The Best SEO Podcast with Matt and Chris #469

Hi, and welcome to the SEO podcast, Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing. My name is Chris Burris, one of the owners here at eWebResults. My name is Matt Bertram, the CEO of eWebResults. The CEO. He got it right this time. Last podcast, he struggled with his own identity. This time, he has identified himself and then pronounced it to the world. I would just say, Senator, we run ads, too. He's also one of the owners here, so let's not forget that. Welcome to podcast number 469. We started podcast number 468, and we were going to do podcast 469 as the topic, but we got off topic, and it turned out to be really cool stuff about search engine optimization and software that we're working with right now that we're really excited. Can't talk about, can't reveal it yet, but we're pretty excited about what's going to happen there and the power in it. Got distracted. We're like, okay, we've got to do another podcast. Yeah, that was an SEO podcast. It turned out to be an SEO podcast. Yeah, so this is now a social media podcast. It's going to be a social media podcast. All under internet marketing, unknown secrets. Secrets of podcasting. Of podcasting. Please remember, we're filmed live here in Houston, Texas, and Matt and I, we are your Results Rebels. Cowabungos. Yeah. See, you did this last time. Oh, that's what I used to do. Yeah, I couldn't remember. It's been a while. Yeah, it's been a while. Yeah, I forgot. Hook them horns. It's this one. Horns Down? What is that? What's Go Cougs? Go Cougs is this one. Oh. We'll do that. Go Cougs. Gig them. Yeah. Our school, the Cougars. So, what we're going to talk about today is we're going to talk about social media. If this is the first time that you've listened to the podcast, you're wondering what the hell's going on. This is odd pauses. Howdy, and welcome to the podcast. If you've listened to this podcast before, thank you for being a great listener. You

can visit our website and find stuff that you can connect with. And if you've listened before, you're probably back because you got some value out of the last podcast. So, we're going to ask you to shiko us. Share, like, and follow. Does my shirt say that? It says share, like, and follow us right there on the back. Boom. Yeah, go ahead and shiko us. We really appreciate that. It adds a lot of value to us. Teaser, the article we're talking about today is, well, it's not an article. There's no article and there's no agenda. It's just social media. A free flow of internet marketing expertise is going to come your direction. If you would like a shirt like that, you can actually get a shirt like that. And, by the way, if you know what the Senator We Run Ads To means, go ahead and hit us up on Facebook and, like, oh, We Run Ads. It's a reference to something. Yeah, we should put a link. That would be kind of cool. Put a link by the shirt. Yeah. Like, you know, what the inspiration is or something like that. So, I'm working on some new t-shirts, right? Okay. So, these are eWeb-specific, marketing agency-specific t-shirts. Yeah. And a lot of our staff wear them all the time. It's part of our new uniform, I guess. But, you know, we're coming out with some that are podcast-related. So, you love the podcast. You like the stuff we put out. You'll be able to get some podcast-related t-shirts. And cats. And we're working on a bunch of them. Still, though, you go to eWebResults.com slash swag. Does that? That might work. I know if you go to bestseopodcast.com forward slash swag. And then there's also a button for it there. So, really, we're starting to move everything from the pod. Well, so, yeah. We should keep the agency stuff at the agency. And then we'll move the podcast. Okay. Good point. We'll do that. I'll make a note. That's why I have this yellow legal

pad here. So, when I make points. Yeah. We got to, yeah. Take action. Yeah. Yes. So, yeah. Bestseopodcast.com slash swag. You just say it and we task it out. Yeah. Very cool. Yeah. We could just text it out. But, you know, that would be rude on a podcast. Well, you know, I'm working on this was, I was actually supposed to write a blog this week. But I'm just going to talk it. You were supposed to write a blog? I was going to talk a blog to Google. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I was going to write it for me. There's this word called dictate. Like, that's a word that some people use. I don't use that word. You're going to talk a blog. I'm going to talk a blog. I'm just going to talk a blog. All right. So, we're going to talk about social media. And we've actually made some changes. And, again, this sounds familiar. When I say we've made changes to the social media offering that we have here, Matt has really made them. Obviously, we're brainstorming and saying, hey, what we were doing in the past. It really wasn't adding value. Well, the algorithm changes. And algorithm changes. When the algorithm changes, the things that you're doing, you've got to do something else. Right? It's a little bit of a movie target as well. Yeah. In the social media environment, for sure. So, I'm assuming we've stopped all of our MySpace offerings. Is that... So, you've got to make changes when you're going to deliver value. We do build links still on MySpace. It's like a video sharing site now. Oh, yeah? So, we do use it. There's link building that's available there. Is that a pro tip? Like, people should... Yeah. I mean, you should build... It still has a high domain authority. Yeah. I'm sure it gets a ton of traffic. But I did have to explain it to one client. They're like, why did you build... Why did you build a link on MySpace? Why did you send me

up a profile on MySpace? Because I don't use that anymore. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, our previous offering, what was it? What are we changing to? Why do we think there's more value there? And we've worked with a lot of social media companies, right? Like, one of the things that we're good at doing is like, hey, if there's another company out there who has some idea about, you know, maybe a better strategy, a better way to do things, let's buy it and try what they're offering. So, one of the things that a buddy of mine suggested that we do, and I actually did this in a previous life with staffing, okay, was working with like VCs and providing some overall just auditing or strategy, right? Of like, hey, I'm about to buy this company or can you do an audit? Like, let me know how much you think their marketing's worth or, hey, I have another agency doing a bunch of stuff for me. Can you take a second look at it? Yep. And that's really one of the areas that we are trying to grow here because we've seen a lot across all industries. We've partnered with all different kinds of companies. We've partnered with a couple people that have written books, have written social media, all kinds of stuff. And we've really picked up a lot. Yeah. We've really acquired and like, just like you, you know, listening to this podcast and learning, you know, we're sharing stuff that we're seeing in the market every day. Yep. And, you know, really the offering that we had was, and a lot of people were offering this, if they're not still offering this, I don't know how effective it is. And they've had to probably bundle it with some other things. Yep. But, you know, three posts on different high value social media platforms for them a week. Yep. That was a consistent service that you used to offer. It created a few social signals. It was some social proof. But you were getting organic reach.

Right. And as the world changes, and as these algorithms change, and as these companies. As the Facebook turns. As the Facebook turns. I do like that. You know, I mean, I'm starting to see Facebook ads for Facebook groups on television. I think it's interesting that they're starting to kind of do the Netflix thing and make their own shows. Right. Which now they're becoming content creators. So that's going to be a little sticky because he would always be like, Mark would, I'll just call him Mark. Mark. Was just like, basically like, we're not a content creator. We can't be liable for any of this stuff. Or the content that's on our site. But now they're starting to do it. So it's really quite interesting some of the changes that are being made. But they basically came out, I think it was like last March. Well, Facebook Live was a big one. Like, Facebook Live was awesome. But now, last March, it's like, hey. And we're still participating in that with UpSocial Live, right? Yeah. No, there's a lot of value. But really now, if you're a business, it's pay to play. Yep. Right? You're not going to get really any viewership. I forget the numbers, how low they were to target your audience. And also, little tips and tricks, I guess, of like, you know, distribution of content across social media platforms. Right. You know, you only have 6,000 friends. That maxes you out. That's your max, yeah. And so if you're going to be doing a post, you need to be maxing out your friends, but also you need to be tagging other people, right? And so then you show up in their feeds, right? And so there's little strategies like that. There's little things you can do to trip the algorithm to get more visibility. But on Facebook, for the most part, which Facebook is phenomenal, okay? Phenomenal targeting-wise, okay? User intent, all that sort of thing. You know, and it's not that expensive right now. And so running ads on Facebook's great. I

recommend it. And one thing that we would absolutely recommend is remarketing on Facebook. Yes. Oh, my gosh. This is a bare minimum. You have to hit the threshold of traffic, right, so that you're able to do remarketing on Facebook. And you should be doing remarketing on Facebook. Yeah. And I mean, you know, look, when you get your site to about 5,000 visitors a month, you can start incorporating remarketing on something like, you know, Adderall. I mean, talk to them, not like, you know, recommending them. They're not giving me any money or anything. But they're tapped into all these different exchanges. Yeah. And so it's really quite a great service to really get in front of people. They help you with a lot of that. And it's something as you get a little bit bigger, you want to look at doing, you know? And it incorporates Google Display into it as well as other ad exchanges. But one of the things that we're doing, I guess, from a service offering standpoint is after that stopped working, I basically kind of shut it down or went down to, like, one post a week. Just so that there's some activity. Because the website used to be the place, like, you hand out a business card and somebody goes to your website. And they're like, oh, you're a legit business. You're legit. Now, they want to go over and check you out on Facebook to see, like, what's happening there. Do you have bad reviews? So it's still, there's still value. And then Facebook's changing, right? So now it's, is it just recommendations? So we had a, I think we had, like, 100 reviews that just got disappeared. Yeah. Is that what it was? It was reviews? I think it was. I think it was reviews, yeah. Yeah. And now it's just recommendations. So things change, right? And that's, you feel like that's a digital asset for you. And then, boom, it's gone. They change it. So you've got to be really careful. And a lot of people are

saying. How vested. Be careful how vested you are in one platform. Yeah, yeah. And so really what we moved to, right, is so we were offering a social media service and it was adding some complexity, you know, approval of content, these sort of things. So we've had to establish, like, a brand guide. You know, we're moving to more videos because it's more engagement. And so we've been changing some things, but we kind of really, it's a bolt-on service. It's not something we offer. And if there's a unique need for it, we do it. There's some things we do with, like, social signals from an SEO standpoint. But for the most part, you know, we were ranking for it, and I just kind of shut it down. Okay. I was like, we're really not. There's other companies. Ranking for social media marketing. Yeah, like, I really shut it down, and I was like, look, there's other companies out there that just do this, that focus on this, and they'll do a better job. And we're not that company, right, for you. Now, what we've kind of, a resurgence we've seen in social media is there's things that you can do, and really where the game's at right now is LinkedIn. I'm about to write an article on everything that I'm doing with LinkedIn. Are you going to talk that article? Yes, I am. Actually, I'm really going to make that work. And so, but what we've seen is it's almost more guerrilla marketing, right? Right, right. So what we've been doing is working with, like, an internal marketing admin at some of the medium-sized companies we're working with and giving them the strategies to do it. Yeah. Right? But they're having. Go into this group or. Go into Nextdoor and do this and, you know, go into these Facebook groups. And a lot more, go into these forums, you know, and don't spam the world or use software or anything like that. Like, really, you know, thoughtful posts and creating that structure. And so we're telling

them what to do, and then some of them are doing it, and it's adding a lot of value. Right. But what we're seeing is, for you specifically, you know, your other business, we're adding, you know, five figures, right? Five figures, four figures. Five figures a month. Yeah. And increased growth outside of SEO when we've maxed out SEO, right? And so the things that you need to do that are different than the things you need to do SEO. And so what we're looking at is more of an integrated marketing service package where we can accomplish some of those tasks for you, but we can do it turnkey in-house, right? And so at some of our larger packages, we've increased our package size. We've added on, like, a marketing assistant for X number of hours that follows our best practices. That's going to do some of these guerrilla marketing things that we're seeing as a need that has to happen. And also video creation, we're seeing it as a need because, you know, we're seeing some websites that, you know, five years ago, great site, but all stock art. Like, people don't even know if it's a real company. Right, right. I mean, we were meeting with one of your good buddies that we're bringing on as a client and spending like eight grand a month on PPC and he's running to a site that I didn't even know. To a homepage. To a homepage that didn't even know was real. Everybody at the table, including the people on his team, were like, if I landed on this page, I would not call them because it looked like a lead generation website. They were all unhappy and it was very uncomfortable that when I realized that they had the guy that was managing everything in-house in the meeting. And that's kind of why he was kind of questioning a number of things that, you know, we had to kind of explain through. It was interesting. Yeah. And then he was like, I want all your marketing material.

I was like, is that the guy? You know, so, so, yeah, so, so really what we're seeing happen is another shift in, in, in the dynamics. Also, I kind of previously touched on this just slightly is there's a divergence. Okay. I'm seeing, seeing it heavily over the last quarter, a divergence in people that understand the internet and, and know that it's the new way to drive leads in business and, and people that are unsure about it. Okay. And so now people are doubling down on, on, on the internet. It's getting more competitive and, um, you know, people that aren't. And so that divergence that's happening, um, you know, it's getting more complex. It's getting harder. And also we're seeing that the needs have to change. Right. So, um, so what we're offering from a marketing standpoint is, um, more guerrilla tactics. Right. Online. And guerrilla tactics, if, if you've ever read the, the, the book guerrilla marketing is like, how do you just go out there and use your own voice? Right. How do you use your own time, uh, to, to, to, to do things that will drive business to you, that will market your business. That don't cost money, like exchange for ads or something like that. This does cost money because you're hiring somebody to do that stuff for you. Um, but yeah. But we have a roadmap. It delivers value. We're doing, it creates, it creates a lot of value. I mean, as an example, we, we, we, we had a number of clients, um, probably a good 30% of our clients were on the social media package and we're like, look, it's not adding any value. Let's, let's drop that. So like we're, if it's not going to add value to you in the bottom line, then it's not something that we're going to sell. Well, you know, and I know we, we need to wrap up here from a social media standpoint. So we're going to have to cut this podcast a little bit short, got to get, get

out there for some, some, some, some meetings and podcasts and sort of things like that. But you have to talk a blog. Yeah. I do. I do. It is. No. I'm going to do that. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So, but, but, but really, you know, storytelling. Yeah. Okay. And, and long form content, uh, and videos is really a great way to do that. That's why we have an in-house video team now. Exactly. I mean, and we're making changes as a company. We've brought on a video crew, you know, and, and we're, we're offering the service and we're seeing the value in conversions and storytelling, long form sales letters. Like the, the, the way people are interacting with the internet is changing. The way people are understanding social media is changing. And, um, I think people are starting to get how they want to use social media. Also things like Facebook ads are starting to work really well because what I'm seeing, at least in, in my kind of circles of friend groups is Facebook. People are getting off Facebook. Like Facebook's getting a little boring. Yeah. Like, you know, no one's putting anything out there that's wowing them. Right. That, that, that, what, what is it? Aw. Right. Like that sense of awe. That sense of awe. So you creating that and running that ad, like it, you can get that to go viral and people to share it. Easily. And, and really communicate your story and people are more, uh, engaging with some of that content. Right. I'm seeing on LinkedIn, uh, a lot of engagement with organic posts. Uh, tick tock is starting to, uh, it feels like it's exploding, but you know. Yeah. You know, but that's the thing is you, you see these things changing and you have to start making adaptations. And what most business owners do is like, Hey, this is how I do business. This is how it's going to be. And this is how it should be fixed going forward. Right. And that's the thing about SEO is

it's a lot more fluid. And social media, like both of them are very. And social media is a lot more fluid. And so, so when it comes down to strategy and tactics, it's super important to stay current, to see what's working, to evaluate it, to A, B test, uh, to look at the analytics and then make decisions based on that. And so, so what we're seeing is, okay, you need to spend a little bit more, um, and you need to offer some different things. I mean, like let's, let's end on kind of just really high level with your business. Um, you're creating some of the, uh, requests for new services from e-web based on the needs of your existing, your other existing business. Exactly. And, and we're building out, um, offerings that we can offer to other clients based upon your needs. So you're driving change into what's happening based on what your needs are in the market. Yeah. Right. Right. And, and it's because the, the, my other business, it's a, it's a supplement business and, and it's a supplement that nobody's heard of. Right. So they don't really know they need it. So I've, I've always called it kind of an education, uh, marketing strategy, right? So you've got to get out there in front of people who don't know you exist, don't know they want your product. And then you've got to let them know about the product. And, and so that's very much different than our core strategy here is search engine optimization, where they know your product. They know maybe not your particular brand, but they know what they're wanting to buy. Uh, and so you've got to get that your, our customer's particular brand in front of them at that time. So this is driving all sorts of new strategies. You know, the whole concept of, of, of being able to place people on podcasts, right? It's just outreach. That's a PR firm. Yeah. Well, yeah. In reality, it's a PR firm, which is certainly something that we've been

shifting towards. That's a PR firm getting, um, you know, Facebook ads. We've mostly focused on remarketing, but really driving Facebook ads and funnels that's, that are supported, like where the traffic is driven by Facebook ads. Um, and, and any other email marketing, we've added like a layer of branding to that. And, and what we're seeing is even if you're maxed out, uh, first position across the board or top three, top five positions in Google, um, and you're, and so you got the lead flow. Well, getting people to buy from you, right? So that's telling conversion, conversion, your unique, your unique selling proposition. People have heard about your brand. And so really the, the evolution of what's happening of how people are interacting online is, it's changing and you have to change with it and the strategies change. And so you have to, um, do things different than you've done before. So things that were working three years ago, you know, they're different now, but the interesting thing is the work, things that were working three years ago. Now are actually new to like, um, you know, foreign markets, foreign markets. And so, so we're seeing some of this is going to come back. Cause if we think about snail mail, it's coming back too, right? Like delivering physical mail to people, um, that has a lot of value because it, you know, all of that mail. Emails. Um, I think emails get kind of left in the dust cause they're not as, you know, sexy, even though the best converting, right there, the best conversion is on emails. Yeah. I mean, if you're B2B, you need to be doing emails like, and, and, and you need to get good at emails and copywriting. So important there, there, there's a lot, I feel like, you know, there was so much that I could talk about as far as like LinkedIn. Yeah. Okay. And, and, uh, one of our previous podcasts, when, when people came in, we were shown kind of behind the scenes a little bit.

Yeah. Um, and, uh, I was talking about some of the things that I'm going to talk about in my article of the things that are working on LinkedIn and, and how to utilize that platform properly. Yeah. Um, you know, I know we don't have time today to go into that, but that's something that I think we could maybe do a whole nother. Yeah. We would be valuable. Maybe, maybe we even do a series. Cause here's the thing, Chris, a lot of people are asking me, Hey, I want to learn internet marketing. I mean, what podcast do I watch first? Yeah. Right. And so maybe it's like, you know, like we did a couple of articles, like one Oh one, one Oh, we could do, you know, we, and this could even become info products to a certain degree is, Hey, you know, here's what you need to do on Facebook. Like, so it's more, we've done a couple of podcasts where we've been like, look, you're getting into internet marketing. Here's the first three things that you have to do. Like with that, with that. Well, that, that's the thing I'll end on. I can tell you that, um, I, I mentioned this one time before, but I went to a class reunion of all, uh, small business owners. Like basically the school I went to, um, uh, was parents all kind of owned, um, small businesses and the kids are taking them over. And I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm working with, uh, one girl from, from my high school reunion and she was going around telling people what we had done for her. And, and, and, and, and I mean, she's been a client for six, seven, eight months. Right. And we've really helped her business grow. She couldn't even articulate to our other friends what I was doing for her. And they're like, Oh, you're doing some kind of internet thing. And so all you, um, internet marketers out there, I think, and a lot of, a lot of, of, you know, to that,

I think, you know, it's really on education. SEO is still so new. Okay. Social media is still so new. Um, and we're in it every day. You, you got to really break down the fundamentals of like where the value is and why it's important. And, and, and explain how maybe you achieve that at a really high level. Yeah. Because I think sometimes we get into the nitty gritty and we maybe could, could, could lose. Just like anybody in any industry, you start using kind of what your assumptions are not things that you can assume your customers know. I mean, what I'm doing on social media, like, I mean, I think if I just start sharing that with people, they like, they would love it. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think they would love it. I think they would love it, but I think I might go a couple layers too deep. Yeah. Like, well, I'll give you one. You need to like your own posts. Like your own posts. Like a lot of people are trying to say, I like your own posts. If you like your own posts, I do think the weighting is a little bit less, uh, than somebody else liking it. But it adds value. But, but, but there is value to it if you're looking at the algorithm and, and a lot of people ask me, well, I don't know if you want to, you should like your own posts or not. I'm like, I like all my own posts pretty much. Do you not like your posts? Yeah. That's kind of crazy. All right. Listen, if you like this podcast, please tell three people about that podcast. Maybe you could do that right now while you're listening. Maybe you can pull up your phone and like, like share it or share it. If you're seeing this on Facebook or LinkedIn, share it. If you would like to grow your business with the largest, simplest marketing tool on the planet. The internet. Call eWebResults for increased revenue in your business. Our

phone number is 713-592-6724. Uh, if you have a referral, somebody who's interested in internet marketing, you send them to us. We deliver amazing value. They pay us and then we pay you. In some form. In some form. Maybe it goes to a charity of your choice. We were filmed live. We were seeing a t-shirt. A t-shirt. A couple of t-shirts. Yeah. I think we would do at least two. Yeah. We were filmed live here at 13105 Northwest Freeway, Suite 515, Houston, Texas 77040. If you would like audio, video, or a transcript of this podcast, you can go look for it on... Somewhere. Best SEO Podcast. Yeah. You guys have made us the most popular internet marketing podcast, or one of them, on... By... What was his name? With the last name SEO. Yeah. According to Michael SEO, it is... Michael SEO. Yeah. He says, we constantly review SEO podcasts, and ours is the best. Woo! Thank you guys. Thank you guys for making us the most popular internet marketing podcast. Until the next podcast, my name is Chris Burns. My name is Matt Bertram. Bye-bye for now. Do you have a pen? Let me borrow your pen. Do you have a pen? Let me borrow your pen. Man, I need a pen and a pen too. Like, I feel like we can like talk about topics and I see that. Right behind you. Right behind you. Well, and then there's you having meetings going, Chris, are you ready? Okay, I'll have one more meeting and then... Yeah. I'm ready now, Matt. Okay, don't worry. I've read the article. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I didn't know what it was. See, that's the thing. You have like six items. We have like six no's and they're... Yeah, we don't want to say no. I want a yes pen too. Awesome. Do we not have a yes pen?