Keeping it simple, useful, and in service of the work.
It Started With a License Renewal
Curious Badger didn’t start as a side project. It started as a line item — a license renewal for an SEO crawler I was barely using.
I opened the tool. I poked around the UI. And I realised something: 80% of what I needed was buried in noise I never used.
So I asked myself: What if I just built something that did exactly what I needed — no more, no less?
A few hours of Python later, Curious Badger was born.
Why Build My Own Crawler?
I work fast. And I rely on tools that help me spot issues, gather structure, and turn insight into action — without spending half my time formatting or filtering exports.
So Curious Badger was designed for exactly that:
- Clean metadata outputs (title, description, headers, alt text, canonicals, schema, etc.)
- Fast error detection (4xx, 5xx, no H1, missing canonicals)
- Configurable crawl depth and limits
- CSV exports that were actually shareable — even with the C-suite
Nothing fancy. No bloated dashboards. Just a lean little crawler that gave me what I needed to do my job better — and faster.
What I Learned About SEO in the Process
Building it reminded me how bloated SEO tooling has become — and how much value lives in the basics.
- You don’t need 100 filters. You need a clear view of structure.
- You don’t need a monthly report. You need a daily check.
- You don’t need a tool to be impressive. You need it to be useful.
And honestly? Seeing clean, on-brand reports that I controlled helped align technical work with strategic conversations. When the report looks right, people read it.
What Curious Badger Changed for Me
Beyond the saved hours each week, it helped reset how I think about strategy.
Instead of chasing every micro-optimisation, I focused on the essentials:
- Are we visible?
- Are we accessible?
- Are we telling a clear story?
- Are the basics in place?
Curious Badger gave me that visibility — fast. And that helped me spend more time improving things, and less time decoding them.
The Bigger Takeaway
You don’t have to reinvent the wheel to make something valuable.
Sometimes, building your own tool isn’t about scale — it’s about trust, speed, and fit. It’s about removing friction from your own workflow and focusing on what matters.
So whether you’re in SEO, content, or growth, ask yourself:
- Where am I wasting time?
- What could I simplify?
- What do I actually need to see?
Then go build (or refine) around that.
Final Thought
Curious Badger is simple, fast, and built for the way I work.
If it sounds like something that could help you too, feel free to reach out. I’m always happy to share.
