What you are paying for in months one to six
The honest answer is a range, and the range is wide enough that anybody quoting a single number is either guessing or selling.
Three to nine months to a first commercially meaningful result, and the variance comes almost entirely from what already exists. A site with authority and a technical problem can move in weeks; a new domain in a competitive category will not, whatever anybody spends.
What the first two months buy
Almost never rankings. They buy the removal of whatever is preventing pages from being indexed and understood, and the decision about which queries are worth pursuing at all. That work is invisible from the outside and it is the part that determines whether the rest is possible.
What moves first, and why
Queries where you already rank on the second page. They move because the page is already understood and only needed a reason to be preferred, which is why a competent programme starts there rather than with the term the board wants.
The terms the board wants usually move last. Saying so at the start is the difference between an engagement that is judged fairly and one that is judged in month three.
- Months 1 to 2: indexing, structure, the query set
- Months 2 to 4: positions that were already close
- Months 4 to 9: the terms that were the reason for calling
- Throughout: the pages that keep earning after the invoice stops
When it is the wrong purchase
If you need enquiries this quarter, this is not the channel and no amount of budget changes that. Paid search can be switched on in a week. That is a real difference in kind, not a difference in effort.
What to take from this
- 01Three to nine months, and the variance is what already exists
- 02The first two months buy the conditions, not the positions
- 03Second page positions move first; the board's term moves last
- 04Needing results this quarter is a reason to buy a different channel
Ask the question directly
- Can you guarantee a position?
- No, and a guarantee is a reliable signal that the terms being guaranteed are ones nobody is competing for.
- What if we stop after six months?
- The pages that rank keep ranking for a while and then decay as competitors move. It is closer to stopping maintenance than to switching off a campaign.
Related answers
SEO management
One monthly programme: technical fixes, content architecture and internal links, aimed at the queries that end in a sale rather than the ones that end in a visit.
SEO or Google Ads first?
Bring the decision you are stuck on
A call, forty five minutes, no deck. We will tell you if we are the wrong firm.