Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Medium-term (3-6 months)
OK, so you know what's hilarious? While everyone's fighting over "SaaS marketing" and "growth hacking" keywords, I've built entire traffic engines around terms nobody even thinks to target.
Last year, I was working with this B2B SaaS client who was getting absolutely crushed trying to rank for obvious industry terms. Their blog was getting maybe 200 visits a month, and the CEO was starting to question whether SEO was even worth it.
Then I showed them something that changed everything: low competition SEO isn't about finding easy keywords - it's about finding valuable problems that nobody's solving yet.
Six months later? We hit 5,000+ monthly visits, not from massive competition keywords, but from hyper-specific problems their customers were actually searching for. The crazy part? Most of these terms had zero competition because companies were too busy chasing vanity metrics.
Here's what you'll learn from my experience finding SEO gold mines:
Why traditional keyword research tools miss the most valuable opportunities
My 3-step process for discovering untapped search intent
How to validate demand before creating content
The content framework that converts low-competition traffic into actual customers
When to abandon this strategy (spoiler: when you hit scale)
This isn't about gaming the system - it's about finding genuine value gaps in the market. If you're tired of creating content that gets buried on page 47 of Google, this approach will change how you think about growth strategy entirely.
Industry Reality
What every startup founder gets wrong about SEO
Here's what the SEO industry tells you: Use Ahrefs, find keywords with high search volume and low difficulty, create content around those terms. Rinse and repeat until you rank.
Sounds logical, right? The problem is everyone's using the same playbook.
Most startups make these classic mistakes:
Chasing volume over intent - They target "project management software" instead of "how to track deadlines when your team keeps missing them"
Ignoring search intent gaps - They see 100 searches per month and assume it's not worth targeting
Following keyword difficulty blindly - A "low difficulty" keyword might still be impossible to rank for if you don't understand the real competition
Creating content for keywords, not problems - They write "ultimate guides" that sound impressive but solve nothing specific
Competing in red oceans - They try to out-content companies with 50x their resources
The conventional wisdom exists because it's easy to teach and sell. Tools can scrape search volumes, agencies can promise "quick wins," and everyone feels productive targeting "high opportunity" keywords.
But here's where it falls short: keyword tools show you what was, not what could be. They can't tell you about emerging problems, shifting search behavior, or the conversations happening in your customers' Slack channels.
The real opportunity isn't in finding easier versions of competitive keywords. It's in discovering search intent that your competitors don't even know exists yet. That's where low competition SEO becomes a true competitive advantage, not just a traffic tactic.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
So I'm working with this B2B SaaS startup - they had a solid product for team workflow automation, but their website was getting less traffic than my neighbor's cat blog. Seriously, we're talking 200 visits a month for a funded company.
The founder was frustrated because they'd spent six months targeting obvious keywords like "workflow automation software" and "team productivity tools." Classic mistake - competing head-to-head with companies that had been doing SEO for years.
Their biggest challenge? They were stuck in a feature-first mindset instead of problem-first. Every piece of content was about what their product did, not what their customers struggled with.
I started digging into their customer support tickets, sales calls, and user onboarding data. That's when I found the gold mine - their customers weren't searching for "workflow automation." They were searching for hyper-specific problems:
"Why do my team notifications keep getting buried in Slack"
"How to track project delays without micromanaging"
"What to do when remote team members miss deadlines"
These weren't showing up in any keyword tool because they were conversational, problem-focused queries. But when I checked Google, guess what? Nobody was directly answering these questions.
The first content experiment I tried was creating a comprehensive guide for "workflow automation platforms comparison." It was well-researched, perfectly optimized, and got exactly zero traction. Why? Because 47 other companies were already targeting that exact phrase with better domain authority.
That failure taught me something crucial: in low competition SEO, you're not looking for easier keywords - you're looking for unaddressed search intent. The real opportunity was in those support ticket phrases that actual customers were typing into Google at 2 AM when their projects were falling apart.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
After that initial failure, I completely changed my approach. Instead of starting with keyword tools, I started with customer conversations.
Step 1: Mining Customer Language
I spent two weeks analyzing every customer touchpoint:
Support tickets and live chat logs
Sales call recordings and demo feedback
Onboarding survey responses
Feature request comments
Customer success team notes
The pattern was clear: customers described their problems in very specific, emotional language. They weren't saying "I need workflow optimization" - they were saying "My team keeps dropping the ball and I don't know why."
Step 2: Search Intent Validation
Next, I took these exact phrases and tested them in Google. Here's what I looked for:
Search results that didn't directly answer the question - Lots of generic "productivity tips" but no specific solutions
Forum discussions and Reddit threads - Real people asking these questions with no satisfying answers
Related search suggestions - Google's autocomplete showing similar problems
Low commercial intent in current results - Informational content, not product pages
Step 3: Content Strategy Framework
Instead of creating product-focused content, I built a problem-solution bridge:
Problem identification - Start with the exact customer language
Situation expansion - Describe the scenario in detail so readers think "This is exactly my situation"
Multiple solution paths - Provide 3-4 approaches, not just "use our tool"
Implementation specifics - Actual steps, not just concepts
Tool mention (when relevant) - Natural integration, not forced product placement
The first article I created using this framework was "How to Track Project Delays Without Becoming a Micromanager." It targeted a problem I'd seen in dozen of support tickets, but nobody was directly addressing it.
Within two weeks, it was ranking #3 for that exact phrase. More importantly, it was generating qualified leads - people who read the entire article and then signed up for a trial because they recognized their exact problem.
The key insight? Low competition SEO isn't about finding easier keywords - it's about finding problems that are being searched for but not being solved.
I repeated this process across 15 different customer problems, creating content that felt like it was written specifically for each searcher's situation. Each piece ranked quickly because there was genuine demand but limited supply.
Customer Mining
Start with support tickets, sales calls, and user feedback to find the exact language customers use to describe their problems
Search Gaps
Look for queries where current results don't directly solve the problem - these are your low competition opportunities
Problem-First Content
Create content that addresses specific situations rather than general topics - make readers think 'this is exactly my problem'
Validation Before Creation
Test search intent and competition levels before writing - use Google searches and forum discussions to validate demand
The results were honestly better than I expected. Within six months, we went from 200 monthly visits to over 5,000, but more importantly, the traffic quality was dramatically higher.
Here's the breakdown:
Organic traffic increase: 2,400% (from 200 to 5,000+ monthly visits)
Average time on page: 4+ minutes (vs. 1.2 minutes from their previous content)
Trial signups from organic: 85 qualified leads in 6 months
Content ranking performance: 12 out of 15 articles ranking in top 5 for target phrases
But the unexpected outcome was what happened to their sales process. The leads coming from these problem-focused articles were much more qualified. Instead of explaining basic concepts on demos, the sales team was having strategic conversations about implementation.
One article about "handling remote team accountability" became their top converting piece of content. It wasn't ranking for a high-volume keyword, but everyone who found it was dealing with that exact challenge.
The timeline looked like this: Month 1-2 was pure research and content planning. Month 3-4 was when the first articles started ranking and generating traffic. Month 5-6 was when we hit our stride and the compound effect kicked in.
What really surprised me was how this approach affected their SaaS growth strategy beyond just SEO. The customer language we discovered improved their ad copy, email campaigns, and even product messaging. It turns out understanding how customers describe their problems is valuable for everything, not just content creation.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
Here are the biggest lessons I learned from this low competition SEO experiment:
Customer language beats keyword tools - The most valuable search terms come from actual customer conversations, not SEO software
Problem-first always wins - Content that addresses specific situations outperforms generic "ultimate guides" every time
Low volume can mean high value - A keyword with 50 monthly searches but zero good answers is better than 5,000 searches with strong competition
Validation prevents wasted effort - Always check search results and forum discussions before creating content
Quality compounds faster than quantity - 15 highly relevant articles beat 50 generic ones
This approach has limits - Once you dominate the low-hanging fruit, you'll need to compete for bigger terms
Sales and marketing alignment is crucial - The customer insights benefit both content strategy and sales conversations
What I'd do differently: I would have documented customer language patterns from day one. We discovered some amazing insights halfway through that could have accelerated the entire process.
Common pitfalls to avoid: Don't get addicted to easy wins. This strategy works best for getting initial traction, but you'll eventually need to compete for higher-volume terms to scale.
When this approach works best: Early-stage companies with clear target customers who have specific, underserved problems. When it doesn't work: If your market is too broad or your customers don't have consistent pain points.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS startups implementing this playbook:
Mine your support tickets for exact customer language
Target implementation problems, not just feature searches
Create content that bridges the gap between problem and solution
Focus on use-case specific scenarios your product solves
For your Ecommerce store
For ecommerce stores using this approach:
Target specific use cases rather than product categories
Address customer objections and concerns in content
Create buying guides for specific situations and needs
Mine product reviews for customer language and problems