In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, John Jantsch welcomes Jon Mest, founder of JustReachOut.io and ChatRank.ai, to break down the evolving relationship between AI, public relations, and SEO. Jon shares how AI is shifting the landscape for marketers, agencies, and entrepreneurs, moving effective outreach away from mass automation and toward authentic, human-driven storytelling. The conversation covers why PR is making a comeback, how AI-powered answer engines like ChatGPT and Google Overviews are changing what it means to “rank,” and what practical steps brands should take to get found—and trusted—in a noisy digital world.
Guest Bio
Jon Mest is the founder of JustReachOut.io, a platform empowering entrepreneurs, agencies, and consultants to land media coverage by pitching journalists directly, and ChatRank.ai, a solution for AI-driven SEO visibility. With over a decade of hands-on experience in PR and search, Jon has helped thousands of marketers simplify their outreach and keep SEO rooted in what actually works—enabling brands to tell authentic stories that resonate, earn trust, and drive results.
Key Takeaways
AI is a powerful tool to guide, not replace, human-driven PR and SEO. The best results come when AI augments authentic outreach, not automates it at scale.
Traditional PR—authentic storytelling, earned media, micro-influencer outreach—is regaining importance as search engines and answer engines prioritize authority, expertise, and credible citations.
AI-powered answer engines (like ChatGPT and Google’s AI Overviews) are changing the rules for SEO. Brands now need to be hyper-specific and authoritative on their niche to get surfaced in high-intent results.
Showing up in AI overviews is the new “number one spot”—but it requires a combination of strong, relevant content and third-party validation through PR and backlinks.
Personalization and relevance are non-negotiable in modern outreach. Mass, generic pitches are filtered out, while targeted, story-driven pitches cut through the noise.
The “hook” in your pitch or subject line is crucial. Journalists and influencers need a compelling, unique reason to pay attention—and proprietary data or exclusive stories make you stand out.
Social proof is still powerful: smaller wins with niche or local publications can build a track record that leads to coverage in larger, national outlets.
Brands should amplify and repurpose earned media where their audience is—whether it’s podcasts, trade journals, or niche blogs—rather than chasing only big-name coverage.
Great Moments & Timestamps
00:00 – John introduces Jon Mest, JustReachOut.io, and ChatRank.ai
00:52 – Jon explains how AI can empower, not replace, authentic PR and SEO
02:28 – Why PR is making a comeback in an AI-driven SEO world
05:20 – The story behind ChatRank.ai and adapting to Google’s AI Overviews
07:54 – What it takes for brands to get featured in answer engines and AI overviews
10:01 – Why specific, authoritative content wins in both search and answer engines
12:02 – The biggest mistakes (and best practices) in pitching journalists today
13:46 – Why personalization is crucial—and mass pitching doesn’t work
14:56 – The power of a strong “hook” and building ongoing media relationships
16:25 – How social proof and stepping-stone coverage help brands earn bigger features
18:51 – Why amplifying coverage where your audience lives matters more than chasing broad reach
20:17 – Where to find Jon Mest, JustReachOut.io, and ChatRank.ai
Pulled Quotes
“AI is an amazing tool to help guide the human-driven marketing approach. But you, the human, have to go in there and tell your story the right way.”
“Personalization and authenticity win—mass, generic pitches just get filtered out.”
“Showing up in AI overviews is the new number one spot…but you have to be hyper-specific, authoritative, and tell a story your audience cares about.”
Search is shifting from keywords to conversational queries and AI-driven answers.
Remodeling contractors can win by becoming the trusted source answer engines rely on.
The Duct Tape Marketing Search Visibility System (SVS) outlines a practical path forward.
Strategy First is the foundation—defining your ideal client and unique message is non-negotiable.
Content needs to be structured, scannable, and conversational to be picked up by AI.
Local SEO, online reviews, and high-authority mentions are key visibility factors.
The Shift: From Keywords to Questions
Homeowners are asking questions, not typing keywords. AI tools like ChatGPT, Alexa, and Google’s SGE are delivering answers, not just links. That means your business needs to be present in the places those answers are pulled from.
Step 1: Strategy First – Define, Differentiate, Dominate
Through our Strategy First engagement, this contractor identified their most profitable audience—homeowners planning luxury kitchen and bath remodels—and developed a core message: “On-time, on-budget remodels with zero headaches.”
Step 2: Write for Humans and Machines
They adopted LMO (Language Model Optimization): TL;DR summaries, FAQ sections, conversational headings. This made their content both human-friendly and AI-digestible.
Step 3: Build an AI-Friendly Digital Footprint
They earned mentions in local publications, home improvement forums, and “Top Remodeler” lists, ensuring they appear in the places AI pulls from.
Step 4: Rebuild Your Site for AI Crawlers
With structured data (schema), accessible navigation, and bot-friendly formatting, they made it easy for AI and humans to understand their offerings.
Step 5: Create Hub-and-Spoke Content That Solves Real Problems
They created three content hubs: Kitchen Remodeling, Bathroom Remodeling, and Additions. Each had a pillar page with subpages answering niche client questions.
Step 6: Max Out Local SEO and Reviews
Google Business was treated like a content channel. Reviews were consistently requested and repurposed for content and schema enhancement.
Step 7: Monitor, Measure, Adapt
They ran monthly AI audits to track visibility and adjusted content to better match query intent. Old blogs were reformatted and new trust-building pages were added.
Conclusion: Build Your Business to Be the Answer
The Duct Tape Marketing approach isn’t about chasing traffic—it’s about becoming the answer. With Strategy First and a focus on visibility, this contractor now owns the conversation wherever homeowners seek remodeling advice.
Strategy First is our foundational process where we define your ideal client, clarify your message, and build the marketing system around those insights. It ensures all marketing is intentional and effective.
What is an Answer Engine?
An answer engine is any search or AI tool (like Google SGE, Bing AI, or ChatGPT) that delivers direct answers to user questions, rather than a list of links. Optimizing for these tools requires structured, question-driven content.
How do I get mentioned by AI tools?
Focus on authority-building—guest posts, expert quotes, forum engagement, and trusted directories. These sources are often ingested by AI for training or real-time responses.
But old-school SEO? The keyword-stuffing, rank-chasing, guest-post-spamming kind? Yeah, that’s buried. Google has moved on. Your audience has moved on. Even AI has moved on.
Today, SEO isn’t about keywords. It’s about being visible where trust is built and decisions are made—in AI summaries, voice search, Google Business Profiles, Reddit threads, podcasts, and YouTube explainers.
The question isn’t “How do I rank #1?” It’s “How do I show up when it matters?”
Old SEO vs. New SEO: What’s Actually Changed
Keyword Rankings → Visibility & Intent
Old SEO focused on ranking for a short list of “money keywords.” But that doesn’t reflect how people search anymore. Today’s winning marketers are shifting to:
Search Impressions > Page-One Rankings
Branded Search Growth > Generic Volume
Click-Through Rate (CTR) by Intent Category
Pro tip: Use Google Search Console to find the hundreds of low-impression long-tail queries you’re already appearing for—and build content hubs around them.
AI Content at Scale → Human-Led Strategy
Yes, everyone’s using AI for content. But the winners are doing it smarter:
Use AI for outlines, FAQs, and first drafts
Layer in human experience, storytelling, and real examples
Prioritize E-E-A-T in every word
Pro tip: Record one real client interview → turn it into a guide → atomize into FAQs, videos, and Google Business posts.
Link Building → Brand Building
Forget cold outreach and shady directories. Google—and AI agents—reward real-world authority.
Get interviewed on industry podcasts
Contribute to comparison roundups and bylines
Sponsor local events or niche trade shows
Pro tip: One Forbes mention or ListenNotes-ranked podcast carries more AI weight than 100 no-name backlinks.
Introducing the Search Visibility System (SVS)
Why Search Is No Longer Just “Search”
Today, people discover businesses via:
Google’s SGE (Search Generative Experience)
ChatGPT, Bing Copilot, and Perplexity
YouTube, Reddit, TikTok, and even podcasts
The SVS helps you show up across ALL of those channels—not just Google.
The 7-Part SVS Framework
Strategy First
Map ideal clients and their real search behavior, including “People Also Ask” and AI-style queries.
Visibility Audit
See how and where you show up in AI-powered and traditional search.
Helpful Content Hubs
Build structured clusters using FAQs, TL;DRs, and “best of” lists.
Local & Reputation SEO
Google Business updates, Q&As, “Is [Brand] trustworthy?” pages.
Digital PR & Authority
Earned media, Reddit engagement, Wikipedia citations.
AI Search Optimization
Monthly monitoring of AI citations and structured content.
Zero-Click Search & AI Discovery: How to Show Up Without Rankings
Here’s the kicker: Not all visibility results in clicks. And that’s okay.
Google’s SGE often answers a question without linking
ChatGPT summarizes multiple sources
YouTube Shorts and Reddit get you discovered without a website visit
That’s why SVS prioritizes branded mentions, structured content, and syndication across platforms. You’re not trying to win a click. You’re trying to win trust.
What to Do Right Now
Ready to move into the new SEO era? Start here:
Audit your current search presence using GSC, ChatGPT, Bing, etc.
Build one content hub using long-tail query data + client conversations.
Claim your local trust signals—Google Business Posts, Q&A, Reviews.
Get cited or interviewed on niche podcasts or comparison blogs.
Reformat existing content with summaries, Q&As, schema, conversational headers.
Final Word: Search Is Still Alive—It’s Just Smarter
If SEO feels broken, it’s because you’re playing by outdated rules.
The smartest marketers in 2025 are shifting from “rankings and backlinks” to visibility, trust, and intent-driven journeys. They’re blending SEO, PR, content, and AI-readiness into one simple strategy.
And that strategy is the Search Visibility System (SVS).
Want help installing the SVS in your business?Let’s talk.
What was once a complimentary, nice-to-have component of content marketing now plays an imperative role. Video has emerged front-and-center and is arguably one of the most effective types of content to connect with your audience.
Video consumption shows no signs of slowing down in the next few years. By 2021, the average person will spend 100 minutes every day watching online videos (a 19% increase from 2019).
If you still haven’t yet embraced video, now is the time to start.
Here are eight types of video content that can be added to any business’s marketing system. This will allow you to tell your brand story in a dynamic, engaging way, and influence people to take action.
1. Brand Story
Every brand has a story. Lots of entrepreneurs have fascinating tales of how they got the idea to start their business and the journey that they went on to get that business off the ground. But when we talk about the core story, it’s not about where the brand has been, it’s really more about the customer’s story.
Every brand has a problem that they solve for their customers. It’s their own unique approach to solving the issue. This is what attracts customers to the business in the first place and keeps them coming back time and again.
Creating a video that tells your core story is a great way to establish trust immediately with prospects. A strong core story outlines a prospect’s problem, paints a picture of a world where the problem has been solved, and then offers up your business as the solution to the issue.
Putting a video like this front-and-center on your website sets you up for success with prospects. Not only do prospects feel seen and heard by what they’re seeing in the video—this is a brand that really gets my problem!—they also have a sense of connection with the people behind the brand.
When the business owner gets on camera and talks directly to their prospects about how they address their big concern, this wins their trust and builds a human-to-human connection from the get-go.
2. Service or Product Videos
You have gotten the attention of a prospect with your core story. Next, your prospect might want to learn more about the specifics of how your business can solve their problems. That’s where product or service videos come in.
It doesn’t matter what kind of business you run. A video showcasing your offerings can help to dynamically demonstrate all the pros of purchasing your product or service.
For more complicated products, like a new software system or a tool or machinery that requires some set-up, product videos can help eliminate some of the fear that a prospect might feel about purchasing a complex product. When they see how easy it is to set up and use in the video, they’ll feel more confident in their ability to do it on their own.
The same is true of videos that feature services. Let’s say you are a car mechanic. People are often distrustful of car mechanics, thinking they’re able to rip people off because most of us don’t understand how a car actually works. A service video, where the mechanic walks viewers through the standard inspection process and points out potential red flags along the way can help to eliminate prospects’ fears that they’re a scam-artist mechanic.
Even for simple products, video can help to bring the item to life. A product video for a children’s construction toy that shows the features of the completed model might sell a parent on the purchase. Or a video on a clothing e-commerce site, showing a model walking back and forth in items of clothing can give viewers a sense of how the shirt or pants look and move on a real person.
Product Video Examples:
Service Video Example:
3. Client Testimonials
Testimonials, reviews, and case studies all play a similar role in the lead nurturing process. They offer social proof that your business is as good as you say it is. Of course, you have a vested interest in selling your business as the best business out there in your field. That is your job when you have your marketing hat on, after all!
The most persuasive messages don’t come from email campaigns or sales reps, they come straight from the mouths of satisfied customers. Testimonial videos create a deeper and more emotional appeal from your brand. Social proof is a powerful decision-making factor. Video testimonials give regular customers the opportunity to be a brand advocate.
By showing prospects an existing happy customer, you give them a taste of what their life could be like if they hired you. If you’re looking for tips on how to get the most out of your interview with one of your happy customers, check out these steps for putting together an effective case study.
Testimonial Video Example:
4. Frequently Asked Questions
Let’s face it, scrolling through dozens of questions in a standard FAQ page is boring. Why not create the most engaging FAQ page possible by incorporating video answers onto the page?
This is also a great opportunity to get a number of people from the company involved in the video creation process. Have someone from each department get in front of the camera. They can each record a handful of answers to the FAQs that are most relevant to their role at the company.
First, this is a fun activity for the team members who participate. Additionally, it provides you with the opportunity to introduce prospects to even more of the faces behind the business. And the greater the sense of familiarity and personal connection you can establish early on, the more you will stand out in terms of trust and likability.
5. Educational and ‘How To’ Videos
People love having their questions answered and learning new things – especially when they’re looking for more information about a specific topic.
Educational videos offer real value to your audience they can apply and use in their everyday lives. When people find the content you produce to be valuable and genuinely helpful, you begin to earn their trust.
When they trust you, they’re more likely to return to you for more help in the future thus building a stronger relationship with them. This encourages leads down the funnel.
Educational Video Example:
6. Event Videos
Planning and hosting an event takes a massive amount of work. Capturing your event on video is an easy way to extend its length and reach. Videos make events scalable. You’re able to spread brand awareness, engagement, and authority far beyond the event itself.
Events are about making new connections and networking with other people. Your event video should capture that.
Event Video Example:
7. Explainer Videos
Explainer videos are often used to learn more about a product or service. They help you deliver important information in a short amount of time and leave a memorable impression. It’s a short informative video that explains something in a colorful, fun, and engaging way.
Adding an explainer video to your homepage is a great way to quickly explain your product or service to someone visiting your site. It effectively walks customers through a scenario where their problem would be solved by using your product. This way a user won’t have to click through and read multiple pages to understand what it is that your company does or what your offer is.
Explainer Video Example:
8. Personalized Sales Videos
Once you have won prospects over with great video content on your website, it’s time to take things to the next level. Encouraging your sales team to use one-to-one video in the sales process allows them to embrace personalization.
Using a tool like Loom makes it easy for even the least tech-savvy sales team in the room to record and send videos. Creating a personalized video, where they address the prospect by name and speak to their specific concerns and questions, makes that prospect feel special. They think, “If this business went through the trouble to record a video just for me, can you imagine the lengths they’ll go-to for me if I become a customer?”
Video content can play a role throughout all stages of the customer journey. Video can be critical to establishing trust, building a personal connection, and moving prospects down the hourglass towards their first purchase.
Having high visibility in a search engine’s organic results is critical to your business’ online success.
People use search engines to find solutions to their problems. And if your product or service isn’t visibly ranking in search as a solution to their problem, that’s a massive missed opportunity for your business.
So what can you do to improve your rankings and where do you even start?
Start by focusing on optimizing your on-page SEO. On-page SEO is one of the most important processes you can use to achieve higher rankings organically and start showing up in front of your target audience.
Because the search landscape is constantly changing and evolving, it’s imperative you make sure your on-page SEO knowledge is up to date. Here are five critical on-page SEO factors that every business should be thinking about.
1. Content
Focus on your H1 headings and H2 subheadings
You need to use H1 and H2 tags. These help Google understand the structure of your page. Your headline should become an H1 heading. Your sub-points should be H2 headings, and bullet points can help organize information under each subcategory.
While this strategy for organizing content makes it easier for readers to skim and settle on the information they’re looking for, it also helps Google to better understand your content.
Use your target keywords at the beginning of your pages
An old-school on-page SEO tactic that still works today is to use your target keywords in the first 100 words of your article or page. Google puts more weight on the terms that show up early on your page—it helps Google understand what your page is about.
2. Page Speed
Slow pages are a no-go. Page speed has been cited consistently as one of the leading SEO ranking factors for years. Slow loading sites provide a bad user experience. Search engines prefer sites that are going to show users the answers to what they’re looking for as fast as possible.
You can improve your site speed by reducing your number of redirects, compressing files, implementing website caching, reducing your page size, removing third party scripts, and many other steps that can speed up load time.
3. Mobile Friendliness
Today, we live in a mobile-first world. More people use mobile devices than desktops to browse the web. And because of that, Google has made it clear that your pages need to be mobile-friendly.
Google has a mobile-first index. On pages where content is not easily accessible for users on mobile, it’s unlikely that you’re going rank high in search results.
Google takes into consideration what the user’s experience is when they land on your site. Your site needs to:
Be responsive and automatically resize to fit whatever device your visitor is using
Use large fonts for enhance readability on a small screen
Have easy navigation—that means having accessible menus is a must
If you have any doubts whether or not your site is mobile-friendly, you can use Google’s Mobile-Friendly Testing tool to see how your site stacks up.
4. Domain names, extensions and URLs
Your URL helps Google understand what your page is all about. And having the right kind of URL can improve your organic CTR.
URLs
Using the right kind of URL is important—every URL on your website should be short, sweet, and keyword-rich. It needs to be a URL that Google’s bots can easily reach and crawl. But the theme here is: keep things simple. Keep the URLs as short as possible, write them in plain english, avoiding number or letter sequences that might only mean something to your team, and use relevant keywords tastefully—don’t just throw in keywords just for the sake of it.
Domain names and extensions
Domain names and extensions do impact on SEO—however, the approach has changed over the years. The major factor that leads to website ranking is hosting valuable content and getting valuable backlinks from authoritative sources. But when you add a keyword-rich domain name and relevant domain extension, it’s icing on the cake.
Let’s take a look at this example.
Say we have Website A with the domain name and extension of www.plywoodstore-london.com and Website B with the domain name and extension of www.londonply.store. Both can rank just as well as the other. However, the latter will garner more trust and will help the business get more on-topic backlinks for the keyword search of ‘London plywood store’.
Your domain extension is an opportunity to communicate what you do—coming up with your domain name gives you the opportunity to be uniquely relevant to your business, and you can get creative while boosting your SEO ranking.
Consider choosing a domain name based on your business type. Here are a few ideas:
If you’re in technology or IT, you could go with .TECH
If you’re in retail or eCommerce, .STORE could be a good choice
If you’re a journalist or publisher, try .PRESS
If you’re building your personal brand, then you can use .ONLINE
5. Internal and external links
The web is built on links—so links are a crucial SEO ranking signal. A well-optimized page will include both internal and external links.
Internal links
Including internal links to other pages with relevant content can help Google to better understand how all of your content is related. When you include internal links, make sure the anchor text has keywords in it. This can boost your rankings with search engines.
External links
Some people hesitate to include external links for the fear that doing so will just drive traffic away. This isn’t the case. You want to show that you’re creating quality content for your website visitors. When you link to other relevant, authoritative sites in your niche, it creates a better user experience and is good for SEO.
If you have a business with an online presence, on-page SEO has to be a focus to compete and stay relevant today in search. Thinking about SEO on each page individually instead of just collectively as a whole gives you the greatest chance at standing out in SERPs on multiple pages.
Have you ever tried to find a domain name and been given the message, “Sorry, that domain name is already taken!”? You are not alone! But with .store, a new domain extension for eCommerce and online stores, you will get the domain you want!
What’s more, www.yourbusinessname.store, instantly tells people your website is a “store” and lets your brand do the marketing for you! So, go ahead
and get the perfect, memorable website URL for your online store at www.get.store.
Video content is a hot topic in marketing circles. We’ve been seeing studies for years now that video is the way people want to consume content. Search engines continue to reward businesses with video on their homepage with additional traffic. So if you haven’t yet embraced video, now is the time to start.
Here, let’s take a look at the five types of video content that can be added to any business’s marketing system. This will allow you to tell your brand story in a dynamic, engaging way.
1. Brand Story
Every brand has a story. Lots of entrepreneurs have fascinating tales of how they got the idea to start their business and the journey that they went on to get that business off the ground. But when we talk about core story, it’s not about where the brand has been, it’s really more about the customer’s story.
Every brand has a problem that they solve for their customers. It’s their own unique approach to solving the issue. This is what attracts customers to the business in the first place and keeps them coming back time and again.
Creating a video that tells your core story is a great way to establish trust immediately with prospects. A strong core story outlines a prospect’s problem, paints a picture of a world where the problem has been solved, and then offers up your business as the solution to the issue.
Putting a video like this front-and-center on your website sets you up for success with prospects. Not only do prospects feel seen and heard by what they’re seeing in the video—this is a brand that really gets my problem!—they also have a sense of connection with the people behind the brand.
When the business owner gets on camera and talks directly to their prospects about how they address their big concern, this wins their trust and builds a human-to-human connection from the get-go.
2. Service or Product Videos
You have gotten the attention of a prospect with your core story. Next, your prospect might want to learn more about the specifics of how your business can solve their problems. That’s where product or service videos come in.
It doesn’t matter what kind of business you run. A video showcasing your offerings can help to dynamically demonstrate all the pros of purchasing your product or service.
For more complicated products, like a new software system or a tool or machinery that requires some set-up, product videos can help eliminate some of the fear that a prospect might feel about purchasing a complex product. When they see how easy it is to set up and use in the video, they’ll feel more confident in their ability to do it on their own.
The same is true of videos that feature services. Let’s say you are a car mechanic. People are often distrustful of car mechanics, thinking they’re able to rip people off because most of us don’t understand how a car actually works. A service video, where the mechanic walks viewers through the standard inspection process and points out potential red flags along the way can help to eliminate prospects’ fears that they’re a scam-artist mechanic.
Even for simple products, video can help to bring the item to life. A product video for a children’s construction toy that shows the features of the completed model might sell a parent on the purchase. Or a video on a clothing e-commerce site, showing a model walking back and forth in items of clothing can give viewers a sense of how the shirt or pants look and move on a real person.
3. Client Testimonials
Testimonials, reviews, and case studies all play a similar role in the lead nurturing process. They offer social proof that your business is as good as you say it is. Of course, you have a vested interest in selling your business as the best business out there in your field. That is your job when you have your marketing hat on, after all! But customers don’t owe a business anything. Glowing feedback from customers demonstrates to prospects that the hype is real; you are as good as you claim to be.
Written reviews and testimonials are great, but videos can help to elevate that connection. By showing prospects an existing happy customer, you give them a taste of what their life could be like if they hired you. If you’re looking for tips on how to get the most out of your interview with one of your happy customers, check out these steps for putting together an effective case study.
4. Frequently Asked Questions
Let’s face it, scrolling through dozens of questions in a standard FAQ page is boring. Why not create the most engaging FAQ page possible by incorporating video answers onto the page?
This is also a great opportunity to get a number of people from the company involved in the video creation process. Have someone from each department get in front of the camera. They can each record a handful of answers to the FAQs that are most relevant to their role at the company.
First, this is a fun activity for the team members who participate. Additionally, it provides you with the opportunity to introduce prospects to even more of the faces behind the business. And the greater the sense of familiarity and personal connection you can establish early on, the more you will stand out in terms of trust and likability.
5. Personalized Sales Videos
Once you have won prospects over with great video content on your website, it’s time to take things to the next level. Encouraging your sales team to use one-to-one video in the sales process allows them to embrace personalization.
Using a tool like Loom makes it easy for even the least tech-savvy sales team in the room to record and send videos. Creating a personalized video, where they address the prospect by name and speak to their specific concerns and questions, makes that prospect feel special. They think, “If this business went through the trouble to record a video just for me, can you imagine the lengths they’ll go-to for me if I become a customer?”
Video content can play a role throughout all stages of the customer journey. Video can be critical to establishing trust, building a personal connection, and moving prospects down the hourglass towards their first purchase.
Both SEO and content creation strategies cannot be implemented successfully without keyword research. Creating content that is ranking and speaks to the intent and needs of your ideal audience requires an understanding of which keywords matter to the relevant searches.
Keyword research is a critical first step to establishing a successful marketing maturity model. While it’s worth investing some time and effort in the process, it need not be arduous or difficult. In fact, I have some tips to help you conduct simple, effective keyword research.
1. Ideation
Who will know your business better than you? Hopefully no one. That’s why a great first step in keyword research is to sit down and brainstorm terms and questions your business answers for clients.
You should have a solid idea of what your business does and what people ask for. Are there certain questions their sales team gets all the time? Is there a consistent piece of feedback you get in reviews about what you did differently from your competition?
Do your best to focus on what customers ask for and stay away from any industry jargon. You are looking for the words and phrases that customers would use to describe your goods and services.
Part of the brainstorming process should also include understanding the types of customers you’re hoping to attract. What do you want to be known for, and what related terms should you focus on?
2. Turn to Google Keyword Suggest
Google Ads does have a keyword research tool, but I find it easier to just go to the search engine itself and run some test searches. Their autosuggest tool is a powerful way to generate keyword ideas that reflect what people are actually searching for.
Let’s say you own a home remodeling business. If you go to Google and type in “home remodel” check out the suggestions you get.
While some people are looking for specific companies, it seems most turn to Google when they’re in the early design stages. They’re on the hunt for ideas. Others still are looking for an app or software to help them begin the planning process; and that makes sense—it’s easier to commit to an expensive remodeling process if you’ve been able to run some scenarios in advance and are certain it’s worth it. And of course, because the home remodel process is expensive, you see questions about loans coming up close to the top as well.
From this one simple search, you now have a goldmine of information and lots of SEO and content ideas. Maybe write a post outlining how to budget for and finance renovations. Perhaps you can create a video showcasing your favorite free design tools where prospects can test out remodeling ideas.
You can also check out the “People also ask” box featured in the middle of the SERPs and the “Searches related to…” links at the bottom of the page for more ideas.
3. Keywords Everywhere Extension
While you’re on Google, why not check out what the Keywords Everywhere extension can tell you? Designed to work on Chrome and Firefox browsers, this extension will tell you even more about the search terms you enter.
Once you type in your search term, the extension will display related keywords on the Google page. It will also pull in Google advertising data, showing you the search volume, cost per click, and Ads competition.
4. YouTube Suggests
While YouTube is owned by Google, it’s still worthwhile to pop on over to their homepage to check out their autosuggests on your relevant keywords.
While the search term might be the same, the results you’ll get are often radically different. That’s because people use Google and YouTube in very different ways. Folks often turn to YouTube for tutorials and other types of content, which means you’ll get to see a whole other side of keyword possibilities by checking out autosuggestions on both Google and YouTube.
5. Wikipedia
Another angle to explore is everyone’s favorite online research tool: Wikipedia. Type in your keyword there, and you’ll find a table of contents at the top of the page. This gives you a whole new list of ways to explore your client’s area of expertise. Take again the home remodel example.
The table of contents on home improvement dives into the reasons one may undertake a home renovation project. Perhaps there’s a way for you to build out content around each of these areas. Create a podcast episode around energy-saving renovations, with information about replacing windows, updating insulation, and walking listeners through alternative energy sources, like solar and geothermal. Write a blog post about how to incorporate safety and emergency preparedness measures into a home improvement project, from fire and burglary alarm systems to back up generators that supply power during an outage.
6. Answer the Public
When you’re looking for popular questions related to your search term, I suggest you check out Answer the Public. Simply type in your search term on the homepage, and the tool will create a visual representation of related questions and phrases, and will even provide you with an alphabetical list of related terms.
7. Analyze All Existing Content and Create Your Hub Pages
Once you’ve done your keyword research, it’s time to take a look at the content you already have. How does that content align with the relevant keywords you found along the way? Are there ways to tweak the content to speak more directly to searchers’ intent? Are there gaps in the content you can fill with new content that will better address those most relevant search terms?
From here, you can begin to build out hub pages. These pages serve as the go-to guides on a given topic, and it’s easy to hone in on the best topics for hub pages once you’ve done your keyword research and understand what people are really searching for when they research your industry or field. Hub pages have major benefits from both an SEO and content perspective, so creating a handful of effective hub pages should be the ultimate goal of your keyword research.
Keyword research is never done in a vacuum. Great keyword research is at the heart of strong SEO and content creation strategies. It will drive your editorial calendar creation and help you get ranking in SERPs. By following the steps above, you’ll be sure to cover all of your bases and give yourself the greatest shot at happening upon unique keywords that can help you get noticed in a crowded marketplace.
Getting backlinks can seem like a daunting task. How do you get other businesses to link to your site online?
If you don’t have any backlinks yet you can get up and running pretty quickly by tapping your existing partners and resources within your community. Things like the local chamber of commerce online listings, alumni directories for the founders’ schools, and church and community directories are great places to start. This is the low-hanging fruit, and getting these backlinks set up is a great way to ease into the next steps in a backlink strategy.
Once you’ve established those links, it’s time to move onto more advanced tactics. Gathering more backlinks should be an ongoing effort, and if you’re looking for legitimate ways to get backlinks, these are the best way to do it.
Research Competitors Backlinks
Start by investigating your competitors. Where are they getting backlinks? Are they in industry databases or local publications that list providers in their city? Once you’ve discovered these additional places where you can be listed, it’s sometimes as easy as filling out a simple form to get your business listed.
A comprehensive SEO tool like SEMrush or Ahrefs can help you research your existing backlinks as well as the links your competitors have acquired.
Update Existing Content
Hopefully, you already have some content on your site. Sometimes, there’s an opportunity to restructure or refresh the content you already have in order to generate backlinks.
Do you have any blog posts that list providers or tools that are helpful for your readers? Take a look through the list and add some new businesses onto these lists. Then, reach out to these businesses to let them know their service or tool has been featured; they’ll want to let their customers know that they got a shout-out on an outside site, and so you’ll likely get a backlink from them.
Submit Guest Posts
Guest blogging has long been a popular, more advanced way to get backlinks. Reaching out to relevant sites and writing a guest post on their blog is a great way to get links. However, over the years the trend of guest posting has waned a bit, so it’s now more difficult to get a guest blogging gig.
It’s worth the try, though! Put together a targeted list of blogs and publications that would be a solid fit for a strategic partner for your business. Write a compelling, error-free pitch email, outlining the topics you could write about and why it would bring real value to their audience. Tailor your pitch to each blog’s specific audience, and take the time to research who you’re emailing so that you can send a personalized message. Finally, feel free to follow up with your contact in a respectful way if you don’t hear back initially.
Join a Podcast
While guest blogging seems to be falling out of favor, guest podcasting is my new favorite way to get backlinks. Just like with guest blogging, guest podcasting is great because it allows you to tap into the existing audience of the brand of the podcast you’re appearing on.
And there’s an additional benefit that guest blogging doesn’t have: It’s very little additional work. While writing a blog post requires research, writing, editing, and selecting photos and relevant emails, when you are a guest on a podcast, you simply show up and talk about what you do every day. You’re an expert in your field, and you can speak comfortably on your topic with little preparation. And with most podcasts, you can call in from wherever you are to speak with the host, so within the 30 minutes or so that it takes to do the interview, you have generated great backlinks.
A service such as Podcast Bookers can get you set up a pitched to podcasts very quickly.
Write up a Report
While it’s sometimes challenging to convince others to let you guest blog, if you have exclusive research to share, you can capture everyone’s attention. Offering up research is a great way to get media links and to even open guest blogging doors.
Yes, exclusive research takes time. However, if you are able to partner with one of your existing business relationships, you can both reap the benefits and halve the work. You and your strategic partner can tap into your networks to find people to interview for the research. Then divide and conquer when it comes to assembly the data and creating visually-appealing ways to share it.
Connect in New Content
How can you get attention and backlinks for new content you create? Mentioning relevant influencers, community members, or others in your posts is a great way to get re-shares on new content.
Of course, you shouldn’t just stuff names into posts for the sake of name dropping. Make sure that the people you’re mentioning are relevant to what you’re writing about. For example, let’s say you are a home remodeling business. Consider pulling together a series of posts featuring families you’ve done work for. If there’s anyone that’s a pillar of the community who they’ve worked with, ask if they’d be willing to be featured. Let’s say you helped the former mayor remodel her kitchen—ask her if she’d be willing to talk about the process and share how her new and improved kitchen has bettered her life.
Once the post goes live, let the person know and ask them to re-share with their network and followers.
Publish a Press Releases
With all of these new digital marketing tactics, it’s possible to forget about those tried-and-true methods. But press releases are still a great way to get attention and backlinks! Are you launching a new product or opening a new location? Did you make a big, announcement-worthy hire? Are you participating in a local community event? There are plenty of reasons you might write a press release.
This is a long-game approach to getting backlinks, but it’s worth the effort. When you’re creating content, link out to tools and resources you genuinely like and think are helpful. If you’re featuring a specific tool or mentioning an individual person, you can email the business or person to let them know. But it’s good practice to include external links in every post, and many of those external links don’t warrant an email to the source.
However, it’s likely that the source is doing exactly what you’re doing: monitoring your online presence. They’ll see an alert that they’ve been linked out to, and that simple thing such as a link can get your brand on their radar screen. While they might not shout out that piece of content or link back to them right away, there may come a time in the future where they’re looking for a link to share that’s relevant to your client’s business, and it’s your site that they’ll turn to.
It’s important for you to build up a repository of backlinks. It matters for SEO ranking and your online reputation, and the more mentions you can get across the web, the more likely you are to win the attention of a new audience. But just as important as quantity is quality. A great marketing strategy can help you gather backlinks that are relevant to your business.
To manage a strong SEO strategy, you need to keep a lot of balls in the air. From comprehensive keyword research to keeping tabs on the competition to tracking backlinks, you need a great set of tools to help you manage it all.
We use a suite of tools to help us manage the many facets of SEO. These three are the ones we use every single day to stay on top of SEO for our clients and ourselves!
SEO can quickly get confusing. You’re running multiple reports, and when it’s across a handful of platforms, you can lose track of the through-line on your data. Because SEMrush has so many features and services all under one roof, it makes keeping track of your reports and data much simpler.
SEMrush offers the following tools and reports:
Domain Analytics: This includes an overview, organic and paid research, backlinks, traffic analytics, display advertising, and PLA research. Plus, you can look at domain versus domain and overall ranking.
Keyword Analytics: From their keyword manager to the keyword magic tool, you can do a deep dive into existing keywords and look for new ones that could net major benefits.
Marketing Insights: These include traffic rankings and analytics, providing insights into your audience, their geographic location, and what pages people are finding through which channels (direct, search, or social media).
Gap Analysis: To identify gaps in keywords or backlinks, you can compare your domain against competitors’ to see where there’s overlap and where you can move out ahead of the competition.
Topic Research: Enter any content topic and get a list of ideas for titles based on what competitors have already published on their sites.
SEO Content Template: By entering a set of keywords you’d like to use in a particular piece of content, SEMrush will give you tips on how to optimize for those keywords, based on the current content landscape on Google.
SEO Writing Assistant: This tool will analyze your writing for SEO, readability, tone of voice, and originality.
Lead Generation Tool: SEMrush’s site audit widget allows you to add their code to your website. Prospects will have the option to audit their website content for free, and a report will be delivered from you to their inbox. This helps marketing consultants drum up new leads.
Listing Management: Distribute business information, manage reviews, and keep all local listings pages current.
CPC Map: See CPC broken down state-by-state, and industry-by-industry. Plus, see CPC cost versus demand for each industry.
Projects: This is key for marketing consultants; you can save and manage your clients’ SEO data from the projects dashboard.
As you can see, SEMrush has you covered, no matter what kind of SEO research or work you’re trying to do. It’s still best practice to use Google Search Console for each of your clients, but Google Search Console requires that you link up to each individual client’s website. With the projects feature on SEMrush, you can easily switch between SEO reports for all of your clients.
Best Tool for End-to-End Tracking: CallRail
SEO only happens online, right? Not quite. While your standing in SERPs is determined by your online presence, the effects of a strong SEO strategy ripple out into the real world. Once people discover a business online and decide they like what they see, they often reach out offline. This is particularly true for small and local businesses, where the phone is often the first point of offline contact between a prospect and your employees.
CallRail is a tool that gives you insight into where call traffic is coming from. Basically, the tool allows you to insert a line of code into your website so that you can clearly see the link between offline and online interactions with prospects. You can also create specific phone numbers that are associated with each ad campaign you run. Then, when you get a call to a certain number, you know that prospect learned about you from that particular ad. They apply the same technology to form submissions, so that you can clearly see the connection between behavior in completing forms online and in-person interactions.
An overview of CallRail’s features, as outlined on their website.
Why does this matter? First and foremost, it provides you additional insight into your marketing efforts. When you’re only tracking online responses to ad campaigns, you’re only getting half the story. Perhaps you craft a campaign that’s so compelling, multiple readers flock to their phones to call your client. If you’re only tracking online reactions, you might think you’re getting crickets in response, when in reality the campaign was so successful people jumped right to making contact with the business.
Which leads to the second point about the importance of call tracking. It allows you to demonstrate your full value to clients. When they can see that your marketing tactics led to X number of clients calling their store, they feel more comfortable in paying you the rate you deserve for your work.
Best Tool for Local SEO: BrightLocal
What works for Walmart’s or Salesforce’s SEO strategy will never apply to a local business. Local SEO comes with its own unique set of tactics and strategies, and BrightLocal is a tool designed to address those local marketing needs.
Some of their SEO tools overlap with SEMrush’s offerings. They provide information on keywords and search ranking, but the difference is that all of their reports and information is localized. So if you have a client operating out of the St. Louis area, all of the data BrightLocal provides will be related to that geographical area.
Plus, they have tools that are focused specifically on two of the biggest SEO hurdles for small businesses: local listings and reviews.
Local listings sites like Yelp and Google My Business are critically important to a small business’s survival. That’s where prospects go to learn about local solutions, read reviews, and get directions and contact information. BrightLocal makes it easy for you to make sure your client is listed on all of the relevant local directories, which gives them a boost in backlinks and ensures that they’re discoverable by those prospects who rely exclusively on local listings, rather than general Google searches, to find local businesses.
A screenshot from BrightLocal’s website, featuring a sample version of their reputation management dashboard.
They also make reputation management easier. Online reviews are particularly critical for small businesses. With a household name brand, people usually already have a sense of whether they’re well-regarded by others. For local businesses without the name recognition, though, people will go online to see what the general consensus from existing customers is about the business. If your client doesn’t have a strategy for soliciting reviews from happy customers or managing negative feedback from unhappy ones, BrightLocal can help you stay on top of all reviews posted across various local listings sites.
Handling SEO for yourself or one client is hard enough. When you’re managing SEO for multiple businesses, things can get unwieldy, fast. When you have the right tools on hand, though, it’s much easier to manage the many moving parts that come along with creating a great SEO strategy.
Obtaining backlinks is an important part of building out your SEO strategy. When you have a fair number of backlinks from reputable sites, it signals to Google that your site is reputable, too. By establishing yourself as a trustworthy presence on the web, you’ll find your pages getting prioritized in Google’s rankings, ahead of your competitors that are relative unknowns in the Googleverse.
But the prospect of having to round up backlinks can be intimidating. How do you get people to link out to your content, anyway? Well, in many ways, it’s a lot like networking. Here, I’ll show you how to apply your existing networking skills to your backlink building efforts.
Start with Your Best Customers
When you send a new LinkedIn request, is it easier to write to your former colleague, or to cold-message a total stranger? The person who already knows and likes you in real life is a lot more likely to respond favorably to your networking request.
The same is true in the world of backlink building. If yours is a local business, turn to some of your most valued customers. Are they members of local communities where you can ask them to spread the word about your business?
Perhaps you own a dry cleaning business, and some of your regular customers are all members at the same church. Consider asking if they’ll include you in the church’s directory, which features local businesses that can help members prepare for special events at the church, like holidays or ceremonies (where they might be wearing their best dress or suit and need a dry cleaner after the fact).
Offer Something in Return
Once you’ve spoken with your customers, take a look at the list of businesses in your community with whom you’ve already established a strategic partnership. If you’re a local contractor, do you have an architect who you typically work with? Maybe you run a coffee shop that sells pastries from the local bakery. Anyone who’s an existing partner or supplier is a potential backlink-sharer!
Whatever the case may be, ask this business if they’re willing to link to your site from their site. And then offer to do the same for them. It’s a win-win, and another smart way to gain mutual benefit from your existing relationship.
Sponsor Local Events
Local events are a great way to get your name out there in the community. It shows that you’re invested in the town or city where you’ve decided to open up shop, and having your name attached to a good cause never hurt any small business!
When you sponsor a local event or donate to the cause, that’s a great opportunity to ask the event host to link back to your website. If you’re one of the event hosts, ask if they’ll include you logo on their homepage and link to your site from there. If you donated an item to their silent auction or provided a food booth free of charge, it’s fair to ask for a shout-out on the event webpage.
Take Advantage of Existing Networks
Beyond your personal relationships with people in the community, it’s likely that you’re already a part of certain local networks. Maybe you’re an alumni of the nearby college or private high school. Perhaps you joined the local Chamber of Commerce when you started your business.
Most of these existing networks are already doing outreach within their spheres. Your alma mater likely has a newsletter featuring class notes that highlight their graduates’ accomplishments. Your local Chamber of Commerce probably has a directory of businesses who are members or are part of the local community. Make sure that your business is listed in the resources that are maintained by these existing networks!
Get Mentioned in the Media
Local press releases are another great way to build up backlinks. Start by establishing a relationship with the people at your local publications. When you have a newsworthy event—say, you want to announce the grand opening of a new location or you just hosted your first-ever Halloween festival for local children—reach out to the person who handles business news or events at the local paper.
Take the time to research and find out their name, rather than sending a “To whom it may concern” email. If you didn’t know them before, that personalized touch can go a long way to getting your message noticed. Attach your press release, and rather than focusing on what getting published could do for you, provide a brief explanation of why the story would be of interest to the community. Finally, be sure to include links to your website within the press release, so that you can obtain backlinks when they post it on their online publication.
Building up backlinks is an essential part of a strong SEO strategy. And while it can seem intimidating at first, if you think of it as an extension of your existing networking efforts, it suddenly becomes less scary! Tapping into the relationships you already have within your community can help you quickly build up the backlinks you need to gain credibility with Google and other search engines.
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