Generate SEO content outlines from SERP analysis with OpenAI and Google Docs

Generate SEO content outlines from SERP analysis to Google Docs

Overview

Stop wasting hours on manual competitor research and content briefing. This workflow automates the creation of data-backed content briefs by analyzing the current top-ranking pages for your specific keyword.

It scrapes the Google Search Engine Results Page (SERP), extracts the content structure (headings H1-H3) from competitor articles, and uses AI to generate a comprehensive article outline based on what is already ranking. The final outline is automatically saved to a Google Doc, streamlining your content production process.

Who is this for?

• Content Marketers: To drastically reduce the time needed to create detailed content briefs.
• SEO Specialists: To analyze competitor content structures at scale without manual checking.
• Bloggers & Writers: To overcome writer's block and ensure their content covers all necessary topics to rank.

How it works

1. Input: You enter a "Target Keyword" and "Target Audience" via the built-in n8n Form.
2. SERP Scraping: The workflow uses Apify (Google Search Scraper) to fetch the top results for that keyword.
3. Filtering: It automatically removes non-article URLs (such as Amazon product pages, YouTube videos, and PDFs) to ensure only relevant content competitors are analyzed.
4. Deep Extraction: It visits each competitor's URL using Apify (Cheerio Scraper) to extract their article metadata and heading structure (H1, H2, H3).
5. AI Analysis: The aggregated data is sent to OpenAI, which analyzes common patterns and generates an optimized article outline.
6. Output:
   • A new Google Doc is created with the generated outline.
   • The request details are logged in Google Sheets for your records.

Requirements

• Apify Account: You will need an Apify account with access to the Google Search Result Scraper and Cheerio Scraper actors.
• OpenAI Account: An API key for OpenAI (GPT-3.5 or GPT-4 recommended).
• Google Cloud: Credentials to access Google Docs and Google Sheets.

How to set up

1. Configure Credential: Connect your Apify, OpenAI, and Google accounts in the respective nodes.
2. Workflow Configuration: Open the Workflow Configuration node. You can change the countryCode (default is "jp" for Japan) to your target region (e.g., "us", "uk") and adjust maxResults if needed.
3. Google Sheets Setup: Create a Google Sheet with a column header named target_keyword. Copy the Spreadsheet ID and paste it into the Store Form Responses node.
4. Run: Click "Chat" or "Open Form" in the trigger node to start the workflow.

How to customize

• Change the AI Model: In the AI Content Structure Analysis node, you can switch between different OpenAI models or adjust the system prompt to change the tone/format of the outline.
• Adjust Filters: Modify the Filter Non-Article URLs node to exclude specific domains you don't want to analyze (e.g., wikipedia.org).
• Output Format: You can modify the Create Google Doc node to include more specific data, such as the list of competitor URLs analyzed.