Why is there no standard price for AI SEO?
Because the work changes a lot from one business to the next. A local firm with one service and a clean site needs a fraction of the work of a national brand with fifty pages built in scripts.
It's also a young field, so agencies package it very differently. One will call a crawler check and an llms.txt file AI SEO. Another means a full programme of page rewrites, schema, reviews and digital PR. Compare what's included, not the label.
What drives AI SEO cost in the UK?
Five things, roughly in order of how much they move the price.
- The state of your site: whether AI crawlers can read it, whether the copy is in the HTML, and whether pages need rewriting or building.
- Scope: how many services, products, locations and buyer questions need covering.
- Competition: how many rivals are already named for your questions, and how strong their reputations are.
- Off-site work: how much digital PR, review building and listing work it takes to be vouched for elsewhere.
- Connectors: whether you want ChatGPT or Claude to check availability, quote or book through an MCP server.
What pricing models will you see?
Four common ones. Each suits a different starting point.
- One-off audit: a report on what the assistants say about you, why, and a fix list. Good for knowing where you stand.
- Fixed project: the audit plus the fixes, done once. Good when the site needs work but the market isn't crowded.
- Monthly plan: ongoing pages, PR, reviews and tracking. Good for competitive markets where reputation decides.
- Add-on to SEO or a rebuild: AI search built into work you're already doing. Usually the best value, because the work overlaps.
Should AI SEO cost extra on top of SEO?
Some, not double. Most of what helps AI search also helps Google: crawlable pages, clear facts, schema, links and mentions.
The extra work is real but narrower: answer-first rewrites, question tracking across assistants, listings and directories the assistants cite, and PR aimed at those sources. If an agency quotes AI SEO as a separate full programme on top of full SEO, ask which tasks are new and which you're already paying for.
What should you ask before you sign?
These questions sort the useful offers from the vague ones.
- Which buyer questions will you track, and in which assistants?
- What exactly will you change on my site, and what will you do off it?
- How will you report, and how often?
- Is the price fixed, and what would change it?
- What happens if I stop after three months? Do I keep the work?
- Do you guarantee placements? The right answer is no.
What's a red flag in AI SEO pricing?
Guarantees, vague deliverables and paid "AI submission". None of the main assistants has a paid way into its recommendations.
Also be wary of long contracts with no monthly report, prices that only appear after a long sales process, and packages built around a single trick, such as an llms.txt file. A useful offer tells you what will be done, by whom, and how you'll see whether it's working.