- How the SEO landscape is changing in 2024
- What the impact of Google’s algorithm update can have on your business
- If AI generated content is truly bad
- New AI generated search experiences on Google
- What this year’s election means for ad spend
Send us your questions, comments, feedback, praise! We can’t wait to hear from you!
Transcription:
Amanda Joyce:
Hi, guys. Yay, we’re back. I’m Amanda.
Devon Hayes:
And I’m Devon, I think.
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, last we checked.
Devon Hayes:
Gosh. Yeah, last we checked. We record these in advance, and so Happy New Year. It has been a hot minute, so we’re excited to be back on the hot mics here with some hot takes.
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, back in the saddle. So today, we are going to hop in and just kind of talk about marketing musts for 2024, and really just the state of the state with all things SEO.
Devon Hayes:
Welcome to Trade Secrets, where we demystify digital marketing to help contractors get the most bang for their marketing bucks.
Amanda Joyce:
This is for you if you’re a contractor looking for actionable marketing insights.
Devon Hayes:
Learn from home services industry experts to elevate your business through simplified marketing strategies.
Amanda Joyce:
Let’s dive into today’s trade secret.
Devon Hayes:
Right now as we record this, we’re, what, halfway through February, and so maybe some of these you have already heard, but these are just kind of some things that we’ve been prepping for our clients and our team and trying to stay ahead of the uphill battle of SEO, AI, and all those fun things. So with that, the most… I think this impacts, Amanda, basically everything we’re going to talk about here, so I’m going to let you kind of talk through this first point here.
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, absolutely. So this is one of those things that keeps Devon and I up at night a little bit. I mean, it’s really cool. It’s job security for sure, but the SERPs in 2024 are going to be changing at a rate we’ve never seen before. By SERPs, I mean search engine results pages. And in 2023, we saw this crazy change in them month over month like we’d never seen before, and we’re just continuing to see that.
I’m sure most of you are just noticing it in your everyday searches, whether you’re looking for a service provider in your local market, maybe you’re online shopping, whatever it is, how dynamic the search results are and how quickly they’re changing. You’re starting to see AI popping up in it. So this is just the overarching theme of what we’re going to talk about today is just that the SERPs are going to continue to change like We’ve never seen them before, so we have to continue to stay on our feet and kind of change up the way we’re approaching SEO and content marketing so that we can stay at the top of the search results.
Devon Hayes:
And the way that impacts you really as a contractor is how you’re appearing online and where you’re appearing, and if that traffic is clicking through to your website, which should be your ultimate digital selling brochure. But if they’re getting the answers that they want right there from Google or the Search Generative Experience that is popping up now at the top of some search results pages, then you’re not getting that traffic through to your site, so your click-through rate is going down, but maybe your impressions are going up and you’re having a harder time converting that traffic.
So kind of the goal and what to consider as we go through each of these bullet points is like, “Okay, how do we stay ahead of the game on search and still start appearing even as the real estate of that Google page changes?”
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, absolutely. So whether you’re listening to this and you have an agency that manages this stuff for you, and this might just help you better collaborate with them, or maybe you’re internally trying to do your own SEO or you’re trying to decide whether to invest in it this year, we just figure kind of having an idea of the state of where things are and what targets you should be trying to hit so that you can rank for the core terms that really impact your business. We’re hoping that today’s discussion will really help you feel like you’ve got kind of a good grasp on that.
Devon Hayes:
We might throw out some new acronyms because we know how much everybody loves acronyms, but you know what they are because you use them every day, you just didn’t know there was an official name for it. So we’ll get into those a bit further, but just yeah, don’t feel alarmed. Everything we’re about to talk about you’ve seen as a consumer and as a user. You just probably didn’t know the acronym because you don’t carry around your pocket marketing jargon dictionary. Okay, so overarching theme content, search engine results page real estate is changing.
The next one that we want to talk about is E-A-Ting. That sounds great. No, E-E-A-Ts, Google’s big algorithm update in June of last year. They added another E, which is expertise. We’ve talked about it a lot on this podcast, but we’re seeing the impact of that now on search and for customers. So, Amanda, I’m going to let you… I keep saying let you, but you’re brilliant on this, so I will allow the listeners to hear the expert speak on this.
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, so really making sure that we’re highlighting your expertise in the content. As an agency, one of the big things we do is interview our clients and make sure that we’re really kind of extracting that information from them so the content that we’re writing is super reflective of actually who they are and that expertise. But if you’re writing an in-house, same thing.
But one of the big overarching themes we also saw last year was everybody getting really excited about AI and trying to figure out how they can make their lives easier and wrangle it. And Google’s had its own response, and they’ve certainly not said no AI ever, but they’re definitely rewarding content that is clearly human written and that highlights that expertise. So if that is at the top of whatever it is you’re thinking about, whether you’re writing your content or someone else’s, you’re updating your website, whatever it is, as long as you’re really making sure you’re underscoring your level of expertise and you don’t just sound like the next guy.
I mean, the problem with AI content is that it’s just scraping the web and writing a new version of what’s already out there. So the whole point of underscoring your expertise is to set yourself apart and you want to do that anyway for your clients. When someone comes and consumes your blog content or reads your website, you want to make sure that you do sound like you’re better than the next guy. So if that’s a big focus for you already, you’re naturally going to be checking that box that Google’s looking for.
Devon Hayes:
Yeah, and I’m pausing and thinking of how I can expound on anything you’ve said here, but it’s, yeah, human written. I guess in the data and metrics world of what we’ve seen from the AI content, because last year beginning… It was December 2022. ChatGPT was introduced and we were all very excited about it, and some people got a little too excited and added so many pages of AI content that how Google responded was by de-indexing, or taking off of Google in layman’s terms. They took a bunch of content out. They stopped storing it in their library is what it means when it gets de-indexed. So the crawlers could crawl it, but it didn’t mean that it was going to serve it on Google.
So how that affects you is if you’ve got AI content maybe de-indexed, but maybe your real content is indexed as well, you’ve got to update it, refresh it, figure out why Google decided your content wasn’t important anymore. An SEO strategist can help you figure that out. But that’s something that you should really consider when you think about how AI content has impacted your content strategy. So I think that was the-
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah.
Devon Hayes:
That’s like the exclamation mark on your point there.
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, no, absolutely. And when we were getting ready to hop on here, I was just reading up on a couple of articles talking about this, and a lot of the things I was seeing underscored a whole lot was making sure that you’re writing kind of from your firsthand knowledge.
So a lot of times what cracks me up is when we are chatting with our clients about content, they’ll just casually mention something to me that is just, it’s their everyday intellectual property. They’ve learned it out in the field, they know it, and I’m like, “Excuse me, could you repeat that?” and it ends up becoming a blog series for us or something because… But that’s the stuff. If you can share a nugget of information in your piece of content that isn’t just riddled through all of the other blogs that you’re trying to… Go look at them and see what they’re missing. What information would you like to share with a high value lead that is not already out there? And if you can weave that into your content, Google’s going to recognize it as first hand expertise and it’s going to help you.
Another tip that I was seeing all over the place was leaning on subject matter experts. So maybe you’re a home exterior contractor and you’re writing about storm restoration. Interviewing an insurance agent that you’ve worked with before that you know is really knowledgeable can be a really great way to pull in a subject matter expert. Maybe they can even make some statements that you can quote them on, and then you’re not taking it on because you’re quoting an insurance expert, so you’re kind of saving yourself from making a statement that you could maybe get your hand slapped for, but you’re also offering some really good information that is going to give a good user experience and Google’s going to love you for it.
Devon Hayes:
Yeah, that was a nice golden nugget to end that segment there. Really, really good information and something actionable that you can do right away, or I was going to say inform your content writer or agency or whoever you’re working with. But so, so important to have that firsthand knowledge and expertise instead of just another iteration of something that already exists on the web, so love that.
I don’t know how many of you have this on your Google, this option, but it doesn’t come up all the time, but it’s called the Search Generative Experience. Sometimes when you do a query, it will automatically pull up AI results for that query. Sometimes you have to push a button then select AI generative results or something. AI-generated results. I can’t remember what it says exactly.
But we want to consider this when you’re writing your content in 2024. We don’t know enough about it yet to know if we can optimize for it. There’s been experiments with two people on the same VPN doing the same query at the exact same time, and they got different results 57% of the time. So what that tells us is that Google is using the data it has on you to deliver the specific results. So I can’t, as an SEO, say, “This is what you need to do to optimize it for sure.”
We do know the results are based on the top organic ranking results, so ranking for number in position one, two, or three for as many topical or as many terms that are relevant to your service in your location is massively important to be considered to be served in that SGE area. And not to be too technical. It’s just the big chunk that shows up first on Google and that tells you it was generated by AI. So sometimes that has… If you search for dresses, it can have a whole bunch of tiles that are dresses and it could give you some information on that, or it could have no shopping results and the layout could look completely different from person to person. What we do know is that there’s less ads on the real estate on Google here.
I say all this to keep this in mind as you are generating content, right? Because this is a different way Google is serving information. Back, gosh, I don’t know how many years ago now, you used to see it was new to see the featured snippet or the knowledge panel where you get the answer and you don’t have to click anywhere and we were all so excited, and now it’s this SGE beast that we’re trying to understand.
So what we do know is it likes succinct answers. It likes to know that you have authority in the space and that you are trusted. So that expertise part of the E-E is still more important than ever if you want to be considered for this new chunk of being featured on that SGE or those AI-generated results on Google.
So that is something to kind of think about in 2024. How it impacts you outside of not being featured is you’re going to see a lower click-through rate. Even if you are featured, you see a lower click-through rate because somebody is potentially getting the answer they need right at the top. And a click-through rate, if you don’t already know this, is just someone who they see you in the search results and then they click the button to then follow the link on through to your website. That could be impacted.
Amanda, let’s see, am I missing something here?
Amanda Joyce:
No, I think you pretty much covered it, but I think the thing… And you really did already say this, but the thing that was sticking out to me in all the articles I was reading through was just talking about how if you really are just dominating in the rest of the search results, you’re going to get rewarded and be shown up. So basically, if you’re following all the other SEO best practices that we talk about here and on other podcasts and wherever you get your SEO knowledge from, if you’re checking all those boxes and creating really quality content, the AI generated search results will come.
Devon Hayes:
And I actually almost missed a huge chunk here, which is really attractive, appealing imagery. Because the AI-generated results have a lot of tiles, you’re going to want really pretty images to kind of captivate the user and hope that they click that tile which links to one of your properties. We did this for one of our clients and what came up was all the links to their social profiles and the last posts that they had done. And then I tried to add a city modifier onto it and then I was served up different results, but their Google business profile was included in the cover photo on that. So that was the other piece of trying to maintain a good, strong click-through rate through to your site was having really appealing images connected to anywhere that you have a link to your website or social media profile.
Amanda Joyce:
Great point. Absolutely. I think sometimes we create those images and we feel like once we posted them, they just disappear into the ether, and this is a really good reminder that they’re going to be there and they’re going to keep coming back up. So just paying attention them, making sure there’s no spelling errors, they’re well branded is really critical.
Devon Hayes:
Yes, and I mean I think it’s a good reminder too. These guys are in the field every day and they get the best photos. If you can make that part of your process is getting great before and after photos. Or, I mean, the photos, it’s a whole other episode, they serve a really impactful part of a good SEO strategy. So yes, it looks good, you want something appealing, but I mean, really, a focus on images and trying to incorporate that into your process is going to be really important. It has been. I think there was a big video emphasis last year, and there still is this year. We’ll get into that one. But images. Invest in high quality images for your brand.
This next one, we’ve got another acronym for you. AEO, Answer Engine Optimization. This one’s really simple. This is talking to your favorite robot, your Bard, or now Gemini, or ChatGPT or Alexa. You ask your robot, and it gives you one succinct answer versus a list of answers to choose from.
So now as SEOs, we have to optimize for AEO, and we do that in a couple of different ways. But again, this is one of those things as a consumer, you know what it is, you just didn’t know it had a name. So the best way to think of it is when you ask your robot assistant and it gives you an answer immediately, optimizing to be that answer is what AEO is all about. That is going to become… Not become, but it’s increasingly more important in 2024, and you’ll want to keep that in mind as you create content, FAQs, all that good stuff.
Amanda Joyce:
Love it. We’ve talked about this approach previously when we were even talking about zero-click searches. Kind of the same idea where you’re trying to give something so succinct, that Google can say, “Perfect. They gave me the exact answer. I can fit this right here in this nice, pretty, little zero-click search box.” So continuing with that. And it’s a good user experience anyway. We all know when we ask a question in old-school and there weren’t the zero-click searches and you had to click into every article to find it and you’re scrolling to find it, and you’re like, “Just give me my answer. You can expand upon it below, but give me the meat and then I’ll decide if I want to dig in on the rest of the meal you’re serving up here.”
Devon Hayes:
Yes. And the way that you optimize for that, that might be the next question. All right, cool. I understand what it is, how do I get served? That goes back to that whole expertise, having the authority, consistently having accurate answers to questions around, we call it, topical authority. But whatever your service area is, you have the right answers and you can put it in a succinct format. You have an FAQ page on all those service pages that ask those FAQs and answers it really succinctly. And using your authority in the space, having a great about us page that points to your authority, it’s actually massively important and often underutilized in the whole organic strategy world. But yeah, definitely making sure that’s up to date is a solid golden nugget, because the authority to be the one and only answer has to be there in order to be the one and only answer.
Amanda Joyce:
Absolutely. And I think good examples of that are things that you’ll even see the people also ask, like how much does a roof replacement cost in Omaha. A lot of times everyone’s a little too afraid to give an answer to that. Everyone wants to give a fluffy answer and say it depends on the size of your roof, and they like to throw out all the variables, but no one wants to give an answer. And when you go look at what Google serves up in that answer in that little answer panel is going to be someone who’s willing to… It could be a range. It can say, “Per square, it ranges from here to there,” but the person who’s bold enough to give an answer is typically the one that gets served.
It’s also an important reminder too, if you do create content like that, revisit it annually so that maybe you don’t have people reaching out to you wanting a bid and they’re like, “Hey, I saw on your website that you said it costs this average price per square and you’re bidding me at this.” So it’s important to stay on top of it, but if you’re the one that’s bold enough to give a strong answer that gives that succinct response, you’re really increasing the likelihood that you’re going to get that love from Google.
Devon Hayes:
Excellent point. Yeah, that is true. I know a lot of people shy away from it. And we know materials cost changes and the supply chain and yada yada yada, but yeah, if you can give a range, that’s brilliant. Just do that. I even tested this out-
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, be bold enough to give something. And then you can go further down and say, “These are the variables that can change the above answer,” but Google will love that you gave that answer and then you can expand upon it from there.
Devon Hayes:
And I was just going to break down, I think, the last note on this AEO situation. We could do a whole episode on this one. Maybe we will. Anyway, but the goal of AEO is to answer questions, and then the goal of SEO is to drive that organic traffic through to your website. So they both serve a purpose. They both have an impact on your marketing and have kind of like… AEO will have that halo effect. Your trust, your authority. Google loving you because of your authority means that your organic rankings are going to improve. So it all ties together. You can’t choose to invest in one over the other. They kind of go hand in hand. So I think that’s my last point on that new acronym.
Amanda Joyce:
Absolutely. Probably for some of these listeners, it’s like, “Great, something else I need to be worried about.” But the great thing is that they’re so intertwined, that really, if you’re playing the game and you’re doing it right, you can do them both simultaneously.
Devon Hayes:
That’s it. That’s the thing. Just do the right thing, provide good content for your users, provide accurate information. That’s what Google favors all the time. It’s not that complicated, really. That’s all it is is you should have a content team to help you do that if you can’t take the time to do it and keep it up to date. But just be a good human, provide good information, and really put your IP to page and share that and you’ll be rewarded for it, truly.
Amanda Joyce:
Absolutely. Okay, so the next one we’re going to talk about is it’s really critical if you are running traditional Google ads. Or honestly, even if you were running Google Local Service Ads, this will probably apply there too. But if you’re running ads in search results this year, it’s going to be important to keep in mind that we see cost per clicks go up year over year always, but given it’s an election year and just kind of the state of the economy and the state of competition in most markets that we serve currently, cost per clicks are going to be going up probably at a faster rate than we typically see on an annual basis, so it’s just important to keep in mind.
Keep that in mind as you’re monitoring your results. Have realistic expectations and kind of ask yourself what your breaking point is. If you’re paying 50 bucks a click right now and you have a 10% conversion rate, so you’re driving leads at $500 and you close 40% of those, ask yourself if the math is mathing. So I just think it’s an important thing to keep in mind as you’re planning for the year ahead that it’s time to buckle down and be prepared to see those prices go up a little bit.
Devon Hayes:
Is that because there’s just so many more searches in any given election year and that the ad space… Because you would think that… I could see if people are searching for things related to politics, why those ad spots would be really expensive, but I guess it just has an overall impact on every kind of service niche then, and I’m guessing it’s because of the amount of users goes up. Or-
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah-
Devon Hayes:
… am I way off base on that?
Amanda Joyce:
Well-
Devon Hayes:
If you’ve listened, you know paid media is not my world, so I’m just truly curious. I mean, I guess we could hypothesize about it. I don’t know.
Amanda Joyce:
Exactly. Some of it is just hypothesizing. There’s definitely a halo effect when there’s just more people jumping into the advertising marketplace.
When it comes to traditional display ad buys and things like that, of course people are… They’re all trying to go buy that space out, whether you are a service provider in your market, and now suddenly… You used to always maybe advertise and have a really prominent spot maybe on your local newspaper’s website or something. Suddenly that spot you’ve maybe owned forever is going to cost 3X and there’s political candidates that are trying to steal it from you. So that has an impact.
But then the economy’s unstable, stuff’s crazy right now, so everybody… The volume that is there, you’re going to find that people who are going after the same service terms as you are heading into their Google Ads account and aggressively increasing those bids, which then causes you to have to aggressively increase them. So a lot of it’s kind of market uncertainty that comes in an election year that then causes everybody to get a little crazy with that bid button, and then we all pay for it.
Google benefits from it. They love it. They changed up even the way they report what… You used to be able to see… You had more insight into exactly what it costed to be in first position. Now they’ll tell you you’re below first page bid. Which is also funny because now the first page of Google is actually 10 times as long as it once was.
Devon Hayes:
Sixty years old.
Amanda Joyce:
But it’s more… They’re just more private with that because they’ve realized if none of us know what that top position costs, we’re all going to just take a guess and keep bidding up.
Devon Hayes:
Yeah. It sounds brutal. That’s for PPC or search engine marketing. What about with the display network? Do you think the cost… Because that’s traditionally a lot less expensive than traditional PPC, right?
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah.
Devon Hayes:
So do you think that the display network, even the prices for that kind of thing, or YouTube ads, are going to also increase?
Amanda Joyce:
Yes, I definitely think we’ll see that more than we… A more direct impact because of politics. Because in those cases, a lot of the display is just… That’s just volume. These people that are running in different markets are just trying to get in front of as many people as they can no matter where they are. And for your average contractor who might be just trying to get in front of people who’ve recently done searches around home additions, that’s all they want to get in front of. But a political candidate wants those people plus everyone else, so they’re driving-
Devon Hayes:
What? They’re greedy?
Amanda Joyce:
I know, shocking. But the beauty of display is that it’s definitely quantity maybe over quality a bit, you could say. It’s still not that expensive. So if you’re paying 60 cents a click and it even goes up by 20%, it’s not breaking your bank as a contractor, but there’ll still be some fluctuation there. But where it hurts worse is when you’re paying 50 bucks a click, and then suddenly it’s 60.
Devon Hayes:
Yeah. And you’ve got a daily budget of a hundred dollars a day.
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, exactly. You’ve got a daily budget. You’re spending $3,000 a month trying to keep it conservative, and you get two clicks and you’re offline for the day. So it’s brutal. Hence why we really like to encourage our clients to focus on SEO as a long-term investment so that over time, they’re less dependent on those clicks that are just never going to get cheaper. I started doing this in 2005. I’ve seen the clicks go from… That was back in the day when you could drive a really high quality roofing lead for $75, and now that’s a click. It’s crazy.
Devon Hayes:
I know. It is crazy. Well, and you think about all the different kind of places on Google now where they have ads. There’s the GLSA, and then they have the sponsored links, and then they have the maps pack that also then has a sponsored link, and then below that, two more sponsored links, and then organic, and then 10 results down, two more sponsored links. There’s so much noise, I feel like, on Google, on the search engine results page, but it’s just-
Amanda Joyce:
And you’re just talking ads. Then you throw in all the zero-click searches and the images, and now we’re going to throw in the AI at the top. I mean, it’s a lot, and so we’re all trying to figure out how to stand out and be that trusted click-through while people have… They can really truly choose their own adventure at this point.
Devon Hayes:
You do have to find a way to stand out, and I think that’s where really having a good tone in your Meta descriptions, which is what shows up on Google to describe… There’s the title of what the page is, and then there’s the description. Sometimes Google takes what we want it to. Sometimes it just pulls content off the page. But it all ties back to having really good content that really speaks to your brand, your brand’s tone, and your expertise.
Amanda Joyce:
Absolutely. And resonates with what your customer wants to hear. There’s so much noise out there. What can you say that’s going to… What do you say in your sales process that makes someone pick you over the next guy? How are you going to get that across? Sometimes it’s not that easy in a tiny Meta, but if you’re consistently getting it across in all your content, maybe they’ll see zero-click search, they’re going to see your ad, they’re going to read a blog, and then when they’re finally ready to hire, you’re going to have proven yourself as a trusted authority and hopefully you get that lead.
Devon Hayes:
Yeah, and I think here too is a good thing to think about as well to get them to click through just quickly is just having your brand’s voice versus a robot voice when you’re trying to get them to click through to your page. What does that title say? Is it too formal or… I don’t know. That’s all part of what we have to do is look at how Google is serving you and what they’re saying. But how does it stand out? Because there’s a thousand landscapers, a thousand roofers, a thousand plumbers. Why would they choose you over somebody else? That’s important to convey with your content and your content marketing team.
Okay, okay, okay. Last one here. Last one. We said this last year and we were right, but I think everybody said this last year, so we were all right. Video, video shorts. More, more, more, more, more.
I think the thing that stood out in terms of metrics that we saw in the marketing world was that yes, shorts under 60 seconds were huge and continue to grow, but there was a lot of people that really did consume that long-form video content as well, which I was kind of surprised. I’m like, “Is anyone really watching hour-long videos?” But that fireside chat format or the webinar format, there was actually a surprising amount of people that stay through the 60-minute mark, so that’s not totally dead and lots of people… Let’s see. I pulled up some stats here on, let’s see, educational or how-to videos. 52% of people watch those kinds of videos. And I did see an interesting set.
If you don’t have one made, get one professionally made on what it’s like to work with you, your process from start to finish. I think we saw the average cost was like $5,400 for a professional video. I’m sure there could be a homey hookup somewhere where it’s a little bit cheaper, but on average, to have a really nice, well-made video, I don’t think they need to worry about having it under 60 seconds, because conveying the experience of working with you is huge, I think. So if you haven’t done that, do that and make sure while you’re doing it, they can format it for both short format and regular desktop viewing.
Amanda Joyce:
Yeah, absolutely. And I completely agree with you that it’s such a critical piece of content to have, that even the expense is worth it. What makes you so special? It’s one of my favorite things that we get to ask people when we first start working with them is just give us their elevator pitch. Why are you so great? And what better way to get that across than with a video?
I love it too when sometimes you see those kind of videos where they’re kind of talking about who they are and maybe they cut it and even have a quick testimonial from a property owner who’s worked directly with them. I mean, that just goes so far. And if you’re about to write a sizable check to somebody to come do something huge on your property, that goes a long way. I just feel like it really can add that extra level of personality of your company and that personal touch that can ease their nerves a little bit and say, “Okay, I know what I’m getting into, I know what these guys are all about, and this is why I’m going to go this direction.”
Devon Hayes:
Love it. All right. I think that kind of sums it up for everything we wanted to touch on today. We could go down the rabbit hole with a lot more, but I think these were the biggest things that we saw impacting the type of work that we do, and so we wanted to kind of share the info and share some things you should be aware of that you can share with your agency or anyone else that you think might find this podcast helpful.
Amanda Joyce:
Thanks for tuning in, guys.
Devon Hayes:
See you next time.
Amanda Joyce:
That was today’s trade secret. Thanks for listening.
Devon Hayes:
Did you find this helpful? We’re just getting started.
Amanda Joyce:
Subscribe and don’t miss our next reveal.
Devon Hayes:
Until next time.
