Building Boring Tools That Rank: 4 Weeks, 11 Tools, and a Plot Twist with ChatGPT
Source: Dev.to
The Premise
I’m a system engineer from Romania working a 9‑5. My side income comes from client work, not products. I wanted to test if a solo developer could build something that grows while sleeping, powered entirely by SEO.
No cold outreach. No paid ads. No Product Hunt launches. Just ranking pages that solve problems people search for every day.
The tools themselves are nothing revolutionary: merge PDFs, compress images, resize photos, extract colors. The kind of utilities millions of people need daily. The experiment was whether I could make them rank.
Week 1: Starting the Engine
Shipped the first two tools
- PDF Merge
- PDF Compress
Both process files entirely in the browser. No uploads to servers. No tracking. Everything happens locally.
Set up the basics: Next.js, Firebase analytics, proper metadata, JSON‑LD schemas. Submitted to Google Search Console and waited.
Lesson learned – New domains have zero authority. Google doesn’t care about you yet.
Week 2: Shipping Fast
Tools added (now 5 total)
- Split PDF
- Image Resize
- Image to PDF
SEO fixes
- Meta titles over 65 characters (truncated in search results)
- Missing canonical URLs
- No internal linking between tools
Converted the site to a PWA and started getting the first installs.
Key insight – Tool pages without content don’t rank. Added guides, FAQs, and keyword‑rich paragraphs to every page.
Started backlink outreach to tool review sites, PDF comparison blogs, and tech writers.
Biggest insight – Free plugins equal free backlinks. WordPress plugins, Chrome extensions, npm packages—these directories send links. iLovePDF and SmallPDF have been doing this for years.
Week 3: First Signs of Life
Milestones
- First 100+‑visitor day
- Brand searches appearing on Bing (people typing “quicktools.one” directly)
- Multiple tools crawled and indexed within 48 hours of launch
New tools
- Color Picker
- Delete PDF Pages
- Compress Image
Added a “smart suggestions” feature: after using one tool, the page suggests related tools. Tiny change, huge impact on retention and internal linking.
Traffic milestone – Pacing at ~3,000 monthly users (organic + returning).
Submitted to Bing Webmaster Tools and Yandex. Crawl frequency improved across all search engines. Multi‑search‑engine discovery can accelerate indexing.
Week 4: The Plot Twist
Traffic source breakdown
| Source | Visitors | Share |
|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 180 | 71% |
| 56 | 22% | |
| Direct | 15 | 5% |
ChatGPT sent 3× more traffic than Google. An AI chatbot became the biggest traffic source without any optimization for it.
Weekly stats
- 675 unique visitors (+51 % week over week)
- 841 visits
- 3,080 page views
- 18 % bounce rate
- 3 min 56 sec average session
New tools
- Crop Image
- PDF Extract
- PDF to Image
Total: 11 tools live in 4 weeks.
Why Is ChatGPT Recommending My Site?
- The tools actually work – No sign‑ups, no email gates, no dark patterns. Just tools that do what they say.
- Privacy positioning stands out – Most PDF tools upload files to servers. Processing everything locally in the browser is a real differentiator.
- Clean UX signals quality – High engagement metrics (82 % of visitors interact, nearly 4‑minute sessions) probably matter to AI systems crawling user feedback.
- Presence on developer platforms – Packages on npm, extensions on Chrome Web Store and Edge Add‑ons signal legitimacy to AI systems.
What Actually Worked
- Internal linking is the fastest SEO win. Every tool now links to 3‑5 related tools, creating crawl paths, topic clusters, and longer user sessions.
- Static HTML links matter more than hidden JS. If a link isn’t visible in the HTML at load time, crawlers ignore it.
- UX leads to SEO faster than expected. Behavior signals (time on page, interaction) boost search‑engine trust.
- Blog posts support keywords and backlinks. Comparison articles started pulling impressions after 2‑3 weeks.
- Multiple discovery channels reduce risk. Traffic from ChatGPT, Bing, npm, extension stores, and direct visits creates resilience; relying only on Google is dangerous.
The Numbers After 4 Weeks
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Tools live | 11 |
| Monthly visitors (projected) | ~3,000 |
| Bounce rate | 18 % |
| Avg. session duration | 3 min 56 sec |
| Top traffic source | ChatGPT (71 %) |
| Backlinks | ~20‑50 (varies by tool) |
| Revenue | $0 (not monetized yet) |
What I’d Do Differently
- Track everything from day one. Missed logging directory submissions, so I can’t measure which ones worked.
- Start backlink outreach earlier. Domain authority is the bottleneck; the sooner you build links, the faster pages rank.
- Don’t underestimate AI discovery. Building genuinely good products might be the optimal strategy for both SEO and AI recommendations.
What’s Next
- Video‑to‑GIF converter (high‑volume keyword)
- More blog content for long‑tail keywords
- Exploring why ChatGPT recommends certain tools
- Continuing the npm/extension backlink strategy
- Eventually: monetization with lightweight ads
Try the Tools
Everything is free and open:
- Merge PDF
- Compress PDF
- Split PDF
- Delete PDF Pages
- Extract PDF Pages
- PDF to Image
- Image to PDF
- Resize Image
- Compress Image
- Crop Image
- Color Picker
Follow Along
I post daily updates on X: @eduardalbu
If you’re building something small and trying to rank it, I’d love to hear what’s working for you.
Tags: #buildinpublic #seo #indiehackers #webdev #nextjs