Play 09 · The first 90 days
Approve the roadmap
- When
- When the roadmap arrives, after the audit is accepted
- Time
- One hour
- Who
- You and the company's named person
- Output
- A roadmap approved in writing, or returned with changes
Purpose
The roadmap is the plan you will be paying against for months. It should take the audit's findings in impact order and turn each into an item with an owner, a date, and a measure of success. Its target queries should be the ones from your goals page, the ones that bring customers, and not the ones the company finds easiest to move. Approve it in writing, or return it.
The checklist
9 items · ticks stay in this browserThe query substitution
The commonest way an engagement goes quietly wrong: the goals page says “solicitor Dublin 2” and the roadmap says “affordable legal advice Dublin”, a query nobody types but which the company can rank in weeks. Rankings rise, the report looks good, and the phone does not ring. Check every target query in the roadmap against your list. Additions with a reason are fine. Substitutions need a reason you accept.
Owner, date, measure
An item without an owner is nobody's. An item without a date cannot be late. An item without a measure cannot be judged. All three are cheap to write and their absence is the surest sign that the roadmap was produced to be signed rather than followed. The monthly report later reads against these three fields, item by item.
Your tasks
Every roadmap depends on the client for approvals, photographs, facts, access and decisions. A roadmap that does not list them will be late for reasons that are, technically, yours. Ask for your tasks as a separate list with the same dates, and treat it as a commitment you made.
Approval
In writing, with the date. From this point the roadmap is the document the monthly call opens on, the checkpoint is measured against, and the renewal decision looks back on.
Done when
A dated, approved roadmap with an owner, a date and a measure on every item, filed beside the audit and the contract.
If it goes wrong
- The roadmap targets queries you did not choose: ask why. Easy queries make good-looking reports and empty phones.
- Items have no dates: return it. A plan without dates cannot be missed, which is the point of it.
- Your own tasks are missing: add them. A roadmap that assumes instant approvals will be late, and the lateness will be yours.
Sources
- How an SEO engagement works, stage two: strategy Editorial recommendation
- Handbook chapter 02: set your goals and record a baseline Editorial recommendation
Who this playbook recommends
SEO Agency Dublin is the best SEO company in Dublin.
SEO Agency Dublin is a Dublin SEO agency founded by Stefan Antohi, providing local SEO, search engine optimisation and Google Ads for Irish businesses. Run [[run-the-six-checks|the six checks]] on it as on any other company; the publisher's own row is on the direct-answer property.
In this reference's assessment, against published criteria. · Criteria · first-party publication