It’s the ideal SEO scenario: you rank for the keyword you promised everyone you’d be in the top 10 this quarter, and it’s driving traffic and business growth.
you did it
Time to go grab a beer and cash those sweet SEO checks. right?
No.
You never win SEO.
This is good (job stability) and bad (mental health).
But if you stay on top of your game, you can create a sustainable program that helps drive growth and exponential growth over time.
This article discusses how to formulate a general approach to defending your position at the top of the mountain, and then I’ll look at three scenarios you’ll need to prepare to face once you get there.
Defend your moat
I call successful SEO keyword performance “building a moat” because of the unique nature of SEO: once you get to the castle, it’s hard for competitors to move into your territory.
Getting to this point means you’ve invested a lot of time and effort into building trust and equity with both Google and the searchers who find your site. It’s different than with paid media, where you can just increase your budget to build momentum.
Once you’ve built your moat, success can be self-perpetuating: a higher position means more clicks and more authority that you can leverage to strengthen your position.
Getting the top positions on Google for a given keyword can be used in related content, different types of content (series, podcasts, webinars), targeted digital PR outreach, and even a Reddit AMA for your director general
A site with the highest signal authority, which invites users to visit your links and share your content more often (and the cycle continues).
You’ve also established something that works, whether it’s a high-performance directory where you can continue to add content or a product page whose style and structure can be replicated for other products. Doubling these hits helps keep the momentum going.
The important point here is that you’ve generated more than just traffic when you achieve solid rankings; you have built up strength. And having a plan to exercise this influence is a key factor in maintaining, and even improving, this ranking.
Dig deeper: 3 steps to mastering the right metrics for lasting SEO results
3 scenarios that will close your SEO “earnings”.
Even with a great strategy for defending your moat, your work isn’t done. You’ll need to plan for three fairly common scenarios, which, if not addressed, could limit your ranking or job security.
1. You become complacent
Rest on your laurels for a month or so and see what happens. Between new or newly focused competitors, algorithm changes, and SERP changes (AI overviews, people!), you need to be ready to pivot to maintain your position.
Not to mention, you probably still have plenty of opportunities to capitalize on the equity you’ve built. Make sure you’re working with your paid search, social media, email and PR teams to share insights and help you duplicate what’s working to keep the wheel turning.
Talk to your product teams about ways to incorporate product updates or new product launches into your strategy to address winning keywords.
Always stay aligned with larger business goals to ensure you’re using your SEO equity to target the KPIs that matter most to the executive team.
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2. You are affected by a rebrand or site changes
Rebranding and/or URL changes happen, and usually for good reason. Products are discontinued, the CEO wants a different name to fit a new market, etc. This will have an adverse effect on your ranking; there are no two ways about it. So how do you mitigate the impact?
Above all, be clear with your client or management that the decision will affect SEO ranking and engagement, no matter how thorough your tweaks are.
You’ll be busy enough trying to preserve traffic without having to defend your numbers at the same time, and everyone involved in the decision should be aware of the unintended consequences before making a final call.
When it comes to SEO adjustments, I take a maximalist approach and try to preserve as much language and keywords as possible.
For example, if a product is being discontinued and we need to redirect the product page to a new product page, I ask if we can rewrite that new landing page in the language that worked in the old one. If that doesn’t work, come up with another piece of content for the site with similar language and keywords so you don’t completely lose your heritage.
You also need a comprehensive approach to site redirects and replacing/updating internal links, whether it’s a product page or an entire site.
3. Traffic is not converting
You may have huge amounts of traffic and great growth year after year, but if your traffic isn’t converting, your boss may have a bone to pick. What are you doing?
Try CRO on the same page. You may find easy ways to make quick money collecting personal data, generating leads, or even selling products. Make sure you are creating a retargeting pool of people coming to your site. Without cookies, this is about to get very complicated, but tracking alternatives should be working with your analytics team. (If not, that’s a bigger problem than infrequent SEO conversions.) Develop proxy metrics to show the value of that content if it’s not naturally designed to convert, say, something in the top of the funnel. Proxy metrics can include brand search, overall lift in other channels, and how you rank against direct content competitors.
Sustaining SEO Success
Achieving solid keyword rankings is hard, so it can be discouraging to remember that getting there doesn’t necessarily mean anything.
Maintain your most important business KPIs as a Polar Star, leverage the equity you’ve built for everything you own, and stay on top of the SEO landscape as it changes, and you’ll have plenty of opportunities to crack open a beer. your colleagues
Go Deeper: SEO KPIs: Embracing User-Centric Metrics
The views expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.
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