SEO On-Air

How To Build Topical Authority In Your Content 
 
Is topical authority replacing domain authority, or is it just a new name for doing content properly? 
 
In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Adam Heitzman (Higher Visibility) and Grant McKinstrie (Digital Positions) to work through what authority actually means now that average content costs nothing to produce. 
 
The conversation examines the shift in the word itself. Adam says authority still means domain rating to most people, but it is blending into topical coverage in a way that is harder to quantify. Grant makes the case that nobody links to a site publishing a thousand meaningless blog posts, so authority now traces back to whether the content was worth referencing at all. He describes a client who published over a thousand posts in a couple of months, watched a small visibility bump fall off a cliff, and had to delete around 950 of them before rankings recovered within weeks. 
 
They also get into commodity versus non commodity content and why Google buries the former, why small businesses hold an expertise advantage over larger ones, why recovery now takes core update cycles rather than days, the eight sources Adam pulls from to build a real audience persona, why Grant mines Reddit and Facebook groups instead of demographic data, and why both of them say AI hands you an averaged out customer rather than yours. 
 
🎯 What You'll Learn: 
 
- Why authority is shifting from domain rating to topical coverage 
 
- What happened when one client published a thousand blog posts 
 
- Why 95 percent of that content had to be deleted 
 
- The difference between commodity and non commodity content 
 
- Why small businesses have an expertise advantage over big ones 
 
- Why AI hands you an averaged out customer persona 
 
- The sources behind a properly researched topical map 
 
- Why Reddit and Facebook groups beat demographic data 
 
- Why recovery from thin content takes longer than it used to 
 
- Why blogs still build authority even when few people read them 
 
Whether you run an agency, own content strategy, publish for a brand, or are deciding whether to scale production with AI, this episode gives you a clear picture of what authority is becoming and the research that actually builds it. 
 
🎧 Tune in to hear why deleting 950 blog posts did more for one site than publishing them ever did. 
 

How To Build Topical Authority In Your Content 
 
Is topical authority replacing domain authority, or is it just a new name for doing content properly? 
 
In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Adam Heitzman (Higher Visibility) and Grant McKinstrie (Digital Positions) to work through what authority actually means now that average content costs nothing to produce. 
 
The conversation examines the shift in the word itself. Adam says authority still means domain rating to most people, but it is blending into topical coverage in a way that is harder to quantify. Grant makes the case that nobody links to a site publishing a thousand meaningless blog posts, so authority now traces back to whether the content was worth referencing at all. He describes a client who published over a thousand posts in a couple of months, watched a small visibility bump fall off a cliff, and had to delete around 950 of them before rankings recovered within weeks. 
 
They also get into commodity versus non commodity content and why Google buries the former, why small businesses hold an expertise advantage over larger ones, why recovery now takes core update cycles rather than days, the eight sources Adam pulls from to build a real audience persona, why Grant mines Reddit and Facebook groups instead of demographic data, and why both of them say AI hands you an averaged out customer rather than yours. 
 
🎯 What You'll Learn: 
 
- Why authority is shifting from domain rating to topical coverage 
 
- What happened when one client published a thousand blog posts 
 
- Why 95 percent of that content had to be deleted 
 
- The difference between commodity and non commodity content 
 
- Why small businesses have an expertise advantage over big ones 
 
- Why AI hands you an averaged out customer persona 
 
- The sources behind a properly researched topical map 
 
- Why Reddit and Facebook groups beat demographic data 
 
- Why recovery from thin content takes longer than it used to 
 
- Why blogs still build authority even when few people read them 
 
Whether you run an agency, own content strategy, publish for a brand, or are deciding whether to scale production with AI, this episode gives you a clear picture of what authority is becoming and the research that actually builds it. 
 
🎧 Tune in to hear why deleting 950 blog posts did more for one site than publishing them ever did. 
 

What Makes Healthcare Marketing So Complicated

Is healthcare marketing genuinely harder than other industries, or just more carefully policed?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Jeff Slater and Steven Busch (Kaleidoscope) to work through what actually changes when every common marketing tactic carries a compliance risk.

The conversation examines the constraints one by one. Steven explains that HIPAA prevents a practice from acknowledging treatment even inside a review reply, so you can thank someone for kind words without confirming they were ever a patient. He also warns that review gating can wipe an entire Google profile, that velocity now matters more than volume, and that a sudden burst of reviews after months of silence reads as a red flag. Jeff adds the compliance layer most sites get wrong, including why accessibility widgets can now be used as evidence against you.

They also get into consent for before and after photos and why it belongs in day one paperwork, the claims you cannot make in a healthcare ad, marketing to parents when the patient is a minor, retargeting without making someone feel identified, running two opposite pricing psychologies in the same campaign, and why healthcare triggers AI answers at a higher rate than any other industry.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

- Why you cannot acknowledge a patient even in a review reply

- Why review velocity now matters more than review count

- What review gating can cost you on Google

- How to collect photo consent from day one

- Which advertising claims are off limits in healthcare

- How to market to parents when the patient is a minor

- How to retarget without making someone feel identified

- The two pricing psychologies that work in the same campaign

- Why accessibility widgets can work against your site

- Why healthcare triggers AI answers more than any other industry

Whether you market a practice, run an agency with healthcare clients, work in another regulated industry, or handle marketing in-house, this episode gives you the constraints laid out plainly by two people who work inside them daily.

🎧 Tune in to hear why the review you are proudest of might be the one that gets your profile wiped.

Why Writing Content For Bots Will Cost You

Is writing content for bots a smart way to earn citations, or the fastest way to lose the next update?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Lea Scudamore (Aimclear) and Scott Rehnberg (Improve & Grow) to argue out whether AI search has quietly pushed the industry back into writing for machines.

The conversation examines Lea's position, which is that she has never written for robots and is not about to start. She describes writing for bots as balancing on a tightrope waiting for the next core update, and says her clients have not felt the recent shifts because they were never playing that game. Scott tries to split the difference and mostly concedes the point, noting that restructuring lost blog content into FAQs works because users genuinely want faster answers, not because a bot prefers it. Koa pushes the counterargument that sites are becoming repositories for AI to translate, and gets talked out of it.

They also get into why organic sessions have been a vanity metric for a decade, how AI helps you scale a bad strategy faster, why not every page should be a converting page, why keyword volume data does not reflect how people actually search, why technical SEO is the tiebreaker when two brands are otherwise identical, where authority genuinely comes from now, and the client insight that turned into a 12.8 million dollar project.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

- Why writing for bots means betting on the next core update

- The difference between writing to be cited and writing to solve a problem

- Why organic sessions stopped being a meaningful metric

- How AI helps you scale a bad strategy faster

- Why not every page on your site should convert

- Why keyword volume data does not reflect how people search

- Why technical SEO is the tiebreaker between two similar brands

- Where authority actually comes from in AI search

- Why ten relevant citations beat two hundred generic ones

- The client insight that turned into a 12.8 million dollar project

Whether you own an agency, write content, run search in-house, or report to a client on performance, this episode gives you two practitioners who never chased the algorithm explaining what they built instead.

🎧 Tune in to hear why the agency that stopped chasing updates has clients who barely notice when one lands.

Keyword Data Vs Customer Insights Which Matters More

Should keyword data drive your content strategy, or should it only confirm what customers already told you?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Austin Coker (95Projects), Jason Patterson (Jewel Content Marketing Agency), and Joshua Squires (Amsive) to work out where content strategy should actually begin.

The conversation examines the case against leading with the tool. Joshua argues keyword research was never a great starting point but makes an excellent validation point, since you should know your audience first, formulate the questions from that, then check which phrasing wins. He describes a cloud provider chasing mid market buyers who never self identified in any query, where the answer came from interrogating who actually downloaded the white papers. Austin adds that he has stopped worrying about search volume entirely, since commercial intent traffic arriving through ChatGPT is far larger than his Search Console suggests.

They also get into why content at scale collapses at around three months and leaves you below where you started, how semantic drift pulls a site away from what the business actually does, why general informational content stopped earning attention, when thought leadership is the wrong play, the immigration client that hit a million dollars in eight months on organic alone, and the two questions Austin asks to uncover what a client is genuinely good at.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

- Why keyword research works better as validation than as a starting point

- Why content at scale tends to collapse at around three months

- Why publishing at volume can leave you below where you started

- How semantic drift pulls your site away from what you sell

- Why commercial intent traffic from AI is larger than reports show

- Why general informational content stopped earning attention

- How to reach an audience that does not self identify in search

- When thought leadership is the wrong play for a brand

- Why scaling outbound content beats scaling your blog

- The two questions that reveal what a client is actually good at

Whether you run an agency, own content strategy, plan keyword research, or brief writers, this episode gives you three practitioners explaining why the customer, not the tool, is the safest place to start.

🎧 Tune in to hear why the highest converting page on one agency's site was built without checking the search volume first.

How SEO And PPC Work Together In 2026

SEO and PPC ran on separate teams for years, so what changed to make them one strategy?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Greta Iverson (Youtech) and Stefanie Cash (Think Integrated) to work through how paid and organic now feed each other, and what breaks when agencies still run them apart.

The conversation examines the convergence from both sides. Greta points out that strong SEO performance pushes paid media costs down, and that organic is usually the first touch while paid takes the last, which makes defending top of funnel work harder than it should be. Stefanie argues AI in paid search is not new at all, since broad match and responsive search ads were always AI, it just became the default. Where they meet: broad match pushed PPC into the same trust signal and intent territory SEO has worked in for years.

They also get into the zero click black hole and what happens to KPIs when impressions rise but clicks fall, the client whose AI written content had to be fact checked against their own services, why AI content is the new content mill, features Google turns on overnight that derail a campaign, what LLM advertising might look like once bidding opens, and why brand mentions are becoming the thing SEO delivers that paid then converts.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

- How strong SEO performance lowers your paid media costs

- Why broad match pushed PPC into SEO territory

- Why AI in paid search was never actually new

- How to report on SEO when clicks stop telling the story

- Why organic gets the first touch and paid takes the credit

- Why high volume AI content behaves like an old content mill

- What to check before publishing client written AI content

- Why Performance Max struggles on lead generation

- What paid advertising inside LLMs might look like

- Why brand mentions are becoming SEO's real deliverable

Whether you run an agency, manage paid campaigns, own the organic side, or sit across both budgets, this episode gives you two specialists mapping where paid and organic now overlap and how to prove the part that has no clean attribution.

🎧 Tune in to hear why the channel getting credit for the conversion is rarely the one that started it.

AEO vs GEO: Do They Need Different Content?

Do AEO and GEO need content built differently, or is this the same audience work under new acronyms?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Matthew Nigro (Sage Marketing Solutions) and Jared Groff (Four Front) to work out how much of an agency's content strategy actually has to change for answer engines.

The conversation examines their shared answer, which is less than the industry suggests. Jared argues that chasing an algorithm leaves you permanently several steps behind, and that what changed is not the content but the number of places you have to publish it. Matthew points out that high intent service searches have not moved at all, and that appearing in ChatGPT often comes down to ranking in Google's top ten in the first place. What has shifted is tone, since these platforms invite conversation rather than keyword language, and users now expect a personalized answer.

They also get into when SEO is the wrong service to sell, the market with no search volume where SEO would have failed, why service pages should be built like homepages rather than walls of text, decision support versus selection support content, why Gemini leans on YouTube and ChatGPT on Medium, why Google is still giving Reddit threads prime visibility years later, and whether local SEO survives the shift.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

- Whether AEO and GEO genuinely need different content

- Why chasing platform algorithms leaves you permanently behind

- Why ranking in Google's top ten still feeds AI visibility

- When SEO is the wrong service for a client entirely

- How to spot a market with no search volume worth chasing

- Why service pages should be built like homepages

- The difference between decision support and selection support

- Which platforms pull from YouTube, Medium and Reddit

- Why user experience signals now decide who keeps position one

- Whether local SEO survives the shift to AI search

Whether you own an agency, sell SEO, build websites, or plan content across platforms, this episode gives you two practitioners explaining what genuinely changed for answer engines and what got renamed.

🎧 Tune in to hear why both of these agencies say their content strategy barely moved, and what they changed instead.

How To Track Marketing Data You Can Actually Trust

Can you still trust your marketing data, or are you making decisions on numbers that stopped being accurate?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Courtney Wasserburger (Right Left Agency), Melissa Zehner (Organic GTM), and Mark Dressman (Rocketship) to work out what to measure once cookies, zero click search, and LLM traffic have taken the tracking apart.

The conversation examines three different answers to the same problem. Courtney insists tracking has to be elite, with clean CRM data, third party attribution platforms, and multiple sources cross checked before any decision gets made. Melissa argues AI simply exposed how wrong marketing KPIs already were, since keywords and clicks were never what drove the business, and that you now work from directional data rather than accurate numbers. Mark adds the measurement that changed his reporting, running blended cost per lead across channels instead of judging each one in isolation.

They also get into why cold email collapsed once the barrier to entry dropped, why organic visibility and brand equity matter more than bottom of funnel metrics alone, why consumers spot AI content faster than marketers expect, the gold rush framing for where the industry sits right now, and why smart marketers assume their customers are smart too.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

- Why attribution stopped being reliable and what replaced it

- How to work from directional data instead of exact numbers

- Why blended cost per lead beats judging channels individually

- Why keywords and clicks were always the wrong KPI

- What a clean CRM setup actually requires

- Why cold email collapsed once the barrier to entry dropped

- Where visibility and relevance belong in the funnel

- Why customers notice AI content faster than marketers think

- How to justify brand work to a client focused on leads

- Why the marketer's insight is the part AI cannot supply

Whether you run an agency, market in-house, own analytics, or read reports you no longer fully believe, this episode gives you three practitioners rebuilding measurement around what can still be known.

🎧 Tune in to hear why the cleanest dashboard in your reporting stack may be the one hiding the most.

How Agencies Balance Quality And Pricing

Can an agency price for real strategy work, or does affordable pricing always mean thinner fulfillment?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Sam Natello (Dotcom Global Media) and Amanda Sexton (Focus Works Marketing) to work through how two niched agencies price their work without gutting quality.

The conversation examines why both landed on packages rather than custom scopes. Sam narrowed to fence contractors after years as a generalist, and every keyword researched now benefits hundreds of clients at once, so the research goes deeper and the price stays attainable. He sorts clients into three revenue bands, delivers 85 to 90 percent as a fixed base, and spends the customization effort on the rest. Amanda works the same way in legal.

They also get into why clients cannot find their own differentiator, the EEAT homework Sam sends clients with permission to use AI on it, why he is hiring more human writers rather than fewer, why the five words that describe your company question got scrapped, the restaurant analogy for where agencies are heading, and the green flags and red flags clients should look for before signing.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

- Why niching down lets you price lower and research deeper

- How to split a package into a fixed base and a customized 10 percent

- Why custom scopes quietly eat the budget meant for execution

- Why clients cannot identify what makes them different

- How to use AI in client discovery without flattening the answers

- Why one agency is hiring more writers in the middle of the AI shift

- Why AI raised the baseline without raising the ceiling

- Why the middle of the market is the most dangerous place to sit

- The green flags and red flags to check before hiring an agency

- Why asking former clients tells you more than any pitch

Whether you own an agency, set pricing, buy marketing services, or are weighing packages against custom scopes, this episode gives you two working pricing models built on the same insight and the reasoning behind each.

🎧 Tune in to hear why the most useful reference an agency can give you is a list of the clients who left.

AI SEO vs Traditional SEO: What Has Actually Changed?

How much has SEO really changed since AI entered the search landscape?

In this episode of SEO On-Air, host Koa Kauwe sits down with Dean Steinman (Presentation Multimedia), Julian Barkat (Egg to Apples), and Jeff Collins (JLC Launch Digital) to discuss how AI is changing search behavior, content production, lead generation, and the role of SEO agencies.

The conversation explores the shift from traditional Google search toward AI-powered discovery, why AI-driven traffic can bring higher-intent leads, and how businesses are adapting their SEO strategies for ChatGPT, Gemini, Google AI Overviews, and other LLMs.

The panel also discusses the growing importance of FAQ and question-based content, schema markup, reviews, unique first-party data, brand authority, and why AI-generated content still requires human expertise and oversight. They also examine how SEO is becoming increasingly connected to multi-channel marketing and why agencies need to evolve as AI makes technical execution more accessible.

🎯 What You'll Learn:

• How AI is changing search behavior and SEO
• Why AI traffic can generate higher-intent leads
• What SEO tactics have changed from the traditional approach
• Why FAQ and question-based content matter for AI search
• How schema markup can help LLMs understand content
• Why unique data and original research can increase AI citations
• How brands can build visibility across multiple channels
• Why human expertise is still essential when using AI
• How AI is changing the role of SEO and marketing agencies
• Why agencies must adapt as AI tools become more powerful

Whether you're an SEO professional, agency owner, marketer, e-commerce brand, or business leader, this episode explores what has genuinely changed in SEO, what still works, and where businesses should focus as search continues to evolve.

🎧 Tune in for a practical discussion on AI SEO, traditional SEO, AI-powered search, content strategy, and the future of digital marketing.