What this is
The Foundations Sprint is the fast, focused way into everything our six-month AI & Search Transformation does. Same method, same platform, same technical standard. The difference is time and volume: two weeks of foundations, six weeks of production, and you come out the other side with your technical groundwork done, your first 45 pieces of content live, and the engine in your hands.
It exists for stores that want the whole system built properly but are not ready for a six-month engagement: smaller catalogues, tighter budgets, or a team that wants to run the engine themselves once it is standing.
Worth reading side by side. The full six-month Transformation is documented line by line at
transformation.teamempathy.co.nz. The sprint runs the same playbook at sprint scale, so the two documents are the honest way to compare the scope difference and pick the right size.
Before we start: what we need from you
Shopify admin, Google Search Console (domain level), Google Analytics 4, and your brand guidelines. Sixty days is a sprint, so access in the first week matters more here than anywhere: the clock starts when we can see your data.
PHASE 1 · WEEKS 1 TO 2
Foundations: baseline, strategy, technical and calibration
This fortnight establishes the foundations and calibrates Notable to your brand, so the six weeks of production behind it run at full pace.
Onboarding and baseline
- Kick-off session, one 60-minute call: scope, timeline, priorities, access
- Dedicated Slack channel for async communication, and a shared Drive folder for the core deliverables
- Full baseline captured before we touch anything: rankings, traffic, revenue by channel, branded versus non-branded split
- AEO scorecard scored across all four pillars, with the evidence behind each score
- AI visibility tracking stood up across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews
Research and strategy
- Keyword research triangulated across Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs and SEMrush, never a single tool
- AI prompt library built for your category, scored and prioritised
- Cluster strategy mapping keywords and prompts to the content territories the 45 pieces will target
- Approval You confirm target keywords, prompts and the content strategy
Technical SEO and on-page
- Full technical site audit with developer-ready recommendations
- On-page error sweep: broken links, H1s, alt text, duplicate and missing meta
- Sitemap and robots.txt review, including AI crawler access
- Schema built, validated and deployed: Product, Organization, Brand, Breadcrumb and FAQ
- Internal linking structure reviewed and improved
- Redirect audit and remediation. If you are mid-migration or replatforming, protecting your existing equity is part of this fortnight
- Toxic backlink review and disavow where warranted
- Meta titles and descriptions rewritten for the pages that rank but do not win the click
- Approval You approve the on-page changes before anything ships
There is no hard page cap on the technical work: the goal is your whole site, and our AI tooling lets us sweep hundreds of pages where the old way rationed them. What keeps a sprint a sprint is review cycles, so we batch changes for approval rather than going back and forth page by page.
Authority foundations
- Backlink profile audited: what you have, what is toxic, what has been lost
- Foundational citations: the directories, associations and industry listings a credible brand in your category should hold
- Entity groundwork that tells AI who you are and why you are credible
Notable setup and calibration
- Your workspace on Notable, our own Shopify-native AI search platform, created and connected to your data
- Approval Your brand kit: tone of voice, claims you can and cannot make, approved by you
- Approval Your content strategy, approved by you
- The first three pieces of content produced with you, closely reviewed together
- Your review feedback folded back into the brand kit, so the system gets sharper before it scales
PHASE 2 · WEEKS 3 TO 8
Content production: 45 pieces on Notable
With the brand kit calibrated and the strategy approved, production runs at pace for six weeks. The 45 pieces are split across two kinds of work, with the mix set by your strategy:
- Content refreshes. Existing blog pages rewritten and restructured to answer what buyers and AI actually ask, usually the fastest wins on the board because the pages already have history
- New blog content. Net-new articles targeting the territories from your cluster strategy, written in your voice
- Published and interlinked properly, so every piece works as part of one engine rather than a pile of blog posts
- Reporting set up so you can see what search and AI are sending you, and what to double down on
Your part: review before it ships. After the first week of calibrated production, the system deploys, and we can connect to your store and publish approved content on a regular rhythm. From that point, reviewing each piece and giving feedback before it goes live sits with you. It is your job to make sure the content represents your brand fully and truthfully, in the way you want, and it is ours to make the review quick: every piece arrives checked for voice, factual accuracy and SEO before it reaches you.
Product page and collection page refreshes are on their way in the platform and are not yet a fully supported content type, and right now they matter less than refreshing your existing blog pages, which is where the fastest movement is. As they land in Notable they join the mix, guided by your strategic priorities.
What you end up with
| Output | By day 60 |
|---|
| Technical foundations | Audit done, schema live, internal linking, redirects, meta and disavow handled |
| Strategy | Keyword and prompt research, cluster strategy, content roadmap, all yours |
| Content | 45 pieces live: refreshed blog pages and new articles, mix set by the strategy |
| Authority | Foundational citations placed, backlink profile cleaned, entity groundwork done |
| AEO score | Climbing from your baseline, measured the same way we measure every client |
| Notable workspace | Calibrated to your brand and connected to your store, yours to keep |
Volumes depend on content complexity, your approval cadence and strategic priorities. We will always choose the higher-value piece over hitting a number.
After the sprint
You keep everything: the strategy, the content, the technical work and your Notable workspace. Three ways forward, all your call.
Run it yourself
Stay on Notable at a low monthly platform subscription, around USD $500 a month, and keep producing with the engine we calibrated. Community and coaching access is coming to this tier.
Step up
Roll into the full six-month
Transformation, with the sprint already banked as your head start.
Keep us close
Fractional support at our hourly rate when you want strategy or technical help.
Investment
| Investment | NZD $12,500 paid up front, or 3 monthly instalments of $5,000 (NZD $15,000 total) |
| Timeframe | 60 days: two weeks of foundations, six weeks of content production |
| Your time | One to two hours a week, mostly reviewing and approving content |
| After day 60 | The engine is yours. Continue on the Notable subscription, step up to the Transformation, or run it fully in-house |
| Compared to the Transformation | The full six-month build is NZD $6,000 per month ($36,000, or $30,000 up front) with far greater content volume, the full authority programme and six months of us running it: the line-by-line scope is at transformation.teamempathy.co.nz. The sprint is the way in when that is not the right size yet |
What you are actually buying. Sixty days of our time is the smaller half of this. The bigger half is the system underneath it: your calibrated brand kit, your content strategy, your technical foundations and the Notable workspace that runs them. That is yours at day 60, and it keeps working whether or not you carry on with us.
What is not included
- The full authority programme. The sprint lays your entity and citation foundations; the sustained digital PR and link programme lives in the Transformation.
- Product and collection page refreshes. Coming to the platform, and lower priority than blog refreshes today. They join the mix as they land.
- Paid advertising, website rebuilds, photography. Same edges as the Transformation: we work alongside whoever does these.
- Ongoing production after day 60. That is what the Notable subscription and the Transformation are for.