5 ms·

Why startups need to approach SEO differently than established companies

142 points by aerosmile 8y ago

spencera6 8y ago
This all seems to make sense, but how realistic is it for a startup to actually spend time on SEO instead of putting those same resources into product development, traditional marketing, etc?
- aerosmile 8y ago
  Author here. Absolutely fair - it's the chicken or the egg question... It's important to get some quick traction doing quick and dirty tricks, but eventually you'll have to demonstrate that you have a scalable channel. If your unit economics allow you to pursue paid acquisition, then certainly focus on that in your early days (and if it's SEM, then you'll learn a lot about search terms that you'll be able to leverage for SEO down the road). But businesses that have a low LTV (eg: less than $100) often don't have that luxury. In those instances, starting with SEO early may be one of the few options you have.
  - nsmog767 8y ago
    This makes sense when the content is closely aligned to the product, like in your examples with language/framework tutorials. What I don't get is all these startups putting money into blog posts like "5 things we like about mondays" when they could be doing doing something valuable.
    - aerosmile 8y ago
      Yep, I think we're all sick and tired of the "5 things..." posts. The point I am trying to make in this article is that founders of early-stage startups are able to - and should - go above and beyond that. Far, far, far beyond that. Essentially, give it all you have, and put it all in your first post rather than splitting it over many different articles. It may be a contrarian strategy, but as a startup you don't really have many other options other than to publish insanely high quality content, even if it means you won't get to publish very frequently. Once you get some traction, you can then start scaling by lowering the amount of effort you put into each and every article.
    - SerLava 8y ago
      Yeah those are the types of article topics that should be aggressively weeded out by any credible SEO specialist or consultant.
- aytekin 8y ago
  It sounds like they did not spend too much time on it. They hired someone in the community to write for them. Then others wanted write on their platform for free. It was a very clever strategy that scaled without much effort or time from them.
  - aerosmile 8y ago
    It actually took all of my time to get the operation going. Considering that I was a co-founder and there weren't many of us around, it was a sizable time investment and a huge gamble for the company. While I didn't have to do any writing, it would be disingenuous to promote the idea that all it takes for SEO to take off is a clever trick. In fact, if there's one message I would share, it is that there are no shortcuts (but on the positive side, if you do put in the work, you can make it despite being an early-stage company). Most of my work went into analyzing the topics we should be writing about, creating lists of keywords I was encouraging our writers to use, recruiting writers, and then building relationships in the relevant communities and promoting the content. Eventually we ended up getting enough people to subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on Twitter that the promotional work went away.
- deltron3030 8y ago
  Product development and the internal documents you have, can serve as the basis for good content. Essentially you're writing about problems that you're solving with your product. Your first articles can be related to your MVP, and the following ones about stuff you discover after gaining your first users. What I think the OP is trying to communicate, is basically that SEO or creating content that attracts people, is just a natural step within the development of your business. You'd need a interesting take on a problem or solve one that nobody else is solving, and then make sure that you don't miss the keywords people search for.
desaideas 8y ago
Working at AirPair with Igor while he was defining and rolling out this strategy was amazing. As we rolled out a new MEAN stack and other improvements to our CTA and inbound lead generation, the results were incredible, from 2-3 leads an hour, we went to 10-15, and then 20-30. A lot of Startup's can benefit from following his playbook to further their brand recognition and build powerful communities to accelerate their growth.
danvoell 8y ago
Great Article! Definitely, don't be scared of the entrenched group. As the article discussed, if your domain is new and doesn't have authority, figure out how to go really deep on a topic. The experience of 99.9% of SEO experts that I know is that after 2 months at a job, they get tired/bored and have implemented 90% of the strategy that they are going to. There is always room to compete as new snippets, algorithm updates, updated information or processes occur.
- walshemj 8y ago
  Alexa voice search is an interesting area
doctorpangloss 8y ago
Does anyone discover in app purchases through a Google search? At IAC, how would SEO help sell a Tinder Pro subscription? At Epic, how would SEO sell Fortnite V-Bucks? It's one thing if you sell this physical product or service that a normal human being can articulate into a query. It's another if you're selling totally imaginary stuff, like V-Bucks. What's the point of writing content for things no one knows they're looking for?
- paulsutter 8y ago
  People definitely search to consider in-app purchases (examples popular enough to be suggested by Google): “Fortnite bucks are they worth it” https://www.google.com/search?q=fortnite+v+bucks+are+they+worth+it https://www.google.com/search?q=fortnite+v+bucks+are+they+wo... “Is it worth getting Tinder Premium” https://www.google.com/search?q=is+it+worth+getting+tinder+premium https://www.google.com/search?q=is+it+worth+getting+tinder+p...
- aerosmile 8y ago
  I know what you're trying to say, and I agree - not every app will be able to leverage SEO... ...but more of them can than meets the eye at first. In fact, the dating category seems like a prime target: 1. Publish local dating pages, like this one: https://www.pof.com/personals/2700onlinedating.htm https://www.pof.com/personals/2700onlinedating.htm 2. When people sign up for an account, promote your mobile app 3. The influx of signups will help with ASO, which will generate more signups, which will help with SEO. 4. Wash, rinse, repeat. My first site was in the calorie counting space, and we followed the above approach to acquire about 8 million users (our content on the web was related to search terms around food names). Eventually, MyFitnessPal did the exact same thing but much better, and it's still growing to this day using the same strategy.
- deltron3030 8y ago
  People don't search for those things directly, but they might search for competitive advantages on those platforms, and if you can give them a good reason why they need x, you might sell.
- ddebernardy 8y ago
mbesto 8y ago
Sidenote - what tools do people recommend using for SEO analysis outside of Searchmetrics?
- jklinger410 8y ago
  SEMRush is my go-to. Ahrefs is also great.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
arosier 8y ago
>It’s important to view each article as a distinct product that requires a budget, has a clear purpose and performance goals, and also needs a distribution strategy. The reality is, the guide he created was a product on it's own. While he ended up with "product" market fit for that piece of content on his first try, this is rare. >We’ll start off with the tutorials, since it is better suited for expensive, amazing content that will allow us to impress and attract 3rd party communities. To find product market fit, you need to solve a problem. Since you know who your target market is (the main niche influencers), identify real problems they have and solve these problems with your product (content). In this case, the solution was making a more user friendly product than what was available on the market. Some markets are saturated with user friendly content, you will need to make your content 10x better than the rest. You will know you have solved their problem, and found product market fit, if they distribute your content. The questions I have are: what is the MVP equivalent for content? How do I know if the content I am creating really solves the searchers problems 10x better than the alternative before spending thousands of dollars on the content?
- aerosmile 8y ago
  The MVP you're looking for are shorter content formats like tweetstorms. Assuming you have enough followers to accurately gauge the response, you could develop an editorial calendar and then track the likes/retweets/replies.
- hayksaakian 8y ago
  Easy to answer your question: Look at everyone else on the first page of Google for your question/keyword and make notes about all the things they're missing. Even if all you do is combine their ideas into 1 'ultimate' article, that's still valuable.
ranidu 8y ago
Great tips here!
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
pavbelshippable 8y ago
First of all, SEO is more of common sense. - It should start with creating a persona for your potential buyer/customer - You need to know your potential keywords - Analyse what your potential customers might search for - You need to understand the intent of the search because there are different types of keywords, all keywords are not created equal. You need to hit those pure buying intent keywords but in a subtle way - You need to do proper keyword research. I have created a keyword research template to help you all https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/168CBn10UK31sMw-fnP8kAqf-kYvVcy-KUmgiwqTbICQ/edit#gid=0 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/168CBn10UK31sMw-fnP8k... Yes, in the end, content is the king. Give them what they want, they will come back again. With your content, you need to make visitors stay for a long time and spend time on the site, Google loves sites/webpages with less bounce rate. Make sure, you distribute your content periodically on the relevant industry channels and forums.
maryglowbom 8y ago
Great article! Thanks

142 points by aerosmile 8y ago

This all seems to make sense, but how realistic is it for a startup to actually spend time on SEO instead of putting those same resources into product development, traditional marketing, etc?

aerosmile 8y ago
Author here. Absolutely fair - it's the chicken or the egg question... It's important to get some quick traction doing quick and dirty tricks, but eventually you'll have to demonstrate that you have a scalable channel. If your unit economics allow you to pursue paid acquisition, then certainly focus on that in your early days (and if it's SEM, then you'll learn a lot about search terms that you'll be able to leverage for SEO down the road). But businesses that have a low LTV (eg: less than $100) often don't have that luxury. In those instances, starting with SEO early may be one of the few options you have.
- nsmog767 8y ago
  This makes sense when the content is closely aligned to the product, like in your examples with language/framework tutorials. What I don't get is all these startups putting money into blog posts like "5 things we like about mondays" when they could be doing doing something valuable.
  - aerosmile 8y ago
    Yep, I think we're all sick and tired of the "5 things..." posts. The point I am trying to make in this article is that founders of early-stage startups are able to - and should - go above and beyond that. Far, far, far beyond that. Essentially, give it all you have, and put it all in your first post rather than splitting it over many different articles. It may be a contrarian strategy, but as a startup you don't really have many other options other than to publish insanely high quality content, even if it means you won't get to publish very frequently. Once you get some traction, you can then start scaling by lowering the amount of effort you put into each and every article.
  - SerLava 8y ago
    Yeah those are the types of article topics that should be aggressively weeded out by any credible SEO specialist or consultant.
aytekin 8y ago
It sounds like they did not spend too much time on it. They hired someone in the community to write for them. Then others wanted write on their platform for free. It was a very clever strategy that scaled without much effort or time from them.
- aerosmile 8y ago
  It actually took all of my time to get the operation going. Considering that I was a co-founder and there weren't many of us around, it was a sizable time investment and a huge gamble for the company. While I didn't have to do any writing, it would be disingenuous to promote the idea that all it takes for SEO to take off is a clever trick. In fact, if there's one message I would share, it is that there are no shortcuts (but on the positive side, if you do put in the work, you can make it despite being an early-stage company). Most of my work went into analyzing the topics we should be writing about, creating lists of keywords I was encouraging our writers to use, recruiting writers, and then building relationships in the relevant communities and promoting the content. Eventually we ended up getting enough people to subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on Twitter that the promotional work went away.
deltron3030 8y ago
Product development and the internal documents you have, can serve as the basis for good content. Essentially you're writing about problems that you're solving with your product. Your first articles can be related to your MVP, and the following ones about stuff you discover after gaining your first users. What I think the OP is trying to communicate, is basically that SEO or creating content that attracts people, is just a natural step within the development of your business. You'd need a interesting take on a problem or solve one that nobody else is solving, and then make sure that you don't miss the keywords people search for.

desaideas 8y ago

Working at AirPair with Igor while he was defining and rolling out this strategy was amazing. As we rolled out a new MEAN stack and other improvements to our CTA and inbound lead generation, the results were incredible, from 2-3 leads an hour, we went to 10-15, and then 20-30. A lot of Startup's can benefit from following his playbook to further their brand recognition and build powerful communities to accelerate their growth.

danvoell 8y ago

Great Article! Definitely, don't be scared of the entrenched group. As the article discussed, if your domain is new and doesn't have authority, figure out how to go really deep on a topic. The experience of 99.9% of SEO experts that I know is that after 2 months at a job, they get tired/bored and have implemented 90% of the strategy that they are going to. There is always room to compete as new snippets, algorithm updates, updated information or processes occur.

walshemj 8y ago
Alexa voice search is an interesting area

doctorpangloss 8y ago

Does anyone discover in app purchases through a Google search? At IAC, how would SEO help sell a Tinder Pro subscription? At Epic, how would SEO sell Fortnite V-Bucks? It's one thing if you sell this physical product or service that a normal human being can articulate into a query. It's another if you're selling totally imaginary stuff, like V-Bucks. What's the point of writing content for things no one knows they're looking for?

paulsutter 8y ago
People definitely search to consider in-app purchases (examples popular enough to be suggested by Google): “Fortnite bucks are they worth it” https://www.google.com/search?q=fortnite+v+bucks+are+they+worth+it https://www.google.com/search?q=fortnite+v+bucks+are+they+wo... “Is it worth getting Tinder Premium” https://www.google.com/search?q=is+it+worth+getting+tinder+premium https://www.google.com/search?q=is+it+worth+getting+tinder+p...
aerosmile 8y ago
I know what you're trying to say, and I agree - not every app will be able to leverage SEO... ...but more of them can than meets the eye at first. In fact, the dating category seems like a prime target: 1. Publish local dating pages, like this one: https://www.pof.com/personals/2700onlinedating.htm https://www.pof.com/personals/2700onlinedating.htm 2. When people sign up for an account, promote your mobile app 3. The influx of signups will help with ASO, which will generate more signups, which will help with SEO. 4. Wash, rinse, repeat. My first site was in the calorie counting space, and we followed the above approach to acquire about 8 million users (our content on the web was related to search terms around food names). Eventually, MyFitnessPal did the exact same thing but much better, and it's still growing to this day using the same strategy.
deltron3030 8y ago
People don't search for those things directly, but they might search for competitive advantages on those platforms, and if you can give them a good reason why they need x, you might sell.
ddebernardy 8y ago

mbesto 8y ago

Sidenote - what tools do people recommend using for SEO analysis outside of Searchmetrics?

jklinger410 8y ago
SEMRush is my go-to. Ahrefs is also great.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

arosier 8y ago

>It’s important to view each article as a distinct product that requires a budget, has a clear purpose and performance goals, and also needs a distribution strategy. The reality is, the guide he created was a product on it's own. While he ended up with "product" market fit for that piece of content on his first try, this is rare. >We’ll start off with the tutorials, since it is better suited for expensive, amazing content that will allow us to impress and attract 3rd party communities. To find product market fit, you need to solve a problem. Since you know who your target market is (the main niche influencers), identify real problems they have and solve these problems with your product (content). In this case, the solution was making a more user friendly product than what was available on the market. Some markets are saturated with user friendly content, you will need to make your content 10x better than the rest. You will know you have solved their problem, and found product market fit, if they distribute your content. The questions I have are: what is the MVP equivalent for content? How do I know if the content I am creating really solves the searchers problems 10x better than the alternative before spending thousands of dollars on the content?

aerosmile 8y ago
The MVP you're looking for are shorter content formats like tweetstorms. Assuming you have enough followers to accurately gauge the response, you could develop an editorial calendar and then track the likes/retweets/replies.
hayksaakian 8y ago
Easy to answer your question: Look at everyone else on the first page of Google for your question/keyword and make notes about all the things they're missing. Even if all you do is combine their ideas into 1 'ultimate' article, that's still valuable.

ranidu 8y ago

Great tips here!

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

pavbelshippable 8y ago

First of all, SEO is more of common sense. - It should start with creating a persona for your potential buyer/customer - You need to know your potential keywords - Analyse what your potential customers might search for - You need to understand the intent of the search because there are different types of keywords, all keywords are not created equal. You need to hit those pure buying intent keywords but in a subtle way - You need to do proper keyword research. I have created a keyword research template to help you all https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/168CBn10UK31sMw-fnP8kAqf-kYvVcy-KUmgiwqTbICQ/edit#gid=0 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/168CBn10UK31sMw-fnP8k... Yes, in the end, content is the king. Give them what they want, they will come back again. With your content, you need to make visitors stay for a long time and spend time on the site, Google loves sites/webpages with less bounce rate. Make sure, you distribute your content periodically on the relevant industry channels and forums.

maryglowbom 8y ago

Great article! Thanks