A monthly retainer is the most common way small businesses pay for marketing — and the easiest place for money to quietly leak. The fee goes out every month; the deliverables are often fuzzy; and a year later you're not sure what it all bought.
Here's what a fair retainer should actually look like.
The problem with a vague retainer
"Ongoing marketing support" is not a deliverable. Neither is "SEO and digital strategy." When a retainer is described in soft, broad language, you've got no way to tell whether you got your money's worth in any given month — and no basis to push back. Vagueness in a retainer almost always favours the agency.
A fair retainer is specific. You should know, before you pay, exactly what arrives each month.
What a fair retainer includes
Four things, regardless of the service:
A fixed, written scope. The specific deliverables, in plain words. "Four articles published" — not "content support." "Google Business optimisation, citations and on-page work" — not "SEO".
Plain-English reporting. Every month: what we did, what it got you, what's next. If you need a glossary to read your own report, the report has failed.
No lock-in. You should be able to leave if it stops being worth it. A retainer you can't exit is a fee you can't question.
No setup fees. The monthly price should be the price. Be wary of a separate "onboarding" charge bolted on at the start.
What's reasonable at the small-business level
So you've got a benchmark, here's roughly what fair small-business retainer pricing looks like — these are our published rates, and they're a reasonable yardstick whoever you use:
- Local SEO — around $500/month for Google Business optimisation, local citations and on-page work.
- Content — around $400/month for two proper SEO articles, researched, written and published; $650 or so for four.
- Google Ads management — a flat fee of roughly $400–$900/month depending on your ad spend. Note: a flat fee, not a percentage of your spend.
- The lot together — bundled, somewhere around $1,150/month for a small business.
If you're being quoted wildly more than this for a single-location small business — and you're not getting obviously more — it's fair to ask why.
Questions to ask before you sign
Three will tell you most of what you need to know:
- Exactly what deliverables do I get each month? — A clear answer is a good sign. A vague one isn't.
- Can I leave if it's not working, and what's the notice? — "No, you're on a 12-month term" tells you a lot.
- Is your ad management a flat fee or a percentage of my spend? — Flat fee means your interests are aligned.
A good agency will answer all three plainly and won't mind being asked.
Our take
NABA retainers are fixed-scope, plainly reported, month-to-month and free of setup fees — for SEO, content and ads. You know what you get before you pay, and you can stop any time it stops being worth it. That's the retainer we'd want to be sold. So it's the one we sell.
Not sure your current retainer stacks up? Run it past the three questions above. The answers usually settle it.