Pricing
How much does a small-business website cost?
In 2026, a professionally built small-business website typically costs $1,500–$8,000 from an
independent studio, with most strategy-led builds landing between $4,000 and $6,000. DIY site builders run
$200–$600 a year; larger agencies charge $6,000–$35,000 and up.
Why the huge range? Three things move the number. Strategy: a template shop skips
discovery and structure — you're paying for pixels. A strategy-led build starts with your customers and how
they decide, which is what makes a site produce enquiries instead of just existing. Scope:
page count, e-commerce, booking, and multiple languages all add real work. Visibility: a
site that's technically set up to rank on Google and be cited by AI tools takes deliberate engineering that
cheap builds skip.
Ongoing costs matter too: hosting (free on modern static builds), a domain (~$15/year), and — the piece
most owners discover late — staying visible, which runs $150–$1,500/month depending on how
actively you want to grow. My own pricing is public: see the pricing
page — builds from $1,500, most clients at $4,000–$6,000.
Updated July 2026
AI visibility
How do I show up in ChatGPT and AI search?
AI tools cite pages that answer questions directly: clear question-based headings, a complete
answer in the first paragraph, specific facts and quotes, and a site that AI crawlers can technically read.
Ranking on Google helps — but it's no longer enough on its own.
Here's the shift: when someone asks ChatGPT or Perplexity "best hospice in Anaheim" or "affordable web
designer near me," the AI writes one answer and names a handful of sources. Industry research in 2026 found
the overlap between top Google results and AI-cited pages has fallen below 20% — they're different
games with different rules.
What actually earns citations: answer-first writing (the first 200 words answer the
question — AI lifts clean, complete passages); question-based headings that match how people
really ask; specifics over slogans — research shows quotations, statistics, and cited sources
measurably increase AI citations; technical readability — many sites accidentally block AI
crawlers or hide content behind scripts; and freshness, because AI answers favor recently
updated content and citations fade within months. That last one is why visibility is monthly work, not a
one-time setup — it's exactly what our Visibility plan does.
Updated July 2026
Plain English
SEO vs AEO vs GEO — what's the difference?
SEO gets you ranked in Google's list of links. AEO gets you picked as the direct answer — the
box at the top, the voice-assistant reply. GEO gets your business cited when an AI tool like ChatGPT or
Gemini writes an answer. Three acronyms, one goal: being the answer your customer finds first.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the established game: earning a spot in the top ten
blue links through relevant content, good structure, speed, and credibility. It still matters — a page that
ranks well is more likely to be cited everywhere else — but it's the foundation now, not the finish line.
AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) targets the direct answer: featured snippets, "people
also ask," voice replies. You win it by answering real questions completely and concisely, right at the top
of the page. In practice AEO has largely merged into GEO — the techniques overlap.
GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is the new game: when AI writes an answer, it names
two to seven sources. GEO is the craft of being one of them — through answer-first content, verifiable
specifics, consistent business information across the web, and a site AI can actually read. The door is
narrower than ten blue links, which is precisely why the businesses that get this right early own an
outsized advantage.
A useful way to hold it: SEO gets you listed, AEO gets you featured, GEO gets you quoted.
A modern small-business site should be built for all three at once — that's how I build every site, and
what the monthly visibility work keeps sharp.
Updated July 2026
