Programmatic SEO examples that actually work

Programmatic SEO is a SEO strategy that uses unique content from your business to create a lot of content targeting multiple keywords at scale.

But what exactly is it, and how can it benefit your business?

In this guide, we'll cover:

• What is programmatic SEO and how does it work?
• Real-world examples of companies using programmatic SEO successfully
• The benefits it offers, like scalability, cost savings, and faster results
• Step-by-step instructions to get started with basic programmatic SEO

Whether you're a content marketer interested in SEO, a SEO agency looking to scale content for your clients or a startup founder looking to get more leads, programmatic SEO presents an opportunity to boost your search ranking for more keywords and get more organic traffic naturally with content.

What is Programmatic SEO?

Programmatic SEO is a SEO strategy that involves using automation and technology to create and optimize a large number of unique, high-quality web pages at scale in order to rank for a high amount of keywords.

Key aspects of programmatic SEO include:

• Using templates and databases to mass-produce SEO-optimized pages, rather than manually creating each page. This allows for publishing hundreds or thousands of pages quickly.
• Targeting long-tail, low-competition keywords with each page to rank for a wide variety of specific search queries. The goal is to capture search traffic in niche topic areas.
• Using existing data, content, and assets to efficiently generate unique page content. User-generated content (UGC) and business data are often used.
• Employing a consistent page layout, design, and content structure across pages. A standard template ensures quality and enables automation.
• Focusing pages on transactional, commercial, or informational search intent to drive conversions. Pages can aim to attract bottom-of-funnel searchers.

Tripadvisor, Yelp, Zillow, BestParents, Zapier, and many e-commerce sites are examples of websites that extensively use programmatic SEO. These sites have thousands of pages targeting hyper-specific searches.

The key benefits are the ability to create high-quality content at massive scale, target a huge variety of keywords, and exponentially grow organic search traffic.

However, it requires very strategic planning and execution to ensure pages are unique, valuable, and not seen as spam by search engines like Google. Here are some real-world examples of programmatic SEO:

Programmatic SEO Examples & Case Studies

We will explain how each case study used programmatic SEO to create thousands of pages for each business.

WorkbookPDF - Programmatic SEO SaaS landing page example

WorkbookPDF is a website that offers AI-generated language workbooks for language learners, each workbook is a PDF file that is personalized to each student depending on their level and topic they are interested in.

WorkbookPDF created hundreds of dynamic pages for each language, level and topic. A great programmatic SEO strategy and page template that really works to rank better on Google for long-tail keywords that users are searching for.

• /:language/level/:level: For example Korean workbooks for grade 11 or German workbooks for beginners.
• /:language/topic/:topic: For example Korean workbooks about animals or French workbooks about wine.

GradientPage - Programmatic SEO for colors

GradientPage, a great programmatic SEO case study, offers gradient wallpapers for designers. To launch their SEO efforts and be found by designers, developers and indie hackers, they created free tools to generate CSS gradients and UI gradients.

They created 500+ pages of CSS UI gradients that designers can use in their projects. Each gradient links to a color and a hex code, offering millions of potential pages.

• /css/ui-gradients/:color: For example after-the-rain or instagram.
• /hex/:code: For example yellow orange (#FFA647) or spring green (#00FF7F)

OG Image Gallery - Programmatic SEO directory

OGimage.org displays hundreds of OG images as examples for inspiration. The website offers templates and an automated OG image generation service for websites and blogs. And showing examples is a great way to show the value of open graph images.

Users can submit OG images as an example, and the website will create a category and post for each. This way, users searching for better images for their social media or meta tags can see examples that are specific to their use case.

• /inspiration/post/:domain: For example, StoryChief.io’s OG image.
• /inspiration/category/:slug: For example, in the SaaS category.

This programmatic SEO example is simple to make with a screenshot API and a few ChatGPT prompts for SEO titles, descriptions, and content.

Peliqan - Programmatic SEO example with Wordpress

Peliqan, a data warehouse SaaS for enterprise, has created thousands of connector pages for each integration that they have. They are using Wordpress with dynamic fields and images that are replaced for each specific page or connection.

This is a great way to target specific keywords that startups are searching for like a “Hubspot analytics to Excel” or “Export Xero data” that are hyper-specific for the pains that users might have.

• /connector/:platform: Integration pages like Salesforce or Postgres.
• /connector/:from/:to: Connectors with two platforms like Postgres & Zendesk.

The challenge is to get all of these 1000+ pages indexed, but a website indexing tool can help.

Popular Programmatic SEO Examples

Let's take a look at some real-world examples of successful programmatic SEO implementations by other startups and businesses that work well.

1. Nomad List: Ever wondered where the best places to live and work remotely are? Nomad List has the answer for digital nomads! This platform uses programmatic SEO to create and optimize thousands of pages, each targeting specific keywords and user search intents. The result? A treasure trove of data on over 2,000 cities worldwide!
2. TripAdvisor: TripAdvisor is a travel enthusiast's best friend. Using programmatic SEO, the platform generates thousands of pages targeting various travel-related keywords. This strategy helps TripAdvisor rank well on Google and attract millions of visitors from organic search.
3. Yelp: Looking for the best restaurants? Yelp has got you covered! Yelp uses programmatic SEO to create pages for all business searches, helping the website reach its target audience and rank well on search engines.
4. Zapier: Zapier is the ultimate online automation tool that connects various applications and services. The platform uses user-generated content to create pages for almost all "integration" keywords, making it easier for users to find and set up integrations between different tools.
5. UserPilot: UserPilot, a user onboarding software, has built a database of tools in their industry and generated a variety of articles using programmatic SEO. This approach has allowed the company to scale its content creation and target long-tail keywords effectively.
6. Wodily: Wodily is a directory of the best CrossFit gyms and boxes globally. There have a list of countries, cities, and gyms. This is a very simple but clean example of a geolocation and global-based programmatic SEO directory.
7. BestParents: Best Parents is a programmatic SEO directory of summer camps for teens. They list camps in the USA, UK and Europe. They have detailed pages and the content is generated from UGC and a mix of AI.

These examples showcase the power of programmatic SEO in driving organic traffic and scaling online presence. By leveraging automation and data, businesses can create and optimize a large number of web pages targeting specific keywords and user intents, ultimately boosting their online visibility and revenue.

What are the benefits of programmatic SEO?

You might be thinking if it’s worth it to implement programmatic SEO? In our experience, it can be a key SEO and content strategy that really pays dividends in the long run. You can link to a specific page when sharing your content on social media and you always have a good page to refer to when talking to customers during sales.

So it’s not only about creating content purely for SEO, it can help you get more leads and sales throughout the entire marketing funnel, this is why content marketing is so important for businesses to implement and to focus on.

But SEO pages at scale can have even more benefits than simple one-by-one content can offer. Some of the programmatic SEO benefits are:

1. Scale: You can cover a lot of keywords and create a massive topical cluster for your website.
2. Cheap: You can create 100x up to 1000x more content with just a few simple templates.
3. Happy users: As seen in the examples above, the content can be helpful to users, as it can cover their specific search intent and give people what they’re looking for.

You need to be careful to avoid creating low-quality, duplicate pages or spammy content. Thin pages or useless pages will not rank anyway and will cause your website to be penalized or just not show up on Google at all.

It’s not super easy to do programmatic seo, but it can be worth it. It’s important to focus on creating high-quality, relevant content that addresses user needs and aligns with search intent. You’ll also need to get backlinks to your pages to increase your website’s authority.

Hard work, good content planning and strategy with the right SEO tools and dedication are key to implementing a successful programmatic SEO strategy.

Programmatic SEO Course

There are various resources available to learn programmatic SEO, including online courses, blogs, and tutorials. Some of the best courses and resources to learn programmatic SEO are:

1. No-Code Programmatic SEO Course: This online course teaches programmatic SEO using Octoparse, Airtable, and Webflow.
2. Learn Programmatic SEO by Preetam Nath: This course offers a methodical approach to finding keywords, understanding user intent, and creating hundreds of landing pages.
3. Free Programmatic SEO Course by PageFactory: This course covers the basics of keyword research, building pages in Shopify and WordPress, and provides access to curated videos.
4. Practical Programmatic by Ian Nuttall: This course has around 3 hours of recorded videos explaining how to research keywords, find and clean data, create pages, and get everything indexed.

Conclusion

Programmatic SEO stands as a powerful tool in the modern SEO toolkit. Leveraging automation and data, it offers a cost-effective way to manage SEO strategies at a large scale. The role of programmatic SEO is set to become even more vital, promising an avenue of growth and scalability for businesses globally.

Pretty simple, right?
Adding more content can improve your site's online visibility and is a key SEO strategy that if done right, can cause you to get more leads and sales for your business.

Want to learn more about how content marketing and how writing high quality blog posts + more SEO content + social media posts can help? Continue reading our guides:

• What Is Content Marketing?
• Website Authority: What It Is and Why It Matters for SEO
• How to Get Google to Index Your Blog Posts in Hours (Not Weeks)
• ChatGPT Prompts for SEO

To discuss how content marketing can transform your marketing performance, request a demo or start your free StoryChief trial. Our team would be happy to give you a walkthrough.