How is the topical map built, step by step?

1. Propose the centre

From the confirmed profile, the competitors and, when research has run, the groups it found, the model proposes the five parts of the centre: the central entity, why the site is the source, the central search intent, the core topics and the border. This step is free and takes about two minutes. Nothing else runs until you confirm or edit it on the Review, Confirm and Build screen. The map is only as good as this page, so fix anything that is off.

2. Mine the attributes

An attribute is anything a reader could want to know about the entity: a type, a part, a cost, a process, a comparison, a requirement, a risk. Attributes come from named sources, each kept with a quote:

• Wikipedia and Wikidata for the central entity and each core topic.
• Google autocomplete for the entity and the core topics, with the alphabet and the question words.
• The People Also Ask questions and related searches stored by your research.
• The pages your competitors publish, read from their sitemaps.
• Your confirmed profile.

The model classifies each attribute as root (the entity cannot be described without it), rare or unique, judges how close it sits to the source context, drops what falls outside the border, and gives each two to four search phrases tagged with their pattern.

3. Test each topic for a page

Every phrase gets its Google Ads volume; every candidate topic gets one live results page. Then the page test runs as a rule: demand, a distinct entity and attribute, results unlike the pages already accepted, a clear pattern. Three of four make a page. A topic whose results share five or more of the top ten with an accepted page is the same results page and becomes a heading there whatever the other checks say. Every phrase is judged for fit against the profile, and the section rule puts each page in the core or the outer section. See Why did a topic become a heading?.

4. Arrange the tree

The model proposes a parent and a title for every page: the entity first, no question form, plus a slug, a meta description, a page type and the image. Rules then set the depth, the chain of pages above each page, and the publish order. See What does the publishing order mean?.

5. Inspect the core

The strongest core pages, as many as the size allows, go through the same inspection as the plan: the ranking pages are read and reviewed, the opening is judged, and the site's chance of reaching the top ten is assessed. Outer pages keep their demand and results page and say "not inspected" rather than carry a verdict they have no evidence for.

6. Decisions and links

Every page gets a page decision with the three verdicts computed from stored records, so its page document, brief, draft and scorecard work exactly as they do for the plan. The link plan is a rule: every outer page links to its core page from the closing section, siblings that share an attribute link to each other in the main text, a hub links every entry, the home page links every top-level core page, and no anchor is used more than three times for one page.

7. The report

The headline, the tree and the publishing order as a printable report, shared like any plan.

Sources and honesty

Every page traces to an attribute with its source and quote, a stored results page and a demand record. The page test, the section, the publish order and the links are rules shown on each page with the table they came from. A page's evidence tier says how much rests under it; an outer page that was not inspected says so.