Maja Volarević
Project Manager and Content Strategist
GoRout, a leading provider of wearable sports technology, specializes in advanced coach-to-player communication systems for football, baseball and softball. The client chose the perfect moment to improve their visibility and authority.
The NCAA had already approved the use of in-game communication wearables for Baseball (2022), but began the allowance for Softball programs in 2024.
The NFHS allowed the use of in-game wearables for Baseball in 2024, and softball followed in 2025. Youth/Travel organizations largely adopted the allowance of these technologies in 2023 and 2024.
It allowed us to launch our efforts on time and capitalize on the increased attention surrounding the approval.
With a limited audience and strict compliance requirements, the company needed a strategic SEO approach to drive sustainable growth and strengthen its reputation.
The starting point in October 2023
Image source: Ahrefs
Market and compliance challenges
This project came with some unique hurdles:
- Targeted audience: The focus was only on coaches and teams for football, baseball and softball.
- Sports expertise: High-quality, credible sports content was required for authority building.
- Limited industry data: With few basic competitor sites, traditional keyword and gap analysis were tough.
- Backlinking constraints: The pool of authoritative, relevant domains for link building was small.
These challenges inspired us to create content that intrigues the target audience, upholds compliance standards, and fuels the client’s growth journey.
Solution: Strategic SEO content marketing plan
To address these challenges, we created and executed a highly specialized SEO framework.
Market and competitor research
First, we did a full market and competitor analysis. It involved researching direct and indirect competitors and looking at their online presence, backlink profiles and content strategy.
We mapped out the regulatory environment to understand the compliance boundaries and gaps in the market where our client could show authority.
We used industry reports and forums to get deeper insights into the pain points and search behavior of coaches and sports teams, so our approach addressed real-world needs.
Goal setting and audience definition
With the market understood, we worked with stakeholders to define specific SEO goals and key performance indicators (KPIs), including organic lead generation.
We created detailed audience personas, mapping out the unique needs, questions and decision-making processes of coaches and athletic program managers for football, baseball and softball.
So, every SEO initiative was tailored to attract and engage the right users.
Content audit and ideation
We audited the client’s existing website content, looking at performance, relevance and compliance. It showed content gaps and opportunities for improvement.
Using our market research and audience personas, we brainstormed a wide range of content ideas, prioritizing those that would deliver value at every stage of the funnel.
Advanced keyword research and topic planning
Image source: Surfer SEO
We used industry-leading SEO tools and our in-house methodology to do in-depth keyword research on long-tail, low-competition and high-intent queries.
We looked at search trends and seasonality for each sport. Our keyword research informed a content plan that included evergreen topics and timely pieces.
We grouped these into content clusters for football, baseball and softball, building a foundation for topical authority.
Examples:
- How a Baseball Pitch Calling System Boosts Player Performance
- How to Coach Football and Mentor Your Team to Success
- Essential Softball Training Equipment to Boost Team Performance
Content optimization for Google and AI Search Engines
Image source: Ahrefs
We optimized every piece of content for both traditional search engines and emerging AI-driven search features we started tracking in May 2025.
We implemented advanced on-page SEO best practices, including semantic keyword integration, structured data and schema markup.
Our content was designed to answer questions, target featured snippets and align with conversational search trends, making it visible in both classic and AI-powered search engine results pages (SERPs). Our efforts pushed 2,950 keywords to rank in AI overviews.
Internal linking and authority link acquisition
Image source: Ahrefs, results in May 2025
To increase content discoverability and site authority, we created an internal linking structure connecting related articles and cornerstone pages.
Externally, we launched a targeted outreach campaign, building relationships with sports publishers, coaches’ associations and industry blogs.It secured high-quality backlinks and brand mentions while positioning our client as a thought leader in the sports tech space.
By acquiring two backlinks each month, we have generated over 40 high-quality backlinks (US, DR 60+, 1,000 traffic volume), which has greatly increased our article rankings and helped us quickly push the most competitive keywords to the top of the SERP.
Data-driven analytics and continuous optimization
Throughout the campaign we used advanced tracking tools, including Google Analytics 4, Google Search Console and third-party SEO tools.
We monitored organic traffic, keyword rankings, conversion rates and backlink growth. Regular reporting cycles allowed us to see what was working, adjust our tactics in real time and ensure compliance.
Analytics insights informed content updates, new topic selection and further improvement of our SEO strategy to drive continuous and long-term results.
Here’s what happened.
Results: Exceptional growth across all key SEO metrics
Image source: Ahrefs
The results we achieved from October 2023 to May 2025 are game-changing.
| Metric | Before | After | Growth Rate (%) |
| Domain Rating | 29 | 38 | +31.03% |
| Referring Domains | 135 | 434 | +221.48% |
| Average Organic Traffic | 844 | 15,211 | +1,702.01% |
| Organic Traffic Value (USD) | $389 | $4,247 | +992.54% |
| Organic Pages | 29 | 246 | +748.28% |
| Average Impressions | 4,444 | 168,913 | +3,700.52% |
| Organic Keywords | 231 | 8,356 | +3,516.45% |
| Keywords in Top 3 on SERP | 10 | 967 | +9,570.00% |
| Keywords in Top 4–10 on SERP | 19 | 1,812 | +9,442.11% |
| Brand Mentions | 5 | 536 | +10,620.00% |
| Form Submissions | 932 | 8,609 | +824.3% |
With this approach, GoRout rapidly became the go-to resource for coaches and teams nationwide, capturing a consistent flow of high-quality inbound leads while staying fully compliant.
Results from Google Search Console
Image source: Ahrefs
Results from Google Analytics 4
Results from LLM Visibility Tracking (2026)
As AI-powered search has become a mainstream discovery channel, we expanded our measurement beyond Google to track how GoRout appears inside large language model responses.
Using Allmond’s LLM visibility tracking platform, we monitored GoRout’s citation rate across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity.
Overall visibility score (Feb 27 – May 28, 2026)
GoRout is now cited in roughly 1 in 8 relevant queries across major AI platforms, a meaningful baseline for a niche sports technology brand.
The strongest momentum is on ChatGPT, where visibility jumped 16 percentage points versus 90 days prior.
On May 28 specifically, ChatGPT cited GoRout in 26% of tracked prompts, the highest single-day score across all platforms.
Prompt-level performance
Tracking across 3,469 prompts reveals that GoRout is being cited for its highest-value commercial queries:
Informational and coaching-focused queries, where our content investment has been deepest, show the strongest citation rates.
Product-specific queries like pitch calling device and coach to player communication system are appearing in LLM results at high scores but are not yet reliably citing GoRout, representing the clearest near-term optimization opportunity.
Competitive standing
In the LLM visibility ranking across all tracked competitors, GoRout holds 13% average visibility, placing it ahead of direct rivals PitchCom (8%), TAP (6%), TeamSnap (3%), and Hudl (3%).
The two brands outperforming GoRout are Under Armour (55%) and Rapsodo (38%), both significantly larger companies with far greater brand search volume, making GoRout’s competitive position strong within its peer category.
What we did to achieve these results
LLM citation is earned, not bought. Our content strategy laid the groundwork for this performance through several deliberate choices:
- Conversational content structure. Articles were written to answer specific how-to and definitional questions, the same format LLMs draw from when composing answers.
- Schema markup and structured data. Proper semantic markup helps AI crawlers parse content accurately and associate GoRout with the right topics and entities.
- Topical authority through content clusters. By building dense clusters around softball coaching, baseball pitch calling, and coach-to-player communication, we established GoRout as the go-to source on these subjects, which LLMs reflect in their recommendations.
- Brand mentions growth. Scaling from 5 to 536 brand mentions created the third-party signals LLMs use to assess authority and trustworthiness.
- Featured snippet targeting. Content optimized to win featured snippets directly overlaps with what surfaces in AI-generated answers, providing a dual-channel benefit.
The result is a brand that doesn’t just rank on Google. It shows up in the AI answers coaches are increasingly relying on when making purchasing decisions.
Key insights & strategic takeaways
- Deep expertise wins: In niche areas, subject matter expertise is the key differentiator.
- Top-of-funnel content converts: Even without mid-funnel keywords, TOFU content can drive leads.
- Trendspotting gives you an edge: Being first to market on new topics gives lasting search visibility.
- AI search is changing SEO: Optimizing for conversational queries and AI features is now key for organic growth.
- Content clustering builds authority: Organizing content around core topics strengthens both rankings and user engagement.
- SERP features expand reach: Getting featured snippets and AI Overviews can drive big brand exposure.
Ready to speed up your SEO growth?
Let’s transform your objectives into measurable wins. Book a call today and discover how a tailored SEO strategy can unlock your next phase of growth.
