Farhad

SEO Manager

ICCO Pizza in London • Freelance

Jul 2025 - Present • 11 mos

Managed local SEO and Google Business Profile for ICCO Pizza's Soho location — a brand-new opening in London's most competitive food market. Engagement started late July 2025 and is ongoing. The Soho location had opened just three months before we came on board. No dedicated location page, no halal content despite a full halal offering, no GBP post history, and zero topical authority. Pizza in London is one of the hardest local SEO niches in the country — dominated by aggregators and well-funded chains. We went in with a patient, structured approach. Work covered five areas: full GBP optimisation with 2–3 posts per week, review management, and Q&A seeding; a dedicated Soho location page built from scratch; a halal pizza page targeting "halal pizza london" — now ranking #2 on Google; a local content programme including a Greek Street Soho guide (ranking #3 for 480 searches/month) and a halal restaurants in Soho guide; and technical fixes including schema markup, GSC/GA4 setup, and on-page optimisation sitewide. GBP results year-on-year (Apr–May 2025 vs Apr–May 2026): total interactions up +337%, direction requests up +322%, calls up +184%, website clicks up +228%, profile views up +150%. In Jan–May 2026 alone, the profile generated 16,444 interactions and 8,826 direction requests - real people navigating to the restaurant. Organic traffic is at an all-time high: 11,600/month per Semrush, up 11% month-on-month. GSC recorded 934K impressions and 44.1K clicks over 12 months. GA4 shows active users up 389% year-on-year. On AI platforms, ICCO is now recommended by ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini — ranked #1 on Perplexity for "halal pizza London" and first pick on ChatGPT for halal pizza in central London. 63 total AI mentions across four platforms.

SEO Manager

Thunderbird Fried Chicken • Freelance

May 2025 - May 2026 • 1 yr

Managed full-scope SEO for Thunderbird Fried Chicken, a multi-location halal QSR brand across seven London locations including Charing Cross, Canary Wharf, and Clapham Junction. The 12-month engagement ran June 2025 to May 2026. When the project started, 96% of organic traffic was branded - just 256 non-branded visits per month. The site had canonical conflicts, broken pages, missing H1s, toxic backlinks (82% low-authority, flagged HIGH risk by SEMrush), and zero presence on any AI platform. The strategy ran in four phases. First, full technical cleanup - fixing broken pages, resolving canonical conflicts, adding H1s, meta descriptions, and ALT text site-wide, removing nofollow tags blocking link equity, and tightening title tags. Second, rebuilding every commercial page: all seven location pages rewritten around local search intent, plus four new menu category pages (Wings, Burgers, Buckets, Tenders) that simply hadn't existed before. Third, topical contentn - a fried chicken cluster including frying guides (now #1 across 15+ query variants), a health-focused article (also #1), and wing content referencing Chipuffalo sauce and Wing Fest credentials, now cited by ChatGPT and Perplexity. Results by May 2026: organic traffic up 67% (6,900 → 11,500/month). Non-branded visits grew from 256 to 6,900/month (+2,595%). Non-branded share flipped from 4% to 60%. Keywords ranking grew from 645 to 2,700 (+319%). Seven keywords now rank #1 on Google including "fried chicken near me" and "chicken wings london." GSC recorded 60,800 clicks and 2.16M impressions over 12 months. GA4 showed active users up 126% year-on-year. On AI platforms, Thunderbird went from zero to 291 mentions across ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, and Google AI Mode. ChatGPT ranks them #1 for halal fried chicken London and #2 for best fried chicken London. Equivalent paid ad value of the organic clicks: £121,600–£243,200.

SEO Manager

Chicome • Freelance

Dec 2024 - Dec 2025 • 1 yr

Managed full-scope SEO for Chicome, a Mexican restaurant and bar at St Katharine Docks, Tower Bridge - one of London's most competitive dining areas. The starting point was rough. The restaurant had recently rebranded from "Chayote" to "Chicome," leaving inconsistent listings across the web. The site had no schema markup, no XML sitemap, missing meta tags, broken internal links, 404 errors, and a homepage with under 200 words of content. No blog, no local citations, and an incomplete GBP profile with no post history. Work covered five areas. First, full technical cleanup - fixed all broken pages, implemented schema markup (Restaurant, LocalBusiness, FAQ), created and submitted the sitemap, restructured internal linking, and resolved all redirect issues. Second, the homepage was completely rewritten with location-specific content targeting St Katharine Docks, Tower Bridge, and London-wide searches. Third, brand consolidation — updated 100+ citations and directories from the old brand name to Chicome, with consistent NAP across all platforms. Fourth, GBP optimisation with 2–3 posts per week, review management, category optimisation, and photo updates. Fifth, a content programme built around Mexican cuisine and local dining - including a "Best Mexican Restaurants London" piece that ranked #1–2 on Google and drove 365 clicks in 28 days alone. Results by December 2025: organic traffic grew from 1,400 to 3,800/month - a 171% increase. Total ranking keywords up 65% to 473. GSC recorded 10,300 clicks and 220,000 impressions over 12 months. The site ranked #1 for "mexican restaurant st katharine docks," #2 for "best mexican restaurants london," and #1–2 for "st katharine docks restaurants." On AI platforms, Chicome now appears across ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini - ranking #1 on Perplexity for four separate queries including "mexican restaurant tower bridge" and "taco spots st katherines dock." Equivalent organic traffic value: £30,900–£51,500 in avoided ad spend.