Nate & Brett discuss how to justify investment in paid media – even when your main focus is organic traffic.

Issues Discussed

* The #1 reason why you should invest in paid media

* The single paid metric that every marketer should know

* How paid media can provide fast feedback for a campaign

* How we use paid media to support organic campaigns

As a sequel to #52, Nate & Brett discuss how to effectively grow your website with updates to existing content, rather than focusing on creating new content from scratch.

Issues Discussed

* Why your old, existing content matters

* How focusing on your existing content can drive better results than new content

* How to balance maintenance vs. creation

* How to prioritize updates to existing content

* How this process affects your new content creation (your new will become your existing content)

Links Mentioned

* Nick Eubanks sales of a 47 post blog for $100,000

* Backlinko’s 40 some odd posts

* Cyrus Shepard’s page update process

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As a sequel to #51, Nate and Brett discuss how to translate good keyword research into incredible content that will drive traffic.

Also – Nate goes on a rant about what “10x content” really means.

Issues Discussed

* How to put your strategy to work

* Tips on creating a content brief

* Doing content research that beats the competition

* Formatting your content for success

* Why drafting is not the most important part

* How to edit effectively

* Keeping your process going

Links Mentioned

Examples of Good Content Development

Nate’s post on Free Content Research Tools

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Nate & Brett discuss how to do keyword research, a fundamental skill for SEO & digital marketing.

Issues Discussed

* How smart keyword research & planning makes money over the long-term

* Starting with your audience – not your product / service

* Doing broad research before narrowing your focus

* Assigning keywords to different topics

* Understanding intent & customer questions

* Thinking about keywords in relation to your broader business

Links Mentioned

Nate’s beginner guide to keyword research

Nate’s guide to keyword mapping

How To Judge Keyword Difficulty

How To Use Free Tools & Research to Find Content Ideas

Garlic Presses on Amazon

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In this episode – Nate, who is particularly riled up, and Brett debate whether businesses should invest time & money in Snapchat.

Snapchat is now one of the largest social apps by active users. Businesses are increasingly looking at Snapchat as an opportunity to grow both earned & paid media.

But is investing time & money in Snapchat worthwhile compared to other platforms?

Issues Discussed

* Background on Snapchat

* How Nate & Brett use Snapchat

* Business Case for Snapchat

* The Case for Staying off Snapchat

* How To Make Your Snapchat Experiments Worthwhile

Links Mentioned

Sharecropping: A Sucker’s Game Then — and Now

The bull case for Snapchat

Knucklepuck’s Snapchat Takeover

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Nate & Brett discuss what marketers can learn from the trending topic of the day – Fake News.

Fake news has been around as long as the written word, but new distribution channels and political implications have brought it to mainstream attention.

But what can marketers (and anyone who works on the Internet) learn from it?

Issues Discussed

* Why Fake News is suddenly News

* The origins of getting attention

* How consumers can respond

* How large Internet distribution channels (aka Google + Facebook) are likely to respond

* What marketers can learn from fake news publishers

Links Mentioned

* Nate’s post on using OutBrain

* Google takes action on news publishers

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As a follow-up to Episode 16, Nate & Brett discuss what to do when your data is not just polluted, but is flat-out wrong.

They talk about ongoing issues with Google Analytics, Facebook, and nearly every analytics platform in digital marketing – and how to deal with the dark side of data-driven marketing.

Issues Discussed

* Follow-up to Google Analytics Spam

* Unspoken issues with Google Analytics

* Problems with internal platform metrics

* Myths about Bad Metrics

* The opportunity for marketers who can overcome bad data

Links Mentioned

* Nate’s Post on Google Analytics Spam

* Episode 16 – Why Your Analytics Are Bullshit

* Info on Vitaly

* Annielytics post on Facebook Link Shims

* Facebook’s Ad Metrics Fraud

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Nate & Brett discuss takeaways from their favorite MozCon presentations. Topics include keyword Research, feature snippets & better information architecture.

Issues Discussed

Keyword Research – Is there anything new from Pete Myers’ “Gather, Group, Generate” process? If not, how should you go about keyword research?

Featured Snippets – “Ranking #0” can be lucrative and daunting. Are snippets as complicated as they seem (they are not) and how can you compete regardless?

Information Architecture – How can you structure your site for better search & sales? How should you approach an existing site vs. new build site?

Links Mentioned

Pete Myers’ Presentation PDF

Rob Bucci’s Presentation PDF

Joe Hall’s Presentation PDF

Nate’s post on content ideas

Nate’s post on beginner keyword mapping

 

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Nate & Brett discuss what professional SEOs & digital marketers can learn from recent industry news & a couple long-building trends.

Issues Discussed

* Lessons Learned from Moz’s Layoff Announcement

* Whether building an audience to sell a product really works

* Google’s AMP project

* “Tinderization” of Google Search Results

* When you should chase Google’s “shiny new things”

* What to do about SEO technical debt

* Whether (and how) small & medium businesses can compete in SEO

* Lack of diversity in Google search results

* Consolidation of digital publishers

* What to do when your competition is a multi-billion dollar corporation

 

Links Mentioned

Moz’s Layoffs

AJ Kohn’s Post

Google’s AMP Project

AMP’s current & future impact

ViperChill’s Post on SERP Consolidation

 

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Brett & Nate discuss what happens when marketing strategies overlap and start to really become all the same thing.

Like #44 – this episode is less of a structured tips & tricks format and more of a conversation about what is happening at the cutting edge of digital marketing. Let us know what you think!

Issues Discussed

* How should paid media budgets work with SEO?

* How do you balance content marketing with SEO considerations?

* How do you optimize for actual online behavior vs. people’s identity?

Links Mentioned

Review & rate us on iTunes

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