methodology
Diagnosis first. Every claim cites its evidence.
No two businesses start from the same place: a neobroker with a dead blog, an issuer whose only rankings are branded, and a media site with editorial muscle need different strategies. Prescribing the wrong mix burns months. So the product starts by measuring — licensed third-party SEO data, a lightweight crawl, and optionally your own Search Console. This page describes the method; the exact probe outputs, thresholds, and decision rules ship inside the product.
stage 1 · diagnose
The probe battery
Nine probes run in parallel and stream their findings into the wizard as they land — “found 1 URL template: /symbol/* — 2,140 pages.” Nothing is asserted without a number behind it.
stage 2 · score
Six posture scores
Each score is 0–100 with a fixed formula, and each answers one question about your posture. They are inputs to classification, not grades.
Can this domain rank beyond the long tail yet?
Are your templated pages ranking assets or thin shells?
How much of your niche’s demand do you touch at all?
Do you catch new queries while they are still new?
Does anyone find you who doesn’t already know you?
What stops the day the ad budget stops?
the triggering evidence — first matching rule wins, and the rule is quoted.
stage 3 · classify
Six archetypes, deterministic rules
Classification is rule-based, not model-based: the first matching rule wins, and your result quotes the exact number that triggered it. Two modifiers overlay any archetype — paid-dependent and spam-risk — and change the prescription when they fire.
| code | archetype | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| A0 | Absent | No SEO strategy exists yet. Green-field. |
| A1 | Brand-only | The site ranks for its own name; no demand capture. |
| A2 | Editorial | Human-written content, no programmatic layer. |
| A3 | Programmatic-thin | One template scaled wide with shallow pages — the wrong axis. |
| A4 | Programmatic-deep | The playbook already works; the gaps are head terms and velocity. |
| A5 | Authority-mixed | Mature. The job is gap-filling and freshness. |
the detection thresholds are part of the product, not this page.
stage 4 · prescribe
The prescription is a function, not an opinion
(archetype, authority tier, business model, editorial capacity) → pillar mix, sequencing, and KPI targets. The decision matrix behind it is deterministic and versioned — and it is the product’s core, so it ships in Blueprints, not on marketing pages. Its character, though: weak domains never get head-term work, issuers start by owning the queries about their own funds, editorial teams unlock list hubs early, and thin-programmatic sites are told to deepen, not widen.
guardrails are visible and explained: “list hubs unlock at authority tier T2 — you’re T0.” You can adjust the mix within them; you can’t silently break them.
The prescription also computes your niche wedge: each candidate keyword cluster is scored by demand against incumbent strength, steering you to where the giants are weak — per query, not by assumption.
the artifact
The Strategy Blueprint
A versioned document: the diagnosis with its evidence, the classification with its triggers, the prescription with its 90-day roadmap and KPI curve, and the machine-readable parameters every downstream module obeys — scoring weights, per-pillar quotas, compliance toggles, prune list. Nothing generates outside it. Re-diagnosis runs quarterly or on demand; each new version ships a diff.
Run stage 1 on your domain
The free scan runs the probe battery, scores, and classification — and shows you the evidence it found.
free · no signup · 9 probes, minutes to run