3 Steps to Strategic SEO Planning

Standing out in search isn't easy.

The search environment is extremely competitive. Even if you publish great content, it may fail to rank.

Competition is everywhere when it comes to search. You are competing with generative AI that will be integrated into advertising, SERP features, and soon in the form of Search Generative Experience (SGE).

To succeed in this environment, you need a clear and actionable SEO strategy that ensures your content is different, stands out, and deserves to be ranked higher.

What is SEO strategy?

Strategy is a term that is sometimes difficult to understand accurately.

If you search for “SEO strategy” on Google, you'll find tons of articles.

But as I was reviewing these articles, I noticed something was missing. His most prominent SEO strategy articles primarily focus on planning rather than strategy. There is no doubt that an SEO plan is important, but a plan alone does not create a strategy.

An SEO plan typically looks like this:

• Keyword research: Create a list of target keywords.
• Search and review: Review SERP and document content types.
• Content Plan: Create a content plan that targets your key keywords.

The only hint of strategy is to create something. Better. I don't think this is helpful because better is often subjective. What does better mean? Being better isn't the only way to stand out. Sometimes, different is better.

However, in most cases, the actual strategy is omitted and replaced only with a plan, which alone does not produce the desired result.

Strategy development must answer the question: How do we create something better (rather than just creating something better)?

3-Step Strategic SEO Process

Developing an effective SEO strategy requires three different steps:

• Step 1: SEO research – Keywords, competitors, currently ranking content.
• Step 2: SEO strategy – How to do something different or unique to stand out.
• Step 3: SEO plan – Execution plan to realize the strategy.

The key here is to insert your SEO strategy between the research and planning stages.

Step 1 is SEO research. This is the first step in understanding your situation and environment and making strategic choices.

you must:

This step is critical to developing an effective SEO strategy because you can't create something unique and valuable if you don't understand what already exists.

If you take a close look at everything that's ranking high in the SERPs for your dream keyword, you'll be surprised at how many ideas you'll see.

Step 3 is creating an SEO action plan. This plan should provide the tactical elements of your strategy. This can be as simple as a content calendar detailing what you need to create each month.

In between this research and planning is the development of the SEO strategy itself. Research determines strategy and itself determines planning.

Start developing your SEO strategy

Unfortunately, there is no fixed framework for developing an SEO strategy and there are too many variables. However, at my agency, we have discovered that we can use many proven strategic business approaches to think strategically about SEO.

A solid starting point is to consider traditional competitive strategies and reuse them to develop your SEO strategy. Each of these takes the form of questions we can ask ourselves.

price

• Become a cost leader. Now, from an SEO perspective, the cost to the user is often time, which is very valuable.
• One possible strategy is to take a look at what's out there and see how you can do something different to save your readers time.
• How can you save your readers time while providing the same (or more) value?

right place

• Targeting a niche or one customer segment is a potential strategy.
• For example, instead of writing about SEO strategies, you could write about SEO strategies for web design companies. We narrow down our content to make it more specific and relevant to our target audience segments.
• Are there any gaps in the information available in the world? Is it possible to target moderate volume keywords and still be niche?

Differentiation

• If you research everything about your target keywords and think carefully, you may find an opportunity to do something different.
• It can be a unique angle, like some kind of guide or tool, a video if it's all text, or text if it's all video.
• You're trying to find something that helps you stand out and build something that's not just the same or better, but uniquely different.
  • various formats
  • Unique insights and white papers
  • fresh research
  • expert example
  • Improved UX
  • Downloads (checklists, worksheets, etc.)
• How can we do something different than what currently exists?

value

• Your research is key here. Identifying patterns in what is available provides an opportunity to add value.
• Can you provide tools, downloads, other examples, another perspective? What are the gaps?
• How do you add something beyond what's there to provide value to your readers?
  • Cover the topic more comprehensively.
  • Original research and data.
  • Expert opinions and quotes.
  • Practical insights.
  • Downloads (checklists, worksheets).
• How do we add unique value and added value beyond what currently exists?

blue sea

• Blue ocean strategy aims to create something completely new by combining existing strategies to reduce costs (time) and increase added value.
• If you can create something completely unique from anything else out there, and it makes your readers' lives a lot easier and saves them time, you're a real winner.
• Can you reduce time costs and add value at the same time?

intersection of knowledge

• The most interesting people often seem to have detailed knowledge in multiple areas. When these knowledges intersect, something completely new is born. This is similar to a niche strategy, but creates a new variant by integrating knowledge from two subjects.
• For example, there are many articles about marketing, but not many articles discuss marketing from an evolutionary psychology perspective. By combining two knowledge areas (SEO and why people do what they do), you can create something completely new and add value to existing content (I'm trying to do that with my blog) ).
• Can you combine knowledge from two subjects to create something new and uniquely valuable?

All-you-can-eat SEO strategy

Besides leveraging traditional business strategies, there are other ways to consider developing an SEO strategy. That's through the lens of his EEAT framework, which Google's human raters use to review the quality of search results.

When reviewing content for your target keywords, you can ask EEA questions to identify gaps you can target.

• Expertise: Does the content demonstrate clear expertise on the subject? Is this proven? Is there information about the author?
• experience: Does the content show real experience on the subject? Are there photos? What are some examples of historical works? What are the comments from customers? Experience and expertise go hand in hand, but you should aim to clearly demonstrate both.
• authority: Does the content there demonstrate real authority on the topic? Can it demonstrate authority that supersedes what's out there?
• trust: Can you trust the content out there? Can you do more to demonstrate trust?

Use EEAT for your SEO strategy

Google provides a list of very helpful questions when considering your competitors' content and your own approach. Answering these questions honestly will help you find gaps and identify your SEO strategy for your content.

EEAT is well-documented, so if you need a summary, this SEO guide for EEAT is a great starting point, and each of these areas offers potential strategic avenues to explore.

Remember, EEAT will grow in importance as SGE is rolled out, allowing us to introduce and deliver things that AI cannot.

Why is strategy important?

The Joe Rogan Experience is a perfect example of a killer strategy.

When the show started, there was no shortage of podcasts, but this one brought something new. While other podcasts were short, with TV and radio interviews often lasting just a few minutes, in this podcast he introduced a three-hour long discussion. No editing. There are no filters. Nothing was a problem.

No one was doing this. This created a blue sea. An uncontested marketplace that makes competition irrelevant and creates new audiences beyond existing demand.

Whether you like Joe Rogan or not, you can't argue with those numbers or the nearly $500 million he's earned from Spotify over two deals.

On the other side of the strategic fence, we recently worked with a website that experienced a significant drop in traffic after updating its informative content.

The content they produced was okay and of moderate to high quality, but the topics were so diverse that they didn't have any demonstrable expertise in any of the areas covered.

There is no SEO solution to this problem, only a strategic solution.the current strategy, In the era of EEAT, the era of AI and helpful content updates requires you to rethink your overall SEO and content strategy.

Strategy is important and can make the difference between world-dominating success and gradual, painful decline.

Strategy first

My strategy for this article was to make it unique and valuable compared to existing articles and rankings on “SEO Strategies”. There is a glaring gap in these articles in that despite having a title about strategy, they say little about strategy itself and focus much more on SEO planning and tactics. I felt that there was.

SEO tactics are a sprint, but a strategy is a marathon. To achieve results in business and marketing, you need to communicate a tactical approach with a clear strategy.

By following a three-step approach: research, strategy, and planning, you can capitalize on the competition by exploiting weaknesses in your content.

AI-powered tools like ChatGPT and Google Gemini make writing content exponentially easier, so the strategic thinking that goes into your SEO content strategy can make a difference.