Making €10,000 Monthly Running A Solo SEO Agency
How Benas pivoted from freelancing to running a successful SEO agency
Hello! Can you introduce yourself and tell us about your business?
Hi there, I am Benas, and I’m the founder of Benasleo.com, a SEO agency.
Born and raised in the quaint Baltic nation of Lithuania, I always knew I’d launch my own venture—school was simply the first step.
Once I’d completed high school, I enrolled in university, but my real learning came from diving into a range of side projects: setting up e-commerce stores, crafting written content, self-publishing books, and exploring social media strategies. Those experiments naturally led me into marketing, where I cut my teeth on paid advertising and email campaigns.
Before long, I discovered my true calling in SEO. For over ten years now (I am 31 now), I’ve built a business around search-engine optimization, helping clients boost their organic traffic.
Although I partner with a small team of freelancers and contractors on occasion, I usually work one-on-one with clients to drive sustainable growth in their natural search visibility.
How did you start this business? Take us through the process.
From the very beginning, my drive to start BDM Business sprang from two things: a deep curiosity about what makes websites “tick” in Google, and the example my father set when he launched his own company straight out of high school.
Here’s how it all unfolded: Growing up in Lithuania, I watched my dad build and run his own business. I loved the idea of being my own boss, but I had no clear roadmap—only the conviction that I’d forge my own path. When I landed at university, I treated my studies as a side quest.
By day I went to lectures; by night I experimented with e-commerce stores, self-publishing books, paid ads, and email campaigns. Each experiment was a mini-MBA in real world marketing.
After two years of dabbling, I landed on SEO. It combined technical puzzles, creative storytelling, and the promise of tangible results. My very first service offering was simple: content writing. A friend of a friend ran a small website and needed fresh articles. I wrote a handful of posts, optimized them for key terms, and watched traffic climb. That small gig gave me my first taste of “building a product” in the service world—the product being well-crafted, search-optimized content.
In those early days, my only real investment was time. I spent dozens of late nights mastering Google Search Console, free online tutorials, and forums. Out-of-pocket expenses were essentially zero: I used free website builders or piggy-backed on friends’ hosting accounts. If I’d bought a domain or paid for a simple hosting plan, it was never more than €20–€30.
As I formalized the business around 2015, I began subscribing to a few SEO tools (keyword trackers, backlink checkers, rank-tracking software). Even then, my total annual spend never exceeded $1,000. Content writing gave me confidence, but I wanted full SEO engagements. I began cold-calling local businesses and sending cold emails to site owners.
Almost immediately, a small e-commerce shop took a chance on me for a three-month audit and on-page optimization project. That became my first real SEO contract—and the revenue from it funded my lifestyle and got me to be able to earn a part-time salary.
With one strong case study under my belt, I created profiles on Upwork and similar marketplaces. There, I turned cold outreach into warm introductions, steadily adding clients who valued long-term partnerships. Upwork fees and small ad spends on sponsored proposals were the only additional costs, and those were always recouped within the first month of any new engagement.
In short: I bootstrapped BDM Business from my laptop and a handful of sleepless nights. Motivated by my father’s entrepreneurial spirit, I invested almost no money—just my time and energy—into learning SEO, pitching services, and delivering results.
By keeping overhead to a minimum (under $1,000 per year in tools) and focusing on building genuine client relationships from day one, I was able to turn that first €20–€30 outlay into a sustainable, six-figure service business.
What are your marketing strategies?
I got my first few clients almost entirely through people I already knew—a friend‐of‐a‐friend who needed content and SEO tweaks and past writing contacts looking for more visibility—then quickly broadened my reach with personalized cold emails offering mini‐audits (which netted a handful of paid pilots) and a few well‐timed cold calls and local meetups in Vilnius.
Once I had a few success stories, I built an SEO‐focused Upwork profile, showcased those early case studies, and won higher‐value contracts by tailoring every proposal and even experimenting with paid bid boosts.
Finally, I reached a point where I started receiving numerous referrals from various sources, including previous clients, my newsletter, and other colleagues, which allowed me to avoid any outreach.
Even to this day, I receive requests on my Upwork profile despite no longer working on that platform.
One of the most effective ways I acquired clients was through a community associated with a YouTube course.
By simply being there and engaging, one person reached out, and we began working together. That turned into a multi-year contract.
Currently, I am exploring various strategies for attracting clients on LinkedIn.
How does your business make money?
My business today is a pure‐play SEO services agency: there are no subscriptions, ad revenues or product sales—just bespoke consulting and execution.
I monetize by selling one main offering: ongoing monthly retainers for full SEO management. Retainers start at around €1,000/month for small sites and can go up to €5,000+/month for larger, more complex engagements.
With an average client paying roughly €2,500 monthly, I consistently hit about €8-10K in revenue each month, which drives our 80%+ profit margins.
Looking ahead, I’m exploring productizing some of my frameworks into self-study courses or toolkits (especially tailored for YouTube creators) and possibly launching a tiered newsletter or membership portal—both as passive-income complements to our core service model.
Right now, the business makes around €110,000 per year with an average MMR of €8-10K.
Where can we go to learn more about you and your business?
You can find all the links here: https://benasleo.com/
Thanks so much for sharing my story!