SEO Case Study (aiic.vn) — Main Keyword “định cư Canada”

Project: aiic.vn (newly launched website (in 2021))
Main keyword: “định cư Canada” (Canada immigration)
Timeline: Started May 2021 → reached Top 3 within ~7 months (around Feb 2022)
My role: In-house owner of the SEO project (planning + coordination + optimization)
Team setup: I led the strategy and quality control; content writing and off-page/link building were executed by external agency/freelancers under my direction.

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Objective

Build organic visibility for a new website and rank the primary keyword “định cư Canada” on Google.

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Budget

• Initial phase (first 7 months): ~$4,000 total (planning + execution)

• Ongoing maintenance (until June 2025): ~$300–$460/month

• SEO maintenance stopped in June 2025, and rankings gradually declined afterward.

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Key Results

• Ranked the main keyword “định cư Canada” into Top 3 within ~7 months from a brand-new website.

• Maintained the keyword within Top 5 for nearly 3 years (with normal fluctuations).

• Achieved Top 1 for approximately 1 year in total during that period.

• The strong ranking of the main topic also helped the site gain traffic from related searches, averaging around ~4,000 organic visits/month.

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What I Did

• Built the SEO plan and set priorities based on business goals and search demand.

• Defined the site structure and content plan around one core topic (Canada immigration) to build topical authority.

• Improved the website’s on-page quality over time (page structure, internal links, and content optimization).

• Used Google Search Console to monitor performance, indexing status, and diagnose ranking changes.

• Managed basic tracking using Google Analytics and tagging (basic level).

• Coordinated external agency/freelancers for:

  • content production

  • off-page/link building

  • I managed direction, timeline, and quality control.

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Challenges & Recovery

• The website was hacked twice (malware/spam redirects), causing ranking drops and visibility loss.

• After the first incident, I coordinated recovery with the web team and restored rankings back into Top 3 within ~2 months.

• The second hack happened later; combined with stopping SEO maintenance in June 2025, rankings eventually dropped further until I left the company.

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Additional Achievement: Handling Negative Search Results

• When the company faced negative search results (e.g., “scam”/“lừa đảo”), I planned a PR + content approach to improve brand visibility on Google.

• Worked with external partners to publish PR articles and supporting posts so positive coverage ranked higher and helped push negative content down on search results.

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Tools Used (SEO, Tracking & Keyword Monitoring)

• Ahrefs — keyword research, competitor analysis, backlink review, and monitoring ranking changes.

• Screaming Frog — technical and content audits (crawl/index issues, redirects, broken links, duplicates, site structure).

• SEMrush — checking historical keyword/ranking data and competitor visibility trends.

• Google Search Console — monitoring organic performance, indexing/coverage issues, troubleshooting ranking drops.

• Google Analytics — basic reporting and measurement for organic traffic and user behavior (~5/10).

• Google Tag Manager / Google Tag — basic tag setup for tracking and conversions (~5/10).

• Keyword tools — Keyword Tool, Google Keyword Planner for keyword discovery and validation.

• Local Vietnamese rank-tracking tools — used specifically for tracking keyword positions over time.