The document discusses prioritizing SEO efforts to drive rapid growth. It argues that the traditional audit-first approach is broken because recommendations are often not implemented. It recommends setting specific business goals and working backwards to prioritize tactics that can be completed in the short term to show quick results. An example roadmap prioritizes optimizations like improving page intent and existing content over technical tasks that have less immediate impact on rankings and traffic. The overall message is that prioritization based on goals and quick wins is needed to successfully implement SEO strategies.

1. The ‘traditional approach’
to SEO is broken - how to
prioritise your efforts &
drive rapid growth
Slideshare.Net/JamesBrockbank
@BrockbankJames
James Brockbank
DIGITALOFT

2. You’ve got 3 to 6 months to
show results for a new client …
like it or not!

3. The deep-dive
audit-first approach to
SEO is broken…

4. RECOMMENDATIONS MEAN NOTHING IF THEY’RE NOT ACTIONED…

5. No two businesses are the same…
so don’t try to use the same approach to
SEO.

6. THE FUNDAMENTALS OF SEO ARE PRETTY SIMPLE.

7. THE FUNDAMENTALS OF SEO ARE PRETTY SIMPLE.
TECHNICAL
SEO

8. THE FUNDAMENTALS OF SEO ARE PRETTY SIMPLE.
LINKS
TECHNICAL
SEO

9. THE FUNDAMENTALS OF SEO ARE PRETTY SIMPLE.
LINKS
CONTENT
TECHNICAL
SEO

10. Prioritisation is what makes
or breaks SEO success.

11. All projects have
resource limitations,
so where do you focus
your efforts?

12. We’re looking at how to prioritise, not
what to prioritise; every site is different.

13. First, let’s talk about
GOAL setting.

14. MOST PROJECTS START WITH FORECASTS, NOT GOALS.
We want to make
as much money
as possible via
organic search…
We want to
generate as
many leads as
possible in
2023…

15. We want to make
as much money
as possible via
organic search…
We want to
generate as
many leads as
possible in
2023…
These aren’t
goals!
MOST PROJECTS START WITH FORECASTS, NOT GOALS.

16. Pivot your approach to SEO strategy
and work backwards from business
goals:
• Stop asking “What can we achieve?”
• Start saying “Here’s what we need to
achieve.”
When you set specific goals, you can
layer in data to help prioritise your key
areas of focus.
MOST PROJECTS START WITH FORECASTS, NOT GOALS.

17. A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.
⬇What results do you need to achieve?

18. ⬇What results do you need to achieve?
⬇ What is your average organic conversion rate?
A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.

19. ⬇What results do you need to achieve?
⬇ What is your average organic conversion rate?
⬇ How much traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.

20. ⬇What results do you need to achieve?
⬇ What is your average organic conversion rate?
⬇ How much traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
⬇ How much extra traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.

21. ⬇What results do you need to achieve?
⬇ What is your average organic conversion rate?
⬇ How much traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
⬇ How much extra traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
⬇ What are your keyword strategy options?
A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.

22. ⬇What results do you need to achieve?
⬇ What is your average organic conversion rate?
⬇ How much traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
⬇ How much extra traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
⬇ What are your keyword strategy options?
⬇ What ranking growth do you need to see?
A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.

23. ⬇What results do you need to achieve?
⬇ What is your average organic conversion rate?
⬇ How much traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
⬇ How much extra traffic do you need to achieve these goals?
⬇ What are your keyword strategy options?
⬇ What ranking growth do you need to see?
⬇ How do you do that?
A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.

24. Get granular and plan your
roadmap at page-level or
category-level…

25. A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.
QUESTION DATA
What results do you need to achieve? 1,000 leads for [service] in 2023
What is your average organic conversion rate? 4%
How much traffic do you need to achieve these goals? 25,000
How much extra traffic do you need to achieve these goals? 10,000
What are your keyword strategy options? Increase visibility and traffic from [keywords]
What ranking growth do you need to see? Push [keywords] into top 3 positions
How do you do that?
Better match intent, internal linking
improvements & improve existing content

26. A PROVEN PROCESS FOR A GOAL-FIRST APPROACH TO STRATEGY.
QUESTION DATA
What results do you need to achieve? 1,000 leads for [service] in 2023
What is your average organic conversion rate? 4%
How much traffic do you need to achieve these goals? 25,000
How much extra traffic do you need to achieve these goals? 10,000
What are your keyword strategy options? Increase visibility and traffic from [keywords]
What ranking growth do you need to see? Push [keywords] into top 3 positions
How do you do that?
Better match intent, internal linking
improvements & improve existing content

27. Short term sprints:
what do we need to do
in the next 90 days to
show results?

28. It’s all about getting things done…
• Most audits don’t get read in full.
• Most actions won’t ever get
implemented.
• Most make too many suggestions &
ask for too many decisions to be
made.
• Most require significant developer
involvement to action.
SEO SPRINTS: AN AGILE APPROACH TO DRIVING RAPID GROWTH.

29. If your recommendations
aren’t being implemented,
don’t be surprised when
you’re standing still.

30. Rapid impact - do within 3 months Medium-term impact - do within 6 months
Low impact - do when resources allow No impact
A PRIORITISED APPROACH TO TACTICS FOR QUICK-WIN RESULTS.

31. Rapid impact - do within 3 months Medium-term impact - do within 6 months
Low impact - do when resources allow No impact
Internal linking
Improving page
intent
Optimizing
existing content
Fixing CRITICAL
technical SEO
issues
Fixing linked 404s
Turning
brand
mentions
into links
Optimizing title tags
A PRIORITISED APPROACH TO TACTICS FOR QUICK-WIN RESULTS.

32. Rapid impact - do within 3 months Medium-term impact - do within 6 months
Low impact - do when resources allow No impact
Internal linking
Improving page
intent
Optimizing
existing content
Fixing CRITICAL
technical SEO
issues
Fixing linked 404s
Turning
brand
mentions
into links
New ‘money’ pages
Optimizing title tags
Supporting content
creation
PR-led link acquisition Site structure changes
SEO testing
Disavowing
unnatural
links
Structured
data
Template
changes
Link audit & strategy
Improving content
quality
Removing thin /
irrelevant content
A PRIORITISED APPROACH TO TACTICS FOR QUICK-WIN RESULTS.

33. Rapid impact - do within 3 months Medium-term impact - do within 6 months
Low impact - do when resources allow No impact
Internal linking
Improving page
intent
Optimizing
existing content
Fixing CRITICAL
technical SEO
issues
Fixing linked 404s
Turning
brand
mentions
into links
New ‘money’ pages
Optimizing title tags
Supporting content
creation
PR-led link acquisition Site structure changes
SEO testing
Disavowing
unnatural
links
Structured
data
Template
changes
Link audit & strategy
Site speed
optimization
Image optimization
Core Web Vitals
Improving content
quality
Server log analysis
ALT text
optimization
E-A-T improvements
Removing thin /
irrelevant content
A PRIORITISED APPROACH TO TACTICS FOR QUICK-WIN RESULTS.

34. Rapid impact - do within 3 months Medium-term impact - do within 6 months
Low impact - do when resources allow No impact
Internal linking
Improving page
intent
Optimizing
existing content
Fixing CRITICAL
technical SEO
issues
Fixing linked 404s
Turning
brand
mentions
into links
New ‘money’ pages
Optimizing title tags
Supporting content
creation
PR-led link acquisition Site structure changes
SEO testing
Disavowing
unnatural
links
Structured
data
Template
changes
Link audit & strategy
Site speed
optimization
Image optimization
Core Web Vitals
Improving content
quality
Server log analysis
ALT text
optimization
E-A-T improvements Low quality / no
relevancy link building
Fixing non-critical
crawl errors
Deleting news posts
from 5 years ago
Removing thin /
irrelevant content
A PRIORITISED APPROACH TO TACTICS FOR QUICK-WIN RESULTS.

35. AN EXAMPLE ROADMAP WITH THE WRONG FOCUS.
MONTH 1 MONTH 2 MONTH 3
Site speed optimization
Image optimization
Core Web Vitals optimization
Alt text optimization
Site speed optimization (continued)
Image optimization (continued)
CoreWebVitals optimization (continued)
Updating links that point to HTTP URLs
Robots.txt review
Link intersect analysis
Site speed optimization (continued)
Image optimization (continued)
CoreWebVitals optimization (continued)
3xx redirects
Competitor content analysis
Quick-win keywords
Low hanging fruit keywords

36. AN EXAMPLE ROADMAP WITH THE WRONG FOCUS.
MONTH 1 MONTH 2 MONTH 3
Site speed optimization
Image optimization
Core Web Vitals optimization
Alt text optimization
Site speed optimization (continued)
Image optimization (continued)
Core WebVitals optimization
(continued)
Updating links that point to HTTP URLs
Robots.txt review
Link intersect analysis
Site speed optimization (continued)
Image optimization (continued)
Core WebVitals optimization
(continued)
3xx redirects
Competitor content analysis
Quick-win keywords
Low hanging fruit keywords

37. MONTH 1 MONTH 2 MONTH 3
Content inventory
Keyword research across existing
pages
Title tag, H1 tag & meta description
rewrites
Internal linking improvements
Fixing linked 404s
Fixing XML sitemap issues
Page-level content optimization
Merging pages to resolve keyword
cannibalization
Reworking content to better match
intent
Internal linking improvements
Creation of ‘supporting content’
Digital PR-led link acquisition begins
Page template changes begin
Creation of ‘supporting content’
Digital PR-led link acquisition
Ongoing page-level content
optimization
AN EXAMPLE OF A PRIORITISED SEO ROADMAP.

38. Previous agency
THE IMPACT OF PRIORITISATION.

39. What are your pathways to growth?
• Which ‘topics’ should be prioritized?
• Which keyword rankings should be
prioritized?
• What actions need to be taken to drive
growth across specific areas of focus?
A PRIORITISED FOCUS TO KEYWORDS & TOPICS.

40. Regular small wins build to
big wins over time.

41. Questions?
james@digitaloft.co.uk
@BrockbankJames
digitaloft.co.uk