Contractor SEO ROI Calculator
What is ranking actually worth to your business? Enter your numbers and see the monthly revenue impact of page 1 rankings, local pack positions, and review growth.
Free. No email required to see results. Numbers update live as you change inputs.
Sets a default average job value you can adjust.
Pre-filled for HVAC. Adjust to match your actual average revenue per booked job.
Percentage of qualified leads that become paying customers. Typical range 25 to 45%.
Drives estimated monthly search clicks available to a top-3 ranked contractor in your trade and market.
Roughly what your Google Search Console or Analytics shows for organic traffic. Guess if you are not sure.
Monthly revenue upside from ranking
+$7,560/mo
Ranking in the top 3 local pack would be worth approximately $7,560 more per month than where you are today.
Scenario 1
Where you are today
- Visitors / mo
- 100
- Leads / mo
- 4
- Customers / mo
- 1
- Revenue / mo
- $1,680
Scenario 2
Page 1 organic
- Visitors / mo
- 250
- Leads / mo
- 10
- Customers / mo
- 4
- Revenue / mo
- $4,200
Scenario 3
Top 3 local pack + page 1
- Visitors / mo
- 550
- Leads / mo
- 22
- Customers / mo
- 8
- Revenue / mo
- $9,240
Baseline site conversion assumed at 4%. Custom, conversion-optimized sites typically hit 6 to 10%.
Payback vs SEO plans
Strong ROILocal
$750/mo
Payback in 1 mo
Authority
$1,500/mo
Payback in 1 mo
Pro
$3,000/mo
Payback in 1 mo
At the Authority plan ($1,500/mo), the projected top-3 ranking upside covers the cost in 1 month. Every month after that is margin.
Directional estimates from 2026 industry benchmarks. Actual results depend on competition, review profile, and site conversion. This is why we start every engagement with an audit.
Email me my results plus the SEO benchmarks guide
Optional. Your numbers are already visible above. This sends a copy of your scenario plus the 2026 contractor SEO benchmarks to your inbox.
How this calculator works
The SEO ROI formula is monthly search clicks, times the share you capture at your ranking, times your site conversion rate, times your close rate, times your average job value. That gives monthly revenue from SEO; subtract what you pay for SEO and divide by the same cost for the return. SEO ROI is not a mystery number. It is the product of four inputs: how many people search for your service in your market, what share of those clicks you can win by ranking, what percentage of visitors become leads on your site, and what percentage of leads become paying customers at your average job value. We hold the search click ceiling constant per market size, apply industry-standard capture rates for page 1 and top-3 local pack positions, and multiply through to revenue.
Assumptions we use, listed transparently: monthly search clicks available to a top-3 ranked contractor are approximately 2,400 in a major metro, 1,000 in a mid-size metro, and 400 in a small metro or rural area. Page 1 organic captures roughly 25% of those clicks. Top 3 local pack plus page 1 captures roughly 55%. Baseline site conversion of visitors to leads is 4% (custom, conversion-optimized sites hit 6 to 10%). Your close rate and average job value are yours.
How to improve each number
- Ranking (capture rate). Local pack position and page 1 placement are earned through on-page SEO, technical health, review velocity, and links. Start with our contractor SEO guide for the full playbook.
- Close rate (leads to customers). Trust signals close jobs. Google reviews are the highest-leverage lever most contractors ignore. See how to get 100 Google reviews for the exact system.
- Site conversion (visitors to leads). Template sites convert at 2 to 3%. Custom, conversion-optimized sites convert at 6 to 10%. That is a 3x swing on the same traffic. See our web design service for what that looks like.
Want the real number for your market?
Start with the free SEO audit for a directional read on where you stand today. For a full competitive and keyword landscape, our $1,000 AI Visibility Audit maps the exact search demand, competitor rankings, and gap opportunities in your market, and credits toward your first month of any ongoing plan.
Frequently asked questions
How do you calculate SEO ROI?
Monthly revenue from organic search (clicks captured, times site conversion rate, times close rate, times average job value) minus your monthly SEO cost, divided by that cost. A contractor paying $750 a month who closes two extra $1,500 jobs from search has $3,000 in revenue, $2,250 in profit above the fee, and a 300 percent return before job margin.
What is a good ROI for SEO?
For a local service business, 3 to 1 or better within 12 months is the bar we use. The first three to six months usually run negative because rankings lag the work. Markets with high job values (roofing, HVAC replacement, remodeling) clear the bar sooner than low-ticket trades.
How long until SEO pays for itself?
Most of our contractor clients cross break-even between month four and month nine. Small metros with weak competition can do it in three; a major metro against established players can take a year. The calculator's payback section shows the month for your inputs.
Why does this SEO calculator ask for close rate?
Because traffic is not revenue. Two contractors with identical rankings earn very different returns if one closes 30 percent of leads and the other closes 60. Close rate is the lever most owners can move fastest, usually by answering faster and asking for reviews.
Also useful: Contractor Funnel Calculator and LSA Cost Calculator.