GEO agency pricing — what Generative Engine Optimization costs in 2026
What GEO work typically includes, how market SEO and GEO retainers differ, and how LuminaForge quotes custom Search & AI Visibility after we understand the need.
Buyers still search for “GEO agency” pricing. In the market, ongoing GEO work typically runs $2,500–$6,000 per month after infrastructure is in place. Technical SEO retainers often sit in a lower band. LuminaForge publishes live citation and performance data on our transparency dashboard. LuminaForge does not publish package prices. We quote custom Search & AI Visibility after we understand the need.
What drives GEO agency cost?
GEO pricing scales with four variables: site complexity, query-bank depth, content velocity, and how many AI surfaces you track.
Query bank (typical)
20–50
Engines tracked
2–4
Build window
4–8 weeks
Compounding window
6–12 mo
1. Website and infrastructure (one-time)
The build phase ships what traditional SEO agencies skip:
llms.txtandllms-full.txtentity briefs- Explicit AI crawler allow-list in
robots.ts - FAQPage JSON-LD on every money page
- Conversational FAQ copy written for extractability
- Performance verified via PageSpeed Insights — Core Web Vitals in the green and Lighthouse Performance in the high 90s on marketing routes (live dashboard)
- Citation tracking dashboard seeded with your branded and unbranded query bank
In the market, website-plus-GEO infrastructure is often quoted separately from the monthly retainer. LuminaForge does not sell a standalone GEO setup package at a published number. Website work is a technique when the front door is the leak, scoped after we understand the need.
2. Search & AI Visibility retainer
After launch, citations compound from entity authority, named experts, third-party mentions, and fresh answer-ready content — not from schema alone.
A typical market retainer usually includes:
- Weekly citation checks across Gemini, Grok, and (when API access allows) Perplexity and ChatGPT
- Query-bank expansion as new conversational intents emerge
- Net-new FAQ and pillar content mapped to unbranded AI queries
- llms.txt and structured-data maintenance after every deploy
- Performance regression monitoring on production PSI
LuminaForge quotes this class of work as a custom Search & AI Visibility engagement after we understand the need. We do not publish a monthly package.
3. Add-ons that change the number
| Add-on | Why it costs more |
|---|---|
| Multi-location service-area pages | Each city page needs unique entity copy + FAQ schema |
| Original benchmark content | State-of-GEO reports and pricing guides require research time |
| AI Employee (Lumina-class chat agent) | Separate technique — see Agents |
| Paid media or link building | Not GEO — billed separately if you want traditional SEO authority work |
GEO pricing vs SEO pricing
Most agencies still sell SEO as keyword rankings and blog posts. GEO adds infrastructure and measurement SEO retainers rarely include.
| Discipline | Primary goal | Typical monthly (market) |
|---|---|---|
| Technical SEO | Rank in Google blue links | $1,500–$4,000 |
| GEO | Get cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity, Grok | $2,500–$6,000 |
| AEO | Win Google AI Overviews and direct answers | Often bundled with GEO |
Read SEO vs GEO vs AEO for how the three layers fit together.
What you should ask any GEO agency before signing
- Do you publish citation data? If they cannot show weekly query-bank results, they are not operating GEO — they are selling content marketing with a new label.
- Is llms.txt included or an upsell? It should be day-one infrastructure, not phase three.
- Who is the named expert? LLMs cite humans with cross-domain authority. Ask who owns the Person schema and bylines.
- What is the performance standard? Core Web Vitals in the green and a public speed dashboard — table stakes for AI crawlers indexing your content and humans deciding whether to trust you.
- How many engines do you track? Two engines is a start; four (Gemini, Grok, Perplexity, ChatGPT) is the 2026 baseline.
How LuminaForge scopes Search & AI Visibility
We do not pitch a package. Every engagement starts by understanding the need:
- Performance audit — production PageSpeed Insights on your money pages
- Schema audit — FAQPage, Organization, Service, Article coverage
- Citation baseline — your current presence across a 20–30 query conversational bank
- Entity gap analysis — named experts, directory listings,
sameAsgraph
Fixed-scope website work, when it is the right technique, typically ships in 4–8 weeks. Visibility work compounds over 6–12 months — citation rate moves slowly at first, then accelerates as authority stacks. LuminaForge quotes after we understand the need.
When GEO is not worth the spend
Skip GEO (for now) if:
- Your site blocks AI crawlers and you will not fix it
- You need leads this week from paid search only
- You have no named expert or review footprint to anchor entity authority
- Your pages load in 4+ seconds on mobile — fix performance before optimizing citations
GEO compounds. It is not a switch you flip in week one.
Next step
Book a strategy call with current site URL, target markets, and the conversational questions you want AI assistants to cite you for. LuminaForge prefers to build custom solutions unique to that business’s needs. We do not package services that do not make sense. We quote after we understand the need.
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