Frequently Asked Questions

Short answers here. Longer ones live on the pages where they belong, and each answer below links to the fuller version where there is one.

Where the longer answers are

On cost: what local SEO actually costs in Ann Arbor sets out what drives the number up and down, and what a service business website costs does the same for a build.

On timing: a realistic month-by-month timeline gives a month-by-month picture, including which work should show early and which cannot.

On whether to bother at all: the situations where we would say no sets out when the money belongs somewhere other than search.

On guarantees: credentials, guarantees and what we will not promise is the written version, including the claims we have deliberately left unproven rather than estimated.

On things going wrong: the diagnostic order when a profile disappears and appealing a suspension properly.

On AI search: what AI answers change for a local business, checked against Google’s own documentation rather than against what is being sold.

The one thing worth knowing before you call anyone

Google’s local ranking guidance states that local results are ranked on relevance, distance and prominence, and that there is no way to pay for a better local ranking.

That single sentence disqualifies a large share of what gets sold to local businesses. If a proposal only makes sense in a world where rankings can be purchased or guaranteed, ask the person selling it to reconcile it with that page.

Call 734-747-3922 or request a free audit if your question is not here.

Questions we get asked most

How much does local SEO cost in Ann Arbor?

Cost depends on competitive density, how many services need pages, and what condition the profile and site start in. The useful test is your profit per job: if two or three extra jobs a month would cover it, the maths works. We quote after an audit rather than from a package list.

How long before I see results?

Profile and listing corrections often move rankings in two to six weeks because they fix data Google already holds. Prominence work — reviews, links, content — generally shows on a geo-grid between three and six months. Competitive categories take longer.

Can you guarantee first page rankings?

No. Google states on its own guidance that there is no way to pay for a better local ranking. We guarantee the work and the reporting: defined scope, published pages, corrected listings, and a monthly geo-grid scan you can use to judge progress yourself.

Do I have to sign a long contract?

No. The work compounds, so leaving early wastes your own money, but that is your calculation rather than a clause. Lock-in mainly protects an agency from its own results.

Who owns my accounts if we stop working together?

You do — the Business Profile, the ad account, the analytics property, the domain, the site and any content written for you. We work with manager-level access rather than ownership wherever the platform allows it.

Should I do SEO or advertising first?

If you need calls this month, advertising. If you need a durable cost per lead, SEO. Most businesses benefit from both in sequence: ads for immediate cash flow and real query data, organic work underneath so the ad budget can eventually shrink.

Can I do this myself?

The highest-return parts, yes. Correcting your primary category, listing every service, setting honest service areas and asking every customer for a review are all achievable in a few focused hours. What almost nobody sustains is the second and third quarter, which is what a retainer really buys.

Do you work with businesses outside Ann Arbor?

Yes, across Washtenaw County and Metro Detroit — Ypsilanti, Saline, Dexter, Chelsea, Canton, Plymouth, Northville, Novi, Livonia and the surrounding towns. The method is the same everywhere; the competitive difficulty is not.

What do I need to do to show up in AI search results?

Nothing special, according to Google's own guidance, which states that structured data is not required for generative AI search and that no new AI files or markup are needed. The work that helps is crawlable pages, specific content, and consistent business facts.

What happens if the work is not producing results?

The monthly geo-grid scan makes that visible rather than arguable. If three consecutive scans show nothing, we change the approach and explain why. If we conclude the economics do not support continuing, we say that too.