The same analysis, with a different person shipping it.
The platform does the same analysis on both plans. What changes is who publishes the work and how many of your hours it takes.
Should I choose askotter self-managed or managed?
Self-managed is $99/mo plus compute above the base: the platform runs the audits, research and drafts, and you publish them, which takes roughly two to four hours a month. Managed is $600/mo, or $1,000/mo with Google and Meta ads, and a person on our team publishes every change after you approve it by text, which takes fifteen to thirty minutes.
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If three hours of your month is worth more than $500, managed is the cheaper plan.
- askotter pricing
- $99/mo self-managed and compute-metered above the base, $600/mo managed, $1,000/mo managed with paid channels. Month to month.
- Not for
- Neither plan supports online stores with cart and checkout, and neither replaces a CRM, a booking system or a sales process. Both are month to month, so choosing wrong costs a month rather than a contract.
Nine questions, answered for both.
| Attribute | Self-managed · $99/mo | Managed · $600 to $1,000/mo |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | An owner who wants the analysis done and prefers to keep their hand on what gets published, and who has a couple of hours a month for it. | An owner whose hours are worth more in the business, who wants to approve work by replying to a message and otherwise not think about it. |
| What you buy | The builder, hosting, the platform, the monthly analysis, the drafts and the AI search work. You ship the changes. | All of that, plus a person who reviews and publishes every change and is accountable for the monthly work landing. |
| Pricing model | $99/mo base, then priced on the compute you use. More analysis and more ad channels watched raise the bill. No setup fee. | $600/mo flat for managed SEO, $1,000/mo with Google and Meta ads run by our team. Ad spend billed to you separately. No setup fee. |
| Setup effort | Identical: one URL or one sentence, first draft the same day. You review the launch yourself. | Identical, with a person walking the launch with you and handling the redirect mapping. |
| Human involvement | You are the review step. The platform will not publish anything without you, and there is nobody else checking the work. | A person reviews every change before it is offered for your approval, and nothing publishes without your reply either way. |
| Who owns the website | Your domain and content from day one. Self-managed has no six-month term attached to it. | Your domain and content from day one. The site itself transfers to you after six months. |
| Who owns the ad accounts | You do, in your own name. Paid channels are metered with the rest of your compute rather than priced as a tier. | You do, in your own name, including the history and the audiences, with our team operating them on your behalf. |
| Ongoing SEO work | The same research, audits and drafts are produced every month. Publishing them is your job, and skipped months show up in the results. | Roughly 12 to 16 hours a month, published by activity, shipped whether or not you remember to ask. The breakdown. |
| Visibility into changes | Every change logged with a timestamp. You made them, so the log is a record rather than an oversight tool. | Every change logged with who asked, who approved and when. This is the log that matters, because someone else is making the changes. |
The honest split.
You have two to four hours a month and you would rather spend them than $500. You want to keep your hand on the copy, you are comfortable publishing, and you will still do it in a busy month.
Three hours of your time is worth more than $500 to the business, or you know from experience that the website is the thing that slips when the week gets full. At that point managed works out as the cheaper plan.
Neither plan supports online stores with cart and checkout, and neither replaces a CRM, a booking system or a sales process. Both are month to month, so choosing wrong costs a month rather than a contract.
Published, and month to month.
No setup fee and no minimum term. Ad spend is billed to you directly by Google and Meta.
You drive the builder and ship the changes Whiskers suggests. The platform does the analysis.
| Self-managed$99/moWebsite, SEO and the platform. Compute-based after that. | |
|---|---|
| Website and SEO | |
| AI web builder, unlimited edits | Included |
| Your site hosted on your own domain | Included |
| SEO: keywords, on-page, schema, rank tracking | Included |
| AI content recommendations, ready to publish | Included |
| Answer engine optimization | Included |
| askotter dashboard and change log | Included |
| Paid channels | |
| Google Ads + Meta Ads, connected and tracked | Add per channel |
| AI bidding and budget recommendations | With each channel |
| True ROAS against your real revenue | With each channel |
| How it runs | |
| Who ships each change | You |
| A person reviews every change before it ships | Not included |
| Ad accounts | Yours, you keep them |
| What moves the price | The compute you use |
| Cancel anytime | Included |
| Sign up for the free 14-day trial | |
The $99/mo covers your website and SEO on the platform. After that the price is compute-based. Ask Whiskers to run more analysis, or to watch more ad channels for you, and the bill scales with how much you use.
No setup fee. Ad spend is billed to you by Google and Meta.
Want a person to run it for you?
Our team builds and runs it. A person reviews every AI recommendation before it ships.
| What is included | PopularManaged SEO$600/moWe build it and run the SEO. | Managed + Ads$1,000/moEverything in Managed SEO, plus Google Ads and Meta Ads run by our team. |
|---|---|---|
| Website and SEO | ||
| We build and host your website | Included | Included |
| Monthly SEO, done for you | Included | Included |
| Content written, reviewed and published | Included | Included |
| Answer engine optimization, run for you | Included | Included |
| One site refresh per year | Included | Included |
| askotter dashboard and change log | Included | Included |
| Paid channels | ||
| Google Ads + Meta Ads management | Not included | Included |
| Monthly performance reviews | Not included | Included |
| Ad budget | Not needed | Under $10K/mo |
| How it runs | ||
| Who ships each change | Our team | Our team |
| A person reviews every change before it ships | Included | Included |
| Email marketing waterfall | Setup | Fully managed |
| Strategy calls | Not included | Monthly |
| Website is yours after six months | Included | Included |
| Get a free proposal | Get a free proposal | |
No setup fee. Cancel anytime. Ad spend is billed to you by Google and Meta.
Want to talk it through first? Book a 20-minute demo
Prefer to run it yourself?
The services behind these comparisons are the small business website builder, small business SEO and answer engine optimization. Other comparisons: askotter vs Wix, askotter vs GoDaddy, askotter vs Thryv, askotter vs a local SEO agency, askotter vs AI website builders.
Who is behind it, and what clients have seen.
CombinatorFounders who are alumni of the Y Combinator network.
Alumni who shipped measurement and ranking systems at consumer scale.
Serial founders who took companies from zero to a working business, then sold them.
Average growth in organic clicks, per client.
Median client growth in organic clicks, the middle of the cohort.
Average growth in sessions referred by AI assistants, per client.
Averages of each client’s own percentage change, measured in that client’s Google Search Console and Google Analytics. Results vary widely by client, and every client with a baseline grew over the window. Team background: Y Combinator, Meta and Amazon are not affiliated with askotter and do not endorse it.
Questions about this comparison
What is the real difference between the plans?
How many hours a month does self-managed take?
Why is self-managed priced on compute?
Can I switch between them?
Start with the audit.
It reads the site you have now and shows what is costing you work, whichever way you decide.
Self-managed is $99/mo and scales with the compute you use. Our team runs it from $600/mo.