Customer Spotlight: Building and Ranking a Website with AI

Generative AI has become a dominant buzzword in digital marketing, but there is still a lot of skepticism around how it can be applied. More specifically, many people question an AI writer’s ability to help websites rank higher. 

So to address this question, we decided to go straight to the source: our customers who are currently successfully ranking with AI generated content.

In this case, we interviewed Patrick, a software developer who builds and monetizes websites on the side. 

Could you provide a bit of background on what you do?

I work full time as a software developer, and a lot of my work relates to automation and making processes more efficient. I also help small businesses build and maintain their websites. When I was just starting out with SEO, I realized the impact of writing articles and immediately started looking at AI content writers. I then decided to create a completely new website with AI generated content to see how it performs.

What is your overall goal for creating this new website?

I wanted to do a true “nothing to ranking” test. I registered the domain on 11/2/2022, built the website in 2 weeks (launched on 11/15/2022) and by 12/15/2022, I was ranking with around 15 keywords and had over 600 impressions.

How did you choose your niche?

I wanted to stay within the technology realm because it’s an area I am familiar with. I am slowly expanding my topics to gain more authority as well as more impressions.

What did you use to set up your domain?

I currently use SiteGround for my hosting and they provide a great platform that comes with SSL’s, site backups, security, and WordPress installation all included with their hosting.  The template/theme is from Elementor and I use RankMath to help with SEO. Overall, I wanted to get the site up and running quickly while making sure that it is user friendly and stable.

How did you decide what to write about?

My topic selection has been broad and somewhat generic so far but up with current events i.e. Leadership, Supply Chain, Finance, and Insights. I want to build a base of authority and also see what topics gain traction. The newest one I added was about Algorithms to not only test AF’s abilities, but use a topic that if written well would have staying power because the content would stay relevant.

How does Article Forge fit in?

Article Forge fits in after doing basic research surrounding what Google looks for to rank keywords. 

The first step is picking broad topics for AF to write about. The next step is more keyword research deeper into the topics to see if higher rankings come faster. I just give AF all my keywords and it writes full articles while I do other work. I do prefer the longer form articles because they have given me the best results so far and I did not find many other competitors that had that.

What are your goals for the content? 

The most basic goal is a proof of concept. Can I write an article and get it to rank in less than a month. The ultimate goal is to monetize both the article writing as a service as well as monetize the traffic to the website.

How do you use Article Forge?

I started off doing one article at a time, then bulk, then linked up my WordPress site.  I love the bulk generator and setting the articles into pending review so I can alter them to be more SEO friendly (I tweak parts of the articles and add my own images and links) directly in WordPress. 

Then I schedule them all on WordPress and let them publish over time.

Why do you use Article Forge instead of alternatives?

The others that I found were either outside of my budget or did not generate more than 1000 words for an article which was required for me.

How are you measuring results?

Right now I am using Google’s Search Console and the analytics inside the RankMath plugin.  Both will show the impressions, keywords/queries, and clicks.  I am measuring results by making sure there is a steady increase in impressions, keywords ranking, and ranking position.

When did you start seeing results?

Within 2 weeks of posting articles, I started seeing a small amount of impressions and a few keywords that ranked.  The bigger results started showed up around the 4 week mark with an increase to both metrics.

What are your next steps for continuing to grow the site rankings?  

My next step is going to be more keyword research and picking topics/keywords with low competition to see if any of those actions bring more action to the metrics.

What are your plan(s) for monetization?

Initially my plan is to increase my customer count and traffic by a few and follow their metrics to confirm the process works. After that, it will be to increase the customer count as well as traffic to my site with more targeted content and monetize that with affiliate marketing ads and / or Google ads.

Are there any other steps or points you think would be interesting to include? 

The biggest factor in testing this out has been patience.  Because I have a fulltime job, I don’t need this to succeed right away, and I believe that I have benefitted from this thought process.

Most business owners want their site to go up as fast as possible and want to see an immediate return on their time invested.  Since I am taking the longer term approach in order to confirm my process works, I believe I will be better prepared to prove to customers that this will work, but I will be able to give a more accurate timeline as to when to expect results.  

Also, because I am using impressions and keywords ranking as my primary metrics where other companies would only focus on clicks and traffic, I believe this sets a better expectation for the customer.  This won’t be a quick monetary return, but the initial indicators could come faster than what we have been told/led to believe for many years.