Why Most E-Commerce Sites Waste Their Traffic

๐ **Source:** [Why Most E-Commerce Sites Waste Their Traffic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI)
> [!note]+ Document Notes
> tags: [ecommerce-optimization, conversion-rate-optimization, seo-strategy, ai-marketing, amazon-business]
> author: [MISSING]
> source: YouTube
> reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI
> date created: {{date:YYYY-MM-DD}} {{time:HH:mm}}
>
> # ๐ท๏ธ Title: Why Most E-Commerce Sites Waste Their Traffic (And How to Fix It)
>
<!-- deep-read:sections start -->
## ๐งญ Table of Contents
- [๐ Summary](#-summary)
- [๐ Main Content](#-main-content)
- [๐๏ธ Notes](#๏ธ-notes)
- [๐ References](#-references)
- [๐ฃ๏ธ Paraphrase](#๏ธ-paraphrase)
- [๐ฐ Newsletter](#-newsletter)
- [โ
Action Items](#-action-items)
- [๐งช Hypotheses](#-hypotheses)
- [๐ Methodology](#-methodology)
- [โ Questions](#-questions)
- [๐ฎ Future Research](#-future-research)
- [๐ก Implications](#-implications)
- [๐ง Learning Styles Assessment](#-learning-styles-assessment)
- [๐ Accessibility Assessment](#-accessibility-assessment)
- [๐ DEIB Assessment](#-deib-assessment)
- [โ
Logical Validity](#-logical-validity)
- [๐ก๏ธ DARVO Analysis](#-darvo-analysis)
- [๐ฏ Conclusion](#-conclusion)
## ๐ Summary
- David Schmer, CEO of Build Growth Scale, explains how most e-commerce sites waste qualified traffic through poor conversion optimization
- Key insight: businesses often need better conversion rates rather than more traffic
- Primary focus should be reducing customer risk through FAQ sections, clear paths to checkout, and answering questions proactively
- AI tools like Claude are revolutionizing business analysis, from customer service emails to financial audits
- Bottom-of-funnel SEO targeting buyer-intent keywords outperforms top-of-funnel blog content for most e-commerce businesses
- Mobile optimization remains a critical blindspot for many e-commerce sites
- Cross-selling and upselling opportunities are frequently missed
## ๐ Main Content
### Core Conversion Principles
The fundamental issue with most e-commerce sites isn't traffic volume but conversion optimization. David emphasizes creating a simple path to checkout while decreasing customer risk through comprehensive FAQ sections and clear product information.
### AI-Powered Business Intelligence
Modern businesses can leverage AI tools to extract actionable insights from existing data. David's team used AI to analyze 100,000+ customer service emails over six years, identifying the most frequent concerns and ranking them by importance for FAQ optimization.
### SEO Strategy Evolution
The discussion reveals a strategic shift toward bottom-of-funnel SEO targeting buyer-intent keywords rather than informational content. Keywords like "voice notes for dentists" or "emergency roof repair Austin" target users ready to purchase.
### Amazon-to-Shopify Data Transfer
Businesses running both Amazon and Shopify operations can transfer keyword research and PPC insights from Amazon to optimize Shopify product pages, titles, and SEO strategy.
## ๐๏ธ Notes
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:01:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=90) Background and E-commerce Journey
- David's background: accounting/finance, worked at consulting firm for 7 years doing M&A
- Started pet supply company in 2017, now CEO of Build Growth Scale (Shopify optimization)
- Early e-commerce exposure: ordering tractor parts on eBay Motors from Iowa farm
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:07:45](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=465) Traffic vs Conversion Problem
- Most websites get qualified traffic but waste it due to poor conversion optimization
- Focus on simple path to checkout and decreasing customer risk
- Higher AOV products require more decision-making support and FAQ sections
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:12:20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=740) AI-Powered Customer Insights
- Analyzed 100,000+ customer service emails from 6 years using AI
- Ranked questions by frequency to optimize FAQ sections
- Much more valuable than generic tools like Answer the Public
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:15:10](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=910) Claude Co-work Integration
- Connects to Shopify analytics, Google Drive, QuickBooks
- Identified $1,000/month in unnecessary SaaS subscriptions in 30 minutes
- Voice mode analysis while mobile for business insights
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:22:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=1350) Website Optimization Best Practices
- Phone number at top of homepage builds trust
- Homepage should display collections, revenue-generating items in top navigation
- Move non-revenue items like "About Us" to footer
- Cross-sells and upsells critical for AOV improvement
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:28:15](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=1695) Amazon-to-Shopify SEO Transfer
- Amazon PPC keyword data applies to Google search optimization
- Same keywords relevant for Amazon titles work for Shopify SEO
- Don't operate Amazon business in isolation from Shopify strategy
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:31:45](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=1905) Blog Content Strategy
- Blog making comeback for expensive, complex installation products ($2-4K automotive DIY kits)
- Publishing daily blog articles to feed AI discovery
- Focus on answering questions rather than just informational content
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:45:20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=2720) Bottom-of-Funnel SEO Strategy
- Target buyer-intent keywords: "voice notes for dentists," "emergency roof repair Austin"
- Put keywords in 4 key places: page title, URL slug, H1, beginning of first sentence
- Most businesses have sufficient baseline authority, need more relevance
#### โฑ๏ธ [00:55:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=3330) Mobile Optimization Issues
- Still seeing businesses not optimizing for mobile in 2024
- Entrepreneurs build on desktop but don't test mobile checkout flow
- Mobile buying behavior increasing with Apple Pay integration
#### โฑ๏ธ [01:02:15](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJA07Nex9aI&t=3735) ChatGPT Ads Platform
- OpenAI launched ads platform, David's team testing with mixed results
- 10 days in, not performing as well as Facebook/Google ads
- Concern about biasing previously "unbiased" answers
## ๐ References
- [Build Growth Scale](https://buildgrowthscale.com) - Shopify optimization company
- [Firing the Man Podcast](https://firingtheman.com) - David's podcast documenting corporate-to-entrepreneurship journey
- [Claude Co-work](https://claude.ai) - AI tool for business analysis and automation
- [Intelligjs](https://intelligjs.com) - Split testing software mentioned
- Answer the Public - Keyword research tool (mentioned as less effective than customer service analysis)
## ๐ฃ๏ธ Paraphrase
E-commerce businesses frequently focus on acquiring more traffic when their real problem lies in converting existing qualified visitors. David Schmer argues that most sites receive adequate traffic but fail to optimize the customer journey from landing page to checkout. The solution involves reducing customer risk through comprehensive FAQ sections, streamlined navigation, and proactive question-answering.
The integration of AI tools transforms how businesses extract insights from existing data. Rather than relying on generic keyword research tools, analyzing actual customer service interactions reveals genuine pain points and concerns that can be addressed through website optimization.
SEO strategy should prioritize bottom-of-funnel keywords that capture buyer intent rather than top-of-funnel informational content. This approach targets users ready to purchase rather than those merely seeking information, resulting in higher conversion rates and better ROI.
## ๐ฐ Newsletter
๐ **E-commerce Optimization Goldmine**: This week's featured interview reveals why your traffic might not be the problem โ your conversion rate is. David Schmer from Build Growth Scale shares battle-tested strategies for turning browsers into buyers, including AI-powered customer service analysis and the resurrection of strategic blog content.
Key takeaways: leverage Amazon keyword data for Shopify SEO, target buyer-intent keywords over informational content, and audit your mobile checkout flow (yes, it's still 2024 and people are missing this!). Plus, learn how Claude Co-work helped slash $1K/month in unnecessary subscriptions in just 30 minutes.
Perfect timing as we head into Q4 โ these conversion optimization tactics could make the difference between a good and great holiday season. Check out the full interview for David's specific mobile optimization checklist and his controversial take on why most blog SEO is waste of time (except when it isn't).
## โ
Action Items
#### DevRel
- Create developer documentation for e-commerce API integrations with AI tools
- Develop sample implementations for customer service email analysis workflows
- Build educational content around Amazon-to-Shopify data transfer processes
#### OSPO
- Evaluate AI tool compliance for customer data analysis workflows
- Review licensing implications of automated business intelligence tools
- Create governance framework for AI-powered business analysis
#### Community
- Share conversion optimization case studies and best practices
- Create templates for e-commerce FAQ optimization based on customer service data
- Develop mobile-first e-commerce development guidelines
#### WordPress
- **Core**: Prioritize mobile checkout optimization features
- **Community**: Create e-commerce conversion optimization resources
- **Training**: Develop courses on AI-powered business analysis for WordPress businesses
#### FAIR
- Document best practices for customer data analysis with AI tools
- Create transparency guidelines for AI-powered business recommendations
- Establish ethical frameworks for customer service data mining
## ๐งช Hypotheses
- E-commerce sites focusing on conversion optimization will see better ROI than those prioritizing traffic acquisition
- AI analysis of customer service emails produces more actionable insights than generic keyword research tools
- Bottom-of-funnel SEO targeting buyer-intent keywords converts significantly better than informational content
- Mobile checkout optimization remains a significant competitive advantage due to widespread neglect
- Amazon keyword research data effectively transfers to Google SEO optimization strategies
### ๐ Methodology
- A/B testing using tools like Intelligjs to measure conversion rate improvements
- Customer service email analysis using AI tools to identify most frequent concerns
- SEO performance tracking comparing bottom-of-funnel vs top-of-funnel content
- Mobile vs desktop conversion rate analysis
- Cross-platform keyword performance measurement (Amazon vs Google)
### โ Questions
- How do conversion rates compare between AI-optimized FAQ sections and traditional ones?
- What's the optimal frequency for publishing blog content in complex B2B e-commerce verticals?
- How effective is ChatGPT's new ads platform compared to established platforms?
- What percentage of customer service questions can be eliminated through proactive FAQ optimization?
### ๐ฎ Future Research
- Long-term effectiveness of AI-powered business intelligence tools
- Evolution of buyer behavior in ChatGPT and other AI-first interfaces
- Impact of AI answer citations on traditional SEO strategies
- Mobile commerce optimization techniques as payment methods evolve
### ๐ก Implications
- **Practice**: E-commerce businesses should audit conversion funnels before increasing ad spend
- **Policy**: Need frameworks for ethical customer data analysis using AI
- **Security**: Customer service data mining requires robust privacy protections
- **Education**: Traditional SEO education needs updating for AI-era buyer behavior
- **Funding**: Investment in conversion optimization tools may yield better ROI than traffic acquisition
### ๐ง Learning Styles Assessment
**Reading level**: Approximately 12th grade using Flesch-Kincaid formula
#### ๐ Visual learners
- **Present**: Conversion funnel diagrams, before/after FAQ optimization screenshots
- **Improve**: Add mobile vs desktop checkout flow comparisons, AI analysis workflow visuals
#### ๐ Aural learners
- **Present**: Full podcast interview with detailed examples
- **Improve**: Create audio summaries of key optimization techniques
#### ๐ฃ๏ธ Verbal learners
- **Present**: Clear definitions of CRO, AOV, and technical terms
- **Improve**: Add more analogies (e.g., brick-and-mortar salesperson comparison)
#### ๐งฉ Kinesthetic learners
- **Present**: Step-by-step mobile audit checklist, hands-on AI tool testing
- **Improve**: Create interactive conversion optimization worksheets
#### ๐ง Logical learners
- **Present**: Data-driven insights, ROI calculations, systematic testing methodology
- **Improve**: Add more specific metrics and KPI frameworks
#### ๐งโ๐คโ๐ง Social learners
- **Present**: Interview format with discussion between experts
- **Improve**: Add community discussion prompts for testing strategies
#### ๐งโโ๏ธ Solitary learners
- **Present**: Self-audit tools and reflection questions
- **Improve**: Create personal conversion optimization assessment framework
#### ๐ฟ Naturalistic learners
- **Present**: Business ecosystem analogies and organic growth strategies
- **Improve**: Connect e-commerce optimization to sustainable business practices
### ๐ Accessibility Assessment
#### Screen reader semantics
- **Present**: Clear heading structure and logical navigation
- **Improve**: Add more descriptive link text, ARIA labels for complex sections
#### Keyboard navigation
- **Present**: Standard web navigation patterns
- **Improve**: Ensure all interactive elements are keyboard accessible
#### Contrast and readability
- **Present**: Standard text formatting
- **Improve**: Verify all text meets 4.5:1 contrast ratio, especially in code blocks
#### Text resizing and reflow
- **Present**: Responsive design principles discussed
- **Improve**: Test at 200% zoom, ensure no horizontal scrolling
#### Media and captions
- **Present**: Full transcript provided for video content
- **Improve**: Add timestamps for easier navigation
#### Forms and interactions
- **Present**: Clear action items and next steps
- **Improve**: Provide accessible alternatives to visual charts/diagrams
### ๐ DEIB Assessment
#### Cultural breadth
- **Present**: Business examples from various industries and sizes
- **Improve**: Include global e-commerce considerations, multi-currency examples
#### Inclusive language
- **Present**: Generally accessible business terminology
- **Improve**: Define more technical terms, avoid industry jargon without explanation
#### Neurodiversity support
- **Present**: Well-structured content with clear sections
- **Improve**: Add more visual breaks, consider cognitive load in dense technical sections
#### Representation
- **Present**: Business owner and consultant perspectives
- **Improve**: Include more diverse business examples and use cases
#### Psychological safety
- **Present**: Respectful discussion of business challenges
- **Improve**: Acknowledge that not all strategies work for all business sizes/types
### โ
Logical Validity
#### Strong reasoning
- **Causal reasoning**: Clear connection between FAQ optimization and reduced customer risk
- **Empirical evidence**: Specific examples (100,000 emails, $1,000 savings) support claims
- **Analogical reasoning**: Brick-and-mortar salesperson analogy effectively explains website FAQ needs
#### Fallacies
- **Hasty generalization**: Claiming "most websites" waste traffic based on limited consulting experience
- **Appeal to novelty**: Assuming AI tools are automatically better than traditional methods
- **Survivorship bias**: Focus on successful implementations without discussing failures
#### Tone of voice
- **Professional and consultative**: Uses specific examples and data to support recommendations
- **Pragmatic**: Emphasizes testing over opinions ("opinions don't matter as much as the output of the test")
### ๐ก๏ธ DARVO Analysis
No significant DARVO patterns detected. The conversation maintains a collaborative, educational tone focused on business improvement strategies rather than defensive positioning.
## ๐ฏ Conclusion
The core insight from this interview challenges the common assumption that e-commerce businesses need more traffic. Instead, David Schmer demonstrates that most sites already receive qualified visitors but fail to convert them effectively. The solution lies in systematic conversion optimization: reducing customer risk through comprehensive FAQs, streamlining the path to checkout, and leveraging AI tools to extract actionable insights from existing customer data.
**Practical next steps**: Audit your mobile checkout flow, analyze your customer service emails with AI tools, and shift SEO focus from informational content to buyer-intent keywords. The businesses that master conversion optimization will outperform those chasing more traffic every time.
## ๐ Refactor Appendix โ Why Most E-Commerce Sites Waste Their Traffic
### ๐ Literature Atoms (H3)
#### E-commerce conversion optimization outperforms traffic acquisition for ROI
> [!quote] ID:rw_main_insight
> Most websites actually get plenty of qualified traffic. They just don't know how to utilize that and do a poor job of converting.
**Context & use**:
- Core thesis of interview around 7:45 timestamp
- Challenges common assumption that businesses need more traffic
- Foundation for conversion-first optimization strategy
**Tags**: #xref #ecommerce-strategy
**Highlight**: Main theme throughout interview
<!-- atomicity: 1 idea โ -->
#### AI analysis of customer service emails reveals optimization opportunities
> [!quote] ID:rw_customer_service
> We exported all 100,000+ customer service emails over six years and ranked concerns by frequency to optimize FAQ sections.
**Context & use**:
- Timestamp around 12:20, specific client example
- More valuable than generic tools like Answer the Public
- Addresses actual customer concerns vs hypothetical questions
**Tags**: #xref #ai-tools
**Highlight**: Practical AI application example
<!-- atomicity: 1 idea โ -->
#### Bottom-of-funnel SEO targets buyer-intent over informational queries
> [!quote] ID:rw_seo_strategy
> Target keywords like 'voice notes for dentists' or 'emergency roof repair Austin' - people ready to buy, not just seeking information.
**Context & use**:
- Discussion around 45:20 timestamp
- Challenges traditional blog-first SEO approach
- Higher conversion rates from commercial intent keywords
**Tags**: #xref #seo-strategy
**Highlight**: Strategic SEO approach
<!-- atomicity: 1 idea โ -->
### ๐ง Permanent Candidates (H4)
#### Customer risk reduction drives e-commerce conversion optimization
**Claim**: E-commerce conversion improves most when businesses systematically reduce customer purchase risk through comprehensive information and streamlined processes.
**Evidence pointer**: [[#E-commerce conversion optimization outperforms traffic acquisition for ROI]]
**Scope & conditions**: Applies to all e-commerce but especially higher AOV products requiring more consideration
**Links**:
- [[Conversion rate optimization]] โ because core principle applies
- [[Customer experience design]] โ because extends into UX territory
- [[FAQ optimization strategies]] โ because specific application
<!-- atomicity: 1 idea โ -->
### โ๏ธ Fleeting Queue
- Research split-testing tools beyond Intelligjs for e-commerce optimization #fleeting #inbox
- Investigate Claude Co-work integrations for business intelligence workflows #fleeting #inbox
- Explore Amazon-to-Shopify keyword transfer methodologies #fleeting #inbox
### โ Things 3 (max 2 actions)
- [ ] Audit edwards.com mobile checkout flow on multiple devices โ conversion optimization #things
- [ ] Test phone number placement in site header โ trust signal experiment #things
---
## Full Transcript
[00:00] We are joined by David Schmer. David,<br>[00:03] thank you so much.<br>[00:04] >> Absolutely. Good to be here, Edward.<br>[00:06] >> You have a really cool background.<br>[00:08] >> Thank you. Thank you. I got a nice uh<br>[00:10] home office set up in my basement and uh<br>[00:13] yeah, I appreciate it.<br>[00:14] >> Well, I meant a background in terms of<br>[00:16] what you've done, but you also have a<br>[00:17] cool home office background.<br>[00:19] >> I totally miss that. Um thank you. Thank<br>[00:22] you for the compliment on on the<br>[00:24] background.<br>[00:25] >> It's a cool It's a cool home office<br>[00:28] background. Yeah, I like it.<br>[00:30] >> Thank you.<br>[00:31] >> You've uh can you share can you share<br>[00:33] what you've done with uh with the<br>[00:34] listeners?<br>[00:35] >> Yeah, absolutely. So, uh a little bit<br>[00:38] about me. So, I my background is in<br>[00:41] accounting and finance and that's what I<br>[00:44] went to school for. When I graduated<br>[00:46] college, I<br>[00:49] went and worked at a consulting firm for<br>[00:51] seven years. there. I was doing mergers<br>[00:53] and acquisitions, business valuation,<br>[00:56] did a little bit of litigation support,<br>[00:58] but really learned a ton about business.<br>[01:00] Now, what I'll tell you is e-commerce<br>[01:02] has always been a part of my life. I<br>[01:05] grew up on a farm in Iowa. Very early<br>[01:08] on, we started ordering parts for our<br>[01:10] tractor off eBay Motors, and I had this<br>[01:13] aha moment. we can spend a half a day<br>[01:15] driving to the John Deere store or in<br>[01:18] two or three days we're gonna have the<br>[01:19] exact part that we need uh show up on<br>[01:22] our doorstep. And so uh you know that<br>[01:25] was my early exposure and then all<br>[01:27] through college I bought all my buddies<br>[01:28] textbooks and sold those on half.com<br>[01:31] which was an Amazon platform. And so<br>[01:33] I've always had an entrepreneurial itch<br>[01:35] and so throughout my time at the<br>[01:36] consulting firm I wanted to do something<br>[01:39] different. I wanted to go out on my own<br>[01:41] and run my own business and that's what<br>[01:43] I did in 2017. I started a pet supply<br>[01:47] company and have been doing that ever<br>[01:50] since. Uh in parallel to that move, I<br>[01:53] started a podcast called Firing the Man,<br>[01:56] uh which documented my journey from<br>[01:58] leaving the corporate world and being<br>[02:00] self-employed. And so, uh since then, uh<br>[02:04] I have acquired a couple companies. Um,<br>[02:07] I've sold a couple companies and<br>[02:09] currently I'm the CEO of a build,<br>[02:12] growth, scale. It's a uh Shopify<br>[02:15] optimization company. It's been around<br>[02:17] for 10 years. The owner, Matt Stafford,<br>[02:20] was one of my mentors and somebody I<br>[02:21] really looked up to and uh was lucky<br>[02:24] enough to join the team as CEO in 2024.<br>[02:29] Matt came on this show last year and he<br>[02:31] we had such a great that was one of my<br>[02:34] favorite episodes and it didn't get the<br>[02:36] as many views as some of my other<br>[02:38] episodes but I still think to this day<br>[02:40] it's one of the most useful episodes<br>[02:42] that I have done that episode with Matt<br>[02:44] and I've I have personally shared that<br>[02:47] episode with lots of friends who are<br>[02:49] starting new businesses because this he<br>[02:53] just shares this is what a landing page<br>[02:55] should look like. This is what a landing<br>[02:56] page that converts should look like. And<br>[02:58] everything that he shares works so<br>[03:02] extraordinarily well. And it's not like<br>[03:04] special like there there are things like<br>[03:06] oh have a phone number. No matter what<br>[03:08] type of business you are h have a real<br>[03:10] have a real phone number. Most people<br>[03:12] won't use it but it's going to build a<br>[03:13] lot of trust. Write when you have a<br>[03:15] successful purchase ask what's the one<br>[03:17] thing that almost stopped people from<br>[03:19] buying and you will get the freshest<br>[03:21] most actionable insights from that. like<br>[03:23] it there's just so much good stuff that<br>[03:26] he shared and you but you also you did<br>[03:28] uh several successful Amazon businesses<br>[03:31] too, right?<br>[03:32] >> Absolutely. Yeah, I would say I have<br>[03:34] made more sales on Amazon than I have on<br>[03:37] Shopify and uh definitely have expertise<br>[03:40] there. Um, the pet supply business was<br>[03:42] built on the back of Amazon FBA and uh,<br>[03:45] it's, you know, I I am still active in<br>[03:48] the Amazon space and so it's when I<br>[03:51] think of a well-rounded e-commerce<br>[03:53] company, Amazon's got to be part of the<br>[03:56] equation. Um, you know, it may not be<br>[03:58] your your primary source of income, but<br>[04:01] it is a big enough marketplace that it's<br>[04:03] hard to ignore it. This method of<br>[04:06] marketing is so effective, I had to make<br>[04:08] sure it wasn't against Google's rules<br>[04:09] before I kept using it. It's a form of<br>[04:11] SEO I call compact keywords. Whereas<br>[04:14] most SEO focuses on putting up articles<br>[04:16] to answer questions, how, what, when,<br>[04:19] compact keywords focuses on putting up<br>[04:20] dozens of pages that sell to searchers<br>[04:23] who are actually looking to buy. These<br>[04:25] pages rank on Google and convert so much<br>[04:28] better than normal that when I<br>[04:29] discovered this years ago, I couldn't<br>[04:31] believe this was allowed. It's less<br>[04:32] work, too. The average Compact Keywords<br>[04:35] landing page is only 415 words. Compact<br>[04:38] Keywords is a 13-hour deep course on<br>[04:40] getting sales with SEO. A customer said,<br>[04:42] "We spent nearly 18,000 in the last year<br>[04:45] and a half on marketing and SEO through<br>[04:47] different agencies locally, and that did<br>[04:49] nothing. We decided to take the leap on<br>[04:51] the compact keywords course. We're now<br>[04:53] getting about 6 to eight calls per day<br>[04:55] on a good day, which is just unheard<br>[04:57] of." Another customer said, "Give it to<br>[04:59] a junior employee. have them follow it<br>[05:02] exactly as Edwards laid out. You don't<br>[05:04] have to do anything and you're going to<br>[05:06] gain a six-figure SEO level employee<br>[05:08] just by having them go through this<br>[05:10] course. Compact Keywords is about<br>[05:12] setting up an SEO funnel that brings you<br>[05:14] sales for years and years and years. It<br>[05:17] works with AI. It's less work than<br>[05:19] traditional SEO and it makes way more<br>[05:22] money. You can get it now at<br>[05:23] compactkeywords.com.<br>[05:25] Back to the podcast. There's this<br>[05:27] concept and we're going to talk about<br>[05:28] Amazon as well, but going back to<br>[05:30] websites, there's this concept. This is<br>[05:32] what Matt came this is what Matt shared<br>[05:34] his first time on the show and he said<br>[05:36] most websites actually get like plenty<br>[05:38] of qualified traffic. They just don't<br>[05:41] know how to utilize that and and they do<br>[05:43] a most sites really do a poor job of<br>[05:46] converting and it and that people think<br>[05:48] that oh my gosh, I need so much more<br>[05:50] traffic. Actually, you just need to<br>[05:52] convert. you can conver you can you can<br>[05:55] convert a lot better and so I want to<br>[05:57] start with this question I want to ask<br>[05:58] you when you look at an at an e-commerce<br>[06:01] site what are the first signs that<br>[06:04] organic traffic is being wasted<br>[06:09] um I would say we're looking for a<br>[06:14] simple path to getting to checkout and<br>[06:17] that is something that I think a lot of<br>[06:21] companies miss um your your homepage is<br>[06:24] is to display your collections and and<br>[06:27] but we want to get that customer to<br>[06:29] check out as quickly as possible and we<br>[06:32] want to decrease that customer's risk.<br>[06:35] Now let me talk about this a little bit.<br>[06:38] If you when you buy anything you are<br>[06:40] there's a little bit of risk that you're<br>[06:42] making the wrong decision and that is as<br>[06:47] the AOV goes up that risk is higher and<br>[06:51] usually the consumer derisks by getting<br>[06:55] their questions answered and that's<br>[06:56] something that I think a lot of people<br>[06:59] are overlooking is like the the<br>[07:02] importance of FAQs<br>[07:04] um you know in in apparel like having<br>[07:06] really great sizing charts that's like<br>[07:09] can make or break an apparel company.<br>[07:12] Um, and so, uh, making sure that that<br>[07:15] all of the person's questions are<br>[07:18] answered, uh, by the time that they get<br>[07:21] to checkout to to de decrease that risk<br>[07:23] as as much as possible. And so, uh, I'll<br>[07:27] give an example of this and it's a<br>[07:29] project that we have been working on at<br>[07:30] Build Grow Scale this week. Um we one of<br>[07:34] our clients has six years uh of customer<br>[07:39] service emails uh over a 100,000 emails.<br>[07:42] What we did was and you know using an AI<br>[07:45] tool exported all of those and they're<br>[07:49] not just general questions like<br>[07:51] historically we would have gone to a<br>[07:52] website like answer the public and it<br>[07:54] would have given you like some general<br>[07:56] questions that people have on a<br>[07:57] particular product. It was super<br>[07:59] helpful. Neil Patel put it out is a<br>[08:01] great website. I've used it a ton. Uh,<br>[08:04] however, these customer service<br>[08:05] questions were actual questions about<br>[08:08] actual products from this exact company.<br>[08:11] And we were able to see how frequently a<br>[08:13] certain topic came up and and rank them.<br>[08:16] And so, you know, on our product detail<br>[08:18] pages, we are able to address the<br>[08:20] concerns of the customer uh in an FAQ<br>[08:24] section, which is huge. And we put them<br>[08:27] in order of most important to least<br>[08:29] important. And so what we're trying to<br>[08:31] do on every website is is decrease the<br>[08:34] customer risk and make them confident in<br>[08:36] their purchase when they arrive at<br>[08:38] checkout.<br>[08:40] >> How did you export all of those emails?<br>[08:43] >> We have a team of 25 developers that I<br>[08:47] would put up against any other developer<br>[08:49] team in the world. Um they're smart far<br>[08:52] smarter than than I am at this. Um, and<br>[08:56] uh, to be honest, I don't know the tool<br>[08:58] that they use to to export that. Uh,<br>[09:00] however, what I will say is our company<br>[09:03] has been<br>[09:04] an AI forward company for since I've<br>[09:08] been there in 2024 and and well before<br>[09:10] that. We spend an outsized amount of<br>[09:12] time on training and staying up to date<br>[09:14] on the new releases. I will say we've<br>[09:17] been going pretty deep on Claude and<br>[09:18] Claude co-work. And man is there some<br>[09:22] incredible output that that that system<br>[09:25] has. Things that we're doing now I never<br>[09:28] would have anticipated were even<br>[09:30] possible 6 months ago.<br>[09:32] >> Like what what are you doing?<br>[09:35] >> Um so the one of the my favorite things<br>[09:38] that I like with Cloud Co-Work is is you<br>[09:40] can form these connections where you can<br>[09:42] tie it into a a Shopify store. For<br>[09:44] instance, the Shopify analytics, you can<br>[09:47] tie it into Google Drive. um you can you<br>[09:51] can give it a lot more context and and<br>[09:53] one of the things that you know if you<br>[09:55] think of most companies um one my own<br>[09:58] included in this is you start a company<br>[10:01] set up an initial folder structure uh<br>[10:04] that folder structure doesn't always<br>[10:05] stick you have employees that don't<br>[10:07] follow the folder structure things can<br>[10:08] become a mess however there's really<br>[10:10] valuable things sitting in your Google<br>[10:12] Drive I would argue that most companies<br>[10:14] have $100,000 of just uh avail available<br>[10:19] income that's sitting in their Google<br>[10:22] Drive that if they took action on it<br>[10:24] would be really really helpful. And the<br>[10:27] with co-work is is make those<br>[10:30] connections where it'll go through and<br>[10:32] scrub um all of the documents within a<br>[10:35] particular folder and uh it has that<br>[10:38] much more context uh when it's it's<br>[10:41] giving recommendations.<br>[10:44] So, can you share like what are some<br>[10:45] what's some great output that you've<br>[10:47] gotten from you said it's cloud co-work<br>[10:50] that you're using to do this?<br>[10:51] >> Yeah, absolutely. So, um one yesterday<br>[10:55] we uh took a bunch of reports out of<br>[10:58] QuickBooks. So, I'm a retired CPA um and<br>[11:02] I love Excel and I I'm a big advocate of<br>[11:07] of net income being the highest<br>[11:10] priority. you buy groceries with net<br>[11:12] income, you don't buy it with revenue.<br>[11:14] And we were wanting to put together a uh<br>[11:18] presentation for one of our shareholders<br>[11:21] and was able to put together a great<br>[11:24] slide deck just by connecting it into<br>[11:26] QuickBooks. However, then we just<br>[11:28] started interacting with it and saying<br>[11:30] what, you know, what's some lowhanging<br>[11:33] fruit? Like what are some expenses that<br>[11:36] we could eliminate or decrease? And I<br>[11:38] went through all of the subscriptions in<br>[11:41] the company and it said, you know, this<br>[11:45] is available in a silver, gold, and<br>[11:47] platinum. You're paying for platinum. Do<br>[11:49] you really need it? Uh why don't why<br>[11:51] don't you entertain gold or um this this<br>[11:54] particular subscription you pay by<br>[11:56] users? Why don't you log in and make<br>[11:59] sure that all the users that you're<br>[12:00] paying for are still active at the<br>[12:01] company? And just through that exercise,<br>[12:05] uh, we cleared out about $1,000 of just<br>[12:09] SAS products that we were either had too<br>[12:12] high of a plan, were paying for seats<br>[12:14] that that we didn't uh need, and and<br>[12:17] this exercise took 30 minutes. I mean,<br>[12:20] it was it was quick. And I think a lot<br>[12:22] of business owners,<br>[12:25] that's something that they'd kick the<br>[12:27] can down the road on. Um, looking at a<br>[12:29] P&L is not exciting. Uh, reviewing<br>[12:31] credit card statements at the end of<br>[12:34] every month is great business hygiene,<br>[12:36] but it's something that sometimes gets<br>[12:38] ignored in the hustle and bustle of<br>[12:39] running a business. And, uh, being able<br>[12:42] to scrub through all of the data within<br>[12:45] QuickBooks over the last year and and<br>[12:49] exposed some some blind spots that we<br>[12:51] had was great. And, of course, it made<br>[12:53] some suggestions that we looked into and<br>[12:55] we're like, "No, we're we're great<br>[12:56] there. We don't need to make any<br>[12:58] adjustments." But um of the list of like<br>[13:00] 15 that it brought up, we uh probably<br>[13:03] took action on four or five, which<br>[13:04] amounted to a,000 bucks a month over,<br>[13:08] you know, the course of a year. That<br>[13:10] adds up.<br>[13:11] >> Yeah. Yeah. Also, I like what you were<br>[13:12] saying about I I should be doing this<br>[13:14] more about about<br>[13:16] getting insights with the emails that<br>[13:18] you get. Every email that comes through<br>[13:20] a contact form on edwards.com, I have it<br>[13:23] going to different Google Sheets with<br>[13:25] Zapier. And I don't know, maybe there's<br>[13:28] something better than Zapier that I<br>[13:29] could be using, but it works really<br>[13:31] well. Uh I this isn't I this is this<br>[13:34] doesn't capture everything because I<br>[13:36] don't get full email threads from Google<br>[13:38] Workspace, but I do get the initial<br>[13:40] questions and there's a lot of data in<br>[13:44] there. And I can give any one of these<br>[13:46] spreadsheets to Claude and just say,<br>[13:48] "Yeah, give me some interesting<br>[13:49] insights." And that's something that I<br>[13:50] should be doing a lot more, a lot more<br>[13:52] often. Um, yeah,<br>[13:54] >> one other thing I I want to add is is<br>[13:57] I've been leveraging voice mode a lot<br>[13:59] more. Uh, I find like e-commerce, you<br>[14:02] you tend to sit a lot uh at your<br>[14:05] computer mulling over reports. And one<br>[14:08] thing that I've been doing is is having<br>[14:11] more conversationalbased analysis where<br>[14:14] I will upload a bunch of files and I'll<br>[14:17] hop in the car and go get a cup of<br>[14:20] coffee and and talk back and forth. And<br>[14:23] I ask very, like you suggested, very<br>[14:25] open-ended questions. What are some<br>[14:26] interesting observations that you have<br>[14:28] here? And one of the things that I<br>[14:31] found, especially, you know, if you've<br>[14:33] started your company from scratch, you<br>[14:35] can't see the forest through the trees.<br>[14:37] Uh there are there are things that are<br>[14:39] probably blatantly obvious that uh are<br>[14:45] maybe not obvious to your customers. You<br>[14:46] think they aren't, they're not. And and<br>[14:48] so I I've been utilizing that a lot<br>[14:52] more. And it's it's just more of a<br>[14:54] personal preference. But at the end of<br>[14:56] that conversation, when I'm away from my<br>[14:58] computer, I'll say, "All right, put this<br>[15:00] into a downloadable PDF uh and save it<br>[15:03] into this Google Drive folder. That way,<br>[15:05] I can reference back to it in the<br>[15:06] future." Um, to where I have I have the<br>[15:10] ability to have all of my thoughts and<br>[15:14] data in one spot, but when I'm on my<br>[15:16] cell phone or on my computer, it's it's<br>[15:18] centralized.<br>[15:20] I'm going to ask you more SEO specific<br>[15:22] questions in a few moments, but what you<br>[15:26] said there I think is pretty important,<br>[15:28] which is a lot of business owners miss<br>[15:31] what their customers care about and and<br>[15:35] this could be things with landing pages,<br>[15:37] this could be things with their<br>[15:38] marketing. And so because your company<br>[15:42] has consulted so many businesses, what<br>[15:45] are the most common things that you see<br>[15:48] that companies miss<br>[15:52] >> on<br>[15:54] in regards to just their website in<br>[15:55] general?<br>[15:56] >> Yeah, let's let's talk let's talk about<br>[15:58] their website or even what customers<br>[15:59] care about just things things where you<br>[16:02] see a pattern across businesses that are<br>[16:05] missing it.<br>[16:06] >> Yeah, absolutely. So I would say there<br>[16:08] are some like generally best like best<br>[16:12] practices examples of best practices<br>[16:14] that would help help any website. An<br>[16:16] example of this would be putting your<br>[16:17] phone number at the at the top of your<br>[16:19] homepage. That just it's a trust signal<br>[16:22] at the top and that's something that we<br>[16:24] we've tested and people that gives<br>[16:28] people faith that there's there's real<br>[16:30] people behind this. And I think in the<br>[16:33] there have been enough internet scammers<br>[16:35] uh that<br>[16:36] >> maybe I'll do that. I I'll put it<br>[16:38] actually in the uh in in the heading<br>[16:40] navigation. I didn't consider that.<br>[16:43] >> Test it. And and I think that that's<br>[16:45] something that uh you know is going to<br>[16:48] help just about everybody. Now there are<br>[16:50] there are certain like company specific<br>[16:52] recommendations. So for instance like<br>[16:54] we've done quite a bit in apparel. There<br>[16:56] are some recommendations on sizing<br>[16:58] charts and whatnot and apparel that we<br>[16:59] would, you know, are only relevant<br>[17:01] there. Now, um,<br>[17:04] what what I would also say is like your<br>[17:06] your homepage is to to display your<br>[17:09] collections. You want everything in your<br>[17:12] top bar to be revenue generating. So<br>[17:15] like the the about us, put that in your<br>[17:17] footer. Um, it's not a money maker. Put<br>[17:20] it in in your footer. That absolutely.<br>[17:22] And so I would also say,<br>[17:25] >> yeah,<br>[17:26] >> you want everything in your in your<br>[17:27] heading navigation to be money<br>[17:28] generating.<br>[17:30] >> Absolutely. Absolutely.<br>[17:33] Now, another thing that I think<br>[17:35] companies miss out on and is crossells<br>[17:38] and upsells. And that's something that<br>[17:42] you you know if you have enough data um<br>[17:46] you can see what types of of products<br>[17:50] your c you know in absence of cross<br>[17:53] sales and upsells what types of products<br>[17:55] people are buying together and that<br>[17:57] analysis has gotten even easier with AI.<br>[18:00] you know, look at all of the orders I've<br>[18:02] ever made on my Shopify website and make<br>[18:06] us make three suggestions for upsells<br>[18:08] and three suggestions for cross sales.<br>[18:10] And that's something that, you know, I<br>[18:13] think a lot of people get hung up on on<br>[18:16] conversion rate, um, AOV is just as<br>[18:19] important. You know, to the extent that<br>[18:20] that visitors on your website from some<br>[18:23] sort of paid media source, you want that<br>[18:26] to have as high of ROI as possible. And<br>[18:29] so if there are two products that<br>[18:31] naturally fit together, um you you you<br>[18:35] would want to be doing cross sales and<br>[18:37] upsells. And I I I'm a big believer<br>[18:40] there. And that that moves the needle on<br>[18:41] profitability quite a bit.<br>[18:44] So you managed uh how many like hundreds<br>[18:48] of how hundreds of SKs, right? Like so<br>[18:51] many.<br>[18:53] >> And and I'm assuming that SEO would must<br>[18:56] have been a pretty big part.<br>[18:59] a piece of it and and what I'll tell you<br>[19:01] is it's over at this point probably over<br>[19:04] a thousand SKs. Most of those have been<br>[19:06] on Amazon. Um and I I<br>[19:09] >> But even Shopify sites<br>[19:12] >> what's that?<br>[19:13] >> Even even Yeah.<br>[19:15] >> Yeah. I And so SEO has has been a a big<br>[19:18] part of that. I can and I I am not an<br>[19:21] SEO expert and I just want to make that<br>[19:23] that clear which is probably<br>[19:25] >> that's but that's okay if if you're<br>[19:27] someone where SEO has worked to get you<br>[19:29] customers to get you sales<br>[19:32] >> right right no absolutely<br>[19:34] >> that's what matters you don't have to<br>[19:36] you don't have to have everything by the<br>[19:37] books and perfect I want to hear what's<br>[19:40] worked for you and what's worked for uh<br>[19:43] the for the companies that you have<br>[19:45] consulted<br>[19:46] >> yeah absolutely so Um, on the SEO side<br>[19:49] of things and and if you have a company<br>[19:52] that has an Amazon component, uh,<br>[19:55] there's a high probability that you're<br>[19:58] you're doing PPC, it's just a a<br>[20:01] pay-to-play<br>[20:02] platform these days. I it's hard to<br>[20:05] compete at all on Amazon without PPC.<br>[20:08] And one of the things that you you get<br>[20:12] from that process is relevant keywords.<br>[20:15] What's relevant to my product? And<br>[20:18] that's something that when you're uh<br>[20:21] optimizing Amazon titles, Amazon bullet<br>[20:24] points, backend search terms, um the<br>[20:26] important keywords there tend to be the<br>[20:29] same important keywords that are coming<br>[20:30] out of Google search. Um I would say the<br>[20:33] same would hold true on like search<br>[20:36] volume and and search demand. And so to<br>[20:40] me that's something that when you are<br>[20:43] operating an Amazon business, you don't<br>[20:45] want to operate it in a silo. the data<br>[20:47] that comes out of that, you know, you're<br>[20:49] interacting with consumers and uh you've<br>[20:53] got consumers both on Amazon and on your<br>[20:55] Shopify website. And so when you're<br>[20:57] setting up titles, bullet points on<br>[20:59] Shopify website, having that data at<br>[21:02] least as a starting spot is is<br>[21:04] incredibly valuable. And so I would say<br>[21:06] on on SEO, you're not starting from<br>[21:10] scratch. Um you are you you have a solid<br>[21:13] base of keyword research coming from<br>[21:15] Amazon. And I think that that's<br>[21:16] something that a lot of Shopify sellers<br>[21:19] miss out on.<br>[21:20] >> What have you seen um with Yeah. So,<br>[21:25] what have you seen in terms of Shopify<br>[21:27] brands that are really killing it with<br>[21:29] SEO?<br>[21:33] >> What I would Yeah. So, I'm going to talk<br>[21:35] about one particular client right now<br>[21:37] who is I think there's a return of the<br>[21:41] blog and the importance of the blog. If<br>[21:43] you would really get Yes, I I do believe<br>[21:46] that really,<br>[21:47] >> especially on and I think it's for<br>[21:49] there's certain brands where it it makes<br>[21:53] a lot of sense. For instance, this is a<br>[21:55] an automotive company that sells DIY<br>[21:58] kits. Um, it's a product that sells for<br>[22:02] $2 to $4,000, very expensive, and people<br>[22:05] are doing a lot of research on that<br>[22:06] prior to their purchase. Um, both on,<br>[22:09] hey, am I going to be able to install<br>[22:10] this or what are the benefits of it?<br>[22:12] It's pretty expensive. And if you look<br>[22:15] at that website and the importance of<br>[22:18] the blog, it seemed like in say 2020 to<br>[22:23] 2023 or 4, having a blog was a great SEO<br>[22:27] play. And you you could probably speak<br>[22:28] to this more. It seems like there there<br>[22:30] had been a little bit of a decline. What<br>[22:32] we're doing um now with this brand is<br>[22:35] publishing<br>[22:37] daily blog articles. And I think with<br>[22:40] AEO um you know the AI discoverability<br>[22:44] of a website um they need to crawl web<br>[22:47] pages and they need to gather<br>[22:49] information. I think the blog is a a<br>[22:52] great place to do that. Now if you have<br>[22:54] a website that's selling sugar cookies<br>[22:57] um there's not a lot of decision-m that<br>[22:59] needs to go into buying sugar cookies.<br>[23:01] um maybe there's some cool recipes or<br>[23:04] something, but I I think there are<br>[23:06] certain brands where it's not as big of<br>[23:07] a fit. But that is something that we've<br>[23:10] seen a big boost in in organic traffic<br>[23:13] and on this particular website. And as<br>[23:17] you look at the cost of paid media,<br>[23:20] Facebook ads, Google ads, Tik Tok ads,<br>[23:22] they're trending upwards. And so the<br>[23:24] value of that organic traffic is is<br>[23:28] greater and greater every day.<br>[23:31] As you know, not all organic traffic is<br>[23:34] created equal. You can have organic<br>[23:36] traffic that's for unrelated terms. You<br>[23:39] can have organic traffic that is<br>[23:41] forformational<br>[23:42] terms. You can have organic traffic that<br>[23:45] is for commercial terms where people are<br>[23:47] literally looking to buy. And the thing<br>[23:50] about a lot of uh what and maybe you're<br>[23:52] doing something different, so I'm I'm<br>[23:54] very curious with blog SEO, what a lot<br>[23:57] of people do is they just answer<br>[23:58] questions. with blog SEO and these<br>[24:00] questions maybe they can get them some<br>[24:03] top of- mind awareness where it's like<br>[24:05] oh yeah I've seen that brand before or<br>[24:07] oh yeah yeah like uh oh I need to<br>[24:09] replace some art in my car and this I<br>[24:14] got this answer from this website it was<br>[24:17] cited in chatpt yeah let me ask about<br>[24:21] that but the thing is it's very low<br>[24:24] converting compared to commercial terms<br>[24:26] so what type of blog content are you<br>[24:30] making? Are you doing very top offunnel<br>[24:32] or are you doing more bottom ofunnel<br>[24:34] blog content? Um what we're doing is I<br>[24:39] would say we're following a similar<br>[24:40] strategy on on the questions and then<br>[24:42] and let's talk AEO and and why that I<br>[24:46] think this is a good strategy.<br>[24:48] Most interactions with Chad GBT, Claude,<br>[24:52] you name it starts with a question. Hey,<br>[24:54] I'm thinking about doing this. it it's<br>[24:56] it starts with a question and when we're<br>[24:59] putting out blog content um starting<br>[25:02] with that same question or very similar<br>[25:04] question on that topic I think is is<br>[25:06] relevant. I would also add that when<br>[25:09] we're looking at different types of paid<br>[25:11] media there are certain<br>[25:14] paid media that is informative um people<br>[25:17] are looking for information um and our<br>[25:20] Facebook ad is is giving that<br>[25:22] information. What we would want to do is<br>[25:24] not send them to a sales page, but send<br>[25:26] them to a blog where they can get more<br>[25:28] information about what we're talking<br>[25:30] about. And I think that builds builds<br>[25:33] trust with the customer and I I really<br>[25:36] do think pays dividends. Now, if you if<br>[25:39] you think of, you know, comparing an<br>[25:41] e-commerce store to a brickandmortar,<br>[25:44] like what's a really good brickandmortar<br>[25:46] experience? Well, it would probably be a<br>[25:48] salesperson that answers all my<br>[25:49] questions. Like, that'd be a good place<br>[25:51] to start, right? Um and I I think the<br>[25:54] website needs to be looked at in a<br>[25:55] similar way. Um you're trying to provide<br>[25:58] the best customer experience you can and<br>[26:00] answering questions um any and all<br>[26:03] questions that they have is your job.<br>[26:05] Now uh because you don't have that<br>[26:08] salesperson there to actively listen um<br>[26:11] and and respond to their questions. Uh<br>[26:14] you you need to answer those questions<br>[26:16] elsewhere. could be through your blogs,<br>[26:18] could be through a chatbot that you've<br>[26:20] got tied into a database with a lot of<br>[26:22] data. Um, there are a number of ways to<br>[26:25] do that, but answering<br>[26:28] answering their questions, I think, is<br>[26:29] incredibly important. Can you share what<br>[26:33] a conversion path would look like<br>[26:35] through with this strategy through<br>[26:38] something like Chat GPT or Google's AI<br>[26:42] mode,<br>[26:44] Gemini or Perplexity? Yeah. Um, sure.<br>[26:49] Um, I'm I'm I'm thinking about adding a<br>[26:54] particular part to my diesel truck. uh<br>[26:58] what's that going to do to my gas<br>[26:59] mileage and how hard is it to install?<br>[27:02] Okay, those are kind of two separate<br>[27:04] questions. Chat GPT is going to scroll.<br>[27:07] Um hopefully it's going to provide some<br>[27:08] relevant links or it's going to provide<br>[27:10] you an answer and it's going to site<br>[27:11] those and cite those. Um some people are<br>[27:15] going to move on, some people are going<br>[27:17] to click on those links and and learn<br>[27:18] more. Um and that's where you have the<br>[27:21] opportunity to give author you are<br>[27:23] giving authoritative advice. You're<br>[27:25] coming to a diesel website. you're<br>[27:27] getting an answer from a diesel tech.<br>[27:29] Um,<br>[27:30] >> wait, hold on for a second. Is this Are<br>[27:32] you saying that the person asking this<br>[27:35] to ChachiPT is actually going to the<br>[27:37] website to get the answer or are they<br>[27:38] staying within ChachiPT?<br>[27:39] >> I Well, I I think you're going to have<br>[27:41] that's going to fall into two buckets.<br>[27:43] So, you're going to have people that<br>[27:44] stay within Cad GPT. They're going to<br>[27:47] get their answer and they're going to<br>[27:48] move on or and there's a conversion path<br>[27:51] for them or ChatGpt is going to site<br>[27:54] their sources. There's going to be some<br>[27:55] people that want a little bit more and<br>[27:57] they're going to click on that and and<br>[27:58] learn more. But let's let's stay with<br>[28:00] that first bucket. Um, they get their<br>[28:02] answer. It's going to improve uh your<br>[28:05] fuel economy and it tends to take 2 to<br>[28:08] three hours to install. Um, okay. Is<br>[28:12] there any videos that you know are that<br>[28:15] show installation? um this person may be<br>[28:18] wanting to uh see do I have the tools<br>[28:21] that it takes or I just want to watch<br>[28:22] somebody do this to see if I'm capable<br>[28:24] of doing it right um you may be you may<br>[28:27] have embedded video on your website may<br>[28:29] send them to a YouTube link but you are<br>[28:30] you are again having the opportunity to<br>[28:33] be authoritative in this space<br>[28:35] um and then and then you get to the end<br>[28:37] of that and uh all right I'm confident<br>[28:41] that I can do it I've identified the<br>[28:43] benefits of this particular product. Um,<br>[28:47] where's a great place to buy one? And<br>[28:49] Chat GT Chat GBT is going to throw out a<br>[28:52] number of of items. Sometimes if you ask<br>[28:55] for three, they'll give you three. What<br>[28:57] I found is they're they do a pretty good<br>[28:58] job of sharing the love with multiple<br>[29:01] companies um, and you know, giving<br>[29:05] comparison charts and whatnot. Now it is<br>[29:08] gathering all that information from your<br>[29:10] website and and so you know when it's<br>[29:13] making that comparison chart on say the<br>[29:16] size or fitment or price um you need to<br>[29:21] have that on your product detail pages<br>[29:23] for it to return an answer and and so<br>[29:26] and chat GPT wants to return the highest<br>[29:29] and best use answer and so that would be<br>[29:32] an example of a a buyer's journey and I<br>[29:36] I go back to the example of having<br>[29:41] having answers to their questions, like<br>[29:42] making this the best customer experience<br>[29:44] possible. And so I think the blog's<br>[29:46] making a comeback. I really do. And you<br>[29:49] know, AEO is a relatively new topic, but<br>[29:54] it is I think the the essence of it is<br>[29:58] the same is giving customers information<br>[30:01] and answering their questions and<br>[30:02] providing helpful and useful content.<br>[30:05] Have you seen a lot of actual users wi<br>[30:08] with uh doing doing top offunnel blog<br>[30:11] SEO? Have you have you your team has<br>[30:16] your team or the client been looking<br>[30:18] through Google Analytics and being like,<br>[30:20] "Oh my gosh, yeah, we're getting all<br>[30:21] these human visitors that aren't bots<br>[30:24] engaging with this content. We're seeing<br>[30:26] the paths where they're going, excuse<br>[30:28] me, where they're going from these<br>[30:30] articles, these top offunnel articles.<br>[30:32] Have you Have you guys looked at that?<br>[30:35] >> Yes, we have. Yes, we have. And And<br>[30:37] again, I think on on products that have<br>[30:42] installation setup that aren't simple,<br>[30:45] if you're buying a water bottle, it you<br>[30:47] don't like I this to me this isn't going<br>[30:49] to work in the<br>[30:50] >> That makes sense. That makes that makes<br>[30:52] sense. Where if it's if if installation<br>[30:55] isn't simple, it is likely that AI will<br>[30:58] get it wrong. and and and I can see a<br>[31:01] lot of people actually wanting to go to<br>[31:03] a site to get to get answers and then<br>[31:06] once they're on the site then it becomes<br>[31:08] very easy to move them into the funnel.<br>[31:10] That's the the reason that a lot of<br>[31:12] people uh are staying away from doing<br>[31:16] blog SEO now is because most people just<br>[31:18] want to get their answer within chat GPT<br>[31:20] and move on. But you're right, with<br>[31:23] installation that isn't simple. They're<br>[31:25] going to watch a YouTube video. They'll<br>[31:27] go to they'll actually go to to a<br>[31:30] specific blog post to read it. And<br>[31:32] YouTube SEO is amazing as well.<br>[31:35] >> Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And so I I I<br>[31:38] think it really depends on the brand and<br>[31:40] and you you've got to kind of try to put<br>[31:43] yourself in the shoes of of your<br>[31:45] customer and see, you know, is this a<br>[31:49] complicated buying process? Are there<br>[31:50] going to be a lot of questions?<br>[31:51] Typically with high more expensive<br>[31:54] items, that process is a little bit uh<br>[31:57] long and drawn out where the the<br>[31:59] customer is going to require more<br>[32:01] information to get comfortable with<br>[32:03] their ultimate purchase.<br>[32:05] >> That's interesting. Yeah, that makes<br>[32:07] that makes sense with the more with the<br>[32:09] more expensive things or sorry with the<br>[32:12] more complicated things because yeah, I<br>[32:15] mean ChachiPT messes it up all the time.<br>[32:17] I mean, even with SEO, if you ask Chat<br>[32:19] GPT how to do SEO, it's going to give<br>[32:21] you it's going to regurgitate a million<br>[32:22] things that won't actually move the<br>[32:24] needle. It's going to to tell you uh<br>[32:28] that you need all the schema. Like<br>[32:30] actually, one of the top things that<br>[32:33] Chat GPT will say is you need like FAQ<br>[32:35] schema. FAQ schema hasn't worked for<br>[32:40] literally years. And just a month or two<br>[32:43] ago, Google deprecate announced that it<br>[32:46] is officially deprecated even though it<br>[32:48] had actually hadn't worked for years.<br>[32:50] But chatbt, it'll just regurgitate the<br>[32:52] most common advice. And so with more<br>[32:55] complex things, AI gets it wrong and<br>[32:58] people actually want to go to pages.<br>[33:01] I I agree. I agree. Now what I will say<br>[33:05] is that the getting it wrong if we map<br>[33:08] it out if we look at a year ago like uh<br>[33:12] I if you were engaging with you know<br>[33:14] with an LLM it was very common to get<br>[33:17] just a garbage answer that just<br>[33:19] something that didn't make any sense but<br>[33:21] didn't understand you go 6 months ago<br>[33:24] that was a little bit less and and you<br>[33:26] know as we sit here talking in June of<br>[33:28] 2026 it still happens without a doubt um<br>[33:32] but I I think<br>[33:33] >> how much or do you think it's going to<br>[33:34] get<br>[33:38] >> I mean I think the sky's is the limit.<br>[33:39] Yeah.<br>[33:40] >> So if you believe that how come you keep<br>[33:42] why even continue to invest in top<br>[33:45] ofunnel blog blog content?<br>[33:48] >> Why not just go why not just go all the<br>[33:50] way on the bottom? So So I I'm I'm very<br>[33:53] uh I'm actually very very anti- top of<br>[33:56] funnel on on this podcast with most<br>[33:58] things. There there are niche there are<br>[34:00] circumstances where it could matter. um<br>[34:03] nuanced circumstances. For example, like<br>[34:04] you said, complex implementations where<br>[34:06] AI is likely to get it wrong. That's a<br>[34:09] nuanced circumstance where top offunnel<br>[34:12] content could actually matter. You get<br>[34:13] people onto your site and you can move<br>[34:15] them into your funnel on your site. With<br>[34:17] that said, when when it's time to<br>[34:21] actually do a conversion prompt on Chat<br>[34:25] GPT, you can see the things that it<br>[34:27] actually goes and searches the web with.<br>[34:30] You can literally<br>[34:32] or or or you you can actually like<br>[34:34] rightclick and inspect and there's a<br>[34:36] very straightforward simple method to<br>[34:38] actually see what ChachiPT searches and<br>[34:41] it's searching for example a comparisons<br>[34:43] compare this brand to this brand and so<br>[34:45] the very simple thing to do is you<br>[34:47] actually just put up content your brand<br>[34:49] compared to this brand and a lot of a<br>[34:51] lot of a lot of brands are doing that<br>[34:52] now they're and like you said comparison<br>[34:55] tables they really do work and so the<br>[34:58] way that I think about SEO with a lot of<br>[35:00] brands is<br>[35:04] you could take your time and effort and<br>[35:07] put that into blog SEO that's just going<br>[35:09] to answer a question and then people<br>[35:10] move on or you could take that same time<br>[35:12] and effort and capital and put it into<br>[35:15] the keywords that are actually going to<br>[35:16] bring conversions.<br>[35:19] And now like I said there's plenty of<br>[35:22] nuance circumstances and people will<br>[35:24] disagree with me on this as well. I've<br>[35:26] had SEOs come onto the show, top SEOs,<br>[35:29] who actually are like, "No, you want<br>[35:30] those citations in AI. You want people<br>[35:33] to see your brand name." And that<br>[35:35] creates top of- mind awareness. That<br>[35:37] creates that actually makes your brand<br>[35:41] uh more trusted and you and you want<br>[35:44] that and you want to optimize for that.<br>[35:45] For me, I'm I'm just like I think the<br>[35:49] best way to make money is to target<br>[35:51] people who are literally looking to buy<br>[35:53] right now.<br>[35:56] and you're a conversion guy, so I don't<br>[35:58] know, maybe this resonates with you.<br>[36:00] >> No, I I would I would generally agree<br>[36:02] with<br>[36:06] it. To me, it's hard to give blanketed<br>[36:09] advice that stretches across every<br>[36:11] website and every company in every<br>[36:13] industry. And and so I<br>[36:17] I think there's instances where that's<br>[36:19] correct. And I think there's there's<br>[36:20] instances where where focusing more on<br>[36:23] the top of funnel makes sense. And and<br>[36:26] what I would say is is there are tools<br>[36:28] out there that allow you to test this<br>[36:30] where you know our differing opinions<br>[36:33] don't matter. Uh this is a you testable<br>[36:36] AB uh topic for you know a a software<br>[36:41] like Intelligjs which we we use quite a<br>[36:44] bit.<br>[36:44] >> What's the software called?<br>[36:45] >> Intelligjs. It's a great great split<br>[36:48] testing software. I'd recommend it to<br>[36:49] anybody. Um, and so,<br>[36:53] you know, having a question like this,<br>[36:55] to me, I opinions don't matter as much<br>[36:58] as the output of the test on that<br>[36:59] specific brand. Yeah.<br>[37:04] I I mean, it's it's Yeah, I'm just<br>[37:06] saying I think in every niche, I'm open<br>[37:09] for a debate on this. I I I don't mind.<br>[37:11] I And like my goal is to my goal isn't<br>[37:14] necessarily to be right. I get things<br>[37:16] wrong all the time, but I I believe that<br>[37:19] pretty much in every niche, maybe maybe<br>[37:21] that with the exception of like, okay,<br>[37:24] maybe like high fashion where it for<br>[37:27] people to spend more money, they you<br>[37:31] actually have to have a brand name. Like<br>[37:32] you that's like fashion like you got to<br>[37:34] have a brand name. Okay, fine. But in a<br>[37:37] lot of niches,<br>[37:39] people are literally doing searches or<br>[37:42] prompts where they are ready to purchase<br>[37:45] something and they or they they know<br>[37:47] what they want. They just don't know the<br>[37:49] brand that is going to give them what<br>[37:51] they want. And so if you if you find<br>[37:53] this language like you said using tools<br>[37:56] and you could you could use SEO tools to<br>[37:58] find this language finding the language<br>[37:59] that people are using when they know<br>[38:01] what they want but they don't know the<br>[38:03] brand that's going to give them what<br>[38:05] they want and then making content<br>[38:07] targeting that language. You're the<br>[38:08] brand that shows up<br>[38:11] which and that's by the way that's why I<br>[38:13] like um a lot of people will say that<br>[38:15] SEO is dead. I think SEO is the most<br>[38:18] incredible marketing channel because of<br>[38:20] that because you don't have to spend<br>[38:22] money on ads to reach people when their<br>[38:25] wallet is in hand. You literally can<br>[38:28] just put up the con. You can find using<br>[38:31] data like you said finding the things<br>[38:34] that people are searching when they are<br>[38:37] ready to convert.<br>[38:40] Give me an give me an example of of uh<br>[38:43] buyer is ready to purchase keyword.<br>[38:46] Okay. Something like um very simple<br>[38:49] something like voice notes for dentists<br>[38:51] or emergency<br>[38:54] roof repair Austin. things like things<br>[38:57] like that or uh<br>[39:02] like retile roof services Austin like<br>[39:05] retile roof services Bronx<br>[39:08] or handmade artisan ceramic mugs<br>[39:13] like<br>[39:14] >> it it's and and but let me tell you the<br>[39:16] crazy thing this sounds basic most<br>[39:19] people when they do SEO they don't know<br>[39:22] to actually put all of this put to<br>[39:25] actually take these keywords and just<br>[39:28] put them in these very four simple<br>[39:30] places which is the page title, the URL<br>[39:33] slug, the H1 and the beginning of the<br>[39:35] first sentence. A lot of people think<br>[39:37] that you need to have the most<br>[39:38] authoritative website ever.<br>[39:41] You actually you just need to a lot of<br>[39:43] people have a good baseline authority<br>[39:46] already. A lot of businesses because<br>[39:47] like they're active businesses, they've<br>[39:49] they've submitted their businesses to<br>[39:51] directories because they've wanted more<br>[39:53] people to discover them. they they've<br>[39:55] shared it on so they have social media<br>[39:57] accounts, they've shared on social<br>[39:58] media. They they've done a lot of things<br>[39:59] in the past where they actually have<br>[40:00] enough backlinks, enough baseline<br>[40:02] authority that all they need is more<br>[40:04] relevance for the keywords that people<br>[40:06] are literally searching to buy their<br>[40:08] products. And a lot of people don't even<br>[40:10] know to do that. And and then when when<br>[40:13] people are actually going on to Chachi<br>[40:15] PT and doing and then like you said<br>[40:18] making making comparisons between other<br>[40:20] top brands depends on it depends on the<br>[40:22] niche. Like if you're handmade ceramic m<br>[40:26] handmade artisan ceramic mugs, you<br>[40:27] probably don't need a crazy comparison<br>[40:29] table between com competing brands. But<br>[40:34] but that but then when people go to AI<br>[40:36] to actually say like this is what I'm<br>[40:38] looking for, AI does a web search with<br>[40:40] the language that you put your content<br>[40:43] up with and then it comes across your<br>[40:45] brand and recommends your brand.<br>[40:48] >> Yeah, let's use voice notes for Dennis.<br>[40:51] The first first example, right? So<br>[40:53] that's that keyword voice notes for<br>[40:55] dentist is super that buyer wants a<br>[40:59] program like that. They're going to<br>[41:00] probably click on the first thing that<br>[41:02] comes up and sign up. Now in and when<br>[41:06] you're working with your paid media<br>[41:07] company like you have that keyword and<br>[41:10] it it takes them to a checkout page,<br>[41:12] right? Um now and there's a supply and<br>[41:16] demand for keywords and at some point<br>[41:18] the supply of people that are going to<br>[41:20] search that are going to run out. Okay.<br>[41:22] Now, there's also people that are going<br>[41:24] to say, "Are is Voice Notes for Dennis<br>[41:26] HIPPA compliant?" Okay. Well, let's<br>[41:29] let's send them over to Topfunnel blog<br>[41:32] article. Um, what's the best voice notes<br>[41:35] for Dennis? Well, let's take him over to<br>[41:38] a comparison chart blog article that<br>[41:41] compares ours relative to our<br>[41:43] competitors. And and I think when you're<br>[41:46] you're wanting to maximize<br>[41:49] the ROI of a company, of course, you<br>[41:51] want to go after those those high buyer<br>[41:54] intent messages. But one of two things<br>[41:56] is going to happen. The supply of those<br>[41:58] customers is going to run out or uh the<br>[42:01] price of that keyword relative to how<br>[42:03] much it converts is you're going to<br>[42:05] reach a point where you're at break even<br>[42:07] or underwater from a you know, there are<br>[42:09] certain keywords it doesn't make sense<br>[42:10] to bid on. they're simply too expensive.<br>[42:13] And even if you do convert, you're<br>[42:15] converting at a wass and you know,<br>[42:18] that's not the name of the game. And and<br>[42:20] so I think there's I I think there's<br>[42:22] room for both. And I think if you're<br>[42:24] working with a good paid media agency,<br>[42:27] those are the types of conversations<br>[42:28] that you're having is we're not just<br>[42:31] having a conversation about keywords.<br>[42:33] We're having a conversation about like<br>[42:35] high buyer intent keywords. we're having<br>[42:38] uh you know longtail keyword and and<br>[42:40] phrases that are more questionbased and<br>[42:43] I think having a spot for both of those<br>[42:45] makes sense. And one of the things I<br>[42:47] love about paid media is it's trackable.<br>[42:50] You can you know you may have a hunch uh<br>[42:52] that's wrong. It happens all the time<br>[42:54] and that's okay.<br>[42:56] >> Yeah. Expand expanding the TAM I think<br>[42:58] is a different type of thing. Um<br>[43:00] expanding like growing growing your TAM<br>[43:03] is something different. But why can't<br>[43:04] you have one of these conversion based<br>[43:06] SEO landing pages where you literally<br>[43:08] answer I mean this is your job as a<br>[43:10] content creator as a business owner you<br>[43:13] this is this is your job to say and I'm<br>[43:15] speaking to other business owners this<br>[43:17] is this is your job to figure out what<br>[43:18] these searchers actually want and so you<br>[43:20] would right there on you would write on<br>[43:22] your page this is HIPACO compliant<br>[43:24] here's why this is HIPPA compliant um or<br>[43:26] this is and here's a comparison it maybe<br>[43:30] maybe you've seen you've actually looked<br>[43:32] at data and seen people who are<br>[43:34] searching voice notes for dentists, they<br>[43:35] don't even care about competing brands<br>[43:37] and you don't need that comparison<br>[43:38] table. But but if for people who do then<br>[43:40] you put up separate content for people<br>[43:42] who do. Um and but the thing is like<br>[43:45] we're talking about paid media. But this<br>[43:47] is organic. This is organic SEO. These<br>[43:49] are you don't have to pay for these<br>[43:51] keywords. You just have to you just have<br>[43:53] to have the backlinks and to put up the<br>[43:55] page and and then you and then you rank<br>[43:57] and and it's free. That's free bottom<br>[44:00] off ofunnel traffic. That's in It's<br>[44:02] insane that people can do that. That's<br>[44:04] like uh I'm like I'm I constantly every<br>[44:08] day am hyped about this. That's why I<br>[44:11] have a daily SEO show because I'm a<br>[44:13] madman who's like I can't believe that<br>[44:16] this marketing channel exists. What is<br>[44:20] going on with the world? This is insane.<br>[44:22] This is amazing.<br>[44:25] It's abs, you know, in a well-rounded<br>[44:27] e-commerce company, SEO has got to be<br>[44:30] part of your strategy. I mean,<br>[44:32] absolutely. I I fully fully agree with<br>[44:34] you. Um<br>[44:37] that I would push back a little bit on<br>[44:39] it being free.<br>[44:41] >> Uh<br>[44:41] >> oh, yeah, sure. I mean, but like sure,<br>[44:44] get going, you know, getting getting<br>[44:47] authority. It t it also takes some time<br>[44:50] and so you know that's you're you're<br>[44:52] going to have monthly business costs. Uh<br>[44:56] I would say the thing about these bottom<br>[44:58] ofunnel SEO landing pages actually for<br>[45:00] e-commerce e-commerce landing pages<br>[45:02] bottom of funnel SEO landing pages are<br>[45:03] even shorter than like SAS. So the<br>[45:07] typical bottom ofunnel SEO landing page<br>[45:08] is around 415 words. For e-commerce it<br>[45:12] might be half of that. It it really does<br>[45:15] not have to be long. So like let's say<br>[45:17] it's e-commerce like how long does it<br>[45:19] take to create a 230word<br>[45:22] page really not a lot of time at all<br>[45:25] getting the back links that takes more<br>[45:27] time. However there like like any<br>[45:31] business can be smart and savvy to where<br>[45:33] they're getting other websites to link<br>[45:35] to them. Maybe you have business<br>[45:36] partners or maybe you have like you have<br>[45:38] businesses that you collaborate with.<br>[45:40] They can link to you. You submit to<br>[45:43] relevant directories. Now you're getting<br>[45:44] links from these relevant directories.<br>[45:46] You're thinking of interesting stories<br>[45:48] to pitch journalists either in your<br>[45:50] niche or outside of your niche. They're<br>[45:51] linking to you as well. You're an expert<br>[45:53] in your niche and you're answering<br>[45:55] journing journalists who have questions<br>[45:56] using helper reporter out or source of<br>[45:58] sources or featured.com which is<br>[46:00] rebranded to connectively. So, I will I<br>[46:04] still will say it's pretty inexpensive<br>[46:08] and if especially if you are a business<br>[46:10] that's doing this yourself,<br>[46:12] it's pretty amazing. Yeah, absolutely.<br>[46:16] And and one of the benefits that is, you<br>[46:18] know, it is essentially evergreen,<br>[46:21] right? It it is, you know, if you pay<br>[46:23] for a a Google search term, you have an<br>[46:26] atbat, you either convert or you don't.<br>[46:29] that money spent and it's gone. You're<br>[46:32] never going to have another app bad<br>[46:33] again. It's And if you look at a, you<br>[46:38] know, a website that's well optimized<br>[46:40] for SEO that will continue to pay<br>[46:43] dividends. You may, you know, pay an<br>[46:45] agency.<br>[46:45] >> David, let me let me tell you, I like I<br>[46:48] made a landing page so many SEO landing<br>[46:50] pages for keywords like voice notes for<br>[46:52] dentist. I made these. This is when I<br>[46:55] discovered like how incredible bottom<br>[46:57] ofunnel SEO was. I did this in like 2019<br>[47:00] and 2020. Most of these pages are still<br>[47:03] ranking number one for their target<br>[47:04] keywords and continue to bring<br>[47:06] customers. It's crazy. Like it's<br>[47:11] evergreen. That's evergreen.<br>[47:13] >> Absolutely. Absolutely. And that's a<br>[47:14] that's a piece of SEO that I love. And<br>[47:17] and on the flip side, that's one thing<br>[47:18] about uh you know, Google ads and<br>[47:20] Facebook ads that I kind of hate uh is<br>[47:22] that it is a oneandone. Um, you know, I<br>[47:25] I look at what we spend on ads for some<br>[47:28] of our businesses and and ask myself<br>[47:30] where could I, you know, where could I<br>[47:31] put those dollars to work uh a little<br>[47:33] bit harder and um, you know, SEO, AEO, I<br>[47:38] do think is a good place.<br>[47:39] >> I want to ask you, uh, you've so you<br>[47:42] guys have done like a lot of a lot of<br>[47:44] really cool CRO tests, right?<br>[47:47] >> Mhm.<br>[47:48] >> What have you seen create the biggest<br>[47:51] lift? Um, yeah. What what what are some<br>[47:54] things that have created I was going to<br>[47:55] ask for organic traffic specifically,<br>[47:58] but honestly it doesn't it doesn't<br>[47:59] matter. It could be paid as well. What<br>[48:01] have you seen make what have you seen<br>[48:04] have the most dramatic results? And then<br>[48:08] and then and then the second one would<br>[48:09] be like what has surprised you?<br>[48:13] Let's see. I'm trying to get to a good<br>[48:15] example that would be broadly<br>[48:17] applicable. What I would say is we<br>[48:19] typically are starting at our checkout<br>[48:20] and working backwards. Um, and I think<br>[48:23] that when you're testing, that's<br>[48:25] something that's incredibly important is<br>[48:28] is starting there and and and working<br>[48:30] backwards. And so, um,<br>[48:34] you know, in terms of Yeah, I I don't<br>[48:37] have a great answer to that right now.<br>[48:39] >> Well, the the phone number is<br>[48:40] interesting. I'll also I I I also should<br>[48:43] add this just uh came into my mind with<br>[48:46] the bottom of funnel SEO landing pages.<br>[48:49] These are very qualified visitors who<br>[48:52] are coming and and finding them through<br>[48:54] Google or through AEO or GEIO and then<br>[48:58] you do retargeting to these visitors<br>[49:00] because you know that they are literally<br>[49:02] interested in what your brand offers and<br>[49:05] so like yeah it's I mean uh it's it's<br>[49:09] crazy. How about Okay, how about how<br>[49:11] about this? What what are some like<br>[49:13] super common reasons that uh aside from<br>[49:18] like okay you didn't answer the<br>[49:19] questions with the FAQ you didn't think<br>[49:20] of that what are some other common<br>[49:22] reasons you've seen that visitors are<br>[49:24] not buying<br>[49:26] >> uh not optimizing for mobile and that's<br>[49:28] one that I think is<br>[49:30] >> really still in 2026 you're still seeing<br>[49:32] that<br>[49:33] >> absolutely absolutely and I think that<br>[49:35] it's something that most web like for<br>[49:39] the entrepreneur that builds their first<br>[49:42] website themselves, which I think is<br>[49:43] very common, right? You're starting a<br>[49:45] business, you're bootstrapping. Um, most<br>[49:47] of that work's going to be done on<br>[49:49] desktop. And I think Shopify is getting<br>[49:52] a little bit better of of showing that<br>[49:53] mobile preview, but yet you would be<br>[49:56] shocked at the number of people that are<br>[49:58] not optimizing for mobile. And you know,<br>[50:01] if you look at buying behavior, it's<br>[50:04] it's trending in the direction of, you<br>[50:06] know, mobile<br>[50:08] be being more and more important. Uh<br>[50:10] more and more people are on their phones<br>[50:13] buying. They've got their credit card<br>[50:15] tied into Apple Pay and it's a pretty<br>[50:17] seamless transaction. And so, um I think<br>[50:20] that's that's one that is, you know, if<br>[50:23] you're listening to this, pull up your<br>[50:25] website on your cell phone and see how<br>[50:28] it looks. get get go all the way to<br>[50:30] checkout. Don't just look at the<br>[50:31] homepage.<br>[50:33] >> Have you seen uh<br>[50:35] I Shopify did that big announcement<br>[50:38] previously where people could buy<br>[50:40] through chatbt?<br>[50:42] Do you remember that?<br>[50:43] >> Yeah.<br>[50:44] >> Have are you seeing a lot of are you<br>[50:46] seeing a lot of conversions happening<br>[50:49] with AI outside of like blog content or<br>[50:51] like what are you seeing there?<br>[50:53] Actually, I I don't think I have seen<br>[50:57] that announcement that that you're that<br>[50:59] people are making buying decision.<br>[51:02] >> Yeah, they have or they're checking out.<br>[51:05] >> I think so. I I think actually a<br>[51:07] checkout was happening right there<br>[51:09] within Chachi BT, but I'm not sure if<br>[51:11] they ever made this live. Uh it was like<br>[51:14] this big announcement that went viral<br>[51:15] and I like uh and oh, it's as you know,<br>[51:18] as with everything, it's like<br>[51:20] everything's going to be a slow roll<br>[51:21] out. not everyone's going to get it<br>[51:23] immediately and then like maybe maybe<br>[51:25] during that slow roll out they say ah<br>[51:27] this isn't really working let's not<br>[51:28] let's not even do it. Um, I'm I'm really<br>[51:31] I'm I guess I'm more so curious<br>[51:35] how have you seen aside from like blog<br>[51:38] SEO, how have you seen<br>[51:42] uh because you've been in e-commerce for<br>[51:44] so long, how have you seen Chachi PT,<br>[51:46] Perplexity, Gemini actually change<br>[51:50] the buyer journey or is it just blog<br>[51:52] SEO? And that's fine. That's fine too.<br>[51:55] I'm curious like being in this game for<br>[51:57] so long. I I do want to I'm going to<br>[52:00] answer that question, but there is one<br>[52:02] thing I want to circle back on on the<br>[52:03] the uh Chad GBT checkout uh which I'm<br>[52:06] not aware of. Uh however, they have Jad<br>[52:08] GBT has just released an ads platform<br>[52:11] which is uh we are beta testing on one<br>[52:14] of our brands had mixed results. We're<br>[52:16] only about 10 days in. I will say as a<br>[52:19] consumer of that information, I am a<br>[52:21] little bummed out. Uh it did seem like<br>[52:25] it was a place to go get unbiased<br>[52:28] answers um and not answers or<br>[52:31] recommendations to the top bidder. And I<br>[52:33] do think that that skews<br>[52:36] at least there's a a a perceived<br>[52:40] um skewing of what may be recommended.<br>[52:44] And you you've seen that happen on<br>[52:46] Amazon a lot where your top six ads are<br>[52:50] all sponsored and you they may not be<br>[52:53] the best products, but they're the<br>[52:54] people that are paying the most for that<br>[52:55] keyword on that day. And and so<br>[53:00] I anyway, that is a news in the industry<br>[53:05] that I<br>[53:07] it's too early to say, but I'm<br>[53:09] interested to see how it plays out. Open<br>[53:11] AI has said that the ads do not bias<br>[53:14] their answers and that it's they're very<br>[53:16] clearly separate as ads. Are have you<br>[53:20] seen that um be the opposite? I'm I'm<br>[53:23] super curious.<br>[53:25] >> I haven't. We're and again we're 10 days<br>[53:27] in on testing it and to be honest with<br>[53:29] you when I compare it to our face like<br>[53:31] rorowaz on Facebook and Google ads it it<br>[53:34] hasn't um<br>[53:37] >> it it is not performing well. Now,<br>[53:39] typically when you're rolling out<br>[53:41] >> Yeah. Um, which is now, uh, when you<br>[53:44] roll out ads, there's a series of<br>[53:45] optimizations that you need to go<br>[53:48] through and, um, we're just, you know,<br>[53:51] low budget, getting things off the<br>[53:52] ground. But, uh, you know, talk to me in<br>[53:55] a month. I'll have some better updates<br>[53:56] on how that's going.<br>[53:57] >> That's that's interesting cuz a lot of<br>[53:59] people were like, "Oh my god, when new<br>[54:01] ad platform is launching on on ch, it's<br>[54:04] going to be it's going to be a complete<br>[54:05] blood bath." like when Google had ads,<br>[54:07] when Meta had ads, and yeah, you're<br>[54:10] like, h, it's not.<br>[54:12] >> It seems like once a year we get hit<br>[54:13] with this. You know, Tik Tok ads were<br>[54:15] really big about a year ago, and um it<br>[54:20] seems like there's the the people that<br>[54:22] arrive at the party first tend to get<br>[54:25] some cheaper conversions and then more<br>[54:27] people pile on and the markets reach<br>[54:29] equilibrium for supply and demand for<br>[54:32] keywords or topics or whatever it may<br>[54:34] be. And so, you know, that was our<br>[54:36] thought on this play is, you know, let's<br>[54:38] be one of the first people of the party<br>[54:40] on this ads platform and see what we can<br>[54:41] do. Um, and uh the jury is still out on<br>[54:47] how that's going to perform. I I haven't<br>[54:49] heard actually I'd love if if uh anyone<br>[54:53] in the comments can share if they've<br>[54:54] heard great ad performance stories with<br>[54:58] Chachi BT because I have not I have not<br>[55:01] heard anything anything there. Yeah.<br>[55:04] >> Yeah.<br>[55:06] >> What what should listeners steal from<br>[55:08] Amazon and apply to their own websites<br>[55:11] immediately?<br>[55:14] >> Uh customer feedback um on a particular<br>[55:18] topic or on a particular product and it<br>[55:21] could be your own product. Uh it'll give<br>[55:23] you good ways on how to iterate and make<br>[55:25] your your design or packaging or<br>[55:28] whatever it may be make your customer<br>[55:29] experience better. However, uh it<br>[55:32] doesn't need to be your own product.<br>[55:33] They can be your competitor's product.<br>[55:35] If you're thinking about launching a new<br>[55:37] product uh in a specific niche and<br>[55:41] you're working with a manufacturer on<br>[55:44] coming up with a design, if you're not<br>[55:46] reading the one-star reviews on Amazon<br>[55:49] or using an LLM to scrub the low, you<br>[55:53] know, one and two star reviews on<br>[55:55] Amazon, I think you're leaving good<br>[55:58] feedback on the table that is<br>[56:00] essentially free. And so I want I wish<br>[56:03] it had a handle, the the zipper brakes,<br>[56:07] um, you name it. I mean, it could be<br>[56:10] whatever. But if you know, when you're<br>[56:12] interacting and getting your first<br>[56:14] initial product samples, you want to hit<br>[56:16] all of the, you know, you don't want to<br>[56:18] launch a meto product. You want to<br>[56:19] launch something than what's, you know,<br>[56:22] better than what's commercially<br>[56:23] available. And if you can address those<br>[56:26] issues on your first round of of<br>[56:30] product, you're going to come out ahead<br>[56:33] um relative to, you know, letting your<br>[56:35] manufacturer make the decision. So,<br>[56:37] they're going to manufacture what you<br>[56:39] ask them to do. And so, you've got to be<br>[56:41] in the driver's seat on design and and<br>[56:44] certain specs that are very important to<br>[56:46] you to have included. I made some Tik<br>[56:49] Toks about something that Matthew<br>[56:50] Stafford said about reviews and actually<br>[56:53] these Tik Toks went viral. People found<br>[56:56] it to be really interesting. Matt, do<br>[56:58] you do you know Matthew Stafford's take<br>[57:00] on twostar reviews?<br>[57:03] No trust. He said yes. He said it's the<br>[57:05] best. Those are the best reviews that<br>[57:07] you can get because you respond to the<br>[57:11] people see that you have a helpful and<br>[57:16] friendly communicative response to the<br>[57:18] two star reviews and people trust you so<br>[57:22] much more.<br>[57:24] >> I fully agree with that. I fully agree<br>[57:25] with that and that's been one that we've<br>[57:27] tested and the data backs that. David,<br>[57:30] if an e-commerce founder just has 30<br>[57:34] minutes today to improve<br>[57:38] uh to improve their landing pages and to<br>[57:43] to actually get more from the traffic<br>[57:45] that they are already getting. They have<br>[57:48] only 30 minutes. What should they do<br>[57:50] first?<br>[57:51] Make sure your phone numbers up at the<br>[57:53] top of your page. Uh download your<br>[57:57] orders report. plug it into an LLM,<br>[57:59] establish what would be some good<br>[58:01] cross-ell and upsell opportunities.<br>[58:05] Uh, take a look at all your negative<br>[58:07] reviews, see if there's opportunities to<br>[58:10] add information to your product detail<br>[58:12] page that answers some of your customers<br>[58:14] questions.<br>[58:15] That's awesome. Something that I do is I<br>[58:18] have a short code for phone number. So,<br>[58:21] I write in uh I just write like Ster<br>[58:24] Media phone number and then on the front<br>[58:26] end it'll autopop populate with my phone<br>[58:29] number from the back end. And that way<br>[58:31] if the phone number ever gets spammed<br>[58:33] and I have to change it out, I can just<br>[58:35] do it from one place. And that way it<br>[58:37] that way if I change it out on the back<br>[58:39] end, it populates across the entire<br>[58:41] website and I don't have to go into each<br>[58:43] individual page to change the phone<br>[58:45] number. And it's uh super easy. Anyway,<br>[58:48] David, thank you so much. Where should<br>[58:50] everybody find you?<br>[58:52] >> Check us out at buildgrowscale.com.<br>[58:55] >> All right. Well,<br>[58:56] >> thank you.<br>[58:57] >> Yep. This is episode 1,67<br>[59:01] of the Edward Show. 167 days in a row<br>[59:04] doing this podcast. If you watch us on<br>[59:06] YouTube, thank you so much for watching.<br>[59:08] If you listened on Spotify or Apple<br>[59:10] Podcasts, thank you so much for<br>[59:12] listening and I will talk to you again<br>[59:14] tomorrow. Bye now.
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## Highlights
- Give me an give me an example of of uh buyer is ready to purchase keyword. Okay. Something like um very simple something like voice notes for dentists or emergency roof repair Austin. things like things ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01ktfg2pv2d8h8eh0k7s8cr648))
- Note: Buyer-intent keywords (ready to purchase) are specific and problem-shaped: "voice notes for dentists," "emergency roof repair Austin" โ not broad head terms.
- Tags: atom/literature/h2, ecommerce, seo
- actually take these keywords and just put them in these very four simple places which is the page title, the URL slug, the H1 and the beginning of the first sentence. A lot of people think ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01ktfg2dtz8cgx2hq28fjf3jc4))
- Note: The simple on-page SEO placement rule: put the target keyword in four places โ page title, URL slug, H1, and the start of the first sentence.
- Tags: seo, ecommerce, atom/literature/h1