Growing a startup’s organic traffic from 1,000 to over 100,000 monthly users is no easy feat, especially in a competitive niche like reading and productivity apps.
In this case study, I’ll break down exactly how I helped Basmo scale their organic visibility through a strategic SEO and content marketing approach.
Project Overview
Basmo is a dynamic reading tracker app that empowers users to build stronger reading habits through personalized goal-setting, progress tracking, and deep reading insights.
- Industry: Reading & Productivity Apps
- Engagement Period: June 2021 – June 2023
- Goal: Build a sustainable organic traffic channel, reduce customer acquisition costs, and strengthen online authority
- My Role: Led the complete SEO and content transformation, from technical SEO to launching new organic growth channels
Situation & Challenge
When I joined Basmo in June 2021, the company relied heavily on paid installs with minimal organic visibility. At that time:
🚩 Organic footprint: Fewer than 1,000 monthly users, fewer than 100 keywords ranked in Google’s Top 10, and just ~70 referring domains.
🚩 Business pain: Rising customer acquisition costs (CAC) and the urgent need to build a sustainable, compounding organic traffic channel ahead of new funding rounds.
🚩 Technical risk: Basmo had just migrated to a new domain, requiring immediate SEO intervention to safeguard rankings and traffic.
The challenge was bold and clear: Transform Basmo’s limited organic footprint into a scalable, high-performing SEO growth engine fast, sustainably, and globally.
Strategy & Execution
I developed and implemented a comprehensive content and SEO strategy focused on high-quality, optimized, and engaging blog articles. Over 200 meticulously researched and keyword-targeted articles were published, addressing trending and evergreen topics within Basmo’s niche.
Key initiatives included:
🛠️ Oversaw the SEO side of Basmo’s domain migration, managing URL mapping, 301 redirects, internal linking, and technical audits to preserve search performance.
🛠️ Launched a complete SEO and content strategy from scratch, focused on long-term, sustainable organic growth.
🛠️ Built and scaled a high-performing blog, publishing 200+ SEO-optimized articles targeting strategic keywords.
🛠️ Expanded the SEO framework across five languages, localizing and optimizing over 200 articles for international markets.
🛠️ Supervised all aspects of technical SEO, improving site structure, internal linking, and page speed.
🛠️ Developed the Discover Basmo content hub — a curated database of book lists and entries to boost topical authority and capture high-intent traffic.
Results
The results far exceeded the original goals:
✅ Scaled organic traffic from 1,000 to over 100,000 monthly users, driving sustainable user acquisition without heavy paid ads.
✅ Expanded the website’s authority by earning backlinks from over 1,200 referring domains, significantly improving domain strength and resilience.
✅ Boosted monthly Google impressions from 30,000 to over 8 million, massively expanding brand visibility and search footprint.
✅ Dominated the SERPs with 40,000+ keyword rankings, including 2,000+ Top 3 positions for competitive terms like: “book tracker”, “best book apps”, “benefits of reading books”, and “what is booktok”.
✅ Drove tens of thousands of readers monthly to top-performing pages.
Impact
By executing a targeted, data-driven SEO and content strategy, Basmo transformed from a little-known startup into a dominant voice in the reading and productivity space, achieving sustainable, global growth and long-term organic success.
Ready to scale your organic growth?
Let’s chat and explore how we can unlock similar results for your brand.