Marketing Built for the CFO: How to Treat SEO Like a Predictable Acquisition Channel

Picture the quarterly review: traffic's up, engagement looks healthy — then the CFO asks, "If we cut this 20%, what happens to revenue?" Silence, and the budget loses ground. Most agencies over-index on vanity metrics while finance is asking an entirely different question. Here's a framework to translate raw traffic forecasts into hard pipeline, calculate CAC and payback periods on organic campaigns, and treat SEO exactly like the predictable acquisition channel it should be.