The Same Side: A Digital Marketing Podcast Rooted in Human Connection

In this episode of The Same Side: A Digital Marketing Podcast Rooted in Human Connection, host Jonathan Danz reflects on heading into the off-season for seasonal businesses. Drawing from his personal experience owning a whitewater rafting outfit in 2007, Jonathan shares five unsexy, foundational marketing strategies that seasonal businesses—from tourism destinations to educational institutions—can implement during slow periods to prepare for the upcoming high season.

Key Takeaways & Strategies

• Keep the Lights On: Maintain a minimal digital presence by leveraging automated responders, call forwarding, and lightweight digital ad campaigns on platforms like Google Search, Facebook, and YouTube to capture early planners.
• Establish Internal Benchmarks: Analyze your own historical data across ad platforms and media types—focusing on click-through rates, conversion rates, and cost per conversion—and always compare like periods year-over-year (e.g., this January vs. last January).
• Conduct Low-Risk Testing: Use slow times to run A/B tests on creative assets (e.g., close-up faces vs. scenic landscapes), landing page layouts, calls to action, and form lengths using platforms like Stellar.
• Build and Refresh Ad Audiences: Keep website tracking pixels firing to accumulate retargeting pools, and upload compliant, first-party email lists to platforms like Meta and Google.
• Perform Digital Housekeeping: Address deferred website maintenance by updating plugins, themes, and PHP versions, while auditing broken links to ensure a smooth user experience.

Resources & References Mentioned

• Agency Website: Digital Relativity
• Conferences & Events: MAICON (Cleveland, OH), Bridge Day (New River Gorge Bridge, WV)
• Tools & Platforms: Google Trends, Stellar (Landing page A/B testing), Thunderbird Email, Google Ads, Meta Ads, YouTube

In this episode, Jonathan and DR Tech Director Justin Ferrel discuss technical web optimization strategies that most anyone can do -- even if they don't have a dev background - to improve user experience and search engine performance.

Performance Optimization

Unused Elements

• Justin Ferrell recommends removing unused WordPress plugins, outdated heat mapping tools, and stray embedded scripts, since these build up as staff change and slow pages down.
• Heavy page builders like Elementor and Avada often add excessive code that hurts performance compared with leaner, custom-built sites.

Metrics vs Experience

• Jonathan Danz and Justin Ferrell agree that Core Web Vitals matter, but real-world user experience is the ultimate measure. PageSpeed Insights shows lab scores alongside 30-day rolling data from real Chrome users.
• A CDN (Content Delivery Network) like Cloudflare serves content from data centers closer to visitors, which speeds up delivery.

Image Optimization

• Justin recommends squoosh.app for reducing image file sizes.

Content Maintenance

Link Management

• Removing stale or seasonal pages once a campaign ends keeps information accurate and prevents visitor frustration.
• When removing pages, use proper redirects: 
  1. 301 redirects for permanent moves.
  2. 302 redirects for temporary changes.
• The Redirection plugin for WordPress can log broken links and help fix 404 errors.

Metadata Management

• Unique page titles and meta descriptions help search engines distinguish similar pages, such as recurring events or seasonal campaigns.
• Duplicate titles can confuse search engines. Adding dynamic details like dates can resolve this.
• Well-written metadata also helps people using screen readers.

Further Learning

• Jonathan suggests Analytics Mania and Loves Data for further learning.

Host: Jonathan Danz, Director of Ad Ops and Analytics, Digital Relativity
Guest: Justin Ferrell, Technical Director, Digital Relativity

Episode Overview

Part one of a web optimization series for non-technical audiences. Justin covers one of the easiest and most impactful optimizations anyone can do: image optimization.

Key Topics

Justin's Background

• First employee at Digital Relativity (started at age 18)
• Originally hired for app development during the App Store boom
• Dropped out of college in 2010 to join DR (he's since earned his degree!)
• Evolved from mobile apps to web development as the company and industry shifted
• Now manages technical direction and institutional knowledge for DR

What a Technical Director Does

• Balances writing new code with knowing what code not to write
• Maintains institutional knowledge and serves as knowledge keeper for client transitions
• Stays current with web development trends and best practices
• Solves problems and troubleshoots issues

The Image Optimization Problem

• Many partners send print-quality images (48MB+, 300 DPI) to websites without optimization
• High-resolution images designed for print are ill-suited for web use
• Impact: If 10,000 people visit a page with an unoptimized image that adds 1 second load time, that's 10,000 seconds of collective human time wasted

Image Format Recommendations

Avoid:

• PNG (no practical reason to use on modern web)
• GIF (for animations)
• TIFF
• BMP

Use:

• WebP: Recommended 80-90% of the time. Converts from PNG while maintaining quality and saving ~95% file size. Supported by all modern browsers.
• AVIF: Next evolution beyond WebP. Saves even more file size but has newer browser support. Use when optimizing for maximum compression.
• JPEG: Still acceptable for photographs

Key Point: Converting a PNG with transparency to WebP keeps virtually identical visual quality while dramatically reducing file size.

Recommended Tool

Squoosh (squoosh.app)

• Free, browser-based image compression tool
• No installation required (though can be installed as a Chrome web app)
• Drag-and-drop interface
• Shows before/after with slider comparison
• Supports multiple output formats
• Does not handle SVGs/vector files

Key Takeaways

1. Image optimization is accessible to non-technical people
2. One person spending 2 minutes optimizing saves thousands of people's time collectively
3. WebP is the practical everyday solution for most web images
4. Use Squoosh to test compression and see the quality tradeoff visually

Next Episode Preview

Part 2 will cover: removing unused items, stale content, broken links, and metadata optimization

Data without a decision attached is just trivia. Jonathan breaks down how to move from GA4 observations to real, actionable insights.

Topics covered:

• Why dashboards full of numbers rarely trigger meaningful next steps
• GA4 as a "camera," not a decision maker, and why its AI Insights are just observations, not insights
• Real example: a higher ed client's active user trend led to uncovering a bot traffic issue via Direct traffic drop, device/OS breakdown
• Why context (experience, industry knowledge, institutional history) is what turns data into insight
• Building benchmarks from scratch on new sites or accounts with no historical data
• Setting decision thresholds as a team (Ad Ops, SPMs, Partners) before a metric moves
• Why small, incremental site optimizations compound over time

Key takeaway: analytics is a tool for building understanding, not a search for "the answer."

The Same Side: A Digital Marketing Podcast Rooted in Human Connection

Sep 17, 2026 · Show notes by @Jonathan Danz

Episode Summary

Host Jonathan Danz uses the "Buddy in Elf" metaphor to explore SEO FOMO in the AI search era. With GEO, AEO, LLMO and a dozen other acronyms flooding marketing feeds, it's easy to feel like you're missing out on some secret to ranking well. The core argument: the fundamentals of SEO (clean code, relevant content, site architecture, schema markup) haven't changed, they're just as important for AI-driven search as they were for traditional search. Rather than chasing every new vendor pitch, the episode makes the case for foundational housekeeping done consistently over time.

Topics Covered

1. The acronym overload — GEO, AEO, LLMO, AIO, AAIO and more, all describing roughly the same thing
2. A history lesson — from keyword-stuffing and link farms to personalization, and why AI search is really just the next evolution
3. Schema markup — what it is, why it's been a foundational tool for 15+ years, and how it disambiguates content for search engines
4. Why "SEO" still fits — generative engines are still search engines, and the old terminology keeps the focus on foundational work
5. E-E-A-T — why experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness matter more, not less, when AI is synthesizing answers from your content
6. Vendor skepticism — why "complete AI visibility" claims are hard to verify, since the underlying models and rankings shift on their own
7. Practical next steps — checking GA4's AI Assistant channel, filtering historical AI referral traffic, and using Google Search Console and Screaming Frog for site audits

Tools & Resources Mentioned

• GA4 (AI Assistant channel) | Native default channel grouping AI-assistant referral traffic (rolled out June 2026)
• GA4 (Session source/medium) | Manually filter for chatgpt.com, gemini.google.com, perplexity.ai, copilot.microsoft.com and claude.ai referrals from before June 2026
• Google Search Console | Free indexing, crawl error, mobile usability and Core Web Vitals reporting
• Screaming Frog SEO Spider | Free tier crawls up to 500 URLs; hierarchical view for auditing site architecture
• Schema.org markup | Structured data standard (Google, Bing, Yahoo, Yandex) for explicitly typing page content

Key Takeaway

SEO fundamentals, clean site architecture, quality content and structured data, still do the heavy lifting, even in an AI-driven search landscape. Don't let vendor pitches or acronym fatigue push you into overcomplicating the basics. Build a roadmap, work it consistently, and remember that your agency and your goals are on the same side.

Show Notes

The Same Side: A Digital Marketing Podcast Rooted in Human Connection
Host: Jonathan Danz, Director of Ad Ops and Analytics at Digital Relativity

Episode Summary

Are you neck-deep in Google Analytics 4 (GA4) on a daily basis, or do you only encounter its metrics during status calls? Either way, wrapping your head around the basics of this platform can give your marketing efforts a serious leg up.

In this episode, host Jonathan Danz breaks down GA4 from a high level. Recording early ahead of Digital Relativity's second all-team meeting of the year—where the team is partnering with Drew McClellan of the Agency Management Institute to optimize organizational workings—Jonathan dives deep into what GA4 actually is, where it sits in your marketing stack, and how to view it as a powerful behavior recorder rather than a perfect "truth machine."

Key Takeaways

• The Event-Based Evolution: Learn how GA4 fundamentally differs from Universal Analytics by switching to an event-based tracking model (where everything is an event with parameters) to prioritize the user journey and prepare for a cookie-less, cross-platform future.
• The Security Camera Analogy: Why GA4 is best understood as a security camera in a retail store—it tracks movements, behaviors, and traffic patterns, but cannot tell you why users act, nor does it capture those who opt out due to privacy settings or ad blockers.
• Conversions vs. Key Events: Discover why setting up "Key Events" (GA4's term for conversions) is critical to measuring website and campaign success in an era disrupted by AI and zero-click search.
• Building a Complete Picture: How pairing GA4 downstream of your ad platforms with visual tools like Microsoft Clarity heat maps and robust campaign tagging creates an unmatched overview of campaign effectiveness.
• Mastering Campaign UTMs: A look at why appending campaign names, sources, and mediums to your URLs is essential for giving your paid traffic the proper credit it deserves.

Links & Resources Mentioned

• Agency Management Institute (AMI): agencymanagementinstitute.com
• Jonathan's blog post on AI Search and Zero-Click Search Results: https://digitalrelativity.com/blog/navigating-the-funkiness-seo-in-the-age-of-ai-overviews-and-ai-mode/
• GA4 Educational Resources:
  • Analytics Mania
  • Loves Data
• Campaign Tagging Tool: Google's Campaign URL Builder

About Your Host

Jonathan Danz is the Director of Ad Ops and Analytics at Digital Relativity, a full-service marketing agency. At Digital Relativity, Jonathan leads the charge in blending development and ad operations to build seamless, highly effective digital campaigns.

Episode 4 Show Notes

Getting the Idea Across: Data Visualization

Podcast: The Same Side: A Digital Marketing Podcast Rooted in Human Connection
Host: Jonathan Danz, Director of Ad Ops and Analytics at Digital Relativity
Episode Title: Getting the Idea Across: Data Visualization

In this episode, host Jonathan Danz explores the power of dashboards and data visualization in digital marketing. Rather than letting data become "ghosts in cloud storage" or overwhelming "data pukes," Jonathan highlights how effective dashboards can serve as conversational tools that foster genuine, collaborative agency-partner relationships. He shares his strategy for designing dashboard systems that tell clear, actionable stories, simplify complex metrics, and build confidence around performance data.

• Collaboration is Key: Successful marketing relies on collaboration, with both agencies and partners bringing their respective expertise and curiosity to the table to solve problems together.
• Audience-Centric Design: Dashboards must be tailored to the audience. Define what success looks like for your specific dashboard to ensure it remains a decision-making tool rather than a checked box.
• Story over "Data Puke": Avoid overstuffed dashboards with no context. A great visualization should allow viewers to grasp the big picture in just a few seconds.
• The Power of Context: Context is the secret sauce. Incorporate elements like time-over-time comparisons, campaign-driven conversions, and seasonal fluctuations to provide a complete picture.
• Pairing Dashboards (The Chain of Logic):
  • Dashboard 1 (Ad Platforms): Focuses on paid media performance (impressions, clicks, click-through rate, cost) with clear benchmarks and trend-line visualizations.
  • Dashboard 2 (Website GA4): Shows how ad platform metrics relate to actual website user behavior (engagement, conversion tracking) to bridge the gap between clicks and real intent.
• The Presenter as a Guide: A great dashboard is easy to understand standalone (even as a PDF), but it truly shines with a knowledgeable presenter who guides partners through a journey of discovery.

• "We can make dashboards all day long, but if they’re not useful to you, they’ll just collect dust. Just like that 'Be Bold With Bananas' cookbook from the 70’s sitting on your hippie memaw’s shelf."
• "Dashboards should tell a story, not just be a data puke that becomes some Magic Eye poster where if you stare at it long enough a picture emerges."
• "If there’s never any deepening of these conversations, that’s probably a good indication of dashboards not being as effective as we’d like."

In this episode, Jonathan, Director of Ad Ops and Analytics at Digital Relativity, steps away from dashboards this episode to tackle AI head on. He pushes back on the FOMO everyone feels watching AI get bolted onto every piece of software, pointing out that even Dario Amodei has admitted Anthropic doesn't fully understand how these models behave day to day. If the people building this stuff don't have it all figured out, nobody should expect themselves to either.

His core argument is problem first, tool second. He compares picking an AI tool without a clear problem to grabbing a wrench before you know what's broken. Start with what's actually slowing you down, then look for something that solves it.

He walks through real examples from the agency: an automated client reporting flow built with Carter using Make, GA4, and Google Docs, plus his own shift toward using Claude for process planning, logic checks, and catching gaps in scripts and campaign reports.

He also addresses the jobs anxiety tied to AI, referencing Bill Gates on how fast this could hit law, customer service, medicine, software, and manufacturing. But he pulls in Google Trends data going back to 2004 showing search interest in "jobs" has stayed high and steady for two decades, while "AI" searches only spiked after 2022. His take: this worry isn't new, AI just gave it a new face.

He closes with three tips: start with low-hanging fruit, ask AI exploratory questions like "what am I missing," and loop in your team when the technical side feels like too much to tackle alone.

Jonathan breaks down the fear of asking questions in analytics meetings, and why paying attention plus educating yourself are the only real paths to leveling up. He covers the basics: impressions, clicks and CTR, then shows how the same numbers can mean completely different things depending on campaign goals and audience. A niche B2B campaign with a 1% CTR might be a win. A broad consumer campaign with the same numbers might be a problem. He also touches on CPM, CPA and ROAS, and makes the case that understanding these fundamentals is what turns you from a passive dashboard viewer into someone who can actually contribute to strategy.

In this episode, host Jonathan Danz, Director of Ad Ops & Analytics at Digital Relativity, introduces The Same Side podcast.

About the Podcast

• Mission: This podcast is dedicated to breaking down the barriers between agencies and their clients to facilitate real, human-focused work.
• Core Philosophy: The show emphasizes that despite the tools or sectors involved, the most critical aspect of marketing is humans interacting with humans.
• Goal: To demystify digital advertising by providing context around metrics, terminology, and ad platforms, helping listeners feel more comfortable and confident in the space.
• Note: This show is a work in progress and is likely to evolve over time.

Who Should Listen

• Professionals who hire or work with agencies.
• Individuals who own or work for agencies.
• Anyone who feels the "human aspect" of marketing is being lost to technology and infinite growth.
• People who are aware they don’t know everything but are afraid to admit it.

About the Host

• Jonathan Danz is the Director of Ad Ops and Analytics at Digital Relativity, a full-service marketing agency.
• The agency utilizes a "Tradigital" approach, blending traditional and digital thinking to help partners in travel, tourism, and economic development achieve their goals.

Coming Up

• The show will focus on "leveling up" through curiosity and asking the hard questions.
• Future episodes will cover foundational digital advertising concepts, starting with an exploration of Impressions, Clicks, and Clickthrough Rate.