#115 Choosing the Best Hosting, Boosting SEO with AI & Essential Website Tools

Speaker: 00:00:17

Hello and welcome. It's episode 35,

Speaker: 00:00:22

choosing the best hosting, boosting SEO

Speaker: 00:00:25

with AI and of course some essential

Speaker: 00:00:29

website tools as well. This is the 90 day

Speaker: 00:00:33

website mastery podcast, the perfect

Speaker: 00:00:35

companion to our 90 day website mastery

Speaker: 00:00:37

program. As I said, it's the 35th episode.

Speaker: 00:00:40

We're excited to bring you even more

Speaker: 00:00:42

valuable insights and practical advice to

Speaker: 00:00:44

help you enhance your website's

Speaker: 00:00:45

performance. Join us as we explore

Speaker: 00:00:48

strategies to make your website work

Speaker: 00:00:50

harder for you, reigniting your pride in

Speaker: 00:00:53

your online presence. We want you to feel

Speaker: 00:00:55

proud of your website. In fact, web proud,

Speaker: 00:00:58

Pascal, is that right? Well, indeed,

Speaker: 00:01:01

that's a term that we're going to be

Speaker: 00:01:02

mentioning a few times because we're a bit

Speaker: 00:01:04

of a surprise in the kind of offering for

Speaker: 00:01:06

our viewers and listeners. And listen,

Speaker: 00:01:08

episode 35, I'm still a little surprised.

Speaker: 00:01:10

It's time that there's more to talk about

Speaker: 00:01:12

and there's more to explore in that kind

Speaker: 00:01:14

of fast-paced, fast-track way of making

Speaker: 00:01:16

sure that you're making wise decisions

Speaker: 00:01:18

about how to use your time to make your

Speaker: 00:01:20

website have a greater impact for your

Speaker: 00:01:21

business, for your audience, but also for

Speaker: 00:01:23

you to really feel proud when you share

Speaker: 00:01:26

that website address. Yeah, absolutely. We

Speaker: 00:01:31

always have four segments to each episode.

Speaker: 00:01:33

We have the You Ask, We Answer. We have

Speaker: 00:01:35

website stories where we have a look at

Speaker: 00:01:37

perhaps an article that we found and we

Speaker: 00:01:40

dig deeper into it. We go to the website

Speaker: 00:01:43

engine room where myself and Pascal share

Speaker: 00:01:47

perhaps an app or a piece of kit that's

Speaker: 00:01:49

going to help you as a website manager

Speaker: 00:01:51

make your life easier perhaps you're a

Speaker: 00:01:53

website content creator or manage your

Speaker: 00:01:55

website and we always finish with the call

Speaker: 00:01:58

to action what content cannot have a call

Speaker: 00:02:00

to action where we give you one change or

Speaker: 00:02:02

adjustment that you should be making to

Speaker: 00:02:04

your website right now so as i said we do

Speaker: 00:02:07

start with you ask we answer and that's

Speaker: 00:02:11

where we take lots of different questions

Speaker: 00:02:13

that you've asked over different periods

Speaker: 00:02:15

of time and we try and focus on one that

Speaker: 00:02:18

we think is going to help the most to you

Speaker: 00:02:21

guys, the people that are listening, the

Speaker: 00:02:22

people that are watching. And by the way,

Speaker: 00:02:24

let us know if you're listening or

Speaker: 00:02:26

watching, get typing away, clicking

Speaker: 00:02:29

buttons, letting us know what you think

Speaker: 00:02:32

and what questions you've got. But let's

Speaker: 00:02:33

move into You Ask, We Answer.

Speaker: 00:02:42

Now, this question for episode 35 is

Speaker: 00:02:44

fascinating to me. So this came about

Speaker: 00:02:47

during a recent kind of consultancy

Speaker: 00:02:49

session with a client where they were

Speaker: 00:02:51

asking me to review a proposal that I

Speaker: 00:02:52

received from the web design agency. And

Speaker: 00:02:55

as you go through the different kind of

Speaker: 00:02:56

stages, which you and I would be very

Speaker: 00:02:57

familiar, we've covered them in previous

Speaker: 00:02:59

episodes, at the end, you always have the

Speaker: 00:03:01

additional cost around hosting and

Speaker: 00:03:04

maintenance. And the client reacted

Speaker: 00:03:06

saying, oh, that seems high. And actually,

Speaker: 00:03:08

I thought, well, I don't think it is, but

Speaker: 00:03:10

that's obviously part of different

Speaker: 00:03:11

experiences. And I said to him, but that

Speaker: 00:03:14

must be because they are suggesting a

Speaker: 00:03:16

dedicated hosting. And they looked at me

Speaker: 00:03:18

thinking, what do you mean? Is it not just

Speaker: 00:03:21

hosting? I said, no, there's different

Speaker: 00:03:23

ways in which you can obviously explore

Speaker: 00:03:25

hosting. And typically, the conversation

Speaker: 00:03:27

is either a shared hosting service or a

Speaker: 00:03:30

dedicated hosting service. And suddenly,

Speaker: 00:03:32

myself having to explain the difference

Speaker: 00:03:34

between the two, the pros and cons and so

Speaker: 00:03:36

on. And I thought, you know what, as a

Speaker: 00:03:37

little kind of challenge, as they say

Speaker: 00:03:40

where I come from, I will ask Johnny.

Speaker: 00:03:42

Ashley, your position on the difference

Speaker: 00:03:45

between shared and dedicated and

Speaker: 00:03:48

advantages and potential drawbacks to

Speaker: 00:03:50

watch out for. What say you? So, I was

Speaker: 00:03:55

always very much against shared. Actually,

Speaker: 00:03:59

let's take this a huge step back. I was

Speaker: 00:04:02

always pro-shared because it was so cheap.

Speaker: 00:04:05

I mean, it was brilliant. You could get,

Speaker: 00:04:07

you know, I mean, you could get such cheap

Speaker: 00:04:09

hosting and you still can, to be fair. But

Speaker: 00:04:12

I think it's a really good point because

Speaker: 00:04:14

most small businesses, you know, a lot of

Speaker: 00:04:19

the types of businesses that we talk to on

Speaker: 00:04:21

a daily basis, don't really consider what

Speaker: 00:04:24

hosting actually is and the impacts of

Speaker: 00:04:28

some of the decisions that are being made.

Speaker: 00:04:30

And ultimately, shared hosting, very

Speaker: 00:04:34

simply, you are sharing a server, whether

Speaker: 00:04:38

that be in the cloud or whether it be

Speaker: 00:04:40

virtual or whether it be physical, you're

Speaker: 00:04:42

sharing a server with other websites.

Speaker: 00:04:45

Dedicated, you have your own server, again

Speaker: 00:04:48

physical or virtual, where it's just your

Speaker: 00:04:51

website on that server. And historically,

Speaker: 00:04:55

from an SEO point of view, there would be

Speaker: 00:04:58

huge concerns about the other websites

Speaker: 00:05:02

that are on that server. And so from an

Speaker: 00:05:05

SEO point of view, it could have an impact

Speaker: 00:05:07

from a speed, from a reliability, from a

Speaker: 00:05:11

virus and malware point of view, lots and

Speaker: 00:05:13

lots of different things. Now, the creme

Speaker: 00:05:16

de la creme is to go dedicated, but it can

Speaker: 00:05:19

be very expensive. You sort of get what

Speaker: 00:05:22

you pay for as well. So, you know,

Speaker: 00:05:24

dedicated service could be anything from,

Speaker: 00:05:26

let's say, £50 a month all the way up to

Speaker: 00:05:28

500 maybe even a thousand pound a month

Speaker: 00:05:31

depending on the type of website or the

Speaker: 00:05:33

server that you need. So it can be quite

Speaker: 00:05:35

pricey but again going for a cheap

Speaker: 00:05:37

dedicated server actually isn't quite as

Speaker: 00:05:40

good as going for an expensive shared

Speaker: 00:05:41

server now. So this is a difficult

Speaker: 00:05:45

question to answer and I think the key

Speaker: 00:05:48

thing really is not to

Speaker: 00:05:52

just buy hosting without really

Speaker: 00:05:55

understanding what it is you're buying.

Speaker: 00:05:57

And if you're going down the shared route

Speaker: 00:05:59

to at least have a good idea of who else

Speaker: 00:06:02

is on that server and who's managing the

Speaker: 00:06:04

server, I think that's probably the most

Speaker: 00:06:05

important thing. And if you're going down

Speaker: 00:06:07

the dedicated route, a cheap dedicated

Speaker: 00:06:10

server actually isn't always great. So

Speaker: 00:06:13

yeah, I've just given some thoughts there,

Speaker: 00:06:16

Pascal. I don't know if you want to

Speaker: 00:06:18

challenge or ask any questions, but it's

Speaker: 00:06:21

more about just understanding what it is

Speaker: 00:06:23

you're buying. And for me, therefore, the

Speaker: 00:06:25

conversation I had with a client was to

Speaker: 00:06:27

try and invite them to imagine what this

Speaker: 00:06:30

could be like. And essentially, I went

Speaker: 00:06:32

into the realm of a shared office versus

Speaker: 00:06:35

your own office. Because with a shared

Speaker: 00:06:37

office, you get occasionally additional

Speaker: 00:06:41

services that can really help you out at

Speaker: 00:06:42

the lower cost because you share

Speaker: 00:06:44

essentially the maintenance and services.

Speaker: 00:06:46

with your own office. Sometimes you have

Speaker: 00:06:48

to be responsible for some of the

Speaker: 00:06:50

maintenance of parts of the building and

Speaker: 00:06:52

so on. So what you need to do really is

Speaker: 00:06:55

look at the contract. And even though this

Speaker: 00:06:56

is done via your web design agency, ask

Speaker: 00:06:59

them to share with you the terms and

Speaker: 00:07:01

conditions and the services, what's

Speaker: 00:07:03

included, what's excluded, and Listen, I

Speaker: 00:07:06

know that some of it is particularly dry

Speaker: 00:07:08

and optically interesting, but it will

Speaker: 00:07:10

have a bearing on the performance of your

Speaker: 00:07:12

website. And I think you're right. There

Speaker: 00:07:14

was certainly horror stories back in the

Speaker: 00:07:15

days where people had shared hosting with

Speaker: 00:07:18

websites which were either a very, very

Speaker: 00:07:20

different type of activities and sectors,

Speaker: 00:07:23

all the way to gambling and more. And that

Speaker: 00:07:26

dedicated, sorry, that shared server was

Speaker: 00:07:29

then blacklisted or sought by the search

Speaker: 00:07:31

engine, and you could be lumped into that.

Speaker: 00:07:33

Now, for me, it's very much, you know,

Speaker: 00:07:36

because you could go for, let's say, the

Speaker: 00:07:38

dedicated service, but actually you're

Speaker: 00:07:40

paying for a service that you don't need

Speaker: 00:07:42

fully. It's a bit like, you know, having

Speaker: 00:07:43

your own office, and then it's too big for

Speaker: 00:07:46

you, so to speak. And vice versa, if you

Speaker: 00:07:48

have a shared office, you almost are bound

Speaker: 00:07:51

to the limits of space and so on and so

Speaker: 00:07:54

forth. So I was kind of making some

Speaker: 00:07:56

suggestions, but I did ask my go-to

Speaker: 00:07:59

assistant, Perplexity, to remind me of

Speaker: 00:08:01

some of the things that you should be

Speaker: 00:08:02

thinking about. if you're going to go for

Speaker: 00:08:04

shared service. And to me, it's about this

Speaker: 00:08:06

idea of clutter, almost. So ask and

Speaker: 00:08:09

investigate how you can cache, for

Speaker: 00:08:11

example, some of the files that people are

Speaker: 00:08:13

accessing on a regular basis. And one

Speaker: 00:08:15

thing that was mentioned about perplexity,

Speaker: 00:08:16

which I've forgotten, I shouldn't have

Speaker: 00:08:18

because you mentioned it in a recent

Speaker: 00:08:20

website call to action, is that content

Speaker: 00:08:23

delivery network CDN You don't have to

Speaker: 00:08:25

understand it much more than asking your

Speaker: 00:08:27

design agency, what do we do about this?

Speaker: 00:08:30

Optimize the code and the content. One

Speaker: 00:08:33

thing that was recommended as well is

Speaker: 00:08:36

don't keep too much of, for example, media

Speaker: 00:08:38

files that you don't need at all.

Speaker: 00:08:40

WordPress is really, really tempting to

Speaker: 00:08:42

use it almost like the busy inbox where

Speaker: 00:08:45

you don't delete anything. So if you're

Speaker: 00:08:46

using WordPress or any other, don't keep

Speaker: 00:08:48

media files you don't use, don't keep like

Speaker: 00:08:50

10 different versions of the same article.

Speaker: 00:08:52

So, you know, that kind of clutter can

Speaker: 00:08:54

really help the performance of a shared

Speaker: 00:08:57

service. But the old optimization is very

Speaker: 00:08:59

important. But the number one question

Speaker: 00:09:01

that I would ask you to ask your agencies

Speaker: 00:09:04

and the hosting providers is around how

Speaker: 00:09:07

often do they keep this software? that

Speaker: 00:09:09

they need updated and used to be given a

Speaker: 00:09:11

log for that. And if you go for shared,

Speaker: 00:09:14

one that I nearly forgot, but perplexity

Speaker: 00:09:16

reminded me, particularly for mobile

Speaker: 00:09:18

phone, you know, ask for the

Speaker: 00:09:19

implementation of the Accelerated Mobile

Speaker: 00:09:22

Pages, AMP. It's kind of old hat now, you

Speaker: 00:09:25

know, it's been mentioned by Google for

Speaker: 00:09:26

many, many years and we take it for

Speaker: 00:09:28

granted, but for you, as the business

Speaker: 00:09:30

owner and the ultimate owner of the

Speaker: 00:09:33

website, asking those questions can reveal

Speaker: 00:09:35

that there are some ways and means for the

Speaker: 00:09:37

shared service to perform better. But

Speaker: 00:09:40

also, conversely, make sure that you ask

Speaker: 00:09:42

the questions, I pay for the DK server.

Speaker: 00:09:46

Looking at the past 12 months, how we

Speaker: 00:09:49

performed in terms of demand on the

Speaker: 00:09:52

server, and am I paying for a bigger

Speaker: 00:09:54

office than I need? all very good points.

Speaker: 00:09:58

And in fact, the optimization points, I

Speaker: 00:10:00

mean, I'd suggest to be perfectly honest,

Speaker: 00:10:02

if you've got a WordPress website, even if

Speaker: 00:10:03

you're on dedicated, you should be doing

Speaker: 00:10:05

those optimizations as well. So more

Speaker: 00:10:07

importantly, challenge your agency,

Speaker: 00:10:09

challenge your hosting provider, and make

Speaker: 00:10:11

sure you know what you are buying. Let's

Speaker: 00:10:14

move on to website stories.

Speaker: 00:10:23

Now in this part of the show, Joni and I

Speaker: 00:10:25

share our reactions, our views, our kind

Speaker: 00:10:27

of comments on the specific piece of

Speaker: 00:10:29

content. It could be an article, it could

Speaker: 00:10:30

be a podcast, a video, an infographic. And

Speaker: 00:10:32

today we're going for an article from

Speaker: 00:10:35

Search Engine Land. It's been a while

Speaker: 00:10:36

since we mentioned them on the show. Joni

Speaker: 00:10:39

and I love SEO, so of course we would be

Speaker: 00:10:42

consulting their content regularly. This

Speaker: 00:10:44

was written by Julianne McCoy, a founder

Speaker: 00:10:46

of firstmovers.ai, and the title is as

Speaker: 00:10:50

follows. AI SEO, how to be visible in

Speaker: 00:10:54

Google, AI overviews, chatbots, and large

Speaker: 00:10:57

language models. And you and I have had

Speaker: 00:10:59

this conversation pretty much from the

Speaker: 00:11:01

get-go when these AI summaries started to

Speaker: 00:11:04

kind of worm their way into the search

Speaker: 00:11:05

engine results, primarily Google, now

Speaker: 00:11:07

they're all doing it, but also this idea

Speaker: 00:11:10

of a near future, perhaps even present

Speaker: 00:11:12

now, where people spend longer on chat

Speaker: 00:11:14

GPT, copilot, Gemini, perplexity, and now

Speaker: 00:11:18

meta AI. More about this in a moment.

Speaker: 00:11:20

where they get the information they need

Speaker: 00:11:22

without having to access, to begin with,

Speaker: 00:11:24

search in your result, but also without

Speaker: 00:11:26

clicking on the link to access your

Speaker: 00:11:28

website. So there is a future of that kind

Speaker: 00:11:31

of zero-click behavior that we've known

Speaker: 00:11:33

about for a while. Now this article is

Speaker: 00:11:35

great because it breaks things down into

Speaker: 00:11:38

Very understandable elements of what to do

Speaker: 00:11:40

about this AI SEO, the appeal and

Speaker: 00:11:44

popularity of the AI summaries, and then

Speaker: 00:11:47

what to do about it. But just to begin

Speaker: 00:11:48

with, to get your reaction, AI summaries,

Speaker: 00:11:51

do you like them? Are you worried about

Speaker: 00:11:53

the impact on website traffic? Um, there

Speaker: 00:11:58

is a concern over website traffic for

Speaker: 00:12:00

sure. Uh, as a user though, I do like

Speaker: 00:12:03

them. Uh, and so it's, uh, that balance

Speaker: 00:12:05

really. Um, and, um, you know,

Speaker: 00:12:08

potentially, uh, the mitigation is plowing

Speaker: 00:12:12

more money into things like Google ads,

Speaker: 00:12:15

which ensures your visibility on, uh, on

Speaker: 00:12:19

the SERPs pages, um, or just optimizing to

Speaker: 00:12:23

get into those AI results. So, so yes, I

Speaker: 00:12:25

like them, but like with everything, it

Speaker: 00:12:27

does bring a challenge and it just keeps,

Speaker: 00:12:29

it just means that we just have to

Speaker: 00:12:31

continuously be at the top of our game,

Speaker: 00:12:33

thinking about it from a technical SEO

Speaker: 00:12:36

point of view, but also considering other

Speaker: 00:12:38

channels. For example, as I said, Google

Speaker: 00:12:41

ads and making sure that we're actually at

Speaker: 00:12:42

the top of the page, nevermind what

Speaker: 00:12:44

results are being shown. And for me, the

Speaker: 00:12:48

best way to illustrate what those AI

Speaker: 00:12:52

summaries are, they're to me like mini

Speaker: 00:12:55

search engine results pages. They stand

Speaker: 00:12:57

the precursors, like the exact summary of

Speaker: 00:12:59

what's actually going to be below. So in a

Speaker: 00:13:02

way which, obviously, this article is

Speaker: 00:13:05

studying, it's these examples. There's

Speaker: 00:13:07

research-based kind of illustrations and

Speaker: 00:13:10

more. So Julia is kind of trying to

Speaker: 00:13:12

suggest that actually, if you think about

Speaker: 00:13:15

it, there's something comforting, which is

Speaker: 00:13:17

that those AI summaries or those AI-driven

Speaker: 00:13:20

search results are totally reliant on what

Speaker: 00:13:23

is currently available on a search engine

Speaker: 00:13:26

database. So there is logic in what's

Speaker: 00:13:28

happening here. And there's a significant

Speaker: 00:13:30

overlap between the traditional, I mean,

Speaker: 00:13:32

is that correct? traditional search engine

Speaker: 00:13:35

experience, funny me like a couple of

Speaker: 00:13:37

years, and the AI powered one, and she's

Speaker: 00:13:40

sharing four elements to kind of look

Speaker: 00:13:42

into. I'm going to go through them rather

Speaker: 00:13:44

rapidly. Please follow the link in the

Speaker: 00:13:46

show notes. We have the article for you to

Speaker: 00:13:49

consult. But number one, continue to do

Speaker: 00:13:51

what you're doing. to rank well on the

Speaker: 00:13:54

traditional Google search engine results

Speaker: 00:13:57

pages. So we're talking about high

Speaker: 00:13:58

quality, authoritative content. Do not

Speaker: 00:14:01

neglect technical SEO and schema markup if

Speaker: 00:14:04

you don't know what it is. Ask, study, ask

Speaker: 00:14:07

AI to give you a summary. And importantly,

Speaker: 00:14:10

do optimize on branded content. Don't just

Speaker: 00:14:13

do some vague notions of what you do.

Speaker: 00:14:16

Really make people learn about the

Speaker: 00:14:17

language of what you do. Number two, be

Speaker: 00:14:21

really intentional in targeting what

Speaker: 00:14:24

people seek out, which is really more

Speaker: 00:14:27

something to do with information than

Speaker: 00:14:28

making a purchasing decision. It's almost

Speaker: 00:14:32

like an 80-20. So what's called, you know,

Speaker: 00:14:34

commonly top of funnel keywords should be

Speaker: 00:14:36

part of what you do because they do appear

Speaker: 00:14:38

very frequently on AI-powered summaries.

Speaker: 00:14:42

Number three, almost like a close cousin

Speaker: 00:14:44

to what we mentioned a moment ago, go for

Speaker: 00:14:46

relevant queries and long-term keywords.

Speaker: 00:14:48

So for example, you know, people say the

Speaker: 00:14:51

vast majority of people look for, for

Speaker: 00:14:52

example, how to choose black shoes for

Speaker: 00:14:56

men. That's the full sentence. And now

Speaker: 00:14:58

with AI Summary, people can write a 10

Speaker: 00:15:01

line kind of query as opposed to just

Speaker: 00:15:03

black shoes. So go back to what you've

Speaker: 00:15:05

done with your optimization and extend the

Speaker: 00:15:09

relevancy in terms of queries. And then

Speaker: 00:15:11

the number four, it's again an extension

Speaker: 00:15:14

to what's been mentioned, which is the

Speaker: 00:15:15

idea of match your content effort, but

Speaker: 00:15:19

also I would say by extension implicitly

Speaker: 00:15:20

design images, videos, and so on, match

Speaker: 00:15:23

all of that to the search intent. So if

Speaker: 00:15:25

someone is looking for how to do

Speaker: 00:15:27

something, then there has to be copy

Speaker: 00:15:30

images, web page layout, and so on, that

Speaker: 00:15:33

is matching that search intent. And as a

Speaker: 00:15:35

reminder, There's two types of search

Speaker: 00:15:39

intents in terms of what people do on the

Speaker: 00:15:41

internet. They look for a specific

Speaker: 00:15:43

website, we call this globally

Speaker: 00:15:45

navigational intent. They're looking to

Speaker: 00:15:48

buy something, transactional intent, but

Speaker: 00:15:50

the vast majority want to learn something

Speaker: 00:15:52

new, and that's called informational

Speaker: 00:15:54

intent. And do you have that experience on

Speaker: 00:15:57

your website is part of the elements of

Speaker: 00:16:00

reflection. So listen, AI overviews, the

Speaker: 00:16:03

chatbots, the large language models,

Speaker: 00:16:06

they're all kind of taking now and

Speaker: 00:16:09

entering the world of search. And they're

Speaker: 00:16:11

there to really provide ease and

Speaker: 00:16:12

convenience. And listen, I was pretty

Speaker: 00:16:15

shocked when Google I.O. this year

Speaker: 00:16:21

the seal of google student saying we're

Speaker: 00:16:23

gonna make search so easy and so

Speaker: 00:16:25

convenient you want to search anymore it

Speaker: 00:16:27

was a bizarre phrase but the more you

Speaker: 00:16:29

think about what's up in the more realize

Speaker: 00:16:31

that that's true so they are some concerns

Speaker: 00:16:33

they always in which you can you know kind

Speaker: 00:16:35

of piggyback but ultimately. Right now,

Speaker: 00:16:38

the logic and the practices are the same.

Speaker: 00:16:41

It may just be that you're being caught

Speaker: 00:16:43

out because you've not done enough with

Speaker: 00:16:46

regard to traditional SEO, if I'm going to

Speaker: 00:16:48

use that term, and you've got to really

Speaker: 00:16:49

now get down to getting on with taking

Speaker: 00:16:53

action for those AI-powered search

Speaker: 00:16:54

experiences. Do you think there's an

Speaker: 00:16:57

element, just reflecting as you've been

Speaker: 00:16:59

talking there, And do you think there's an

Speaker: 00:17:02

element from the likes of Google that are,

Speaker: 00:17:06

how do we stop the leaky bucket

Speaker: 00:17:11

of people moving to Ploplexity and moving

Speaker: 00:17:15

to ChatGPT instead of using the

Speaker: 00:17:19

traditional search engine where they make

Speaker: 00:17:21

a huge amount of money from Google Ads?

Speaker: 00:17:24

And so do you think that, you know, I'm

Speaker: 00:17:26

just reflecting and I'm thinking, is one

Speaker: 00:17:30

of actually their biggest reasons of

Speaker: 00:17:32

incorporating AI search into that search

Speaker: 00:17:35

page, because they're trying to get people

Speaker: 00:17:36

back to ensure that they can keep charging

Speaker: 00:17:39

for adverts. Well, for sure. And listen,

Speaker: 00:17:42

you know, it's all about, you know, who do

Speaker: 00:17:43

we keep on our properties? And with regard

Speaker: 00:17:46

to, um, Google, you know, they have the

Speaker: 00:17:48

whole ecosystem of Google maps of Google

Speaker: 00:17:51

search of Google images and YouTube and so

Speaker: 00:17:53

on, but they want to keep you on their

Speaker: 00:17:54

properties on their land. And they don't

Speaker: 00:17:57

really want you to move elsewhere. And,

Speaker: 00:18:00

and I think what's interesting for them is

Speaker: 00:18:01

the threat was primarily social networks,

Speaker: 00:18:04

but now we have independent platforms like

Speaker: 00:18:07

a perplexity like chat GPT and a few

Speaker: 00:18:10

others are going to come along

Speaker: 00:18:11

particularly national. So for example in

Speaker: 00:18:13

France they have something called mistrial

Speaker: 00:18:15

which is actually pretty good and so it

Speaker: 00:18:17

goes on. So for me this idea of how do we

Speaker: 00:18:21

kind of continue to evolve the search

Speaker: 00:18:24

experience and we're always thinking from

Speaker: 00:18:25

a business point of view but as a user if

Speaker: 00:18:28

you have a simple question usually they

Speaker: 00:18:30

are a simple question and you can give a

Speaker: 00:18:33

quick summary with the ability to click on

Speaker: 00:18:35

that link symbol that most people want.

Speaker: 00:18:38

And then, you know, within a few seconds,

Speaker: 00:18:41

you kind of go, ah, brilliant, I kind of

Speaker: 00:18:43

got what I needed here. And the beauty of

Speaker: 00:18:46

being able to save those searches for a

Speaker: 00:18:48

more deep dive kind of, you know,

Speaker: 00:18:51

interaction, I think is interesting. But

Speaker: 00:18:53

you're right, it is competing for our time

Speaker: 00:18:56

budget. You know, the average, certainly

Speaker: 00:18:58

in the UK, person spends, to the tune of

Speaker: 00:19:02

69 hours a day online. And they want that

Speaker: 00:19:04

the vast majority to be on their

Speaker: 00:19:06

platforms. It just reminds me of Google

Speaker: 00:19:09

trying Google plus trying to be the king

Speaker: 00:19:14

of, uh, of social networks, but failing,

Speaker: 00:19:17

but the Gemini Gemini Gemini is doing

Speaker: 00:19:20

well. Uh, and, uh, and I, I am embraced

Speaker: 00:19:23

with, with, um, uh, AI on search pages.

Speaker: 00:19:26

Um, I think the key points for me, uh,

Speaker: 00:19:29

like I've already said, and, and, and like

Speaker: 00:19:31

the article talks about, uh, focus on best

Speaker: 00:19:35

practices, focus on, uh, top of the funnel

Speaker: 00:19:38

keywords, um, and, uh, and, and really

Speaker: 00:19:42

consider, um, you know, what you would

Speaker: 00:19:45

normally do from an SEO point of view,

Speaker: 00:19:48

make sure you're doing that stuff. So, uh,

Speaker: 00:19:50

uh, a good topic. Let's move on to our

Speaker: 00:19:54

third segment, which is the website engine

Speaker: 00:19:57

room.

Speaker: 00:20:05

Next segment of the show, we select two

Speaker: 00:20:07

apps, two software solutions, maybe a

Speaker: 00:20:08

piece of kit that can make life easier as

Speaker: 00:20:11

a content creator and website manager. So

Speaker: 00:20:14

Johnny, what is your selection for episode

Speaker: 00:20:16

35? So we've been talking a lot about AI

Speaker: 00:20:20

and this one is AI videos. Now you know

Speaker: 00:20:24

this is becoming a bit scary in the fact

Speaker: 00:20:28

that you are starting to potentially see

Speaker: 00:20:30

videos online that are made with AI but

Speaker: 00:20:34

you don't necessarily know. And one of the

Speaker: 00:20:37

tools that came up in a number of

Speaker: 00:20:41

conversations was SendPotion.com.

Speaker: 00:20:45

SendPotion.com. As we say, all the links

Speaker: 00:20:47

will always be in the show notes. It's a

Speaker: 00:20:49

way to make AI videos from text in your

Speaker: 00:20:52

own face and voice. You can customize

Speaker: 00:20:55

video backgrounds, turn screen recordings

Speaker: 00:20:57

to AI videos, and much more. It's worth

Speaker: 00:21:02

having a play with just to get a feel for

Speaker: 00:21:05

where things are going and how easy some

Speaker: 00:21:09

of this is. Now, you know, we always

Speaker: 00:21:14

advocate for authenticity. We advocate for

Speaker: 00:21:17

being real, for really good content. But

Speaker: 00:21:22

just like we talk about AI as in chat GPT,

Speaker: 00:21:26

Gemini, perplexity, we talk about it being

Speaker: 00:21:28

a digital assistant. We talk about it how

Speaker: 00:21:30

it fits in the workflow. It's all about

Speaker: 00:21:33

what you say to it, how you use it, where

Speaker: 00:21:36

you use it in the workflow. Likewise, AI

Speaker: 00:21:39

videos have a place, and it's just about

Speaker: 00:21:42

how you use them, and it's about being

Speaker: 00:21:43

authentic with them. But yeah, SendPotion,

Speaker: 00:21:46

it's worth having a look. They have a free

Speaker: 00:21:48

version, and their pricing isn't too bad.

Speaker: 00:21:52

From a lot of the videos I've seen

Speaker: 00:21:53

produced, it's worth having a play. Thank

Speaker: 00:21:57

you very much. And listen, you know, part

Speaker: 00:21:58

of what we do with regard to the website

Speaker: 00:22:00

engine room is to ask you to have a play

Speaker: 00:22:02

to experiment, because this is the

Speaker: 00:22:04

precursor of maybe the next evolution of

Speaker: 00:22:07

what this platform is all about. And, you

Speaker: 00:22:09

know, I said this in the masterclass that

Speaker: 00:22:11

I host on AI and digital marketing, this

Speaker: 00:22:13

idea of becoming a skilled operator of the

Speaker: 00:22:16

tools of the time. And I think

Speaker: 00:22:18

ScentPotion, at first you can go, well,

Speaker: 00:22:20

why would I want to have a copy of myself?

Speaker: 00:22:23

with my voice and my face out there. I

Speaker: 00:22:25

said, well, maybe because in six months

Speaker: 00:22:27

time, you're going to discover a very

Speaker: 00:22:29

valid use case about this, but this time

Speaker: 00:22:31

you're ready to email. And I think really

Speaker: 00:22:34

my selection is a bit like this. So Meta,

Speaker: 00:22:36

the parent company of Facebook, Instagram,

Speaker: 00:22:38

WhatsApp, Messenger, and many more. has

Speaker: 00:22:41

released their kind of large-range model.

Speaker: 00:22:44

So a competitor to GPT, to Gemini, to

Speaker: 00:22:47

Copilot, and the others, meta.ai. So what

Speaker: 00:22:51

I've done, I've done the experiment where

Speaker: 00:22:52

I've literally copied and pasted the same

Speaker: 00:22:55

prompts, the same briefing, the same

Speaker: 00:22:56

instructions that I have recorded on the

Speaker: 00:22:59

other platform. And I have to say, the

Speaker: 00:23:01

results are better. It's more

Speaker: 00:23:04

conversational, which we understand coming

Speaker: 00:23:06

from the social network. It's a bit more

Speaker: 00:23:08

detailed. It's a bit more kind of keen to

Speaker: 00:23:10

help out. But that's what happens when you

Speaker: 00:23:12

wait for the others to get on with their

Speaker: 00:23:14

stuff. You can kind of look at what

Speaker: 00:23:16

they've been up to and then release you on

Speaker: 00:23:18

one. But there's also from the conference

Speaker: 00:23:22

that was delivered a few weeks ago now,

Speaker: 00:23:26

where Meta are really seeing things like

Speaker: 00:23:28

the smart classes and VideoGen, which is

Speaker: 00:23:32

their version of text-to-video. So we're

Speaker: 00:23:35

going to see, again, a lot of platforms

Speaker: 00:23:38

fighting for our attention and our budget.

Speaker: 00:23:40

But I thought meta.ai would be a very,

Speaker: 00:23:43

very helpful additional team member as

Speaker: 00:23:47

part of the digital assistant. And I've

Speaker: 00:23:48

also put in the show notes, Johnny, a link

Speaker: 00:23:51

to the official website for meta.ai. So

Speaker: 00:23:55

meta.ai takes you right into the belly of

Speaker: 00:23:58

the chatbot, so to speak, but ai.meta.com,

Speaker: 00:24:01

you can spend some time to study what they

Speaker: 00:24:03

have in mind. Interestingly, they are

Speaker: 00:24:05

thinking of creating also some AI

Speaker: 00:24:07

characters. So a real kind of virtual

Speaker: 00:24:10

representation of your system. I wonder

Speaker: 00:24:12

whether there's a link between that and

Speaker: 00:24:14

SendPotion, where maybe the future is not

Speaker: 00:24:16

so much a copy of you, Johnny, but a

Speaker: 00:24:19

mascot of sorts that the business has

Speaker: 00:24:22

adopted that can be part of the experience

Speaker: 00:24:25

with customer interaction. Thanks very

Speaker: 00:24:28

much, Pascal. Yeah, let us have a play.

Speaker: 00:24:30

Let us know what you think. Our final

Speaker: 00:24:33

segment, we always finish with the website

Speaker: 00:24:35

call to action.

Speaker: 00:24:44

Now this is about the one change or one

Speaker: 00:24:45

adjustment you should be making right now

Speaker: 00:24:47

to your website. Jonny, what is your

Speaker: 00:24:49

recommendation? So really simply break

Speaker: 00:24:53

down your forms, make them easier to fill

Speaker: 00:24:57

out, add trust signals and pre-tick

Speaker: 00:25:01

marketing opt-ins. So with clauses making

Speaker: 00:25:06

it clear that you're following privacy

Speaker: 00:25:08

policies and TNCs, but what I'm talking

Speaker: 00:25:11

about here is contact forms or any type of

Speaker: 00:25:13

form that you've got on your website. How

Speaker: 00:25:15

could you break it down and how could you

Speaker: 00:25:18

take people on a journey and get them to

Speaker: 00:25:20

fill that out and I think a bit of it is

Speaker: 00:25:23

using behavioral science. I think it's

Speaker: 00:25:25

about the wording, I think it's about

Speaker: 00:25:27

adding those trust signals, I think it's

Speaker: 00:25:29

about just simply breaking it down and

Speaker: 00:25:31

making it into a workflow. Now, I do not

Speaker: 00:25:34

advocate these guys whatsoever. However,

Speaker: 00:25:37

Ocean Finance, the credit card, please do

Speaker: 00:25:40

not apply and I absolutely don't advocate

Speaker: 00:25:44

them. However, Whoever is in their

Speaker: 00:25:47

marketing department knows how to create a

Speaker: 00:25:51

really, really good form. So if you

Speaker: 00:25:54

Google, apply for an Ocean Finance credit

Speaker: 00:25:57

card, I'll put the link in the chat notes.

Speaker: 00:25:59

As I said, please don't apply. And this is

Speaker: 00:26:03

not what this is about. But have a look at

Speaker: 00:26:05

their so simple form. It's so clever. The

Speaker: 00:26:10

wording, it just, It breaks the whole

Speaker: 00:26:14

thing down. The wording's extremely

Speaker: 00:26:17

clever. It starts using the data that

Speaker: 00:26:20

you're putting in. It starts straight away

Speaker: 00:26:22

using in some of the next pages. And as I

Speaker: 00:26:27

said, it adds lots of trust signals as

Speaker: 00:26:29

well. So it's using behavioral science.

Speaker: 00:26:30

It's breaking the forms down. Have a look

Speaker: 00:26:32

at Ocean Finances, apply credit card, and

Speaker: 00:26:35

that will be my call to action. Break your

Speaker: 00:26:36

forms down, get more people converting.

Speaker: 00:26:38

It's all about conversion rates. What's

Speaker: 00:26:40

yours, Pascal? Well, I want to break

Speaker: 00:26:42

things down also, but I want to talk about

Speaker: 00:26:45

the regular content marketing or the

Speaker: 00:26:48

content ideas meeting. And I want people

Speaker: 00:26:50

to kind of almost rethink and reset the

Speaker: 00:26:52

agenda for that meeting. But to begin

Speaker: 00:26:54

with, I think it's wholly appropriate for

Speaker: 00:26:56

this to become the AI and content

Speaker: 00:26:59

marketing meeting. I would suggest a

Speaker: 00:27:01

couple of hours a month is probably what

Speaker: 00:27:03

you need to think through what you're

Speaker: 00:27:05

going to be doing for the coming month or

Speaker: 00:27:07

quarter. So I would say six elements to

Speaker: 00:27:10

your new agenda of sort. Number one is

Speaker: 00:27:13

you're celebrating your wins. People do

Speaker: 00:27:14

that often enough. So what's worked well,

Speaker: 00:27:16

you know, what are we kind of getting in

Speaker: 00:27:19

terms of commercial wins, but about

Speaker: 00:27:21

operational wins, but also technological

Speaker: 00:27:23

wins. So can we list all those wins?

Speaker: 00:27:25

Because in there, it could be the spark of

Speaker: 00:27:27

an idea, which is for the second item on

Speaker: 00:27:29

the agenda, which is let's get creative.

Speaker: 00:27:31

Any new content ideas, questions that our

Speaker: 00:27:34

customers have been asking recently, any

Speaker: 00:27:36

new formats or even events we should be

Speaker: 00:27:37

tapping into. So that kind of takes care

Speaker: 00:27:40

of the part of the meeting. The next thing

Speaker: 00:27:41

should be exploring AI tools and apps and

Speaker: 00:27:44

collectively with your, you know, with

Speaker: 00:27:46

your teammates, explore what's working

Speaker: 00:27:48

well, what's not working and being them,

Speaker: 00:27:49

but also any new tools that we should be

Speaker: 00:27:51

testing, perhaps recommended by Johnny and

Speaker: 00:27:54

Pascal. Number four on the agenda, Then

Speaker: 00:27:57

schedule that content and look at themes

Speaker: 00:28:00

and topics and ideally look at the next

Speaker: 00:28:02

quarter if you can. But you should also

Speaker: 00:28:05

spend some time, which is item number five

Speaker: 00:28:07

on the agenda, on just some notional ideas

Speaker: 00:28:09

of how you're going to spread the word.

Speaker: 00:28:10

Because I think people, Jonny, spend still

Speaker: 00:28:12

a lot of time on the content creation, but

Speaker: 00:28:15

not on the promotion of that content. So

Speaker: 00:28:17

then it lives on your website, no one

Speaker: 00:28:19

knows about it, it goes on social media,

Speaker: 00:28:20

we don't get enough shares. The spreading

Speaker: 00:28:22

of the word is very important. And then

Speaker: 00:28:24

the final item is when you assign the task

Speaker: 00:28:27

and the deadline, ask yourself the

Speaker: 00:28:29

question, can AI help with the

Speaker: 00:28:31

productivity and keeping it on track? And

Speaker: 00:28:33

I think this AI content marketing meeting

Speaker: 00:28:37

needs to be just a bit more broken down

Speaker: 00:28:39

now than it is now. Six suggestions, they

Speaker: 00:28:42

are in the show notes for you to review. I

Speaker: 00:28:44

think that's going to make a big

Speaker: 00:28:45

difference.

Speaker: 00:28:50

Fantastic. What great call to actions as

Speaker: 00:28:53

always. We have found ourselves in

Speaker: 00:28:58

many recent episodes talking lots about

Speaker: 00:29:00

AI, but rightly so. Like we always say,

Speaker: 00:29:04

it's a great digital assistant. It's all

Speaker: 00:29:06

about embracing it, but it's about

Speaker: 00:29:07

understanding how to get the most out of

Speaker: 00:29:09

it. We talked about hosting. virtual

Speaker: 00:29:12

shared servers or dedicated servers, find

Speaker: 00:29:16

out, do you even know what your website is

Speaker: 00:29:19

hosted on? That would be a question. And

Speaker: 00:29:21

if you don't know the answer, start asking

Speaker: 00:29:24

some questions because I imagine that a

Speaker: 00:29:26

few of you don't. And if you do know the

Speaker: 00:29:28

answer, start challenging them in terms of

Speaker: 00:29:31

when was the software last updated, what

Speaker: 00:29:32

other websites are on there, et cetera, et

Speaker: 00:29:34

cetera. And we've covered some great apps

Speaker: 00:29:36

and tools and some good call to actions.

Speaker: 00:29:41

It's a time to go through your show notes

Speaker: 00:29:42

and reflect and bite-size this down

Speaker: 00:29:47

and start putting some of these things

Speaker: 00:29:49

into place. And of course, visit the

Speaker: 00:29:51

90-day website, masterymarketing.com

Speaker: 00:29:55

website, where you can get There's an

Speaker: 00:29:58

e-book full of lots of the tools that

Speaker: 00:30:01

we've gone through. And we have the action

Speaker: 00:30:03

randomizer, which gives you those

Speaker: 00:30:05

bite-sized call-to-actions. So if you've

Speaker: 00:30:07

got a little gap on a Friday afternoon,

Speaker: 00:30:11

roll the dice on our website, and it'll

Speaker: 00:30:12

give you a bite-sized little thing that

Speaker: 00:30:14

you could go in action right now on your

Speaker: 00:30:16

website. Pascal, great episode. Thank you

Speaker: 00:30:20

very much. You reminded me of the mantra

Speaker: 00:30:22

of, I want to bring back to the four. It's

Speaker: 00:30:25

all about very simple things done very

Speaker: 00:30:27

well, very often on, on that note, you

Speaker: 00:30:31

couldn't have said it any better. Thank

Speaker: 00:30:33

you so much for joining us. Please do

Speaker: 00:30:37

reply on our social medias. Let us know

Speaker: 00:30:40

what you think. give us some topics to

Speaker: 00:30:43

discuss. We really enjoy helping you start

Speaker: 00:30:47

making you feel proud of your website

Speaker: 00:30:49

again. Thanks for joining us. We will see

Speaker: 00:30:51

you all soon. Take care. Bye-bye.