Old World Popcorn – Ahrefs Score 100 Optimization
Overview
During an internal sync on 2026-03-17, Mark walked through the SEO remediation work completed on the Old World Popcorn site. The Ahrefs site health score was brought from the low 60s to 100 through a combination of image optimization and heading structure fixes. The site still has meaningful gaps in content and traffic that require ongoing attention.
What Was Fixed
Image Optimization
The homepage featured a white popcorn product image at 2000×2000px — far oversized for web use. This was causing slow page load times and triggering an Ahrefs error. The image was resized significantly, resolving both the performance issue and the crawl warning.
H1 Headings Added
Pages on the site had been built without any semantic heading structure. The developer used the Hello theme (an unauthorized theme per internal standards) and manipulated font sizes visually rather than using proper HTML heading tags. Mark manually added H1 tags to pages, including the About Us page, and added the target keyword into H2 elements where possible.
"How does a web developer build a page with no headings?" — Mark Hope
Internal Linking
At least one internal link was added to the About Us page by linking the word "values" to the About Us URL, resolving an outstanding internal linking warning in Ahrefs.
Remaining Issues
| Issue | Status |
|---|---|
| No target keywords set on any page | Ongoing — content calendar in progress |
| No blog content | Ongoing — Gavin assigned to write posts |
| Low domain rating | Ongoing — no organic traffic yet |
| Missing H2/H3 tags on remaining pages | Needs developer attention |
| Homepage image variant (brown background) | Pending — Andre submitted two alternatives (orange, beige) |
The site has virtually no organic traffic — analytics showed roughly one visit every few days. Mark noted this creates a circular problem: Google won't assign domain authority without traffic, but traffic is hard to generate without authority.
Action Items
- [ ] Finalize content calendar and assign blog writing to Gavin (@Karly Oykhman)
- [ ] Choose homepage image variant from Andre's two options (orange or beige) and update the site (@Karly Oykhman)
- [ ] Add H1/H2/H3 headings with target keywords to all remaining pages
- [ ] Message Gilbert re: Google Merchant Center approval status — products were under review (@Karly Oykhman)
- [ ] Consider running a short Facebook/Instagram ad campaign to seed initial traffic (@Karly Oykhman / team)
Context & Notes
- The Google Merchant Center account was set up under Doudlah Farms as the parent, with Old World Popcorn as a sub-account. Two products were submitted and under review at the time of the call.
- Gilbert had previously attempted to create a Merchant Center account and had to be removed before Mark could configure it correctly.
- The Hello theme used to build the site was not an approved theme per internal standards. This contributed to the heading structure problems.
- Meta descriptions and schema can be handled via the AI-assisted SEO automation tool. H1/H2/H3 tags cannot — those require developer intervention to avoid breaking Elementor layouts.
Related
- [1] — the AI tool used to automate meta titles, descriptions, and schema
- [2] — new process requiring target keywords on all developer sitemaps
- [3] — Doudlah Farms client overview
- [4] — source meeting notes