Assuming he’s done the foundational stuff (on page and technical SEO), next up is content. But good quality content, and content that is well optimised for these keywords. - As you said, creating a bunch of content for long tail keywords , which may be lower competition would be like “quick wins”. He might even rank some of them without links (but of course , depend on the nuances of those keywords). - On top of this, build links. Quick wins here will be people in his network, suppliers, directories, professional associations etc etc - depends what industry he’s in. - manual outreach . Guest posts on relevant websites or website from adjacent industries (bridging content). Depending on the content or linkable assets he’s made in previous step, start building resource links, resource page links, roundup links. If he’s really done a good job on the content he’ll get some links. (And I build links btw )