Personal brand · Gastronomy · Organic, no paid media
Making a chef the reference for his own profession’s vocabulary
For Chef Batuhan Özkök — who has worked at one of Türkiye’s first Michelin restaurants — we built the brand identity, the website, the UI/UX, the technical SEO and the conversion work. Without a single lira of advertising spend.
This page reports two separate measurements and never mixes them: search performance (Search Console) and AI visibility (DataForSEO). Each carries its own window.
Measured result
Last 28 days vs. the same period last year
- 99×
- Impressions
- 100 → 9,934
- 17×
- Clicks
- 5 → 85
- 16.6
- Positions gained
- 25.3 → 8.7
- 136
- Queries on page one
- at least · of 289 sampled
The Search Console query export accounts for only 14 of the 85 clicks — Google anonymises long-tail queries. So “136 queries on page one” is a floor, not a ceiling.
Source: Google Search Console · Last 28 days vs. the same period last year · 2 September 2026
Query sample covers 14 of 85 clicks
01 · What we built
Brand, site and content architecture
We built the chef’s personal brand from nothing: identity design, website, interface and experience flow, technical SEO foundation and conversion work. One idea sat at the centre of the publishing strategy — a chef’s authority is measured by who defines the language of his own profession.
- 01
Brand identity
A visual identity and tone matched to the kitchen’s language and the chef’s stance.
- 02
Website and UI/UX
A flow that carries the visitor toward the service: speed, legibility, mobile-first.
- 03
Technical and content SEO
A crawlable, deepening content architecture built on gastronomy terminology.
- 04
CRO
Simplifying the paths that lead to contact and service enquiries.
02 · Growth
What twelve months changed
Impressions went from 100 to 9,934 and clicks from 5 to 85. Average position fell from 25.3 to 8.7 — the average query moved from the bottom of page three onto page one. At least 136 of the 289 sampled queries now sit on the first page.
Page one · 136 queries
Bar lengths are on a logarithmic scale — on a linear axis the prior period would be invisible.
| Average position | Queries | Share |
|---|---|---|
| 1–3 | 31 | 10.7% |
| 4–10 | 105 | 36.3% |
| 11–20 | 82 | 28.4% |
| 21+ | 71 | 24.6% |
| Metric | Last year | Now |
|---|---|---|
| Clicks | 5 | 85 |
| Impressions | 100 | 9,934 |
| Average position | 25.3 | 8.7 |
Source: Google Search Console · Last 28 days vs. the same period last year · 2 September 2026
Why did click-through “fall”?
In the same period last year there were 100 impressions and 5 clicks, so the rate looked like 5%. Today there are 9,934 impressions and 85 clicks, so it reads as 0.9%. That is not a decline — it is the arithmetic of a far larger impression base. A rate computed on a five-click baseline means nothing.
03 · The honest finding
This visibility is not commercial visibility yet
So as not to overstate the result: almost all of this traffic comes from definitional searches. “What is a private chef”, “what is a sommelier”, “what does bib gourmand mean”. These are not the queries a hotel or restaurant operator types when looking for a consultant.
| Query cluster | Queries | Impressions | Share | Clicks |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Definitional | 54 | 3,656 | 72% | 8 |
| Commercial | 6 | 75 | 1% | 0 |
Source: Google Search Console · Last 28 days vs. the same period last year · 2 September 2026
That is not a failure, it is a sequence. The authority layer gets built first: if a chef defines the vocabulary of his profession, being searched for as a consultant in that field becomes a matter of time. The commercial queries have already begun to surface — “restoran danışmanlığı” sits at position 2 today.
One more figure worth noticing: the highest click-through rate on the whole site belongs to a commercial page — the Istanbul private chef service page, at 8.5% on 94 impressions. Small volume, strong intent.
/blog/istanbul-ozel-sef-hizmeti · 8.5%
| URL | Query cluster | Clicks | Impressions | Avg. position |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| /blog/ozel-davet-sefi-ne-yapar | Definitional | 13 | 3,087 | 4.7 |
| /blog/istanbul-ozel-sef-hizmeti | Commercial | 8 | 94 | 8.5 |
| / | Commercial | 7 | 81 | 5.4 |
| /blog/food-cost-nedir-restoran-karliligi | Definitional | 4 | 319 | 8.6 |
| /blog/otel-kahvaltisi-nasil-karli-hale-getirilir | Commercial | 3 | 157 | 7.9 |
| /blog/tabak-tasarimi-masterclass | Commercial | 3 | 91 | 7.7 |
| /en/blog/f-b-kpi-dashboard-ornekleri-otel-restoran | Commercial | 3 | 57 | 7.6 |
Source: Google Search Console · Last 28 days vs. the same period last year · 2 September 2026
04 · AI visibility
The most-cited domain in AI answers
Across a curated 24-query sample an AI Overview appears on 22. On 9 of them batuhanozkok.com is cited as a source — the most-cited domain in the measured set. Second place goes to ekşisözlük.
- 24
- Queries measured
- 22
- Have an AI Overview
- 9
- Cite the client
Getting ahead of ekşisözlük on Turkish gastronomy terminology means getting ahead of the default reference source for the language.
AI Overviews are volatile and personalised. This is a point-in-time desktop measurement on a named sample, not a site-wide rate.
Source: DataForSEO · Türkiye/Turkish · curated 24-query sample · 2 September 2026
| Domain | Citations |
|---|---|
| batuhanozkok.com | 9 |
| eksisozluk.com | 7 |
| armut.com | 6 |
| sefkapinda.com | 5 |
| hasascibasiahmetozdemir.com | 5 |
| horecatrend.com | 4 |
And the gap the measurement exposes
All 9 citations sit on definitional queries. On commercial queries the count is zero — and an AI Overview is present on 8 of them, sourced from someone else. That is the name of this account’s next move: become the source in the commercial cluster too.
- 9
- Definitional citations
- 0
- Commercial citations
- 8
- Commercial blind spots
Two commercial queries that are clean right now
Two commercial queries have no AI Overview at all, and he already ranks at the top of both. With no answer engine intervening, these are pure ranking plays.
- restoran danışmanlığıposition 2
- tabak tasarımıposition 5
Being cited is not the same as being clicked
On “private chef nedir” we rank 4.1 and the AI Overview cites us as a source. Even so, 1,334 impressions produced 6 clicks — 0.45%. The answer engine answers the question completely, so the user has no reason to click. That is why we never present AI citations as a traffic result.
private chef nedir · position 4.1 · 1,334 impressions · 6 clicks · 0.45%
05 · Reach
Turkish content, international readers
Most traffic is domestic, but there is a steady tail from the United States, Bulgaria, India, Malaysia and Singapore. Gastronomy terminology is a shared language everyone in the industry looks up.
| Country | Clicks | Impressions |
|---|---|---|
| Türkiye | 60 | 7,505 |
| United States | 6 | 692 |
| Bulgaria | 3 | 13 |
| India | 2 | 80 |
| Malaysia | 2 | 63 |
| Singapore | 2 | 18 |
| Device | Clicks | Impressions | Avg. position |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mobile | 52 | 6,995 | 6.8 |
| Desktop | 32 | 2,896 | 13.4 |
| Tablet | 1 | 43 | 7.1 |
Source: Google Search Console · Last 28 days vs. the same period last year · 2 September 2026
Frequently asked questions
- Does personal-brand SEO work without advertising?
- On this project, with zero advertising spend, impressions went from 100 to 9,934 and average position from 25.3 to 8.7 in twelve months. But it takes time: the authority layer is built first and the commercial queries follow behind it.
- Does being cited in AI answers bring traffic?
- Not directly. On this account we rank 4.1 for “private chef nedir” and are cited in the AI Overview — and the click-through rate is still 0.45%. When the answer is given completely, the user does not click. Citation is an authority signal, not a traffic channel.
- How does definitional content help with commercial queries?
- If you supply the definitions in a field, search and answer engines mark you as that field’s reference. On this project that earned 9 AI citations in the definitional cluster, and the commercial queries have started to surface — “restoran danışmanlığı” is at position 2 today, on a query with no AI Overview at all.
- Why do the query-level results look incomplete?
- Search Console anonymises long-tail queries and caps its export. On this account the query table accounts for only 14 of the 85 clicks. That is why we always report query counts as a floor rather than a total.
Related pages
Do you want to be the reference in your own field?
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