How I Built a Personal Website That Ranks #1 for My Name
Why every operator and entrepreneur should own their name online. The technical setup, SEO strategy, and content approach behind dainereid.com.
Google "Daine Reid." My website is the first result. Above LinkedIn. Above social profiles. Above everything else.
That didn't happen by accident. It took about three months of deliberate work, and it's one of the highest-leverage things I've done for my career and business building.
If you're an operator, entrepreneur, or anyone who wants to be taken seriously professionally, you should own your name on Google. Here's exactly how I did it.
First, why it matters. When someone meets you at a conference, gets your name from a referral, or sees your comment on a LinkedIn post, the first thing they do is Google you. What shows up determines their first impression before you ever get a chance to speak.
If the first result is your personal website — a site you control, with your story, your work, and your credibility on display — you've already won the framing battle. If the first result is a random LinkedIn profile with a blurry photo from 2019, you've lost it.
For me specifically, having a website that ranks first means every AI product I build, every blog post I write, and every piece of content I share has a credible home base. When I pitch to potential clients or partners, they can see my work without me having to send a deck.
The technical setup is straightforward. The site is built on a simple stack and hosted on Netlify. Fast loading, clean design, mobile responsive. Nothing fancy. The performance matters for SEO — Google rewards sites that load quickly and work well on mobile.
I structured the site as a multi-page architecture rather than a single-page app. This is important. Each page — Home, About, Blog, Projects, Writing — is a separate URL that Google can index independently. A single-page site with JavaScript rendering is harder for Google to crawl and index.
The SEO fundamentals that actually moved the needle:
Person schema markup. I added structured data to the homepage that tells Google exactly who the site is about. Name, job title, location, social profiles, areas of expertise. This is the single most impactful thing I did for ranking. Google uses schema markup to understand entity relationships — it connects "Daine Reid" the search query to dainereid.com the website.
Title tags and meta descriptions on every page. Each page has a unique, keyword-relevant title and description. The homepage title includes my name prominently. Sounds basic, but I've audited dozens of personal sites where every page has the same generic title.
Consistent NAP (Name, Address, Platform) information across all my profiles. My name, location, and website URL are identical on LinkedIn, X, GitHub, and everywhere else I have a presence. Google cross-references these signals to build confidence that a website belongs to the person it claims to represent.
Backlinks from relevant sources. Every social profile I own links back to dainereid.com. When I guest post or get mentioned somewhere, I make sure the link points home. The site isn't going to outrank a major publication on competitive keywords, but for my name as a search term, a handful of consistent backlinks is more than enough.
Blog content with regular updates. Google favours sites that are actively maintained. Publishing blog posts every week or two signals that the site is alive and relevant. Each post also creates a new indexed page, which gives Google more opportunities to surface the site for related searches.
The content strategy is simple: write about what I actually do. Franchise operations, AI products, building businesses in Australia. Every post is written for a human reader first, but structured in a way that Google can understand — clear headings, relevant keywords used naturally, internal links between related posts.
What doesn't matter as much as people think:
Design. My site looks clean and professional, but it's not a design masterpiece. For personal SEO, content and structure matter far more than aesthetics. Don't spend three months perfecting your design before publishing anything.
Domain age. I registered dainereid.com relatively recently. For a personal name search, you don't need a 10-year-old domain. Google just needs clear signals that this site represents this person.
Posting frequency. I don't post every day. I post when I have something worth saying — usually every week or two. Consistency matters more than frequency.
Social media followers. My social following is modest. Ranking for your own name doesn't require a massive audience. It requires good on-page SEO and a few quality backlinks.
The strategy in three sentences: Build a clean, fast website with your name as the domain. Add Person schema markup and ensure every page has unique SEO metadata. Create regular content and make sure every online profile you own links back to your site.
That's it. No tricks. No expensive SEO tools. No agency. Just fundamentals executed consistently.
The total cost is under $20 a year for the domain. Netlify hosting is free for personal sites. The investment is time, not money.
If you're an operator or builder and you don't own your name on Google, you're leaving credibility on the table. It took me a few weekends to set up and now it works for me 24/7.
Want help setting up your own? I'm happy to walk you through it — daine@dainereid.com.