We run a service that provides phone numbers for SMS verification. Like most small online businesses, we get much of our traffic from Google, and like most small online businesses, we learned SEO by doing what everyone else does.
Step 1: Studying the Competition
Our niche has a clear search pattern. People rarely search for “temporary phone number” in general. They search for a number for a specific service: “WhatsApp verification number,” “temporary number for gmail,” “receive SMS for Telegram.”
So we started by looking at who ranked for those queries. The answer was the same handful of competitors, and they all used the same playbook: a separate landing page for every service, often hundreds of them. The service name appeared in the URL (usually something like /receive-sms/[service]), in the title tag, the H1 and throughout the body text.
We went through their sitemaps to count pages and see how their URL structures were organized. Using Ahrefs and Ubersuggest, we checked which of those pages actually brought traffic and which just existed. The pattern was clear: a relatively small number of pages for popular apps drove most of the visits, while the long tail of obscure services brought in a trickle each but added up.
We also noted what the top pages had in common: a short intro, a list of available numbers or countries, a price, a few FAQ items and links to related services.
Step 2: A Slow Rollout
The obvious move would have been to generate pages for all services we support and publish them in one go. We didn’t, for one main reason. Hundreds of near-identical pages appearing overnight is exactly the kind of pattern Google’s scaled content abuse policy is designed to catch. Most of those pages would have sat in “not indexed” anyway.
Instead, we built a priority list. Each service was scored on search volume, keyword difficulty and, most importantly, whether we could actually deliver: a page for a service where our numbers rarely work would only bring in disappointed users. We then published in small batches of about 5-7 pages per week, starting with the services where we had the best success rates.
After each batch, we watched Google Search Console: how quickly the pages were indexed, which queries they started appearing for, and where impressions came without clicks. Those signals shaped the next batch and helped us adjust titles and content on pages already published.
Step 3: Making Each Page Worth Indexing
A template with the service name swapped in isn’t much of a page. To give each one a reason to exist, we added information that was genuinely specific to that service and hard to copy:
- service-specific notes, like whether it tends to accept VoIP numbers or which errors users most often run into
- log of recently received verification messages
- current price
- a handful of FAQ answers written for that particular service
Every intro was written by hand. It took longer, but it meant no two pages read like the same text with a different name in the middle.
By the usual SEO standards, it worked. Pages got indexed, started ranking and brought in steady traffic.
Then the Complaint Arrived
The complaint was about one of our pages, a landing page about a popular dating app. The app’s name was in the URL, the title, the main heading and throughout the text, exactly as we had planned it. The complaint came through Cloudflare, filed by an agency representing the trademark owner, with a registration number and a request to remove the page immediately.
That one email cleared up several things we had believed about SEO and brand names.
Myth 1: If you don’t use the logo or claim a partnership, you’re safe
Our page didn’t use the app’s logo, didn’t pretend to be the app and didn’t sell access to it. It sold phone numbers and explained that they could receive a verification code from that platform.
It didn’t matter. The complaint wasn’t about impersonation. It was about the name itself, used in exactly the places that matter most for SEO.
Myth 2: Everybody does it, so it’s fine
Online stores build pages around brand names all the time. Electronics shops publish compatibility pages for specific devices, and parts retailers organize catalogs by car model. In our own niche, competitors still run hundreds of pages named after individual apps, apparently without getting any emails.
But “everyone does it” isn’t a legal defense. It only means most people haven’t been noticed yet. Why our page drew attention while others didn’t, we still don’t know.
Myth 3: Switching to general pages is a painless compromise
We removed the page rather than argue. In the US, mentioning a brand to describe compatibility is often defended as nominative fair use, but for a small company, fighting over one landing page wasn’t worth the cost.
Then we rebuilt the site around categories. Instead of a page for each app, we now have generic pages like free numbers for Whatsapp and Telegram, along with a site-wide disclaimer that we aren’t affiliated with any of the brands we mention.
Legally, it was the right call. For traffic, it hurt. A general page about dating sites simply doesn’t rank for a search about one specific app the way a dedicated page did. Safer, yes. Painless, no.
Myth 4: Good SEO and legal risk are separate problems
This was the biggest lesson. The page drew a complaint precisely because the SEO worked. We had made sure Google understood exactly what the page was about. Google understood. So did the trademark owner.
Every step of a standard SEO checklist, putting the keyword in the URL, the title, the heading and the content, is also a step toward making a brand name more prominent on your site. Do it for one app, then another, then another, and you’ve built a very efficient system for getting noticed by trademark owners.
What We Do Now
We still provide free numbers for SMS verification as a way to test our platform. We still write about the services our customers use, because that’s what people search for. We just do it more carefully: general pages instead of brand-specific ones, brand names in the text rather than the URL, and a clear statement that we’re independent.
