Independent studio, building since 2015

Web design and SEO for businesses that need the phone to ring.

I am Charlie Runa. I build sites and rank them for founders and small teams across the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia.

A quiet studio desk beside a large window, laptop open on a page layout, morning light across the timber surface
Projects
50
Building since
2015
Countries served
4
Fastest to page one
65 days
Recent work

On the desk this year.

Websites rebuilt for clarity and speed, a custom product configurator and a web application, two of them still in progress. Each one opens the live site.

All 50 projects
  1. Game Tile Courts (opens in a new tab)

    UI/UX website improvementModular sport court tiles, with clearer paths from product research to a free court layout and quote.gametilecourts.com
  2. Badge My Auto (opens in a new tab)

    UI/UX improvement and custom configuratorCustom car badges with three interactive builders and a live, actual size preview in chrome, gold and matte.badgemyauto.com
  3. My Backyard Sports (opens in a new tab)

    UI/UX website improvementBackyard court builders in six markets, with service and location pages organized around getting a quote.mybackyardsports.com
  4. BE Electric (opens in a new tab)

    Electric company website developmentA veteran owned Sacramento electrician, with every service page leading to a free quote.be-electric916.com
  5. Raber HVAC (opens in a new tab)

    UI/UX website improvementNortheast Ohio heating and cooling, rebuilt as a fast static site with online booking and 43 city pages.raberhvac.com
  6. Raber Electric (opens in a new tab)

    Custom WordPress developmentA custom WordPress child theme for the electrical sister brand to Raber HVAC, with county and city pages.raber-electric.com
  7. House of Alchemie (opens in a new tab)

    UI/UX layout improvement In progressThe sales site for five AI business advisors, reworked for a clearer path to a seven day trial.houseofalchemie.ai
  8. House of Alchemie app (opens in a new tab)

    Custom web application In progressA Next.js app where members work with AI business advisors, with access granted from checkout.app.houseofalchemie.ai
The honest version

A pretty site that nobody finds is an expensive brochure.

Most of the businesses that come to me have already paid for a website. It looks fine. It also sits on page four, loads in six seconds on a phone, and sends every enquiry to an inbox nobody checks.

The fix is rarely a redesign. It is usually structure: pages that match what people actually search for, markup that search engines and AI models can read without guessing, and a path from landing to enquiry that does not lose people halfway.

That is the work. The design is what makes people stay once the structure has brought them in.

Hands sketching a page layout in pencil in a dot grid notebook beside a closed laptop
Structure first. Every time.
Printed page layouts spread across a plywood table with pencil annotations and two coffee cups
How it runs

Four stages. You see the work at every one.

  1. 01

    Audit before opinion

    I look at your analytics, your rankings, your competitors and your current build before I suggest anything. You get the findings whether or not you hire me.

  2. 02

    Scope and fixed price

    A written scope, a fixed price and a date. No hourly meter, no scope that quietly grows.

  3. 03

    Build in the open

    A staging link from week one. You watch it come together and give notes as it happens rather than at a reveal.

  4. 04

    Launch and measure

    Analytics, Search Console and call tracking configured on day one, then a report you can read without a glossary.

Where I work

One site. Four countries. English speaking markets.

Clients in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, plus occasional work in New Zealand and Ireland. Same language, same search index, different search behavior.

A Canadian roofer and a British plumber are not searching the same way, and a page written for one reads slightly wrong to the other. Where it matters I write the page for the market that pays for it, mark the site up as English with no regional lock, and let Google serve it where it is relevant. Where it does not matter, one clear page beats four thin ones.

How the SEO work is structured

Questions people ask before they call

Where are you based, and does that matter for my project?

I work from Quezon City in the Philippines and my clients are mostly in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia. In practice it matters less than people expect. I work 7am to 7pm Pacific, Monday to Friday, everything runs through shared documents and recorded walkthroughs, and you get a written record of every decision rather than a meeting you have to remember.

Can you rank a business in more than one country?

Yes, with a caveat worth being honest about. One English language site can rank in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Ireland at the same time, because Google serves the same index with regional weighting. What a single site cannot do is win local map results in a country where you have no address and no local phone number. If you sell a service remotely, one strong site is the right answer. If you need to appear in the map pack in three countries, you need a registered presence in each, and I will tell you that before you spend anything.

How long does SEO actually take?

For a low competition local service in a defined area, first page movement in 60 to 90 days is realistic, and I have done it in 65. For a competitive national term, six to twelve months is the honest range. Anyone quoting a fixed date for a competitive keyword is guessing, and you should treat the quote as a warning.

Do you do the work yourself?

Yes. There is no account manager between you and the person writing the code. That is the reason I take a limited number of projects at a time rather than filling a pipeline.

What does a project cost?

A focused site for a small service business usually lands between 1,500 and 5,000 US dollars. Larger builds with ecommerce, multi location architecture or a full identity run higher. Ongoing SEO is quoted monthly against a scope you approve first. I quote a fixed price after a discovery call so you are not exposed to an hourly meter.

What do you need from me to start?

Your current site if you have one, access to your domain and hosting, and thirty minutes to talk through what the business actually sells and to whom. Everything else I can research.

Tell me what is not working.

Send me your site. You will get a straight answer about whether it needs a rebuild, a rewrite or nothing at all.