Thousands to an Agency, or Pushnom?
Most small businesses spend on one of three things to be visible online: an SEO agency retainer, Google Ads, or hours of manual work. Here's what each actually costs — and what Pushnom does instead, from $29/mo.
What You're Probably Paying Right Now
Agency and Google Ads figures are industry-typical ranges for small/medium businesses as published by WebFX (webfx.com), checked September 2026 — your actual cost will vary by market and provider. Pushnom figures are our own current pricing.
What Each Option Actually Does
Google Ads buys attention while you pay for it; an agency executes what you brief them; Pushnom runs the SEO/GEO/AEO/local work itself, autonomously.
| Pushnom | SEO Agency | Google Ads (self-run) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Runs autonomously, no briefing needed | |||
| Auto-applies fixes to your site | If you ask | ||
| AI-search visibility (ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity) | Rarely covered | ||
| Keeps working after you stop paying | Mostly | ||
| Local SEO / Google Business Profile | Extra cost | ||
| Google Ads campaign management | Separate service | ||
| Rank & competitor tracking included | Often extra | Separate tool | |
| Multilingual content | Extra cost | ||
| Gets started | Minutes | Weeks (onboarding) | Ongoing effort |
Where the Agency Retainer Money Usually Goes
A big share of an agency retainer is people-hours: someone auditing your site, someone writing meta titles, someone building a monthly report deck. That's real, skilled work — it's also exactly the kind of repeatable work Pushnom runs as software instead, which is where the price gap comes from.
The report below is a real example of what that looks like from the other side: an automatic SEO audit with a score, prioritized issues split by severity, and page-level performance data — generated without a person manually compiling it.
None of this means an agency is bad value — for link building, digital PR, or genuinely custom strategy work, a skilled person is still the right tool. It just means the repeatable, measurable half of "SEO work" doesn't need an hourly rate attached to it anymore.
Why Compare SEO Against Google Ads At All?
They're not really substitutes — Google Ads buys immediate, rented visibility that disappears the moment you stop paying. SEO (including AI-search/GEO visibility) compounds slowly but keeps working after you stop actively investing in a specific piece of content. Most businesses end up needing some of both.
That's also why Pushnom doesn't try to replace Google Ads — it includes Google Ads campaign management as one of its modules, alongside the organic SEO/GEO/AEO/local work, so you're not paying for a separate tool or a second retainer to manage the paid side.
How We Verified This
The agency and Google Ads cost ranges below are published industry figures, not estimates we invented — checked directly against the source below.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are these agency and Google Ads cost figures accurate for my business? +
Does Pushnom replace an SEO agency entirely? +
Does Pushnom replace Google Ads? +
What exactly is in the SEO audit report shown above? +
Why is Pushnom so much cheaper than an agency if it does similar work? +
What Reviewers Say
Verified reviews from G2 and Capterra will appear here once our profiles are live.
