SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

SEO is the ultimate compounding growth channel. A blog post you write today can drive traffic for years. Paid ads stop working the moment you stop paying. SEO keeps working. Three pillars of SEO: (1) On-page—titles, meta descriptions, headers, content quality, keyword usage. (2) Technical—site speed, mobile-friendliness, structured data, crawlability. (3) Off-page—backlinks from other sites, brand mentions, domain authority. Keyword research: Find what your audience is searching. Use tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, or free alternatives (Google Keyword Planner, AnswerThePublic). Target keywords you can realistically rank for—avoid competing with Wikipedia and Forbes for 'startup' (impossible). Go for long-tail: 'best project management tool for remote teams' has less competition. Content strategy: Write for humans, optimize for robots. Answer questions your customers are asking. Structure with H2/H3 headers (Google loves hierarchy). Use keywords naturally (don't keyword-stuff—Google penalizes that). Long-form content (1,500+ words) tends to rank better for competitive queries. Backlinks matter: A link from TechCrunch or Hacker News is worth 1,000 links from random blogs. How to get backlinks: (1) Create genuinely useful content people want to reference, (2) Guest post on relevant sites, (3) Build tools or data that others cite, (4) Get featured in roundups and listicles. Timeline: SEO is slow. Expect 3-6 months before you see meaningful traffic. If you need customers this quarter, SEO won't save you—run ads. But if you're building for the long term, SEO compounds like nothing else.

Ahrefs publishes data-driven SEO studies that rank #1 for thousands of keywords. Notion's template gallery ranks for 'project management template', 'wiki template'—bringing in users who discover Notion through search.