If you’re wondering whether to do SEO before or after writing a blog post, this guide will show you how to do both, without losing your voice.
- How to Write a SEO Blog: Two Common Approaches
- The Blended Approach: SEO and Creativity Working Together
- Simple SEO Tests to Run Before You Start Writing
- Using AI to Optimise Your Blog Post for SEO
- How to set up ChatGPT to optimise your blog post
- ChatGPT Prompts to SEO Your Blog Post
To make your posts visible on Google, you need to understand how to SEO a blog post — not just technically, but in a way that supports creativity and clarity.
In my experience, large teams leave SEO to other specialists, and small teams ignore it completely. The main driver behind this is the technical nature of optimisation. But behind all the confusing terms and acronyms is a simple fact of digital life—SEO is about matching your content to what users need.
How to Write an SEO Blog: Two Common Approaches
SEO is an art rather than a science – there’s no one way of doing it. There are two basic approaches: 1) Research first, then write, or 2) Write first, then retrofit SEO. There are merits and demerits to both approaches:
SEO before writing
Pros: You guarantee you’ll write on key phrases like how to optimize a blog post, where you’re more likely to rank and attract search traffic. For more on effective blogging strategies, consider these proven tactics from top bloggers.
Cons: Some people find that putting SEO at the front of the writing process hinders creativity and turns the task into a mechanical exercise rather than a writerly flow. The result can be dull and uninspired copy.
SEO after writing
Pros: You let your creativity run its course and then massage the results to achieve visibility goals. For older content requiring updating and reoptimisation, you have no choice but to retrofit.
Cons: The significant risk is spending hours writing a post with very little chance of ranking highly on Google because the idea is not novel enough, or there is little interest in the topic. For some, that may not matter. But as a general rule, this is a poor way of creating content.
The Blended Approach: SEO and Creativity Working Together
You don’t need to choose between creativity and visibility. With the right mindset and a little bit of structure, you can write naturally and rank effectively.
The blended approach means doing enough SEO before writing to shape your thinking: identifying what people are searching for, spotting related questions, and framing your headline accordingly. Then, once the draft is written, you revisit it with fresh eyes and optimise it for clarity, structure, and search — without compromising your original voice or intent. This process saves time, reduces rewrites, and turns SEO from a bolt-on task into a natural part of your content creation.
Simple tests to run before you start writing your post
The aim is to clarify the kinds of words and phrases that searchers use and the questions they most frequently ask. The easiest way to do this is to use Google search.
- Write down the question you are answering in the form of a headline. For guidance, see Runcible’s tips on writing irresistible headlines.
- Draft a meta description (the copy that appears on a Google search page that acts as an advertisement for your post).
- Type your headline into Google (preferably in private browsing or incognito mode):
- What does the ‘auto-suggest box’ say as you are typing?
- Are you getting the right kinds of results, or is Google confused?
- What do the blocks ‘People also ask’ and ‘People also search for’ suggest?
- Are the top 10 results all from household names? If so, make your question more nuanced and repeat the cycle.
- Write a structure for your post, including a headline and subheadings based on this research, and, if you’re happy you understand the language and queries searchers are using, proceed with the piece. Otherwise, carry on researching.
Using AI to Optimize Your Post for SEO Once it’s Written
The aim is to ensure that all of the information that Google looks for is present and effectively presented, and to draw on what the search engine already knows about your website’s strengths and weaknesses.
Many paid tools will help you here. [Add some recommendations?] But I recommend you use ChatGPT (or another LLM) to use the best information from Google itself and, in the future, build more sophisticated analytical capabilities.
How to set up ChatGPT to optimise your blog post
- Access to sources: Ask your website owner or development team for access to Google Search Console (GSC) and Google Ads.
- Configure your LLM: Before you can analyse spreadsheets, you must be on the paid version of ChatGPT and enable ‘Code interpreter’. Since you will want to make this a regular habit, set up a project.
- Upload your GSC data: You only need to do this once (although it is a good idea to update the data periodically). Go to ‘performance’, choose a time range, click ‘Export’, and then ‘Download CSV’. Unzip that file and go to your ChatGPT project, click on ‘upload files’ and choose ‘Search’, ‘Queries’, and ‘Performance’ from your download folder.
- Query Google Ads on your big question. This is something you need to do each time you optimise a post. Log in to Google Ads, choose ‘Tools’, ‘Keyword Planner’, and ’Discover new keywords’. For this post, I entered ‘How to SEO a blog post’ and the URL of my website. Click on ‘Download Keyword Ideas’ and then ‘CSV’. Upload this file to your project.
- Upload your draft blog text.
ChatGPT Prompts to SEO Your Blog Post
You are now set up to use AI to answer critical questions about your post.
Use this prompt as a starting point:
“Looking at the draft post, performance data and keywords, give me key phrases I should use to maximise Google visibility and suggest where they should be placed in the text.”
This will generate a manageable list of ideas.
You will probably be prompted with the question, ‘Would you like help retrofitting these phrases into the draft post or rewriting the headline and meta description?’ Answer ‘yes’. If you aren’t prompted, then prompt ChatGPT.
Change your text with all the suggestions that make sense. Remove your original draft from your folder and upload this new draft. Use this prompt to see if ChatGPT can improve on its results:
“I have revised the draft in line with your recommendations. Acting like a world-class SEO, what new suggestions would you make to maximise this post’s visibility on Google?’
Here are some other prompts I have found helpful:
‘Am I missing any obvious questions?’
‘Suggest a meta description that will maximise the click-through rate’
‘Which key phrases is this post most likely to rank for, and which are too competitive?’
‘Can you suggest places in the text of my post where I could link to other posts on my website?’
‘What signals should I monitor in Google Search Console to measure the impact of this post?’
Final thought
This is just a starting point. The real value from LLMs like ChatGPT does not come from robotically following set prompts but from getting creative with the data you supply and the questions you ask.