Position #1 On Google Is Dead (8.1 Million Searches Prove It)

0:00Joy Hawkins, welcome back to the

0:01podcast. Thank you for coming on.

0:03>> Super excited to be here. Um, I have a

0:05lot to talk about today, so should be

0:07good.

0:07>> It's going to be fun. So, all right.

0:09There's this 8 million search study

0:14that happened. That's insane.

0:18>> Yeah. So, I'll tell you how it started.

0:20I a couple months ago got a message from

0:23another SEO named Sheiler Dond. Don't

0:26know if you've heard of him. He's kind

0:27of under the radar. actually asked him

0:28if he like does any public speaking and

0:30he's like not really. So he's probably

0:32hasn't been on like a ton of podcasts,

0:33but the guy is actually insanely smart.

0:35He has this Chrome extension that

0:37basically takes like snapshots when

0:39people are searching. Um so it gives him

0:41like access to see like essentially the

0:43differences in Google search results.

0:46And he started noticing after the May

0:48core update of 2026 that uh there was a

0:51lot of fluctuation in what people were

0:53seeing. and he would say like, "Okay,

0:54you know, you do a search for, let's

0:56say, like Denver plumber and you're

0:58seeing one thing and then you get

1:00somebody else to search and they're

1:01seeing like a completely different

1:02order. Um, and then same thing for the

1:05next guy." And so he's just noticing

1:06like all this shuffling and he he

1:08messaged me. He's like, "Are you seeing

1:09this?" And I was like, "Actually, yes."

1:11I was like, "I noticed this the other

1:13day and so did one of my co-workers. We

1:15were looking at our rank tracker and we

1:18do we've been tracking organic rankings

1:20on a grid for a very long time which is

1:22I don't think not I don't think that's

1:24normal like most rank trackers they do

1:26grid tracking in local SEO they are only

1:29looking at map pack rankings. So we use

1:31this uh tool called places scout which I

1:33don't even know if you can sign up for

1:35the tool anymore like cuz they were

1:36bought out by Yex and I'm not sure what

1:38the new version uh entails but the

1:41version we're using the old version

1:42literally tracks organic rankings on a

1:44grid. So every time I send a keyword to

1:46be scanned, it does like 40 or 50 scans

1:49of that same keyword. And what we were

1:51starting to see is like traditionally

1:53speaking, when you would search

1:54something like Denver plumber, the grid

1:56was fairly consistent. So if you were

1:58third, uh you're pretty much third for

2:00the majority of the grid. And then the

2:02further you get away when you start to

2:03get into like other towns and cities and

2:05it starts to change because you've got

2:06proximity is a factor, right? But

2:08usually uh we would see in local SEO

2:11that you could dominate like a huge area

2:14um and it was fairly consistent as long

2:16as there was a city name in the term. So

2:18this is very different if you just type

2:19in plumber then you would usually see

2:22like it varies a lot based on where the

2:24person's searching. If they're in one

2:25area of the city they're going to see

2:27something. If they're in another area

2:28they're seeing something closer to them,

2:30right? So I was like yeah I'm seeing

2:32some variation but I I don't want to

2:34like come to conclusions quickly. like

2:36I'm I'm big on like I need to see more

2:38data. I need to repeat things. I need to

2:40make sure it's not just like a random

2:41oneoff. So I reached out to Mark Cabana

2:44over at Yex and I was like listen can

2:47you go through our reports and using the

2:50data from all the reports that we've run

2:53um can you tell me if this has changed?

2:55And I told him what my theory was. I was

2:56like my theory is that like basically

2:59you know a business used to rank kind of

3:00consistently for these keyword patterns

3:02and now they're not. And um basically

3:05what he found when he sent it back to

3:07me, he looked at over 8 million search

3:10results. So like again, cuz every time

3:12we're sending a grid, it's usually like

3:1340 50 searches. So he looked at over 8

3:15million total. Out of that 8 million, um

3:18he said 48.7%

3:21of them became more volatile starting

3:24the week of the Makeor update. And we

3:26have this like chart that we put on our

3:27blog and it's um it's basically like you

3:30know you've always had a bit of

3:31volatility but then it just spikes like

3:33crazy in May. And anybody that follows

3:37SEO news will know like when you have a

3:39core update there's always a lot of

3:40volatility but the thing is it stayed

3:42volatile. So it wasn't like your

3:44traditional like oh lots of volatility

3:45because there's no core update

3:46happening. It's like no no the graph

3:48spiked and then stayed spiked from May

3:51until today. So it didn't go away. Um,

3:55and essentially like we looked at a lot

3:57of different keyword patterns, a lot of

3:59different things. Um, the one that we

4:00saw get hit the hardest was that what we

4:03call explicit geo terms. So that was

4:05like your um main category plus city. So

4:09um again like Denver plumber,

4:11electrician, Dallas, that kind of thing.

4:13Those are the ones that used to be like

4:15fairly stable and now they are

4:17fluctuating like crazy. And I I showed

4:20an example um where you have like you

4:22know again a grid that's on the organic

4:23side like pretty green and then you have

4:25red patches because they're not in that

4:27area and now it's like red green red

4:30green red green like not ranking ranking

4:32not ranking ranking and it's like wo

4:34>> this method of marketing is so effective

4:36I had to make sure it wasn't against

4:38Google's rules before I kept using it.

4:40It's a form of SEO I call compact

4:42keywords. Whereas most SEO focuses on

4:45putting up articles to answer questions,

4:47how, what, when, compact keywords

4:49focuses on putting up dozens of pages

4:51that sell to searchers who are actually

4:53looking to buy. These pages rank on

4:55Google and convert so much better than

4:57normal that when I discovered this years

4:59ago, I couldn't believe this was

5:01allowed. It's less work, too. The

5:02average compact keywords landing page is

5:04only 415 words. Compact Keywords is a

5:0813-hour deep course on getting sales

5:10with SEO. A customer said, "We spent

5:12nearly $18,000 in the last year and a

5:14half on marketing and SEO through

5:16different agencies locally, and that did

5:18nothing. We decided to take the leap on

5:20the compact keywords course. We're now

5:22getting about 6 to eight calls per day

5:24on a good day, which is just unheard

5:26of." Another customer said, "Give it to

5:28a junior employee. Have them follow it

5:31exactly as Edwards laid out. You don't

5:33have to do anything, and you're going to

5:35gain a six-f figureure SEO level

5:37employee just by having them go through

5:39this course." Compact Keywords is about

5:41setting up an SEO funnel that brings you

5:43sales for years and years and years. It

5:46works with AI. It's less work than

5:48traditional SEO and it makes way more

5:51money. You can get it now at

5:52compactkeywords.com.

5:54Back to the podcast. So, yeah, you wrote

5:56you wrote uh on X, you said this SEO

5:59messaged me something bizarre. You

6:01reached out to Yex to dig into the data.

6:04what they found after analyzing 8.1

6:088.1 million search screenshots blew us

6:11away. So, right after Google's Mayor

6:13update, as you were saying, organic

6:15rankings became 48.7% more volatile. 97%

6:21of tracking reports started wildly

6:23shuffling. Mobile local searches were

6:26hit the hardest. Two people searching

6:29the exact same phrase at the at the

6:32exact same time are now seeing

6:34completely different results. Checking

6:37your rank once from your desk and

6:39claiming where number three is no longer

6:42the reality.

6:44>> Yeah. So that is the biggest takeaway

6:46from this that I would say I concluded

6:48is we in SEO we've known this for a

6:51while that like you search something

6:53where you are, I search something where

6:54I am, we're probably going to see

6:55something slightly different. Um, but I

6:57don't think the average business owner

6:58gets this. Like we still constantly have

7:00clients like, "Oh, I'm number three. I'm

7:02number four." No, you're not. Like,

7:03there's no number three. There's no

7:05number four. There's just businesses

7:07that are very visible and businesses

7:09that are not very visible. And so, I

7:11want to be really clear. I do not think

7:13this is like SEO is dead, whatever. I do

7:15think it's like giving a static position

7:18is dead. Like if you're trying to say

7:20I'm position one, that is an incorrect

7:22statement because you're like, well,

7:23you're position one this amount of

7:25times. And then depending on how large

7:27your sample size is, that number will

7:29change, right? So um I think what this

7:32is really problematic for, to be honest,

7:34is like tools, like tools that are

7:36reporting on rankings or tools that are

7:39um trying to give you a visibility

7:40status. If they're not doing hundreds,

7:42if not thousands of searches, I don't

7:45think they're accurate because, you

7:48know, let's looking at this grid.

7:50Sometimes I got a red, sometimes I got a

7:52green. Like, that's wild. And if it's

7:54just doing a single scan and saying

7:56you're not ranking, you could be ranking

7:58the next time you search. So, it's made

8:01competitive research extremely

8:03difficult.

8:05>> Okay. So, how about then for Yeah. for

8:08for SEOs who are trying to figure out

8:11it's like it's like look, we we know the

8:14click-through rate between position 4

8:16and position one is I mean position

8:20one's going to get way more clicks. Uh

8:23so how

8:26how does somebody who's trying to move

8:28up just those like couple of spots where

8:30they're so close but they need accurate

8:33data to to figure out what should

8:35somebody like that be doing?

8:37Yeah. So, there's two places you want to

8:39measure and you can see and this is what

8:41you should have been looking at probably

8:42all along, but again, this is something

8:44I feel like small business owners just

8:45don't get yet. Hopefully, within a year

8:47or so of them seeing different results

8:48all the time, maybe they'll get it. But,

8:51uh, you should be looking at traffic

8:52over rankings always, but then for local

8:55SEO becomes a little more nuanced

8:56because a lot of your leads don't go to

8:58your website. So like people that search

9:01on Google, if they find you in a local

9:04pack or they find you in an AI powered

9:06local pack, uh there's options to call

9:08you without going to your website. Like

9:10maybe they just read your reviews, look

9:11at your photos, whatever, and then call

9:12your business. Well, they never went to

9:14your website. So I think this also is

9:16good for call tracking companies because

9:19uh we have been pushing call tracking on

9:21our clients forever. Um, but I'm like,

9:23you have to know where your calls are

9:24coming from because it's so hard to

9:26correctly put attribution where it

9:28belongs. And at least call tracking

9:30gives you an ability to do that. And

9:33with AI and stuff, like you can even um

9:35use things like transcripts to figure

9:37out like what types of calls you're

9:38getting and that will help you with

9:39like, you know, matching to specific

9:41keywords. Um, but I think that the

9:43traditional like rankings are the end-

9:46all beall is just hasn't been true for a

9:48while and it's even more not true now.

9:52I wouldn't say that rankings were the

9:53end. I mean, obviously rankings were not

9:55the end all. Sales and making money is

9:57the end all

9:57>> when I started in SEO they were. I mean,

9:59again, like depending on how far back

10:00you go, it was like you're page one,

10:02position one, and that was like the

10:04thing to do, right?

10:05>> Well, I was going to Well, I was going

10:06to say that that rankings are still

10:08extremely important. Like that's the

10:10thing that they're super they're super

10:12important. You need that data.

10:14So the only way to get it from what I

10:16and I don't know tell me if if uh you

10:17have another idea but uh if you do

10:19enough scans you'll you'll get it right.

10:21So when I um showed a we have a

10:23competitor there's competitor tab inside

10:24places scout that will list all the

10:26different websites that showed up and

10:28how often they showed up. So I basically

10:30have um that tab that I'm always looking

10:33at and it'll tell you how many times

10:35each website was in the top three.

10:36That's all I care about. Like anything

10:38past the top three you're probably not

10:39getting traffic from. So, I look at like

10:41top three organic rankings, how often

10:43were you there, and then sort and you're

10:45going to see that like there's still

10:47sites that dominate. Like they're there

10:48the majority of the time that like SEO

10:50still works. But, um, I think

10:53[clears throat] the the kicker is you

10:54have to have enough scans to know that

10:56you can trust it because if you're only

10:58sending like two or three searches in,

11:00then I don't think you can trust that

11:01and there's nothing valuable in it.

11:05So, I mean,

11:09how is this going to change how you're

11:11really doing SEO? Like, that's

11:13>> Yeah,

11:13>> that's the question.

11:15>> So, for me, honestly, I have I use

11:17>> everybody. What are you saying to

11:18clients?

11:19>> Yeah. So, we're telling clients like

11:20we've been telling them forever like

11:21don't go search on Google and then

11:23assume wherever you see your business is

11:25where your customers are seeing

11:26business. The things we tell our clients

11:28is like you hire an SEO company to make

11:30you more money. Like, just forget about

11:32rankings for a second. And yes, that's

11:34part of the picture of what we're going

11:35to do is we want to make your website

11:36show up higher more often, but uh the

11:39idea that there's a static search page

11:41on Google is a thing in the past and I

11:43think it's becoming more and more of a

11:45thing in the past. Um so we tell our

11:48clients like at the end of the day it's

11:49all about revenue. So I think there's

11:52more um need to have really good

11:54tracking. Um I think that's really

11:56really important. So we have like

11:57monthly calls with our clients where

11:58we'll ask them like how many how many

12:00leads did you get this month or how many

12:01sales did you close? Like really that's

12:02the that's it. It's all that matters is

12:04business. And then we're making sure our

12:07clients are tracking where those are

12:08coming from. And most of them do. Like I

12:10think even small businesses do a good

12:12job of knowing where their revenue comes

12:14from. So they'll they'll be able to tell

12:16you like you know if we have a dentist,

12:17okay, I got like 20 p new patients this

12:19month from Google. Great. Again, we can

12:22see that too. We can see leads and we

12:24can track leads back to sources. So when

12:26we track like our main reporting for

12:28clients is a lead graph and it shows how

12:31many calls you got from Google My

12:32Business or Google business profile, how

12:34many calls you got from organic, how

12:35many calls you got from LLMs, how many

12:37calls you got from ads, like and it it

12:38shows them so you can see trends. Um,

12:41and I wouldn't stop there though because

12:42again leads leads are great. They're

12:45better than traffic, but the end all

12:47beall is did you actually close those

12:49people? Are they the right leads? Um, so

12:51I think it involves a lot more

12:52collaboration between the business and

12:54the SEO to make sure that you're going

12:56down the right path.

12:58>> There be would would you look at

13:00rankings at all?

13:02>> Yeah, we so the only the time I look at

13:04rankings is to figure out what tactics

13:06are working, right? So, and also to see

13:08like who's dominating like if I want to

13:10know I think where rankings are useful

13:12for me is if I want to know where the

13:13ceiling is currently in a market because

13:15there is a ceiling in local SEO. like

13:17you're not just going to be able to rank

13:20indefinitely for a large area and

13:22increase and increase and increase. So,

13:23I like to know who the winner is and how

13:26you stack up against them. So, that's

13:27what I use rankings for. And then when

13:30we're doing testing, which we're

13:31constantly doing, I look at rankings as

13:33one of the metrics to see if it worked.

13:36But it's like if I see ranking increases

13:38but I can't match it to traffic

13:39increases then I usually don't care

13:42about it cuz at the end of the day again

13:44like I need to make sure there's traffic

13:47otherwise I'm like do I trust this

13:48ranking report? Like I don't know.

13:51>> Yeah. The thing is just a lot of SEOs,

13:53they like to use rankings to figure out

13:55when to re-examine a page to see if it's

13:58underperforming. Mhm.

14:00>> And and and sales isn't going to give

14:02you as much isn't it's going to give you

14:06a tiny sliver of data compared to

14:08rankings when you're trying to figure

14:09out is my page underperforming compared

14:12to uh these other pages.

14:17>> Search console is usually like my go-to

14:20for figuring out if something's doing

14:21better or worse, right? Like if you're

14:23getting more traffic, great. If you're

14:24getting less traffic, that's bad. So I

14:26think [clears throat] of course Google's

14:28updates uh put more importance on

14:30Google's data and less importance on

14:32thirdparty data, right? Which I'm like

14:34that to me is an agenda they would want.

14:36Like of course Google wants you using

14:38Google products. And I've felt this way

14:40for a long time about keyword research.

14:41The best keyword research you can get is

14:43ad data. Like by a long shot, right? If

14:46you want to know what keywords to

14:47target, which ones convert, you're not

14:49going to get anything better than what

14:50Google ads will tell you. Um and I think

14:52that's how Google wants it, right? like

14:54they they want everybody relying on them

14:56for everything. And I think the best

14:58theory on why Google did this that I've

15:00heard, and these are theories, like

15:02there's none of us can prove this, is uh

15:04actually a really really smart guy. I

15:06don't know if you've ever had him on

15:07here, but his name's Ian Evans, and he

15:09runs um a SAS tool that does CTR

15:13manipulation. Um he's such a smart guy.

15:17Like so so smart. Even though I don't

15:19touch CTR manipulation, I've had so many

15:21great conversations with him. and he

15:23thinks that Google's doing it to combat

15:25CTR manipulation. I was like, that's so

15:27fascinating because it's true. Like,

15:29let's just say you've got a website and

15:31one search they're ranked position three

15:33and then another search they're ranked

15:34position six and Google is able to track

15:36that they're getting clicks, the same

15:38number of clicks in both positions.

15:39That's a sure sign that you're doing CTR

15:41manipulation, right? So, I was like,

15:43"Yeah, this would be a good safeguard

15:46against CTR manipulation, which it's

15:48probably becoming a growing pain in

15:50Google's butt cuz I've seen a lot more

15:53people doing it lately." I I won't do it

15:56cuz I'm like, even if they're not

15:58catching you now, I'm like, I think it's

16:00coming. I It's scared me. And I've seen

16:02this with links too many times that I'm

16:04like, I just don't want the I I don't

16:06want the mountains with the valleys.

16:08Like, I just want the steady growth. So,

16:11not willing to um spend my clients

16:13budgets on things that are going to

16:15potentially penalize them next year.

16:17>> What do you think about the go-to

16:18redirects?

16:20>> Oh, man. Okay, so this is another thing.

16:21I really do think that like Google is

16:23sick of people scraping them. Like

16:25that's that's what I think their agenda

16:26is here, right? They're sick of people

16:28scraping them. It costs them money, cost

16:30them resources, they get nothing from

16:31it. Um and I don't blame them. If I was

16:34them, I'd probably be the same way. So,

16:36I think they're trying to like

16:37aggressively block scrapers. And I've

16:40had so many talks with people that build

16:42SAS tools and things and um heard their

16:44problems of the things that Google has

16:46had them do. And this one is like wild.

16:49So I was chatting with someone the other

16:51day um who told me cuz we were like it

16:53broke a couple of the things in in rank

16:55trackers uh the go-tos, right? Because

16:57instead of seeing your website now the

16:59rank tracker is seeing a go-to URL. So

17:01how does it tell you what position

17:02you're in? So we originally saw it broke

17:05and then there was a solution that was

17:07deployed and then earlier this week that

17:09solution broke and when I reached out

17:11they were like um so now Google won't

17:14even give you like they used to have it

17:16in the code or something you could get

17:17the URL of the website now you have to

17:19actually visit the website to get that

17:21now I don't know if there's somebody

17:23really smart listening to this that's

17:24going to tell me there's a way around

17:25that but these people literally have

17:28found ways around Google for you know

17:30decades [clears throat] and that's what

17:32they're finding is they actually have to

17:33visit the URL in order to actually see

17:36the URL, which I'm like, that's

17:39problematic. Are we going to now have

17:41crappy click data in search console,

17:44which I don't want. We've already had

17:46crappy impression data for a very long

17:48time thanks to rank trackers. And I've

17:51always said like clicks are the thing

17:52you can trust, you know, as long as

17:54you're not doing CTR manipulation. But

17:56um if that's now going to be a thing,

17:58that's the only way that rank trackers

18:00and then I'm like, how much easier is it

18:02going to be for Google to then block

18:03those IP addresses? I I don't know. I

18:06don't know where this is headed.

18:07>> Yeah. Right. Because the clicks are

18:09getting inflated from the rank trackers

18:11clicking in,

18:12>> right? But they're not just clicking my

18:13site. So it's not like

18:16>> Yeah. Like if they're search they're

18:17doing it to every single website in the

18:19SER, right? So if there's 10 websites

18:21and they're clicking every single one,

18:22all 10 of those sites. So, even if I'm

18:24not doing rank tracking and my

18:26competitors all are and now I'm getting

18:28all these clicks, like I have no idea

18:29what's going to happen. I'm going to

18:31check on it next week and see if uh if I

18:34can see clicks from the rank trackers

18:36that we ran. Um I really hope not, but

18:39they don't filter it out for

18:40impressions. Impressions have massive

18:42spikes every time we run one of these

18:44reports. Um because there's thousands of

18:47keywords that are being searched every

18:49single time. Um, so I'm like genuinely

18:52concerned about what this is going to

18:54lead to.

18:55>> Yeah, we we were talking about this

18:57before we started recording and I said

18:59maybe uh maybe Google would actually

19:02work with the major SEO suites to just

19:05give them the data that they need

19:06because I mean it it it's pretty well

19:08they don't want Google Search Console

19:10data to be massively inflated either.

19:13>> No, they don't want they don't want

19:15that. And then you're and you're you're

19:16like you're like no Google Google hates

19:19these these companies. And then I'm like

19:21so I said why didn't Google roll this

19:25out 10 years ago? Why and I can't

19:27imagine that they didn't think about

19:28doing these redirects 10 years ago? I

19:31can't imagine I would I would bet that

19:33they've had this in their back pocket

19:35for over a decade.

19:37>> And it's it's like why why do it? It

19:40seems like they did it now to combat

19:42because they because the SER API case

19:45got dismissed and they need to stop the

19:49AI tools. Uh it was and it didn't it

19:53doesn't seem like it was a move against

19:55SEOs.

19:56>> Yeah, I think it's it's a move against

19:58all the people scraping Google, not the

20:00people bots, right? Like whether it's AI

20:02tools or whether it's uh rank trackers

20:05or whatever. I I can only imagine that

20:07since we have AI, how much more the

20:10volume is that is scraping Google and it

20:13costs them resources, right? Like to to

20:15to handle that. So, if it's

20:17significantly increased their cost, then

20:19obviously they're going to want to

20:20combat it. But I I don't personally

20:22think Google cares at all about SEOs.

20:24I've kind of always felt that way. I

20:26think you want Google as your friend

20:27because you don't want to like piss off

20:29the Google gods and you know,

20:31>> but I don't I don't know if that's true.

20:32Google writes about SEO all the time.

20:34They they put out an article saying good

20:36good geo is is good SEO. Like

20:39>> oh my god, the stuff they say is so bad

20:42though. Like there's so many statements

20:43that are like

20:45>> that's like a halftruth. And so if you

20:47don't know how to read it, there's so

20:48many people that misinterpret things. Um

20:50cuz I I do agree that good SEO is good

20:52geo, but also I can tell you straight up

20:55like the algorithm for the AI local

20:58packs on Google is so different than

21:00three packs. if you if it was the same

21:03and all you had to do is the same stuff,

21:04you get the same businesses and you

21:06don't. So that tells me it's different.

21:08And uh I've also like found the ways

21:11that you manipulate one versus the

21:12other, they're different. So it's like,

21:14yeah, it's kind of true cuz you're

21:16right, there's a lot of overlap, but

21:18this is the same conversation I had for

21:20years talking about how the local

21:22algorithm is different than the organic

21:23algorithm. Like guys, they are

21:25different. They have different factors.

21:26You got to look at them as separate.

21:27Now, we got three algorithms. We don't

21:29have two. So, I'm like, this is where

21:32Googlers go out and make statements. And

21:34I'm like, okay, like at the end of the

21:35day, Google wants to make money. Google

21:38wants everybody buying ads from them.

21:39They want to make money. They're a

21:40business, right? They don't owe us

21:41anything. So, I think that's the thing

21:43to keep in mind. Like, I'm not one of

21:44those SEOs that's like constantly

21:46railing on Google because I'm like, what

21:48do they owe me? Like, they don't owe me

21:50anything. I, you know, the only thing

21:52I've done for them is maybe, you know,

21:53help them make more money through ads.

21:54So, they like me for that. But I really

21:56don't think Google has any incentive or

21:58reason to care about SEOs. Um, I think

22:01we are manipulating them to make a

22:04business and I think it's fine and it's

22:05great and it's not going anywhere. I do

22:07think it's becoming more expensive. Um,

22:09so I agree with that uh statement.

22:11Darren Shaw said that when we were on a

22:13webinar recently and I was like, it's

22:14true. Like you now have to do like a lot

22:16more to compete and a lot of the cheap,

22:18scalable, easy tactics don't work as

22:21well as they used to. So, I do think

22:22it's getting more expensive.

22:25>> Like what? Like what doesn't work as

22:27well?

22:28>> Oh, man. Like like Okay, let's just say

22:30like uh scaling content, right? Like you

22:32used to be able to just throw up uh like

22:35a 100 different pages. You could swap

22:36some things out. Honestly, like there's

22:37strategies like that that have worked

22:39really really well for a long time and

22:40they are starting to nail that kind of

22:43stuff. Um one of the things I've noticed

22:45with AI local packs is that um keyword

22:48stuff in your business name doesn't work

22:49as well. So previously that was like a

22:53gold mine you know for uh businesses if

22:55they got like a keyword rich business

22:57name they would dominate the local pack

22:59that is not as true for the AI stuff

23:02it's looking at other factors higher

23:04probably a good thing um the other one

23:06what are the other tricks like making

23:08your operating hours longer that was

23:09another one that like works really well

23:11in the traditional local pack doesn't

23:12work as well for AI local packs they

23:14show closed listings all the time um so

23:17it's definitely different and I think

23:19like some of the easy easy wins. Um, and

23:22especially with

23:23>> Is it Is it that Google hates SEOs or is

23:26it that Google hates SEOs who do

23:30shortcuts?

23:32>> Yeah, definitely definitely that one. I

23:33I don't think Google hates all SEOs.

23:36There are some SEOs that genuinely try

23:37and like help their search results be

23:40better, but at the end of the day, I do

23:42think we're at odds with them because I

23:43think if Google had

23:45>> always hated SEOs who who hated who who

23:48were doing shortcuts, that's always it's

23:49always been that cat and mask game.

23:51>> Yeah. But I would argue even like the

23:53the people like I I think we follow

23:56Google's guidelines for the most part.

23:58Like I'm not a big like advocate of

24:00doing risky stuff, but at the end of the

24:02day, like I ignore lots of Google's

24:04recommendations because they're dumb.

24:06[laughter] So like,

24:06>> oh, for sure. I mean, Google Google

24:09gives gives halftruths and they don't

24:11like I made this episode about the good

24:13geo good is good SEO and how there are a

24:17lot of things that they didn't say like,

24:19yeah, it's like write this article about

24:21your firsthand experience and they don't

24:23mention you got to target a keyword if

24:24if you want it to show up. It's like

24:26like absolute basics or they're like um

24:30inauthentic mentions don't work.

24:32Inauthent inauthentic mentions

24:34absolutely work.

24:36>> Everyone knows that inauthentic mentions

24:38work.

24:38>> Totally.

24:39>> Uh yeah. Um but for the most part, I

24:43also agreed with a lot of the things

24:44that that were in that article. But

24:46>> yeah.

24:47>> Yeah.

24:48>> I'll tell you one theory I heard that I

24:49don't agree with. Some people were

24:51saying that this is like an AI thing and

24:53that the reason why the search results

24:54are varied is because like

24:56>> the go-to thing or or oh the the vari

24:58sorry that the the varied search

25:00results. Um so the reason why that

25:02doesn't make sense to me is that so when

25:04sheer did the original study he was

25:06looking at logged in users who are

25:08searching right so you and me searching

25:09from our computers logged into Google

25:11would see one thing. When we did this

25:13study it was all incognito logged out no

25:15like there's no Google profile because

25:17it's a rank tracker right? So it's not

25:18logged in. there's no history of the

25:21user cuz it's not a user. Um, so it

25:23can't be personalization. That just

25:25doesn't make any sense because there's

25:26no click history. There's no tracking.

25:29Um, and I'm not don't like I'm afraid

25:31I'm going to get questions about like

25:32how detailed the the rank tracker works

25:33and how it gets by Google systems and if

25:36it's a different IP address. I have no

25:37idea. That would be a good question for

25:39Mark. Um, but it can't be

25:41personalization. It's not the same thing

25:43as you seeing the websites you visit all

25:45the time higher. So, I just wanted to

25:47that was a theory. I kept getting that

25:49question on our article when we posted

25:51it on the video and people are like,

25:53"Oh, it's personalization." I'm like,

25:54"No, this is not personalization. These

25:56are um logged out users with no like

25:59click history." So, it's definitely not

26:01that. Um and I don't think it's like

26:03it's like working like AI in a sense. I

26:06think there's another agenda behind it,

26:08but that's just again I can't prove any

26:09of that. It's just my theory.

26:11>> What other interesting comments did you

26:12get? Yeah, I think people are like

26:15there's definitely from the business

26:16owners, they're like, "What do I do

26:17about this?" Right? And I'm like, again,

26:19my answer is like, you shouldn't have

26:21been measuring SEO success based on

26:23rankings alone. And again, sure, if you

26:25want to throw that in as a metric, my

26:26only advice would be make sure it's not

26:28just one scan. So, if you're going to

26:30use rankings, and this is where I think

26:32there's a lot of popular tools out there

26:33that don't do this, they don't do

26:35multiple scans. Like even some of the AI

26:38visibility tools, they're doing like 20

26:40searches a keyword. I'm like, come on.

26:42like you really think you're going to

26:43get anything uh valuable on which

26:45businesses show up more often? Like you

26:48have to do a ton to get uh valuable

26:51stuff. So I think for local you probably

26:53want a minimum of a few dozen to get

26:56meaningful data, right? If you do, let's

26:58say 40 50 searches and you're

27:01continuously seeing the same businesses

27:03in the top three, I think you can trust

27:05that data. If you're doing one search,

27:07two searches, three searches, I don't

27:09think you can trust that data. And I've

27:11seen this all the time in hrefs when I

27:13try to look at um I try to use the rank

27:15tracker because I like to know when

27:16we're doing an audit for a site and I

27:18see a drop. Uh I want to know like when

27:21that drop happens. The problem is you

27:22look at the graphs and they're like

27:24zigzags. It's like really hard. It's

27:26like this is not helpful. So I think

27:30it's problematic if you're like and

27:32again we get clients that do this are

27:33like oh my blank report told me I'm

27:36ranking number one and now I'm ranking

27:37number three. And I'm like, it's

27:39probably nothing like it's just

27:42fluctuation. This is the life of uh the

27:45search results, right? So, we just have

27:47to trust other metrics more.

27:50>> Somebody who's evaluating which SEO

27:52suite to go with, what should

27:54[clears throat] they be asking support

27:56to to figure out just like email sales

27:58or like try trying to figure out which

28:00one is best?

28:01>> I would say how many searches are you

28:03doing per keyword to come up with a

28:04position? Um if you're even looking at

28:06positions, right? So, I think that's

28:07that's a really important question to

28:09ask. Uh cuz if it's one, again, like

28:13very uh I'd be very skeptical of what

28:15you're seeing. Um because some of the

28:17businesses that are winners, like

28:19they're doing really well that are

28:21dominating markets still have zeros like

28:23where they didn't show up. And if that's

28:25the one scan, it's going to make you

28:27panic when you have no reason to panic.

28:29So, I think trust your search console

28:31data also like that's really uh better

28:34data than rank tracking. And then I

28:36would also say your your phone calls,

28:37right? Like I can't tell you how many

28:39times rankings don't agree with phone

28:41calls and like rankings are up but phone

28:44calls are down or vice versa. So this is

28:46where I'm like your phone calls matter.

28:48Being able to know like where they're

28:49coming from. Um that is the data that

28:52you should be tracking. And um I can

28:55definitely say like SEO tactics still

28:57work the same as they did a year ago.

28:59Different tactics, but they still

29:01there's still lots of ways to get more

29:03traffic from Google, to get leads from

29:04Google. That's what we're here for. Um,

29:07so definitely do not think this is bad

29:08for SEOs. I think this is good actually

29:11for SEOs because if you work in SEO, I

29:14think the average business owner being

29:16able to figure this out just got much

29:18harder. So

29:19>> I was thinking about that too. I think

29:20there's going to be less competition. I

29:22think there's going to be less

29:23competition and it's going to be a lot

29:24easier.

29:25>> Yeah. And so I think again I think that

29:27the people that are good at SEO, they'll

29:29be fine. the people that were taking

29:30shortcuts, the people,

29:31>> the people who listen to our podcasts,

29:33you're going to be okay. That's

29:35>> You'll be fine. Yeah. As long as you

29:36listen to Edward, you're good. But like

29:38>> listen to Edward, listen to Joy, listen

29:40to to David and our fantastic guests.

29:43>> Yeah. I do think it's harder for people

29:45getting into the industry, right? So,

29:47you know, to I think it's it's not going

29:48to be worse for you, Edward. It's not

29:50going to be worse for me. This is we're

29:51we're going to be fine. Like there's not

29:53going to be any issues here. But like

29:54getting into it definitely I think it's

29:55harder like it's harder to explain this

29:57to my like entry level people that are

29:59just starting.

30:00>> Yeah. But you know you know if if you've

30:02never if you've never done SEO and then

30:04you like you you find a target keyword

30:07and then you put it in the right places

30:08and then suddenly you see you're on page

30:10one that still says to you like okay

30:14we're going in the right direction here.

30:16>> And then you might you might be looking

30:18at Google search console and you might

30:19see you might see your clicks go up. and

30:22how I don't we could talk again about

30:24how trustworthy that click date is, but

30:26you're going to see that it's going to

30:27be relative at the end of the day. It's

30:28it's also going to it's it's going to

30:30adjust and and rank trackers are going

30:33to adjust how they do things slowly. So,

30:35it's it's all going to be like relative

30:37and you so you're going to see your

30:38clicks go up and then you're going to be

30:40like, okay, I'm doing like the right

30:42things here. And so, you can still you

30:44can still look at the data to figure out

30:47what's working well. And I think also

30:49David came on the show to talk about

30:50this with the go-to redirects. A lot of

30:52people are just building their own SEO

30:53tools now.

30:54>> Agreed. Like I wouldn't want to be an

30:57SEO tool right now. Like having to deal

30:59with this. It just sounds like a

31:00nightmare. Like I I'm very glad I'm not

31:02in that. Uh

31:04>> yeah. Yeah.

31:05>> But yeah, I think it's like the the

31:06direction rankings should increase

31:08traffic which should increase leads and

31:10which should increase revenue, right?

31:12Like as long as you can follow that

31:13trail, you're doing all the right

31:15things, right? It's like where in that

31:17trail things get broken. It's again, you

31:19have to diagnose it. Like I had a um I

31:22had a client the other day where I'm

31:24looking at their page and it got like

31:26zero clicks, but it was a page that we

31:29had optimized. I could see that rankings

31:30had gone up a ton, but zero clicks, like

31:33literally nothing. And then I look at

31:34their calls from their Google business

31:36profile um and their Google Business

31:38profile calls have like shot up like

31:39crazy. Like they almost doubled in a

31:41month. And the business is like

31:43thrilled. They were like, "Oh my gosh,

31:44we got so many leads from this exact

31:46type, from that exact page that like you

31:48optimize like the the top."

31:50>> How do they know it's a page?

31:51>> Well, sorry.

31:53>> How do how do they know it's the page

31:54that's leading to the calls?

31:56>> Well, it's like the main thing that we

31:57did, right? So, we optimized for a

31:59particular term. It's like a really

32:00niche term, probably the stuff you talk

32:02about in your course,

32:03>> and then they started getting calls for

32:05that thing. And uh they're getting calls

32:07on their Google business profile. So,

32:08they're not the person's not clicking

32:10the organic result, right? They're I

32:11guess finding them because their Google

32:13business profile increased in ranking.

32:15They're now getting more calls for this

32:16thing. It's a really lucrative thing for

32:18them. So, it's like a huge money maker

32:20and they're like, "Oh my god, like again

32:22like within weeks of us kind of doing

32:24our stuff, they're getting all these

32:26calls." So, it's it's clear like but if

32:27I looked at search console literally the

32:29page has zero clicks and I'm like if I'm

32:31the only measuring it based on that I'm

32:33going to be like this wasn't worth it.

32:34>> So, it's I' I have a lot of those now

32:37and this is where I'm like it's nuanced.

32:39I think the number one thing I hear at

32:41SEO conferences from like uh smaller um

32:45SEO companies is they they hate talking

32:46to clients. They're like, "I don't want

32:48clients. I don't want to talk to

32:49clients." And I'm like, "You kind of

32:51have to like this is becoming like a a

32:53deal breakaker because I need to connect

32:55those dots." So, I need to know uh what

32:58the business is actually making money

33:00from. So, like I can't even tell you how

33:02much of our calls in the last year have

33:03shifted from like us talking about like

33:05random SEO tactics to like how is your

33:07business doing? What are you getting

33:09more of? What are you getting less of?

33:10What do you care more? What's making you

33:11more money? Like, we're actually like

33:13asking them way more about their

33:14business than we did a year ago. Um,

33:17>> it would be it would be cool to to have

33:19like um so you you you

33:22track all everything that comes into

33:24your contact forms because you're

33:25absolutely right when you're targeting

33:27bottom ofunnel keywords, the support

33:30requests you get, you can tell what page

33:34they came from based because they will

33:36use language related to that term, that

33:39bottom ofunnel term that you targeted

33:41because you're targeting these different

33:42scenario-based terms and you can tell

33:44why they are there And uh and so if you

33:48have an LLM that knows the keywords that

33:51you're targeting and it sees all these

33:54all these support requests, it can

33:56actually group people into where they

33:58most likely came from. And then you can

34:00kind of you can use that as well to

34:02figure out what's working and and what's

34:04not.

34:05>> I'll also say like a thing that's really

34:06important that uh unfortunately um this

34:09is going to sound old school, but like

34:10just asking people how they heard about

34:12you. I think like that's becoming more

34:14more necessary because G4 even like

34:18attribution there is jacked up because

34:19somebody was telling me the other day

34:20like you know AI isn't getting as much

34:23>> credit as it probably should because

34:24people might do their search on AI and

34:26then go to Google and then your branded

34:28searches go up but they found you

34:30somewhere else and then you're like how

34:31do you know it was AI? Well, we ask

34:33everybody that contacts us and then we

34:35track it, right? We we put in a source.

34:38Um, so I do think like, you know, every

34:40business should be making an effort to

34:42do that like old school. Make sure you

34:44ask everybody how they heard about you.

34:46And don't be surprised if they like list

34:48multiple sources, but um [clears throat]

34:50it's some small business do this, some

34:53don't. But I'm like you can't rely on

34:54just tools to do all that for you if you

34:56want like a lot of accuracy.

34:59>> So you were saying that we have all

35:00these different algorithms now. What are

35:01the biggest ranking factors for the

35:03local algorithm? Yeah. So, local

35:05algorithm, it's reviews. Like, honestly,

35:08I wish uh a lot of days I wish this

35:10wasn't the case, but reviews are like

35:11the biggest factor. It's um there's

35:14three different metrics when it comes to

35:15reviews that matter. Uh so, it's the

35:17average rating, so that you know, if you

35:19bump up from a 4.5 to a 4.6, you'll see

35:22a ranking boost. It's the number of

35:23reviews. Uh we see a specifically

35:25there's a ranking boost when you hit 10

35:27past that. It's a matter of how you

35:29stack up to your competitors. So, if you

35:31are at 100 and the guy you're competing

35:34with is at 500, you've got work to do.

35:36And then the third one is the volume of

35:38uh the frequency, sorry, of reviews. So,

35:40even if you're the number one leader

35:42when it comes to numbers, if you stop

35:43getting new ones, uh your rankings will

35:45start to fall. And um we tell people

35:47like with local pack rankings, if you're

35:49not like actively getting reviews, we

35:52can do everything in the world right for

35:54SEO and you're not going to stay in the

35:56three-pack. And it's frustrating because

35:58I it's I can't control it. like my

36:00customers have to go get the reviews.

36:03So, it's always been a dealbreaker. We

36:05are really upfront with people right at

36:06the bat. We're like, "Listen, we'll do

36:07our stuff. As long as you do the reviews

36:09piece, you'll win, but we can do lots of

36:12good stuff. And if your reviews start

36:14dipping, it's so much of a factor." And

36:16this is one of the I think maybe good

36:19things depends on where you fall on the

36:22thing here, but with AI local packs,

36:24reviews are not like that. like it is

36:26not always the top reviews that Google

36:29shows. Um, which is nice, I think, for

36:33like the smaller businesses. Uh, because

36:36sometimes when you start in a market and

36:37you have like a monster business that's

36:39got 5,000 reviews, like how do you

36:40compete with that? Like I have no idea.

36:43Um, so I do think that that is good for

36:46uh the brands that are not the dominant

36:48leaders. These are um something they're

36:51all over mobile in the US. They're now

36:54in Canada. They started showing up uh

36:56this summer and they are basically an AI

36:59overview, but instead of like a

37:01traditional three-pack, it shows usually

37:03two businesses. The first one's fully

37:05visible, the second one gets cut off, so

37:06it's like one and a half. Um, and you

37:09can click show [clears throat] more and

37:10then it'll expand and show you like a

37:11list. Um, we're seeing them all over the

37:14place now. uh they were on about 10ish%

37:17queries for the majority of this year um

37:19in the United States. And I don't know

37:21what other countries they're in because

37:22I'm only tracking the US and Canada, but

37:25I know Canada, they weren't they weren't

37:26here earlier this year and now they're

37:28here. Um and you're way more likely to

37:31see it on a mobile device. So if your

37:33rank tracker is also only tracking

37:35desktop, you're not going to be seeing

37:36them at all. Um actually, I take that

37:39back. I do see them on desktop, just not

37:40as often as on mobile. How important are

37:45keywords in the reviews when when the

37:48reviewers are using keywords?

37:50>> So that one I would say is more more

37:52important for AI because of AI actually

37:55pulling in like reviews and review

37:58texts. That's something that they do. Um

38:00so often if I'm like I want a dentist

38:04that is um good with kids for example um

38:08I'll get like a if I search using AI

38:10mode or uh if I get an AI review it'll

38:12like specifically look at reviews and

38:14say like okay here according to the

38:16reviews it'll say that like this person

38:18said like oh their kid got like a candy

38:20at the end or whatever. Um, so I think

38:24review like like the keywords or the

38:26detail of the reviews is going to matter

38:28a little more for AI. Um, we did a test

38:31years ago to figure out if we could um

38:34move rankings based on like putting

38:36specific keywords in reviews. It wasn't

38:37like a huge test. We picked a business

38:39that had like 20 reviews and then my

38:41staff left like 12 for them, all

38:44positives and like it was like a tree

38:45farm. [laughter] Um, so we were like

38:47trying to like get them to increase for

38:49like a very specific thing for trees and

38:52uh it didn't work. Um, so we we tried

38:54that for I think it would spread it over

38:56like a month or two. I've heard people

38:58who um buy reviews say that it does

39:01work. Maybe they're doing hundreds of

39:03them. I have no way to test that

39:05ethically. So I uh I don't know if they

39:08matter for three-pack rankings, but our

39:10our test on it failed.

39:12>> How important or how what's more

39:15important? having a keyword in in okay

39:19so like fast Wi-Fi let's use that as an

39:22example actually the reason that I'm

39:24saying that is I just got back from

39:25Chicago my hotel didn't have the Wi-Fi

39:28that I was hoping that it would have and

39:30you know this show comes out every day

39:32and so I I had to find a cafe with fast

39:35Wi-Fi to go to to upload so I used Ask

39:38Maps and I said this is this is this is

39:41my hotel give me a cafe next to it that

39:43has fast Wi-Fi and Ask Maps was it

39:47looked like it was primarily looking at

39:50the keywords that mentioned Wi-Fi, that

39:53mentioned speedy Wi-Fi, fast Wi-Fi, so

39:55and so, and I actually ended up finding

39:57a really great place. Uh, and so I

40:00wonder though if it was just because the

40:05businesses around me, and I was in a

40:06very central part of Chicago. I was in

40:08Westloop and I wonder if it was uh

40:11because the businesses around me didn't

40:16have fast Wi-Fi in their Google business

40:18profile or if it was just because fast

40:23Wi-Fi is being used in the in the

40:24reviews.

40:25>> Yeah, I would say reviews would likely

40:27be the culprit for that one because it's

40:29a subjective thing. So, Google isn't

40:30going to give the business a field for

40:32it because well, what's fast? I don't

40:34think they're going to trust the

40:34business on that. They're going to trust

40:36consumers on that. kind of similar to

40:38like what's the best food, you know?

40:40>> Yeah. And I think I did and I think I

40:42did when I was researching see some

40:44businesses describe themselves as fast

40:46Wi-Fi, but but Google chose to look at

40:49what pri chose to prioritize what the

40:51reviewers were actually saying.

40:53>> Yeah. And and this this is the funny

40:55thing. So on your business profile, like

40:57the description field doesn't impact

40:59ranking. We've done a lot of tests on

41:00it. In fact, I was trying to figure out

41:01if like the AI snippets show a little

41:04description. Even those aren't really

41:05influenced by what you put in. I don't

41:07even know why Google has a field because

41:08they don't use it for anything. Um, but

41:10your website, I will tell you that you

41:12can absolutely control stuff based on

41:15content on your website. And this is

41:17where like I I've, you know, probably

41:20you've heard Lily Ray talk about how

41:21Google's um cracking down on

41:23self-promotional listicles and things

41:25like that, right? It works until it

41:26doesn't, right? Like I think businesses

41:28that put out like one or two uh do

41:31really well from it and then if you

41:32start putting out a whole bunch, that's

41:34when you get in a lot of trouble. Um, we

41:36saw for a uh I tweeted out an example.

41:39It was I think best lawyer Tampa. It

41:41might still be out there. You might be

41:42able to replicate it. And the AI local

41:45results because this was one that pulled

41:46a AI local pack was literally pulling a

41:49list from a listical following the

41:52entire order of the list. So that the

41:54order that the businesses ranked on

41:55Google was exactly the way that they

41:57ranked on this list. Oh, sorry. I think

41:59it was best personal injury lawyer, not

42:00best lawyer.

42:01>> And it's one of the personal injury

42:03lawyers in the list who's the first guy.

42:05It's his listicle on his website. He

42:06lists himself first. He lists like seven

42:09or eight lawyers after him and the the

42:11order literally matches. So I'm like

42:13that's crazy that this guy literally

42:15hijacked like the entire local pack

42:18based on a listical on his website that

42:20Google tells you not to do. I'm not

42:22saying go do this to be clear because

42:23again I'm like I've been on the fence on

42:26>> do you want just one? Do you want like a

42:28bunch? And I don't know people have you

42:29definitely don't want

42:31>> I was going to ask you how many is too

42:32many self-promotion listicles. If you

42:34had asked me last year, I would have

42:35said like do a few. I don't do them at

42:37all anymore because um I again I think

42:40there's too many reasons not to now. Um

42:43and so I think it's fine to refer

42:45yourself as the best again in a limited

42:47fashion. But I wouldn't go create a

42:48listical with a bunch of competitors

42:50because um right now Google for each of

42:53the competitors is now quoting this

42:54other guy's website as the site of this

42:56like the source. So instead of listing

42:58the website of the law firm um it's

43:00listing the competitor. I don't know. It

43:03gets messy and I don't know, especially

43:05in the legal industry where we work a

43:06lot. I don't know what the implications

43:08of that are. I don't know if the other

43:09lawyers can do something about that

43:11because you're not really like the bar

43:12has rules around this stuff. Um, and

43:15from what I've been told by my Florida

43:18clients, you're not supposed to do this.

43:20So, I don't know. It it gets too messy

43:22for me to I I don't want my clients

43:24having like legal problems or, you know,

43:27problems with the bar. Um, so I've kind

43:29of shied away from it, but I I used to

43:31think it was fine originally because it

43:33worked so well. Now I think it's I don't

43:37know. There's risks involved. So proceed

43:39with caution.

43:40>> I you know I I saw I I think it was X

43:42that I saw this um I forget who who who

43:45shared it, but like somebody was taking

43:47their comp somebody noticed that the

43:49number two spot was what was being uh

43:52referenced when you have a

43:54self-promotionalistic.

43:55So [laughter] this person was putting

43:57their competitors number one and then

44:00putting themselves number two.

44:02>> Yeah. And this is why Google hates SEO.

44:04So

44:04>> yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

44:05>> We pull this [laughter] up. But also,

44:07okay, so this is where I I kind of look

44:08at it this way. If there's a better way

44:10to optimize for best, I believe there is

44:12that gets you there anyway that doesn't

44:14have any risk attached to it, do that

44:16instead, right? That's where I go to it.

44:18So, I'm like, I think it's fine to do

44:19risky things as long as the risk isn't

44:21too high and it's the honest best way to

44:23do it cuz nothing else works. Then,

44:25okay, like maybe you should do it. But

44:27to get listed for best, there's better

44:29ways to do that. Like, get some awards,

44:32beef up your page, let let the awards

44:34call you the best and then and then

44:36quote them. Then you're not really

44:37saying it yourself. You're just like,

44:39"Oh, I won best law firm, so I'm the

44:42best law firm." Like, you you can put

44:44that on there, right? and that'll have a

44:45similar effect and there's no risk to

44:47doing that. So, I think that I think

44:48there's just better ways.

44:50>> I've also just like straight up I've al

44:52also always not been a fan of going

44:55after best x for y best x for y

44:58keywords. I've I've always not been a

45:00fan after go of going for those keywords

45:02because the intent for those is not

45:05necessarily somebody who just wants to

45:07like one-shot it. They're going to look

45:09pick the top one and then go. A lot of

45:11these searchers want a comparison shop

45:13and so the intent isn't isn't quite as

45:17high. And if you actually just remove

45:19best and you target you you target the

45:22keyword where you just say like, you

45:24know, this is what we do. This is why

45:25we're credible. This is why people love

45:26us, you might show in that SER for best

45:29anyway.

45:30>> And and yeah, you might show in that SER

45:33for best anyway.

45:35>> And you might show really high if if you

45:37have a good page title and you're

45:38keeping people on the page. Uh, and I've

45:40just I've never been a huge fan of going

45:43after these best X for Y type keywords.

45:48I think they're I also think they're

45:50quite I think they're like a a not

45:52creative way of doing SEO cuz it's like

45:55the very obvious, okay, like what do we

45:57target? Okay, yeah, we are a personal

45:59injury injury lawyer in in uh Nebraska.

46:04Let's go after best personal injury

46:06lawyer in Nebraska because it's like the

46:08only thing. And you can actually just

46:10say like personal injury lawyer in

46:12Nebraska. We get you these results in

46:15the page title. Something like that.

46:16People click you have a really good

46:18page. Oh, wow. Okay. And we we do this

46:21different than other ones. You say that

46:22in the page. Oh, okay. That's that's

46:26good.

46:27>> Yeah. I never think it's been more

46:28important to have a unique selling

46:29proposition than than now. like you you

46:31got to have something that makes you

46:33different and like clarify that because

46:34the things that I've noticed that Google

46:36pulls in um with the AI overviews, it's

46:38like they are looking for what makes you

46:41credible and what makes you better and

46:42then they're highlighting those things

46:44and it's really cool cuz you can control

46:45it like you can literally um edit text

46:48on your website and have it change like

46:51what Google shows in the AI overview um

46:54as a description for your business. So

46:56like the number one place they are

46:57looking for that information is on your

46:59website. That is great news for SEOs and

47:02business owners because like I have seen

47:05again the business site or website there

47:07was a study done by Ben Fischer recently

47:09over at Study Demand. I believe it was

47:1160% of the citations that they looked at

47:14for local queries were the business

47:16website. They're like it was more than

47:18all the other sources combined. Um so

47:21like you actually have a lot of control

47:23over what um AI says about you by just

47:27your own website.

47:29So, the website's not dead. It's good.

47:31[laughter]

47:32>> Are you um You're always running really

47:33cool experiments. Are there any that

47:35you're running right now?

47:37>> Oh, man. Yeah. We're What am I running

47:39right now? We're running some I'm

47:40running some around content pruning. So,

47:42this concept of like Yeah, you've got

47:44>> I've got this one site that has I forget

47:46how many. Like I think he's got like a

47:47thousand pages that get like zero clicks

47:50and so we're deleting them all and

47:52seeing what happens. Um been a while

47:54since I've done one at scale. like

47:56usually we're just like, you know,

47:58deleting a page here and there and

47:59stuff. So, I'm trying that one out.

48:00We're doing a ton of ad experiments

48:02right now. Um, so lots in that arena. I

48:05think that Google's got so many new cool

48:07features. Trying to think what else

48:09we're doing. Um,

48:12yeah, I'd have to actually like look up

48:13my list. We we usually have like about a

48:16couple dozen running at a any given

48:18time. I'm doing a test on content, too.

48:20Uh, where I had um we have a tool that

48:22takes transcripts and turns it into

48:25content. using Claude. Um, and so I took

48:28some of those pages that we had already

48:30published and said, "Okay, give this to

48:32a human writer and take this content

48:33down that the tool got from the

48:35transcript, have the human write from

48:37the transcript instead, and I'm going to

48:39see if there's any difference." I'm not

48:41expecting there to be any difference at

48:43all, but uh, we'll see.

48:45>> So, you're turning you're turning

48:47YouTube or sorry, you're turning podcast

48:50transcripts.

48:51>> Yeah, we interview our clients. So, one

48:53of the biggest ways that we take client

48:55uh content, sorry, from our clients is

48:57that we do like an hour interview with

48:58them and we will get their expertise on

49:01a topic, right? Cuz we want to get the

49:02stuff that's not already on the web. If

49:04we go write it ourselves, we're going to

49:06be compiling information from stuff that

49:08already exists. So, I'm like, tell me,

49:09you know, your experiences, like if

49:11you're a home service company and you

49:12went out to a house, tell me what you

49:13did. Tell me what you fixed. What were

49:14your problems? How much did it cost?

49:16Like that stuff. And then we take that

49:17transcript and we turn it into content

49:20using um this tool that my colleague

49:22Noah Learner built. Um and so it's

49:24really good. Does a really good job of

49:26quoting um things that were said in the

49:28interview and stuff. So now I'm like,

49:29"Okay, I want to see if a human writer

49:31taking that same transcript will produce

49:33anything better that will rank better

49:36than what the tool used." Cuz like I've

49:38had some of my staff are like, "Well,

49:39it's AI content because it's an AI

49:41powered tool." And I'm like, "It doesn't

49:43matter." But I want to actually like

49:45have something to show that it doesn't

49:46matter. So, um that's where I'm actually

49:50having a human writer try it to see if

49:51there's uh any difference. I could be

49:53wrong,

49:54>> but I'm not expecting it to be

49:56different.

49:56>> I wanted to ask you because you were

49:57mentioning call trackers. What what what

49:59do you recommend for call trackers?

50:01>> Yeah, so we usually like I see the

50:03majority of our clients use Call Rail.

50:04They're they're kind of the giants in

50:06the space that we work in. Um, some of

50:08them have their own proprietary stuff

50:09and whatever, but Call Rail is really

50:11easy to use and uh integrates really

50:13well with like Google properties and

50:14stuff.

50:16>> Uh, the pruning thing is I'm I'm looking

50:18forward to that experiment. I I came

50:19across this post on X and this woman was

50:22like, "Yeah, I deleted uh I pruned 200

50:24pages and our rankings just like shot

50:26up."

50:27>> And [clears throat] um

50:29>> I've heard so many of those.

50:30>> I'm a huge fan of pruning. I'm a huge

50:33fan of of of pruning for sure. So, if

50:36you want to interview somebody on that

50:37topic, talk to Lars Lofrren. I don't

50:39know if you've had him on, but he

50:41>> many times. Lars is great.

50:42>> Yeah. Oh, he's

50:43>> Oh, yeah. We've talked about pruning. We

50:44We did this like two three hour helpful

50:48content update episode with him,

50:50Gogenra, and David Quaid. And he's like,

50:53"One of the things that I will do to

50:55recover an H an HCU site is we will do

50:59like this mega prune." And the the

51:02people of the site, they hate it. And I

51:04hate it. and everybody hate hates it,

51:05but we got to do it anyway. And and so

51:07we had this long discussion about how to

51:09figure out what to prune, how to like go

51:12about it. [snorts]

51:14>> That's an interesting So, I will tell

51:15you, I've done pruning on uh like HCU

51:18level hits sites. It wasn't I don't know

51:20if it was HCU specifically, but like I

51:23called them classifiers. Like whenever

51:25you have a domainwide penalty and none

51:27of your crap ranks and you went from

51:29like here to like here all in one core

51:31update, that's that's usually when you

51:33have a domain level penalty. So I I have

51:35a list of sites that have those um that

51:38I track and uh we definitely got like a

51:41bunch of businesses in that camp earlier

51:43this year contact us. And for a few of

51:46them, I did a big pruning project uh

51:49where we deleted like a good chunk if

51:52not like 50% more than 50% of their

51:54content. Uh cuz nothing was ranking

51:55anyways. So I looked back and I was like

51:57which pages were leading to leads and

51:59conversions and like really really

52:00matter. Kept those and like just got rid

52:02of all the rest. It didn't recover the

52:03domains yet. So I don't know. I should

52:05ask Lars like what the timeline is. But

52:07this was the spring of this year. None

52:09of them recovered with like the Mayor

52:11update or August um or anything like

52:13that. So, it it didn't work yet. Um, if

52:17you have a domain penalty, but I I don't

52:19know how often Google comes back to

52:20re-evaluate those. Like, if they've

52:22completely nailed your domain,

52:24>> how often do they even like look to see

52:26if they'll regain?

52:27>> What external signal are you like once

52:29you've done this pruning, are you are

52:31you driving external signals or to the

52:34site? Are you

52:34>> getting better and stuff? Are you

52:36building links, getting brand mentions,

52:39>> all sorts of these things?

52:40>> I mean, they're all big businesses or

52:41real businesses and stuff too, right?

52:43Like one of them is a um they're a

52:46massive company that has like tons of

52:49locations. Like they're a well-known

52:51brand. So I mean they're just naturally

52:53going to

52:54>> Why did they get hit by the HCU?

52:56>> Uh AI content. So scaled.

52:59>> When when was when was it?

53:01>> Uh most of these were either June or

53:04December of last year. Um one of those

53:06core updates.

53:07>> Okay. Okay. Yeah, those were the two

53:09>> there's different there's all these

53:10different helpful content updates

53:12>> and so like I'm I'm more so talking

53:14about like content sites.

53:16>> Yeah. No, these are actual businesses

53:18like real [clears throat] businesses. Um

53:20the other big one that it

53:21>> pass that's I mean that like yeah those

53:24those penalties are devastating. That's

53:26why that's why like me, you, everybody,

53:31even people, even people who wear very

53:33dark hats say don't play around with

53:37scaled content on your money site. Don't

53:39do it.

53:40>> Big brands need to hear this because

53:41they're getting pitched like, "Oh, you

53:44can spin up like, you know, a page for

53:46every neighborhood, a page for every

53:47city, and like, you know, and your

53:49traffic will go up." And that's actually

53:50a true statement because your traffic

53:51will go up until it it declines. But

53:54>> again, a year ago, I don't think this

53:55was risky. Uh I never seen any reason

53:58not to do it other than it's a waste of

53:59time, right? You put up a bunch of

54:01content and it doesn't rank, then you've

54:03wasted a bunch of time. Um but now it's

54:06like, oh no, there's actually a risk

54:07involved. Um so yeah, I agree. Like big

54:10brands need to hear this cuz some of the

54:12things I've I've seen I'm like, what

54:14were you thinking? But they there's some

54:16new, you know, hot shot in the marketing

54:19company that comes in and that's like we

54:20can scale your traffic and we can, you

54:22know, do all this awesome thing and like

54:24and then it just uh crashes, right? But

54:27I think it was June of last year,

54:29December of last year, and May of this

54:31year that were the most devastating to

54:33local business sites. Um, so those are

54:36the updates.

54:37>> If you're a scammer, it's a pretty good

54:38business model. Think about it. You you

54:40you go into a you go into a company that

54:43doesn't know anything and you're like,

54:44"Listen, I'm going to I'm going to 100

54:46times your organic traffic. It's going

54:48to be crazy. It's going to blow your

54:50mind." And then you're like, "Let's see

54:51it." So, you put in this scaled AI

54:53content and it works for a bit. And then

54:56while it's working, the CEO, the CMO is

55:00giving you the most incredible

55:01recommendations. This guy is so legit.

55:04This girl is so legit. Look at what they

55:07did. Oh my god, this is crazy. Every day

55:10it's doubling. This is insane. And now

55:13you have all these recommendations and

55:14then it crashes and and you're and

55:17you're just like, "Oh, don't worry.

55:18It'll come back. I don't know what's

55:19wrong." I like, "Don't worry."

55:21Meanwhile, you've had all these

55:23recommendations for people who are

55:24paying you to go into their companies

55:26and doing it and it's working for them.

55:27And kind of like a parasite, you're

55:29you're like spreading and and then by

55:31the time that people realize that you

55:33are the reason that their businesses

55:35aren't showing up anymore, it's like now

55:38you're you have gotten so many crazy

55:41recommendations.

55:42And most people aren't going to go and

55:44write bad things on you. If you're if

55:46you're a scammer,

55:48that's a pretty good scam tactic.

55:50>> See, I don't I don't recommend that. I'm

55:52not recommending that. I'm not

55:53recommending that. But I'm just I'm

55:55thinking out loud which is like

55:56>> okay

55:57>> it's there's a reason that there's a

55:58reason that like you don't see when

56:00people are when people share on X look

56:03at this crazy growth from my scaled from

56:05my AI content pipeline. There's a reason

56:07that they don't show the aftermath.

56:10There's a reason.

56:11>> Well, yeah. So there's a there's a

56:12company I know the company behind it cuz

56:14we we got one of their clients and they

56:16hired them to do link building and it

56:18was cloud stacking. So that that

56:20terminology if you're not I don't know

56:22Google it. I think Kyle Roof has a

56:23really good article that talks about

56:25what cloud stacking is. They were doing

56:27that. It's actually really easy to find

56:28their clients because you start seeing

56:30the same, you know, b like businesses

56:32linked to from some of the same websites

56:34and then you get the format down. It's

56:35like you can reverse engineer it and get

56:37like a list of all their clients. So I I

56:38did that a little bit like I looked to

56:40see what other sites were on the same

56:42network through the same company, found

56:44a list of their domains and I started a

56:45prediction list and I was like this

56:46site's going to crash, this site's going

56:48to crash. And this year I've taken at

56:49least like five or six already off the

56:51prediction list because they crashed.

56:53>> So I'm like this is sad that I'm able to

56:54actually predict this now. Um because I

56:57saw this one guy crash, knew this was

56:59why he crashed, and then now I'm seeing

57:01others in the same boat. But the crazy

57:03thing is you look through the list, more

57:05than half of them are still climbing. So

57:07it's like, you know, like they're still

57:10doing really well. So

57:12>> until they're not.

57:13>> Exactly. But I'm like, I don't know if

57:14these people even realize or I don't

57:16know if they're like intentionally doing

57:18it. I think it's because

57:20>> Google never used to penalize this to

57:22the level that they are now. So, it

57:23wasn't like it was it was fine to do it

57:26like a few years ago. Um, but like I I

57:29never saw small businesses, not in the

57:31industry that I'm in, like in local SEO,

57:32I never saw small businesses getting

57:33domainwide penalties a couple years ago.

57:35Like never saw it. Um, and maybe I just

57:38wasn't dealing with spammy enough

57:39verticals because I've talked to other

57:40people who have, but like I didn't see

57:42it. We get like tons of businesses

57:43contacting us all the time. So,

57:45>> and what Lily Yeah. So, so Lily Ray,

57:48she's been on both of our shows and I I

57:50clipped up um I clipped up our episode

57:52into shorts and one of the things she

57:54said was that when it becomes a real

57:57when something becomes a real problem,

57:59Google will take hyperaggressive

58:02measures.

58:03>> Hyperaggressive. And of course scaled AI

58:06content is going to become I mean we

58:08knew that from the moment we saw chat

58:11GPT. Of course this is going to become a

58:13big issue. And and you you saw that even

58:16in I I believe it was the beginning of

58:192024. It was it was the beginning of of

58:22of that time when a lot of big voices on

58:25X were like look like look at what I'm

58:27doing. And then a few weeks or no, it

58:30was then it was like a a week or two

58:32later. Oh my god, like every property in

58:35my Google Search Console has been hit.

58:37Google's been rooting through my GSC.

58:39Everything's gone.

58:41>> Um [snorts]

58:42and and to be fair, when that happened

58:45then, Google was going after the voices

58:47that were publicly sharing it.

58:49>> Uh but but now Google has huristics to

58:52figure out, is this a scaled content

58:55site? And Google's gotten pretty good at

58:58it.

58:59>> Did I tell you about the lawyer that was

59:00doing all the um the accident pages like

59:02for all the I didn't tell you this one?

59:04Okay. No.

59:05>> So, this is one I was looking at

59:06recently. They got hit I believe in May

59:08of this year. Like just completely wiped

59:10out. Like they don't rank anywhere for

59:12anything. Um and uh they had I actually

59:16um went back to their site map to see

59:17how many pages they were creating in

59:19which months and how like how much

59:21content they were putting out. And they

59:22were basically creating pages about um

59:25like anytime there was a car accident,

59:26they would talk about it like it's news,

59:28you know? So like somebody gets in a car

59:30accident, they would just like reproduce

59:32the news on their website. Um which I

59:34can tell you I had

59:36>> smart.

59:37>> Yeah. I had one or two clients try this.

59:38Didn't work for them. Like they're in

59:40the same boat. Uh they wanted to do this

59:42as well. And I'm like, yeah, this is the

59:43type of stuff you have to avoid because

59:45not only is it outside of your topical

59:47authority, like you shouldn't be

59:48publishing news information if you're a

59:50lawyer. Like that's confusing.

59:52Everything that they're competing with

59:53in the search results are new sites, so

59:55not other um businesses, right? But they

59:58this guy back in 2024, I believe it was,

1:00:01he put out like 2,000 in one month and

1:00:04was totally fine. Totally fine until

1:00:06this year. Like he's been doing this for

1:00:08like five or six years. So it's been

1:00:11working so well.

1:00:12>> Wait, wait. So he's been putting up

1:00:132,000 pages a month for five or six

1:00:15years.

1:00:16>> At first it was like 60, 70, whatever.

1:00:18Like it was like a smaller number. And

1:00:20then I was looking over the timeline and

1:00:21on like December of 2024 he put out like

1:00:24like 2,000 in one month and then after

1:00:25that it was like in the hundreds per

1:00:27month. And um so he's just been

1:00:29continually doing

1:00:30>> traffic before he got hit.

1:00:31>> Oh high. Like that's what I'm saying.

1:00:33He's been doing this for like it's not a

1:00:34new thing. He didn't start doing this

1:00:37recently and I think that's important.

1:00:39>> Wait, how many years was he getting away

1:00:40with this for?

1:00:41>> Like at least five. I have I'd have to

1:00:43look up the chart.

1:00:43>> So So let me let me ask you this. Was do

1:00:46you think for him it was worth it? Uh, I

1:00:49don't know.

1:00:50>> Five years getting away with that.

1:00:51>> Okay. But his domain no longer ranks

1:00:53anywhere. So, I don't know. I think it

1:00:55would depend.

1:00:55>> He'll get a new domain. If I have five

1:00:57years of that crazy traffic.

1:00:59>> Yeah. Yeah. Fair enough.

1:01:01>> He'll get a new domain, use that money,

1:01:02pay some good link builders, like

1:01:05>> Yeah. This is where I'm like it it um so

1:01:08I don't know what the cost is to the

1:01:10business because if I'm thinking again

1:01:11if it's a real business let's say that

1:01:12domain is advertised

1:01:14>> elsewhere like and you've got to own

1:01:16your business cards and your billboards

1:01:18and like whatever um then maybe here

1:01:20okay I've got the chart up sorry let me

1:01:22actually give you the real numbers cuz I

1:01:23want to like okay so he's been doing it

1:01:24since 2018.

1:01:25>> Oh my gosh.

1:01:26>> Um and uh hold on I think 2022 was when

1:01:31like it kind of jumped quite a bit. So

1:01:33he was publishing and to be clear not

1:01:35every single one of these numbers was an

1:01:37accident page but like the majority of

1:01:38them were. I didn't go through like I

1:01:40went through his site map to see like

1:01:41obviously he's got other pages on his

1:01:43site.

1:01:43>> A lot of it is top of funnel garbage is

1:01:45where

1:01:45>> yeah most of these pages were about a

1:01:48specific car accident that happened.

1:01:50>> Um and he was

1:01:51>> he could he could relate them because if

1:01:52it bleeds it leads and he could relate

1:01:54it to his practice,

1:01:56>> right? Because he deals with car

1:01:57accidents. But

1:01:58>> it's like you're not a news site first

1:02:00of all. But he went in 2022 was when the

1:02:03volume upped and it started getting to

1:02:04the hundreds for the most part. And then

1:02:072024 was when he had 2,000 publish in

1:02:09one month. Kept going, kept going, kept

1:02:11going. And like I mean 2026 in January,

1:02:14he published 775 pages on his website.

1:02:17Uh then 725 the next month. And like

1:02:19everything was smooth sailing until May.

1:02:21>> I Joy, I want that. I want that sweet

1:02:24click data. I want to know I want to

1:02:25know how how much traffic he's getting.

1:02:28>> So Oh my gosh, the numbers. Okay, hold

1:02:30on. Let me actually see if I can chart

1:02:31this out in HFS and I'll tell you. Uh,

1:02:33give me a sec.

1:02:34>> You can cut this. You can cut this out,

1:02:35right?

1:02:36>> I can I can cut anything out. Um,

1:02:39[laughter] yeah. Yeah. But um I'm I'm c

1:02:41cuz like

1:02:43there's a level where it's like

1:02:46>> now we're debating. I don't think that

1:02:48this guy knew he was going to have his

1:02:50domain hit. So I'm like this is one of

1:02:52those things where I'm like take if

1:02:54you're thinking about doing this

1:02:54strategy and I also don't know if you'd

1:02:57get away with it for five years now. I

1:02:58don't think you would. So if you if you

1:03:01want to try this, this is what we but

1:03:02this is what we say. If you want to try

1:03:03this, try it on a different domain and

1:03:06and have that not be connected to your

1:03:09primary GSC to your primary Google

1:03:11search console.

1:03:12>> Okay, so how much do you tr like trust

1:03:13traffic numbers in uh AHFS? Hold on.

1:03:17>> Enough for enough for for this episode.

1:03:19>> Okay, at at peak uh back in March of

1:03:23this year, it's listing 6,900. Uh that's

1:03:26that's high for a law firm, I would say.

1:03:29Uh back in 2024, well, again, this is it

1:03:32depends on what kind of site you're

1:03:33looking at. It's that's a good number

1:03:35for a law firm. Um 30,000 was December

1:03:382024. So, it's gone up quite a bit um

1:03:41since then. And then it crashed. You

1:03:44know what? I think I can show you this

1:03:46without

1:03:47>> I don't think it was worth it.

1:03:49>> Without Did you want to see the I can

1:03:50screen share and show it to you?

1:03:52>> Yeah, screen share. Let's see.

1:03:53>> It's not showing the domain, which I

1:03:54really really don't want.

1:03:55>> Yeah. Yeah. Let's Let's do it.

1:03:56>> Hold on. Hold on.

1:03:57>> You can just click the screen share

1:03:58button.

1:03:59>> I'll make a time stamp.

1:04:01>> All right. Here we go.

1:04:02>> So that's the that's the graph here. So

1:04:06>> last five years. Look at that. And wait.

1:04:08So uh Okay. Wait. Can you go?

1:04:13This is not worth it.

1:04:15>> He was He's dumb.

1:04:18>> Or is SEO's dumb? I don't know.

1:04:20>> Yeah, he's a dummy. Yeah, it's I mean

1:04:23>> because you're saying that a lot of it

1:04:24is top offunnel traffic, too.

1:04:26>> Yeah, this this one is Well, no. Yeah,

1:04:28it's definitely not um like people are

1:04:30looking for specific. A lot of it's uh

1:04:33because I've seen sites that have done

1:04:34this. I've seen some of the uh that

1:04:36>> honestly it's one of the dumbest things

1:04:38that you could do because you could

1:04:39spend this the the last you said he's

1:04:41been doing this since 2018. He could

1:04:44spend uh the last 8 years doing proper

1:04:48SEO and he'd be way further if he wasn't

1:04:51investing his time into these like

1:04:55stupid little shortcuts.

1:04:57>> Yeah. Let me let me show you the graph.

1:04:59This is his um I can screen share this

1:05:01as well and show this to you. Let me

1:05:02just move you over to the other screen

1:05:04and I'll screen share. So here's the

1:05:06chart.

1:05:08>> This [snorts] is number of pages. This

1:05:10is the number of pages he was publishing

1:05:11by month by year.

1:05:15This guy's a dummy.

1:05:17>> And this is the type of content.

1:05:19>> I'm sorry. I'm sorry to him.

1:05:20>> This is this is like

1:05:22>> passenger passenger ejected in serious

1:05:25rollover crash on I435 in Kansas City.

1:05:29And it's it's just like a news article.

1:05:31>> I have a list of lawyers that are doing

1:05:34this though. Um like it's it's not

1:05:37something that a lot of them do, but

1:05:39definitely um one that I've seen

1:05:40multiple times. Um, I don't know how

1:05:43common it is. I couldn't tell you how

1:05:44many lawyers do this, but it was like,

1:05:45oh yeah, this really great way to get

1:05:48content out there that would bring in

1:05:49traffic, lots and lots of traffic, and

1:05:51you probably convert some of it. Um, but

1:05:53yeah, it's not working so well anymore.

1:05:56>> Joy, is is so is position number one on

1:06:00Google dead?

1:06:01>> Yes.

1:06:02>> Okay. And

1:06:04>> I'll stand behind that statement.

1:06:05>> Okay. So, what should people what should

1:06:07people do going forward? Let's talk

1:06:09about We've been talking a lot about

1:06:10what doesn't work. Let's end the episode

1:06:12with things that SEOs should do that

1:06:15works that they should focus on, invest

1:06:17time in, invest money in.

1:06:20>> Yes. So, anything that will help build

1:06:22your brand, right? So, I think

1:06:23traditional marketing has has increased

1:06:26substantially to helping SEO efforts.

1:06:28So, I think um I've mentioned this

1:06:30before in your show, Edward, winning

1:06:31awards is something that's a new tactic

1:06:34that we um suggest clients do all the

1:06:37time now that I didn't used to suggest a

1:06:38year ago. um making sure that the way

1:06:41that you're

1:06:41>> making up awards. No, no, no. I'm

1:06:43joking. But not really. But not really.

1:06:45I mean, people are doing it and it's

1:06:47working and it's and it's hard and it's

1:06:49and it's hard to it's hard to detect.

1:06:53>> Like

1:06:56big people who have been on this show

1:06:57many times are I'm sure you've seen it

1:07:00on X. I don't I'm not going to call them

1:07:01out, but like I'm sure you know what I'm

1:07:04talking about.

1:07:04>> I know what you're I know exactly what

1:07:06you're talking about. No, less people

1:07:07who do this too. I I wouldn't do it, but

1:07:09again, depends on the level of brand. If

1:07:10you pitch this to a um large brand,

1:07:13they'd probably laugh at you. So, I

1:07:14>> Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Abs.

1:07:16And if and if and if you're a large

1:07:18brand, you probably won real awards and

1:07:20you don't need to do this.

1:07:21>> Yeah. I think

1:07:22>> again,

1:07:24if there's an extremely niche keyword

1:07:26and it's like, well, we don't have any

1:07:28awards that are related to that keyword.

1:07:30It's like, [laughter]

1:07:33>> I don't know. Um, I would uh definitely

1:07:36prioritize

1:07:38um your your website like good

1:07:39oldfashioned SEO is actually I think

1:07:41again working even better. It it matters

1:07:43more for the AI we're seeing on Google

1:07:46um than it did for organic. So I think

1:07:49that's good. Um I think reviews still

1:07:51despite um the variances of how much

1:07:53they matter matter a lot. Also you

1:07:56probably want to get reviews on a few

1:07:57other sites now too. That's another

1:07:59thing that I think is slightly different

1:08:01than before. social media is becoming

1:08:04more of a must. Um, so we're current I'm

1:08:06doing actually a lot of testing on that

1:08:07too, like just trying to figure out like

1:08:09what exactly on social media um,

1:08:13helps with SEO and helps with AI. Had

1:08:16our first successful like Reddit post

1:08:17that we did for a client that actually

1:08:19got traction where like we try to get

1:08:21ones that get like lots of views and

1:08:22clicks. It's really hard to do for

1:08:23another business. Um, so it's hard, but

1:08:27I think again like the harder something

1:08:29is, the more likely it's going to stick

1:08:32long term and the more likely it's going

1:08:34to have value that's not going to die

1:08:35off. Um, and when it comes to content, I

1:08:38would say you want content around

1:08:39anything with numbers. So numbers are

1:08:42kind of the things that we're pushing,

1:08:43things like, you know, statistics, uh,

1:08:46cost data, anything that's like factual

1:08:49stuff. Uh, Google loves that. And I

1:08:51think it's more important than ever to

1:08:52be super detailed, like really really

1:08:55detailed about everything that you did

1:08:56for your customers. Uh like down to the

1:08:59color of their cabinets, down to like

1:09:02how long it took you to do something, um

1:09:05what type of business they are, what

1:09:07type of homeowner they are, uh where

1:09:09they live, uh you know, without giving

1:09:11away any private information, but like

1:09:13um again, if queries are starting to get

1:09:15longer, if that's the trend we're

1:09:16heading towards, then you need to

1:09:17actually have more detail on your

1:09:19website. So, I haven't changed much when

1:09:23it comes to like our playbook for

1:09:24on-site in the last year. It's still as

1:09:27effective as ever.

1:09:28>> Real photos or AI photos?

1:09:30>> I'm sticking with real for now. I

1:09:32haven't done an AI photo test in a

1:09:34while, but um I don't think with phones

1:09:36these days, it's actually that hard to

1:09:38get a photo. You know, everybody's

1:09:39phones takes pretty high quality photos

1:09:41these days. Um so, the the barrier to

1:09:43entry isn't what it used to be. Um so,

1:09:45we don't have an issue getting photos

1:09:46like I would have said something

1:09:48different probably five or 10 years ago.

1:09:50What what type of keywords are you

1:09:51targeting?

1:09:53>> Yeah, so I I agree with you, Edward. I

1:09:54think thatformational keywords as a

1:09:56traffic source are starting to die. I

1:09:58mean, the good news is I have like most

1:10:01of our clients, if you looked at their

1:10:03GSSE for the last 16 months, traffic is

1:10:05down. Most of them, like I'm not going

1:10:06to sit here and pretend that that trend

1:10:08didn't hit the businesses we work with.

1:10:10It did. Mostly informational. Like

1:10:12almost all of the traffic decline was um

1:10:14for keywords that AI overviews are just

1:10:17like just taking it all, right? Um, so,

1:10:20uh, the good news is I haven't talked to

1:10:22a client that was devastated by that or

1:10:25even most of them didn't even feel it

1:10:27like at all with their bottom line. So,

1:10:29it's like fine.

1:10:32Goes to show you that like that never

1:10:33should have been the focus anyway.

1:10:35>> Yeah.

1:10:35>> Um,

1:10:36>> so yeah, I I definitely agree with like

1:10:38your entire approach like longtail

1:10:40keywords are are the way to go. Trying

1:10:42to find like the very specific

1:10:43>> Not even just long long tail. doesn't

1:10:45even sorry to interrupt cuz a lot of

1:10:46people think that I'm only after long

1:10:48tail cuz there's plenty of there's

1:10:49plenty of high intent keywords that are

1:10:51two words.

1:10:52>> Yes. Yes, you're right. You're right. Um

1:10:54like a big one for local is like brands.

1:10:57Um so you know for example uh if you're

1:10:59like a garage door company like the

1:11:01brands of garage doors you sell or the

1:11:03specific like model names or things like

1:11:05that is like the level of detail you

1:11:07need. Um, so a lot of people just don't

1:11:10go deep enough with the descriptive um,

1:11:13ways that they're like listing their

1:11:15content and stuff. So content I think is

1:11:16better than ever. Uh, link building has

1:11:18been a bit of a struggle in the sense of

1:11:20like I think volume of links is

1:11:22definitely not something I have

1:11:25previously gone after, still wouldn't go

1:11:27after, but uh, usually in local you

1:11:29don't need a ton of links. So it's it's

1:11:32not about quantity.

1:11:33>> Love it.

1:11:33>> Um, yeah. And I think local link

1:11:36building is like the kind of big thing

1:11:37that we are focusing on the most lately.

1:11:40Um so like uh getting links from niche

1:11:44sites that only exist in your particular

1:11:46industry or sites that are like specific

1:11:48to your geo. So you know if you're in

1:11:50Seattle there's like a bunch of

1:11:51different Seattle specific sites and

1:11:53things. Um again I think that importance

1:11:55has gone up um in the last few years not

1:11:57down.

1:11:59>> This was a lot of fun.

1:12:01>> Yes. [clears throat] Thanks for having

1:12:02me.

1:12:02>> This was a good episode.

1:12:04I was making jokes. I'm actually um I

1:12:06don't know if you can tell I'm kind of

1:12:07sick. I didn't tell you at the beginning

1:12:08of the episode. Like I have a I'm like

1:12:11crazy jetlagged, have a crazy sore

1:12:13throat and uh I had so much fun in this

1:12:17episode and so like

1:12:18>> you seem a little low energy, but like

1:12:20>> Oh yeah, I'm super low energy. I'm like

1:12:22super I'm super tired, super low energy,

1:12:24but but honestly this episode energized

1:12:28me,

1:12:28>> reinvigorated breathed life into me.

1:12:31Joy,

1:12:31>> I know. I was trying not to be too

1:12:33negative. I know I do that a lot because

1:12:34I I study the things that fail, but I'm

1:12:36like, "No, no, we have like plenty of

1:12:37things that still work." Um, it's just

1:12:39more new things that are failing than

1:12:41things like the new stuff that's

1:12:43working. Like, the stuff that's working,

1:12:45a lot of it is the same stuff that we've

1:12:47been doing all along. Um, however, the

1:12:49the risky things, those are changing

1:12:51like faster than they used to.

1:12:55>> Yeah. I I you know I'm I'm kind of a fan

1:12:57of some risky things, but you really

1:13:00[clears throat] got to think hard about

1:13:02like could Google detect this? And I I

1:13:05think a lot of people they they do this

1:13:07these risky tactics without realizing

1:13:09Google has all the data at its disposal.

1:13:12And yeah,

1:13:14>> I I was getting there and then I've

1:13:16completely reversed. Like I was starting

1:13:17to get to the point where I was like,

1:13:18"Oh, like screw Google. Like don't

1:13:20listen to what they say." and like, you

1:13:22know, as long as it's not something

1:13:23you're going to get nailed for

1:13:25currently.

1:13:25>> Oh, I I think people should absolutely

1:13:27listen to what Google says.

1:13:28>> Well, okay. Yeah. With with a grain of

1:13:30salt. But I would I think where I where

1:13:32I've changed my thinking on risk is I

1:13:34used to kind of measure it based on what

1:13:35I was currently seeing. Now I'm like,

1:13:37what's going to happen a year from now?

1:13:38Like CTR manipulation, for example. I

1:13:40don't think Google's currently really

1:13:41dinging it much at all. So, it's like

1:13:43really working right now. I can't really

1:13:45see that they're like actively

1:13:46penalizing sites that are doing it. Like

1:13:48it's one of those things that you do it

1:13:50and it the worst case scenarios doesn't

1:13:51work. So I used to look at stuff like

1:13:53that like a couple years ago and say

1:13:54like why not? Now I'm taking a different

1:13:56approach cuz I'm like well what if they

1:13:57start targeting it next year and then

1:13:59>> well that's that's well that's something

1:14:01that I wouldn't do because that's

1:14:02something that they couldn't they they

1:14:04can detect that's something that they

1:14:06that they can detect but inauthentic

1:14:08mentions. So like um you know there you

1:14:12see you see an article that is getting

1:14:14cited recommending like let's say let's

1:14:17say you're like um give me a local

1:14:20keyword.

1:14:21>> Okay. Sure. Let's do plumber Dallas.

1:14:23>> Plumber Dallas. All right. So you're

1:14:24you're going to an NLM and you're like

1:14:27yeah I my pipes burst. Um I'm in Dallas.

1:14:29I need a plumber. and and you see just

1:14:33across a range of prompts, it's this

1:14:35like one article or two articles that

1:14:37keep on getting cited and then you

1:14:40contact them and you're like, I'll give

1:14:41you x amount of money if you put us if

1:14:43you recommend us in your article and and

1:14:45and then now you're the one who's

1:14:47getting recommended by the LLMs because

1:14:49of that. That's against Google's rules.

1:14:52>> But like are they going to be able to

1:14:54detect that? No.

1:14:56>> No way. I think they Okay, so this is

1:14:58where

1:14:59>> they will be able to detect it depending

1:15:00on the site and how much they do it.

1:15:02Okay, so the biggest way that I've seen

1:15:04>> if you do if you do anything too much

1:15:06then it's okay. Sorry,

1:15:07>> but it's not you, it's the site that

1:15:08matters, right? Like it's like will they

1:15:10catch the site and then devalue all the

1:15:12the the places that that site is linking

1:15:14to. Depends on what the site does,

1:15:16right? So I think like Google the way

1:15:18that they track link networks, it's not

1:15:19like the site's buying the links

1:15:20necessarily. I think they're they look

1:15:21at the patterns of the sites selling the

1:15:23links and then if you're on that site,

1:15:24they know you bought the links. And it's

1:15:27not actually that hard. Like I started

1:15:28putting in sites, look at their outgoing

1:15:30anchors. You want to know if a a site is

1:15:32selling links, look at the go outgoing

1:15:34anchor text. It's telling if you see

1:15:36casinos and personal injury lawyers,

1:15:38they're selling links.

1:15:39>> Yeah, sure. Okay. [laughter] But

1:15:44yeah, but first of all, is that is that

1:15:46going to hurt your business? Maybe you

1:15:47lost like a couple hundred bucks by

1:15:49buying this, but in the meantime, like

1:15:51for as long as it worked, you got you

1:15:54probably made some sales cuz you you're

1:15:57getting recommended.

1:15:58>> Like most things, if you don't do it at

1:15:59scale, you'll probably won't get caught,

1:16:01right? Like it's like what Google is

1:16:02targeting is not a specific tactic. It's

1:16:04scale. They're targeting links at scale,

1:16:06link building tactics at scale, content

1:16:08at scale. Like it doesn't matter if it's

1:16:10AI or not. If you scale, like I don't

1:16:12think AI wrote half those articles I was

1:16:14talking about. AI wasn't even a thing

1:16:15back in 2018. So it's like, no, these

1:16:17were probably handwritten. Doesn't

1:16:19matter.

1:16:20>> Can you can you can you scale something,

1:16:24but they're handwritten and you you're

1:16:28continually building your authority and

1:16:30then it's all right

1:16:32>> cuz I'm talking about I'm talking about

1:16:34like a major company. Let's talk about

1:16:35like a a Red Bull. And Red Red Bull like

1:16:37Red Bull I looked at Red Bull's SEO. Um

1:16:40[snorts] they have major authority

1:16:42because you know they're sponsoring the

1:16:43biggest events on the planet. They're

1:16:44getting the best links. it like what

1:16:46they are doing. They're getting the best

1:16:48links. Uh but they don't really know. It

1:16:50seems like from what I was looking the

1:16:52when I was briefly looking at their SEO,

1:16:54it it it looks like they don't really

1:16:56know what they're doing when it comes to

1:16:57targeting keywords. So, let's say they

1:16:58just started to go hard targeting

1:17:00keywords and they had like an awesome

1:17:03SEO writer, an awesome content writer,

1:17:05and they're they're targeting all these

1:17:07like high intent keywords in their

1:17:08niche. They could probably put up a ton

1:17:11of pages. And I'm not going to suggest

1:17:13that they should put up pages really

1:17:15fast, like they should be putting up

1:17:16like 10 a day, but they might even be

1:17:18able to with that with that amount of

1:17:20authority. And if the pages are

1:17:22satisfying intent,

1:17:25>> actually, I don't see. Yeah.

1:17:26>> The way I imagine Google looking at it

1:17:28is they're they're really trying to

1:17:29answer the question, does this page only

1:17:30exist for SEO? Right? I'm sure they've

1:17:32got ways to tell that, but um any

1:17:34business I've looked at

1:17:36>> that's scaled a specific thing. So, for

1:17:39example, if you scale a bunch of best

1:17:41posts and you say you're the best roofer

1:17:43in 15 different cities, you are way more

1:17:46likely to get caught than if you do it

1:17:48on one. Um, so anytime that I think what

1:17:51Google looks at for scale is like

1:17:52similarities in URL structure,

1:17:54similarities in title tags, similarities

1:17:56in um things like that. If you're like

1:17:58Trip Adviser, this isn't a problem

1:18:00because of the type of site you are. So

1:18:02Google understands that if you're Trip

1:18:03Advisor, Yelp, whatever, you're going to

1:18:05have like millions of pages that are

1:18:07going to have the same format, and

1:18:08that's totally fine. But if you're a

1:18:09small business, they have like a

1:18:10different criteria. If you're Red Bull,

1:18:13I would say, and you start scaling the

1:18:15same stuff, just insert different color,

1:18:18insert different whatever, then you're

1:18:19probably going to get caught. Um, but I

1:18:22don't think

1:18:22>> that's that's against Google's

1:18:23guidelines. That's against Google's

1:18:24guidelines, too.

1:18:25>> But I don't think just adding more

1:18:26content is going to do anything bad.

1:18:28Like if the content's all different and

1:18:31not the same, then as long as it's like

1:18:34good, and I know that's like so

1:18:36subjective, what's good content? As long

1:18:38as it's stuff that answers users

1:18:40questions that Google doesn't have 5

1:18:41million copies of already, then it

1:18:43should rank. If it's like really not

1:18:46contributing anything um to the

1:18:48worldwide web, which is the majority of

1:18:50pages that get published, then uh yeah,

1:18:53I don't think you should be doing it at

1:18:54scale. But it's it's a very nuanced

1:18:55question.

1:18:57Uh, did you see I I don't know if you

1:18:59did, but so David Quaid and I had had

1:19:00this episode. Can you launch a

1:19:02100,000page website and not get and not

1:19:05get penalized?

1:19:06>> What did he say?

1:19:07>> Uh, he said it's hard. I mean, everyone

1:19:10everyone agrees that it's hard. I made

1:19:11the argument that you that you can do

1:19:13it. Like if if you are Microsoft and you

1:19:17have all this interesting data or you

1:19:19know what even if you're not Microsoft

1:19:21if you have all this really interesting

1:19:23data and you just productize it and you

1:19:26turn it into a database that anybody can

1:19:28access and you you make announcements

1:19:31for it and people and it's actually good

1:19:33data and it's going viral and people are

1:19:34sharing it. I I think you'll be fine. I

1:19:38think I think because it's this is novel

1:19:40data. It's proprietary novel data that's

1:19:44that's put online in an interesting way

1:19:47that people actually like and they're

1:19:49sharing. And actually I I don't see why

1:19:52a website like that would get hit. Now

1:19:55the problem is like like you were saying

1:19:57a lot of these a lot of people when they

1:19:59try to do this they're they're just

1:20:01going and scraping and stitching

1:20:03together other people's content.

1:20:05>> Mhm.

1:20:05>> And there's nothing new on it.

1:20:07>> Yeah.

1:20:07>> That's that's the problem. That's why I

1:20:09think Reddit does so well because

1:20:10everything that gets posted on Reddit is

1:20:11some new opinion, some new thing for the

1:20:13most part. Not saying Reddit's got its

1:20:15own problems, but like it's like user

1:20:16experiences, things that come out that

1:20:18are new. Um, yeah, I just uh I don't

1:20:21know. I try not to have opinions on

1:20:22things that I haven't tested or uh I've

1:20:25never launched a site that large. Um, so

1:20:28I have no idea what would happen um from

1:20:30doing it, but I can't imagine I ever

1:20:32would have a client want to do that, so

1:20:33I'll probably never have to worry about

1:20:35it. No, I I I did it because um a fan

1:20:38had had messaged me and was like, "Can

1:20:40you and David do an episode on this?"

1:20:42Because me and my friends, we we keep

1:20:44trying to launch um these these sites

1:20:47with like tens of thousands of pages and

1:20:49it's just not working. And and he and

1:20:50and he wanted to know, is there a way to

1:20:53do this?

1:20:54>> And uh and and so I looked at the site

1:20:57and it was like a claude site. It looked

1:20:59like a claude site and the information

1:21:02didn't seem to be novel or proprietary

1:21:04at all. Yeah, there's a site I'm

1:21:07tracking. It's on my predicted to crash

1:21:08list that's completely [laughter]

1:21:11completely AI generated. Yeah. Um it's

1:21:15uh it's completely AI generated. It's um

1:21:19in the legal niche ranking very well,

1:21:22but I noticed they have tons of links.

1:21:25Like all of a sudden they got all these

1:21:27links from lawyers who probably don't

1:21:28know they're linking to it would be my

1:21:30assumption.

1:21:31>> Oh, I wonder how they got those links.

1:21:33>> I have theories. But anyways, yeah, so

1:21:35that's uh like that's why they're

1:21:37ranking though. I don't think if you

1:21:39launched a site like that without

1:21:40without the links piece, it would be

1:21:42ranking. And it's like they're they're

1:21:43good links. Like they're links from law

1:21:45firms referencing this site and their

1:21:47content. But the content is completely a

1:21:49thousand.

1:21:50>> Yeah. The links the links can only get

1:21:51you so far because eventually the

1:21:53behavioral signals will tip them over

1:21:55and they're going to get that mount AI

1:21:56pattern.

1:21:57>> Yeah. And it's interesting because it's

1:21:58a it's a category that I'm like maybe

1:22:00it's an okay thing for it to be all AI.

1:22:02I don't know how it's going to go and if

1:22:04people are going to click on it or stay

1:22:06on it, but it's it's an interesting

1:22:08>> Let me ask you this. If Forbes put out

1:22:11scaled AI content,

1:22:13>> would Forbes get hit?

1:22:14>> Yes. Like I think so. I mean, they

1:22:16they've already got history here, right?

1:22:18Like

1:22:18>> Yeah. Yeah.

1:22:19>> So Forbes used to be everywhere a few

1:22:20years ago for like tons of local queries

1:22:23and they had those top best pages that,

1:22:25you know, Lars outed them. So,

1:22:28>> are there are there any websites that

1:22:29you think could get away with scaled AI

1:22:32content?

1:22:34>> Um, I think if you were like Yelp, for

1:22:36example, and you wanted to use AI for

1:22:38like descriptions on all your pages,

1:22:40that's fine. Like, I can't imagine that

1:22:42being bad. Um, because I don't think

1:22:44>> they're using but they're doing that

1:22:46they're doing that with their own

1:22:47proprietary data, right?

1:22:49>> Yeah. Like, so I, you know, I think

1:22:50there's lots of uses. Like, if I was an

1:22:52ecom site and I need a description for

1:22:535,000 different pairs of shoes, um, I

1:22:56don't think it matters if AI, you know,

1:22:59comes up with descriptions for 5,000

1:23:00different pairs of shoes. Um, so it like

1:23:03it's a lot of context is needed, right?

1:23:05Like I don't think AI content is bad at

1:23:07all. Um, I think AI content detecting

1:23:09tools and things like I don't know. Um,

1:23:12I don't I don't find them super useful

1:23:14>> unless unless the ecom site that content

1:23:17was above the fold and it read like AI

1:23:20and people didn't trust the pages and

1:23:23like they see the shoes but they look at

1:23:25the content and they're like, "Uh, yeah,

1:23:27let me just find one that looks more

1:23:29real."

1:23:30>> I mean, I don't know. I don't know if

1:23:31the average user even cares, right? I

1:23:33don't know. I just want to know what the

1:23:34shoe is. I don't care if AI wrote it.

1:23:37There's definitely things that I would

1:23:38turn me off if I knew AI was writing it.

1:23:40It it it definitely on social posts is

1:23:42starting to irritate me like crazy. Like

1:23:45LinkedIn has become such a cesspool of

1:23:46AI content that I don't even want to go

1:23:48there anymore. Um

1:23:50>> that's what I'm saying though. That's

1:23:51what I'm saying though. There there's

1:23:52people who are who really get turned off

1:23:54by by the m dashes and the verbose

1:23:57writing, the wordy writing, uh the the

1:24:01clear pattern patterns. And it's like,

1:24:04do you think I'm stupid? Like when I see

1:24:06people post on LinkedIn these like

1:24:07garbage AI posts, it's like, do you

1:24:09think we're stupid?

1:24:10>> Do you think we're stupid?

1:24:12>> It's like it's offensive.

1:24:14>> LinkedIn added a thing where you can

1:24:15report something as AI slop. I'm like,

1:24:17that's the best feature ever. I like

1:24:19doing that.

1:24:20>> I think we I get more AI content

1:24:23comments, sorry, on my LinkedIn posts

1:24:25than real ones. Like, it's just

1:24:26>> Oh, it's it's Oh, me too. I get a I

1:24:29don't know if I get more. I mean, I get

1:24:30a lot. I get a lot. It's crazy and it's

1:24:32super annoying. Like, do people really

1:24:34think we want to talk to bots? Like, is

1:24:36that what social media has become? Like,

1:24:37no thank you. I'm out.

1:24:38>> I made this episode about um this forum.

1:24:41It's called Wind Wind Windows forum.

1:24:43This is insane. So, they went to the SEO

1:24:45subreddit and and started complaining

1:24:47that they got hit by by Google. They got

1:24:49penalized by Google and that they didn't

1:24:51deserve it. And they're like, "Yeah, we

1:24:53we're really not using that much AI

1:24:55content, and we pruned all the AI

1:24:57content. We removed it." And you look at

1:24:59the site, they didn't remove it. They

1:25:00used a ton of AI content. And not only

1:25:02that, they put in bots into their forum

1:25:06that were clear bots labeled as bots

1:25:08that were responding to their users,

1:25:11their to their human users in human

1:25:13sounding ways. So it like you would be

1:25:16like um you would say, "Yeah, um I

1:25:20really like this thing about Windows.

1:25:22What does everybody else think?" And

1:25:23then a bot would come in that would look

1:25:25like a bot that would say it's a bot and

1:25:27be like, you know, that's a really

1:25:28interesting insight that you have. Wow,

1:25:30you're so it's so cool that you and it's

1:25:32like you [laughter] you're not going on

1:25:34a forum to get kudos from bots and and

1:25:38and they couldn't figure out why they

1:25:40were why they were Yeah, people don't

1:25:42people don't want that.

1:25:44>> Human humans want things. They want

1:25:46coupons. You want something that that

1:25:47humans are going to respond well to, put

1:25:49out a coupon. Like like this is where

1:25:51I'm like people just are focusing on

1:25:52stuff that's trendy. I don't know about

1:25:54you, but like the amount of businesses

1:25:56that are willing to throw money at AI

1:25:58strategies, it's insane. Like, it's

1:26:00actually insane. They're willing.

1:26:02>> And I'm like, this makes no actual sense

1:26:04to me. I'm like, your SEO budget is

1:26:07this, your AI budget is this. And I'm

1:26:09like, an AI traffic currently is 2% of

1:26:12Google like for our clients. I should

1:26:14clarify. nature it's a nature it's a

1:26:16nature of of like uh business school

1:26:18people who were working at these

1:26:19companies like um I was sharing this I

1:26:21was sharing this actually uh with

1:26:23somebody yesterday during the initial

1:26:26coin offering so there were these things

1:26:28called initial coin offering ICOs where

1:26:30people could basically raise a bunch of

1:26:32money by making a token on the

1:26:34blockchain and this was going really

1:26:36viral in 2017 2018 and just like huge

1:26:40amounts of money were being raised from

1:26:42nowhere and then like It was it was

1:26:45crazy. But so this is like the hype

1:26:47around this was so insane that Long

1:26:51Island Iced Tea Company or corporation

1:26:54rebranded themselves and they're still

1:26:56rebranded to this. It was in 2017. They

1:26:59changed their name to Long Island

1:27:02Blockchain Corp. No, Long Blockchain

1:27:04Corp. It was just Long Blockchain Corp.

1:27:06And they did this to capitalize on the

1:27:09blockchain trend. And then they never

1:27:10did anything with it because they got

1:27:12they got you can literally go look

1:27:15Google Long Blockchain Corp and you will

1:27:17see the Wikipedia post saying Long

1:27:20Blockchain Corp. formerly Long Island

1:27:22ICT Company and it's it's that's that's

1:27:25what these companies that's what that's

1:27:27what that's human nature. They get

1:27:29swiped up they get swept up in the hype.

1:27:31>> I'm just like it's a waste of your

1:27:33money. Like put your money where you're

1:27:34going to make money.

1:27:35>> It's a waste. It's put your money where

1:27:36you're going to make money. I I can tell

1:27:38you we are actually sitting down um I

1:27:40was sitting down with one of my VPs

1:27:42recently and we were like, "Okay, which

1:27:43social platform should we really go in

1:27:45on next because we went really hard in

1:27:47on YouTube and it's really paid off. So,