What’s important to Google this year

So it’s been a while, thanks for Tooning back in. As I mentioned in the kick-off episode for the year, I took a little break to deal with some personal stuff, but now I’m back and ready to face everything SEO has to throw at us in 2025. But what do we think is coming down the tube? How much will Chat GPT influence SEO? Do the old methods still work? Today I’m joined by one of my favourite SEO’s to talk through our predictions for the coming year.

Tune in to learn: 

• Why it’s important to focus on UX (user experience) friendly sites

• Why Google AI summaries are here to stay

• Why SEO needs to become a multi-channel approach

• Why we need to move beyond keywords and focus on user intent behind queries

• Why everyone (including SEO pros) needs to work on building up their EEAT (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness)

• Why video content is so important

• Why we should focus on collaboration instead of creation

• Why AI content is going to increase

• How building communities can lead to potential customers

• How you can use AI agents to streamline SEO processes

Head to episode notes

Freebies:

1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Hey, we're back. It's 2025 and the Recipe for SEO Success podcast is back on the airwaves (or the earwaves or whatever podcasts are).

For those of you who have been following my story online, you'll know that 2024 wasn't my best year. Very sadly, my dad passed away, and that caused obviously a lot of upset and changes.

But never fear, we are back and I will be launching a series of episodes over the coming weeks and for the first part of this year, I really want to focus on Australian SEO talent. There are now dozens of SEO podcasts. When I started, there were very few. Now there are hundreds. Every software seems to have an SEO podcast, every publication.

But we seem to see the same guests appearing again and again, and they're often the celebrity guests who are also on the speaker circuit. 

And since my audience is primarily real people, small business owners, ecommerce store owners, marketing managers, often who are trying to do SEO themselves with a very tight budget, I feel often these tips from the glamorous superstar SEOs aren't quite as relevant.

We'll also continue our reality SEO episodes where we talk to people who are doing the do who aren't necessarily getting paid as SEO experts. And also I will continue to do my tips,I really want to go back to the basics, what is happening in 2025?

How is SEO going to change? And of course it's always changing as it always has, we can't ignore the rise of ChatGTP and AI. So of course we'll be covering those in the episodes, but still core principles stay the same. 

So that's going to be the focus. Aussie Experts for now, more tips and advice, more reality, and a real focus on getting back to basics. So if that sounds good to you, put this in your favourite, listen in and welcome back. I'm so glad to be back in my little seat in my little hut in my back garden talking SEO again. 

Listen to all the tip episodes

Freebies:

1. Free online training: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. SEO SOS Challenge

4. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Hello, I just want to explain that we're going to be taking a little bit of a break on the podcast, probably about a month or so.

This is sadly because I've had some bad news from home and I need to return to the UK and spend some time with my family. So I hope you can bear with me while I get through this difficult time.

We will be back later in the year with more great episodes.

Thanks for listening. I wish you all well. Thank you.

Freebies:

1. Free online training: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. SEO SOS Challenge

4. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

How to make your ecommerce store stand out with SEO

Do you struggle to get your products to rank high on the search engine results pages? 

Last year we went through how you can improve user experience on site with Louis Smith.

And today we’ll cover some common mistakes ecommerce owners make that can lead to their products ranking poorly, or sometimes not at all. 

Tune in to learn: 

• How ecommerce SEO differs from service-based business SEO

• What features ecommerce owners can access in the SERPS

• Why you should get set up on Google Merchant Center.

• The biggest mistakes ecommerce sites are making

• What the best structure for product pages is

• Patrick’s top tips on how to make more engaging product descriptions

• How to use internal linking to cross-sell your products

• Why having a personalised brand can help you stand out

• What role schema plays in ecommerce sites

Useful resources: 

• Google Merchant Center

• Google Keyword Planner

• SEMrush

• Ecommerce SEO-friendly UX: from crappy to kerching with Louis Smith (NEWBIE)

Head to episode notes

Freebies:

1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. Free challenge: SEO SOS

3. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

4. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Today is a tip episode, no guest to interview, just little old me.

My tips, my advice.

These shorter, more succinct episodes are here to help with easy learning and quick wins and I promise they’re 100% jargon and gobbledegook free.

Today I’m answering a question that was posted in the I LOVE SEO group about whether someone can optimise one web page of their website, and if that will be enough.

Listen to all the tip episodes

Freebies:

1. Free online training: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. SEO SOS Challenge

4. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

There is a mountain of SEO advice out there, but how much of it is actually doable for the average business human?

In my reality SEO episodes, I talk to real humans and get the truth about how they use SEO and digital marketing to improve their businesses.

Today I’ll be talking to a former student of the Recipe For SEO Success Course, Jane Fonti.

We’ll chat about how Jane got her start in SEO, the digital marketing highs and lows, and the challenges she’s faced along the way.

Head to the episode notes

Freebies:

1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. Free SEO SOS Challenge

4. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Today is a tip episode, we’re going to be talking about easy ecommerce SEO, five things for store-owners to focus on in 2024. 

I’m gonna be honest, I think that most ecommerce stores need to focus on some foundational elements.

So let's jump in. 

Listen to all the tip episodes here.

Freebies:

1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Knowing your audience and cutting through the noise

In 2024 with the rise of AI, it can feel like we’re moving further and further away from our humanity. If we can chatbot our customer service, analyse spreadsheets to decide our next move, and Chatgpt our content do we really need to build relationships with our customers any more?

Well obviously, yes, yes we do!

But where do we start? 

How do we really know who our audience is, what they’re talking about and how to reach them?

Can we use data and insights to find out what podcasts they’re listening to, which social accounts they follow and the websites they love most?

And when we know all that information, what the hell do we do with it?

Today’s guest is an all-time favourite of the show and is going to help us understand what the eff is going on in the world of digital marketing and social media this year - and how we can be better marketers.

Tune in to Learn:

• How much influence AI has actually had in digital marketing 

• The biggest challenges marketers are facing n 2024

• What ‘dark social’ means

• What the future of paid ads looks like

• What is working in social media

• How SparkToro works

• How to use the data you find using SparkToro

• Why email marketing is the way forward

• What you should be investing your time in marketing right now

Useful resources:

• Geraldine DeRuiter’s new book: If You Can’t Take the Heat

Head to the episode notes. 

Freebies:

1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Today is a tip episode, no guest to interview, just little old me.

My tips, my advice.

These shorter episodes are here to help with easy learning and quick wins and I promise they’re 100% jargon and gobbledegook free.

Today we’re going to be talking about what the first steps are for a new website when it comes to SEO.

Check out all the Toon tips here.

Freebies:

1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

So here we are, a fresh new year to grapple the Google beast and get our site found online.

But what should be our SEO priorities in 2024? What’s coming down the pipe? And what is old hat? Today I’m joined by one of our favourite guests on the Recipe for SEO Success podcast, Cyrus Shepard.

We’re going to be rubbing our crystal balls together and chatting through what we think are the big things to focus on in 2024. Will AI ruin SEO once and for all? What algorithm updates do we see coming? Can we finally forget schema? We’ll answer all this and more in today’s episode.

Tune in to learn: 

• What impact Generative AI will have on the Search results

• The importance of User signals in ranking

• What Cyrus learned as a Google quality rater

• Whether backlinks still matter

• If you still need to keep using schema

• The three-second rule and why it matters more in 2024

• What Cyrus learned from the recent Google privacy trial

And so much more.

Head to episode notes 

Useful resources: 

• Cloudflare

• Pingdom

• GTmetrix

• Google Search Quality Rater Guidelines

Freebies:

1. SEO SOS Challenge

2. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

3. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

4. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course