How Much Does SEO Cost in Dubai & Why? [Updated 2022 Rates]

Search Engine Optimisation (or SEO as it is more commonly known as) is one of those areas of digital marketing that creates more questions than answers!  For years, SEO was actually seen as a "dark art", a mysterious area of the internet where those who knew the secrets could manipulate search engines such as Google into ranking a website at the top of its search engine results page.

Luckily, this is no longer the case and Google itself has helped clean up the industry.  Today, SEO is more about following a set of proven processes and activities.  Unlike before, these activities are actually visible and tangible, which has helped SEO agencies like Nexa, to provide much more clarity in terms of our pricing policies.

Why Even Bother with SEO?

The fact that you're browsing this web page suggests that you have an interest in SEO for your business, which is great, but before we go into the costs and how these are calculated, it probably makes sense to ask ourselves why we should still bother with SEO in 2022 and beyond, given that there are so many more digital marketing options available today.  We're often asked if SEO still holds value and to demonstrate why we believe it does, we turn to real business reasoning and metrics rather than SEO jargon to help justify our argument.  To start, let's address these 4 key questions:

1 - How important is it for your business to be visible if someone is searching for a product or service that your business offers?

Most purchasers today still turn to Google when searching for a provider of a product or service and if your business is the type of business where your customers are likely to originate from this channel, it's vital that your business is visible.  Not only will strong visibility increase traffic to your website but the fact that you're visible also gives your business a psychological thumbs-up in the eyes of a prospect.  And that brings us nicely to the second question.

2 - How important is it that your website is more visible at the top of Google's search results page than your competitors' websites?

It's likely that if your answer to question 1 above was positively inclined, that your answer to this question will be the same.  If your business is in a competitive field where many other businesses provide the same or very similar services, being more visible at the top of Google's search engine results pages will increase your chances of winning new business ahead of your competition.  If your website is not visible right now, all is not lost.  Luckily, Google understand that businesses need to be visible in order to drive qualified traffic to their websites and offer advertising in the form of Google Adwords and Pay Per Click advertising.  

Google Adwords will help your business to generate immediate traffic, but at a cost that may not be sustainable for your business in the long run.  What do we mean here?  Well although each advert for your business will be charged on a cost per click basis, there's no guarantee that the click will result in a lead let alone new business.  That means that you'll need to invest sums of money on a regular basis with no guarantee of generating new business for you.

There's no guarantee with SEO either of course, but the main difference here is that you're not paying for each visit to your website, so there's no financial impact of an organic visit to your website that doesn't convert into new business.  We mentioned above that Google advertising can be costly and this will cost will be different for every industry.  For example, Nexa's industry is digital marketing and the average cost per click from Google Adwords is $6.80 per click (as of  2022). 

Without a strong SEO strategy, Nexa would be forced to invest in Google Adwords to generate traffic.  Thankfully, Nexa has an incredibly strong SEO strategy (the fact you're reading this article is testament to that) and we generate on average, 14,000 organic visits to our website every month.  If we have to pay for this traffic, the cost would be $95,200 per month.  That's the equivalent of $1,142,000 per year.

4 - How much should I spend on SEO each Month?

Based on the above, it's clear that SEO can demonstrate serious value for a business.  It, therefore, makes sense to allocate a reasonable budget for this activity as the more you can invest in this activity, the faster the results will be.  Nexa's tried and tested methodology has consistently shown that the more SEO work carried out for a client, the better and faster the results. If we were to estimate the SEO investment paid by Nexa each month for the $95,200 worth of free, organic traffic we currently receive, the monthly cost would be $8,800 per month.  Based on a return of $95,200, our ROI from traffic alone is 1:11.

What's important to understand here is that 

So, What Determines How Much SEO Costs (in Dubai or Anywhere else)?

Quite simply, it comes down to two main areas.  The industry you are in and activities carried out by the SEO agency in order to be able to show you the results you desire.

Why are these Related?

Again, there's a simple answer here and it comes down to how much competition you have online.  Some industries have an extremely aggressive competitor set (think banks, real estate companies, dentists etc) where many of the companies have a strong online presence on the search engines and social media.  Many of the top-ranking competitors may also have high-quality websites, which is also a ranking indicator used by Google to determine an industry's best companies. 

What this all means is that businesses in a highly competitive industry will have to work harder than companies who have less online competition (think steel manufacturers and other industrial, B2B companies).

SEO Price in Dubai / SEO Costs

We know you're searching for SEO price Dubai but in order to provide an answer to this question, let's go back to the activities.  Generally there are a number of set stages that need to be followed in order for any SEO activity to have any level of impact at all and these phases may differ from agency to agency.

SEO Cost Breakdown: Technical Stage

This should normally be the first stage of any SEO activity.  The technical stage will include a full analysis of your website including the website structure, SEO-friendliness and content analysis.  Once this is complete, a recommendations document will be provided to you or if agreed with the SEO agency, any recommendations provided will be implemented directly onto your website.  Also at this stage, the agency should ensure that your website is prepared for any ongoing or content activity on your website.  For SEO to work for you, you will need to regularly add content to your website so your site needs to have sections available for this.  The most obvious area of your website for this is a blog and your agency may include the adding of a blog onto your website as part of this process.

There may be a separate cost of this activity outside your ongoing retainer-based agreement.  At this point, you may see an instant impact in the rankings of your website.  But it's highly important to understand and remember that despite the rankings improving, there has at this point not been any actual ongoing SEO activity for your website, which may mean that any boost in rankings is short-lived and unsustainable.  

It's the ongoing SEO guides that will provide you with what we regard as fully sustainable search engine rankings (i.e. rankings that won't fluctuate up and down sporadically).

SEO Cost Breakdown: On-Going Activity

Once the technical stage is completed, the actual meat and substance of your SEO activity can begin.  It's important not to jump to this stage before the technical activity is complete as the impact of any work down on a structurally better website is significantly higher than with a website that isn't Google-friendly.

This stage can be a stage that takes as long as 12 months but if conducted and implemented properly can start producing results for your business within just a couple of weeks.

The activity within this stage is based on actual work that is completed and hosted on your website and is centred on content.  We recently wrote an article about how Google works and much of this article was focused on content and what Google's objectives are as a business.  To summarise though, Google's main objective is to provide the best quality search results for its users.  This means providing the best possible answers or information to the questions that are being typed into Google.  Therefore, if your website contains the most relevant and quality information, there is a good chance that your content will be ranked above other sites that perhaps do not answer the search query as well.  

The cost of this SEO activity is therefore fully linked to the content that is created for your website.  It is also dependent on the type of content that is created.  Below is a list of the type of content that you should consider creating that can have a positive effect on your SEO activity and some approximate prices for each of them below.  Based on this, you will be able to work out how much you should be paying for SEO activity.

• Short Form Blog Articles:  Generally 300 - 750 word articles (From US$ 175 per article)
• Long-Form Blog Articles:  Generally 800+ word articles (From US$ 300 per article)
• Videos (From US$ 1,500 per video)
• Infographics (From US$ 1,000 per infographic)
• Audio Content (eg Podcasts)

The cost is therefore highly dependent on the volume and type of content created for you.  For most businesses, creating 4 to 6 blog articles will suffice and allow you to target a range of highly relevant keywords.  For businesses in more competitive industries, we would recommend creating around 15 to 20 long and short-form articles per month and then supplementing this with occasional videos and infographics.

Important:  An often tell-tale sign of whether an agency offers Google-compliant services or whether they offer unscrupulous activities designed to wrongly-manipulate Google's algorithms is if they offer a "no-fee until we show you results" deal.  As attractive as this sounds, this often means that the SEO agency have some machine-driven SEO activity, which creates thousands of bad links back to your website.  Google have targeted this type of activity and can remove any website found guilty of this from its search engine.  Bottom line: Don't take the risk.  

SEO Cost Breakdown: Social Media Activity

This may not be included in the scope of work for an SEO Agency but social media is having an increasingly important impact as far as SEO is concerned with there being more than enough evidence to suggest that there is an impact on SEO rankings based on social media activity.

SEO Packages in Dubai

The last section of this article is to address the topic of SEO Packages that many agencies offer in Dubai.  While package options are attractive both from a supplier and purchaser perspective, it's important to note that most packages will not take into consideration the specific needs of your business.  Remember, every business is different and therefore, from an SEO perspective at least, will require different activities to produce results.  Be careful not to take the easy option of choosing the middle package out of the three offered by a SEO agency and instead, opt for a package that addresses the needs of your business.

Conclusion and why you should invest in SEO

To conclude, we hope that we've made it clear that despite the obvious reasons why the cost of SEO fluctuates not just from agency to agency but also from industry to industry.  If you are in a highly competitive industry, it may only make sense to invest in SEO if (a) there is enough search volume to justify your investment and (b) the revenue or profit from a sale allows you to generate a worthwhile return on investment for your business. If any of the above does not apply, you should seriously re-consider your efforts in other areas of marketing that may produce a more desired income and return on your investment and effort applied.

We hope that the above article is helpful and allows you to budget what you should be investing in SEO with an SEO agency and what you should be receiving in return.  There's no doubt that SEO today is absolutely vital for any business looking to build a sustainable long-term digital marketing strategy.  Aside from the online visibility, there is a high level of credibility that can be earned by being found at the top of a search engine results page.

Pay-per-click costs are increasing as more and more people use the platform and therefore organic clicks (those from search engine results pages without the little 'Ad' symbol) can save a company thousands of dollars, especially for highly competitive search terms.

One last thing.  Be wise.  Your company's online reputation can significantly impact your business and its future.  If you speak to an SEO agency that promised you the world and more, take a step back and think.  Don't take unnecessary risks that may get your website blocked from Google.  

Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is.

If you would like to talk to us about SEO or perhaps understand how much you should be looking to spend on a strategy that will work for your business, please click on the button below: