Most SEO "strategies" are a list of tactics with no spine.
"We'll do content, links, and technical." Okay — toward what? In what order? Measured how? Against whom?
A real SEO strategy answers those questions before any work starts. This article gives you the exact 6-part template I fill in for every new engagement at Goldie Agency. Copy it, work through it, and you'll have a defensible 90-day roadmap by the end of an afternoon.
Part 1 — The objective (one sentence)
Every strategy starts with a single, specific, measurable objective.
Not "grow organic traffic." That's a wish, not an objective.
Try: "Rank in the top 5 for our 10 highest-intent commercial keywords within 9 months, lifting organic-sourced trials from 14/month to 100+/month."
That sentence does a lot of work. It defines the target keywords (commercial, high-intent), the success metric (trials, not traffic), the baseline (14/month), the goal (100+), and the timeline (9 months).
If you can't write your objective in one sentence with numbers in it, you don't have a strategy yet. You have a vibe.
Part 2 — The diagnosis
Before planning the route, map where you're starting.
Run through this checklist:
- Technical health: crawlability, indexation, Core Web Vitals, site architecture
- Current rankings: what already ranks, what's on page 2 (the fastest wins)
- Backlink profile: domain rating, referring domains, toxic links
- Content inventory: what exists, what's outdated, what's missing
- Competitor gap: what the top 3 competitors have that you don't
The diagnosis tells you which of the six files (audit, keywords, content, links, internal mesh, scoreboard) needs the most weight. A site with great content but no links needs a different plan than one with great links but thin content.
Part 3 — The keyword map
Now you decide what to win.
Cluster your opportunity space into:
- Pillars: the head terms you ultimately want to own (high value, high competition)
- Supporters: the cluster of articles that build topical authority toward each pillar
- Quick wins: keywords already ranking on page 2 that a small push could move to page 1
- Commercial priority: which keywords actually drive revenue (rank these first)
Map every target keyword to: intent, estimated difficulty, current position, target position, and the page type that should win it.
This becomes your editorial and optimisation backlog.
Part 4 — The content plan
With the keyword map done, plan the content.
Decide the ratio. For most B2B and SaaS sites I weight it roughly:
- 60% commercial pages (comparison, alternative, use-case, BOFU) — these convert
- 30% linkable assets (data studies, tools, stat roundups) — these earn links
- 10% top-of-funnel blog — mainly to feed internal links to the commercial pages
Then sequence it across 90 days. Quick wins first (momentum), anchor assets second (long-term links), commercial pages woven throughout (revenue).
Part 5 — The link plan
Content alone rarely moves competitive rankings. You need authority.
Decide:
- Volume: how many links per month does the competitive gap require? (Look at competitors' referring domain velocity.)
- Method mix: outreach, digital PR, HARO, niche edits, partner links
- Priority pages: which pages get the link equity first (usually your anchor assets, which then pass authority internally)
The link plan is where most DIY strategies fall short. They plan content beautifully and then hope rankings follow. They don't. Authority is the lever.
Part 6 — The scoreboard
Finally, decide how you'll measure and report.
- Leading indicators (weekly): content shipped, links landed, technical fixes deployed
- Lagging indicators (monthly): ranking movement, organic traffic, organic-sourced conversions
- The north-star (quarterly): the revenue metric from your Part 1 objective
Set the cadence now, before the work starts. A strategy without a scoreboard drifts. A scoreboard keeps everyone honest about whether the plan is working.
How to use this template
Open a blank doc. Write the six headers. Fill each one in for your site.
Part 1 takes 15 minutes (if you're honest about the metric). Parts 2-3 take an afternoon with Ahrefs or Semrush open. Parts 4-6 take another afternoon.
By the end of a day, you have a real 90-day SEO strategy — not a list of tactics, but a spine that tells you what to do, in what order, and how you'll know it's working.
What's next
This template is File 02 (keyword map) and the connective tissue between all six files in the SEO Growth Playbook.
If you want the deepest file — the link plan (File 04) — the free Link Building Mastery book covers it in 200 pages.
If you'd rather have the whole playbook deployed on your site by my team, book a free strategy call. 30 minutes, with me directly.