How To Add PPC and LSAs to Your SEO Offer (and How To Price It)

If your SEO clients aren't getting the results they used to, it's not your fault.

Google and ChatGPT are built to answer the question without sending a click. There's less organic traffic to go around and the same amount of competition.

So I don't send SEO-only proposals anymore. Every one includes Local Service Ads at minimum, and most include pay per click.

How do you add PPC to an SEO offer? Add Local Service Ads and Google Ads to your SEO retainer as one bundled service. Hire a PPC contractor to run the campaigns per account, ask the prospect what a customer is worth and how many leads they close, then forecast cost per customer before you propose a budget. Price the bundle below SEO and paid sold separately, and require a minimum ad spend.

Here's the short version:

• You don't need a PPC team. Hire a contractor per account and keep the strategy.
• Start with LSAs. You pay per lead, so a small budget still produces a forecast you can stand behind.
• Ask about the business, not the keywords. Customer value, close rate and how many customers they want.
• Forecast cost per customer before you name a budget.
• Bundle it. $5,000 SEO plus $3,000 paid becomes $6,000 together, plus ad spend.

Why SEO Alone Is Harder To Sell

Your client's website now sits under ads, a Maps pack and directories. Organic results still matter. They just aren't the first thing a searcher sees.

Here's "HVAC near me" from Miami. Local Service Ads at the very top. A text ad right under them. The local company's website was 8th in the organic results.

And then you walk into a sales call and say: "Pay me $5,000 a month. It'll take 6 to 12 months. I'm not sure what you'll get."

That's a hard sell when you know Google isn't sending the clicks it used to. Be honest with yourself about that, and be honest with the prospect.

Paid changes the conversation. You can talk about leads and customers in month one, while the SEO builds. The full case is in our guide to blended search.

The Paid Placements To Add

There are three paid placements on a local search: Local Service Ads, pay per click ads and Google Maps ads. We run all of them under one retainer.

Pay per click is the one most SEOs know. Here's why I still sell it, even to personal injury firms paying upwards of $1,000 a click on the big terms:

• Speed. SEO takes months. PPC gets clicks and calls almost overnight.
• Precision. You pick the exact searches, and negative keyword lists keep out the ones you don't want.
• Cheaper pockets. "Car accident lawyer" is brutally expensive. Narrower case types in the same practice area cost a fraction of that.
• You can forecast it. Click price, conversion rate and close rate give you a cost per customer before you spend a dollar.

Paid comes with extra cost, and that's where SEO prospects push back. They're already stretched on the retainer.

So start small. Don't build a massive campaign. Pick a narrow set of searches you know convert, put a limited budget behind them and let it run.

When those pockets turn a profit, reinvest it in the ads. The budget grows because it's earning, not because you talked them into it.

Why Local Service Ads Are the Easiest Add-On

Local Service Ads charge per lead, not per click. According to Google's Local Services Help, you're charged when someone contacts the business through the ad, like a call or a message.

That's why you can run them on a small budget. You know what a lead costs before you start.

Here's the math I use on the call:

• $500 a month at $50 a lead = 10 calls.
• If they close 20%, that's 2 new customers, or $250 each.
• If a customer is worth $2,500, that $500 just brought in $5,000.

LSAs also sit at the very top of the page. First bite at the apple.

And they're simpler to run than Google Ads. PPC targets keywords. LSAs target service categories. No negative keyword lists, far less campaign setup.

The trade-off is control. You can't pick the exact searches you show up for.

LSAs need a localized search to show. That's fine: local is where most of the SEO opportunity is right now anyway. More on selling Local Service Ads.

What if you've never run paid? Don't hire a PPC team. Find a contractor who runs campaigns per account.

I'm a big believer in jumping off the cliff and opening the parachute on the way down. You keep the client, the strategy and the forecast. They run the campaigns.

The Questions That Build the Forecast

Before you propose a budget, ask what a customer is worth and how many leads they close. Those two numbers turn ad spend into an ROI forecast.

Ask every prospect:

1. What's a new customer worth to your business?
2. What percentage of leads become customers?
3. How many more customers do you want a month? That tells you how much to spend.
4. Who answers the calls, and who follows up? A great ad can't fix a phone nobody picks up.

Here's what most SEOs don't expect. Prospects love this part. People want to talk about their business.

Compare that with explaining title tags. This is a conversation about growth, and the North Star is sales. Here's our full list of discovery call questions.

How To Forecast Cost Per Customer

Multiply it out: clicks from the budget, leads from the landing page conversion rate, customers from the close rate. Divide spend by customers and compare it to what they told you a customer is worth.

This is what the PPC proposal builder in Agency OS does. You set the target cost per customer from what the prospect told you, then add the keywords you'll target and their click prices.

Add a landing page conversion rate and a lead conversion rate. It calculates the forecast cost per customer and tells you whether you're under target.

In this example, it's $541 per customer against an $800 target.

Then test the downside. On the video, I drop the landing page conversion rate to 16%. The cost per customer jumps to about $700. Still under target. That's the forecast you can stand behind.

If they already run Google Ads, export the account and upload it. The proposal audits it and shows where the money's going today.

Then it builds the deck: their current data, the keyword research and the forecast for Google Ads, Local Service Ads and ChatGPT ads.

That's a different conversation from an estimated traffic forecast. It's built on numbers you can bank on. Here's how we lay out a full PPC proposal, and how to set a PPC budget.

How To Price SEO and PPC Together

Price the bundle below what SEO and paid would cost separately, and make ad spend a separate line. The client gets a discount. You get a bigger retainer.

Here's how I do it:

$5,000 for SEO and $3,000 for paid, sold separately. $6,000 together. The client gets a big discount, and you have a $6,000 retainer instead of a $5,000 one.

Ad spend sits on top, set by how many customers they want and what a lead costs.

What if they push back on PPC?

Fine. LSAs are included in the SEO retainer at no extra fee. They don't cost much to run.

But I require them to spend about $1,000 a month on the ads. That part isn't optional. SEO alone isn't enough anymore.

Agency OS lets you set the fee as a flat retainer, a flat fee plus a percentage of ad spend, or a percentage only. More on choosing between those in agency pricing models.

Then lower your SEO retainer to make room. Use AI to deliver SEO for less, and pass some of that on so the client can afford ad spend. I know that sounds backwards coming from me.

I've pushed agencies to go upmarket for years. But AI has cut what it costs to deliver SEO. You don't have an excuse for not using it.

A lower SEO fee plus paid makes a bigger total retainer than SEO alone, and the client sees results in month one.

I know what you're thinking: "They can't afford my retainer plus ad spend."

That's exactly why the SEO number has to come down. The account still grows. It just grows through ads.

And this is where it's all heading: clients want one agency that handles everything. An agency of record, almost a fractional CMO.

We get more prospects every month who say the same thing. AI is overwhelming. They can't keep up. They don't want five vendors.

They want someone who knows what they're doing to handle the ads, the SEO and whatever comes next. The agency that already runs SEO and paid is the one they hand it to.

We can't keep treating SEO like it's 2012. Here's how to keep selling SEO with paid in the mix.

Adding PPC to SEO: FAQs

Can I sell PPC if I've never run Google Ads? Yes. Hire a PPC contractor to run campaigns per account. You keep the strategy, the forecast and the client relationship.

Should I start with PPC or Local Service Ads? Local Service Ads. You pay per lead, setup is simpler and a small budget still produces enough leads to learn from. Add PPC once the client sees results.

How much should I charge for SEO and PPC together? Price the bundle below the two sold separately. For example, $5,000 SEO plus $3,000 paid becomes $6,000 a month together, with ad spend billed on top.

Do I include ad spend in my retainer? No. Keep the management fee and the ad spend separate, and set the spend from how many customers the client wants and what a lead costs.

What's the minimum ad budget for an SEO client? I ask for about $1,000 a month on Local Service Ads at minimum. Below that, there aren't enough leads to know what's working.