Search Engine Journal Show

Email marketing is still one of the most effective ways to reach your audience. However, staying up-to-date on the latest trends is crucial to avoiding common mistakes.

Jay Schwedelson, the founder of SubjectLine.com, joins me on the SEJShow to discuss subject line techniques you should be testing, key tips for conversions, and pitfalls to avoid.

You'll discover new options to stay ahead of the curve and how to make the most out of your email marketing.

You're not going to get more business by sending less. That's not the way it works. You need to send more. Marketers think they send too much, but they're just not sending relevant stuff. –Jay Schwedelson, 6:50

Technology has changed in the last five to seven years, and the reason you go to the inbox versus the junk folder is not because of the content. It's not because of the words or symbols that you're putting in your subject line. It's because of your sending reputation. It's because of the engagement, the opens, and the clicks you're generating with the people in your database. Your engagement is the reason you're going to the inbox or not. –Jay Schwedelson, 8:58

You go in the junk folder because you have a bad sending reputation. You have no engagement. The misconception of spam trigger words hurts marketers because they're trying to write subject lines, not utilizing the words that all marketers know to work the best –things like free or expires.–Jay Schwedelson, 9:47

[00:00] - About Jay.

[03:02] - What is the Guru Conference?

[08:15] - Common email myths.

[11:10] - Does purging & getting unsubscribes help with ratios?

[15:24] - Email triggers words that are not okay.

[19:24] - Using emojis in subject lines.

[23:13] - What are Friendly Forms?

[26:01] - Importance of personal names & avatars.

[29:10] - How important is a subject line in outreach emails?

[33:15] - How personalized can we get with email marketing?

[37:10] - How important is it to get the CTA above the fold?

[40:25] - Holiday email marketing tips.

[45:24] - How to avoid getting into the promotions folder of Gmail.

Resources mentioned:

Guru Conference - https://guruconference.com/

Subject Line - https://www.subjectline.com/

Outcome Media - https://outcomemedia.com/

Inside Scoop - https://jayschwedelson.com/

Email marketing here at SEJ is one of our cores. It's one of our most significant pillars in terms of marketing. –Loren Baker, 4:57

You don't have to get any negative repercussions from an unsubscribe. You get negative repercussions from spam complaints which only occur if you're doing some sketchy stuff. –Jay Schwedelson, 12:44

If they're going to unsubscribe, they will never buy anything from you. So, therefore, they send the offer because they're looking and waiting for something. –Loren Baker, 5:46

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Jay Schwedelson:

Email marketing expert Jay Schwedelson is one of the best in the business. Founder of the #1 rated subject line grading tool, Subjectline.com, he's evaluated over 15 million subjects and helped 200 thousand marketers send out their message effectively!

Also, as the President and CEO of Outcome Media, Jay has helped some of the most iconic brands in the world to become even more successful. With his innovative solutions, he knows what it takes for your business to soar.

Connect with Jay on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/schwedelson/

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

In content marketing, trust is the most critical factor. But with all the updates happening now, will this still hold, and will content marketing die off soon?

Vitor Peçanha. the CMO and co-founder of Rock Content, joined me on the SEJShow to discuss the future of content marketing.

We talked about the importance of branding in trusted content (for even zero-click searches), the "death" of content marketing, and the challenges and opportunities of building a global content marketing company.

Content marketing today, it's like going back to our roots and saying hey, you need to generate value. It would help to recognize that brand awareness so people will remember you. That brand recall, the positive perceptions of your brain, that's emotion. So instead of saying, "Hey, here's a lot of ads," we will build all this by attracting people with excellent content. So it's the same cruise as before with the new channels, formats, and measuring methods.–Vitor Peçanha, 48:03

SEO has a straightforward response marketing mindset. People say that an ad served but not clicked is branding. With PR, if you get an article in the New York Times or Forbes that discusses your brand, but it doesn't link to you, I think a link builder or an outreach person might be upset, but that's a win. That's a branded win.–Loren Baker, 35:47

Branding is a tough thing to measure. It's something that for the last, I would say, 15 years. When you think about branding and how it is in content marketing, we have to explain that it's not only demand generation, last click, and exact attribution. You're building a huge asset, and you win the game when people are looking for your brand. –Vitor Peçanha, 43:30

[00:00] - About Vitor & Rock Content's mission

[04:23] - Rock Content's acquisitions.

[07:48] - Learnings in acquiring businesses.

[15:15] - How was the Helpful Content update for Vitor?

[23:54] - How important is content planning for outreach?

[36:39] - How marketers can identify branding wins.

[44:06] - One of Vito's best successes in Brazil.

[46:12] - What is share of search?

[52:20] - How to optimize blogs in 2023.

Resources mentioned:

Rock Content: https://rockcontent.com/

Rock Content's Social Impact Page: https://rockcontent.com/social-impact/

If you acquire a company, you're not acquiring only the revenue; you're not acquiring only their market share., you're acquiring their culture and their team. –Vitor Peçanha, 8:32

When we think about the customer journey, I like to say; ideally, you have to take people to your media and domains continuously. –Loren Baker, 24:39

The important thing here is to broaden your scope and think about content and SEO from a minimal perspective if there is no link, but there's also no value. You got to believe I'm building an online presence and reputation. If I can make people go to my website because I managed to introduce a new concept, that's a great strategy.–Vitor Peçanha, 33:17

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Vitor Peçanha:

Bringing global brands to new heights is what Vitor does best. He is an international speaker and one of the founders of Rock Content. A world-renowned leader in content marketing, Rock Content helps businesses grow their brands and drive revenue.

Vitor's leadership helped Rock Content grow from a small start-up in Brazil to an international powerhouse. Their global expansion strategy was significant for their success, which saw them invest heavily in new acquisitions.

Connect with Vitor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pecanha/

Follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/pecanha

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

There are many things to consider when launching a new product. But there are ways of getting everything ready and popping the cork in Google once you go live.

HubSpot's Aja Frost & Justin Champion joined me on the SEJShow to discuss the role of SEO in product launches, how its seamless integration helped HubSpot's launch of CMS Free, and how your company can incorporate these learnings into your next launch, expansion, or growth initiative.

I think the best way to understand what someone is looking for is to look at the SERP and then ask yourself what the format and meaning of the content ranking are and how you match that. –Aja Frost, [17:20]

It has free web hosts and free SSL, so when you're thinking about launching a website that the cool thing is that you can have a sales arm and a marketing arm that fits right into your CMS. –Justin Champion, [04:21]

I like taking a hybrid approach from time to time because the SERPs themselves are constantly changing. So putting all of your eggs in one search intent basket may work for a shorter period but can come back to bite you in the end. –Loren Baker, [17:35]

[00:00] - How Aja & Justin got started in SEO & HubSpot.

[02:46] - What is HubSpot's CMS Free?

[05:01] - Unique SEO plays that are incorporated into this rollout.

[07:54] - How easy is it to get stakeholders' buy-in?

[15:24] - How do you handle informational vs. transactional intent queries?

[19:15] - A walkthrough on pre-launch pages.

[26:09] - Were the launch pages made indexable and included in XML?

[27:07] - The Nike strategy.

[29:26] - Ways that improved the value of pages linking to them.

[32:20] - What else can SEO professionals do to improve relationships?

[38:27] - How to incentivize for user-generated content.

[45:56] - Thoughts on ads to a landing page & organic discovery.

[53:53] - Final tips on the linking & SEO side.

Resources mentioned:

CMS Hub Free Web Hosting: https://www.hubspot.com/products/cms/web-hosting

We find much more value in investing in relationships so that when something happens where a page comes out, we can tap into resources and build inbound links quickly. –Justin Champion, [22:37]

I would urge anyone listening to this who ranks both in ads and an organic listing for one query to map the relationship between spend and click-through rate. –Aja Frost, [46:46]

I have so many conversations with SEOs that have gotten into this practice within the past five or six years and are afraid almost to do anything that's link-building oriented, like "Break The Rules," like whose rules? I don't know! –Loren Baker, [36:22]

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Aja Frost & Justin Champion:

HubSpot's Director of English Growth, Aja Frost, channels her inner rock star to ensure the company reaches the right audiences with organic search strategies. Author of Work-From-Home-Hacks and former head of content SEO, she also shares her tips on working remotely successfully.

Justin Champion is an expert in the field of link building, with years of experience that can help you grow your business. As HubSpot's Head of Link Building, an instructor for higher education, and the author of Inbound Content, he knows what it takes to find the most effective strategies.

Connect with Aja on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajafrost/

Connect with Justin on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/championjr/

Follow Aja on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ajavuu

Follow Justin on Twitter: https://twitter.com/justinrchampion

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

It is possible that what works in SEO now is not what you think. Contrary to popular belief, it's not all about keywords and keyword research - though they certainly help!

Today, almost everything works differently, and we're here to find out why.

Craig Campbell, Glasgow's top SEO expert, joined me in this episode of the SEJ Show for a candid discussion about what's REALLY working in SEO at the moment, including a discussion around dropped domains, domain leasing, PBNs, link building, YouTube, TikTok and other media outlets that Google loves!

There are a lot of domain names that are not personally branded, and you could turn them into an excellent money website in some way. Whether it be affiliate or ecommerce, it really doesn't matter. A website's a website. –Craig Campbell, 29:24

I don't even see people going to the Wayback machine recreating all your videos. Many people just slap up any old URL and brand new URLs and stuff like that. What they don't do is do the basics properly. You need to reignite that. It's run out of gas, essentially, the website. You need to reignite it –Craig Campbell, 31:23

If you ever feel like you have imposter syndrome and don't know anything about SEO, go to a room where no one knows anything about SEO. They'll all ask you questions because you will be validated immediately. –Loren Baker, 12:38

[00:00] - A little about Craig & his YouTube channel.

[04:28] - What is Craig's core focus?

[05:55] - How many sites did Craig launch before finding two profitable ones?

[13:22] - How does it feel to be the only SEO in the room?

[17:03] - What are expired domains?

[30:59] - What NOT to do when buying dropped domains.

[37:18] - The best way to approach expired domains.

[50:39] - Is Craig noticing anything in the middle of this content update?

[55:38] - How important are Domain Authority ratings and other metrics in inbound links?

[58:04] - Does Craig ever look at Majestic?

Resources mentioned:

Craig Campbell SEO - https://www.craigcampbellseo.com/

Odys Global - Premium Aged Domains & Websites for Sale - https://odys.global/

Typically, what I would do with any website that I bought is I would repurpose it. I might not keep the exact template and look of pictures, but what I would be doing is recreating, going through any URLs that had links pointing to them, I would be recreating those URLs. I would put the content back up from the Wayback machine and keep the website as close to what it was initially just to start to rank again for some of the terms it did have. Then link equity starts to kick back in. –Craig Campbell, 22:00

I'm not just looking at the domain name. I'm looking at the number of outbound links. I'm looking at the number of keywords that rank on that website. I'm looking at the referring domains. I'm looking at a bunch of other quality checks, and I think that part is what these guys are missing. –Craig Campbell, 32:38

Take the time to invest in an idea. It can be local, global, a $500 product, or even a $20 product, and just do it right and get it out there. Who knows, you might get addicted, and you might, if you're like Mr. Craig Campbell here, be able to flip it for 50x. Its monthly income is fantastic. –Loren Baker, 1:01:19

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Craig Campbell:

Craig Campbell is regarded as one of Glasgow's most experienced SEO practitioners. With his expertise spanning all aspects of SEO, he has built up an unmatched wealth of digital marketing knowledge.

He is also a businessman known as "Craig Campbell SEO." The pandemic led him to start a YouTube channel that is now home to more than 100,000 subscribers.

Subscribe to Craig on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CraigcampbellseoUk

Follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/craigcampbell03

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

Sometimes SEO and other marketing integration can be overlooked when you're doing migrations or other developmental projects, especially on the ecommerce side.

Holistically, you can't do one without the other. So the search engine and conversion pieces are equally as important as the technology pieces.

Ethan Giffin, the founder and CEO of Baltimore-based Groove Commerce, joined me on the SEJ Show to discuss overall SEO for ecommerce & DTCs, Google Merchant Center / Shopping, the importance of CRO & Upsells for SEO (and other channels), and ways to prepare for the 2022 Holiday Shopping season.

Shopify Plus can be a good fit if you have a simple business. However, you need more customization if you have a more complex interaction with more business rules and logic. Big-commerce people generally float over to the big commerce side of things. –Ethan Giffin, 12:38

Programmatically create the best framework. The best framework is thinking about how the template is laid out. What is the hierarchy of the template, what are the components, and how do the sites link together from an internal linking standpoint? So I'm just a believer that many things we did back in the day still work. –Ethan Giffin, 16:11

Suppose you're new to a company and you hear a migration. In that case, hopefully, there are archives within the company that people used before you. There are lists of the redirects that were integrated and implemented into the site. Just cleaning that history up can be incredibly impactful. But again, it gets into human behavior and the ability to make things more efficient. –Loren Baker, 20:37

[00:00] - About Ethan.

[12:14] - Most commonly overlooked issues during migration.

[24:44] - An essential factor to consider in building an ecommerce site.

[31:48] - What to do when a product is no longer sold.

[35:18] - FAQ schema recommendation.

[37:23] - What is rendering on the ecommerce side?

[41:29] - Recommendation on optimizing from an ad script perspective.

[43:01] - Optimizing schema integrations on the catalog side.

[48:55] - Ecommerce companies Ethan has worked with.

Resources mentioned:

Groove Commerce: https://www.groovecommerce.com/

Every app that you install into your store has overhead. Every kind of front office sales-related app, reviews, upsells, cross-sell, site search, out-of-stock notifications – everything has a component to it that loads into the browser, and that creates a heavier page. –Ethan Giffin, 25:15

People don't think about margin enough. So how do you promote those products and get people to buy things with the best margin versus the most popular ones? So really, it's thinking about how to optimize the catalog. –Ethan Giffin, 47:32

If you have a business and you're moving to another building, you don't just bring the storefront with you. You got to bring everything you got to bring the offices, the desks, everything. So if you're migrating a site, you don't just redirect the front page and the top like collections or categories. You must take care of everything –the blog, subdomains, subfolder structures, etc. –Loren Baker, 22:56

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Ethan Giffin:

Ethan Giffin, GrooveCommerce's CEO, has been a leading ecommerce and web analytics expert for most of his career. Conversion rates, search engine visibility, and web analytics are all things he knows inside and out. However, he is passionate about helping businesses succeed online without having to become experts.

There are only a few people like Ethan. His love for SEO, conversion rates, and ecommerce go hand in hand with his passion for traveling and DJing in between - not to mention those pocket squares!

Connect with Ethan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ethangiffin/

Follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/opie

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

Marketplace models drive traffic and revenue while enabling businesses to stay flexible and expand their reach.

In this episode of the SEJ Show, I talk with Ryan Lee, Founder & CEO of Nautical Commerce, about managing marketplaces, SEO for marketplaces, increasing web traffic with marketplaces, and more, especially as we near the holiday season.

Last year, the holiday shopping season was huge, especially with everything that Google Shopping was rolling out. So getting outside of Google a little bit is the topic of this episode about marketplaces.

The most successful marketplaces don't act like commerce companies. What they are is they're exceptional customer service organizations. This is because they deliver such a unique and high-value customer experience. –Ryan Lee, 29:36

This idea is that SEO is transactional versus relational. Lifetime value is the relational component. How do you build that relationship with the customer, so they repeat business? Marketplaces are maniacally focused on that piece, whereas traditional commerce companies optimize only for SEO to get the transactional execution. There needs to be equal emphasis on both. It's got to be transactional to get them in the door. But once you get them in the door, how do you create that emotional connection with the buyer? –Ryan Lee, 34:23

One of the most significant differences is that when we talk about SEO, we're thinking about on-site components and optimizing your listing on a third party. –Loren Baker, 20:30

[00:00] - Ryan Lee's background.

[02:19] - What is marketplace commerce?

[04:45] - Larger marketplaces besides Amazon.

[09:58] - Will you have a higher closing rate on a marketplace vs. Google?

[20:18] - Paid & organic opportunities to practice SEO within marketplaces.

[36:32] - Where does Ryan see Google shopping going?

[41:38] - Advantages to marketplace SEO.

[52:36] - Can you lose your loyalty programs by being on marketplaces?

Resources mentioned:

https://www.nauticalcommerce.com/

If you're in-house SEO and you're working in an ecommerce company, and there's a code freeze coming up for the holiday season, take that time that you have away from the site to focus on organic optimizations within marketplaces such as Amazon, Wayfair, and other platforms and then utilize those learnings as a proven backed up a data-driven strategy to implement the following year on your website.

Once you sell via those marketplaces, work on ways and strategize to bring those marketplace buyers back into the core and back into the site. Then you can sell them on your loyalty programs and everything from there. –Loren Baker, 45:16

I hardly ever see anyone break down whether or not the customer that came from SEO has a higher lifetime value than paid or other channels, which I always hear, but I never necessarily see the data. It seems like many SEOs are held accountable for that first-time sale and not necessarily what's done on the back end. –Loren Baker, 32:40

At the end of the day, you already have the buyer in a place where they can complete the transaction. That's a significant distinction between looking at a car on the side of the street and then actually being at the dealer. You have a higher probability that that person will close at the dealership. –Ryan Lee, 13:12

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Ryan Lee:

Ryan is an industry insider with extensive experience building enterprise cloud platforms that boost business efficiency.

In everything he does, from payments to technology consulting services like mobile applications to financial management technologies, his passion for innovation can be seen - all explicitly geared towards enabling transformation within organizations across various industries worldwide.

As the founder and CEO of Nautical Commerce, he is passionate about driving growth and building solid teams toward a platform that orchestrates complete lifecycle marketplace transactions. From startups to enterprises, he makes marketplace technology accessible to all.

Connect with Ryan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanjlee/

Follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/rlee0524

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

PPC is one of the most potent ways to reach your target market. However, knowing which approach is best can be challenging with so many changes in how people consume information.

From opportunities in Google Shopping + Google Local to the challenges with ecommerce supply chain issues & customer expectations, Kirk Williams joins me for a PPC discussion on ecommerce and beyond.

The show provides you with some invaluable insights into PPC, regardless of whether you are just starting or looking for new ideas.

I think we're looking at another unprecedented season. I say that somewhat sarcastically because, you know, okay, we had the covid, we had like the covid rebound, we had, you know, just everything that's been upset in the last few years.

Now, all of a sudden, we are increasingly looking at a potential consumer buying hesitancy period. As a result, we could be in for some consumer credit card debt that has been highest since the 90s or early 2000s.

So we're walking into the holiday season where people are already very much in credit card debt and, I think, probably with inflation and stuff. –Kirk Williams, 15:07

It's a great time to test your feed right now. The best way to optimize it would be to identify the terms people search for and land on products. Now might be a good time to update your product types if you've been putting off updating them for a while, especially if you have to migrate things. –Kirk Williams, 27:34

I don't think Apple played fair with how they started the conversation with that prompt since they weren't communicating accurately how the digital ecosystem works and the benefit of personalized ads. –Kirk Williams, 34:20

[00:00] - Introduction to Kirk

[03:58] - How important is video in PPC?

[07:09] - What Kirk focuses on with Zeto.

[10:06] - Benefits of working with a micro agency.

[14:06] - Holiday season PPC in ecommerce: exciting things to watch.

[19:34] - What should your goal be this holiday season? Sell now or go for LTV?

[27:05] - What can you do now to boost shopping and local integration?

[30:48] - How privacy changes are affecting ad strategies.

[44:52] - How will you target ads if cookies go away?

[46:27] - What is the privacy sandbox?

[53:02] - Kirk's recommendations for platforms other than Google to prepare for the holidays.

Resources mentioned:

https://zatomarketing.com/

https://zatomarketing.com/ppc-marketing-book

https://zatomarketing.com/blog/stop-the-scale-book

As part of their strategy, brands need to figure out how to invest in video, so even those of us who normally do more like Google ads, which used to be more search and shopping, are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of video when it comes to ad placement as well. –Kirk Williams, 6:39

Privacy changes do impact ads. However, there is a difference between digital privacy and digital security. –Kirk Williams, 32:46

First of all, Google flocks sound very, very scary. It sounds especially compared to cookies, right? Whoever invented the word cookies or called these things a cookie is a genius because no one is scared of a cookie. –Loren Baker, 50:15

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Kirk Williams:

Kirk is the PPC expert everyone should know. He runs ZATO, a micro-agency specializing in paid search, and has worked in this industry since 2009. In his podcast and book "Ponderings Of A PC Professional" and"Stop The Scale," Kirk will walk alongside readers on their way towards success as marketers, both online and off.

PPC Hero has recognized him for six years, and he's been featured on podcasts and webinars across multiple industries to talk about his experience as an entrepreneur. Speaking about paid search advertising at conferences worldwide is one of his favorite ways to share his knowledge.

Connect with Kirk on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ppckirk/

Follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PPCKirk

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

What is headless CMS? Why are more companies looking into it nowadays?

Powered by greater flexibility and scalability, it might be the next generation of content management systems.

Lidia Infante, Senior SEO Manager at Sanity.io, joined me on the SEJ Show to explain how headless CMS works and how it can be particularly beneficial for ecommerce businesses.

I don't have to build every page. I create the content in a core database, a central source of truth. And then, I deploy it following a template.–Lidia Infante, [16:00]

I think there's a little bit of a misconception about headless. A lot of people out there, the conversations I'm having with people that are not tech SEOs is they feel that just utilizing a headless means that it's automatically going to be faster, quicker, and a better experience. –Loren Baker, [25:15]

For most ecommerce sites, I would recommend going with a headless solution, especially if you're on a direct-to-consumer side with a big brand.–Lidia Infante, [45:09]

[00:00] - Lidia's background. [10:36] - What is headless CMS & how is it helpful? [17:20] - Do you build from scratch in a headless environment? [22:00] - Are headless CMS quicker? [26:00] - SEO optimizations in headless. [31:30] - Other benefits of using a headless CMS system. [36:00] - How well does AI content rank in it? [39:52] - Where does Lidia see headless going in the next four to five years? [44:45] - What kind of business should look into headless CMS? [49:59] - How important is JavaScript?

Resources mentioned: https://www.sanity.io/shopify https://www.sanity.io/sej - Free boosted Sanity plan for SEJ readers https://www.dangler.co.uk/

Regarding SEO and other stuff you can do, I think the main pain point that Headless solves is content velocity.–Lidia Infante, [28:00]

Headless CMS can guide you a little bit more when it comes to optimizing web performance. Different headless CMSs will help you achieve amazing core web vitals differently.–Lidia Infante, [26:19]

B2C brands need to ensure that the experience they provide on their website is not the typical ecommerce experience of title, product, picture, price, and description. It's more similar to the experience they can provide in a shop. –Lidia Infante

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer. Connect with Lidia Infante:

Lidia Infante is a consultant, writer, and speaker who has been working to help businesses grow their reach through SEO in European markets, the US, and Australia.

She got her start on the business side of things through psychology, allowing for organic growth strategies that are now driving ecommerce sites' success!

As part of her passion for SEO, she enjoys regularly participating in podcasts and webinars in the SEO community. She writes about international strategy, digital business, and women's rights on her website.

Connect with Lidia on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lidiainfante/ Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/LidiaInfanteM Visit her website: https://www.lidia-infante.com/

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal: Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

In the past few episodes, we've discussed the SEO and organic tracking implications of the switch from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4, but how does GA 4 help with paid campaigns, affiliate campaigns, Google Ads, campaign tracking with IDs, etc.?

Krista Seiden of KS Digital and former VP at Quantcast joined me on the SEJ Show to discuss the benefits and advantages of GA 4 for paid campaigns plus other opportunities digital marketers will face with the sunsetting of Google Analytics UA.

One of the misconceptions is that this product just isn't there yet, and I would push back a little bit and say it's constantly evolving, and a lot of new things have come out. So take the time to know how to use the tool and understand what's actually there. –Krista Seiden, 4:55

Don't expect your data to be precisely the same between UA and GA4. So even things like sessions and user accounts will be different because GA4 calculates these things in different ways than Universal Analytics. –Krista Seiden, 44:41

I do not think that this deadline is going to change. I would suggest taking this one seriously. If you don't start moving now, you'll probably not be able to pull your year-over data within GA4. The sooner that you get it implemented, the more historical data you will have in GA4 to be able to compare to. –Krista Seiden, 22:09

[00:00] - About Krista & her in-house background at Google Analytics.

[03:23] - Common misconceptions about GA4.

[05:20] - Is there more customization with GA4?

[07:10] - Hesitations with the transfer.

[08:42] - New feature releases with GA4.

[12:57] - Why build reports with GA4 if you can utilize Google Data Studio?

[16:08] - How is GA4 concerning GDPR?

[19:33] - Differences in transition with GA360 and GA4360.

[24:30] - What to expect with GA4.

[26:18] - Can you define direct traffic better with GA4?

[27:22] - Changes that affect PPC.

[30:53] - Differences between goals and conversions.

[34:15] - Reason why the data retention period is only two months by default in GA4.

[35:18] - Recommendations to get started with GA4.

[41:04] - Does Krista recommend a fallback?

Resources mentioned:

https://ksdigital.co/academy/

https://join.measure.chat

It's nice that we now have this ability to actually customize the UI of GA4. So, for example, we can choose what reports to show or not for people in our organizations. –Krista Seiden, 5:44

GA4 is a heck of a lot more privacy-centric than Universal Analytics. –Krista Seiden, 16:41

I'm sure there's gonna be a lot of people waiting until the last minute. So do not wait till the last minute. Like we said, if anything, just go ahead and drop that tag on your site now. –Loren Baker, 49:18

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Krista Seiden:

Krista Seiden is a savvy, experienced analytics leader who has led teams at Adobe and Google. In addition, she has led optimization initiatives for companies such as The Apollo Group and Quantcast. As an analytics and optimization methodology expert, she has become one of the most sought-after consultants in the industry.

Her expertise led her to start KS Digital, an analytics consultancy in 2019, which helps businesses optimize their digital marketing and analytics investments.

In addition to being dedicated and hardworking, she also contributes occasional guest posts to top industry publications such as Google Analytics Blog. When she is not working, she enjoys traveling as much as possible!

Connect with Krista on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristaseiden/

Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/kristaseiden

Visit her website: https://www.kristaseiden.com/

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker

Do you want to get more from your SEO efforts, boost your marketing strategy, and drive more traffic?

Then you'd want to take a look at schema strategy.

Martha van Berkel, CoFounder and CEO of Schema App, joined me on the SEJ Show to share tips on what works great with structured data and what to watch for in the future.

To achieve that beautiful result, you must translate your content into the language of search engines. So that language is schema.org. Schema org is a vocabulary. And I often describe it, like, I speak French, so it's like French or Italian. And it describes all these different ways that you can explain something.–Martha van Berkel, 06:50

So structured data enables rich results, using the language of search engines and code to translate your website into this language to achieve these rich results. And the rich results are those enhanced results in search. So you see stars, FAQs, an image, a video, a carousel, and availability.–Martha van Berkel, 06:07

With structured data, it needs to represent what's on the page, and this is important to know whether you're an enterprise or whether you're in a smaller organization.–Martha van Berkel. 10:09

[00:00] - A little about Martha.

[05:41] - How internet connectivity differentiates from schema.

[09:56] - How important is marking your site to reflect the actual content?

[11:55] - Why schema drift is important.

[15:30] - How important is it to match up the signals that Google's reading?

[18:30] - What are the measurable aspects of stretch grid data?

[23:09] - Workarounds that are not dependent upon others for implementation.

[26:58] - ​​Challenges of scaling schema data for enterprises.

[30:06] - What Martha sees in the market right now.

[36:12] - Two reasons to do structured data.

[38:48] - Where's a good place to start your site on schema?

[42:48] - Other happenings in the product, PDP page, schema & market world.

[54:22] - Does Martha recommend schema markup for privacy policy terms and conditions?

Resources mentioned:

Schema App - https://www.schemaapp.com/

Google wants you to be specific and enjoys you to be answering that particular question naturally. Therefore, your markup should be clear. –Martha van Berkel, 14:04

Look at the video schema if you have a video on your product or PDP pages.–Loren Baker, 52:00

As we go into a recession where people are cutting costs, I think structured data is one of those strategies that can do that. You can very easily correlate the work you're doing and the investment you're making to results.–Martha van Berkel, 12:40

For more content like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/searchenginejournal

Are you looking to keep up with current and effective digital marketing today? Check out https://www.searchenginejournal.com for everything you need to know within the digital marketing space and improve your skills as an internet marketer.

Connect with Martha van Berkel:

High-energy entrepreneur, Martha van Berkel, has a proven track record of bringing ideas to life. As founder and CEO. of Schema App, she helps companies harness structured data's power. By connecting the dots and taking action, she helps teams and businesses succeed.

In addition to being the face and voice of Schema App, she is an expert in creating and defining new markets, onboarding customers, and getting them excited about opportunities.

Martha spent 14 years at Cisco as an intrapreneur, product manager, manager, and program manager. She has seasoned leadership skills and a great knack for simplifying complicated technology!

Connect with Martha on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martha-van-berkel/

Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/marthavanberkel

Connect with Loren Baker, Founder of Search Engine Journal:

Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/lorenbaker

Connect with him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorenbaker