SEO services for clients

The claim

“This is a perfect example of AI enabled high ticket service and he’s around $500k ARR in like a week / (I’m a customer btw) / Josh is gonna do full stack ~ish SEO offer that’s prob a $5-10k/mo retailer 2 years ago / He’s gonna fulfill it with AI workflows that cost pennies on the dollar / Same outcome / $1-2k/mo …” (truncated)

@landforce, 6 October 2026, 2,843 views as collected¹. The live count was 12,234 on 10 October².

“Imagine turning €0 into €120,000 per month with AI-enhanced SEO…” (opening line only)

@JulianGoldieSEO, 17 October 2024, 2,940 views¹².

A slash marks a line break. SEO is the work of making a website rank higher in Google. Here you sell it to businesses, usually for a monthly fee (a “retainer”; the tweet’s “retailer”). “ARR” is monthly subscription income times twelve.

The trade itself is real. Google’s advice to businesses says: “Many SEOs and other agencies and consultants provide useful services for website owners”⁷². This page judges the scheme, not the people who tweeted.

The sums

Ahrefs, which sells SEO software, polled 439 providers: the most common fee was $501 to $1,000 a month⁴. The poll is from 2024 or earlier and its averages run high⁴.

Clients needed (our sums; €120,000 is about $134,500⁹⁵):

So $1,000 a month is one to three clients, and €120,000 a month is a company with staff.

Costs are low: a data tool at €119 to €229 a month²¹ and about $1.50 of AI writing per article (our estimate)²³. Everyone pays the same, so profit goes to whoever can win and keep clients. Revenue is also not profit: one report puts the average digital agency’s net margin (what is left after all costs) at 13%¹⁶. A solo seller with no staff keeps far more of each euro, but has far fewer euros.

What happens to most people who try

One 2025 survey of 279 SEO professionals found a median freelance income of $58,000 a year¹¹. The median is the middle person: half earn more, half less. The survey says its sample may be too small¹¹. Surveys count only people still in the trade; we found no data on how many starters ever get a client.

Two newcomers published results from cold email (email to strangers). One sent 172 and after a week had 2 real replies and no revenue³⁹. The other, already running a web agency, sent 43 and won one client at $230 a month⁴⁰.

Google’s rules limit what can be sold: paid links count as link spam unless labelled as paid⁶²⁶³, and mass AI pages that add no value may break its spam policy⁶⁴.

The upside

The best evidence is on TrustMRR, a site that reads owners’ payment accounts directly. As far as we could see, nobody outside it checks the numbers. Owners choose to list, and the figures are revenue, not profit³⁷. Among the SEO sellers listed, AEO Engine shows $160,959 of monthly recurring revenue; its last 30 days were up 178% on the 30 days before, so this is a peak³³. Indexsy shows $45,203, with revenue down 19%³⁵.

Self-reported, with no payment proof: Benas Leonavicius reported €126,000 revenue for 2024 after more than ten years in SEO⁴². Jade Pruett, previously an SEO specialist for large publishers, reported “around $30k MRR” (monthly recurring revenue) in 2023, serving one niche, therapists⁴⁴.

The “$500k ARR” tweet is not verified. The seller, Josh Pigford, posted “nearly $400,000 ARR in 10 days” from “a few dozen clients”⁹¹. He says the first week’s sales all came through his X account, which has about 75,600 followers³⁹¹. That is under two weeks of sign-ups multiplied out to a year, and no client had finished the refundable first month³⁹¹. It shows that a known founder with an audience can sell this fast at $1,000 to $2,000 a month, but not yet that the service works for clients, or what a seller without that audience would sell³⁹⁰⁹¹. We found no proof of the €120,000 figure¹.

Our estimate of a good first year for a competent newcomer with no client network is two to five clients, roughly $1,000 to $5,000 a month before tools and tax⁴⁸. No first-year data lies behind it.

What it takes to compete

• Skill and years. Above $10,000 a month solo, every documented case had years in SEO or a large audience^42444791.
• A route to clients that is not cold. Referrals bring new business for 85% of marketing agencies surveyed¹⁸. Without a network, the documented routes are a marketplace profile such as Upwork, or teaching one niche⁴²⁴⁴.

To tell early: can you name a site you ranked? Do you know ten business owners who would take your call? Do 100 personal approaches bring a paying client?

Who else makes money from it

The @JulianGoldieSEO profile links to a paid group on Skool, a platform for online communities²⁴⁹. It shows 3,390 members at $69 a month⁴⁹. How many pay, and how much, is unknown. The author also runs Goldie Agency, which sells links at $302 to $390 each²⁶²⁷. We did not check how those links are obtained or labelled.

Suppliers are paid whether or not a newcomer wins a client, and some pay for referrals: Semrush, which sells SEO data, pays “$100 to $300 for every sale”⁵⁸. So “how to start an SEO agency” content can pay its author whatever happens to the reader.