THE CLIENT

Out-Task Environmental: From Invisible To Page One

Out-Task Environmental is a Melbourne-based environmental consultancy specialising in soil testing, environmental site assessments and contamination assessment for property developers, builders and land owners. The firm operates across Melbourne and Geelong, serving clients on soil testing, site compliance and environmental consulting work.

Increase In Top 3 Keyword Rankings

400 %

Keywords in top 3 grew from 1 to 5, including #1 for ‘environmental site assessments’ (1,300 searches/mo) from unranked.

Increase In Top 10 Keyword Rankings

200 %

Top 10 rankings grew from 7 to 21, tripling page-one visibility across 84 tracked terms.

Non-Branded Organic Click Growth

135 %

Non-branded clicks grew from 34 to 80 across six months, with brand and name excluded.

The Challenge

Out-Task Environmental came to JBE with organic traffic basically non-existent. The site had plateaued for two years with no meaningful organic growth, and a recent site rebuild had dropped rankings further. Technical issues ran deep: missing meta titles, duplicate titles, multiple H1s on pages, broken external links, site structure problems and a backlink profile loaded with spammy directory links actively hurting the site.

The Strategy

Rebuilding organic from near zero needed a technical reset, content rewrites and a backlink cleanup running in parallel. Three connected workstreams: fix the technical gaps and bad links, rewrite content around keyword targets, then build authority through citations and quality outreach.

Step 1 - Technical Foundation Fixes And Backlink Cleanup

The site needed its foundations rebuilt. We fixed meta titles and descriptions across the site, cleaned up duplicate titles and multiple H1s, repaired broken external links and tightened site structure for users and Google. In parallel, we audited the backlink profile and submitted a disavow file to Google removing spammy directory links that were actively dragging rankings down. Core Web Vitals improvements were raised with the website platform team to progress what we could inside the site’s constraints.

Step 2 - Content Rewrites Around Keyword Targets And Buyer Personas

Locked keyword targets drove every content decision. We rewrote H1s, H2s, meta titles and body copy on the home page and all key service pages, aligned to the keyword strategy and the client’s defined buyer personas. New pages were added where search demand existed and the site had no answer: the Soil Testing Geelong page was built after Google Search Console showed consistent search demand for the term in Geelong specifically.

Step 3 - Citations And Contextual Link Outreach For Local Authority

Local visibility needed citations and real links. We built citation volume across business directories to strengthen local signals, then ran outreach for contextual links on relevant, high-authority sites. Early wins included placements on property investment and real estate publications aligned to Out-Task’s buyer base. Reviews were flagged as the next lever for map pack visibility, with ‘environmental consultant melbourne’ showing review count as a core ranking factor.

The Results

Specific core service keywords moved into #1 and #2 positions on Google: ‘environmental compliance consultant’, ‘environmental compliance service’ and ‘independent environmental consultants’ now rank #1, ‘environmental site assessments’ (1,300 searches/mo) sits at #1 from previously unranked. Page-one visibility tripled, non-branded clicks more than doubled, and the keyword universe expanded by 56%.