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  • Are you a Jack of All Trades? Digital Surfer Wave 197

Are you a Jack of All Trades? Digital Surfer Wave 197

SEO Q4; AI Overviews At All Time Low; Amazon Rufus AI; AI Models Are Blind; Full Stack Marketers; and Much More!

Author

Yoyao
July 13, 2024 • Est. Learning Time: 18 minutes

FIRST …

Admitting that I can’t do everything was the first step to growing my businesses.

We often hear the term Jack of all trades, master of none—this couldn’t be truer in the digital marketing landscape.

I was reminded of this with Brenna Kelly’s article on being a “Full Stack Marketer” (below). It reinforced that digital marketing’s broad scope makes it nearly impossible for one person to excel in every aspect simultaneously.

I like to think I’m competent at everything because I know and understand how to execute on all aspects, but actual mastery is a different story. For instance, while I’ve managed PPC campaigns, I haven’t spent enough time to master the most effective strategies.

Creating topical maps is a different story—I know them inside and out, thanks to extensive experience and a broad knowledge base.

Take creating a topical map on “SEO” as an example. Using AI tools like ChatGPT or Claude or hiring a Fiverr ‘expert’ might give you basic on-page and off-page SEO insights. But it will miss out on the nuances specific to all the different SEO types that are crucial for aligning with a site’s goals and audience needs.

This breadth of learning has its advantages, especially when evaluating new strategies or solutions in my business. I’ve talked to others who hire VAs with minimal oversight and no SOPs (standard operating procedures), leading to poor outcomes. They assumed expertise based on the VAs’ claims, but without a clear SOP and firsthand experience, distinguishing quality work from crap is challenging.

That’s why I believe it’s important to do everything yourself a few times first, so you understand the process. This hands-on approach gives you the ability to make informed decisions about whether to hire in-house or outsource to specialists later on.

I’ve outsourced to services before because I don’t have the time to do things like link building. It takes so much time to do the outreach. How do I know? Because I’ve done it before myself.

And because I’ve done it myself, I’m better able to assess whether the service provider is doing a good job or not.

Recognizing the limits of what you can achieve is crucial. It guides you to focus on where you can truly excel and make informed decisions about when and how to delegate other tasks.

I’ll also be the first say - I don’t have it all figured out. But understanding our strengths and limitations is key to achieving sustained growth.

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CONTENT CREATORS

Brandon Saltalamacchia shares his experience meeting with Google's Danny Sullivan. Brandon discusses the impact of recent algorithm changes on small publishers, like his site Retro Dodo, and the urgent need for Google to support creators better. He proposes a new role within Google to bridge the gap between engineers and creators, ensuring practical, creator-focused advice.

My Take: It’s nice to see that some people at Google are genuinely interested in hearing from creators. But there’s still not much actual forward movement from what I can see.

SEO

Glen Allsopp shares the latest "Detailed Q4" report that dives deep into the strategies of leading companies in the SEO landscape. He offers invaluable insights into what top-performing websites are doing to maintain their dominance in Google search results. There are also a number of new sites being launched. Some of the key takeaways:

  • AI-Generated Content: Companies like Nextdoor are successfully leveraging AI to generate massive amounts of traffic across 300k AI-generated pages.

  • Strategic Acquisitions: Acquiring niche sites and redirecting them can lead to significant search traffic boosts, as seen with Catster and its two acquisitions.

  • Niche Success: Small, targeted sites like Monday Mystery Movie can still thrive with focused content and smart SEO practices.

  • Domain Authority Tactics: The Associated Press is using its domain authority to rank third-party content, though this strategy may face challenges from Google's evolving policies.

  • New Sites Still Take Time: HealthCentrals’ new MedCentral.com site is 7 months old and at ~34K organic traffic with a DR50 site.

  • Taking Down Content Sites - The Arena Group has taken down 3 of their content sites without notice.

Danny Goodwin has shared some fascinating insights on the recent decline of Google AI Overviews, which now appear in less than 7% of search queries. This change is part of a broader trend, with fewer AI Overviews visible and occupying less screen space. Goodwin’s analysis, supported by data from BrightEdge, sheds light on how these shifts impact search visibility and user experience. Some of the key takeaways:

  • Education, entertainment, and e-commerce sectors saw the largest visibility decreases.

  • Reddit and Quora citations in AI Overviews have almost disappeared.

  • AI Overviews occupy less space, now 13% smaller on average.

  • Search intent affects AI Overview appearances, with “best,” “what is,” and “how to” queries more likely to trigger them.

My Take: Not surprising at all. But this is also a huge sign for those of you pumping out AI-generated content without human oversight. If Google, having spent billions and billions on their AI Overviews, can’t consistently produce good content - how good do you think your AI-generated articles that cost pennies are? 😅 So make sure a human reviews those articles!

Unless you have the backing and network of sites to be able to spread fake news like the one about Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky’s wife buying a Bugatti car with American aid money.

Mark Traphagen discusses the three fundamental pillars that form the backbone of successful SEO: authority, relevance, and user experience. He explains how focusing on these aspects can significantly boost your website’s search rankings.

SEO Ripples

  • Kevin Indig discusses Google's transformation into a shopping marketplace. He highlights the critical SERP features shaping ecommerce queries, such as product listings and Discussions & Forums, and explains their significant impact on click-through rates and organic traffic.

  • Anu Adegbola reveals a handy hidden report in Google Analytics 4 that helps you reconcile conversion discrepancies with GA4 and Google Ads. She shares a step-by-step guide to access this tool, which can significantly improve your campaign accuracy.

  • Barry Schwartz explains Google's new Search Console feature that allows merchants to easily add shipping and return information. This update simplifies how merchants specify these details, ensuring they appear in Google Search. Barry highlights step-by-step instructions to configure shipping policies, delivery times, costs, and return windows. This actionable guide will help merchants streamline their shipping and return processes, enhancing customer satisfaction and search visibility.

  • In this latest episode of "Search Off the Record," the Google Search team dives into the complexities of rendering JavaScript-heavy websites and ensuring content visibility. Key highlights include the evolution of rendering practices, the importance of the Document Object Model (DOM), and common pitfalls web developers face.

  • Roger Montti dives into how Google now supports a "AI-generated" label and new metadata that can now be used in search results to identify images enhanced or extended by AI. This boosts transparency and trust with your audience.

  • Google updated their URL best practices, emphasizing that URL fragments should not be used to change page content. Instead, Google recommends using the History API for dynamic content changes. This clarification aims to reduce confusion and ensure proper indexing and ranking.

AI

Amazon has officially rolled out its AI shopping assistant, Rufus, to all users in the US through its mobile app. Rufus can now answer questions about shopping, products, and even politics. The assistant uses Amazon's product details, reviews, and community Q&As to provide information and recommendations to users.

source: theverge.com

Devin Coldewey exposes the limitations of current "visual" AI models. Despite claims of visual understanding, these AI systems struggle with basic visual tasks that even a first-grader would ace. The study highlights that AI's so-called vision is more about pattern matching rather than true understanding.

My Take: I would add that just because it has a hard time ‘reading’ graphics, it still has the ability to ‘read’ text through OCR (Optical Character Recognition).

AI Ripples

MARKETING

Brenna Kelly discusses what full stack marketers are and how these versatile professionals handle everything from SEO and content creation to social media and analytics, making them invaluable to businesses, especially startups.

Alana Chinn explores the various types of online communities that can improve your brand's presence and engagement. She categorizes these communities into six main types: Brand Communities, Social Communities, Networking Communities, Content Communities, Support Communities, and Learning Communities.

Flori Needle compares the benefits of free and paid online communities, helping you decide which model suits your goals best. She breaks down the pros and cons of each type with tips to guide your choice.

source: hubspot.com

Marketing Ripples

  • Brent Csutoras dives into Reddit's popularity and how it can improve your brand's visibility on Google. Discover strategies to leverage subreddits for SEO benefits, tapping into user-generated content and community engagement.

CONTENT

Resolving keyword cannibalization can dramatically boost your website’s SEO performance. In a recent Backlinko case study, addressing cannibalization issues with a 301 redirect resulted in a 466% increase in clicks year over year. This guide provides actionable steps to identify and fix keyword cannibalization, helping you improve your site’s rankings and user experience.

Emma Russell dives into the shifting landscape of user behavior. She discusses the importance of thorough research and user journey mapping to understand and cater to these shifts effectively. Emma shares insights on gathering and utilizing data to make informed decisions, highlighting how businesses can adapt their strategies to meet evolving customer needs.

source: moz.com

Andy Crestodina dives into three practical ways to use AI for auditing web pages. He breaks down methods for copywriting review, conversion optimization, and SEO scanning, all designed to improve the quality of your web content. Using AI tools like ChatGPT, Andy provides specific prompts to help you get actionable insights on your web pages.

LINK BUILDING

Cyrus Shepard disavows every single link to his DR 69 website (10k+ links and 1473 domains). This bold experiment aimed to test the true impact of Google's Disavow Tool on site traffic and SEO performance. After two months of anticipation, Cyrus reveals his surprising findings and shares theories on why the disavow tool might not work as expected. And now he’s on “Take 2” of disavowing the “good links” and leaving in low-authority and spam links.

Spoiler: Nothing happened in two months.

Vince Nero gets into link exchanges, providing a comprehensive look at this popular link-building tactic. He breaks down the different types of link exchanges, the potential risks and benefits, and offers guidance on how to safely engage in them. He also discusses the differences between one-to-one and ABC link exchanges and how each can impact your SEO.

TOOLS AND RESOURCES

James Oliver analyzes 32,499 monetized websites to discover the most popular WordPress themes used. He breaks down their unique features and why they stand out for ads and affiliate marketing. The Top 3 are: GeneratePress, Astra, and Kadence, in that order.

My Take: I’ve been using GeneratePress and GenerateBlocks for many years now on all my sites. I’ve tried others, but just keep coming back to GP. And now I have a system to get sites up quickly, so it saves a lot of time. He also lists a variety of sites that use the themes, so you can see the possibilities. That’s actually how I found this article - TopicalMap.com is listed under GP 😃 

Jennifer Pattison Tuohy shares Google’s latest move to offer its dark web monitoring service for free to all users. This service scans for personal information leaks and combines it with the "results about you" feature, which lets users manage their indexed personal info.

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