How We Work
You Own Your Website.
Actually Own It.
No monthly fee to keep your own site online. No hostage situation if you leave. You pay once, and it's yours.
The problem
There’s a model in this industry we won’t take part in
Build a business a website, then charge $99 to $300 every month forever — not for work, but for permission to keep using something they already paid for.
Stop paying and the site goes dark. Ask to move it and you find out you never owned the design, the domain, or the content. Some companies register the domain in their name so you can’t take it with you.
You paid for it. It’s yours. That’s the whole policy.
The subscription model
What most agencies sell
- $99–$300 every month, indefinitely
- Site goes offline if you stop paying
- Domain often registered in their name
- You can't move the site elsewhere
- You never receive the files
- Often a separate $500–$2,000/month SEO retainer on top
- Five years in: $6,000–18,000 for one website
Crispline
What you get here
- One payment. $1,899 or $2,499.
- Site stays online whether you hire us again or not
- Domain registered in your name, on your account
- Move it anywhere, any time, no permission needed
- Files and logins handed over at launch
- SEO work done once, properly, as part of the build
- Five years in: what you paid on day one
The other monthly bill
A typical local SEO retainer runs $500–$2,000 a month
That’s where most small-business SEO agencies price it — fewer than a third charge under $500. Over a year it’s $6,000 to $24,000 — more than a whole website costs to build.
Here’s the part nobody says out loud: for most local businesses, the work that actually moves the needle is one-time work. Correct your structured data. Fix your titles and descriptions. Get your Google Business Profile claimed and accurate. Make your address consistent everywhere. Add schema. That’s a fix, not a subscription.
I know because I did exactly that on my own business. I wasn’t ranking in the top 20 for anything. After the fixes I was top 5 or 6 in three of my five categories. No monthly retainer, no ongoing fee — the data was just wrong, and then it wasn’t.
To be fair: ongoing SEO genuinely earns its money in competitive markets where you’re fighting for terms every month. If you’re a national e-commerce brand, pay for it. But if you’re a contractor in New Hanover County, you’re probably paying a subscription for a problem that could have been solved once.
Our fix package is $1,200, one time. At $750 a month — the middle of the most common rate — a retainer passes that in two months and keeps going forever.
Sources: SE Ranking’s survey of 260 SEO agencies, 94% serving small and local businesses — 30% charge under $500 a month, 54% charge $500–$2,000. Ahrefs’ survey of 439 SEO providers — local SEO averaged $1,557 a month.
The obvious question
So how do we make money?
By doing work. We charge for building the site, for audits, for fixes, and for updates when you want them. If you never need us again after launch, that’s a sign we did the job properly.
Most clients do come back — a new page, a seasonal update, a Google Business Profile problem. But they come back because they want something, not because a subscription obliges them to.
If you’d rather not deal with any of it, there’s an optional Care Plan — $200 a month for two update visits to your site and Google listing, and an ad landing page kept current. That’s paid work, not permission. Your domain stays in your name, you don’t need the plan to stay online, and if you cancel, your site stays up and the files are yours.
Questions Worth Asking Any Web Company
Including us. If the answers are vague, that tells you something.
Whose name is the domain registered in?
If it's not yours, you don't control your own web address.
What happens to my site if I stop paying?
“It comes down” means you were renting, not buying.
Can I move my site to another host?
Proprietary platforms often mean no.
Do I get the files and logins at launch?
If they're withheld, that's leverage, not a service.
Whose Google account will my Business Profile live under?
Agencies claiming it under their own is one of the most common lock-ins we untangle.
What does the monthly fee actually pay for?
Hosting costs a few dollars. If it's $200 a month, ask what the rest buys.
Ours: hosting is the few dollars. The rest of our $200 Care Plan pays for two update visits a month to your site and Google listing, a monthly review push, and an ad landing page kept current. It’s optional, there’s no contract, and cancelling doesn’t take your site down.