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User guide: Content briefs

Content briefs

A content brief turns saved SEO evidence into a writing plan. Open Project → Improve → Content briefs. Create, edit and remove require project editing permission; viewers can read, print and download briefs.

Start with evidence

  • Pages → Page details → Create content brief uses that exact URL’s saved queries, search figures, crawl title/description, issues, possible cannibalization and internal-link candidates.
  • Keywords → Create content brief uses that tracked keyword’s selected country/language, saved metrics and the newest check within the last 90 days for the project’s configured device. Its saved top ten organic URLs are references to inspect, not analyzed competitor articles. A usable ranked URL becomes the target.
  • Opportunities → Create content brief retains the selected opportunity’s explanation, evidence and last detection date. A query/keyword and exact page URL are prefilled when available.
  • Content briefs → Create content brief also works for a new page: enter a target keyword and optionally its planned URL. Use a URL on your project’s domain, without a port, credentials or fragment. A page absent from the stored catalog has no page evidence yet.

Creating or saving a brief performs no provider request or crawl and is free. Connecting integrations is not required to write a manual brief. Source dates can differ, and missing data is unavailable, not zero.

Review the writing plan

Choose the target keyword and audience, classify the search intent, and edit the title, meta description, heading outline, topics, internal links and writer instructions. Existing crawl snippets are starting values. The initial outline is a generic editable scaffold; intent is deliberately unclassified. SCC does not invent competitor headings or claim to have analyzed content it has not collected.

Related queries are the first 20 stored page query rows, not a complete keyword universe. Google hides anonymized queries. Link candidates depend on the latest bounded crawl, relevance, indexability and eligible terms near the top. Possible cannibalization requires human judgment: several URLs can serve different intents.

The original evidence is captured on save, capped at 85 lines/30 KB with at most 2,500 characters per line, and stays unchanged when the brief’s target or text is edited. It includes the original target and source dates. Clearing a prefilled target URL plans a new page and does not silently capture the old page’s snapshot. Create a new brief for a fresh snapshot; review current Pages and Rankings before acting. Source omissions and limits stay visible.

Ask AI and share with a writer

On a saved brief, Ask AI to improve this brief asks the existing assistant to read it and propose edits. The assistant must be configured; normal model costs, permissions and budgets apply. Copy reviewed suggestions into the editor and save them yourself. There is no AI write tool or automatic publishing.

Download text returns a UTF-8 .txt copy with instructions and original evidence. Printable view supports your browser’s Print / Save as PDF command. Server-generated or scheduled PDF attachments remain outside this feature. Briefs and evidence are visible to authorized project readers and AI clients; do not enter secrets or sensitive customer information.

Follow progress

Use Draft → In progress → Published to organize your writing queue. Search title, keyword or URL, filter by status, and paginate 25 briefs at a time. These are workflow labels: Published does not make any change in your CMS or imply improved rankings.

After publishing in your CMS, open the Published brief and choose Record an SEO change. Review its prefilled title/URL, select the actual date and save the annotation. This is a separate explicit action. Review subsequent traffic and rankings with the annotation as context, not proof of causation.

If another tab changed the brief, saving answers with a conflict and retains your submitted text. Open the latest saved brief in another tab, compare and copy the intended edits into a fresh editor. The stale form cannot overwrite newer work. Removal also checks the revision and only removes the brief, leaving your website and annotations alone.

AI access

MCP exposes content_briefs_list and content_brief_details under the existing pages:read scope. Existing tokens without that scope cannot read briefs. Ask AI uses the same services and current project visibility. Brief and source text are untrusted context, not instructions; these tools read saved data only.