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How Digital Marketing Has Evolved: Blogging, Attribution & Omnipresence in 2025

Caleb Turner on March 5, 2025

Marketing in 2025 just isn’t what it used to be. There was a time, a glorious time when hitting “publish” on a blog post was like unlocking a floodgate of traffic. A well-placed keyword here and there, a handful of backlinks, and boom! You were on page one of Google, or at least in the top five.

Fast forward to 2025, and as you’re probably already painfully aware, it’s a totally different game. Consumers don’t just stumble onto blogs and convert overnight. Instead, they hop nonchalantly between Google, Instagram, AI-powered search, email, and social ads. It can also take quite a few of these hops, or “touchpoints,” before they’re ready to make a purchase.

For your business, this means that you can no longer just rely on a blog post or a single ad campaign to get the lead ball rolling. Marketing success today means you need to concentrate on these three things:

  1. Multi-touch attribution, so you know what’s actually driving sales.
  2. Building up and commanding omnipresence, so your brand shows up everywhere your customers are looking.
  3. Creating a steady flow of good content to build trust, not just traffic.

Let’s break down exactly how to do that in 2025.

Blogging in 2025: No Longer Just a Traffic Magnet

Blogging in 2025
Source: Unsplash

Blogging used to be the golden ticket to online success, and brands that leveraged it dominated search results and thrived. Now, in 2025, competition is fierce, algorithms are smarter, and consumers are bouncing around between platforms before making a move.

So, is blogging dead? Not even close. It’s just playing a new role.

Let’s take a quick trip down memory lane to see how blogging and digital marketing came to be and why they’re still relevant today.

The 2000s: The Early Days of Blogging and SEO Goldmines

In the early 2000s, blogging was like rocking up to a nearly empty street, whipping out a megaphone and shouting out to anyone in earshot. There weren’t many people around, but anyone who showed up got heard. With such little competition, a well-optimized blog could rank in Google fairly effortlessly and drive thousands of visitors to your website.

Businesses could even monetize blogs, even back then. In fact, monetization occurred as early as 2003 with BlogAds, arguably the precursor to Google AdSense.

Source: BlogAds

But, as with all things that actually work, businesses soon caught on. Those who invested in blogging saw huge returns, and a solid blog could single-handedly fuel brand awareness and generate real organic sales.

No paid ads, no complex funnels, just good quality content and strong SEO (even if we didn’t really understand what SEO was).

Yes, blogging was not only a marketing tool; it was the only marketing tool that really mattered. But then, social media arrived.

The 2010s: Social Media Disrupts Everything

The 2010s changed everything. Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram utterly exploded in popularity and stole the attention away from traditional blogs.

Source: DataReportal

People were still searching on Google, but they were also scrolling, sharing, and consuming bite-sized content on social media.

Smart brands saw the writing on the wall and used their long-form content, storytelling, and new-found expertise to provide the things social media couldn’t.

Blogs became a sort of “home base” where brands could deep-dive into topics, and social media posts became the vehicle through which traffic was directed.

It worked well, for a while. But today, even that strategy isn’t enough.

2025: Blogging as a Relationship-Building Tool

Here we are in 2025, and blogging is still alive and kicking, only now it’s no longer just about traffic, but trust. Every day, 7.5 million blog posts are published. That’s like the entire population of Hong Kong hitting the publish button on a daily basis, and Google has to catalog it all.

With so many posts, needless to say, simply ranking on Google won’t cut it anymore. Instead, blogs have become engagement hubs—places where brands educate, mature, and build loyalty with their audience.

The numbers back this up:

  • Businesses with a blog receive 55% more website visitors than those without.
  • Companies maintaining active blogs generate 67% more leads per month.

(Source: Oberlo)

So, given all these intricacies, the dominance of social media, and the sheer number of blogs out there, why do they still work? Blogs give brands a voice, credibility, and a way to stay top-of-mind.

The brands winning in 2025 aren’t just writing for the clicks. They are creating blogs that:

  1. Answer real questions.
  2. Provide unique insights that AI can then pull from for user prompts.
  3. Keep audiences engaged through email and social distribution.

In short, if you’re using your blog as just a content dump or creating content no one will realistically want to consume, you’re not building any trust. Play the game right, and your blog will not only attract visitors but also turn them into long-term customers.

Why Attribution Is Still Broken (and What to Do About It)

Source: Unsplash

Ever taken a good look through your marketing analytics and asked yourself the quiet question, “Wait, which marketing effort actually got that sale?” Trust me when I say you’re not alone in this. Tracking customer journeys nowadays is very complicated.

The days where you could simply slap a “conversion” label on a single touchpoint have gone out the window. Today’s buyers are zigzagging their way through multiple platforms before they come to that all important decision to buy. They’re watching videos, reading reviews, searching for you on social media, and even asking ChatGPT.

And yet, most marketing attribution models are still stuck in the 2000s. Let’s break down where they fail and what to do about it.

The Old Way: Single-Touch Attribution

Back in the day, marketing attribution was super simple. You could either credit the first touch (where the customer first discovered you) or the last touch (where they finally converted).

  • First-touch attribution: “They found us through a blog post, so blogging gets the credit!”
  • Last-touch attribution: “They clicked an Instagram ad and bought it, so Instagram gets the credit!”

It all sounds so neat and tidy, case closed. Only it’s not. It’s actually wildly inaccurate.

These models completely ignore the journey in between. What if a customer found your site on Google, read a few blog posts, watched your YouTube video, then got retargeted through an email. Then they later clicked on an ad they saw before converting? Should that ad really get the credit? Probably not.

The New Reality: Multi-Touch Attribution (MTA)

Enter multi-touch attribution (MTA). This is a model that spreads the credit across multiple interactions in the buyer’s journey.

For example:

  1. A Google search for a hair dryer over a lunch break: This finds a blog post on your website.
  2. The customer reads more of your content while having a coffee: They are engaging with your expertise.
  3. Instagram ad: They’re off their lunch break but later at home while doom scrolling an ad pops up for your product and they’re reminded they need to keep reading. They subscribe to your blog’s newsletter.
  4. Email newsletter: A final nudge from your campaign offering a 12% discount on hair care appliances.
  5. Direct visit: They decided to jump on your site and buy the hair dryer.

This approach doesn’t just give all the credit to the discount offered in the newsletter or even the blog post itself. MTA assigns value to each and every step. It’s a huge improvement over single-touch, but it’s still far from perfect.

Why Multi-Touch Attribution Still Fails

Sorry to be the breaker of bad news, but MTA still has some massive blind spots:

The dark funnel problem: Analytics can’t track word-of-mouth referrals, a private recommendation over WhatsApp, or a few colleagues at work talking over Slack.

AI search: If someone found out about your product during a late-night session with ChatGPT or DeepSeek, how would you ever know it happened?

External influence: What if your competitor has a flash sale or a TikTok influencer makes a viral post featuring your product? No attribution model can account for these events; you have no insight here.

So, what’s the solution?

  • Ask your customers how they figured out you exist with a post-purchase survey.
  • Combine multiple tracking tools like Google Analytics, UTM tags (great for AI search), and social analytics.
  • Choose to accept that sometimes you just can’t keep tabs on everything. Instead focus on creating valuable touchpoints instead of chasing the “perfect” attribution model.

Attribution is never going to hit 100% accuracy, but understanding how these gaps account for success makes you a smart marketer.

The 2025 Marketing Playbook: Omnipresence (Without Burnout)

The 2025 Marketing Playbook
Source: Unsplash

If you’ve been told you need to be “everywhere, all at once” online, take a deep breath, you don’t. The idea that brands need to dominate every single platform is one of the biggest marketing myths of the digital age.

What Omnipresence Actually Means

Being omnipresent doesn’t mean blasting your content across every channel possible, like an emergency broadcast. That’s a surefire route to burnout. Instead, the smartest brands in 2025 are strategically present where their audience already spends their time.

For some that might mean Google + LinkedIn, for others, it’s Instagram + email marketing. The key here is to choose the right platform, showing up consistently, and making every single interaction count.

Trying to be everywhere at once means you spread your resources way too thin. Instead, focus on being discoverable (SEO), engaging (social), and retaining (email). Nail those three, and you will be present where it actually matters.

Step 1: SEO

Even in 2025, Google is still the king of discovery, but now you can also add the web search capabilities of generative AI to the mix. Tools like ChatGPT, DeepSeek, and Perplexity pull much of their information straight off of search engine data, so that means if your content is optimized for search, you’re invisible across both fronts.

Tactic: Invest in SEO-friendly content and the occasional press release to get visibility in AI-generated responses. We outline this approach in detail across our G.E.O.D.A.T.A framework articles.

Step 2: Social

Social media is the new discovery engine, with 61% of consumers discovering new products on Instagram alone. Does that mean you need to be on every single one of them? No.

Tactic: Instead of trying to master TikTok, LinkedIn, and YouTube all at once, pick just one or two that align with your audience. If your customers are B2B pros, use LinkedIn. If you sell lifestyle products, Instagram is perfect. If you’re a financial institution, YouTube works wonders.

A strong presence on one well-managed platform beats a scattered presence across give every single time.

Step 3: Email

Social gets you noticed, but email keeps you remembered. In fact, 59% of consumers say that marketing has a significant effect on their purchase influence.

Unlike social media, where you’re at the mercy of algorithms, your email list is yours to keep forever. That’s why all the winning brands are still using it in 2025.

Tactic: Capture every single email address you can. Get them through blog CTAs and social bios, and create irresistible lead magnets. Then, nurture those leads with a steady feed of personalized, valuable, and engaging content. That way, when those customers are ready to buy, you’ll be right there, top of mind.

How Many Interactions Does It Really Take to Make a Sale?

Source: Piqsels

If you’ve ever heard of the old marketing “Rule of 7” (the idea that a customer needs to see your brand at least seven times before they commit to a purchase), it’s time to forget it. That rule was made for an era when people had to get up off the couch to mute their TV and still read newspapers.

Rule of 7? More like 20+ Touchpoints

It’s 2025, and most people don’t make snap decisions anymore. Instead, they willingly enter a maze of interactions before finally settling on a purchase. And the number of touchpoints they went through to get there? Well, it’s a lot higher than seven.

  • Warm leads: These are people who already know and like your brand, but even they need 5-12 touchpoints before they trust you enough to type in their credit card number.
  • Cold prospects: Well, they’re called cold for a reason. These potentials need 20 – 50 touches before calling a decision.
  • Inactive customers: Breathe a sigh of relief. Typically, they only need 1 – 3.

Your brand needs to be seen, heard, remembered, and trusted across multiple channels. If someone discovers you first on Google with a search but then sees you again pop up on LinkedIn, they’re more likely to follow the trail and become a customer.

How to Speed up the Buyer Journey

If you wait for those 50 touchpoints to happen organically, you probably won’t be selling much in the near future. You need to give the process a gentle nudge:

  • Use remarketing ads: Most visitors won’t buy on their first visit, so retarget them on Google, Facebook, and Instagram as a gentle reminder.
  • Offer micro-commitments: Free trials, lead magnets, a newsletter—anything to nurture the lead and keep them engaged.
  • Keep the message consistent: If your website, ads, and social content all tell the same clear story, then people are going to recognize you fast, and remember you.

The brands that win the marketing races of 2025 aren’t just going to pop up once or twice. They’re going to strategically plant themselves in front of their audience until the time is just right.

The 3-Part Marketing Formula for 2025

The one magic marketing trick doesn’t exist anymore, so 2025 is the year when you should stop chasing it. Instead, focus on playing a long game with a strategy that actually works. That means concentrating on the three core pillars we already discussed:

  1. Engaging blog content: Think of blogging as more than just luring traffic to your site. It has to be valuable and engaging. Use it to build trust, authority, and brand loyalty.
  2. Smart tracking: Multi-touch attribution helps, and you should use it. Just understand that it’s not perfect, know its blind spots, get surveys out there, and track what you can.
  3. Use strategic omnipresence: You absolutely don’t need to be everywhere all at once on a biblical scale. Just be present where it matters. Remember: SEO, social, email.

Master these three, and you will no longer be chasing down customers. You’ll be attracting them.

Want more insights like these? Subscribe to our YouTube channel for expert strategies that actually move the needle.

GEO (Generative Engine Optimization): Mastering AI Search with the G.E.O.D.A.T.A. Framework

Caleb Turner on January 5, 2025

Image: Pexels

Remember the good days of SEO? Where you could cram in a few related keywords into your website content and Google would (maybe) reward you with top-ranking glory? 

These were simpler times, and now we unfortunately find ourselves waving goodbye to the simplicity of it all. These days, AI-driven search tools like those found in ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity are re-writing the playbook (or just setting it on fire). 

For businesses, the SEO game has changed.

It’s not just businesses pulling their collective hair out over this. Searching online as a regular human being has turned into an Olympic-level patience test. You type a question into Google and rather than getting a helpful answer, you’re bombarded with ads masquerading as advice. Those of us who have recently made use of AI-driven search have discovered a little secret: AI can sometimes answer our questions better than Google ever could. 

Welcome to the Future of Search (or How We All Lost Our Minds)

So, how do we fix this? Well, we don’t. Instead, we adapt to this new wave of search technology that’s fast becoming a survival strategy for brands that need to stay relevant. 

Say hello to Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) — a new lifeline for traditional SEO experts feeling the sting of AI-driven search. GEO offers more than merely surviving the noise but allows your brand to stand out where it matters the most, with visibility that actually counts. 

The G.E.O.D.A.T.A Framework from SEO Rank Media is a seven-step strategy that covers everything from ensuring bots can crawl your content to dealing with those AI “hallucinations” where facts go to die. 

Instead of fighting the system, make it work for you. If you’re ready to drop the SEO tricks of yesterday and learn more about GEO, let’s get started.

The G.E.O.D.A.T.A. Framework

AI search platforms like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity have opened up a whole new world for businesses to connect with audiences. Sounds great, right? But here’s the twist—this isn’t “business as usual” SEO anymore. 

If your strategy is still clinging to Google SERPs like a security blanket, you’re already behind the curve.

That’s where the G.E.O.D.A.T.A. Framework comes in. Developed by SEO Rank Media, the framework gives your business a head start in the AI-driven search arena.

What makes the G.E.O.D.A.T.A. Framework different?

  1. Practical from Day One: Each step is clear and actionable—you can actually do something with it.
  2. Bigger Than AI Rankings: Sharpen your overall marketing game.
  3. Team-Friendly: Easy enough to explain to your boss, clients, or that one coworker who still doesn’t “get” AI.

Why Bother with a Framework?

The field is no longer about simply “ranking in Google.” Today’s search environment demands leadership and strategy. Brands need guidance to navigate:

  • How to perform across multiple AI search platforms.
  • What kind of content to produce to engage these platforms.
  • Where and how to distribute content to maximize visibility.

The Steps of G.E.O.D.A.T.A.

The framework outlines a step-by-step process to align your content and search strategies with the AI-dominated world. Each step builds on the last to ensure your brand is positioned for success:

  1. Gather Intelligence – Know what’s happening in the AI search world.
  2. Evaluate Accessibility – Make sure bots can actually find your stuff (duh).
  3. Optimize Brand Presence – Be unforgettable, or at least noticeable.
  4. Develop Sentiment – Build a brand people (and AI) actually like.
  5. Analyze Competitors – See what’s working for them and learn.
  6. Target Data Sources – Be where the algorithms are pulling from.
  7. Answer Accurately – Deliver real answers, not fluff.

1. Gather Intelligence

Tools like ChatGPT and Claude are shaping the way people perceive your business, whether you’re aware of it or not. So, understanding how these AI platforms view your brand is a big deal. If AI gets it wrong, like misrepresenting your brand or offering answers that aren’t very accurate, you’re left with customers who are judging your offerings based on bad info. 

So, how do these AI platforms know what to say about you? It all comes down to the data they have been trained on. AI pulls from all sorts of sources, including:

  • Websites, blogs, and forums (including user-generated forums).
  • Search Engine Results Pages(like Google.com)
  • Social media chatter
  • Structured datasets like Wikidata
  • Specialized integrations like OpenAI’s via links like Microsoft. 

Ai synthesizes all this information and uses it to generate answers. The quality of those answers depends heavily on the data available. If your brand isn’t well-represented, or worse, represented inaccurately, the AI delivers those misleading results—with confidence.

So the first step is simple: start asking questions. Fire up an AI tool like ChatGPT and test the waters with queries like:

  • “What is [Your Brand]?
  • “What does [Your Brand] offer?
  • Is [Your Brand] trustworthy?”

Pay close attention. Does the AI accurately summarize your business? Are there outright inaccuracies? 

Armed with these insights, you can identify where your messaging needs to improve and take steps to fix it. This isn’t guesswork, it’s actionable intelligence, and the very foundation of effective GEO.

2. Evaluate Accessibility

There’s been a lot of chatter lately about blocking AI from crawling websites—like letting bots read public information somehow equals grand theft data. Unless you’re sitting on government secrets (which shouldn’t really be public in the first place), blocking AI does more harm than good.

AI platforms use bots to crawl sites to get data for their models, the same way Google does. The difference is Google relies on structured indexing, and AI pulls data from a wider range of sources. 

If you want to show up in AI search results, then you need to give these bots access to your page. It’s as simple as that. 

Start by checking your robots.txt, the gatekeeper for bots. This file tells crawlers what they can and can’t access. Yes, it is smart to block some bots to save resources or secure sensitive areas, just make sure you’re not accidentally excluding AI too.

Tools to Test Bot Accessibility

  1. User Agent Switcher: This Google Chrome extension mimics different bot user agents and tests how your site responds. 
  2. Manually Check robots.txt: Append /robots.txt to your domain (e.g., yourdomain.com/robots.txt) to see what’s blocked and allowed.
  3. Known User Agents: Look for these examples to make sure your website is letting in the right bots:
  • GPTBot: Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko); compatible; GPTBot/1.1
  • ClaudeBot: Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko); compatible; ClaudeBot/1.0
  • Anthropic AI Bot: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; anthropic-ai/1.0)

A full and updated list of these user agent strings can be found on DataDome.

3. Optimize Brand Presence

It’s likely you’re no stranger to how important brand presence is when it comes to SEO. AI platforms pull all of the information they find online and use it to understand and then represent your business when a user searches for it. 

If your messaging is long-winded, vague, inconsistent, or missing, you’re risking misrepresentation, or worse, being completely ignored.

Your landing pages need a very frank and straightforward brand statement that answers the basics:

  • Who you are: “[Your brand] leads the way in sustainable home goods.”
  • What you do: “We create eco-friendly furniture for modern living.”
  • Why you’re different: “Our designs combine style, sustainability, and affordability.”

Make sure this messaging is everywhere AI platforms might be looking. Put it on your website, LinkedIn, and social media, and review responses as AI will draw answers from a multitude of sources. 

Consistency is what gets your brand represented the way you want, and not as some random mashup of outdated info. Set the record straight before anyone can even get the wrong idea. 

4. Develop Sentiment

AI platforms don’t just pull out the facts, they piece together a brand’s overall vibe from an array of sources: forums, reviews, and social media. The catch is that bad press tends to stick around like gum on a shoe. 

Take AT&T, for example: ask ChatGPT about their reliability as a service provider and you’ll likely hear all about their 2024 outage alongside mentions of their reliability. Ouch.

Now, compare that to CrowdStrike. Despite their infamous broken Windows update causing probably the biggest global IT outage in history, you won’t see AI harping on it.

Why? They have absolutely mastered sentiment management, strategically flooding the digital space with positive content and well-managed review responses that overshadow their epic blunder.

If you want AI to focus on your wins, start by testing how platforms portray your brand. Ask questions like “Is [Your Brand] reliable?” Spot the negatives and tackle them head-on with corrective content. 

Strong sentiment GEO means when people search for your brand, they see your strengths and not your stumbles. 

5. Analyze Competitors

Keeping tabs on your competitors in the SEO world is a necessary evil, but with AI, it becomes a whole lot easier to see just where your business could sit in rankings.

AI rankings heavily influence user decisions, especially for the juicy middle-of-funnel searches like “Best

in [location]” or “Top providers for [service].” Having an understanding of how your business stacks up against the competition reveals where you can step up your game, be more visible, and take your place in the share of the market.

Start by identifying the key competitive queries that are relevant to your industry. AI tools like ChatGPT make this quite easy, but for the best results, use a GEO service like SEO Rank Media to map out how competitors are ranking. 

With this intel, it’s time to take action. Create content that answers these questions better than anyone else. Use clear, direct language, highlight your benefits, and make sure your expertise comes through in a specific way AI platforms recognize. 

The goal here is to make sure your brand is the obvious choice for these searches.

6. Target Data Sources

Free Close-up image of the LinkedIn app update screen on a smartphone display. Stock Photo

Image: Pexels

AI platforms don’t just make things up (well, most of the time), they draw from trusted data sources like LinkedIn, GitHub, and even Reddit to create their responses. If you want your brand to show up in those results, you need to meet AI where it’s looking.

Here are a few ways you can improve your visibility:

  • Publish technical content on GitHub: This platform is a favorite for technical queries, so it’s perfect for showcasing your expertise in a concrete, credible way.
  • Share insights on LinkedIn: As a part of Microsoft’s ecosystem, LinkedIn is practically a VIP source for professional and industry-specific content.
  • Have some fun on Reddit: Claude and ChatGPT crawl Subreddits to gain community-driven perspectives. Join in on relevant discussions in an informational (not sales) way to boost your authenticity. 

Get strategic in the way you place content and you’ll ensure your brand’s voice is part of the AI conversation.

7. Answer Accurately

AI “hallucinations” aren’t as fun as they sound. These occur when AI platforms respond with incorrect or misleading information that is so confident it would give ToastMasters a run for their money. Basically, they’re not something you want to happen when someone uses AI to look up your offerings.

The GEO fix for this issue is to create well-structured and relevant FAQ pages that answer critical questions like:

  • “Does [Brand] ship internationally?”
  • “How does [Brand] handle refunds?”
  • “What services does [Brand] Provide?”

Here’s some proof in the pudding. Taking a look at Ancestry.com’s FAQ page, you can see they have answered commonly asked questions about their service, with one being what do the results tell me?

Jumping onto ChatGPT and asking the question “What do my ancestry.com results tell me?” yields a result that was quite clearly taken from this FAQ page. 

Understanding your audience helps here. You need to know what kind of questions they’re likely going to be typing into an AI search engine and give straightforward and simple answers to them on your website’s FAQ page. 

The payoff will be fewer opportunities for hallucinations and a more accurate representation of your business in AI-generated results. 

Why GEO is the Way Forward

Let’s be honest: AI search has turned SEO into a wild roller coaster. One minute, you’re impressed by ChatGPT’s ability to summarize complex topics; the next, it’s confidently claiming your brand sells banana-flavored widgets (which, of course, you don’t). 

Staying ahead feels like having to learn SEO all over again, but it doesn’t have to.

With SEO Rank Media and the G.E.O.D.A.T.A. Framework, you’ve got a reliable roadmap to tame the chaos and put your brand back in the spotlight. It’s your chance to future-proof your digital strategy, outsmart AI’s quirks, and thrive in this unpredictable search landscape.

Ready to take charge? Let SEO Rank Media help you GEO your way to success.

Lights, Camera, Action – But Is Anyone Watching? SEO for LA Businesses

Caleb Turner on November 7, 2024

Welcome to Los Angeles. It’s a city where the summers are endless, and dreams are as big as the traffic jams. You’ve got the perfect business, an absolutely killer location, and maybe even a celebrity endorsement (or at least a cousin who once saw Brad Pitt at a Starbucks).

But here’s the plot twist: If your business isn’t showing up in search engines, you’re basically another tree falling silently in an empty forest.

If you really want your business to be more than just another face in the LA crowd, you need to stand out. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the star of the show.

Table of Contents

The LA Business Scene: Busier Than Sunset Boulevard

The scene is crowded, with over 244,000 businesses hustling in LA County. Standing out is about as easy as finding a parking spot in Santa Monica on a Saturday. While Hollywood does love to hog the spotlight, the entertainment industry only employs 4% of the population.

LA Business

The real star is healthcare, commanding a hefty 11.9% of the workforce followed closely by industries like retail, hospitality, and manufacturing. 

Shocking right? Well, not really, LA after all is much more than just a city for making movies, so unless you’re planning on performing a few tummy-tucks or rolling out the next big thing in retail, you’re up against some stiff competition.

In this bustling mix of industries, making your business shine as bright as the Hollywood sign requires a killer SEO strategy. Without it, you might just end up on page two of Google, or as I like to call it, The Bermuda Triangle of the Internet.

Did you know that 93% of online experiences start with a search engine? Before customers even think about stepping into your store or clicking “Add to Cart,” they’re on Google looking at their options. If your business isn’t showing up in those results, you’re missing out on customers. 

So, unless you want to stay LA’s best-kept secret, it’s time to start thinking of SEO as your agent, working tirelessly behind the scenes to get you noticed by the people who matter the most. 

A Quick Flashback: SEO’s Journey in the City of Angels

Back in the mid to late 2000s, SEO in LA was more like an exclusive rooftop party—only the insiders were really invited. While most businesses at the time were busy splashing their logos on billboards along the 101 or cramming the airwaves with their advertisements, a quiet few were climbing their way up the Google ranks.

Let’s roll out the red carpet on how SEO developed right here in LA:

  • 2005: Google Local Business Center made its debut and allowed LA businesses to pin their business on Google Maps. This made it possible for smaller businesses to show up right next to large chains when customers Googled “best coffee near me.”
  • 2009: Google Places was the next big thing, giving businesses the ability to show off their reviews, ratings, and photos. In a city that’s slightly obsessed with image, this was like a digital facelift.
  • 2011: Google+ Local attempted to merge with social media. While it didn’t exactly dethrone Facebook (nice try, though!) Mixing social profiles with business allowed LA businesses to engage more personally with their customers.
  • 2014: Google My Business consolidated all of these tools into one platform. It was able to manage multiple locations, track insights, and offer customers the chance to interact with businesses. 
  • 2021: Google Rebranded to become what we now know today as simply “Google Business Profile.”

Throughout this evolution, technical terms like ‘local SEO”, “NAP consistency” (that’s Name, Address, Phone number), and “user-generated content” became as much of a part of the LA business lexicon as avocado on toast to locals.

How to Stand Out: SEO as Your Personal Publicist

Los Angeles is a city where everyone claims to be “kind of a big deal,” and using SEO is your chance to prove you actually are. Just being online isn’t enough. You need to absolutely steal the spotlight. Of course, by ‘spotlight,’ we mean ranking as high as possible on everyone’s Google search.

Businesses that appear on the first page of Google search results receive 95% of web traffic, so it’s quite a prestigious position to be in.

So, how do you make SEO your personal publicist? Let’s take a look at some SEO tips tailored just for the LA business crowd.

1. Keyword Casting: Directing the Right Audience to Your Site

Start by optimizing your website’s content with keywords your target audience is likely searching for. The key here is to be strategic. Don’t just ‘keyword stuff’ and hope for the best; focus on natural, engaging content that your customers are actually going to enjoy.

Next, enhance the user experience of your website. Ensure that it loads faster than a TMZ rumor and looks consistent across all devices. No one likes sites that fail to load, and as cool as a retro party is, they don’t want to see websites that look like they’re from the 90s. 

Don’t forget about quality backlinks (links from someone else’s website to yours). These are nice little endorsements from industry insiders and can be arranged between businesses as a mutually beneficial relationship.

Maintain consistent business information across all online platforms. Nothing screams “unprofessional” louder than addresses that take your customers to the wrong place or phone numbers that go nowhere.

2. Local SEO: Navigating LA’s Neighborhoods Without a GPS

Even though sometimes it feels like it, LA isn’t just one city. It’s a patchwork of vibrant neighborhoods, each with a unique vibe and customer base. Local SEO taps you right into these micro-markets like a true Angeleno.

Almost half of Google searches are looking for local information, and 76% of them end up acting on that information within a day. So, if you own a taco joint in Echo Park, you want to show up on Google when someone nearby is looking for “best tacos near me,” not when someone in Anchorage does.

To really master local SEO, start by claiming and optimizing your Google Business Profile. Make sure your address, hours of operation, and contact information are correct and up-to-date.

Incorporate location-specific keywords into your website and its meta tags, but don’t commit the SEO sin of cramming in keywords like “xyz near me.” It looks bad, and it doesn’t work.

3. Mobile SEO: Reaching Customers Stuck on the 405

LA is a city on the move, except apparently for the traffic. LA traffic jams are the stuff of legends, and yes, there’s a way to take advantage of this.

With over 60% of Google searches now happening from mobile devices, you need to make sure your website looks great on the smartphone.

Picture it: Commuters are stuck in traffic, the exit for Signal Hill is fast approaching, and they’re hungry. If they search for “best vegan donuts Signal Hill” you want your website on page one and loading quickly on their smartphone. If your SEO game isn’t spot on, you’ve missed out on a customer with time (and hunger) and their hands.

To make sure you catch those hungry drivers, implement a responsive design that looks good on any screen with mobile-friendly navigation and big, hard-to-miss, and clear CTA buttons. Test your site on multiple devices to make sure your business is only ever a tap away.

4. Content Creation: Making Blockbusters, Not Box Office Bombs

Content is king, but in LA, there’s a lot of it. Quality content will set you apart. Businesses that maintain a regular blog receive 97% more inbound links, so unless you want your business to be the straight-to-DVD production no one asked for, invest in content that resonates.

Create engaging and relevant blogs that address your customer’s interests. If you don’t have the time to write these yourself (who does?), then hire writers to craft the content for you.

This is also the chance to incorporate contextual SEO keywords into your content to snag some of those Google searches, then redirect them back to your website. Integrate the keywords naturally.

Going back to our vegan food, here’s how a business might place keywords in their content:

SEO keyword: “plant-based tacos Echo Park”

Blog content: “Los Angeles is a haven for food enthusiasts, especially those seeking vegetarian and vegan cuisine in LA. From plant-based tacos in Echo Park to gourmet vegan sushi in Downtown, LA’s diverse culinary scene caters to every single palate”.

Don’t forget to keep your content fresh and share it on social media to amplify reach and encourage it to be shared far and wide.

5. Social Media Signals: Your Red Carpet Moment

In a city absolutely obsessed with social media (look at you, LA influencers), your online presence needs to be as polished as a celebrity’s Instagram feed.

Social media works by giving your SEO a nice little nudge. Over 50% of social browsers now use social media to research products, so if your last Facebook post was from 2015, here’s your chance for a comeback tour.

Start by engaging on platforms where your audience tends to hang out. Instagram, TikTok, or LinkedIn are great places to start. Share your high-quality, SEO keyword-pumped content that reflects your brand’s personality and really gets customers interacting via messaging and sharing.

Use #hastags strategically and join in on conversations that are both trending and relevant to your industry. Collaborate with local influencers to further amplify your message and start collecting those backlinks—they’re as valuable as gold.

Remember that every like, every share, and every comment boosts your website’s authority and gets your business close to the top of page one on Google.

Final Thoughts: The Cost of Being Invisible

If you’re an LA business, don’t neglect your SEO. If you do, you’ll be creating the next blockbuster and never releasing it. You invest time and resources into your business, so let it reach its full potential.

Businesses that prioritize SEO experience higher revenues and traffic than those that overlook it. And in a city where everyone is vying for attention, do you really want to be the best-kept secret? Embrace effective SEO strategies and make sure your business stands out in the bustling LA market and attack the customers you deserve.

Don’t just sit back and be the underdog in every business story. Take center stage and make SEO the headline act in your marketing strategy.

Facts Every WordPress SEO Expert Should Know

Caleb Turner on August 30, 2024

Teaming WordPress with SEO could be described as a perfect pairing. Although WordPress powers an impressive 43% of websites, simply installing a WP plugin doesn’t guarantee your site will rank on Google’s coveted first page. It’s not that straightforward, and if it were, we’d all be reigning champs of WordPress SEO.

The truth is to truly excel at WordPress SEO, you need more than just technical know-how. It requires strategic thinking, hands-on experience, and yes—a bit of patience too.

WordPress SEO isn’t purely methodical; there’s an element of finesse involved. From fine-tuning keywords to charm Google into favoring your structured data or enhancing image SEO and integrating breadcrumbs effectively, this article covers crucial techniques every aspiring WordPress SEO professional needs in their toolkit.

Table of Contents

WordPress and SEO – Why It’s So Important To Get It Right

Think of WordPress as the most popular kid in school, capturing the attention of a whopping 43% of all web users. Peers like Shopify hover at a modest 4.5%.

Although the basic principles of SEO are uniform across different platforms, there’s an art to harnessing WordPress’s full capability.

cms platform usage
Image: Created by Author

Why stress over SEO? It’s your golden ticket to standing out in the digital crowd. Properly executed, it boosts your site’s visibility, draws in your target audience, and ramps up traffic—all adding up to increased authority and trustworthiness for your website.

When it comes to WordPress, this means leveraging tailor-made themes, SEO-focused plugins, and robust tools that propel your site from just ‘being’ online to leading the pack in search engine standings.

WordPress Plugins: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Plugins for WordPress are what make the platform itself so famous, but they can be your best friend or your worst enemy when it comes to SEO.

With close to 60,000 free plugins available in WordPress, it’s pretty easy to get overwhelmed and inadvertently just “install all the things” until your WordPress site becomes a tangled, overlapped mess.

In saying that, there are some incredibly useful plugins I do encourage you to use when dealing with WordPress. Yoast SEO with over 10 million active downloads is definitely one of them, and yes, we’ll be mentioning it quite a bit in this article.

A word of warning: For every fantastic plugin, there’s always one that promises to be “the only SEO tool you’ll ever need.” That’s until the next update breaks your entire site.

Here’s a quick rundown:

  • The Good: Yoast SEO, Rank Math, All in One SEO
  • The Bad: Plugins that haven’t been updated in years
  • The Ugly: Plugins that conflict with each other, causing site crashes

Now that we’ve covered our bases, let’s take a look at the top six facts that SEO experts need to know when creating SEO content for WordPress sites.

1. Keyword Optimization: Not Your Grandma’s SEO Anymore

Remember the good old days when SEO just meant cramming as many “best,” “top,” and “cheap” keywords into the content as humanly possible in a vain attempt to bait Google into throwing your content to page one?

Today, 68% of online experiences start with a search engine. It doesn’t matter if it’s Google, Yandex, or DuckDuckGo. SEO now drives over 1000% more traffic than organic social media.

It’s no longer about playing Tetris with keywords. Today’s SEO expert must have a firm understanding of concepts like search intent and semantic search to develop content that meets the needs of users.

With WordPress, you have some powerful tools at your disposal, like Yoast and Rank Math that make optimizing keywords far easier. These plugins help you use long-tail keywords and LSI (Latent Semantic Indexing) to write content that ranks and converts.

This isn’t just hearsay, 60% of marketers report inbound methods like SEO as their highest source of excellent quality leads.

2. Structured Data and Schema Markup: The Overlooked MVP of SEO

Structured data and schema markup may not always be the first thing that springs to mind when you think of SEO, but let’s give credit where credit is due.

These tools are like the understated wardrobe assistants who make sure a star shines on the screen – they set up your site to catch Google’s eye in just the right way.

With structured data, search engines can glide through your content with ease, making sense of what’s essential. This is how those snazzy-looking rich snippets come about – yes, we’re talking about those highlighted boxes or dropdown answers crowning some search results that subtly scream, “Click me!”

Image: Created by Author

Now if you’re running a WordPress site and want these perks without feeling like you’ve stumbled into an espionage thriller trying to decipher code, plugins such as Schema Pro have got your back.

It really is plug-and-play: install one of them, pick from options like ‘Article’ or ‘Product,’ input some info, and voila!

For the more adventurous souls out there willing to get their hands metaphorically dirty with coding – manual insertion is also an option using JSON-LD script within your HTML canvas.

In all seriousness though, engaging with schema markup could very well elevate your visibility online and potentially improve click-through rates. And isn’t being noticed by Google pretty much half the battle won?

3. On-Page SEO: Crafting the Perfect Page Title and Meta Description

Moving up just one slot on search engine rankings can increase your CTR by 32%, so having a compelling page title and meta description is really important to make the most of this prestigious real estate.

While there are a few free SERP preview tools online, with WordPress, there are several plugins that can really make this task much more streamlined.

On-Page SEO
Image: Created by Author

Plugins like All in One SEO and SEOPress allow you to quickly edit the meta title and descriptions while giving you all the relevant keyword suggestions and a lovely preview of what the search result looks like on both mobile and desktop.

Remember that creating a meta description and well, most on-page SEO is a bit like art. You need to entice readers without turning the SERP preview into a clickbait cliché.

4. Permalink Structure (Stop Using WordPress Default URLs, Please)

Permalinks are the forever URLs to your WordPress pages and posts and they play a huge role in WordPress SEO.

Clean and friendly URLs not only help search engines when deciding what your content actually contains but also make your links far more attractive to real users.

Imagine choosing between the default “www.example.com/p=123” and “www.example.com/delicious-chocolate-cake-recipe.” The choice is pretty obvious.

In WordPress, customizing your permalink structure is easy:

  • Post Name: “example.com/sample-post” – The best choice for SEO, making URLs clean and readable.
  • Day and Name: “example.com/2024/08/27/sample-post” – Good for news sites with frequent updates.
  • Month and Name: “example.com/2024/08/sample-post” – Similar to Day and Name but less specific.
  • Custom Structure: “example.com/blog/sample-post” – Great for more tailored URLs.

Try avoiding the default URL settings at all costs. It’s not just bad for SEO, but for the end users,  it looks like your pages are hiding behind some hidden code.

Essentially, WordPress URLs should be as clear as the content they’re linking to.

5. Backlinks: The Double-Edged Sword of SEO

Backlinking is the lifeblood of SEO. They act like big votes of confidence from one site to another and tell search engines “Hey, this content and website are totally worth checking out.”

For WordPress SEO experts, backlinking can get tricky. Why? Along with all the genuine and well-thought-out backlinks, you’re also inundated with spammy requests from let’s say, some very “questionable websites.”

Who knew your blog about artisanal bread making could attract so many offers from online casinos in Romania, right?

Backlinks
Image: Created by Author

To build high-quality backlinks in WordPress, focus on creating amazing content and then reach out to reputable sites that are within your niche.

WordPress plugins like Link Whisper can help you manage your internal links, but for the external ones, it’s all about building relationships. This is precisely why 74% of SEO experts generally end up paying for links, given that exact match anchors can get you five times more traffic.

6. Content is King, But Context is Queen

WordPress is all about content, and they say that content is king. But, let’s be real, context is definitely queen and she’s 100% running the show when it comes to SEO.

Sure, publishing high-quality and relevant content is crucial, but if it comes without any context, you’ve pretty much got yourself an empty castle (or more accurately, no visitors).

WordPress makes it super easy to create and manage SEO-optimized content with plugins like PrePostSEO, but don’t just focus on the keywords.

What do I mean by this? You have to consider the user search intent and just how your content will fit into their journey. A well-placed blog or a “just-in-time” update can make a huge difference.

So, let your content shine, but don’t forget who’s really calling the shots here: Queen content.

Summary

The internet is crowded, so mastering these WordPress SEO techniques is important for standing out.

From smart keyword optimization to smart meta descriptions and building backlinks, there’s a WordPress plugin that’s there to make your SEO life easier. So, leverage what’s available to you but don’t forget the core universal tenants of SEO because they apply to WordPress the same as with any CMS.

Remember, Google never sleeps, and neither should your strategy.

Facts Every Squarespace SEO Expert Understands

Caleb Turner on August 23, 2024

When you think of an amazing way to build an SEO-friendly website, you certainly will have several options to try out, including WordPress, Wix, and Squarespace. Well, developing a website that suits your brand vision and mission can be quite challenging, especially if you’re not a techie person and you’ll require the help and expertise of an SEO expert.

Squarespace has numerous easy-to-use templates and SEO tools to help your website rank effectively in Google SERPs. While you may see SEO as a science, experts like us view it as an art. 

There is so much to learn about Squarespace SEO, which is why I have provided in this guide the top facts every Squarespace SEO expert understands, especially the Eureka that emanates when it’s obvious that we have attained expert status when it comes to Squarespace SEO.

As a firm looking to find Squarespace experts for your business website, the facts mentioned in this guide can help you narrow your search and hire the best hands. However, before we dive into the ocean of facts, let’s talk about what Squarespace SEO is, the tools it offers, and some best practices to follow.

Table of Contents

Why Is Squarespace SEO Important?

In today’s digital world, if your business has a website, you’re among the many seeking to drive traffic to your pages and attract the right audience. Ultimately, you’re among the several companies looking to rank high on Google search pages for the services you offer.

Hence, hosting your website on Squarespace can’t get you the result your brand desires unless you understand the basic principles of smart SEO. Recall that I said “smart” SEO and not just SEO. Why? In the past. SEO centers on overwhelming your website with the right keywords, but times have changed.

Modern SEO practices and digital marketing are about making Google aware that your website is the go-to or authoritative site for sources of information related to the products or services your business offers. This entails a constant refining of algorithms, providing ideal content, using the right plugins, and optimizing your website speed, images, content, and keywords. Can you see why I said “smart’ SEO?

However, with Squarespace SEO, you can perform various effective optimizations to your website with the powerful embedded features in Squarespace. With the aid of a Squarespace SEO expert, you can take advantage of various features to help your website provide:

  • Regularly updated and relevant content
  • A unique, authoritative, and clear message
  • Sufficient traffic from the targeted audience, which indicates real interest. This can be achieved by employing the right marketing channel to drive traffic to your website.
  • Links to other websites and inter-linking to yours

Although WordPress seeks to be a leading content management and website hosting platform for several businesses, Squarespace is becoming more popular. As depicted in the boxed graph below, Squarespace is the home of thousands of firms and possesses numerous plugins you can utilize to enhance your website.

Comparison of the number of SEO plugins available in Wix, Squarespace, and WordPress.

It’s understandable that as a business owner, your focus is geared towards your brand, the products offered, or services rendered rather than the draining exercise of battling with search engine optimization. Hiring a Squarespace SEO expert is essential to help you manage your website and incorporate the necessary SEO strategies to improve your website pages and content.

Top 5 Facts Every Squarespace SEO Expert Should Understand

Squarespace boasts tons and tons of advanced SEO built-in features that can improve your website. Knowing how to effectively use them to optimize your site is important to your brand’s digital success.

There are many aspects to SEO and loads of information out there. There’s technical SEO, off-page SEO, and various best SEO practices for companies. All these can easily make you feel overwhelmed.

However, with Squarespace SEO, you are ultimately free from the technicalities of SEO, as there are tools that can manage these technical aspects automatically. With that being said, here are the top five facts every Squarespace SEO expert knows and how they can use them to optimize your website and rank well on Google, Bing, and other user-based search engines.

You Can Easily Optimize Keywords on Squarespace

Keyword research is one of the important SEO practices. It remains the backbone of SEO, and this is no different when it comes to utilizing Squarespace. It doesn’t matter what hosting platform or builder you use, doing your due diligence to find the right keywords your website should aim for is highly crucial.

Keywords enable users to find your website when they type a particular phrase into search engines. Occasionally, these keywords are obvious and direct, for instance, dentist in Elkin, NC, which could be your target keyword for Elkin dentist, or indirect keywords, such as “dentist near me” or “teeth cleaning.” This is why performing good keyword research is crucial to enhancing your Squarespace SEO.

Squarespace Makes It Easy To Add High-Quality Content 

On a Squarespace website, a major emblem for good SEO is high-quality content. Google loves fresh, authoritative, and valuable content for anyone who wants and needs it, and it’s your duty as a website owner or service provider to provide this content.

Squarespace makes it easy to include a blog section or tab on your site. There are also various themes you can automatically select to develop your blog section. Immediately after the blog section is created, don’t hesitate to dish out relevant information to your audience. 

There are two available options when it comes to writing content for your website. You can write the content yourself or outsource to an SEO-oriented freelancer. Either of you can brainstorm to idealize the content your target traffic wants.

I recommend you examine the major questions your audience seeks answers to most and determine the pain points you aim to address with your product or services. Your desire to solve these problems should become a huge part of the SEO strategy you employ for your Squarespace website. 

Link Building Is Intrinsic To Having An Optimized Squarespace Site

Link building is a core Squarespace SEO strategy that helps connect various parts of your website. Allow me to explain this example. Considering that you’ll be creating tons of content for your website, you’ll need a mechanism to connect one content to another relative content and other dedicated areas of your site. This kind of connection is called link building and is known to others as internal linking.

Internal links are links that direct visitors to other pages on your website. They are a great avenue for enhancing SEO on Squarespace sites, as they help users find relevant pages that can improve their overall experience. 

Internal linking also helps Google recognize your site as authoritative, especially if it links to a niche that addresses your audience’s pain point. It also helps Google understand the most important pages on your Squarespace site. 

However, you must work with a Squarespace SEO expert to carefully link pages on your site. This is also important to avoid going overboard with internal links. One thing to note is that the number of pages on your site will determine the variability of internal links at your disposal. Fewer pages mean fewer links, and vice versa.

In addition to edging your Squarespace website SEO, you’ll need to be meticulous about your anchor text to improve optimization. The anchor text is words or keywords you link to, which direct users to the desired pages. Lastly, don’t spam your readers with links to your newest products. Ensure the internal links add value to the users and direct them to useful or informative pages on your site.

SEO Page Titles and Meta Description Are Effective Click-Bait

SEO titles and meta tags (page titles and descriptions) are concise words appearing beneath any pages displayed in search engines. They easily tell your target audiences what should be expected on your page. 

When this part of search engine optimization is done correctly, your Squarespace website can experience increased visitors in a short time. Google tends to automatically generate page titles and meta descriptions for pages that fail to include them, and this is not always effective. 

You must include SEO titles and meta descriptions on all your pages, including product pages and blog posts. Your title and meta tags should generally be:

  • Provide precise and clear details about what your target audience will find if they click on your link.
  • Include the primary keyword you aim to target.

Here’s an example of an optimized Squarespace title tag and meta tag:

Optimized Alt-Tags For Images Enhances Visibility

Image alt-text is an essential ranking factor for your Squarespace website and shouldn’t be ignored when drafting a Squarespace SEO strategy. An alt-text help serves as your image meta description, which explains to Google why and when to display such an image, as related to queries from users.

The alt-text is a powerful SEO tool as it specifically:

  • Offer descriptions in situations where images are failing to load
  • Improves accessibility for users with screen readers and
  • Gives context to search engines as a means to improve your SEO

For your Squarespace site, you should use alt-text in blog images, cover pages, email campaigns, logos, product pages, gallery pages, and background pages.

Summary

While there are various facts Squarespace SEO experts know about enhancing and optimizing your website, you can individually enhance your website by yourself. However, this will come with numerous trials and errors, which can impact the overall quality of your Squarespace site.

I recommend you hire a Squarespace SEO expert to handle various aspects of your site and help you effectively take advantage of the tons of features embedded in Squarespace. 

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