Exactly what to do, from day 1 to a year in.
SEO is not a mystery, it is a sequence. This is the plan we run: what to do in your first 30 days, by 90 days, at 6 months, and over a year, with each step mapped to the tool that does it for you.
One plan, $199/month. No contract, cancel anytime.
Foundation and quick wins
Fix what is broken and capture the fastest wins before writing a single new page.
- Run a free audit and a deep crawl to surface technical issues, broken pages, and thin content.
- Connect Google Search Console so every decision is based on your real data.
- Scan your site once so the AI understands your business, services, and market.
- Bulk-fix titles and meta descriptions, and add missing schema, the changes that lift clicks immediately.
- Find striking-distance pages (ranking 5 to 20) and improve them first, they move fastest.
Content engine and momentum
Build topical authority by publishing answer-first content on a consistent schedule.
- Research keywords and save them into lists by volume, difficulty, and intent.
- Plan a content calendar around topic clusters (one pillar, several supporting posts).
- Generate two to four AI-citable articles a week with the content engine.
- Ship each post with internal links and FAQ or Article schema built in.
- Turn on rank tracking and AI-visibility tracking to watch progress.
Authority and scale
Compound your content, close the gaps competitors rank for, and clean up conflicts.
- Run a competitor gap analysis and target the high-volume keywords they win and you do not.
- Find and fix cannibalization where two of your pages compete for the same query.
- Scale content to cover each topic cluster end to end, not just the easy terms.
- Monitor referring domains and new or lost backlinks every week.
- Let the weekly report and AI action plan tell you the next best move.
Dominance and GEO
Own your category in Google and in the AI answers that increasingly replace it.
- Expand into programmatic or location pages wherever demand justifies them.
- Double down on GEO so ChatGPT, Perplexity, and AI Overviews cite you by name.
- Refresh and re-optimize older content that has slipped or gone stale.
- Track share of voice against competitors and defend your top terms.
- Reinvest in the clusters that convert, not just the ones that get traffic.
Not sure where you are on this plan?
Run a free audit and your AI coworker will tell you exactly which phase you are in and the single most valuable thing to do next.
SEO plan FAQ
How long does SEO take to work?+
Expect the first movement in 30 to 90 days (usually CTR and quick wins first), meaningful traffic by 3 to 6 months, and category-level results by 6 to 12 months. SEO compounds, so the curve is slow at first and steep later. The plan above sequences the work so you see early wins while the compounding builds.
Which timeframe plan should I follow?+
All of them, in order. They are phases of one plan, not separate options. Start with the first 30 days no matter your goal, because the foundation and quick wins make everything after them work better. Then progress through each phase as your site matures.
Do I have to do all of this manually?+
No. Each step maps to a tool in SmashSERP that does the heavy lifting: the audit finds the issues, the content engine writes the pages, the trackers watch your progress, and the weekly report tells you what to do next. You approve and publish; the platform does the work.
What if I only have a few hours a week?+
Follow the phases but do less per week. Even one well-structured, AI-citable article a week plus fixing your existing titles and schema will move the needle over a few months. Consistency matters more than volume.
Keep exploring SmashSERP
Run this plan on your site.
SmashSERP does every step of it: audit, content, tracking, and a weekly plan that tells you the next move.
One plan, $199/month. No contract, cancel anytime.