Course Library

The modules. The material.

Six core modules, each one addressing a distinct area of SEO knowledge that affects how marketing teams operate in practice.

Each module is self-contained. Work through them in sequence for a complete foundation, or jump directly to the topic most relevant to your current situation. Modules are written in plain language and designed to take roughly two to three hours each to complete at a comfortable pace.

Module 01 Foundations

How Search Engines Work

Crawling, indexing, and ranking demystified

Search engines are software systems making billions of small decisions. Understanding the basic logic behind those decisions helps you understand why your vendor's recommendations exist and what they're trying to influence.

  • What crawling is and why it matters to your site
  • How indexing works and what can prevent it
  • What ranking factors actually are
  • How algorithm updates affect existing rankings
Module 02 Evaluation

Reading an SEO Audit

Separating critical issues from noise

A standard SEO audit can contain hundreds of findings. Knowing which ones require urgent attention, which ones are medium-term improvements, and which ones can safely be ignored changes how you allocate resources.

  • How to read audit findings by actual impact
  • Common audit items that are usually overemphasized
  • Questions to ask before approving any audit recommendation
Module 03 Strategy

Keyword Strategy for Non-SEOs

Understanding the decisions behind keyword selection

Keyword strategy involves tradeoffs between search volume, competition, and business relevance. This module explains how those tradeoffs get made and how to evaluate whether your vendor's keyword selections actually serve your business goals.

  • What search intent is and why it drives keyword selection
  • How to read a keyword report without running the research yourself
  • The relationship between keywords, content, and business outcomes
  • What a keyword map is supposed to accomplish
Module 04 Risk

Links, Authority, and Risk

Evaluating backlink strategies before you approve them

Backlinks remain one of the most significant factors in how pages rank. They are also one of the areas where well-intentioned strategies can cause lasting damage. This module covers what sound link-building looks like and what to be cautious about.

  • Why links matter and how search engines evaluate them
  • The difference between earned links and purchased links
  • How to evaluate a link-building proposal
Module 05 Oversight

Tracking, Reporting, and Vendor Accountability

Knowing what the numbers should actually show

Monthly reports can make almost any situation look like progress. This module covers what meaningful SEO reporting looks like, which metrics to pay attention to, and how to structure conversations with vendors around actual performance.

  • Which SEO metrics connect to business outcomes
  • How to read a Google Search Console report
  • What to ask for in vendor reports and why
  • How to identify when a report is obscuring poor performance
Module 06 Technical

Technical SEO Without the Code

Communicating across the marketing-development gap

Technical SEO findings often require development resources to address. This module gives you the language to communicate technical issues to developers and the context to understand why those issues matter to search performance.

  • What site speed means for search and user experience
  • Mobile usability issues that affect rankings
  • What structured data is and when it matters
  • How to manage a site migration without losing search visibility
Marketing professional studying an SEO performance report at a desk with multiple screens
Applied to real decisions, not just theory

Not sure which module to start with?

The Where to Start page helps you identify the module most relevant to your current situation. Answer a few questions about your role and your most pressing challenge, and we'll point you in the right direction.

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