acquisition history. It identifies useful references, broken customer paths, and evidence requiring policy review. The audit should produce justified actions with source records, rather than automatic removal instructions based on vendor scores.
SEO · Content · Local · Web Design
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