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Case study 12 / 12

LJC

Inside a Malta SEO agency: from its first content writer to Head of Operations & Technology, automating the content department with AI along the way.

Type
In-house role
Sector
SEO & content agency
Status
2021–2025
Built with
Google Apps Script · OpenAI API · Google Sheets · WordPress

The situation

A fast-growing link-building and content agency serving iGaming, crypto and finance affiliates needed high-volume content at each client’s own standard, mostly from junior writers. In January 2023 a Google update ended its biggest guest-post account overnight, and the department had to pivot to long-form content to survive.

What was built

Content pipelineTopic ideation, a colour-coded assignment workflow, writer guidelines and one-to-one onboarding for every new writer.
Writer performance systemA scoresheet weighing volume against client disapprovals, backed by daily word counts and words-per-hour KPIs.
Quality gatesA second-check step, a plagiarism audit, a duplicate detector across every client sheet and a writer error log.
Link-offer methodDomains filtered by authority, traffic, topicality and past orders, plus competitor-gap offers. One sportsbook bought 110 of the 150 domains offered.
AI-assisted productionA ChatGPT workflow rolled out to the whole team, then the GPT API inside Google Sheets for drafts, briefs, metas and translations.
Pre-write automationApps Script and the OpenAI API producing 100+ drafts in minutes, each filed into its own Google Doc, with no paid plugin.
Invoicing backboneReady-to-invoice sheets with word counts, prices and batch IDs that fed finance directly.
Second teamTrained and coached a new writing team in Sarajevo, with QA standards and daily calls.
ERP & CRM requirementsOne of the main sources of requirements and feedback for the ERP and CRM an outside firm built for the agency.
Access & offboardingLocked down Google Workspace sharing and offboarding, moved 2FA onto company devices, and set NDAs and access limits for outside developers.

Wired into

  • Google Sheets
  • Apps Script
  • OpenAI API
  • ChatGPT
  • WordPress
  • Ahrefs
  • Majestic
  • Copyscape
  • Zapier
  • Slack
  • Monday

AI inside

AI drafting was in the workflow from August 2022, three months before ChatGPT launched. In February 2023 I co-led the switch to AI-assisted production with an AI-content specialist who brought the prompts. A week later the GPT API was running inside Google Sheets, six days after OpenAI opened it. Tests across AI detectors showed them contradicting each other, which gave the agency evidence to defend its content.

Results

1 → 3articles per writer per day after the AI workflow rolloutFeb 2023
435articles, about 250,000 words, delivered in a single monthJune 2022
101long-form articles, about 340,000 words, in six weeks after a Google updateJan–Mar 2023
12languages from one 4,000-word job, in about 2 hours of work and 50 cents of API creditsApr 2023
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