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Startup SEO

An SEO Agency for Startups That Scopes to Your Stage

Most startup SEO plans assume a big budget and a long runway. We're an SEO agency for startups, mainly funded AI startups from seed to Series B, and we scope the work to what your stage can use now. HeyOz launched with a single homepage, and now has 91 AI citations and page-one positions.

Get a free AI visibility consultation

Free. No pitch deck. We reply within one business day.

Led by the former Senior SEO Manager at Invideo AI. Trusted by Viggle AI, HeyOz, Wisemonk and Monk.

Measured against a fixed baseline on every engagement.

  • Viggle AI
  • HeyOz
  • Wisemonk
  • Monk
  • Zivoke
  • TryScent

What search can and can't do for you at this stage

Search compounds, but slowly, and it punishes pages written for a pitch you later drop. So the honest answer depends on where you are. Before product-market fit, do the foundations and little else. After it, build the pages buyers use to choose.

We can't tell if it's too early for SEO

Your positioning may change next quarter. Pages written for today's pitch can be wrong by the time they rank.

Our budget won't stretch to a big retainer

Agency minimums assume a content team and a link budget. At seed, that's a large share of spend for a channel that pays back later.

Our team is abroad, our buyers aren't

You work in one time zone and your buyers search in another market. Pages have to read naturally to them and rank where they buy.

What an SEO agency for startups should do first

Stage decides the order. A seed team with one homepage and a Series B team with a content backlog need different work, and the plan we send says plainly what waits. These six cover the ground from first launch to a repeatable channel.

01

Before fit, only the foundations

Clean indexation, Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools set up, and a homepage that says plainly what you do and for whom.

02

At seed, a handful of buyer-intent pages

Comparison and use-case pages for the searches closest to a purchase, shipped before anyone starts a blog calendar.

03

After Series A, a publishing rhythm

A steady flow of pages, links and mentions, with reporting your board can read without a glossary.

04

Listings before you can afford link campaigns

Profiles on review sites, launch directories and category roundups. They cost time more than money and feed AI answers.

05

A baseline from week one

Rankings, AI citations and signups recorded before work starts, so every later budget call rests on numbers.

06

Nothing a future team has to undo

No bought links, no mass-generated pages and no shortcuts that a growth lead hired after your next round would have to clean up.

Covered on every engine your buyers use

  • ChatGPT
  • Perplexity
  • Claude
  • Gemini
  • Google AI Overviews
  • Google AI Mode
  • Copilot

ChatGPT search and Copilot draw on Bing's index, so Bing rankings feed AI answers. We work on search and AI engines as one program.

How it works

The same four steps on every engagement, with a clear view of what to expect at 30, 60 and 90 days.

  1. 01

    Understand

    Map your product, buyers, competitors and the prompts and searches that decide your category.

    Days 1 to 30. A fixed baseline across every engine and the prompts that matter.

  2. 02

    Prioritize

    Pick the few moves that will get you recommended fastest and turn them into a focused roadmap.

    Days 1 to 30. A focused roadmap agreed, with the first fixes already shipping.

  3. 03

    Execute

    Do the technical, content, authority and AI visibility work ourselves.

    Days 30 to 60. Content, technical and authority work shipping every week.

  4. 04

    Improve

    Track citations, rankings and conversions against the baseline and keep refining.

    Days 60 to 90. A first read against the baseline, then the next quarter planned.

Who this is for, and who it is not for

A good fit

Funded startups, mainly AI products, from seed to Series B, with a live product and active users

  • Seed teams choosing a first growth channel
  • Startups with US buyers and a team elsewhere
  • Founders who want a plan before any retainer
  • Launched products with signups but no search presence

Not a fit yet

  • Teams still validating the idea, with no product
  • Startups wanting guaranteed rankings by a date
  • Founders expecting search to replace sales within a quarter

Startup search options by stage and budget

SearchAxe Doing it yourself Large agency retainer Junior marketing hire
Fits a seed budget Scoped to your stage and quoted after a free consultation Yes, paid in founder hours Rarely, minimums run high A salary before any results
Knows what to skip The plan names what waits Hard without experience Scope tends to grow Learning on your site
Covers AI answers Included from the start Only if you learn it Often extra Unlikely
When work begins Once the plan and quote are approved Whenever you find spare hours After onboarding After hiring and ramp-up
What you keep Pages, a baseline and a roadmap Whatever you shipped Depends on the contract Knowledge that leaves with them

What you get each month

  • Baseline report Where you stand on every engine and in search before any work starts.
  • Monthly AI citation and ranking report Citations by engine, rankings and referring domains, read against the baseline.
  • Signups and demos attributed The pipeline that search and AI answers drove that month.
  • Slack access A shared channel with the people doing the work.
  • Rolling roadmap What shipped, what is next and why, updated every month.
  • Competitor movement Which competitors gained or lost ground in AI answers and search, and why.

How we get started

From first call to work in progress in three steps.

  1. 01

    Book a free consultation

    A call about your product, your market and where you stand in AI answers and search today.

  2. 02

    Get a plan and a quote

    We send a plan for what we would do first, with a clear quote for the work.

  3. 03

    Work starts right away

    Once the plan and quote are approved, the work starts immediately.

What clients say

We had thousands of pages going nowhere. Amit cleaned that up and rebuilt our landing pages. Our top three rankings are up 362% and our citations across AI engines have grown more than a hundred times.

Nan Ha Nan Ha Product Growth Lead, Viggle AI Read the Viggle AI case study

We came to Amit with a good product and almost no search presence. He gave our team a plan we could actually follow. Referring domains are up 183% and our first page rankings have more than tripled.

George Kurdin George Kurdin Co-Founder, Monk Read the Monk case study

Our content was getting published but not landing anywhere. Amit reworked how we format it for AI engines and our citations across all seven engines are up over 400%. The Reddit community he built now brings us leads weekly.

Aditya Nagpal Aditya Nagpal Founder, Wisemonk Read the Wisemonk case study

We launched with a homepage and nothing else. Amit built the search foundation, the landing pages, the blog, the schema. Our domain rating is up 70% and we went from zero AI citations to being quoted by six of the seven AI engines.

Ahad Shams Ahad Shams Founder, HeyOz Read the HeyOz case study

We had multiple pages fighting each other for the same terms. Amit mapped it all out, consolidated what needed consolidating, and rebuilt our service pages. Organic traffic is up 147% and our top three rankings have more than doubled.

Manjunath Thandu Manjunath Thandu CEO, Zivoke Read the Zivoke case study

Who's behind SearchAxe

Amit Malvi spent four and a half years at Invideo AI, rising from SEO Executive to Senior SEO Manager. He built and led a 20-person link building team and owned the company's GEO and AEO programs. Today he works hands-on with a small number of AI startups.

Questions buyers ask us

Is it too early for SEO before product-market fit?

Too early for a big program, not for the foundations. Get indexation right, set up Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools, write a clear homepage and add a few pages for the problem you solve. Hold off on blog calendars and link campaigns until positioning stops moving, since pages built for a pitch you later drop become cleanup work.

How long does SEO take for a startup?

On a new domain, expect months before rankings carry meaningful signups. HeyOz launched with one homepage and reached page-one positions ten months later, which is a realistic pace for a focused program. Technical fixes and directory listings move faster. AI citations sometimes arrive before rankings do, when the right third-party sources start mentioning you.

We're on a small budget. What's the minimum worth doing?

A narrow scope done properly beats a broad one done thinly. For most seed teams that means technical foundations, three to five buyer-intent pages and listings on the review sites and roundups in your category. We'll quote that, and we'll tell you if your budget fits better with your own team working from our plan.

Do you need to be in the US to rank there?

No. We work remotely with every client. Where your team sits matters less than where your buyers search, so we research queries, prompts and competitors in that market, track rankings and AI answers there, and write pages in the spelling and phrasing those buyers use. Domain, hreflang and language settings get checked for the target market too.

Do you work with accelerator-backed startups?

Yes, if there's a live product and enough funding to sustain a few months of work. Demo days and launch weeks bring a burst of links and press that fades fast. We help turn that one-off attention into pages and mentions that keep ranking and keep getting cited long after the launch traffic is gone.

What should a seed startup expect in the first 90 days?

A baseline in the first month, then technical foundations, a handful of buyer-intent pages and listings on the review sites in your category, all shipped. By day 90 you get a first read against the baseline that shows direction, not a verdict. Rankings on a new domain keep building for months after that, so judge the channel over quarters, not weeks.

What does startup SEO cost with you?

There's no package price, because a seed startup with one homepage and a Series B company with thousands of pages need very different work. After the free consultation you get a written plan listing what we'd do first and what can wait, with a quote for that scope only. Nothing starts until you approve both.

Do you take on startups that aren't AI companies?

Our focus is funded AI startups, because that's where Amit's in-house years at Invideo AI apply most directly. Software startups whose buyers research by asking AI engines can be a fit too. If yours isn't, we'll say so on the first call rather than learn your market on your budget.

Let's get your product recommended.

Funded AI startup, seed to Series B? Tell us where you stand and we'll reply within one business day.

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