083: Using SEO to Have Your Website Found

Michele  (0:01)  On the podcast, today is Meg Casebolt of Megabolt Digital. Meg focuses on SEO to help her clients have their websites be easily found. And what I love most about her approach is that it's crafted to allow for the individuality of each client. The term SEO can be so off-putting or something that we don't want to think about, but it's necessary in the online world. Meg uses Google Analytics as a jump-off point to help her clients much like I use financial statements when clients come to me. They're just tools that give us insight on how best serve our clients. And in the conversations, we also found that we have other parallels to approaching more of the difficult topics. Today, I hope that you'll learn more about search engine optimization.  Have an idea of where to start looking for that and what you should do. And at least the understanding of knowing how your clients search for your products and services can affect your ability to be found. The online world is very busy and we have to stand out must not be the best-kept secret.

Michele  (1:41)  Hey, Meg, welcome to the podcast.

Meg  (1:43)  Hey, Michele, thank you so much for having me here today. I'm so excited to talk to you about all of this, so many things to talk about.

Michele  (1:49)  I know I know. I just want to start by saying I mentioned it in the intro, but you and I have been working together. I think one of the topics that we're going to talk about today is how we both kind of analyze the business. And there are pieces of documentation that we each look at to analyze the business based on our specialty, right? 

Meg  (2:11)  Totally. 

Michele  (2:11)  I cannot wait for us to jump into that. But before we do that, Meg, I would love for you to share with me and with the listeners, a little bit of your journey on how you got to the business that you. You didn't start with this business.

Meg  (2:26)  Do any of us ever start with the businesses that we're in? 

Michele  (2:29)  Rarely. 

Meg  (2:30)  I'm sure there are some interior designers who, when they were four years old, said, I want to help make people's houses beautiful, and they just pursued it aggressively the whole time. But I think for most of us, especially in this kind of open economy, we kind of stumble our way into things right? So that's okay if it happens. You've said before that you started in software development and somehow ended up in the workroom. Sometimes the path that we build for ourselves is nonlinear. So in the same way, I have a bachelor's degree in political science, I have a master's degree in Community Economic Development. I spent eight years working in fundraising for nonprofits in the Boston area. I grew up in, Rochester, New York, kind of upstate New York and then moved to Boston after college. I raised a lot of money for especially global health organizations, mentoring for children, food banks, you name it, I wrote grants for it. And while I was working at the nonprofits, we have limited marketing budgets. And so I had to think creatively about where we needed our money to go and what I could do in the house. And so I wrote a grant to get myself graphic design training so that we could stop paying and outside graphic designers and bring that work in the house. That started my role is less about fundraising and more about marketing and communications. I was able to do more graphic design for the nonprofit's that I worked with.

Then fell in love with my now-husband. We did long distance for two years while I was living in Boston and he was living in New York. I moved to be with him and I couldn't find a job in nonprofits. So I started working for an architecture and interior design firm, doing their marketing. Which I think is one of the reasons that you and I connected, is because I stumbled into interior design. It s something that I love marketing. So I spent two years doing the marketing for that green-sustainable, architecture interior design firm in Saratoga Springs, New York. And then I  got married, got pregnant looked at how much it costs to send your kid to childcare now. And when Oh, maybe I don't want to send my kid to full-time childcare. And so I left the architecture firm. I started a graphic design firm and was a freelancer for several years. I started with more of the print design. Again, going into nonprofits I worked for a couple of law firms doing all of their print design for their sponsorships. So and so law firm supports this nonprofit and it went into their gala books. I was doing the design to benefit the nonprofit. So again, it all kind of ties together. And then I started doing more web design. Helping people build not just here's the pretty flyer that you want to use. But then I started building social media graphics and I started building websites and moved into that space because I had surrounded myself with other freelancers and entrepreneurs and people who needed to be digital.

Once I started building websites, I was building out these beautiful websites, WordPress, Squarespace, building out sales pages, brands, logos, brand identities, all the things and I had a couple of clients say to me, "Well, I love the new website you built for me, but how come nobody's finding it"? We had never talked about people finding it as part of our scope of services. We had never... I didn't know what SEO was four or five years ago, and these conversations were happening, but I didn't want my clients to feel let down. So I started looking into what are some things that I can do as the person building these websites to help them show up in Google search results. So that when people are spending thousands of dollars with me to get these new websites built, they're getting new clients from them. And once I started looking into that, I was like, man, learning this is time-consuming. I reached out to a couple of other friends who were web designers, and I said, "How do you find the time to do all the thing is for the web design and also do the search stuff to get it found in Google search results"? And they're like, "Oh, I struggle with it, too." I don't know how anyone can do both. And I don't want to spend that much time doing the SEO and search stuff. I would rather do the web design, and I realized I would rather do the SEO, I would rather help the websites get found then build the websites. And so I started teaming up with my friends who are designers and offer add on SEO services to them so that their clients could have the results of showing up in those search results, and their clients felt great about it and they didn't have to learn how to do sort of the technical piece to get those websites found. That was something that I could specialize in. And once I decided to specialize and getting websites found in search results, the world opened up to me. I was getting referrals coming in from everywhere. I have multiple web designers, copywriters, strategist marketing people that are constantly sending me leads. And then I have a couple of industries where I have a little bit of a whisper campaign going on between. So I work with a lot of interior designers because interior designers keep telling other interior designers about me.

Michele  (7:54)  Yeah, yeah. You know, a couple of things that strike me in that number one is when we were kind of kicking going about the fact that the business that we start not the business we end up with. 30 years ago when I graduated from college and started working. You didn't hear about business coaches, you certainly didn't hear about SEO because we were not even having internet at that point that didn't come out until years later. We didn't even have laptops, there was no such thing as a, we had dumb terminals on our desk, we didn't even have PST so we didn't have those things. So there was no way that the business of today could have been the business that I had 30 years ago. It had not even been created and happen. And this thing to your point with the SEO, new industries are being created every day based on a new need, due to the shifts in our technology and the opportunities in front of us. So if there was ever a time like I remember,  growing up, I wanted, I loved being entrepreneurial, but there was no entrepreneurial path and colleagues and free an entrepreneur. It just wasn't there. The other thing that struck me and I made a note when you mentioned it and I love this, you were talking about starting off working for the nonprofit's and having a very limited budget. And I know what I call that and I think a lot of people probably use a similar term but we would call that guerrilla marketing right? 

Meg  (9:22)  Yeah. 

Michele  (9:22)  But just out there Mike McCalla Michalowicz has a book called Toilet Paper Entrepreneur, that same kind of scrappy, I'm working in my garage kind of thing. And I think that is so important, Meg, for even part of our discussion today because many that are listening. I get asked this all the time, "What should my marketing budget be? How much should I spend on marketing and advertising?" And SEO is a piece of that puzzle? It's not the whole puzzle. It is a piece of and I can give you percentages and work through all that with people. But what I usually say to them is do you have more time or do you have more money?

Meg  (10:00)  Yes, that's where I was going to go. You can spend the money to hire somebody to do it for you, or you can learn to do it yourself and come up with a plan and spend the time to create. Whether that's content for your website, whether those are blogs or videos, whether it's spending some time on social media and posting over there, it's a lot of the marketing things that are will say organic marketing, which is the free marketing channels. They're free, but they're time-consuming. They're time-consuming to learn. And sometimes they can take a while to work. So if you have a budget, you can hire somebody to do it for you. If you have a budget, you can do Facebook ads, Google ads, print ads, you can kind of get yourself out that way. But you don't necessarily need to have an advertising budget or a marketing budget to have successful marketing.

Michele  (10:02)  Right. Correct. With money. So what I use... We get to have a time budget where we might not have a money budget because it's... 

Meg  (11:00)  Yes. 

Michele  (11:00)  Right. And I always talk about profit first thing, our money. But we profit first our time as well when we just are allocating and spending our time budget on our calendar. And so usually I'll ask two questions. Do you have more time? Or do you have more money? Like, how does that balance out? And do you have an interest? Because I might have plenty of time and zero-interest or zero. And it's not going to do me any good. I'd rather go spend that time doing something else. But I know even in my journey, when I first started, I wanted to do like, for me, I'm one of those entrepreneurs that I want to do everything in my business to get it started. Then I want to hand it off. I want to know enough to be dangerous. I want to try it and to figure out enough so that I have an understanding. And then I realize I can't go deeper without that being a focus. Kind of like where you mentioned, the web designers were like, well, if I go to SEO and I've made that effort to focus, I can't focus on the pretty of the web design. It takes too long. And it's so deep and it's so much bigger. And so I usually do enough to get started and go, Okay, now I get it, I understand it, handoff, handoff.

Meg  (12:12)  But I think when you have at least a foundational level understanding of how your marketing can work, and how the different pieces of your marketing can collaborate and build upon each other, then it's easier to hand off without being taken advantage of.

Michele  (12:28)  Exactly. 

Meg  (12:28)  I think that there are a lot of agencies out there that can say things like, oh, we'll do all your social media and your SEO and your website design and you're this and you're this and you're this, and they're saying it's only $10,000 a month. And then if you knew what you were looking for, you're like they're working three hours a month, they're stealing from me. If you don't know what you can expect in terms of results and how long things take to complete and what the experts are doing. Even if you don't know how to do the things that they're doing. You can be taken advantage of by people who are not well-meaning as you and I are.

Michele  (13:01) That's right. Or you know, conversely, well, not even, I guess in the same vein, are they giving me unique results? Or are they giving me copycat results that they've created one time and they're pushing it? 

Meg  (13:13)  Totally. 

Michele  (13:13)  There's nothing wrong with shared information and share data, as long as you know, that's what it is going in. And it's priced appropriately for that. 

Meg  (13:22)  Yeah.

Michele  (13:22)  Totally cool with it. I just don't want something sold to me as a unique solution that is not unique to my business with my words, and what's going to drive them to me?

Meg  (13:35)  Absolutely. When you and I started talking, I said, full disclosure, Michele, I've worked with other business coaches for interior designers.

Michele  (13:42)  Right. 

Meg  (13:42)  And I want to let you know that. The fact that you are also so focused on p&l and profitability, I'm going to create your plan for what I want you to be talking about, in the way that your website sounds that have nothing to do with what I created for those people who may have the same title as you.

Michele  (14:00)  Right, Right. Because I mean, how many... I work with designers. They all have the title designer. I've worked with each of them in their business, for their business, for what makes them unique. And it's that same type of thing. 

Meg  (14:14)  And some of them may be doing the same thing but in different geographic areas. And so the advice that you're giving them can be the same whether they're in San Francisco or Dallas, Some of them might both be in Dallas, but one of them is commercial. And one of them is residential. And so you can kind of going to have things right, you can have best practices that aren't necessarily bespoke, but then you can customize those things based on the situation that person is in.

Michele  (14:39)  Absolutely, absolutely. And so even, when you and I started talking, and that was one of the reasons the minute we started talking, I'm like, we've got to do a podcast together. I came to you and ask questions. I didn't know everything, but I knew enough to know which questions I needed to ask. One of the things I want to ask you though, is before we jumped kind of like the meat and potatoes part of this is what is Seo, not? There are a lot of after that I want it. We'll talk about what SEO is. But let's talk about what it's not. 

Meg  (15:12)  Oh my god, I love this question. 

Michele  (15:14)  We throw that out as if we all should know what SEO is. And, when we know what we know, it means search engine optimization. Okay, that sounds all great. That's like a preachy word. Right? That's I'm getting preachy word. But what is it not? And then let's talk about what it is.

Meg  (15:32)  Yeah. So you'll notice when I was talking about my journey, I never... I every once in a while, always say SEO. But usually, I say getting websites found in search results, right? Like we're on Google because I don't want to have to say search engine optimization and like, push my glasses up my nose like a big nerd. Even though I am a big nerd. I'm willing to admit that. I think that SEO is an industry people have become so deeply entrenched in it that they just talk in jargon, and it's hard for normal people to understand people talking about SEOs. I don't want to say dumb things down,  I simplified things. Right?

Michele  (16:05)  I know that I'm known for taking complex topics and breaking them down, you are the same. We are in common. So let's break down SEO for just a minute before we talk about how we go into look at the health of a company's SEO strategy. I mean, I'm all good with breaking down the preachy techniques.

Meg  (16:24)  Let's do it. 

Michele  (16:25)  Let's get it out of there and go down to like, what is it? What is it not? 

Meg  (16:29)  Alright, so what is not? Often when people think about SEO, they think that it's about just taking keyword phrases and shoving them into your website in awkward places. They think about if you're on WordPress and you have the Yoast SEO plugin, you get a green light and therefore your SEO is good. They think about SEO as a switch that you can turn on and off and say, "Oh, can you just install the SEO on my website?" None of those is the way that SEO works. SEO is not like a package. It's more of a long term process. 

Michele  (16:44)  You and I talked about that it's the long journey. It's a long game and not a short game, not to say there aren't some short games. 

Meg  (17:10)  There are ways you can speed up the process. Sure. So when I think about SEO, I think about making your website show up in as many search results as possible and getting Google to trust you. So where do I start?

Michele  (17:24)  Well, that's good. But so let's dig into the first one. 

Meg  (17:27)  Yeah.

Michele  (17:28)  Getting it to show up in as many searches as possible for the searches that you want to be found for.

Meg  (17:34)  For the things that you think your ideal client is looking for.

Michele  (17:37)  Right? 

Meg  (17:38)  Let's not even say the searches that you want to be found for. I don't care what you want to be found for. I care what your clients are looking for and the problems that you can solve for them. Before they even know that they have a problem. You have to kind of have this almost telepathic mind-reading ability to say. We just talked about this for years is you, interior designers need to know the difference between gross and net revenue. Okay, what are the phrases that people are already searching for around gross and net revenue? Are they saying gross revenue, gross profit, gross income? Which of those are people looking for? And how can we write something on your website so that when an interior designer is looking for knowing what her net revenue is, or net income is, we know the phrases that she's going to look for? And we can include those in the title of the post and the meta description of the post. And those are the two parts of the show up in search results. Those are the parts that like when you go to the search results. There's the blue part that says, five things you need to know about your interior design net revenue. And then the meta description is the black part underneath that, that says if you've been wondering how much your interior design business is making, here's the formula that you want to use to figure out your profit. So when we can both read the minds of the people who are looking for these problems, and then make it clear to them that we have the solution to the concerns that they have, then they will come to our website. It will be easier to rank for something more specific because fewer people are talking about things like revenue for interior designers, right? Like, that's not a very common thing to be discussing. So when somebody's searching for that, and they find Michelle, they're like, Oh, my God, I found the exact answer I'm looking for. And then we think about what's another problem that they have and create the small pieces of answers for them in your blog post, in your podcast, show notes in any videos that you're producing.

Michele  (19:48)  Right. 

Meg  (19:48)  But it's not just people who are looking for a business coach for interior designers. Yes, I want those people who are looking for that to find Michelle also, but I want them to find her for lots of different solutions that she can provide. 

Michele  (20:02)  Right? So just to push back on and get maybe add a layer of clarity to that first comment about being found what I want to be found for, I do think there's huge value in that not just for what they're looking for. And let me expand on that for a minute, from what I was meaning to put out there. For those who may be listening. My goal, from my standpoint, is to build a business doing what I want to do, not what my clients want me to do, and don't misinterpret that. I want to do what Michele wants to do because that's what Michele loves and is passionate about. Now, I might have to... so I want to be found to be doing certain things, but I certainly have to use the words and phrases that the ideal clients wanting that product or service would look for.

Meg  (20:48)  That's exactly it. 

Michele  (20:49)  That right. So that's where I'm coming from when I say the searches that I want to be found for meaning for the products and the services that I want to provide. And I make that distinction. And I know you mean the same thing. So I do.

Meg  (21:02)  So let me clarify that a little bit when I said I'm not as concerned with the things you want to be found for so much as what your clients are searching for. I can tell you that there are zero people a month looking for profit, first interior design coaches, but they don't know that's a thing. So you want to go out and brand yourself as a prophet first interior design coach, you're not going to get a lot of traffic from that only because not because I don't think you should talk about that. But because people don't know it exists.

Michele  (21:31)  Right? No, I don't disagree. And so what I'm saying though, is if we were to take it out of context of my business, and we look at it in a broader sense, I'm constantly getting designers who say, "I am being found but they're not my ideal clients like the wrong people are finding me." So in that case, they are not showing up for what they want to show up for. 

Meg  (21:55)  Yeah. 

Michele  (22:02)  I'm saying there has to be this, this meshing of I am creating a business and I have all of my clients create a business out of their strengths, their abilities, their values, what they want to put out into the world, then we have to message that correctly so that those who want that same thing can find us. And that's what we're seeing from both sides.

Meg  (22:23)  And so I think for interior designers, often what we think we have to produce for people is a roundup of here are 10 lamps that we like, or here are cheap ways that you can organize or get your bathroom into shape. But when you're doing those types of content, you're going to be attracting people who are looking for that kind of content. And so if you're writing posts that are here are these lamps, you can get a target and Walmart but you expect people to pay you for bespoke custom materials, then those people are not going to find you for it. Whereas if you write a post more about Why you should hire an interior designer, instead of the Pottery Barn catalog person that will get you things from Pottery Barn, then you're going to attract people who have a budget for Pottery Barn. Maybe you want to be above the Pottery Barn budget. You're going to get closer to those clients that you want when you talk about Pottery Barn. And when you're talking about Target.

Michele  (23:19) Right, I tell my clients, you're going to catch the fish that you've baited the hook to catch.

Meg  (23:25)  Oh God, I love that. And so I just Southern phrase, I don't know that I was a New Yorker can say that, but I like the phrase.

Michele  (23:32)  Right. And so I might say to them, "I'm in Atlanta. I grew up in the south, we would go fishing in the ponds and the rivers and the streams and they will go deep-sea fishing in the ocean." And I'll say to them, "Do your clients live in saltwater? Do they live in freshwater? Which fish are you going after? What jig are you using? What bait are you using?" You can't fish or bait your hook for fish A and be surprize that you're, capturing something else. You've got to go after what you want. That's the point here, we have to look at, in my opinion, SEO from two directions. From the direction of me as the company, what do I want to be known for, found for, search for? And then from the ideal client. So what are they using as their phraseology? What are they typing into Google? What are they going into Amazon and looking at a book title? Like when they're going on, is there a book when they go to YouTube? Is there a solution? What are they typing in? That's what I need to match up with what I'm putting on the hook to catch them.

Meg  (24:39)  Totally. I have a Venn diagram that I use a lot in my bag. Yes, with ease totally. I have a Venn diagram that I use a lot, which is like, what are the things that are three overlapping circles, right? So obviously, I can't show you this on a podcast. But the first one is, what are the things that you want to be found for that are relevant to these services or products that you are providing? The second is, what are the things that people are searching for? And the third is, what is a topic that hasn't been talked about by everyone else and so that you can be found for it? So everyone in their mother listening to this podcast probably wants to be found for something like a high-end interior designer or luxury interior designer or high end whatever product you're producing, luxury draperies. 

Michele  (25:29)  Yeah. 

Meg  (25:29)  Everyone wants those clients. So they're going to be harder to compete for. So we have to be clear about not just what are those phrases that we want to be found for, but what are those problems people are having that maybe not everyone can pinpoint or think about?

Michele  (25:48)  Right. Even back and forth in our discussion, in the same discussion that I have with my clients. I'm not a coach for everybody. I'm not and I know that might sound shocking to some of the listeners. Just like they can't be a workroom for everybody or the designer for everybody, or the upholsterer for everybody or this stager for everybody. I couldn't handle the entire world if they came to me. So, I know very clearly, I know what my ideal client looks like from my one to one services. I know what my ideal client looks like and the needs that they have for my mastermind. And I know what the ideal client is and the needs and the budget that my client would have if they want to be part of my Designers' Inner Circle, and I know it. I even do something that a lot of coaches don't do. Even to be part of my group community coaching program. I go through an interview process because I don't want people to spend money with me in any way shape or fashion. If it's not a good match, I'd rather than go spend their money with a different coach, or in a different way or own a different product or service or educational tool. I only want to work with those that I can serve. Because that's where I feel good about that spend. And I feel like there's this fair and reasonable exchange of money for education or coaching or solution. And so I don't want to fish for the masses, I want to fish for those who want to execute real change in their business and who are dedicated to fighting for their business. That's all that I want. If they're not willing to do that. I'm gonna let all the other people catch them.

Meg  (27:32)  Yeah, so I think Seth Godin to go into marketing speak calls this your minimum viable audience.

Michele  (27:36)  Yes. 

Meg  (27:37)  You can't serve every household in your community. I can't do one to one SEO services for everyone or I would burn out. I'm not gonna sware on the podcast, but...

Michele  (27:49)  We don't even have the capacity.

Meg  (27:51)  Yeah. So you need to know your capacity. You need to know who you want to work with. And you need to know what their problems are and then write to their problems or create for their problems.

Michele  (27:58)  Who can we affect you the most change with like, just like designers? They want to work in a project where they can affect the most change. And so what is it that, define that? So I think at least I know from my perspective, SEO starts with me, it starts with me defining what I want to do, where I want to be, what I want to put out in the world. Then working with an expert like you to say, "Okay, now what are they? Who is your ideal client" Like I came to you with every bit of information? I did. I mean, I know y'all are shocked at that.

Meg  (28:32)  You probably had a binder before you even called me. 

Michele  (28:34)  I do have a binder. I do, it is right there. But I came to you with all the information. And said, "Now help me work on the messaging, helped me work on the words." You used at the very beginning when you said what SEO was not. And you said it's not awkwardly sticking search phrases in your content. And that was something... I just did a podcast a couple of months ago, about transparency in our process and transparency and what we're doing, but not necessarily telling every single thing in the world about our pricing. And that's what I wanted. I wanted to be very authentic and organic. And I wanted when people read something that they weren't like, well, dang, she just inserted a keyword, you can tell when that's done. 

Meg  (29:20)  You can tell when it's awkward. People are just trying to squeeze things in there. 

Michele  (29:24)  It's like I'm not doing it.

Meg  (29:25)  No, I always say like, "We should write and we should record and we should produce for our audience." And then if we can make it work for the robots, those Google crawlers. Take a look at our website. Better, cool. But the point is that we want to create something that's a good user experience for our clients.

Michele  (29:42)  I didn't want people to read it and go, "Okay, she used a lot of great keywords, but I have no clue what her point is." I have read content like that. It was SEO. That I went to read it and like, know what you just said to me, but I can see you that six keywords squeezed into that blog. Yeah, good for you. Moving on...

Meg  (30:01)  And you probably worked well for it and you get no leads from it. They come to your website, they read the first paragraph, and they're like, "I am out of here. This is the solution for me." And when I am working with my clients about getting the right people to their website, I say like, "I don't just care if you get the right people to your website, I want them to engage. I want them to, you know, read more than one blog post. Then go listen to your podcast if you have those, and then head over and figure out how they can work with you because they have fallen in love with you from your website." And you can track that information.

Meg  (30:34) You don't just have to guess and say, "Well, I don't know which blog posts they found, or did they come to my homepage first, or where did they look or, hey, which of these people are downloading my freebie?"

Michele  (30:47)  Right. 

Meg  (30:48)  You don't have to guess on any of that. You can get that information given to you for free from your website using Google's tools.

Michele  (30:56)  So before we jump to that, I want to make one comment. Here's what I love. I love when like I was at the market in the fall, and somebody walked up to me and they're like, "You're Michele, aren't you?" And I said, "I am. How did you know that?" And they said, "I recognize your voice from your podcast."

Meg  (31:16)  Isn't that so cool? 

Michele  (31:18)  So cool. Or people will come up to me and talk to me as if they know everything about me.

Meg  (31:23)  Does everyone say, "Wow, you're shorter than I think you are."

Michele  (31:25)  Yes.

Meg  (31:28)  I get that every time I go to a conference. They're like, "You're so tall." I'm like, "I'm five, nine." I mean...

Michele  (31:33)  I get there. I'm five, three. And everybody says, "For his commanding as you are, we thought you would be like a much, tiny little thing." Yeah. So

Meg  (31:41)  It's so fun seeing people in real life when you've only ever seen them like from the armpits.

Michele  (31:46)  That's right, that's right or heard their voice. But I love it when they also call me and say, "Hey, I want to talk about working with you. I read all your blogs. I've listened to all your podcasts. I've downloaded everything. I've been in all your challenges. Like I am in, I've done all the free work for everything that you've given me. But now I want more." They're like they're rabid fans, right? 

Meg  (32:08)  Yes. And this is what content marketing as a whole, not just SEO, I've recently read that people typically consume. And it's up from a Forbes article that I'm happy to share with you. So you can put it in the show notes. People typically consume 11 pieces of content before they reach out to you. Whether that's your homepage, your Facebook page, a blog, post a listen to a podcast, 11 pieces of content before they reach out to you. And by the time they reach out, they are 70 to 80% sure that they work with you. Right, it's getting them to that 70% and then you just have to carry them across the finish line. You have your content and your website working for you.

Michele  (32:50)  They wouldn't have you lifted me. Yes, they know they will email me and I love it. So if anybody's listening and you're emailing me, I love it. Keep emailing me. They will say,  "I did this, I listened to the podcast, you told us to do this, and I did it. And I did this. And here were my results." So it's just like coming to me. And I'm like, I love that. And I think that's what all like, that's what I want to be found for. I again, I know, I can't work with everybody. And I put a lot of detailed thought and time and attention into my blogs, into my newsletter articles, and into the information that I put out on my website. I want them to find it, I want it to be consumed. 

Meg  (33:28)  And I think one of the things that you talk about with your audience, as women in a service-based culture, we feel like we have to give things away for a low price or for free and that we cannot charge high prices. And this is what I want to bring out is you are giving away so much for free with your content. And some people maybe aren't ready to go to your Designers' Inner Circle and spend a couple of hundred dollars a month to be in that community. But there are things that you're telling them to do for free in your podcasts in your blog post in your newsletter. So That they can get to the point that when they have that revenue in place, now the first place they're going to do go is to your designers in their circle and say, I already know that this process and this coach works for me. By creating that free content, you're building an audience that will be real fans of yours, whether or not they're buying from you.

Michele  (34:19)  But what's also interesting, and I want to share this, and then I want to talk about the analytics and is that what I find interesting is some designers follow me that absorb the content that uses the content that does not engage with me in a coaching scenario, but they recommend me to other people who do engage.

Meg  (34:43)  That's cool.

Michele  (34:44)  And so like it, they may not be at a point where they can, but they don't hold that back and they share it with another business owner who says I'm looking for a coach and they're like, "Well, I'm not engaged, but I've used all her free content, you should go check out Michele." That to me is if I can't afford it, maybe somebody else could. And I'm not going to withhold that. And I love that. So our design community is the same. There may be somebody being drawn to their Instagram and their Facebook and their website that cannot engage with you right now. But they may very well be the one that sends your information to somebody else. 

Meg  (35:23)  Absolutely. I recently did a 30-day free challenge about SEO to help people with it. And a lot of those people said, "Okay, next year, I want to work with you, I want to buy your course. But hey, I know somebody who needs you now." And so I got a lot of leads from people who hadn't even necessarily been through the challenge. They were referred to me by people who are consumed by free content. Yeah. 

Michele  (35:43)  So Meg, one of the things that you and I found that we had very much in common among 5000 other things. When we started talking and I started sharing with you that sometimes, so I'm going to dig into mine and then I'm going to dig into yours. Sometimes people think to your point earlier that I'm just a profit first coach. And that's not true. Profit first is a tool in my coaching toolbox. And so I coach the entire business, the entire firm, the entire business owner, part of the time when I'm coaching is a skill that can be used in life, not just in business, right? But what I do is I use the financials as my jump-off point. So when somebody comes to me and says, "Hey, I want to work with you," and I say, "Okay, send me your financials." And I'm saying this because I think there are these two things. I think there's a misconception number one, that you are I only look at one thing and we don't. We use usually one part of a business, the analytics from one part of the business to look at, to then realize it's like a spiderweb-like, where do we go from here? Right. And I happen to use the p&l and the balance sheet, because some of my clients are coming to me saying, "I'm in trouble." Some are coming to me saying, "I want to scale and grow, when it all looks good." Some are coming, "I want to move out of my home or I want to hire, I want to do this or I want to do that, or I want to work less, or I want to work more." They're not coming to me with every doom and gloom scenario. But it doesn't matter what they come to me for I say, "Show me your financials. Let's make sure the financials can support the growth, you want to buy a car you want to hire, you want to move out, you want to do this. Let's start with the financials." And so that is my base point of analytics to then turn around and dig through. I might say to them, "Oh my gosh, this is great. So you need to go hire Meg, you need to go hire Nicole to do branding, or you need to go. So and so to build a website." I'm going to give them that information. But I start looking at the financials, tell them where you start. If you were to look at our SEO, what did you start and how can they do that?

Meg  (37:54)  So I think in the same way that you say, "I start with financials, but I coach the whole business." I start with a search. But I coach the whole website. We'll just have our little parallel worlds going on here. So most times people come to me because they say, "I want more search traffic coming in." And I'm like, "Cool, we can do that. But first, let's look at what's already happening on your website." And so I'll set up usually, I'll set up a bunch of different conversion goals using Google Analytics. Again, Google Analytics is a free tool that Google gives us, you install it, and it starts tracking all the traffic that's coming through your website. It's from every marketing stream that you're using, where you can see geographically, where are people coming from demographically? What does your audience look like? And maybe, you're thinking that you're hitting a bunch of people who are in Minneapolis and you're, you think that you're trying to reach women who are 24 to 44. And you're reaching men who are 60 Plus, and you're like, "Oh, no, I gotta change my demographics."

Michele  (38:55)  All those emails I've been getting.

Meg  (38:57)  Anyway, I don't want to get too far. 

Michele  (39:01)  It does, you start to realize that what you think is not always what's happening. 

Meg  (39:06)  Yes, And you can see...

Michele  (39:09)  I was like, "Oh, I didn't know that my blogs were being picked up and shared." But I had no idea that they were driving as much traffic to my site. As they were, I didn't know.

Meg  (39:21)  You can see which pages people are coming into on your website, what's the first page that they land on. How many people are only reading that first page that they land on and leaving versus how many are going to multiple pages? How long are they spending on your website? When they get to that blog post that people are sharing, Then do they go to your homepage? Do they go to your work with me page, they go to your contact page? Do they go to their blog posts? You can watch the way that people are working on your website. And if they're coming from social media, you can see all of that same information just from people coming from Facebook, just from people coming from Pinterest, from Instagram, from YouTube. And then I also obviously as the search person look at when people are searching on Google for you, or Bing or Yahoo, I say Google because it's 95% of the market share search engines. When people are looking at Google for you, and you're showing up in those search results, what are those keywords that those people are typing in? Not only what are the keywords, but we can also see, how many times are you showing up in those search results? For which keywords? How many of those people who are seeing you in the search results are clicking on your page? And what position are you in those search results? So I probably just like overwhelmed some people with all the information that we can collect here, but I'm just want to like make it super clear that if we have Google Analytics on your site, even if you aren't looking at it regularly, set it up so that you can have that data available to you when you want to bring someone in to learn more about this. We can also set up what is called conversion goals, which is Michele when people come to your site, how many of them sign up for your financial checkup? How many of them go to take a look at your Designers' Inner Circle landing page? How many of them fill out your contact me form? We can see not only what percentage of people are doing all of those actions that we want them to do on your site. But we can also see, hey when people come over from Facebook, they're likely to download the financial guide. When people come over from Instagram, they're likely to go to the contact page and fill out the form. So you can not only see how people are behaving on your site, but how different traffic channels are driving people with different actions. And it's fascinating.

Michele  (41:37)  It is. So I'll tell you, I had another company that I worked with for years, they were running all of my analytics and so I wasn't running it so I never saw and back earlier this year, I set up my analytics on my webpage, took it back over so that I could watch. I don't have data for a long time. I have it from a short amount of time and I say that because if anybody's not yet set it up, go ahead and set it up now because you've got time to watch it. And I still had enough after three to four months for you to get enough data to help me to start working. So even if you don't do SEO right now, give yourself the gift of having the analytics so that when you're ready to jump in, to understand, to look, you've got the data. The same with again, the p&l, go ahead and do your financials, whether you know how to read them or not. Let's get them created. Because when it's time to analyze, we have the data. Can you explain the difference between Google Analytics and Google console? What they are? Because I know for me, I sometimes still I'm like, I've got them both. I know, I'm supposed to have them. It's a confusing world. And when these new tools are coming up all the time, like Google console hasn't been around forever. What is what are the differences? 

Meg  (42:59)  Absolutely. It's very similar in terms of how they work together, but they'd stand independently. So Google Analytics analyzes or tracks will say, everything that happens on your website. It used to be probably 2015 and earlier that they would include the keywords that people are looking for in your analytics. So you could see it all in that one place. And back then they also had a different tool called Google Webmaster Tools, which if you've been around digital marketing for a while, you may have also seen. It tells you when things are broken. As part of Google's algorithm that they use to judge whether a website should show up within certain search results, they realized that a lot of the things that they included in Webmaster Tools, were impacting people's search results. So if they had broken links on their website if their website wasn't mobile-friendly, it was showing up in Google Webmaster Tools, but people weren't paying attention to it because they didn't realize that it had this impact on their search. So a couple of years ago, they took those keywords, those search terms that people were showing up for. And they moved them from being inside Google Analytics into Google Webmaster Tools. And they renamed that tool, Google Search Console. So Google Search Console is kind of like a stepchild of Google Analytics, where Google Analytics will show you all of who's coming to your website, how are they behaving. And then Google Search Console looks specifically at both. It looks at what are those people searching for when they are trying to find you, or find what you provide. Maybe they don't know that they're trying to find you. They're trying to find your services. And it also includes any technical things that you need to think about.

So a couple of years ago, Google stopped looking at the desktop version of your site first, and it looks at the mobile version of your site first to make sure that that's where technology is going more people are looking at things on their phones and their tablets than on their desktops. So if you have a problem where things are looking fine on your desktop, because you are your web designer built on desktop, but didn't also test it on a cell phone. It will ping you there and say, "Hey, the width of this particular web page is too wide on mobile." And so having those kinds of technical updates about your website come from Google Search Console, it makes sense because it does impact your search rankings. So I would say Google Analytics is kind of everything that's happening in your business or on your website, regardless of what marketing you're doing. And then Google Search Console is those pieces that do impact your page rank and your search results in the Google algorithm.

Michele  (45:31)  Okay, that's good to know. So when you look at Google Analytics is there because I'll be honest, it's a lot, right. I can read financial statements all day long. I just spent days with one of my blind shades shutter clients going through every cost. And how we were going to pay out commissions. I'm telling you, we didn't do just a Take 10%, we dug into everything. I can eat and breathe and live those percentages and those numbers because I know him and I understand them. And when I go into Google Analytics, unless I know what I'm looking for... And then somebody has said to me, specifically, "Michele, look here, this is what it means," they've given me a primer. It can be overwhelming. And so,  many of our listeners are not Google Analytics, savant, like you are. You've done a lot of work to get there. So I'm not minimizing your abilities. And that's a lot of work. You realized very quickly, you couldn't do all of that and everything else that you were doing. Give us an idea, if somebody has Google Analytics, let's say they turned it on. It's been on for months, years, whatever, what is one of the one places they can look to make some decision on where to start with SEO? 

Meg  (46:56)  Sure. 

Michele  (46:56)  What number would they look at? Where would they go?

Meg  (46:58)  So I'm going to walk you through But I'm also Michele going to send you a link to free three-part training that I have. It should be, I think it's like eight minutes a day to walk you through this where you can watch me do it on my screen. I want to make sure... I will talk you through this. But I know that it's sometimes easier to watch someone do it to say, Wait, I'm going into which report and so I'll walk you through it.

Michele  (47:21)  You recognize it can be overwhelming for those of us that that's not what we eat, breathe and live. 

Meg  (47:30)  It's overwhelming. I mean, I said earlier, "Here are all the things that you can learn from your analytics and just listing those things out." And that was maybe 20% of the data that they collect. Sometimes you can have the total moment of data overload and just like shut down like I don't know what all these charts and line graphs and pie charts mean. And I just want to walk away from it. So I want 100% to get overwhelmed. Here are the first two things that I look at.

Michele  (47:59)  Okay. 

Meg  (47:59)  The first is I look at where the people's traffic is coming from. You go into on the left sidebar, you go into the report called the acquisition. And then you go to a little subset called channels and then you go to the report that says all channels. When I say channels, here are the channels that are typically listed in there. Direct traffic, which is when people go directly to your website. Referral traffic, which is when you have people sharing your blog posts out and people can click from those people's emails or blog posts into your blog posts. That's referral traffic when it comes from one person's website to your website. Social traffic, anything coming from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, even though Pinterest and YouTube technically search engines, Google lumps them into society. Even like Pocket, Tik Tok... Anything that comes from a social network is going to roll into social and you can specifically look at which social networks are driving traffic. Then that's organic search is one of the traffic channels and then email. So if you're sending out email marketing, usually that will be rolled in the email. And you can see when you send someone a newsletter, and they click on one of the links, you can see where they're going. So that's the first report that I look at. Where exactly are people finding this website? And you can dig in a little bit more, Michele, you and I did a screen share of this where I said, "Where's your referral traffic coming from? Oh, it's from these three people who are sharing your content." So you can see, not just these three people every time I publish blog posts are sharing it with their audiences, but also how much is coming from each of those people. And if you have those conversion goals set up, you can even see, okay, those people are coming over here, how many of them are also downloading my free lead magnet? How many of them are going to my contact page? How many of them are looking at this? You can track not only where are those people coming from, but what they're doing once they get there. So this is a little bit advanced.

Michele  (49:51)  That's good.

Meg  (49:53)  But it's good to know that you can get that information, right? Because what I often see is that there are people who say, "Oh, I'm getting so... I'm just making up, whatever, I'm getting so much traffic from Pinterest." And I'm like, "I'm so glad that people are coming to your website from Pinterest, but many of them aren't staying for more than a minute." Whereas if people are coming from, let's say, YouTube, they're sticking around for 10 minutes. So let's spend less time on Pinterest and more time on YouTube. I'm not saying that's true for every business.

Michele  (50:22)  But I think the point and that Meg, at least my takeaway was the same kind of takeaway that I had when I looked at mine. I didn't have an understanding that one of the referral sources when they sent people to my site, they stayed longer than a different way. I thought it maybe was the opposite. And sometimes when you go and we dug in, and we looked, I was like, "Oh, wow!" I knew they were sharing my content, but I didn't realize that it was driving people to my site, and what they were doing after they got there. 

Meg  (50:54)  Totally.

Michele  (50:55)  And so I believe, what we think is happening. And then again, this is just about getting people to our website, that's number one. But then we want them to act on the information on the website, not to ping on and ping off. Like, that's not what we want. 

Meg  (51:09)  Yeah, we're not just looking at quantity, we are also looking at the quality of the behavior of the people coming. Being able to segment and say, people, coming from this space or people landing on this page. So there's the second thing that I look at, I go into on the left sidebar, I'm doing this off the top of my head guys. I don't have it in front of me.

Meg  (51:27)  So if you go on the left sidebar, there's a section called behavior. And then there's one called site content that you can click into and you can go to landing pages. And this is what I look at to see when people are coming from these different marketing channels. Where are they coming into? What's the first page that they are visiting? That's where you can look at. If they land on this blog post. They're likely to look at more blog posts. If you're coming to my homepage. They're spending five minutes on the site, whereas a blog post or spending one minute on the site, or you can kind of get an idea, again of the quality of the traffic that is coming to you. And actually, in this free three-part training that I am happy to share with your audience. I then overlay them on top of each other and say, when people come from Facebook, and they look at this landing page, here's their behavior. When they come from Facebook, and they look at your homepage, here's how they behave. So you can kind of do a cross-sectional analysis, which probably the phrase cross-sectional analysis is overwhelming to some folks. But you can see how people behave based on where they're coming from. Which can be mind-blowing, if you feel like you've been spending a ton of time well, I don't want to single out Instagram because people don't typically leave Instagram to come to your website.

So a lot of people that I work with spend a lot of time on Instagram and don't see an uptick in their traffic or sales from it. I love Instagram. It's where I spend the majority of my social media time but I think of it as developing relationships, not making sales. So reassessing the expectations that you have for your marketing can make a huge difference. For example, Michele, you see that your referral traffic is spending a lot of time on your site, maybe you want to do a bit more outreach to other people who can send you more referral traffic, right? Because you know that if you can get in front of those people's audiences, then they can become your long term followers. Whereas if people are just finding you on Twitter and coming once and leaving and never coming back, don't spend as much time on Twitter.

Michele  (51:28)  Ok, we will put the link down below.

Michele  (53:31)  Yeah, it's so very true. I think it then it helps you put into perspective what you're using each, let's say social media channel for. What is the desired outcome of working with the referral source? Is it to have relationships built or is it for a sale, and nothing's wrong with both? 

Meg  (53:51)  Nothing's wrong with both. 

Meg  (53:55)  Let's talk about this a little bit. If you get referral links from really authoritative sources that can help Google understand that you are more of an authority in your topic. So, Michele, if you got put into Forbes magazine for how you help people with profit first in this specific industry, getting that link from the Forbes website, which is a great authority in the business space, could impact the authority for your entire page and help you show up and more search results as well. Whereas if you show up in a completely unrelated, fishing magazine, because now we're talking about fishing earlier, if you show up at a fishing magazine, that's not going to impact your traffic as much because it's not relevant to you, even if it is the premier fishing magazine. Right. So when you're thinking about maybe doing some outreach to different referral traffic sources, think about what's both authoritative in your industry and relevant to your target audience.

Michele  (54:58)  Okay, so I'm so glad we're going to have a resource to help me and everybody else read and understand. If somebody is looking to tackle, let's say, the beginning of SEO on their own. You talked about two items on a website that are super important, the meta description and the title, right? What are some other things that they could start to do until they can maybe afford to work with you or someone like you or hire that out? You know, we talked about time and money. Let's say they have more time than money right now. Where do they start? What are some things, they've looked at analytics, they've got a very high-level understanding of that. They need to do some of their little guerilla marketing, and we got to start, we got to start with some low hanging fruit. What is the low hanging SEO fruit?

Meg  (55:49)  I think the first thing that you can do is start to assess the way that your ideal client is talking. Not just necessarily the way that you talk about your services,  I think often when I start working with interior designers, they talk in interior design speak, and they say, we're going to do a procurement process to get your furniture and then we're going to install it. And as consumers, they're just looking for like, I need someone to help me find a couch. It's not about procurement and installation and markups and all the things that we in an industry talk about, it's about learning the way that your people are speaking.

Michele  (56:28)  That's true for every industry.

Meg  (56:30)  Totally.

Michele  (56:32)  Like mine, we talked about, I might use the term revenue or income, they may say how to make money. 

Meg  (56:37)  Yes.

Michele  (56:37)  They're going to say it very differently than the way that I might term it. Even the use of sofa versus couch.

Meg  (56:45)  Yeah.

Michele  (56:46)  Right.

Meg  (56:47)  You know if you're wondering and this is kind of a fun exercise. I know there are people don't think there's anything fun about SEO. But if you're wondering do people where I live call it a sofa or a couch head over to Trends.google.com and Google Trends will tell you a side by side comparison of what phrases people have searched for for the past five years by day, how many people are searching for sofa and how many people are searching for couch and how many people are searching for loveseat you open up to five different terms. And then you can look at it by geography. If you're curious about that. If you are in Seattle, maybe people in Seattle say sofa but people in Atlanta say couch. And so you want to be able to search or be found for the way that the people who geographically are looking for things near you are searching for. 

Meg  (57:43)  Yeah.

Michele  (57:43)  That's so good. Because I know there's this whole discussion of the couch so lowbrow, we don't want to use the word couch. We want to use the word sofa. But if the people in your area are searching for a couch and you're talking sofa, they're not going to find you.

Meg  (57:56)  They're not going to find you and the reason that people have used Google Trends in the past, by the way, is looking at a diagram of Coke, pop, and soda. And looking at that map...

Michele  (58:09)  Yes. Or Coke, everything we asked for a Coke and we might mean Sprite. But we're asking for Coke.

Meg  (58:14)  You're asking for a soft drink right where I live. It's right on the border of pop and soda. So I'm in a pop zone surrounded by a soda zone and my husband's from a soda zone surrounded by a pop zone.

Michele  (58:15)  Come down here you get a soft drink. Yeah. 

Meg  (58:28)  It's just a Coke.

Michele  (58:30)  Exactly.

Meg  (58:31)  Or an Orange Coke. And I'm like, "Oh, what is this?"

Michele  (58:34)  I love that. Trends@google.com. Okay, so that is good because I was going to ask you, so I know we say, consider the phrases and the words that your ideal client would use to describe. But how do we do that?

Meg  (58:48)  Yeah.

Michele  (58:49)  

One of the exercises that I try to have my clients do is imagine for a minute that you are sitting in the house of your ideal client. How do you go in and do the talk? How are they describing their problems? What are they saying to you? What are they telling you? Or imagine that you were eavesdropping on a group of your ideal clients all sitting around talking about what problems they had and how you solved it? How would they describe that to each other? 

Meg  (59:14)  Yes.

Michele  (59:15)  And use their words.

Meg  (59:16)  Yeah. And I think another one that might be good for your audience is you go into Pinterest, you type in the topic you want to talk about, and you look at all those little other suggestions that show up? Yes. And think, I was talking to somebody yesterday who was talking about decluttering. And underneath when we went into Pinterest, and we saw decluttering, It was like decluttering your living room, declutter in your garage, decluttering your house, house management. All of these phrases are the other things that people are looking for related to that. That can be a really good place to start, that's a little bit more fun than the keyword research tools that I use.

Michele  (59:54)  Well, but even some of that happens inside a Google search, right?

Meg  (59:59)  Yes.

Michele  (59:59)  It's that predictive search where you start to type and it drops down the box and tells you every other phrase or add on.

Meg  (1:00:07)  Totally. The autocomplete for Google is helpful. If you scroll down to the bottom, they have Google related searches. And then they also have a little box in that Google search result called people also ask. That is, people are looking for should my sofa have two cushions or three cushions? And then other people also asked might be, what's the difference between a sofa and a couch or what's a small couch versus a loveseat? Or they may be looking for that information. If there are people also ask about it. That means people are searching for that question. Related keywords, people are searching for that stuff. So that might also give you some ideas of these are the things that I can write about, that people are looking for. Not just what I think people are looking for, but what Google says people are looking for.

Michele  (1:00:53)  Okay, one more loaded question before we wrap this up, some will tell you... You've probably heard the same that I have, blogging is dead, blogging is dying, don't blog. I don't think that's true. I think blogging is taking up a different space than it used to, I think it has maybe a different end game in some ways than it used to. But it is still, in my opinion, one of the best ways to get your ideas and your opinions out there in written word so that it can be found and searched. What's your opinion on that? 

Meg  (1:01:27)  I'm going to parse some terminology here. And I would say don't worry about blogging, worry about content marketing. 

Michele  (1:01:35)  Fair.

Meg  (1:01:36)  The way that I think about blogging is like let me sit down and tell you what lipstick I'm wearing today or like oh my kids this. I think blogging is more personal and more day to day stuff. It feels more like blogging to me as the old school live journal feels.

Michele  (1:01:52)  Yeah. that old lives... that's not what... I'm certainly talking about content marketing.

Meg  (1:01:57)  So I think content marketing...  I think the feeling of blogging being, you have to produce something daily or you will not show up in search is old.

Meg  (1:02:07)  It used to be that way, 5-10 years ago. Now, I would rather see you write one great blog that can show up in search traffic that's a little bit more in-depth than a daily, today about this couch here the picture, that's it. We want to be able to be a resource for people that can show up in those search results and display our expertise on these topics. So yeah, to a certain extent, and blogging the old school way of you need to blog four times a day and tell everyone what you ate for breakfast.

Michele  (1:02:07)  Old. I think that's what Instagram became. 

Meg  (1:02:39)  Instagram is a microblog.

Michele  (1:02:41)  It's a microblog. When I'm talking blog I'm talking about that's the way it used to be and that's why I'm saying I think it's still alive. And I think it's still very needed, but I do think it has shifted into this content marketing to us. 

Meg  (1:02:53)  Yes. And when you think about it as content marketing where you are answering people's questions, you are marketing your business, you are putting yourself out there and raising your hand and saying this is an area where I am an expert. It might look like a blog. 

Michele  (1:03:07)  That's right, and a blog.

Meg  (1:03:09)  It's an authority platform. Blogging, podcasting, and video are all authority platforms where you can stand up and say, this is what I want to be known for. This is what I want to be found for. SEO and blogging and video content are still very much alive. If you think of it from the perspective of how can I solve people's problems with this. Not just how can I talk about what I do today?

Michele  (1:03:32)  Yeah, I look at it... I even the term content marketing, there's something about that this sometimes feels eek to me. I mean, I don't want to feel like everything I'm doing is a marketing strategy because that changes the way I sometimes even approach it.

Meg  (1:03:46)  I agree. 

Michele  (1:03:47)  What I'd like to think about internally, I mean, I don't disagree that it is content marketing as a full-blown business marketing strategy. But I like to think about it in the day to day is content sharing and if I think about it as a content share. You know what, here's a question that 15 of you asked me last week, I want to know, I feel better about sharing. And like you said at the beginning, "Speaking to my people, and not thinking about it as marketing." I can go back and add some of the marketing, hey, click here, link here, have a call to action, I can go back and add that in. But I want my initial give to be authentic and real and caring. And so I think I come at it first and foremost, but content sharing that if that's all you ever absorbed, my goal was to help you. Then secondly, how can I remarket used the content? 

Meg  (1:04:43)  I love that so much? Because you use your content to connect with people?

Michele  (1:04:47)  Yes.

Meg  (1:04:47)  I think in the kind of older, traditional blogging model it is, let me talk at you about what I do. And I think that content marketing and the ways that you are content sharing can be more, let's say start a conversation. Let's connect on this, send me an email and tell me what you think about this or download this guide that goes into a deeper, it's more about connection and service than it is about kind of tooting our horns.

Michele  (1:05:13)  Right. And I say that because a lot of people say to me, I hear that if I've heard it once, I've heard it almost every time, they will say, and I've said it myself, in all fairness, I hate marketing. And it's not that's not fair. And it's not true. What we hate is this idea of self-promotion. We don't like self-promotion. And so I have shifted in my brain that I am solution promoting. My goals to solution promote. It just happens to be that I am part of that solution. And so when I can change my mindset to I'm not self-promoting, I'm not climbing up on the pedestal. I'm not saying Michelle so great. Instead, I'm saying, here's an idea that's worked for me and the majority of my clients, let me share with you this solution. By the way, I'm the one that can help you do it, It feels so much more real. And it connects differently. Because you said, it's not me talking at you, it's me giving you tools and sharing with you and then saying I can help you solve that.

Meg  (1:06:10)  Yes, and how we were talking earlier about, you're able to provide free resources for people who are not yet ready at the stage to work with you. But they can get to know you. And the marketing term for all of this is know, like and trust. If they can't find you. They can't know you, they can't like you, they can't trust you. So in many ways, we're putting out our personalities, our expertise, we're sharing the basics of what we work with people on a greater scale. So when we are in those paid programs with them, or we're telling people about the services that we've given to previous clients so that future clients can find us for those. But if you're not sharing your expertise and your results, then people can't find you for that expertise and results. And I think that there's also sometimes fear in especially women-owned businesses. What can I possibly say? Everything's already out there. I can't blog about a couch and have somebody else look and say anything different than what other people have blogged about that couch. Right. And so I think sometimes there's a bit of imposter complex that shows up when we're starting to talk about this. And I'm sure you work with your clients on this. Because your design style and the way that you serve your clients are different from the other people that you are technically competing against, right. But when you look at a group, like The Designers' Inner Circle, you can see Wow, this person has a more modern style, this person's a bit more traditional, this person wants to work with this kind of client and this person wants to work with this kind of client.

By thinking about what sets you apart, even within a group like that, that might give you the perspective to say I want to find more clients like this, and this is what these clients are looking for. You don't need to write about everything that's ever been said about interior design, but maybe you're seeing a thread in your ideal clients of what their problems are? Or what are the things that they are looking to improve in their houses? And you can just talk about that and talk about your experience and start from there and do some case studies of, you know, before and afters of rooms that you've worked with. Or the problems people came to you with and how you solve them. And, hey, we had to knock down this wall. And we knew that it was okay because we looked at the structure of the plans of the house. Thinking about those kinds of solutions you provided to your existing clients can be great content, to put on your blog to create a video to talk about on a podcast to let people find you for the things that you've already done.

Michele (1:08:36)  Well, and in all fairness if I'm out there searching about everything that every other coach in the whole world is saying, right, the topics that I cover that they cover. That's not necessarily what my ideal client is going to do. So I am so immersed in my industry. As are interior designers, we talk about these things all day every day and Facebook and Inner Circle and different groups. We're always talking about these things. So they're so second nature to us, we just assume that everybody has already, gotten all the information. But our ideal client, it could be the first time they've heard it or the first time they've seen it. And so, I love it when people come back to me and they go, now that I've heard your voice, I read all the blogs in your voice. I can hear you speaking to me. 

Meg  (1:09:20)  Your blog has a southern accent. That's cute. 

Michele  (1:09:23)  That's exactly right. I have a southern accent. But and that's true about anybody else. It's true about the designers and the workrooms that are writing this content sharing. It takes on their personality, what is the differentiator in their business is them. And so letting that personality shine and not being afraid to be who they are in the business that they have, and to uniquely serve those that they're called to serve. That's what draws people. That's the honey.

Meg  (1:09:51)  1,000%.  I could be intimidated by the number of bros out there who are talking about SEO and feel like I don't know how to talk about it better than them because I learned it from reading their blog posts, right? But they don't simplify it the way that I do. They don't speak to the audiences that I speak to those bros do not talk to interior designers. I guarantee you they do not. So how can those people that I want to serve, get the information in a way that they can digest and they can process based on their life experiences and their businesses. I can reach them without needing to talk the way that the other people in my industry are talking.

Michele  (1:10:34)  And that's the same way that the designers and the workrooms and anybody else who's listening to the podcast, take your own experience. Think about the experience in the lifestyle of the people that you're trying to connect with and just speak the same language. If you speak it very authentically. Again, not stilted and throwing in crazy keywords because it thinks that's what you think you need to do. They will find you and it will feel authentic, and then they will know you, the quicker they get from know to like to trust, they work with you. They can know you and not like you and not trust you. Like when I said I go to some of those places, and it looks like they've jacked up their keyboard and I'm like, I'm out of here. I'm looking to get from know to like to trust and as quickly as I can get there, man, I'm sending you the credit card. Let's go.

Meg (1:11:19)  Yeah, and I think you make a really good point, which is the way that I teach how to come up with content that sounds authentic, which I hate to use the word authentic. 

Michele  (1:11:27)  I know.

Meg  (1:11:28)   It's like that's what it is right? With personality is that I tell people to go do some keyword research, figure out the topics that people are looking for. And then record yourself a voice memo of yourself talking about it so that you get the way that you talk about it. Sometimes I'll even do like a boxer message to my friend Justine because she's just really good like an editor for me and says,  "Did that make sense to you?" And that way, I can just download that boxer message that I sent to that one person because I want my clients to have that level of understanding that Justine does, and that's who I'm talking to. She's my, my avatar. And luckily, it's a real person that I can get feedback from. But I can send her a boxer and say, Does this make sense to you? And then if I can get a little bit of feedback coming in, you can be thinking about how did I explain this to a client recently when they came in and they had this question for me, and then download that file that audio file, you can send it to a transcription service, and then you can go back into that and say, okay when I started talking about this, I was talking about sofas. Let me make sure that I include both terms sofa and couch in the post so that I can write for both of them. But it doesn't have to be a sofa or couch that phrase every time you use it right. You can just make it sound conversational, but make sure that the thing that you want to be found for it is sprinkled throughout, not like pressed into it

Michele  (1:12:50)  But just sprinkled if it is noticeable that you are cramming in the words you're not doing it well. 

Meg (1:12:57)  Yes and if you are trying so hard to get keywords into it. That means that you haven't done a really good job thinking about what you want to be talking about.

Michele  (1:13:05)  Right?

Meg  (1:13:06)  So, where can our clients find you? If you guys just heard my I'm sorry, I was gesturing so wildly that my iPhone just had Siri go off and she was like, I don't know what you're trying to do here. Okay, so if you guys want to find me, you can find me over at my website, which is Megaboltdigital.com. I'm sure Michele will include it in there. And I'm also the place where I hang out most online is Instagram. So that's also Megabolt Digital.

Michele  (1:13:29)  Excellent. Meg, I have so enjoyed talking to you and digging into SEO, we probably could have 14 other podcasts. It is, it's really rich. There's a lot there. We just scratched the surface on why SEO is important and why we need it. Where to look, what to do, and what it's not. And if I could say anything and you may have a closing idea or thought you want to leave and mine would be this. This is a long game and it is a process. It is a pealing of onion from my own experience. This is not you got in, you did it at one time, and you're done. It's an ongoing process because the search engines change the algorithms to change that. That sounds overwhelming to a lot of people. You can do a lot of face work, but it is something that we have to keep a watch on and on in some type of an ongoing manner. It just needs to show up on our radar. If we are wanting to be found online. Would you agree? 

Meg  (1:14:28)  I totally agree. And I think you're totally you nailed it with like, this isn't an on-off switch where your SEO is done. This is marketing. This is a process and the more that you can be clear about the problems that your ideal clients are having and create content for them. The more content you're going to think to produce because more people will be finding you asking you more questions. And if you only talk about one specific part of interior design for a year, that means that you'll have a lot more... like, let's say Just talking about paint colors for a year. And you're like, these are the paint colors that I use east-facing rooms, west-facing rooms and living rooms, bathrooms. Let's say that's all you talk about for a year, you can become the paint color girl, you can be that person. And then maybe the next year, six months or three months, or whatever that is, you can say, now I'm going to talk about tile. And you guys, I think we, as professionals, forget that not everyone knows what we know. We're remodeling parts of my house. And I'm like, I don't know if I want ceramic tile or, I can't even come up with the types of other tiles, right. So I'm going on to Pinterest. I'm going on to Google. I'm wondering which countertop what do I want quartz or granite for my kitchen? That's a blog post. Do I want quartz or Korean for my blog posts that are over my kitchen? That's a blog post. So any conversation that you're having with people you can be found for that.

Michele  (1:15:51)  I think one other just add on to that. And I know that I have struggled with this sometimes. I think that if I've written one blog post about a topic that done. And sometimes like you said, you could write about paint for six months or a year, I need to remember and the listeners need to remember, I'm going to say a blog or a piece of content that we're sharing an article that we're writing, if you will, small post, it is not exhaustive. And so we can talk about the same topic in a multitude of ways over time. It's not like I've spoken about tile once, therefore, I can not write another piece of content about tile. And for some reason, we get it in our mind that we've already covered that. And so that feels like we have already exhausted every topic. And that's not the case either.

Meg  (1:16:39)  Yes, Think about every question that a client comes to you for when you're choosing your tile. What type of material should I use? Which pattern should I use? How big should it be? What's the average cost per square footage of tile? 

Michele  (1:16:52)  Edge? What edge should I use?

Meg  (1:16:52)  What edging should I use? The more that you write about that topic, the more Google realizes this person knows their you know, what about tile. So it doesn't have to be one post does everything. Each one of these can be one thought. It can be 500 to 1000 words to answer a question that people have. And then maybe somebody comes in and they're like, I just want to know whether I should do a herringbone or a checkerboard pattern in my tile. Then they get to your site and they're like, "Oh, I didn't know that there was so much information from here, I should hire this person to do this for me." Right?

Michele  (1:17:28)  Right.

Meg  (1:17:29)  The more depth that you can give to the content, it doesn't all have to be this big cerebral blogging thing. It can just be, speaking out of your own experience, using your expertise, sharing examples from your work, and just putting yourself out there as an authority. And it can take a couple of months for Google to kind of pick up on it and say, Oh, she's been writing about tile for two months. I guess this is what she's known for. It can take two or three months to kinda like...

Michele  (1:17:55)  A long game, right? Yes.

Meg  (1:17:58)  But then once you become the top person, it'll be hard for somebody else to knock you out of that space.

Michele  (1:18:03)  Perfect. Well, there is just so much information here, I am loving working with you. And I love how we immediately realized that I analyze a business based on the financials and you go to the analytics, they were just so many parallels. And I've shared with all of my listeners that I know enough marketing to be dangerous, but I am not the marketing guru in the world. I can help you with your money, I can help you with all the other things. I can tell you who to go higher to get help with the marketing, but I am learning it and I am owning it. Just like I can't expect somebody to own their business and close the door and shut their eyes when it comes to finances. I can't do that in my business either. And so I just want to encourage whoever's listening, whether it's financial or whether it's marketing or whether it's employees or hiring or whatever. Find somebody to help you in the area that you are not the expert in. They will move you ahead faster than you can move ahead yourself. For those of you who love this, and you just got energized by this whole conversation.

Meg  (1:19:07)  Which is hard to do when it comes to doing this.

Michele  (1:19:11)  Roll up your sleeves and jump in, you own the business, you get to do that. And when you hit the point that you're like, Okay, I don't want to go any farther, then go find the expert that can pick up and help you move. So thank you, Meg, for sharing all with your expertise today. Forgiving us a place to start in analytics. Explaining the difference between that and console. Giving us a good definition of what SEO is and what it's not. Also how to do it organically and naturally and with our personality and not in a stilted, odd, weird way. I think we all have absolutely somewhere to go from here. 

Meg  (1:19:45)  We covered a lot today. 

Michele  (1:19:47)  We did, well in that always the way my podcast goes? 

Meg  (1:19:50)  That's so true. You pack so much in. 

Michele  (1:19:52)  I know I know.  Thank you for your time and I'll have all of your details in the show notes and so everybody can find you. 

Meg (1:19:57)  Alright, thanks so much for having me, Michele. It was great being here with you.

Michele  (1:20:00)  You're welcome, Meg. Have a great day. I'm so thankful to Meg for a fun, energetic conversation about SEO and getting our websites found. Don't let fear stop you from moving forward even a little bit. When doing difficult things like marketing or even financials it can sometimes feel that way. Find a mentor or an advisor to assist you. I do. I work with coaches and others to help me along my journey. And I live to also work with those who need the things that I have to offer. If you're interested in not going through the entrepreneurial journey alone reach out The Designers' Inner Circle was built just for that. To have a community where we share what we've learned from each other and also from a trusted authority. You can find more information at ScarletThreadConsulting.com. Let's move forward in our business together to be profitable because it doesn't happen by accident.