Mastering SEO: From Wild West to Strategy with Barry from First

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Ivor: So hello everyone and welcome to GTM Tells the podcast where I sit down with experts in B2B, go to market to hear and exchange stories that have unlocked growth. And today I'm really pleased to. Have Barry, who is the head of marketing at first.

So Barry, great to have you here today. How's it all going?

Barry: Yeah. Very good.

Ivor: Good stuff. So I think let's, let's get into it. And, um, to kick things off, perhaps it'll be good if you could share a bit about your journey into digital marketing, especially when we initially talked, um. Your focus was on, on SEO, and it'd be really interesting to hear how [00:01:00] you got into that when it was in the Wild West type era.

So yeah, looking forward to hearing.

Barry: Yeah. Uh, I think Wild West is a good description of it either. So yeah, when I, when I started back in 40, um, 14 years ago, um, it really literally was the wild West. It was, you know, digital market was just kind of breaking out. It was just finding its feet. Um, you know, there's no real experts at that time.

It was just kind of, you know, the, see what sticks and see what works. Um. It's strange that, you know, 14 years later, you know, I'm still here. And SEO is such still a fundamental part of, of, you know, of, of our, our strategy at first and so many other companies in, in B2B marketing. Um, but yeah, I, I, I didn't really find, uh, marketing, marketing kind of found me.

So, um, I sort of fell into it as most people do. When your mid twenties, um, started life an, an agency called a People, um, and you know, our, our. But primarily it was kind of small to medium-sized enterprises, which was great because I got to work, um, [00:02:00] across all different size of businesses of all different, um, kinds of marketing budgets, which, you know, presents its own challenges.

Um, but yeah, it was a real, it was a real kind of broad spectrum of, of, of enough for me to cut my teeth on looking after those, um, SEO accounts. And I was basically, back in those days. I would look after those, uh, SEO customers, I'd review their strategies, their campaigns, made recommendations on, on how they could improve their performance and get higher up the organic listings.

Um, but, you know, like you alluded to really was the wild West. It was, you know, a lot of, um, link acquisition, um, you know, a lot of kind of keyword optimization, um, for dous organizations. Um. It was, yeah, it was, it was, it gave me a foothold into digital market. Gimme a taste for it. And then over time, as I, as I kind of moved for the agency, um, you know, got to work on, um, website projects, um, you know, obviously Facebook has Google Ads.

All that was, that was kind of getting launched as well. So it gave me a really good, kind of broad, broad spectrum of, of digital marketing really. Um, [00:03:00] and then obviously after six and a half years there, stepped out into going to, um, uh, in-house, which was a real kind of, um. See change for me because suddenly I didn't have all this sort of team around me to support me.

Uh, I was literal out on my own, having to make all the decisions, and the book kind of stopped with me. So it's a very different, um, kind of pressure. Um, so started at a company called Tactus, which was a technology, um, provider. Um, became one of the biggest OEMs, Microsoft OEMs in, in, in Europe in my time there, which was a fantastic journey to be on.

Um, and then, yeah, I've worked in logistics. Um, worked at, um, agency side working with lots of different B2B companies in more, shall we say, traditional industries. The great thing about that is that there was an opportunity there to kind of bring in someone like the, sort of the SaaS best. Best practices, the things that I was influenced by and bring them into those, those older, um, sectors, um, and really make a difference there and make an impact, which was great.

And sort of drag those, um, kicking and screaming into the 21st century, shall we say. [00:04:00] Um, and now I've landed at first, so I mean, I've been in the l and d world for the last, um, two years. Again, another startup. I'm a glut of a punishment. I like doing the hard yards at the start. I don't like to make life too easy for myself.

But yeah, I love, you know, getting started in the, you know, a blank sheet of paper and really being able to make a difference, um, and, and see that impact over time. And obviously you try a lot of things, but it it strange. However, that, you know, SEO is, is such a good skill to. To learn for any marketer. I think, because as I said to you at the start, you know, 14 years later, here I am on, you know, having the opportunity to speak to you about SEO, uh, and the journey I've been on and, you know, it's still such a, I think, such a fundamental channel for organizations, um, that you need to be kind of betting on that channel early to see the results, you know, and two years in, as I'm sure we're gonna get into, you know, we're starting to see the fruits of that labor.

It does take time. Um. Yeah, it, it, it's one of my favorites and yeah, it, it, it's what life, how it's funny how life kind of works and it's still as fundamental to me now as it was 14 [00:05:00] years ago.

Ivor: Yeah. And before we get into how SEO is today and what you're doing with, with, first, I'd be interested to hear more about how SEO was different. Back then. Um, and what were the key strategies you used when you first were getting started and what were some like key challenges that you, you faced, uh, when you first set out in, in SEO, if you can remember?

Barry: Yeah, my mind's not gone just yet either. It's not yet, but it's, you know, you know what? It's still fresh because in all honesty, the fundamentals haven't changed in 14 years. You know, the things that I used to speak to, to, to our, um. Our customers about and recommend. They're still the same things that I'm kind of doing now.

You know, it was key. It was keyword research, you know, finding relevant keywords in your niche. Um. Great quality content, which I'll come back to on what, what we defined as great quality content. It's probably been the biggest change in that time. Um, you know, good on [00:06:00] paid SEO, you know, good technical SEO you know, are you telling the search engines what that page is about?

Essentially, uh, having a good user experience. Um, you know, someone lands on that page, you know, is your, is your, is your page loading? Is it, is it, are people finding what they're actually searching for, et cetera. And then the, the hardest part for me is that bit, that the sort of bit in the background, the.

Sort the magic bit that people don't really see and and probably underestimate the importance of is like the high quality links. I guess what has changed in the last 14 years is what def what's defined as a high quality link and what's defined as a good user experience, et cetera, because it's very different to, it was 14 years ago, so back then.

Link. Link acquisition was very much about, you know, the volume of links, you know, could you get more links? It didn't te, it didn't generally matter where those links came from. It was just the more, the merrier and then that stand you really good stead, you know, and the, the concept necessarily didn't have to be, um, sort of ground break, you know, in depth for anything like that.

It was just a case of, you know, if you had a key word. [00:07:00] Um, you know, let's say Black Sox, for example, is the first thing that can come to my head. You know, if you had a lot of links going into your website for that keyword and your page mentioned that. You know, word a number of times, you know, you, you had a pretty good chance of getting onto the first page of Google and doing really well out of it.

But what, what happened, um, about sort of three or four years into that journey is that obviously, you know, Google understood that people were, were, were creating it content and it was only just for search engines. It wasn't really. Considering the end user. Um, and then, you know, the Google Penguin and Google, Google Panda updates came out and that sent a shock way through, you know, businesses, as I say, I was, I was working with small to medium sized enterprises, but it didn't just affect them.

It, it affected some of the really big organizations as well. So into Flora, I remember they were one of the big. Um, case studies at the time that were really hit and solved. You know, a lot of companies lost their organic listings overnight. Now the problem, which is probably a whole different podcast in itself, is just depending on that one channel meant that, um.[00:08:00]

You put all your eggs in that basket and suddenly, you know, you didn't have any customers overnight. And, you know, it was, it was hard for a lot of businesses. Um, you know, there's a lot of clearing up, um, link profiles. There's a lot of, you know, redoing websites and redoing of, um, content, et cetera. Um, so it just meant that it's kind of forced people's hand into doing things the right way, but probably the way that it should have always been done from the start anyway.

Um, and I think that was a, as a seismic shift in terms of the SEO. Industry and people really starting then to say, look, there is, you can't really gain that system anymore. There are no shortcuts. You know, you have to do things the right way. You know, you have to great create, um, great quality content with the end user in mind.

Have a great website, um, you know, with a great user experience. So the, the, the, the more it's changed, the more it hasn't, it's just become, you have to, you have to do things the right way now and don't take shortcuts.

Ivor: Yeah. And you mentioned those, these updates like Penguin and, and Panda [00:09:00] and, yeah. I remember when I was, um, digital marketing lead at a large financial enterprise and. They had the same issue where they lost so much traffic overnight and so much revenue was attributed to that traffic as well. And I think one of the issues is as a digital marketing person, as someone focused on SEOs, ensuring that you're kept up to date with all those incoming updates from from Google.

And I wanted to understand how you kind of ensure you are kept up to date and you know about. All these updates coming and how do you kind of adapt to those, uh, changes?

Barry: Yeah, so I'm signed up to, you know, a lot of SEO newsletters, uh, you know, like search engine land and that type of thing. And, and really that's, you know, Neil Patel and, you know, they'll send me, they'll send me emails on a regular basis, and I think that's probably. The best way to keep on top of [00:10:00] it, because it changes, in all honesty, it changes that fast.

There's so many different algorithm updates. You, they're happening every day and, and you don't even sort of notice half of them unless they effect you directly. And then obviously now and again, you'll get, you know, you'll get a, a major one that, that suddenly, you know, sends, sends everything into kind of a tailspin.

Um, but yeah, I think for, for anyone, in terms of trying to keep up with that, there's a, there's a couple of newsletters websites that I recommend, um, with much smarter people. Um, we have much more knowledge about SEO than I, um, who kind of, you know, are on top of this stuff. They'll send the latest, the updates, and then it's just, it's just taking out the bits that you want that, that are relevant to you really, and, and the biggest changes and where it's gonna impact you.

Um, and keeping abreast of it all as well. But it isn't, it isn't easy and keeping on top of it, it changes that fast, but that's, that's the guess why we love it as well. It's never, never sta sitting still.

Ivor: Yeah, definitely some, some good newsletters to, to follow. And I think, you know, clearly SEO has come a long way. The [00:11:00] fundamentals, as you say, Barry, have not changed, but it has developed a lot and it's become a, a lot more sophisticated, um, and will touch on. How it's going to change in the future as well with the advent of, of AI and, um, all the technology that's developing in generative ai.

And, um, I want to, you know, tap into a little bit your experience at first and how you've used SEO to, to drive there and to drive growth there. And you mentioned that. You've built it from pretty much the, the beginning. And so I'd be interested to, to hear how you kind of created that strategy. What were the results and what some key findings, um, there.

Barry: Yeah, I'd be happy to share that because it's been interesting because literally, you know, we started with, you know, when, when I started two years ago, it was literally, we had a, a website. [00:12:00] Um, there was no, no real blog articles on there. There's a few just to kind of kick things off. Um, there was no sort of on page page optimization.

There was no, there was no, um, strategy around like what we were gonna rank for. So it was literally starting from, um, you know, the ground up. Which is, you know, something I enjoy doing because, you know, you can, you can really kind of see the impact of it over time. So in terms of where we went from it, I, you know, imagine two years ago we didn't have any sort of domain authority.

There's some very, very, um, big players who have been doing it for a very long time in, in l and d. Um, and those legacy, um, organizations rank very well for very competitive key phrases. We've, we've. High search volumes. So initially the strategy was obviously to understand our audience and kind of what you're searching for, but to, to go for a less, um, less competitive key phrases.

So ones where we thought there was an opportunity there, some of the longer tail ones, so we weren't going the, for the ones that may be, you know, had. 2000 [00:13:00] searches a month, which we'd all have to be on the first page forward, don't we? But we knew that wasn't gonna happen overnight. So, so we looked at the, the stuff that was maybe had a hundred searches or 50 searches that actually was, was, um, probably more relevant to, to, to our audience anyway.

So we set out about trying to rank for as many of those key phrases as possible. And the way that we did that was we just started by simply, you know, not in reinventing the wheel. It's not rocky science. You know, we looked at what our competitors were ranking for. So as I said, you know, some companies of a similar stage as those, um, or ones that we knew, um, ranked really well and, and kind of had an SEO strategy as such.

We just used it tools like SEM, rush to sort of reverse engineer that, that, that. Keywords, really. What were they ranking for? Where were the opportunities that, that we could maybe rank alongside them or rank better them? Looked at the content they were ranking for and looked at how could we produce something more infor, informative, more in depth, um, and outrank them for it.

So that was our initial starting point. You know, obviously it, it's about mapping out our content pillars, [00:14:00] you know, what are the themes that are relevant to, to first our industry as well. And then all that kind of, um, spun off from there. And then we created those articles. We had a consistent cadence. So another thing with, with um, SEO obviously i, is that it does take time.

So if you are selling this, this sort of idea into your, your, um, stakeholders, you know, the thing is to upfront is just to kind of get that off the, on the table and say, look, this is a strategy we believe in. You know, don't expect results in the first, you know, couple of weeks. You know, this is gonna take a long, sustained period.

And, and, and, you know, if we keep doing this for six months, a year longer, we're gonna, it's gonna pay dividends for us. Um, so that's how we kind of started, you know, set expectations, uh, initially. And, you know, we, we, we produce an article a week. Uh, we optimize for keywords know, and lo and behold. Nothing really happened.

Um, so keep the faith, you know, it happened to us as well, you know, you kind of think, is this gonna work? Is it gonna

Ivor: Nothing good comes easy, right?

Barry: No, no, it doesn't. And, and, you know, there's no such thing as in [00:15:00] overnight successes. The, um, you know, and we kept at it. We kept producing the content, you know, and, and then we started to see those green shoots.

Um, you know, and, and as I said, as you alluded to at the start, you know, two years later we're getting over 5,000, um, visitors a month to our blog articles. You know, one of the fastest growing, um, blogs in l and d, you know, rank Outranking, a lot of, um, bigger organizations with, with, you know, bigger resources than us.

Um, but this is a channel that we're, that we're winning and seeing results on Another thing as well, um. You know, with the blog content as well. And another way, you know, if people are selling this into stakeholders is that, you know, you can really, you can repurpose that content as well. So, you know, we, we don't just stop at like, putting the article out and then that's on our blog and it sits, then we forget about it.

You know, we turn it into, to, to carousels, into infographics, into, um, our newsletters, you know, videos. So, you know, we, we repurpose that content like crazy to maximize your value. And get a, and so it [00:16:00] doesn't just have a limited, um, shelf life. You know, some of that content we're still using a couple of years later, you know, and those blogs were written two years ago.

Um, so, you know, it has so many benefits in terms of that, you know, it's your organization rather than just, just that kind of sort of traffic.

Ivor: Yeah. Yeah. Rep repurposing content is, yeah, a really good strategy to, to employ and. Particularly if you've got loads of different blog articles, you can then turn that into ebook and then suddenly it's a, a lead generation tool as well. And you're capturing a lot of those, those visitors that come to your site as well.

Um, and something you alluded to, Barry, is the fact that the l and d industry is super competitive, and I wanted to understand how you ensure that your content does stand out. And is competing with those, those larger players that have massive budgets.

Barry: Yeah, so obviously it's, you know, [00:17:00] everything starts with the research, you know, so we'll be looking at their articles, we'll be looking at, um, keywords that are ranking for, and then it's about how can we, how can we make this better? You know, can we, can we add. More points to it. Can we add more analysis to it?

Can we add more, more, um, depth and more context to, to the topics that they're, they're talking about and they're trying to make a better version of, of kind of what's out there already. Really that's gonna add some benefit to our, our end users. The challenge with, um, with, with SEO obviously is that, you know, just, just the way that we're doing it now is that, you know, anyone can come along and anyone can replicate that and improve that.

So there's, there's a, there's a fir I'm sure there's a first out there now. Somewhere clicking at eye heels, looking at our, our rankings, you know, looking at how they can outperform us. So, no, it, it is never kind of guaranteed. And then obviously you've got the, the, the search engine updates as well that co blindside you, which we mentioned at the start.

But, um, from my perspective to that is the, the, the biggest kind of danger, you know, in terms of anyone setting [00:18:00] out on this journey is that it just as it is easy for us to identify, um, and outperform competitors, people can just as easily do that to you. Especially when you're, when maybe you're starting to adopt, look at other channels or you've not updated the article for a while, you know you've got a target on your back.

So one of the ways around that is obviously, and this is where we're trying to move towards, um, in these next 12 months, is more first party data. Um, so it's more of our own type of

Ivor: Yeah.

Barry: Not stuff that's kind of out there already in, in, in, in, in the public, you know, through doing surveys and, and research and, and, and I guess again, coming back to understanding what our customers, deeply, understanding our customers and, and, and kind of what they need and want to help them perform better and do their jobs better, help their organizations.

So we're creating more of that kind of content because that's the stuff that's harder to replicate and that's where you're gonna win long term as well.

Ivor: that. Um, yeah, super defensible, isn't it? The first party data, I think a really good example of [00:19:00] a company doing that well is, um, gong, they just used all their. Data from, from their tool to base all of their content around and suddenly no one can replicate that content. Right. And it becomes super, super unique.

So yeah. Super interested to, to follow you guys and see how that plays out over the next months.

Barry: Gong a great one. They've been a huge influence on me. The way that they've done it in terms of their Gong Labs, uh, producing that content is very much something that we're trying to sort of mirror in, in, in our l and d world. So it's a, it's a worth. Anyone following those guys for inspiration?

Ivor: Um, something you also talked about was, you know, reporting to stakeholders on the impact of SEA and how do you attribute SEO to the goals of, of the business? Because, you know, getting some website visitors to your, your site is all well and good, but at the end of the day, a business needs to, to make money so.[00:20:00]

How do you then kind of attribute that to something, um, that the business is, is focused on in terms of their Yeah. Commercial gong.

Barry: It is a, it's a very good point. It's a very good question actually, Amy, because that is always the challenge, isn't it? It's, you know, when I sit there in a, in that, you know, our, our monthly quarterly meetings saying that we've had, you know, an increase from zero to 5,000, um, you know, visits a month, which, you know, pat myself on the back, uh, you know, there's a CFO and there's a CEO in there that, that's saying, okay, that's great, but where does that contribute to our bottom line?

Why should we invest? Ultimately, you know, why should we invest more in, in, in marketing or that channel? So it is trying to justify that, that, um, that, uh, impact in, in a way that they're gonna kind of see the value of it as well. So the main thing is. Obviously it gets easier as time goes on, as I've mentioned, you know, because you're gonna have more opportunities to understand how it is impacting.

But I think the main thing is we have, obviously our CRM system [00:21:00] set up. We have the, the first thing is obviously having stuff like Google Analytics and a CRM system that can report on these things, because if you don't have that, you go in and completely blind. So having that set up from day one is really gonna help you measure the impact, understands what, what's working and what isn't, and then being able to report it.

Now, luckily we're we, we keep a really close eye on that so we can see, you know, through, through our tools we can see, you know, what, what bugs people are clicking on so we can create more of that type of content. Unless there's stuff that isn't, isn't working quite so well, but then we can see those people coming through to our website.

I. And we can see the journey that they've been on. So we've got many instances now where people have clicked on a, a, an article we've created. They've come into our website having not known about first beforehand, they've, they've looked around, they've come back maybe a couple of times. I read a few blogs, and now they're at a point where they've booked a demo and become a customer.

I. So I can now go into to meetings and say, actually, look, this is, this has contributed this amount of revenue, this computer, this much to our a RR. If we double this, we'll likely double that, [00:22:00] that, um, conversion rate, and we'll double that, that a RR as well. So from this one channel. So that took time that that didn't happen overnight.

But if you can make that, if you can attribute it all the way back to someone becoming a customer. That's a very powerful place to, to, to, to be in and justifying the impact you're having as well. I think without, without having that set up and analyzing it to that level of detail, you know, you are always gonna struggle to get the, the sort of support and buying that you need.

Ivor: Yeah. It's essential isn't it, to, as you say, link that marketing data to the sales data and whether those people are coming into the, the pipeline and ensuring that, yeah. There's that link between the website visitors, the SEO strategies, and. And, and the leads being generated for, for the business.

Yeah.

Barry: and, and I, there's so many tools now, isn't there? You know, you could probably list off, you know, a hundred that, that do it for you. There's really no excuse not to be doing it in, in some shape or form. Now, from day one.

Ivor: [00:23:00] Yeah. Okay, so switching gears a little bit and talking about the, the A word, so AI and its impact on SEA. So.

Barry: Never heard of it either.

Ivor: I dunno what you're talking about. Yeah. So how do you see it impacting SEO specifically? We've seen, I mean, a lot of tools like chat, GPT Gemini, um, are becoming really, really popular. And it's quite funny because I remember when. Google first came out and there was everyone with, you know, their laptops open and you could see Google as the page usually being focused on and, and used by, by everyone in the room I was in.

And similarly, when I walk into the office, when I go to the WeWork, the shared office, there's [00:24:00] everyone opening chat, GPT. And so I think we've seen a similar. Type of seismic impact with those tools. Say, how do you think it's, um, changing the SEA landscape?

Barry: Yeah. Well, it, it already is. I mean, in, in twofold, really. In one way, even before we get to the search, you know, chat, GPT and Gemini, they're enabling faster content production. Whi, which is great in some ways, but obviously what what's gonna happen is, you know, there's only so much of that type of content you can produce.

And so, so little of it is gonna be unique after a while. So we're gonna be in a similar situation to maybe we were 14 years ago. You know, history always repeats itself, doesn't it? Where I think we're gonna get to a point where there's gonna be so much of this kind of like, you know, generic, um, content coming out.

Actually the, the, the search engines eventually maybe try and find, try and find a way to, to remove it. I'm sure they'll get that. They'll, they'll sit out and, and become smart enough to, to spot it and remove it eventually over time as well. [00:25:00] You know, there'll be no unique tone of voice. Everything's gonna sound, sound similar and just as, just in the way that, you know.

If someone's, if someone's not great at producing content now, they're not gonna be great at producing content with chapter GBT. They're just gonna produce more of it. So there's just gonna be more bad content out there, and it's not really gonna help anyone. So, although in the short term it, it, it's probably an advantage because people can produce more of this kind of vanilla content over time.

What's gonna happen is. You know, I, I think they'll be impacted and they'll suffer as a consequence of it. So that, that's the challenges, the advantage of it is also gonna be the, the, the same sort of challenge and potentially the downfall of it as well. So I think that's one, one side of it, which, which has pros and cons.

Um, and obviously we're seeing the, and I, you know, you said it quite right there, this search towards more conversational search results. So, you know, with Google, we've always had this kind of, you know, the, the, the. The target was always his top 10 positions, wasn't it? Or top three positions. Its top 10 links the first page of Google, and that was the Holy grail.[00:26:00]

Um, but now we're already starting to see this, this move towards this more sort of conversational search results a little bit with Gemini, but very much in the way you've said in terms of chat, GBT. I mean, when I'm searching for things myself now, like I do go to chat GPT before I go to Google. Which he never would've dreamt, would've happened like, you know, you know, 80 months ago.

Um, because I can just ask longer phone questions and I can get a more in-depth answer. Um, and it's any, and it, and it, you know, I feel like there, I trust the results a little bit more as well. So I think we're already starting to see that change, but no doubt that you'd been to this world and Google start to catch up and yeah, I see that kind of first page of Google as we know it disappearing and it becoming more about a, a conversational, personalized.

Um, search or first page or what we now call the first page of Google.

Ivor: I'm actually seeing across our customers. Um, when we look at the breakdown of the sources of traffic, there's direct of course, and there's SEO, but [00:27:00] there's chat. GPT is usually there with like six, 7% on average across our customers. So we're only gonna see that that grow and yeah, I think it's interesting that you talk about that first like page.

And usually what I'd focus on is getting in that 60% of that first page because like you wanna be above the fold. 'cause no one really scrolls down on that first page. I think everyone just clicks in those first links. But now with, yeah, those summaries, I think it's become even smaller and you want to be in that first 30%.

'cause they're only linking to a number of like six or so articles, five articles. So it is becoming harder, I think, to. Um, rank can get those results in, in s and yeah, there'll just be a focus more on better and better content. Um, maybe a more human element to content as well. Maybe having all generative ability will allow a lot of companies to be [00:28:00] more human with things like videos and, and content like that.

Within SEA.

Barry: Well, it, it's interesting you that you made that point because obviously what we might get to a point as well is where you are starting to see people come through now is a clickthrough on chat, CPT, but, but actually if these, these results are, are contextual in the long form and they're in that search, then, then I guess you probably won't even have to click through, you know, all the answers will be there.

So it's more about sort of being. Present and brand, brand awareness and actually just, just making sure that you're appearing when people do search for that, what that is gonna just think of my marketing head on and reporting head on for a second. It's just gonna make it tougher for the like of us to report the impact of it.

So that'll, that'll create some new challenges in itself as well. And it'll be focused more on brand awareness, I guess.

Ivor: Yeah, for sure. So yeah, one, one question before we, we wrap up and I get your recommendation, so you've. You know, bill first from, its, its early days and in terms of the SEO strategy, so I'd be interested to, to [00:29:00] hear what advice you have for startups or smaller businesses looking to leverage SEO effectively, particularly with limited budgets.

Barry: Yeah. Um, well, the first thing is, you know, I, I think if you're starting out, we have a limited budget in, in a startup, in, in any. In any sector really, you know, start SEO early because you're gonna reap the, that's money in the bank. You know, those seeds are gonna be planted now and you're gonna start to, to reap the rewards, you know, six, 12 months from now.

Um, and you'll be grateful that you, you started when you did. Um, even if it might not feel like it in those first initial kind of meetings when you turn report on the success of it. Um, but the first thing is obviously. Research, you know, deeply understanding your audience. Firstly, you know, there's no point in just writing content for the sake of writing content sake and just pumping it out there, which I've seen a lot of organizations make the mistake of doing, you know, what are people actually searching for?

And as I mentioned at the top, using tools like, you know, SEM, rush, um, you know, it doesn't have to cost you a, it's not a [00:30:00] big investment. But what that will do is reverse engineer what your competitors looking for. Um, you don't have to reinvent the wheel, you know, the answers are already out there. You know, before you go searching for them and, you know, see what, what's ranking, see what you've got opportunities for.

Don't go after the big. Search volume, one of key phrases. I call them, you know, start small, start on the, the, the little wins, the, the low hanging fruit as, as the old SEO term goes. And then, you know, build it up over time. And then you can start to, as you start to build it up, you can go for some of these longer term.

Um, key phrases, but also trying to, trying to sort of put a spin on that and trying to get those, you know, as, as I said, where we're going to with first is trying to get that industry data, maybe using subject matters in your experts, in your organiz. You know, every organization's got a subject matter expert.

It might be the CEO, um, you know, it might be someone else, um, in a different team. But leveraging the expertise you've got in house as well and, and creating a kind of unique position, uh, will set you apart also in, especially in those early days. Um. Obviously experimenting with different, [00:31:00] um, formats as well.

You know, we, we, we, you know, I particularly always think about SEO as as content, but you know, it's video, isn't it? It it's podcasts, you know, it, it's things like this which, you know, set you apart from, from your, um, competitors as well and seeing what works for you, seeing what has success, because, you know.

You know, we have a lot of success in catalog at LinkedIn and, and the organic search. But actually that might not be right for everyone. You know, there might be different opportunities for, you know, video might be, you know, where people consume content in your industry. So again, going back to understanding what your audience wants and consumes is a great starting point.

Um. And then again, repurpose, repurpose, repurpose. Don't just stop when you create that first piece of content, um, you know, if you put a lot of time of energy into it, just don't, just stop at just creating that and then put it as a blog or an article on your site. Just get, turn it into an ebook as you said.

You know, get that content, use it as paid ads, uh, you know, share it on socials, share it in your newsletters, you know, maximize its value. That's what your, your stakeholders are gonna love as well. Um, and [00:32:00] as I said at the start, you know, start now and get perfect later. You know, the, the first few things that you're gonna do might not work, but don't give up.

Keep at it. Keep chipping away at it, and over time you're gonna see the, the results and, and read the reward. And, and in terms of other challenges you're gonna do, you know, the cost for acquisition cost per lead is gonna be so much, um, less than, than other, other paid channels. Um, so yeah, that'd be my advice.

Ivor: Yeah. And it's more sustainable as well, right? And yeah, I love that approach. As of. Getting started now and make it perfect later. And it sounds like you're getting towards that with the first party data and I think that's a really, really good insight for, for others to potentially adopt as well. So my favorite part of the, the podcast and something we do on every episode is we ask each guest to recommend a book for the next guest.

And Barry really interested to, to hear what you'd [00:33:00] recommend for our next guest and, and why.

Barry: Yeah, so your next guess I'm, I'm gonna get 'em to check out Cash Izing, um, by Drew Eric Whiteman. Um, this is a book that's, uh, an oldie but a goodie. Um, it's an absolute kind of like marketing classic in terms of, um, actionable strategies, understanding, um, you know. Persuasion techniques, understanding, um, bio-psychology, et cetera.

And, and the great thing, what you're, what you, what you get with this one I is that what you understand quite quickly is that. Platforms change. You know, channels change, but the people don't change. You know, the, the techniques that were working when it was back in the days of kind of print ads and, you know, I had to get people to cut a coupon out of paper.

They're still the same strategies that work now, just in a slightly different format in the digital age. Um, and he's, that book is, is basically got a list of tips. Um. Done in a really written, in a really kind of sim simple way. So even people like me, you can understand it and put them into, and you can put those actions into [00:34:00] practice and see the results as well.

It was a game changer for me. Real eye opener. Um, you know, I've been able to, um, execute. Put into action a lot of the stuff that was in that book and, and c out and build a career off the back of it as well. So it's highly recommended. Uh, I've got the audio version I'm kicking myself because when you ask that question, I realized that I gave away the paper version a few years ago, so I'm gonna go have to buy that copy again.

But, you know, it's a, it is a few pound investment for something that's gonna last your lifetime. Um, so yeah, highly recommended that book for anyone listening.

Ivor: Nice. Another one to add to my, my reading list. So on that note, thank you so much for your insights, Barry. It's been really, really fantastic conversation. Learned a lot about SEO myself and, um, really interested to, to hear your background and I'm sure. All of the listeners will be able to take away a lot of valuable lessons from everything that you shared, so thanks a lot.

Barry: No problem, my absolute pleasure and luck. If, see if anyone wants any, any advice or tips or anything, just, you know, [00:35:00] connect with me on LinkedIn, um, DM me and like I said, I'll be happy to help anyone who's in, in a similar situation ready to get started and maybe, you know, looking, looking to, for some tips on, on how to can get ahead.

Ivor: Great. Thanks for tuning in everyone. If you're interested in the topics. Or want to be a guest, then please reach out to us. Speak next time.

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[00:00:00]

Ivor: So hello everyone and welcome to GTM Tells the podcast where I sit down with experts in B2B, go to market to hear and exchange stories that have unlocked growth. And today I'm really pleased to. Have Barry, who is the head of marketing at first.

So Barry, great to have you here today. How's it all going?

Barry: Yeah. Very good.

Ivor: Good stuff. So I think let's, let's get into it. And, um, to kick things off, perhaps it'll be good if you could share a bit about your journey into digital marketing, especially when we initially talked, um. Your focus was on, on SEO, and it'd be really interesting to hear how [00:01:00] you got into that when it was in the Wild West type era.

So yeah, looking forward to hearing.

Barry: Yeah. Uh, I think Wild West is a good description of it either. So yeah, when I, when I started back in 40, um, 14 years ago, um, it really literally was the wild West. It was, you know, digital market was just kind of breaking out. It was just finding its feet. Um, you know, there's no real experts at that time.

It was just kind of, you know, the, see what sticks and see what works. Um. It's strange that, you know, 14 years later, you know, I'm still here. And SEO is such still a fundamental part of, of, you know, of, of our, our strategy at first and so many other companies in, in B2B marketing. Um, but yeah, I, I, I didn't really find, uh, marketing, marketing kind of found me.

So, um, I sort of fell into it as most people do. When your mid twenties, um, started life an, an agency called a People, um, and you know, our, our. But primarily it was kind of small to medium-sized enterprises, which was great because I got to work, um, [00:02:00] across all different size of businesses of all different, um, kinds of marketing budgets, which, you know, presents its own challenges.

Um, but yeah, it was a real, it was a real kind of broad spectrum of, of, of enough for me to cut my teeth on looking after those, um, SEO accounts. And I was basically, back in those days. I would look after those, uh, SEO customers, I'd review their strategies, their campaigns, made recommendations on, on how they could improve their performance and get higher up the organic listings.

Um, but, you know, like you alluded to really was the wild West. It was, you know, a lot of, um, link acquisition, um, you know, a lot of kind of keyword optimization, um, for dous organizations. Um. It was, yeah, it was, it was, it gave me a foothold into digital market. Gimme a taste for it. And then over time, as I, as I kind of moved for the agency, um, you know, got to work on, um, website projects, um, you know, obviously Facebook has Google Ads.

All that was, that was kind of getting launched as well. So it gave me a really good, kind of broad, broad spectrum of, of digital marketing really. Um, [00:03:00] and then obviously after six and a half years there, stepped out into going to, um, uh, in-house, which was a real kind of, um. See change for me because suddenly I didn't have all this sort of team around me to support me.

Uh, I was literal out on my own, having to make all the decisions, and the book kind of stopped with me. So it's a very different, um, kind of pressure. Um, so started at a company called Tactus, which was a technology, um, provider. Um, became one of the biggest OEMs, Microsoft OEMs in, in, in Europe in my time there, which was a fantastic journey to be on.

Um, and then, yeah, I've worked in logistics. Um, worked at, um, agency side working with lots of different B2B companies in more, shall we say, traditional industries. The great thing about that is that there was an opportunity there to kind of bring in someone like the, sort of the SaaS best. Best practices, the things that I was influenced by and bring them into those, those older, um, sectors, um, and really make a difference there and make an impact, which was great.

And sort of drag those, um, kicking and screaming into the 21st century, shall we say. [00:04:00] Um, and now I've landed at first, so I mean, I've been in the l and d world for the last, um, two years. Again, another startup. I'm a glut of a punishment. I like doing the hard yards at the start. I don't like to make life too easy for myself.

But yeah, I love, you know, getting started in the, you know, a blank sheet of paper and really being able to make a difference, um, and, and see that impact over time. And obviously you try a lot of things, but it it strange. However, that, you know, SEO is, is such a good skill to. To learn for any marketer. I think, because as I said to you at the start, you know, 14 years later, here I am on, you know, having the opportunity to speak to you about SEO, uh, and the journey I've been on and, you know, it's still such a, I think, such a fundamental channel for organizations, um, that you need to be kind of betting on that channel early to see the results, you know, and two years in, as I'm sure we're gonna get into, you know, we're starting to see the fruits of that labor.

It does take time. Um. Yeah, it, it, it's one of my favorites and yeah, it, it, it's what life, how it's funny how life kind of works and it's still as fundamental to me now as it was 14 [00:05:00] years ago.

Ivor: Yeah. And before we get into how SEO is today and what you're doing with, with, first, I'd be interested to hear more about how SEO was different. Back then. Um, and what were the key strategies you used when you first were getting started and what were some like key challenges that you, you faced, uh, when you first set out in, in SEO, if you can remember?

Barry: Yeah, my mind's not gone just yet either. It's not yet, but it's, you know, you know what? It's still fresh because in all honesty, the fundamentals haven't changed in 14 years. You know, the things that I used to speak to, to, to our, um. Our customers about and recommend. They're still the same things that I'm kind of doing now.

You know, it was key. It was keyword research, you know, finding relevant keywords in your niche. Um. Great quality content, which I'll come back to on what, what we defined as great quality content. It's probably been the biggest change in that time. Um, you know, good on [00:06:00] paid SEO, you know, good technical SEO you know, are you telling the search engines what that page is about?

Essentially, uh, having a good user experience. Um, you know, someone lands on that page, you know, is your, is your, is your page loading? Is it, is it, are people finding what they're actually searching for, et cetera. And then the, the hardest part for me is that bit, that the sort of bit in the background, the.

Sort the magic bit that people don't really see and and probably underestimate the importance of is like the high quality links. I guess what has changed in the last 14 years is what def what's defined as a high quality link and what's defined as a good user experience, et cetera, because it's very different to, it was 14 years ago, so back then.

Link. Link acquisition was very much about, you know, the volume of links, you know, could you get more links? It didn't te, it didn't generally matter where those links came from. It was just the more, the merrier and then that stand you really good stead, you know, and the, the concept necessarily didn't have to be, um, sort of ground break, you know, in depth for anything like that.

It was just a case of, you know, if you had a key word. [00:07:00] Um, you know, let's say Black Sox, for example, is the first thing that can come to my head. You know, if you had a lot of links going into your website for that keyword and your page mentioned that. You know, word a number of times, you know, you, you had a pretty good chance of getting onto the first page of Google and doing really well out of it.

But what, what happened, um, about sort of three or four years into that journey is that obviously, you know, Google understood that people were, were, were creating it content and it was only just for search engines. It wasn't really. Considering the end user. Um, and then, you know, the Google Penguin and Google, Google Panda updates came out and that sent a shock way through, you know, businesses, as I say, I was, I was working with small to medium sized enterprises, but it didn't just affect them.

It, it affected some of the really big organizations as well. So into Flora, I remember they were one of the big. Um, case studies at the time that were really hit and solved. You know, a lot of companies lost their organic listings overnight. Now the problem, which is probably a whole different podcast in itself, is just depending on that one channel meant that, um.[00:08:00]

You put all your eggs in that basket and suddenly, you know, you didn't have any customers overnight. And, you know, it was, it was hard for a lot of businesses. Um, you know, there's a lot of clearing up, um, link profiles. There's a lot of, you know, redoing websites and redoing of, um, content, et cetera. Um, so it just meant that it's kind of forced people's hand into doing things the right way, but probably the way that it should have always been done from the start anyway.

Um, and I think that was a, as a seismic shift in terms of the SEO. Industry and people really starting then to say, look, there is, you can't really gain that system anymore. There are no shortcuts. You know, you have to do things the right way. You know, you have to great create, um, great quality content with the end user in mind.

Have a great website, um, you know, with a great user experience. So the, the, the, the more it's changed, the more it hasn't, it's just become, you have to, you have to do things the right way now and don't take shortcuts.

Ivor: Yeah. And you mentioned those, these updates like Penguin and, and Panda [00:09:00] and, yeah. I remember when I was, um, digital marketing lead at a large financial enterprise and. They had the same issue where they lost so much traffic overnight and so much revenue was attributed to that traffic as well. And I think one of the issues is as a digital marketing person, as someone focused on SEOs, ensuring that you're kept up to date with all those incoming updates from from Google.

And I wanted to understand how you kind of ensure you are kept up to date and you know about. All these updates coming and how do you kind of adapt to those, uh, changes?

Barry: Yeah, so I'm signed up to, you know, a lot of SEO newsletters, uh, you know, like search engine land and that type of thing. And, and really that's, you know, Neil Patel and, you know, they'll send me, they'll send me emails on a regular basis, and I think that's probably. The best way to keep on top of [00:10:00] it, because it changes, in all honesty, it changes that fast.

There's so many different algorithm updates. You, they're happening every day and, and you don't even sort of notice half of them unless they effect you directly. And then obviously now and again, you'll get, you know, you'll get a, a major one that, that suddenly, you know, sends, sends everything into kind of a tailspin.

Um, but yeah, I think for, for anyone, in terms of trying to keep up with that, there's a, there's a couple of newsletters websites that I recommend, um, with much smarter people. Um, we have much more knowledge about SEO than I, um, who kind of, you know, are on top of this stuff. They'll send the latest, the updates, and then it's just, it's just taking out the bits that you want that, that are relevant to you really, and, and the biggest changes and where it's gonna impact you.

Um, and keeping abreast of it all as well. But it isn't, it isn't easy and keeping on top of it, it changes that fast, but that's, that's the guess why we love it as well. It's never, never sta sitting still.

Ivor: Yeah, definitely some, some good newsletters to, to follow. And I think, you know, clearly SEO has come a long way. The [00:11:00] fundamentals, as you say, Barry, have not changed, but it has developed a lot and it's become a, a lot more sophisticated, um, and will touch on. How it's going to change in the future as well with the advent of, of AI and, um, all the technology that's developing in generative ai.

And, um, I want to, you know, tap into a little bit your experience at first and how you've used SEO to, to drive there and to drive growth there. And you mentioned that. You've built it from pretty much the, the beginning. And so I'd be interested to, to hear how you kind of created that strategy. What were the results and what some key findings, um, there.

Barry: Yeah, I'd be happy to share that because it's been interesting because literally, you know, we started with, you know, when, when I started two years ago, it was literally, we had a, a website. [00:12:00] Um, there was no, no real blog articles on there. There's a few just to kind of kick things off. Um, there was no sort of on page page optimization.

There was no, there was no, um, strategy around like what we were gonna rank for. So it was literally starting from, um, you know, the ground up. Which is, you know, something I enjoy doing because, you know, you can, you can really kind of see the impact of it over time. So in terms of where we went from it, I, you know, imagine two years ago we didn't have any sort of domain authority.

There's some very, very, um, big players who have been doing it for a very long time in, in l and d. Um, and those legacy, um, organizations rank very well for very competitive key phrases. We've, we've. High search volumes. So initially the strategy was obviously to understand our audience and kind of what you're searching for, but to, to go for a less, um, less competitive key phrases.

So ones where we thought there was an opportunity there, some of the longer tail ones, so we weren't going the, for the ones that may be, you know, had. 2000 [00:13:00] searches a month, which we'd all have to be on the first page forward, don't we? But we knew that wasn't gonna happen overnight. So, so we looked at the, the stuff that was maybe had a hundred searches or 50 searches that actually was, was, um, probably more relevant to, to, to our audience anyway.

So we set out about trying to rank for as many of those key phrases as possible. And the way that we did that was we just started by simply, you know, not in reinventing the wheel. It's not rocky science. You know, we looked at what our competitors were ranking for. So as I said, you know, some companies of a similar stage as those, um, or ones that we knew, um, ranked really well and, and kind of had an SEO strategy as such.

We just used it tools like SEM, rush to sort of reverse engineer that, that, that. Keywords, really. What were they ranking for? Where were the opportunities that, that we could maybe rank alongside them or rank better them? Looked at the content they were ranking for and looked at how could we produce something more infor, informative, more in depth, um, and outrank them for it.

So that was our initial starting point. You know, obviously it, it's about mapping out our content pillars, [00:14:00] you know, what are the themes that are relevant to, to first our industry as well. And then all that kind of, um, spun off from there. And then we created those articles. We had a consistent cadence. So another thing with, with um, SEO obviously i, is that it does take time.

So if you are selling this, this sort of idea into your, your, um, stakeholders, you know, the thing is to upfront is just to kind of get that off the, on the table and say, look, this is a strategy we believe in. You know, don't expect results in the first, you know, couple of weeks. You know, this is gonna take a long, sustained period.

And, and, and, you know, if we keep doing this for six months, a year longer, we're gonna, it's gonna pay dividends for us. Um, so that's how we kind of started, you know, set expectations, uh, initially. And, you know, we, we, we produce an article a week. Uh, we optimize for keywords know, and lo and behold. Nothing really happened.

Um, so keep the faith, you know, it happened to us as well, you know, you kind of think, is this gonna work? Is it gonna

Ivor: Nothing good comes easy, right?

Barry: No, no, it doesn't. And, and, you know, there's no such thing as in [00:15:00] overnight successes. The, um, you know, and we kept at it. We kept producing the content, you know, and, and then we started to see those green shoots.

Um, you know, and, and as I said, as you alluded to at the start, you know, two years later we're getting over 5,000, um, visitors a month to our blog articles. You know, one of the fastest growing, um, blogs in l and d, you know, rank Outranking, a lot of, um, bigger organizations with, with, you know, bigger resources than us.

Um, but this is a channel that we're, that we're winning and seeing results on Another thing as well, um. You know, with the blog content as well. And another way, you know, if people are selling this into stakeholders is that, you know, you can really, you can repurpose that content as well. So, you know, we, we don't just stop at like, putting the article out and then that's on our blog and it sits, then we forget about it.

You know, we turn it into, to, to carousels, into infographics, into, um, our newsletters, you know, videos. So, you know, we, we repurpose that content like crazy to maximize your value. And get a, and so it [00:16:00] doesn't just have a limited, um, shelf life. You know, some of that content we're still using a couple of years later, you know, and those blogs were written two years ago.

Um, so, you know, it has so many benefits in terms of that, you know, it's your organization rather than just, just that kind of sort of traffic.

Ivor: Yeah. Yeah. Rep repurposing content is, yeah, a really good strategy to, to employ and. Particularly if you've got loads of different blog articles, you can then turn that into ebook and then suddenly it's a, a lead generation tool as well. And you're capturing a lot of those, those visitors that come to your site as well.

Um, and something you alluded to, Barry, is the fact that the l and d industry is super competitive, and I wanted to understand how you ensure that your content does stand out. And is competing with those, those larger players that have massive budgets.

Barry: Yeah, so obviously it's, you know, [00:17:00] everything starts with the research, you know, so we'll be looking at their articles, we'll be looking at, um, keywords that are ranking for, and then it's about how can we, how can we make this better? You know, can we, can we add. More points to it. Can we add more analysis to it?

Can we add more, more, um, depth and more context to, to the topics that they're, they're talking about and they're trying to make a better version of, of kind of what's out there already. Really that's gonna add some benefit to our, our end users. The challenge with, um, with, with SEO obviously is that, you know, just, just the way that we're doing it now is that, you know, anyone can come along and anyone can replicate that and improve that.

So there's, there's a, there's a fir I'm sure there's a first out there now. Somewhere clicking at eye heels, looking at our, our rankings, you know, looking at how they can outperform us. So, no, it, it is never kind of guaranteed. And then obviously you've got the, the, the search engine updates as well that co blindside you, which we mentioned at the start.

But, um, from my perspective to that is the, the, the biggest kind of danger, you know, in terms of anyone setting [00:18:00] out on this journey is that it just as it is easy for us to identify, um, and outperform competitors, people can just as easily do that to you. Especially when you're, when maybe you're starting to adopt, look at other channels or you've not updated the article for a while, you know you've got a target on your back.

So one of the ways around that is obviously, and this is where we're trying to move towards, um, in these next 12 months, is more first party data. Um, so it's more of our own type of

Ivor: Yeah.

Barry: Not stuff that's kind of out there already in, in, in, in, in the public, you know, through doing surveys and, and research and, and, and I guess again, coming back to understanding what our customers, deeply, understanding our customers and, and, and kind of what they need and want to help them perform better and do their jobs better, help their organizations.

So we're creating more of that kind of content because that's the stuff that's harder to replicate and that's where you're gonna win long term as well.

Ivor: that. Um, yeah, super defensible, isn't it? The first party data, I think a really good example of [00:19:00] a company doing that well is, um, gong, they just used all their. Data from, from their tool to base all of their content around and suddenly no one can replicate that content. Right. And it becomes super, super unique.

So yeah. Super interested to, to follow you guys and see how that plays out over the next months.

Barry: Gong a great one. They've been a huge influence on me. The way that they've done it in terms of their Gong Labs, uh, producing that content is very much something that we're trying to sort of mirror in, in, in our l and d world. So it's a, it's a worth. Anyone following those guys for inspiration?

Ivor: Um, something you also talked about was, you know, reporting to stakeholders on the impact of SEA and how do you attribute SEO to the goals of, of the business? Because, you know, getting some website visitors to your, your site is all well and good, but at the end of the day, a business needs to, to make money so.[00:20:00]

How do you then kind of attribute that to something, um, that the business is, is focused on in terms of their Yeah. Commercial gong.

Barry: It is a, it's a very good point. It's a very good question actually, Amy, because that is always the challenge, isn't it? It's, you know, when I sit there in a, in that, you know, our, our monthly quarterly meetings saying that we've had, you know, an increase from zero to 5,000, um, you know, visits a month, which, you know, pat myself on the back, uh, you know, there's a CFO and there's a CEO in there that, that's saying, okay, that's great, but where does that contribute to our bottom line?

Why should we invest? Ultimately, you know, why should we invest more in, in, in marketing or that channel? So it is trying to justify that, that, um, that, uh, impact in, in a way that they're gonna kind of see the value of it as well. So the main thing is. Obviously it gets easier as time goes on, as I've mentioned, you know, because you're gonna have more opportunities to understand how it is impacting.

But I think the main thing is we have, obviously our CRM system [00:21:00] set up. We have the, the first thing is obviously having stuff like Google Analytics and a CRM system that can report on these things, because if you don't have that, you go in and completely blind. So having that set up from day one is really gonna help you measure the impact, understands what, what's working and what isn't, and then being able to report it.

Now, luckily we're we, we keep a really close eye on that so we can see, you know, through, through our tools we can see, you know, what, what bugs people are clicking on so we can create more of that type of content. Unless there's stuff that isn't, isn't working quite so well, but then we can see those people coming through to our website.

I. And we can see the journey that they've been on. So we've got many instances now where people have clicked on a, a, an article we've created. They've come into our website having not known about first beforehand, they've, they've looked around, they've come back maybe a couple of times. I read a few blogs, and now they're at a point where they've booked a demo and become a customer.

I. So I can now go into to meetings and say, actually, look, this is, this has contributed this amount of revenue, this computer, this much to our a RR. If we double this, we'll likely double that, [00:22:00] that, um, conversion rate, and we'll double that, that a RR as well. So from this one channel. So that took time that that didn't happen overnight.

But if you can make that, if you can attribute it all the way back to someone becoming a customer. That's a very powerful place to, to, to, to be in and justifying the impact you're having as well. I think without, without having that set up and analyzing it to that level of detail, you know, you are always gonna struggle to get the, the sort of support and buying that you need.

Ivor: Yeah. It's essential isn't it, to, as you say, link that marketing data to the sales data and whether those people are coming into the, the pipeline and ensuring that, yeah. There's that link between the website visitors, the SEO strategies, and. And, and the leads being generated for, for the business.

Yeah.

Barry: and, and I, there's so many tools now, isn't there? You know, you could probably list off, you know, a hundred that, that do it for you. There's really no excuse not to be doing it in, in some shape or form. Now, from day one.

Ivor: [00:23:00] Yeah. Okay, so switching gears a little bit and talking about the, the A word, so AI and its impact on SEA. So.

Barry: Never heard of it either.

Ivor: I dunno what you're talking about. Yeah. So how do you see it impacting SEO specifically? We've seen, I mean, a lot of tools like chat, GPT Gemini, um, are becoming really, really popular. And it's quite funny because I remember when. Google first came out and there was everyone with, you know, their laptops open and you could see Google as the page usually being focused on and, and used by, by everyone in the room I was in.

And similarly, when I walk into the office, when I go to the WeWork, the shared office, there's [00:24:00] everyone opening chat, GPT. And so I think we've seen a similar. Type of seismic impact with those tools. Say, how do you think it's, um, changing the SEA landscape?

Barry: Yeah. Well, it, it already is. I mean, in, in twofold, really. In one way, even before we get to the search, you know, chat, GPT and Gemini, they're enabling faster content production. Whi, which is great in some ways, but obviously what what's gonna happen is, you know, there's only so much of that type of content you can produce.

And so, so little of it is gonna be unique after a while. So we're gonna be in a similar situation to maybe we were 14 years ago. You know, history always repeats itself, doesn't it? Where I think we're gonna get to a point where there's gonna be so much of this kind of like, you know, generic, um, content coming out.

Actually the, the, the search engines eventually maybe try and find, try and find a way to, to remove it. I'm sure they'll get that. They'll, they'll sit out and, and become smart enough to, to spot it and remove it eventually over time as well. [00:25:00] You know, there'll be no unique tone of voice. Everything's gonna sound, sound similar and just as, just in the way that, you know.

If someone's, if someone's not great at producing content now, they're not gonna be great at producing content with chapter GBT. They're just gonna produce more of it. So there's just gonna be more bad content out there, and it's not really gonna help anyone. So, although in the short term it, it, it's probably an advantage because people can produce more of this kind of vanilla content over time.

What's gonna happen is. You know, I, I think they'll be impacted and they'll suffer as a consequence of it. So that, that's the challenges, the advantage of it is also gonna be the, the, the same sort of challenge and potentially the downfall of it as well. So I think that's one, one side of it, which, which has pros and cons.

Um, and obviously we're seeing the, and I, you know, you said it quite right there, this search towards more conversational search results. So, you know, with Google, we've always had this kind of, you know, the, the, the. The target was always his top 10 positions, wasn't it? Or top three positions. Its top 10 links the first page of Google, and that was the Holy grail.[00:26:00]

Um, but now we're already starting to see this, this move towards this more sort of conversational search results a little bit with Gemini, but very much in the way you've said in terms of chat, GBT. I mean, when I'm searching for things myself now, like I do go to chat GPT before I go to Google. Which he never would've dreamt, would've happened like, you know, you know, 80 months ago.

Um, because I can just ask longer phone questions and I can get a more in-depth answer. Um, and it's any, and it, and it, you know, I feel like there, I trust the results a little bit more as well. So I think we're already starting to see that change, but no doubt that you'd been to this world and Google start to catch up and yeah, I see that kind of first page of Google as we know it disappearing and it becoming more about a, a conversational, personalized.

Um, search or first page or what we now call the first page of Google.

Ivor: I'm actually seeing across our customers. Um, when we look at the breakdown of the sources of traffic, there's direct of course, and there's SEO, but [00:27:00] there's chat. GPT is usually there with like six, 7% on average across our customers. So we're only gonna see that that grow and yeah, I think it's interesting that you talk about that first like page.

And usually what I'd focus on is getting in that 60% of that first page because like you wanna be above the fold. 'cause no one really scrolls down on that first page. I think everyone just clicks in those first links. But now with, yeah, those summaries, I think it's become even smaller and you want to be in that first 30%.

'cause they're only linking to a number of like six or so articles, five articles. So it is becoming harder, I think, to. Um, rank can get those results in, in s and yeah, there'll just be a focus more on better and better content. Um, maybe a more human element to content as well. Maybe having all generative ability will allow a lot of companies to be [00:28:00] more human with things like videos and, and content like that.

Within SEA.

Barry: Well, it, it's interesting you that you made that point because obviously what we might get to a point as well is where you are starting to see people come through now is a clickthrough on chat, CPT, but, but actually if these, these results are, are contextual in the long form and they're in that search, then, then I guess you probably won't even have to click through, you know, all the answers will be there.

So it's more about sort of being. Present and brand, brand awareness and actually just, just making sure that you're appearing when people do search for that, what that is gonna just think of my marketing head on and reporting head on for a second. It's just gonna make it tougher for the like of us to report the impact of it.

So that'll, that'll create some new challenges in itself as well. And it'll be focused more on brand awareness, I guess.

Ivor: Yeah, for sure. So yeah, one, one question before we, we wrap up and I get your recommendation, so you've. You know, bill first from, its, its early days and in terms of the SEO strategy, so I'd be interested to, to [00:29:00] hear what advice you have for startups or smaller businesses looking to leverage SEO effectively, particularly with limited budgets.

Barry: Yeah. Um, well, the first thing is, you know, I, I think if you're starting out, we have a limited budget in, in a startup, in, in any. In any sector really, you know, start SEO early because you're gonna reap the, that's money in the bank. You know, those seeds are gonna be planted now and you're gonna start to, to reap the rewards, you know, six, 12 months from now.

Um, and you'll be grateful that you, you started when you did. Um, even if it might not feel like it in those first initial kind of meetings when you turn report on the success of it. Um, but the first thing is obviously. Research, you know, deeply understanding your audience. Firstly, you know, there's no point in just writing content for the sake of writing content sake and just pumping it out there, which I've seen a lot of organizations make the mistake of doing, you know, what are people actually searching for?

And as I mentioned at the top, using tools like, you know, SEM, rush, um, you know, it doesn't have to cost you a, it's not a [00:30:00] big investment. But what that will do is reverse engineer what your competitors looking for. Um, you don't have to reinvent the wheel, you know, the answers are already out there. You know, before you go searching for them and, you know, see what, what's ranking, see what you've got opportunities for.

Don't go after the big. Search volume, one of key phrases. I call them, you know, start small, start on the, the, the little wins, the, the low hanging fruit as, as the old SEO term goes. And then, you know, build it up over time. And then you can start to, as you start to build it up, you can go for some of these longer term.

Um, key phrases, but also trying to, trying to sort of put a spin on that and trying to get those, you know, as, as I said, where we're going to with first is trying to get that industry data, maybe using subject matters in your experts, in your organiz. You know, every organization's got a subject matter expert.

It might be the CEO, um, you know, it might be someone else, um, in a different team. But leveraging the expertise you've got in house as well and, and creating a kind of unique position, uh, will set you apart also in, especially in those early days. Um. Obviously experimenting with different, [00:31:00] um, formats as well.

You know, we, we, we, you know, I particularly always think about SEO as as content, but you know, it's video, isn't it? It it's podcasts, you know, it, it's things like this which, you know, set you apart from, from your, um, competitors as well and seeing what works for you, seeing what has success, because, you know.

You know, we have a lot of success in catalog at LinkedIn and, and the organic search. But actually that might not be right for everyone. You know, there might be different opportunities for, you know, video might be, you know, where people consume content in your industry. So again, going back to understanding what your audience wants and consumes is a great starting point.

Um. And then again, repurpose, repurpose, repurpose. Don't just stop when you create that first piece of content, um, you know, if you put a lot of time of energy into it, just don't, just stop at just creating that and then put it as a blog or an article on your site. Just get, turn it into an ebook as you said.

You know, get that content, use it as paid ads, uh, you know, share it on socials, share it in your newsletters, you know, maximize its value. That's what your, your stakeholders are gonna love as well. Um, and [00:32:00] as I said at the start, you know, start now and get perfect later. You know, the, the first few things that you're gonna do might not work, but don't give up.

Keep at it. Keep chipping away at it, and over time you're gonna see the, the results and, and read the reward. And, and in terms of other challenges you're gonna do, you know, the cost for acquisition cost per lead is gonna be so much, um, less than, than other, other paid channels. Um, so yeah, that'd be my advice.

Ivor: Yeah. And it's more sustainable as well, right? And yeah, I love that approach. As of. Getting started now and make it perfect later. And it sounds like you're getting towards that with the first party data and I think that's a really, really good insight for, for others to potentially adopt as well. So my favorite part of the, the podcast and something we do on every episode is we ask each guest to recommend a book for the next guest.

And Barry really interested to, to hear what you'd [00:33:00] recommend for our next guest and, and why.

Barry: Yeah, so your next guess I'm, I'm gonna get 'em to check out Cash Izing, um, by Drew Eric Whiteman. Um, this is a book that's, uh, an oldie but a goodie. Um, it's an absolute kind of like marketing classic in terms of, um, actionable strategies, understanding, um, you know. Persuasion techniques, understanding, um, bio-psychology, et cetera.

And, and the great thing, what you're, what you, what you get with this one I is that what you understand quite quickly is that. Platforms change. You know, channels change, but the people don't change. You know, the, the techniques that were working when it was back in the days of kind of print ads and, you know, I had to get people to cut a coupon out of paper.

They're still the same strategies that work now, just in a slightly different format in the digital age. Um, and he's, that book is, is basically got a list of tips. Um. Done in a really written, in a really kind of sim simple way. So even people like me, you can understand it and put them into, and you can put those actions into [00:34:00] practice and see the results as well.

It was a game changer for me. Real eye opener. Um, you know, I've been able to, um, execute. Put into action a lot of the stuff that was in that book and, and c out and build a career off the back of it as well. So it's highly recommended. Uh, I've got the audio version I'm kicking myself because when you ask that question, I realized that I gave away the paper version a few years ago, so I'm gonna go have to buy that copy again.

But, you know, it's a, it is a few pound investment for something that's gonna last your lifetime. Um, so yeah, highly recommended that book for anyone listening.

Ivor: Nice. Another one to add to my, my reading list. So on that note, thank you so much for your insights, Barry. It's been really, really fantastic conversation. Learned a lot about SEO myself and, um, really interested to, to hear your background and I'm sure. All of the listeners will be able to take away a lot of valuable lessons from everything that you shared, so thanks a lot.

Barry: No problem, my absolute pleasure and luck. If, see if anyone wants any, any advice or tips or anything, just, you know, [00:35:00] connect with me on LinkedIn, um, DM me and like I said, I'll be happy to help anyone who's in, in a similar situation ready to get started and maybe, you know, looking, looking to, for some tips on, on how to can get ahead.

Ivor: Great. Thanks for tuning in everyone. If you're interested in the topics. Or want to be a guest, then please reach out to us. Speak next time.

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