How We Increased A Cybersecurity Brand’s Organic Traffic By 64% in Five Months

Published: January 29, 2025Updated: February 3, 2025

In October 2022, we were approached by a cybersecurity brand facing significant challenges: Organic traffic was through the floor, leads were proving hard to come by, and the site was barely ranking for any keywords.

It’s fair to say that Castra really needed our help. 

This is how it all unfolded.

Facing The Growth Plateau

At the start of this project, Castra (now Lumify) was in a difficult position. 

The site only had 10 keywords ranking on the first page of SERPs and just 350 keywords had been indexed in total. 

On top of that, there was a distinct shortage of site traffic. In fact, it was averaging 340 organic users per month, so there weren’t many opportunities for conversions. 

Plus, there simply weren’t enough inbound leads from the site to sustain growth. 

Clearly, achieving Castra’s goals of increasing high-quality traffic and inbound leads wasn’t going to be easy. We needed to develop a strategy that would be equal to the challenge.

This is how we did it.

Turning Our Insights Into A High-Impact Strategy

We devised a strategy that would be carried out over four phases. 

The foundational stage involved keyword research, followed by the creation of a content strategy and publishing timeline. 

Then, we’d move on to optimizing the site’s existing content and fixing any technical SEO issues. 

Here’s the process we followed.

1. Mining competitor sites for key industry terms

First, we needed to conduct thorough keyword research to identify untapped opportunities and build a keyword strategy that aligned with Castra’s specific objectives. 

But, how did we do it?

Well, we used industry-leading tools to identify:

  • Niche, long-tail keywords we could use for blog posts.
  • Low-competition, high-volume bottom-of-the-funnel (BoFU) keywords for service pages.
  • Underserved search queries.
  • Gaps in competitor content.

We also closely analyzed competing sites within the cybersecurity niche to identify high-ranking keywords we could target for Castra’s site. 

Alongside this, we audited Castra’s existing content to find gaps in its keyword coverage. 

We specifically looked for missing search terms with high buyer intent, such as “MDR solutions”, “managed SIEM services”, and “threat intelligence services”. 

We ensured we identified missing informational intent queries too, as we knew we could target these with content that would build topical authority. 

Lastly, we intently monitored cybersecurity trends like “OpenSSL vulnerabilities” to target timely, relevant topics. 

During this research phase, we focused on three different types of keywords we could use to ensure Castra achieved its business goals.

This is how we approached each one.

BoFU keywords

As mentioned, Castra’s main goal was to attract more qualified traffic and leads. This meant that our primary focus would be BoFU keywords, as they typically signal high buyer intent. 

When analyzing the site, one of the first things we noticed was that it didn’t have pages dedicated to each of the company’s services. 

Clearly, we needed to identify keywords with high commercial intent that matched the services Castra offered so that we could create relevant pages and attract qualified leads.

This included BoFU keywords related to services like “MXDR” and “MDR” and terms related to specific tools such as “Exabeam” and “Palo Alto Cortex”. 

These were all high-conversion, product-related keywords that we knew would attract businesses actively seeking cybersecurity solutions. 

Creating content for these terms would help Castra achieve its aim of increasing qualified traffic and leads. 

ToFU keywords

When developing a holistic keyword strategy, it’s vital to identify keywords that will help build the brand’s topical authority and establish it as a thought leader within its niche. 

Naturally, this was part of our plan for Castra, which is why we pinpointed top-of-the-funnel (ToFU) keywords that we could target with informational/educational content. 

This included search terms with informational intent like:

  • “How to Implement Proactive Cybersecurity in Banking”
  • “What is EDR and XDR?”
  • “Insider Threats in Finance Solutions”

Targeting industry-specific topics like these would allow us to position the company as an expert in niche verticals. 

Plus, we knew that we could use the educational content to introduce potential leads to solutions without applying direct sales pressure. 

MoFU keywords

To help us address the specific pain points of Castra’s audience and further enhance the brand’s authority, we also targeted middle-of-the-funnel (MoFU) keywords. 

These were terms with mixed informational and commercial intent like:

  • “EDR Vs XDR: Which Is Best For Your Business?”.
  • “Best Threat Intelligence Tools 2023”.
  • “SIEM Vs IDS For Enterprise Security”
  • “Proactive Cybersecurity For The Banking Industry”.

Our aim was to target these keywords with content containing comparisons, recommendations, and solutions that would pre-sell Castra’s services by positioning the brand as a thought leader.

2. Building an effective content strategy and publishing timeline

Now that we had our keywords, we needed to build a content strategy around them and establish a publishing timeline. 

First, we had to decide which keywords to prioritize. This was an easy decision as the commercial intent of the BoFU keywords aligned with the client’s goal of driving more qualified traffic and leads. 

Then, we planned to move on to the ToFU and MoFU keywords. 

Here’s what our content strategy looked like.

1. BoFU content (November 2022)

We started by creating service pages for the BoFU keywords to try and rank as quickly as possible for terms like “MDR.” 

The content we created highlighted the unique value of Castra’s solutions and tools to differentiate the brand from its competitors and attract leads that were almost ready to convert. 

It was really important for us to prioritize the service pages as this would quickly start to move the needle on traffic and leads. 

2. ToFU content (October – February 2022)

Next, we created blog posts for the ToFU keywords to build authority and brand awareness. 

The blog posts addressed foundational and trend-based content by targeting topics such as:

  • “OpenSSL 3.0.7 Released: Everything you need to know about the high-severity vulnerability”
  • “People first, automation second: Unlock the real value of your SOC”

The primary aim of these articles was to capture time-sensitive traffic for trending issues.

3. MoFU content (December 2022 – February 2023)

Then, we focused on content that provided comparisons to potential leads and offered recommendations and solutions to their specific pain points. For example, one of the posts we created was “SIEM Vs IDS For Enterprise Security”. 

We used comparison articles like this to give users actionable insights and subtly position Castra’s services as solutions to their problems. 

We also created content targeting the banking and finance industries, as cybersecurity is in high demand within these niches. Additionally, we knew that prospects within these niches could be big-ticket leads that would bring in a substantial amount of revenue. 

    3. Finding gaps in the content—and filling them

      Our keyword research phase didn’t end with new content opportunities; we also identified gaps in Castra’s existing content that we could optimize. 

      The aim was to increase the relevancy of the existing pages so that they would attract more traffic and leads and start ranking more highly in the SERPs. 

      So, we analyzed the existing content on the site and optimized the meta titles, meta descriptions, and headers by naturally incorporating new keywords. We also placed keywords within the body content to improve on-page SEO.

      But we weren’t just looking to improve the SEO of these pages—we wanted to increase conversions, too. This meant adding compelling, solution-oriented CTAs that drive leads toward converting. 

      Additionally, we established a logical internal linking structure within topic clusters to improve user experience and help both users and bots navigate the site.

      4. Revamping the site for users and Google

      This phase of our strategy involved conducting an in-depth SEO audit of the site so that we could identify any technical SEO issues. 

      The issues we did find would need to be addressed to ensure Google could easily crawl and index the site’s pages, making them discoverable in SERPs. 

      Enhancing the site’s technical SEO would also improve its speed, leading to a better user experience and reduced bounce rates. This is why technical SEO fixes were a vital part of our plan.

      The first thing we did was fix all of the broken links and faulty redirects we identified. Then, we optimized the site’s metadata to ensure relevance and consistency.

      Next, we improved the site’s speed by:

      • Minifying the site’s CSS, JavaScript, and HTML code
      • Compressing large files
      • Compressing image files and ensuring appropriate file formats were used (e.g. JPEG for photos)
      • Leveraging browser caching for faster loading times on repeat visits.

        The Results

        Once our strategy was executed, it didn’t take long for Castra to start seeing the results.

        In just five months, from October 2022 to February 2023, this is what we achieved for our client:

        • Traffic increase: The site’s organic traffic rose from an average of 340 monthly users to 560, a 64% increase.
        • Keyword growth: The site’s indexed keywords grew from 350 to 670. Plus, rankings for keywords on the first page of SERPs surged from 10 to 49 for terms like “Threatstream” and “USM Anywhere”.
        • Specific keyword wins: The rankings for core keywords massively improved. For example, the ranking for “MDR Services” was up by 66 positions, and it was up by 55 positions for “Threat Intelligence Services”. The improvement for “XDR Solutions” was even more impressive, moving up 70 positions. 

        These improvements directly led to an increase in lead generation which, alongside increasing traffic, was the main goal of the client when they reached out to us.

          Our Reflections

          Ultimately, this project wasn’t just an SEO campaign—it was a complete transformation. 

          Through a combination of strategic planning, a deep understanding of search intent, and meticulous execution, we turned Castra’s struggling site into one that drives meaningful traffic and qualified leads.

          From keyword research to improving technical SEO, each phase was meticulously designed to deliver results that aligned with the client’s goals. This led to a 64% increase in organic traffic, massively improved keyword rankings, and a strong foundation for future growth.

            Scott Johnson

            Founder

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