Case Study
Zero Backlinks. Zero Rankings. Zero Ad Spend.
How a brand-new website generated search traffic in 7 days using nothing but Reddit comments
Phrase Café • phrase-cafe.com • October 2025
The Starting Point: Invisible
Phrase Café is a Spanish-learning newsletter that teaches language through disappearing text exercises. Think Duolingo meets morning email ritual.
When it launched, the situation was familiar to anyone who's ever built something new:
- •Domain authority: Zero
- •Backlinks: Zero
- •Google rankings: Zero
- •Paid ad budget: Zero
- •Ahrefs visibility: Not even registering
The traditional playbook says: write blog posts, build backlinks, wait 6-12 months, pray to the algorithm gods.
We ignored it completely.
The Strategy: Comment-First Visibility
Instead of building a traditional SEO foundation, we applied Odd Angles Media's Growth Package (the same system we use for clients):
- •50+ strategic comments per month across both new threads and historical thread takeovers
- •Keyword monitoring to catch real conversations as they happened
- •Thread creation using optimized titles and story-based posts
- •Target communities: r/Spanish, r/LearnSpanish, and r/languagelearning
The goal wasn't to "go viral." It was simpler than that:
Show up naturally wherever people already talk about learning Spanish.
Every placement was framed as "here's what helped me" rather than "sign up here." Curiosity over promotion. Value over pitch.
The Results: Discovery Before Rankings
Within 14-hour window
304
Clicks
763.8%
Impressions
63.8%
Click-Through Rate
But here's the insight that matters more than the numbers:
100% of impressions and clicks came from exact-match brand searches. Queries like "phrase cafe" and "phrase-cafe.com."
That means users weren't finding us through random search keywords. They were actively searching for the brand after seeing the name somewhere else.
That somewhere else was Reddit.
Visual Evidence
Ahrefs visibility during the launch period
Example of strategic comment placement
Google Search Console results from the first day
The Reddit Discovery Loop
This is classic Reddit-driven discovery in action:
- User reads a Reddit thread about learning Spanish
- They see a comment mentioning Phrase Café as a helpful resource
- They open a new tab and Google the brand name
- They click through to the site
- Search Console registers a branded query
A 63.8% CTR confirms what we already knew: these weren't cold clicks. These were people who had already decided to find us. The intent was baked in.
Why This Matters: Time Compression
Here's what traditional SEO looks like for a new domain:
- •90+ days before showing up on Ahrefs
- •6-12 months before meaningful organic traffic
- •Hundreds of hours invested in content and link building
- •Thousands of dollars in tools, writers, and outreach
Phrase Café registered branded search impressions within the first week (purely from Reddit mentions) while still showing zero visibility on Ahrefs.
We compressed months of SEO runway into days. Not through shortcuts. Through showing up where buyers were already having conversations.
What We Learned
1. Reddit-first discovery works before SEO ever kicks in
The first 500 visitors came from curiosity (not algorithmic discovery). They found us because someone recommended us in a thread they trusted. No rankings required.
2. Exact-match brand searches = warm intent
Even low volume here is more valuable than hundreds of cold clicks. When someone Googles your brand name, they've already been sold. The conversion happens before they land on your site.
3. One thread can be more valuable than 100 backlinks
The conversations live forever. They're indexed by Google. They keep feeding branded search traffic for months (or years) after the comment was placed. Traditional backlinks decay. Reddit threads compound.
The Takeaway
This isn't a paid campaign or an SEO trick.
It's Reddit culture applied strategically.
We proved that a brand-new project (with zero domain authority, zero backlinks, and zero ad spend) can generate branded search demand before even registering on Google.
Just by being part of the conversation.
Now imagine what it could do for your business.
Ready to see similar results?
Book a Strategy CallOdd Angles Media is the pioneer of comment-based Reddit visibility for B2B brands and SaaS companies.
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