How SEO Smart Transformed Our Online Visibility
Thika Wax Works has manufactured waxes, adhesives, construction chemicals and institutional hygiene products in Kenya for more than 60 years. Until recently, almost none of that reputation was visible online. This is an account of what changed, what it took, and what it produced — with every figure drawn from our own analytics.
The problem we had
We were a market leader that search engines could barely see. For a company with six decades of manufacturing behind it, our online visibility bore almost no relation to our standing in the market. Buyers searching for chemical and adhesive suppliers in Kenya were finding younger competitors with a fraction of our track record before they found us.
The underlying issue was not advertising spend. It was that nothing about our experience, our credentials or our product range was structured in a way that search engines — and, increasingly, AI systems — could interpret. We had authority in the market and no way of demonstrating it online.
What we did about it
We appointed SEO Smart, a Nairobi digital agency specialising in search and AI visibility, in 2023. The programme has run continuously since and covers six areas:
- Website design and user experience — a full rebuild structured for both buyers and search engines.
- Managed WordPress hosting and maintenance — fast, secure infrastructure that keeps pace with traffic growth.
- Technical and on-page SEO — crawlability, site architecture, page performance and on-page structure.
- Structured data and entity authority — schema markup defining our organisation, our products and our leadership so that search engines and AI systems can identify us precisely.
- Content strategy and expert publishing — technical buying guides written from our own manufacturing experience rather than generic marketing copy.
- AI visibility optimisation — work aimed specifically at being cited by AI assistants and AI-generated search results, not only at ranking in a list of links.
One decision mattered more than the rest: our content is authored under my own name, as chief executive, rather than published anonymously. That ties six decades of company history and my own professional background to the material we publish, which is what both search engines and AI systems look for when deciding whether a source can be trusted.
What it produced
Organic search is now the company’s largest single source of new website visitors, and its most engaged channel. For the first time, we can also measure visitors arriving from AI assistants. The figures below are our own — Google Analytics 4 and Google Search Console.
- Organic search is our largest single source of new visitors — 50.8% of new users (Google Analytics 4, July 2026) — and our most engaged channel, at around a minute and a half per visit.
- Measurable visits now arrive from AI assistants — a distinct channel in Google Analytics 4 — engaging longer than almost any other source.
- First-page search visibility in our home market — an average position of about 7.2 in Kenya, from 41,594 impressions and 1,269 clicks over the twelve months to July 2026.
- Organic accounts for 58.9% of all engagement on the site — the behaviour of an audience arriving with genuine purchase intent.
Why we recommend them
What impressed us was that SEO Smart did not stop at short-term wins. Under Mehul Shah, the strategy evolved from conventional search optimisation into a broader brand authority and AI visibility programme — strengthening how our company is discovered and how our expertise is represented across digital channels.
I have known and worked with Mehul for well over a decade, through his own growth from independent consultant to founding SEO Smart. That continuity — and his combination of technical depth with a clear view of where discovery is heading — is why we have stayed. You can connect with Mehul Shah on LinkedIn.
I would recommend SEO Smart to any company looking for a strategic digital growth partner rather than simply an SEO vendor.
About SEO Smart
SEO Smart is a Nairobi-based digital agency working in search engine optimisation, generative engine optimisation, WordPress design and digital marketing. They helped us close the gap between a 60-year reputation and what buyers could actually find online.
Sources and method. Channel and engagement data: Google Analytics 4, Thika Wax Works Limited property, 1–31 July 2026. Search data: Google Search Console, thikawaxworks.com, 1 August 2025 – 30 July 2026.
Bhagesh Chandaria
Chief Executive Officer, Thika Wax Works Limited