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Can you do SEO yourself with a paid tool, or should you hire someone?
Summary
A tool can research and measure, but it can't decide what to change or go in and change it. If someone on your side has the hours to rewrite pages and fix the site, software is enough. Google's own guidance says a small local business can probably do much of the work itself, and it names a site redesign or a new site launch as good moments to bring in a professional.
What $129 a month pays for
Ahrefs Lite is $129 a month, and Semrush's SEO plan is $139 on monthly billing. That money buys information: which searches a competitor ranks for, who links to them, which of your pages are broken or share a duplicate title. Lite tracks 750 keywords, and Ahrefs refreshes those rankings once a week.
The software stops there. An audit can list 200 broken URLs, but somebody with access to the site still has to set up the redirects. Buy the tool without that person and what you mostly get is a monthly report.
Where an SEO or agency earns its fee
Google's page on hiring an SEO lists the services consultants and agencies commonly offer:
- a review of your site's content or structure
- technical advice on hosting, redirects, error pages and JavaScript
- content development
- keyword research
- SEO training
- expertise in specific markets and regions
- optimizing for generative AI
Keyword research, plus some raw material for a site review, is the only part a subscription overlaps with. The rest is judgment and labor.
Questions Google suggests asking
- Can you show examples of previous work and some success stories?
- Do you follow Google Search Essentials?
- What results do you expect, over what timeframe, and how will you measure them?
- What experience do you have in my industry, and in my country or city?
- Will you share every change you make to my site?
Google also suggests checking references. The red flags it lists are just as specific: a guaranteed #1 ranking, a claimed "special relationship" with Google, a "priority submit" offer, or a firm that won't explain what it plans to do. Google says it never accepts money to include or rank sites in its search results.
What access to hand over for an audit
At the audit stage, Google advises granting read access to Search Console and holding back write access. Search Console has owners, full users and restricted users, and a restricted user can view most data but can't submit a sitemap or remove a URL. Google is clear that the site owner stays responsible for whatever a hired company does.
Work out your own number: the SEO Tools Cost Calculator finds the cheapest published plan for your sites, tracked keywords and users.
Sources
Figures come from each vendor's own pricing pages and documentation. We have not tested these tools hands-on, and no ranking here is paid for.