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Craig Campbell: The SEO Tricks Google Still Can't Stop — Transcript

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0:00the one and only Craig Campbell joins
0:03the podcast. What?
0:06Craig Campbell, welcome.
0:09>> Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here,
0:10mate. An absolute pleasure. I've not
0:13done an SEO podcast in a while, so
0:16I'm looking forward to it.
0:18>> Well, you are uh you're very well known.
0:21You've been doing SEO for 25 years.
0:24What is one tactic that Google claims
0:27doesn't work anymore, but you know still
0:29works?
0:31>> Oh, many. Um
0:33link building, CTR.
0:37There are there are there's countless
0:38things that you know Google will say,
0:40oh, don't do this, don't do that.
0:42And
0:44you know
0:45it's uh it's one of those things where
0:47Google have obviously got a narrative
0:48and they don't want the
0:51general public to be trying to
0:53manipulate their system. So, of course,
0:55I think there's a lot of uh
0:58narrative out there to you know make
1:00people think twice or or
1:02scaremonger or whatever it might be. Uh
1:05and I think there's a lot of that goes
1:06on. And uh
1:09listen, you can look at any website. You
1:10know they they say things like
1:13AI content doesn't work. Now I
1:15I could pull up websites right now
1:17and I can show you AI content that works
1:19in a massive scale. Now, of course, they
1:21may come and slam it
1:22several months down the line and and so
1:24on and so forth, but there's just so
1:26much uh
1:28stuff that goes on out there where are
1:30you hear that
1:31you know thing being said and then you
1:34you look at the competition or you look
1:36at other niches and you're just like
1:38well, that doesn't make much sense. So,
1:41um you know there's countless things uh
1:43you know and and I do a bit of work in
1:45the iGaming space and
1:48there you know there's it's a kind of
1:50dog-eat-dog world over there and you
1:52know there's a lot uh
1:54stuff that it's just beggars belief that
1:56it still works. For example,
1:58you know they talk about another topical
2:01relevancy and stuff like that. Now,
2:03[clears throat] I could show you a
2:05suicide website that ranks for best
2:08bingo websites.
2:09Um, you know, so you know, I could show
2:11you a Chinese restaurant that ranks for
2:14online casino.
2:15You know, there there there's so many
2:17things and obviously
2:19it could be niche dependent and you
2:21know, I think the gloves are off
2:23for the iGaming space for sure, but
2:25there there you know, there's countless
2:26examples of stuff there where Google
2:28says one thing and I can physically see
2:31with my own eyes another thing
2:33happening. So yeah, I think there's a
2:35lot of [ __ ] goes on out there and uh
2:38yeah,
2:39it is what it is.
2:41>> How does uh you said it's a Chinese food
2:44restaurant?
2:45>> Yeah.
2:46>> [clears throat]
2:46>> Yeah, so yeah, so how does a a yeah, a
2:48Chinese restaurant
2:50rank for best online casino?
2:55>> The
2:56the the crazy thing is is beggars belief
2:59because you know, if I was in charge of
3:00Google, that wouldn't be allowed to
3:02happen. You know, it's not topically
3:03relevant.
3:04None of the previous information on
3:06there is
3:07anywhere close to being relevant to
3:09that.
3:10Um, but you know, the canonical abuse
3:13still works and uh
3:16that that is how how it's been done and
3:18people are leveraging the power
3:20and authority from it doesn't really
3:22matter what the domain name is
3:25and being able to to get rankings for it
3:27now.
3:29I'm sure if someone from Google was to
3:30listen to this, they would go
3:32but yeah, we know about this and you
3:34know, we're we're counteracting it and
3:36of course, you know, it might not be a
3:37long-term strategy, but
3:40still beggars belief that that's allowed
3:41to happen and still continues to happen
3:43and
3:44again
3:46are they going to catch it? They've been
3:48saying they're going to catch it for
3:49years and I still see it happening to
3:50this day, so
3:53yeah.
3:54>> This method of marketing is so
3:56effective, I had to make sure it wasn't
3:57against Google's rules before I kept
3:59doing it. It's a form of SEO I call
4:02compact keywords. Whereas most SEO
4:04focuses on putting up articles to answer
4:06questions, how, what, when, compact
4:09keywords focuses on putting up dozens of
4:11pages that sell to searchers who are
4:13actually looking to buy. These pages
4:16rank on Google and convert so much
4:18better than normal that when I
4:19discovered this years ago, I couldn't
4:21believe this was allowed. It's less
4:23work, too. The average compact keywords
4:26page is only 415 words. Compact Keywords
4:30is a 13-hour deep course on getting
4:32sales with SEO. A customer recently
4:35said, each lesson is dense with
4:37information. You are giving years worth
4:39of experience boiled down into 15 to
4:4230-minute lessons with no filler or
4:44fluff. I feel like I'm gaining a new
4:46superpower. Compact Keywords is about
4:49setting up an SEO funnel that brings you
4:51sales for years and years and years. It
4:54works with AI. It's less work than
4:56traditional SEO and it makes way more
4:59money. You can get it now at
5:01compactkeywords.com.
5:03Back to the podcast.
5:04>> Everyone will know what a canonical is.
5:05If you're in SEO space and you don't
5:07understand what that is. Now, I get
5:08asked this question all the time.
5:11I am not going to tell someone exactly
5:12how to do it.
5:14You are You are doing a canonical
5:17uh and abusing it and passing the power
5:20to another website. Now, the reason I
5:23don't really want to go into too much
5:24detail is you don't know who watches
5:25these things. You don't know if Google
5:26are watching it. They're going to start,
5:28you know, doing things or whatever. And
5:29I don't want to talk too much about
5:31canonical abuse because all of the peers
5:34in the AI games basically going to say,
5:35Craig, what a prick. Why did you
5:37highlight that on a podcast? So,
5:39uh that is one thing I don't want to
5:41delve too deep into, but uh you know, I
5:44think for any SEOs listening out there,
5:46uh you you will know what a canonical is
5:48and you'll know how to pass power to
5:52the the the the relevant place. So, um
5:55yeah, I don't want to give you a guide
5:57onto that just because
5:59uh as I say, my peers more than anything
6:02will be like, Craig,
6:03why the [ __ ] did you mention that in the
6:04podcast? So,
6:07that's the one thing I,
6:08I don't really want to go too deep on.
6:12>> What are some other shenanigans that are
6:13going on that you can break down?
6:17>> Shenanigans of like LLM manipulation,
6:20very very easy uh
6:23to do, you know, being cited on other
6:25websites, you know, rather than
6:28um
6:30rather than saying Edward's the best SEO
6:32in the world on your own website, which
6:33I'm you know,
6:35would be considered on-page
6:37optimization, you need a whole bunch of
6:40other trusted authority websites to say
6:42that's the case. Uh so there's a lot of
6:44LLM manipulation goes on,
6:47poisoning of the LLMs, you know,
6:50doing press releases or guest posts or
6:52whatever you're going to do uh to to
6:54make that happen. And again,
6:57Google will say that can't happen, this
6:59won't happen.
7:00You know, I I've done presentations at
7:02conferences with exact case studies of
7:05that and and how easy it is to do uh
7:07using very very basic tactics like a
7:10press release, like just being a bit
7:12more strategic with your guest posts or
7:14link placements and being able to get
7:16that corroboration of
7:18the narrative that you're trying to put
7:19out there. And uh you know,
7:22everything is there to be gained uh when
7:25it's online. And obviously that is what
7:27optimization is as far as I'm concerned.
7:29Uh I don't consider it shenanigans. Uh
7:32you know,
7:33at the end of the day,
7:35if you're my competition,
7:36I'm up against you and my job is to beat
7:38you uh you know, in terms of rankings
7:40and then and
7:41how you go about it.
7:43Obviously I'm never going to go out
7:44there and and you know,
7:46try and harm your business strategically
7:49or or or whatever. You know, there are
7:50people who go out and do that kind of
7:52shenanigans as well.
7:54My job is to get better links, better
7:56content, better everything, you know,
7:58AI overviews, everything that I can do
8:01better than you. That that is what
8:02competition is, that is what
8:03optimization is. Uh and
8:06you know, again a lot of people see
8:08these things as shenanigans. It's just
8:11strategy. It's just tactics, and you've
8:12got to try and test these things to see
8:14how far you can push them and and
8:17how
8:18how far you can, you know, use it to
8:20your advantage to make money. And
8:22essentially, that's all anyone really
8:24wants to do. So,
8:25shenanigans is a
8:28award or you know, a lot of people talk
8:31about black hat and
8:33you know, all of these kind of things or
8:35you know, even leveraging expired domain
8:36names and all of these kind of
8:38strategies that have gone on for years
8:40and years and years and and they call it
8:42black hat. Really? Is it? You know, is
8:44it shenanigans? Is it just strategic?
8:46And and that's obviously where the you
8:48know, people entitled to their opinion
8:49and
8:51and obviously Google are entitled to put
8:52their narrative out there as well. But I
8:54think for for us as SEOs,
8:56you you've just got to try and test
8:58different things
9:01and see what works for you.
9:04>> I think there are some shenanigans. Like
9:05if you're paying attention with what's
9:06happening with the King of SEO
9:08competition started by by Mr. James
9:11Dooley, like that's shenanigans. Those
9:13that is funny what's going on there.
9:15>> I mean, there is and obviously, you
9:17know, again,
9:20it is it's shenanigans and and like I
9:22say, I've done stuff like that to to
9:25other friends in the SEO space as well.
9:28I wouldn't really call that shenanigans.
9:29You know, it's it's a bit of a test and
9:31it's a bit of a
9:33whatever, you know, and and everyone
9:34coins all of these kind of different
9:36terms for it as well.
9:38You you have to test and you know, James
9:39Dooley, for example, is a big big tester
9:42and obviously he's got
9:43Jesper Nielsen involved and you know,
9:46doing the parasite thing and everything
9:48else that Jesper does.
9:50And they keep emphasizing that he's the
9:52you know, the king of [snorts]
9:55SEO or or whatever it is he is today.
9:58And why not? Why not? You got to you got
10:01to try these things and then you're able
10:02to go and present it and then you're
10:03able to apply these to your own
10:04businesses.
10:06So,
10:07you know, when we do these kind of tests
10:09or or when we have these kind of funds,
10:10there's never
10:12any kind of abuse against another
10:14person's website, you know, like like
10:15something like that. It is it's just
10:17fun.
10:18But I think there's a lot of lessons to
10:20be learned from it as well. And [snorts]
10:23you know,
10:25we always run tests and and I'll tell
10:27you a story. We ran a test a few years
10:29ago and it was for [snorts]
10:32whoever it was just a 24-hour test.
10:35And we ran a test to see whoever could
10:37rank number one
10:38for I think it was image SEO king was
10:42the search term.
10:43Just [ __ ] around
10:45would win it. Didn't matter whether it
10:46was a video, an image, a press release,
10:48a website, a GMB listing, it did not
10:51matter.
10:52The gloves were off 24 hours bang.
10:55And I tell you,
10:57I
10:58was up against a few guys who done
10:59digital PR. Now I done a YouTube video,
11:02I done a blog post, I done some image
11:06optimization and stuff like that as
11:08well.
11:09Someone else
11:11done a GMB
11:13and they were starting to creep up. Now
11:15what happened there
11:18is someone else in the UK was up against
11:21me and the last time you can do a press
11:24release in the UK is about 5:00 at night
11:26UK time to get it published that day. So
11:29someone waited to the last possible
11:30minute
11:31and done a press release and they took
11:33position one and I'm like
11:35[ __ ] what am I going to do? So
11:38I then thought the guys in the US are 6
11:41hours behind. It's not 5:00 over there.
11:44So I phoned up a guy called Randy Roddy.
11:47Randy,
11:48can you can you squeeze me in a press
11:50release blah blah blah blah blah? So I
11:52overtook that guy just thinking like
11:54that. However,
11:56something else happened. The person that
11:58done the GMB
12:00hadn't claimed or verified the GMB.
12:04So someone else came in at the last
12:05minute strategically trying to come in
12:07at the last minute and they bought image
12:09SEO king.com.
12:12And they they put the website up it
12:14crawled and indexed and everything else.
12:15Now, one test
12:17or no one ever knew that this was a
12:19thing. And it was a guy it was Lee and
12:21Honey Witcher, who are Americans. I
12:23don't know if you're aware of those
12:24guys, but you know, they're they're
12:25crazy people, great people by the way,
12:27but they do a lot of testing. Now, they
12:30bought MJS SEO King. And what we found
12:32from that test was that Google, because
12:35they had the GMB listing, which wasn't
12:37mine, it was someone else's, wasn't
12:39verified, it auto assigned it
12:42to mjsseoking.com.
12:45So we have these competitions and you
12:46learn
12:47all of these little weird things. Now,
12:50part of that story is
12:52um
12:53I'm sitting the guy that had the GMB
12:56listing was like, Craig,
12:58you're a dirty bastard. You've you've
13:00robbed my
13:01you've stolen my GMB. And I'm like, no,
13:03no, no, no, it wasn't me, blah, blah,
13:04blah, blah. It was actually Honey
13:06Witcher that had done that and it auto
13:08assigned, but he thought I was trying to
13:10steal it from him. So there's this
13:12internal debate with us going, you
13:14[ __ ] thieving bastard, you done this,
13:16you done that.
13:17And that didn't actually happen. It was
13:19actually Honey Witcher that said to me a
13:20few months later. She's like, by the
13:21way, I heard you guys were all we
13:23weren't fighting, fighting, but we were
13:25just debating with each other and, you
13:26know, internally in the group. And uh
13:30and, you know, Google had
13:32auto assigned that GMB to that exact
13:34match domain name. And we're just like,
13:36wow, we would have never known things
13:38like that happened having not done that
13:40test. Now, um you know, so there is a
13:43lot of shenanigans out there, but again,
13:45it's for stupid search terms like MJS
13:47SEO King. We actually did get held once.
13:49We done a a stupid test and it was for
13:54I'm pretty sure it was something like
13:55digital marketing Las Vegas.
13:57And we actually got a lot of our peers
13:59going, that's pretty shitty what you're
14:01doing. You're going to take over the
14:02whole of page one.
14:04And that's actually someone's commercial
14:07business there. You know, they're doing
14:08local SEO and they you know, they're
14:09dealing with the local people. And it
14:11was at that point where
14:15any of the kind of tests or shenanigans
14:16that I personally get involved in, I
14:17wouldn' want it to harm another person's
14:19business, if that makes sense. So, any
14:22of the stuff that we go after now,
14:24certainly the group of friends that I've
14:25got, we don't go after people's
14:27commercial terms because that wouldn't
14:28be fair to you, for example, if you were
14:30in Vegas and you'd worked there for
14:32years and then everyone's coming in,
14:33parasite SEO this,
14:35you know, age domains that and you know,
14:37stamping all over your search just for a
14:39bit of fun. It's not really fair. So,
14:42that's where
14:44again, you know, you don't have to you
14:46know, when you're doing the shenanigans,
14:47you can have a bit of fun with it, but
14:48don't do it on
14:51people's businesses
14:53is what I would say. So,
14:55yeah,
14:56but you know, I think these tests
14:58provide a lot of value and there's
15:00obviously people competing for it as
15:01well and I think with James Dooley and
15:04stuff like that, there was a few other
15:05people going for
15:06King of SEO. I think
15:09can't remember all their names, but I
15:10think there was four or five guys going
15:12for it
15:13and you know, doing different things.
15:15So,
15:18>> I made a video about King of SEO. The
15:21competition's probably up to maybe a
15:23million views now
15:25and so a lot more people joined. My
15:27first made a video asked I asked James
15:29because I saw he he came on his podcast.
15:31He's like, yeah, I'm thinking about
15:33starting this King of SEO competition
15:36and then he just he went and did it with
15:37Jasper
15:38and
15:40and I saw this and and he's just he put
15:42up a press release. Jasper put up a
15:43press release and now they're showing up
15:45for King of SEO.
15:47AI overview is saying the King of SEO.
15:48So, I made a video about that. That
15:50video got, I don't know, 80,000 views,
15:53but that video kicked off this
15:55competition. All these other SEOs
15:56started joining
15:58and now it's just gotten completely out
16:01of control and it's so funny the tactics
16:04that people are doing to show up for
16:05King of SEO.
16:07>> Yeah, it's I'm just looking at just now
16:09here. Dooley's still at the top
16:12on my end. David Quaid, Withers, Julian
16:15Goldie
16:16and stuff like that there. So,
16:19yeah.
16:20But all of that stuff, I think it's a
16:23it's
16:25>> Here's what I don't understand, Craig.
16:27With canonical abuse, Google knows how
16:28it works. So I don't even understand
16:30what the what the like
16:32it's a canonical abuse is a well-known
16:34thing in SEO.
16:35>> Yeah. Of course it is.
16:37It's very basic. It's nothing
16:39scientific. You know, canonical abuse
16:40has been on for years and years and
16:42years. It's just a topic that I don't
16:44want to give too much away on, as I say.
16:47Google are watching you and everything
16:49else. I don't want to be weaving red
16:50flags to a bull. So like I say,
16:54it's canonical abuse has been on for a
16:57long, long time and still goes on to
16:58this day. And
17:01like I say,
17:03it [snorts] still works very, very well
17:05in a lot of markets, especially
17:06Southeast Asia. So you can go there and
17:09reverse engineer what they're doing.
17:13>> You said a friend managed to convince
17:16ChatGPT and other LLMs that you were a
17:18member of the French Olympic Aquapony
17:21Aquapony, is that how you pronounce it?
17:23The French Olympic Aquapony team.
17:25>> Yeah.
17:25>> did
17:26what what happened? How did that work?
17:29>> So a guy called Alan Cladics
17:34I'm trying to think what I done.
17:36I don't know if I done something to him
17:37or he done it to me first, but anyway,
17:40he he goes around talking about, you
17:43know, poisoning the LLMs and being able
17:45to manipulate this and manipulate that.
17:47And he found an expired domain name
17:50which was the aquapony.fr,
17:53which was the French aquapony website.
17:56And he decided to
17:59he also built me a website that was
18:01craig-campbell-seo.com.
18:04Built me a website and it said I was the
18:06Olympic coach of the aquapony team, blah
18:08blah blah blah blah blah. He then
18:10confirmed that information on the
18:13old aquapony.fr website and, you know,
18:16published it in a few other places. And
18:18he regularly walks about telling that
18:20story, but again, uh,
18:23he did ask
18:25if it was cool to do that, um, and all
18:27that kind of stuff, which it is, of
18:29course, uh, as long as it's not, you
18:31know,
18:32causing me any kind of
18:34distress or abuse or anything like that,
18:36then it, you know, it's all done in in
18:38good taste. So, um,
18:41yeah, they you know, again, very simple
18:43and easy to do, and he loves he actually
18:46goes around talking about it and he's
18:48actually got the pony, uh,
18:52[snorts] the pony, uh, doll or whatever
18:54you want to call it, and he takes that
18:55on stage as well. But he's actually done
18:57it to a few other people since, so when
18:59he talks at specific events, he'll pick
19:02on a new person. So, I'm not the only
19:04one that's had the aqua pony. I think
19:06there's several people across the world
19:08who are now,
19:10uh, you know, apparently, uh, Olympic,
19:14uh, aqua pony,
19:16uh, coaches and stuff like that.
19:18[laughter] Um, so again, just stuff for
19:21shits and giggles, and
19:23like I say, it's, uh,
19:25it follows in the same lines of the, you
19:27know, King of AIO and everything else.
19:28You know, you're you're grabbing those
19:30domain names, you're doing a bit of
19:31this, a bit of that, and just
19:32manipulating the, uh,
19:35the AI to to think that that's actually
19:37true. And, uh, yeah, but
19:41I, it's fun, all fun and games, and, uh,
19:43you know, as long as he and again, I
19:45think with a lot of that stuff, there's
19:46a lot of education in in between there.
19:48So, can you take that information,
19:50reverse engineer what's been done, and
19:52then go and do it for your own brand,
19:53your own products, or whatever it's
19:54going to be? Absolutely. And, uh, you
19:57know, Alan Cladic's there, uh, is still
20:00going around just now. I think he's been
20:01telling that story for about 18 months,
20:03uh, and he's still still doing the
20:05rounds with it.
20:07>> Well, it's a really fun thing. It's
20:08like, um, when the King of AIO
20:10competition kicked off, Jasper in
20:12Jasper's press release about James
20:14Dooley, Jasper said that James was
20:17crowned,
20:18there was a crowning event at Lee I Lee
20:21I La Stadium. Is it Lee I Stadium?
20:24>> Yeah.
20:24>> Um, yeah. There there was a crowning
20:26event at a stadium for James being
20:28crowned the king of SEO. And and the SEO
20:31review just just uh quoted it. Like
20:34there's a real crowning event. And
20:35honestly, so my the the video that I
20:37made, I'm like I'm like you really
20:39should just like with all with the
20:41turbulent times that we are in right
20:43now. I mean, we're we're heading here in
20:45the United States. It's election day in
20:47a couple of days.
20:49Like with just the crazy times, you
20:51should be wary of the information that
20:53you get from large language models
20:55because these things are really easy to
20:58game by people like us.
21:00>> Yeah. It's it's sad. Uh
21:03it's and and that's the thing like I I
21:06look at non-SEO people like friends, you
21:08know, who who don't know anything about
21:10SEO.
21:11And they are fully reliant on the likes
21:13of ChatGPT for information. Where do I
21:15get this? Or what is that? Or uh you
21:18know, who did this guy used to play
21:19football for? Or whatever it's going to
21:21be. And
21:22that stuff can of of course be heavily
21:25uh manipulated and uh yeah, you could
21:28cause a lot of disruption uh with that.
21:32You know, and that's the scary thing
21:34uh about it. And I think um you know,
21:36when these guys are doing their talks,
21:38hopefully that is what people understand
21:40as well. You know, you can't really
21:42trust this
21:43to be accurate all the time. I know the
21:46LLMs in terms of giving information is
21:49is relatively good, but yeah, I've seen
21:51a few where it's it's giving out some
21:53absolute garbage and you're just like
21:54wow. Um
21:56[clears throat] wow.
21:57>> Like I've had uh Colin Krakowiac on the
22:00podcast a few times now. I'm not sure if
22:02you're familiar with him. He has uh
22:04yeah, he's he has a gigadomains. I think
22:06that's his site, but he has 200,000
22:08domains and 30,000 websites. And
22:12when you have
22:13that amount of properties,
22:16you can create a narrative.
22:18>> The Bulgarian guy? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
22:20>> yeah, yeah. He was on with Charles Yeah,
22:22we did an episode. Him, Charles Float,
22:24and David Quaid and me all together on a
22:27on the pod.
22:28And yeah, when you have like 30,000
22:30websites and 200,000 domains, you can
22:32create consensus and there's people out
22:34there who can very easily create
22:36consensus and and uh yeah, fool LLMs.
22:40Well, in a in a more practical matter,
22:43what is the most effective tactic that
22:45you've tested for getting a website or
22:48business mentioned in ChatGPT for like
22:51terms that actually matter that will get
22:54that business purchases?
22:58>> Press releases still still do very very
23:01well for me, but again,
23:03uh
23:04it depends on what you're trying to do,
23:06you know.
23:07If you're in the iGaming space, for
23:09example, it's a lot harder to game
23:11because there's just so much more noise
23:12and everything else, but you know, for
23:14me as it stands just now,
23:18press releases
23:20you know, a
23:21quick and simple easy way to to do
23:22things, but depending the competition
23:25level, what country you're targeting,
23:26you may have to go and do a bit of
23:27parasite SEO
23:29uh and and some other stuff on top, but
23:31for me, you know, for you know, to give
23:33a
23:34you know, a an answer
23:36uh you know, as as a one-off, uh a press
23:39release works very very well.
23:42>> What do you use for for press releases?
23:44EIAN and AB, something else?
23:46>> Yeah, so the whole mixture I I use a guy
23:49called the news guy, Randy Roddy, uh the
23:52news guy.com. You know, if you're
23:53targeting America, you've got Magic PR
23:56if you're doing uh the UK. Now, these
23:58guys syndicate that news to
24:02all of those websites, you know, uh and
24:04they've got little bolt-ons and you
24:06know, they can send it to Bloomberg and
24:08and you know, various other Yahoo
24:10Finance and stuff like that as well. And
24:12you know, for me, it's not really
24:15necessarily about the syndicated blast.
24:17It's those kind of top-tier little
24:18add-ons, you know, your Bloombergs, your
24:20Yahoo Finances, the ones that are
24:22powerful and trusted. Um
24:24and that is normally enough to to do
24:27what you need to do for most people, you
24:29know, especially if you're doing kind of
24:31local or
24:32I know America's a completely different
24:34ball game. Uh,
24:36but you [clears throat] know, if you're
24:36in the UK or a lot of other places, a
24:38press release will get you
24:40where you probably need to be for the
24:41here and now. You may argue
24:44bigger country, more more competition
24:47and stuff like that, then you may have
24:49to do that little bit extra um to to you
24:52know, take it up to the next level. But
24:54yeah, the press releases, but again,
24:57you've also got press advantage and
24:58various other guys out there as well you
25:00can use. I don't want to be seen to be
25:02citing my friends or whatever. You know,
25:04there there's lots of good places out
25:05there. Just make sure you've got
25:07you know, a a whole bunch of the kind of
25:09top tier publications within that
25:11syndication as well.
25:13>> Yeah, Yahoo Finance works crazy well.
25:16>> Yeah. That's
25:18that's that's the one that I won the uh
25:22the MEJ SEO king competition with. It
25:24was an old Yahoo Yahoo Finance that dug
25:27me out of the hole there. Um and the
25:30only problem with Yahoo Finance is it
25:32gets archived every 90 days, um which is
25:35a pain in the ass. Um so yeah, it's but
25:39obviously Yahoo or Yahoo Finance is
25:41posting that much stuff. They've got to
25:43do something. And so your your
25:47article doesn't always last for the long
25:48term or your manipulation, if you want
25:50to call it that, won't always last for
25:52the long term. So you may need to go and
25:54revisit that.
25:55>> Is there anything that you do to get
25:57press releases um archived longer than
26:0090 days, like building links to them?
26:03>> You can. Uh you can obviously force uh
26:07index them but you know, build tiered
26:08link building to them and all that kind
26:10of stuff, um which a lot of people do
26:12and I'm a big fan of that. A lot of
26:14people say
26:15you know, why do you do you know, these
26:18kind of blasts using different tools and
26:20stuff like that? And it's not
26:21necessarily from the the power aspect of
26:24a money robot or uh back refs or any of
26:27the other kind of tools that do that.
26:30It is to keep them or retain them in
26:32Google's index is is the you know the
26:35most important thing. And I remember
26:38a few years ago
26:39used to talk about
26:41some it was actually legit the website
26:43legit and the guy said to me Craig I'm
26:46going to make a page here and I want you
26:47to give your
26:50top 10 things that you buy on legit.
26:54And one of those uh was blog commenting.
26:57And I seen people in forums now going
26:59what a [ __ ] ass wipe Craig is uh blog
27:02commenting how old is that tactic blah
27:03blah blah blah blah.
27:05And I felt like just saying guys if you
27:07understand how the internet works I'm
27:09not doing blog comment because I think
27:10it's strategically the best strategy or
27:13uh
27:14it's going to pass any kind of serious
27:16amount of power or anything like that.
27:18But doing that to retain stuff in
27:20Google's index is a low cost way of of
27:22doing that or or a money robot blaster
27:24or whatever it may be. Um so you know
27:27what I had a few people going oh what an
27:29idiot you know blog commenting how when
27:31was the last time this guy done this
27:33that or the next thing and you're like
27:35you you know like you say you know you
27:36need to retain stuff in Google's index
27:38you can't and and you know obviously in
27:40the the AI era
27:43you know crawl budget and and you know
27:46uh
27:46information retrieval from Google comes
27:49at a cost and they're not going to
27:51keep everything in the index forever
27:53more it just can't happen. So you know
27:55as an SEO you need to to think about
27:58these things as well and optimize or
27:59tweak or strategically come up with a
28:02plan to make sure that your
28:04best articles or or whatever it's going
28:06to be um are retained in that index. So
28:10yeah I'm a big fan of that.
28:12>> Talk about that about using a blog
28:14comment to
28:15get a press release index for longer.
28:20>> So you know
28:22blog comments is spam you know it's spam
28:24and and you know one of my favorite
28:25tools
28:27that has ever came out and and it's
28:28still something I use today and and just
28:31to be clear I 'm not saying it's the
28:32best tool the world, but Scrapebox
28:34um is an old but gold tool. And you
28:38know, you can go on there and like I
28:40say,
28:41um do a bit of blog comment, you can go
28:43and paste your link onto, you know,
28:46those blog comments and everything else.
28:48Now, of course, there's a lot of web
28:49websites that have got the kind of spam
28:51and everything else on there,
28:52but there's equally as many websites out
28:54there that are douchebags that allow
28:56those comments
28:58to be on their pages because
29:00they don't understand how the internet
29:02works or how WordPress works or uh you
29:05know, how you're going to protect
29:06yourself against that. And again, uh you
29:08know, using Scrapebox is a
29:11cost-free way of doing that. And you
29:14know, if you've got a limited budget uh
29:17or you don't have the money to do these
29:18things, then what are you going to do to
29:21retain stuff in Google's index? Now, of
29:22course, you could just you could argue
29:24with me and say, Craig, just whack it
29:25through an indexer or go and do this or
29:27go and do that or go There's so many
29:29ways to do it. Um but you know, blog
29:33commenting, like I say, when I first
29:35started out in SEO, uh you know,
29:38Scrapebox was a a great spamming tool.
29:40You know, even if you just wanted to hit
29:41someone's contact form and just bang
29:43bang bang bang bang try and sell to
29:44them, it was a great tool for doing that
29:46stuff. So I think, you know, when you
29:49use these tools and uh
29:51you're used to them, then why wouldn't
29:53you go and do that for a proportion of
29:55websites to to save yourself some money?
29:58Uh and again, like I say, uh try and and
30:01retain stuff in Google's index. So you
30:03know, Scrapebox is how I do it. Uh and
30:06you know, you just fire it up. You know,
30:07obviously you've got to get proxies and
30:08Scrapebox is a bit of a learning curve,
30:10but you know, again,
30:13uh you know, it's old but gold tool. But
30:15I'm not saying that's what you have to
30:17do.
30:18That was what I would do on the gigs on
30:21legit
30:23that were available. Uh and again, you
30:25know, that that's that's why I put that
30:27one out there. But like I say, times
30:29have moved on. You know, people have
30:32other tools. You know, you've got GSA,
30:35you've got money robot, you've got, uh
30:37RankerX, you've got Backlinks. There's
30:39so many other alternatives now that are
30:42very, very low cost that will probably
30:43get you stuff that's going to be a hell
30:45of a lot better, um, than than doing
30:48blog comments in this day and age.
30:51>> But the point is to pass some some juice
30:54to the press release, some authority to
30:56the press release.
30:58>> Yeah, and even no follow links can pass
31:01can pass authority if it's on I had Kyle
31:03Roof on last week and, uh, one of Kyle's
31:06experiments showed that if a page is
31:09getting is if a page is ranking and
31:10getting organic traffic, no follow links
31:12on it will actually pass authority. And
31:15then Joy Hawkins, she's been on many
31:17times and she tested this many she she
31:19did a bunch of tests with this and she
31:22put, uh,
31:23she put one of she put a page on her
31:25site in a local forum, her local forum,
31:28but it was a there was a no follow link
31:30and the forum page was ranking. It was
31:32getting clicks from Google. She puts a
31:35no follow link to her to a page on her
31:38site. That page on her site also has a
31:41YouTube video embedded on it. Not only
31:43does the page on her site rank from the
31:45no follow link, but it worked so well
31:47that the embedded YouTube video also
31:49started ranking.
31:51And, uh, [clears throat] yeah. And so
31:54that's the concept.
31:55>> Yeah, but again, it goes back to that
31:57thing. People have got to try and test
31:58these things and be able to
32:00hold their own in an argument when
32:01someone says, nah, that doesn't work,
32:03that can't work or whatever it's going
32:05to be. Well,
32:06go check the proof.
32:08You know, and, uh,
32:10I think that's what you've got to,
32:13uh,
32:14do is, you know, you hear information
32:16and you can't just blindly say, yeah,
32:19full of [ __ ] full of [ __ ] And I think
32:21that's what a lot of people do. That
32:22can't happen, you know.
32:24So and so said that that, you know,
32:25couldn't be a thing or whatever, um, or
32:27no follow links are, you know, a waste
32:29of time or whatever. Um, you know, no
32:32follow is a directive. It's not
32:34something that
32:35Google could do what they want, you
32:36know.
32:37It's it's one of those things and again
32:40uh you know when you've got people like
32:42that
32:44providing
32:45proof of of
32:47what they've found and you know you know
32:50I love I love hearing that seeing that
32:52and and watching those type of people
32:54and that's that's you know what the SEO
32:57world's all about and you know I'm a big
32:58fan of Kyle Roof as well you know he's
33:00done a lot in the industry over the
33:02years even with his Lorem Ipsum and all
33:04these other uh
33:06as you would call it shenanigans and uh
33:09you know these these are things where
33:10you hear other people say uh full of
33:13[ __ ] full of [ __ ] full it's not full of
33:15[ __ ] go go look um you know and and
33:19take take it take out what you will from
33:21from that person's test and uh yeah I
33:24think that's
33:26what many people don't do now they just
33:28watch in the sidelines and
33:30you know just make decisions based on
33:32what they think uh without any kind of
33:34proof of concept.
33:36>> Yeah the the uh Lorem Ipsum was uh is
33:39particularly fascinating so yeah for
33:41people who don't know Kyle used um a
33:44gibberish page to win kind of win an SEO
33:47competition
33:48um targeting rhinoplasty keywords or a
33:51rhinoplasty keyword and so he had his
33:54keyword and the related language in the
33:56right places the rest of the language on
33:58the page was all Lorem Ipsum placeholder
34:01text
34:02and uh and so
34:04he eventually comes in it was like a few
34:07days after the competition ended he
34:09comes in number one for the keyword um
34:12and then this story goes viral and it
34:14goes viral past the SEO community
34:17and so Google sees this and Google's
34:19like well we don't we don't want someone
34:20to make to make us look bad like this so
34:23not only did Google de de-index this
34:27test site that the Lorem Ipsum page was
34:29on but Google
34:32and this is what Kyle shared on the
34:33podcast called his registrar got 20 of
34:37his other test sites that they were not
34:39connected to each other no connecting
34:41GSC, avoiding fingerprinting, avoiding
34:44everything.
34:45And Kyle said, yeah, they called my
34:47registrar
34:48and they they found out what these my
34:51other test sites were and they deindexed
34:5320 more of my test sites and those are
34:54that's what he shared on the pod.
34:56And um
34:59yeah, but but uh it was like um
35:02you wouldn't even know like how
35:04important
35:05having the language in the right places
35:06are, like if you don't hear
35:08stories like this.
35:11>> Uh he say he's a good lad and I think
35:13that that's what finally
35:15put Kyle's name in the map and
35:18when he was
35:20when he was doing all of that that put
35:21that really uh
35:24propelled him into stardom.
35:27>> So okay, you've said um PBNs. You've
35:30said you've always loved PBNs and that
35:31people claiming they don't work are
35:33wrong.
35:34What separates a good PBN from one that
35:37Google will detect?
35:39>> So you know there's a lot of different
35:42things there, you know, so
35:44a PBN
35:46as far as I'm concerned has to still be
35:49treated as a real website.
35:50Um you know if you're going to
35:55sell links on it and everything else,
35:56you know, and it's got 80,000 outbound
35:58links on it and all that kind of stuff,
35:59then effectively people are going to see
36:01what you're doing or Google are going to
36:03see what you're doing. But you know, in
36:05terms of content and everything else
36:06that goes on there, you know, a big
36:08thing for me is when you're building a
36:11PBN
36:13you want it like I say treat it as a
36:14real website. It's not going to be spam
36:16to death. The content is going to be as
36:18it should be.
36:20You know, and and effectively has to
36:24not be tied to the one shared hosting
36:26account and stuff like that as well
36:27because what is a PBN? Is that 10
36:29websites? Is it 50 websites? Is it 150
36:32websites? Everyone's answer's going to
36:33be different. Um you know, and for me
36:36when I was always building PBNs out
36:39I had different uh Gmail address and
36:41everything in
36:42each account. I had them on separate
36:44hosting or I had different IP addresses
36:46and everything else. Now, that all comes
36:48at a cost. And sometimes, you know,
36:50people are going, oh, it's all right,
36:52Craig, you know, I'm with Easy Blog
36:53Networks, for example, and I just host
36:55them all on there for 20 quid a month,
36:57and you're just like massive, massive
36:59footprint, massive [ __ ] footprint.
37:02And listen, Easy Blog Networks, I don't
37:05even know if they're still a thing.
37:08What I also didn't like about them at
37:09the time
37:11because they tried to get me to to host
37:12some of my PBNs there is
37:16they would automatically allocate your
37:18asset onto whatever they felt was
37:21relevant. So
37:22just to mix things up, they'd put my
37:24website on an Australian server, and it
37:25would be a .co.uk domain name.
37:28I don't want that. So I want that
37:29element of control. If I'm targeting the
37:31UK, I want to be hosted in a UK website
37:34with a .co.uk domain name.
37:36I don't want Easy Blog Networks to make
37:38that decision for me. And again,
37:42it probably cost me a lot more money in
37:43the long run,
37:45but
37:46it was always about avoiding those
37:47footprints.
37:49And And you know, again, a lot of people
37:51link all of the [ __ ] together and all of
37:54that kind of stuff as well, creating a
37:56big massive link wheel. And again,
37:57people were doing that in
37:59the early 2000s.
38:01It's just not wise to do that. So trying
38:03to make sure that your footprint's free,
38:05your website's get quality content on
38:07there and everything else. And no,
38:10listen, no one wants to do
38:12work on these things. You know, we're
38:14all lazy
38:15bandits if we're being honest, you know,
38:17as SEOs. But I just think for a PBN to
38:20get that to work for you, a little bit
38:22of time, effort, or budget has to go
38:24into it to make sure you differentiate
38:26your website from, you know, the the
38:28hundreds of thousands of other garbage
38:30websites that are out there.
38:31And you know, even if that does mean
38:33spending a little bit more money on, you
38:35know, the backlinks or powering that
38:36stuff up or retaining stuff in Google's
38:38index and everything else as well, and I
38:40think for me, I see a lot of people just
38:42lazy with PBNs. You know, there's no
38:45content velocity, link velocity going
38:47on. You know, they throw the website up
38:49and it just sets for years. And then,
38:50you know, it was a DR 45 and then they
38:52look at it three years later and it's a
38:54DR 9 and they're like,
38:56yeah, PBNs don't work.
38:59And of course, you know, you you have
39:00to, you know, work with them, work them
39:04to your advantage. Um but you know, I
39:06think
39:07Google's evolved over over the years and
39:10uh
39:11they're cleverer and and that's why we
39:13need to do a little bit more work when
39:15you're when you're, you know, building
39:16these assets out. Um but
39:20like I say, people still use them very
39:22well to their advantage, whether it's
39:23through
39:24expired domain names and repurposing the
39:26website and using it for this, that, or
39:28the next thing. Uh you know, I would
39:30still call that a PBN, but remaining
39:33footprint free is the the biggest thing
39:35and I was probably ultra cautious with
39:37it and maybe
39:39too much to to my own detriment because
39:41it cost me a lot more money and the
39:43management and the maintenance and
39:44everything else is just a pain in the
39:46ass. So um yeah, it's it's not an easy
39:50job and uh
39:52like I say, I would probably now the
39:54older wiser me,
39:56I would rather use your PBNs and let you
39:58manage all of that crap uh and you know,
40:00just use your your PBNs. And I think
40:02that's even when you come to buying
40:03links, uh you know, you need to look at
40:05the outbound links and you know, all of
40:08the kind of other stuff that's going on
40:09there uh and the type of content that's
40:11going on there and the type of links
40:12that are on there as well. So
40:15you know, it's it's it's a big big job
40:17if you're going to build a PBN on a
40:18massive scale. Uh a lot of work, a lot
40:21of management, a lot of maintenance. But
40:22again, with AI and everything else
40:23that's come out, we can make websites
40:25quicker. You know, you can you know,
40:28push them to, you know, different places
40:30relatively easy and and straightforward.
40:32You've got Cloudflare pages and
40:34everything else you can throw stuff up
40:35on. So you know, the job has got easier
40:38in that aspect, but I think Google
40:41are looking for that little bit extra
40:43quality, unique content, content
40:45frequency, and everything else. And uh
40:47again,
40:48it's you know, the jobs become harder.
40:50It wasn't like it was you know 15 years
40:53ago where you could have an exact match
40:56domain name and pump one page of content
40:59on it and boom, you know that website
41:00ranked it got traffic and you know
41:02passed a bit of value to the other
41:04websites that you had and you done lead
41:05gen in a massive scale or whatever. You
41:07know that's the kind of PBNs I used to
41:09build back in the day.
41:11You know even if I had a phone call from
41:13a plumber in Glasgow
41:15which is where I'm from
41:17and he didn't go ahead
41:18I would just weirdly and you're probably
41:20the same yourself
41:23you start looking at all the domain
41:24names that were available so you would
41:25buy them all even if that guy was not
41:27going to be a client you'd buy like
41:28plumber Glasgow, plumber Edinburgh and
41:30all the surrounding areas
41:32and you know I think SEOs do that type
41:35of thing and that's the the kind of PBNs
41:36I used to build back in the day. Nowhere
41:39near as aggressive as that now
41:41because like I say the management and
41:43maintenance of those
41:45to do that on that scale now is just
41:49probably not worth the hassle.
41:52>> Glad that you bring that up. I I
41:53normally talk about I mean I'll go I'll
41:56talk about black hat stuff. I'll talk
41:57about everything in SEO. I do this show
41:59literally every day so I need infinite
42:00content. I'll cover everything there is
42:03to cover in SEO.
42:04But like in terms of what is most
42:07reliable it's going to be white hat.
42:09It's like I've had so many black hat
42:12SEOs who have come on the show who have
42:14said yeah I've stopped I've I've stopped
42:17doing like iGaming, I've stopped doing
42:19like super heavy affiliate.
42:22I can't take the DMCA takedowns that are
42:25happening
42:27or like it's just way more expensive to
42:30do a PBN now
42:31and
42:32if you're like a normal business owner
42:35you don't want to have to worry about
42:36any of that stuff and
42:38and and honestly I don't think a lot of
42:40business owners have to worry about any
42:41of that stuff to do effective SEO.
42:44>> Uh I think you know
42:46like you say
42:48there
42:49are so many niches out there
42:52where you can go and build an e-com
42:53store if you've got the right product or
42:54the service and you don't need to be
42:56going up against the i-gaming guys doing
42:58the the you know takedowns and and
43:00everything else.
43:01Do you really want to be fighting in
43:02that market and and you know waking up?
43:05And yeah, sure it's lucrative and you
43:07can make a lot of money. Um but do you
43:10really want to go to sleep at night
43:11going I don't know if I'm going to wake
43:12up with any revenue? Um the answer's no
43:16and you know I think over the years I've
43:19always tried to diversify my income
43:22streams and I've tried to do stuff as
43:23clean and as as good as I possibly can
43:27um
43:28without fear of
43:30Google catching my PBN or whatever it's
43:32going to be. Why not just pay for
43:35you know
43:36quality links and and you know being in
43:38newspapers and I'm not talking about a
43:39syndicated PR blast you know do your
43:41high-level PR and you know mix uh all of
43:45your kind of link uh building strategies
43:48up and that you know obviously is what
43:50Google Google wants. So I think you know
43:52it's nice to talk about black hat and
43:54doing affiliate and doing i-gaming and
43:57listen
43:58I do like I say some work in the
44:00i-gaming space
44:02and there's just certain countries out
44:04there Southeast Asia for example where
44:06you've got a very short window to make
44:07money because obviously gambling's
44:09illegal and and everything else. So
44:11they've got a very short window to make
44:12money and they've no real option but to
44:15deploy those tactics to to get their
44:17cash grab and then rinse and repeat
44:19rinse and repeat rinse and repeat.
44:21So sometimes you're pushed to do it but
44:24as a human being do you really want to
44:26go through that stress
44:28and make money there there are already
44:30other easier ways to make money out
44:32there. For example
44:34you know one of the niches I'm currently
44:35in I do sports trading cards. Uh you
44:39know there's nothing dodgy, nothing
44:40illegal, something I enjoy. It's it's a
44:43hobby. I can make money from it. I can
44:45buy a product at that price and I can
44:47sell it for that.
44:48I know what to buy. Uh I know what to
44:51hold on to. I know how to get a card
44:52graded to be able to it on for two or
44:54three times more money.
44:56So, and that's just that niche. I'm in
44:58there. There's so many other niches out
45:00there where you can actually just do
45:02things a lot cleaner, a lot easier, uh
45:06and a lot better without all the kind of
45:09[ __ ] around. And uh you know, for me,
45:11you know, I'm doing a lot of that. I do
45:13a lot of football podcasts um as well.
45:16And all I'm doing is taking my SEO and
45:18marketing knowledge and applying
45:20applying it to a niche that I actually
45:22enjoy um and and I understand and and
45:25and you know, have passion for. Um you
45:28know, so I enjoy doing my football
45:29podcast with with heroes uh that that
45:31you know, I would consider you know,
45:33guys that I watched growing up. I love
45:35monetizing it through uh
45:37the the you know, the trading cards and
45:39stuff like that, which I know is very
45:40very big in America. Um
45:44but you know,
45:45and it's clean, it's simple, it 's easy.
45:48I don't need to you know, have the
45:49sleepless nights or anything like that.
45:51And I think if you can get yourself into
45:53that position long term,
45:56you know, of course that's what you want
45:57to do. You don't want to be doing all
45:58this other jackass stuff.
46:01>> Is that a lot about SEO for collectors?
46:03That's that's interesting. Are you um so
46:06how many trading cards do you have?
46:08Thousands?
46:08>> Thousands. Thousands.
46:10>> so do you um have you made like a
46:12database and you're doing some like
46:14programmatic SEO with this so that
46:16somebody could search the card and and
46:18then they see like the price and all of
46:20that stuff?
46:21>> Yeah.
46:21>> And they have the attributes. Man, it
46:23must be really easy too with AI now. You
46:25just take pictures of the back and front
46:27and um
46:29and then like everything is
46:31automatically filled in in your
46:32database. So it's it's all populated. It
46:35could go live immediately.
46:37>> Exactly. So and there's not a lot of
46:39competition. You know, I've actually got
46:41friends who laugh SEO friends who laugh
46:44at me going, Craig, are you doing your
46:45shitty little Pokémon cards? And I'm
46:47like, it's not Pokémon cards I do. It's
46:48it's sport soccer or football cards I
46:51do. I've got some NBA ones and and
46:54various other ones. But they laugh and
46:56I'm like, guys,
46:58this is the easiest
47:00and most lucrative niches I've ever
47:01[ __ ] been in. Um, you go and do your
47:04[ __ ] GMBs and get them suspended and
47:06all the other [ __ ] [ __ ] of the day
47:08and [ __ ] stress yourself out.
47:10I'm quite happy doing what I'm doing.
47:11So, you know, like you say, there you
47:14know, there's different ways to do it.
47:16Um, you know, I I I do live streams on
47:18whatnot as well, um, on a regular basis
47:22doing repack streams and everything
47:23else. So,
47:25you know, there's so many ways that I
47:26can monetize this. Um,
47:30and it doesn't necessarily always have
47:32to
47:32>> you must crush. You must crush with this
47:35cuz like um
47:36do you take a you take a nasty SEO like
47:39you and and put you in a niche that's
47:42not SEO where you don't have a million
47:45other savvy marketers against you
47:48um in a niche where people are spending
47:51a lot of money
47:52and I that's like a recipe for just
47:55absolutely destroying.
47:58>> Exactly. And
48:00you know,
48:02I always say to people, you know, they
48:03always say, Craig, what you know, what
48:04what niche should I get into? Do do
48:06something you enjoy. And you know, I
48:08didn't know about the I didn't know what
48:11a sports trading card was uh until a
48:13couple of years back.
48:15And I used to laugh. I I'll tell you a
48:16funny story actually. I had a guy about
48:1810 years ago who wanted SEO from me.
48:22And he came to me and he showed me this
48:23shitty little card website, and I looked
48:25at it, and I'm just like,
48:28[ __ ] you know. And I looked at the
48:30competition of the keywords and
48:31everything, and I thought,
48:32God, this guy's not going to have the
48:34money
48:35to be able to pay for real SEO in this
48:36niche. Now, that's ignorance in my part,
48:39pure ignorance.
48:40So, I kind of gave the guy the price,
48:42never really gave him the time of day.
48:45And and you know, up comes a couple of
48:47years ago, one of my friends is sitting
48:48going,
48:49look at these cards, look at this card,
48:51look at the value of that card, look at
48:52this. And I'm like, what the [ __ ] is
48:54this card [ __ ]
48:55And I remember that conversation with
48:56that guy, and and and I've said to my
48:58friend,
49:00can you can you show me some other cards
49:02and the value of them, you know, cuz
49:03some of these a Michael Jordan cards
49:05go for a couple grand, one card, you
49:08know, that's got a PSA slab on it, a
49:11couple of hundred grand easy.
49:13I I'm like, how can these cards be worth
49:15that much money? So I was [ __ ]
49:17ignorant to this
49:19but I've always been into sports and I I
49:21like, you know, sports memorabilia
49:23and everything I've got a lot of sports
49:25memorabilia in my background actually,
49:26but
49:27you know, collectibles and everything
49:29else is something I've always been
49:30interested in
49:32just as a kind of hobbies, but I was
49:34really ignorant
49:35to this niche and and you know, it blows
49:37my brain
49:40as to how much money
49:42is out there and like you say no
49:43competition. So you know, and and I kick
49:46myself hard going 10 years ago I could
49:48have gotten into this because
49:50if I'd just given that guy the time of
49:51day
49:52I mean I looked at his website and it
49:54looked shitty and crappy and I just
49:55assumed it was shitty little stickers.
49:57That's the ignorant, you know, me there
50:00and I just thought no football stickers
50:03is not going to make a lot of money.
50:04You're not going to have the right
50:05budget to compete for these high level
50:06search terms.
50:08Leave me alone kind of thing and and I
50:10kick myself hard for it now going
50:12you ignorant so and so.
50:14So
50:16yeah, it was a bit of a wake up call and
50:18like I say got into
50:21you know, researched it a lot, started
50:23live streaming and and thoroughly enjoy
50:26it and and it's something I'm still
50:27doing to this day. So I think
50:29collectibles
50:30you know, there's not
50:32there's not a lot of SEOs in it. I can
50:33tell you that much.
50:36>> Um how long have you been doing the
50:37collectible business for?
50:40>> Probably about 18 months now.
50:42>> Oh wow, so you're fresh in it.
50:44>> Yeah.
50:44>> Oh yeah, oh man dude you could I'm like
50:46thinking like you're going to build up
50:48some some memorabilia empire. Like you
50:51really could.
50:52>> Dude I've got a scary scary amount of
50:54memorabilia
50:56and
50:58like I say
50:59>> You're going to you going to dude it's
51:00going to be you're going to like do some
51:02crazy stuff. I'm so sure. Oh my god.
51:06Like 10 years from now, what's a
51:09business like this going to look like?
51:11It's going to be it's going to be
51:12stupid.
51:14>> And of course a
51:15fairly sizable football podcast now off
51:17the back of it as well.
51:19Um and yeah, it's it's only going to
51:23grow arms and legs and I think
51:25uh
51:26it's one of those things
51:28you know if you know I don't know what
51:30your favorite sport is or whatever, but
51:33as a as a general guy,
51:36you're going to be passionate about your
51:38favorite basketball player or baseball
51:40player or whatever it's going to be. You
51:42don't really care about the money. It's
51:43it's it's a kind of hobby. It's a
51:45impulse buy and everything else. And
51:47that's the best thing you can sell. It's
51:48not selling SEO to a business who might
51:51or might not need
51:52your SEO. This is something that people
51:54[ __ ] would kill and fight over. You
51:57know a Michael Jordan card, you know you
51:59show that on a a live stream and
52:01whatnot, you're going to have all sorts
52:02of people bidding and
52:03you know going crazy for it. And
52:06you know it's kind of
52:07>> how have you done how I want to ask how
52:09big has the SEO been for this business?
52:15>> It's it's not outrageously big. You know
52:17I think the uh the live streaming and
52:20everything else is probably
52:23the biggest thing that's out there.
52:25Um you know live streaming on whatnot
52:27and stuff like that is to build up your
52:29following and build up your trust and
52:30authority in that niche. So I think you
52:33know you can't
52:34go and do SEO. I mean you can of course
52:36go and do SEO and and drive
52:39traffic in and everything else. But the
52:41SEO is the kind of final piece of the
52:43jigsaw from you had to do the live
52:44streaming first.
52:46>> Cuz I I was I was thinking like people
52:48were just searching they would just
52:49search the card that they would want to
52:51buy or the piece of
52:52memorabilia that they would want to buy
52:54or maybe the type they would just they
52:56would give a prompt to AI yeah I'm
52:57looking for something like this and you
52:59have all the metadata you have
53:00everything for for your pieces of
53:02memorabilia.
53:04>> Yeah.
53:04>> And you you've built up enough authority
53:06to your programmatic SEO
53:08memorabilia database. And so then yeah,
53:11it just populates.
53:13>> There will be an element to that, you
53:14know, where you're absolutely right.
53:17However, you know, if I want to buy a
53:18card, one of the first websites I'll go
53:20to is a a website called Card Hobby or
53:24I'm going to go to eBay because most
53:25people will sell on eBay or Vintage or
53:27or Card Hobby. That is where you go
53:31as a marketplace to sell those cards. So
53:33yes, there's a you know, there will be a
53:35proportion of people who simply search
53:37for it,
53:38but a lot of people will just go to eBay
53:41and promote the card
53:41>> Are you also targeting uh keywords like
53:44um trading card marketplace and things
53:46like that? Yeah.
53:47>> Yeah.
53:48Uh so
53:49>> Is that super competitive trading card
53:51marketplace?
53:53>> No.
53:54No.
53:54>> Is there volume there?
53:56>> There's decent volume there, yeah. Um so
53:59you know, there there there's decent
54:01volume there.
54:02It's whether
54:05It's whether you can build a brand big
54:06enough to take the majority of traffic
54:08away from the marketplaces that are
54:09already there is is probably going to be
54:11your biggest thing, but like I say, I'm
54:14not saying SEO is not important for it
54:16and and you know, you're 100% right. You
54:18can do everything you just discussed
54:20um and obviously get some decent
54:23traction and decent traffic from that.
54:25Um
54:27and obviously you can give a lot of
54:28educational stuff out because I made a
54:29lot of mistakes when I was getting into
54:31this trading card niche because I didn't
54:32understand the licensing of the cards.
54:35So I would see a card
54:37and it would look really good and it was
54:38signed by whoever it may be.
54:42I didn't really understand the
54:43licensing, all these other little
54:44nuances in the niche. So I was buying
54:46these cards, but they had no resale
54:48value. Um
54:50so
54:51in terms of people getting into the
54:52hobby and searching for stuff and
54:54educating them and stuff like that, I
54:56think you know, you would pick up a lot
54:57of traffic from a lot of that stuff as
54:58well because these are all things I made
55:01mistakes on and I was sat with a whole
55:02bunch of cards
55:04that I really couldn't sell for the
55:05money that I bought them for um, because
55:07I
55:08I was just naive and a rookie, um, to to
55:11the niche. And, like I say, there's
55:13certain, uh,
55:15companies like Panini, Topps, and
55:17various other ones that are out there
55:18who own the licensing to a lot of those
55:20cards. And there are other people who
55:22are not licensed who sell really nice
55:24cards, but they're not worth a [ __ ] as a
55:27uh an investment, if that makes sense.
55:29Um,
55:31but yeah. So it you know, it's like
55:33anything.
55:35You've got to go in and
55:37just make mistakes and it it costs you
55:39money in the short term, but you know,
55:41it's a massive learning curve and you've
55:42just got to adapt very quickly to
55:45to kind of a new niche. And uh you know,
55:48and like I say, with the trading cards
55:49as well, if you can buy a raw card and
55:52you can then get that graded, you're
55:54going to double uh or triple the value
55:56of of of the card. And if you hold on to
55:59it for a year or whatever, you know, one
56:02of my footballing idols, uh, Diego
56:04Maradona, Argentinian guy,
56:07he's dead now.
56:08Uh, now his cards are so rare because he
56:10can't sign them anymore. There's
56:13there's no more memorabilia to go in
56:14those cards. So the the price of his
56:16cards are only ever going to go up. So
56:18when you buy it or get a card like that
56:21and you hold it for five or 10 years,
56:23it's only ever going to shoot up in
56:24price. And you know, people have created
56:26databases of the value of the cards and
56:28everything as well. So again, you could
56:30add all of that to your um
56:32yourself, you know, when you're using
56:34Claude or or or whatever you wanted to
56:36use to to build these things out. So you
56:38know, there's a lot of people building
56:39apps for that kind of stuff and how to
56:41to kind of value these cards and you
56:43know, project where the market's going
56:45and what ones you should maybe sell.
56:47Because equally,
56:49it's all right buying a card and you
56:51feel it's only ever going to go up. You
56:53could buy a card and the guy turns to
56:54[ __ ] or goes to jail or he does
56:56something he shouldn't have and the
56:58value of his card's going to go down. So
57:00you kind of need to have some
57:02understanding of the the people that
57:05you're buying the
57:08you you the cards the the of the the
57:10guys that you're following. Like Michael
57:11Jordan, for example, his cards are only
57:13ever going to skyrocket because he
57:15doesn't really sign cards anymore. And
57:16he's he's not a bad guy and he's always
57:18going to be seen as a legend unless, you
57:20know, he goes and
57:22murders someone
57:23you know, next week. I don't really see
57:25his cards really going down in value.
57:27Um you know, he's a real icon
57:30uh in that space and he's the kind of
57:31dream cards for a lot of people.
57:35>> It's interesting how you're like I made
57:37every mistake. That's
57:38Making every mistake that's why I hate
57:40uh shiny object syndrome so much is
57:42because
57:44like people go from niche to niche to
57:45niche just thinking they're going to win
57:47the lottery with their next niche. Like
57:49oh my god, I heard about this niche. I
57:51Or like what's everybody doing right
57:52now? They're they're getting into data
57:54brokerage, like trying to sell data to
57:57AI companies. But with any niche that
57:59you go into, there's going to be a
58:01million little nuances that are going to
58:04suck your time, going to suck your
58:05resources or start trying to start a
58:07PBN. You you heard some heard a guest of
58:10mine come on the show being like yeah,
58:11PBNs are great and they don't tell you
58:13the little nuances that you got to
58:15figure out on your own and and then you
58:17it and it's not great like they said it
58:19would be because you don't know these
58:20nuances and you like yeah. And so
58:24um
58:25that's why I'm really not a fan of of
58:26like like that's why I'm like when you
58:28stick with this for 10 years, you're
58:30going to have like the biggest
58:31memorabilia empire because then 10 years
58:33you're going to have like all those
58:34nuances like figured out.
58:36Um back to SEO, I want to ask you uh
58:38what what are your most reliable link
58:41acquisition tactics?
58:46>> I think
58:47trying to be creative uh
58:50and coming up with stories um is is what
58:53I'm currently doing for
58:56the the card niche in particular. You
58:58know, if you get a card of so and so and
59:00whatever, it's very easy to
59:02if you're creatively minded to come up
59:04with a narrative
59:06that the newspapers and everything else
59:07will will absolutely pick up. And you
59:09know, I think real digital PR, if you
59:12want to call it that.
59:14For what I'm doing is is really simple
59:16and really easy, but also
59:18uh
59:19what I'm doing to help the card thing is
59:21I'm getting big football guests on
59:24and doing podcasts with them and trying
59:26to get them to tell stories or say
59:29things. For example, had a guy today uh
59:32ex-football player
59:34who got addicted to painkillers
59:37and uh
59:39nearly killed himself. Now everyone
59:41thinks because he's a multimillionaire,
59:43people don't suffer from mental health
59:44and whatever else. Now this isn't a a
59:47link acquisition tactic as such.
59:50It's a great story to hear of someone of
59:52an elite level
59:54having suffered things that you know
59:56everyone suffers from. Um and
59:59of course
1:00:01the marketer inside me
1:00:03is going to leverage those stories
1:00:06to get
1:00:08the links that I need
1:00:10to prepare myself up there if that makes
1:00:12sense. That's that's very basic stuff,
1:00:15but it's
1:00:15>> How How do you leverage How do you
1:00:16leverage a story like that to to So are
1:00:19you sending that to or like cuz what are
1:00:21you going to do? You're going to get
1:00:22links to the podcast on Spotify or the
1:00:26podcast on YouTube.
1:00:27How would you Or would you What would
1:00:29you
1:00:30Pardon Pardon me?
1:00:31>> To our or to my card website. And so
1:00:33I've got card website with the podcast
1:00:35and everything embedded on it.
1:00:37>> But if I'm a if I'm a reporter, if if
1:00:39I'm a journalist and I'm putting up a
1:00:42story about um
1:00:44the this football player who's having
1:00:46mental health issues, why am I going to
1:00:48link to the card website and not to the
1:00:50podcast episode where the player is
1:00:52talking about it?
1:00:53>> Most journalists will do both. Um you
1:00:56know it's up to you. I'm I'm pitching
1:00:57the journalist. I'm going to them saying
1:01:00do you want this? Do you want that?
1:01:01Here's what I want. Um so you know
1:01:05some of these podcasts are not released
1:01:06yet and I I can reach out to the
1:01:08journalist saying here is the topic.
1:01:10Here's what happened with this guy.
1:01:12I will give you this, but here's what I
1:01:14want in return. Um, so you're able to
1:01:17also, you know, get your brand and
1:01:18everything put out there. Now,
1:01:21obviously there's
1:01:23different things for different niches,
1:01:25but there's a lot of things that happen
1:01:27in the sporting world where I can get
1:01:29press relatively easy um because I you
1:01:33know, I've had some of the biggest names
1:01:34in the world uh on on my podcast from a
1:01:38sporting perspective uh and it's very
1:01:40very easy for me to then do link
1:01:42building
1:01:43uh as as a result of that. So that's
1:01:44probably the quickest, easiest, and most
1:01:47powerful thing to do because not only am
1:01:49I building links to the YouTube channel
1:01:51because of course they will maybe put
1:01:52clips in there linked to the YouTube
1:01:54channel, they're they're also giving me
1:01:56my brand mention uh and stuff like that
1:01:59as well, but they will also link to my
1:02:00website as well because we obviously
1:02:01take the transcription, put that on the
1:02:03website and everything else as well. So
1:02:06you know,
1:02:07it again it's up to up to to you to
1:02:09build those relationships with the the
1:02:11journalists and if they want that
1:02:13article
1:02:14which is going to be a hot topic, then
1:02:17you know, I've already got about six
1:02:18journalists saying I want a story, I
1:02:19want a story, I want a story. I only
1:02:21recorded the podcast this morning uh
1:02:23with the guy uh
1:02:25and you know, the guy hasn't done many
1:02:27podcasts talking about that topic, you
1:02:30know, and we even had the guy's wife on
1:02:32giving her perspective of what it was
1:02:34like living with someone
1:02:36who had addiction, he was hiding it from
1:02:38his wife, what impact it had on his
1:02:39family. So there's so many things out
1:02:42there from a marketer perspective that
1:02:45you can do to to to leverage link
1:02:48building and of course from there I can
1:02:50also go and do your syndicated, your
1:02:52Yahoo finances, I can get guest posts, I
1:02:54can do all of the other kind of stuff,
1:02:56but
1:02:57as we all know
1:03:00as SEOs,
1:03:01it's different for a plumber. You cannot
1:03:03go and get a high profile, you know, New
1:03:06York Times to start talking about some
1:03:08little plumber in Ohio, for example.
1:03:12What are you going to say that this guy
1:03:15that this guy did?
1:03:16>> You could. You could. You could start a
1:03:17podcast. You could start a podcast, get
1:03:19on bigger and bigger guests, and then
1:03:21get interesting stories, and then you
1:03:23build up This is what you've done. This
1:03:25is what I I mean I literally made an
1:03:26episode about it, and it didn't perform
1:03:28very well because people don't want to
1:03:30put in the work to do this. Or SEOs they
1:03:32they don't want to have a They don't
1:03:34want to have a podcast. But like you
1:03:36build up a rolodex of journalists who
1:03:39trust you, who are going to give you who
1:03:41are going to give you that that
1:03:43the the link to your website in exchange
1:03:46for stories. And now you're not spam in
1:03:49their inbox. Maybe some of them will
1:03:50even give you their WhatsApp because
1:03:51they know that you're delivering the
1:03:53goods, and you build up a rolodex and
1:03:55you have that. So something that I I I'm
1:03:57funding a um
1:03:58We're We're I'm funding a vibe coded
1:04:00SaaS that's growing off of my method of
1:04:02SEO. And one of the things that we're
1:04:04doing is we started a podcast to invite
1:04:08on niche bloggers, like bloggers in our
1:04:10niche, because we just want to create
1:04:12relationships with them so they'll link
1:04:13to us in the future. Or like um people
1:04:16who are in adjacent businesses that are
1:04:18still like relevant to our audience,
1:04:20where their backlinks will also matter
1:04:22to us. They're in an adjacent business.
1:04:24We invite them on. We talk to them. And
1:04:26then in the future we're like, hey yeah
1:04:28it'd be awesome if you could write a
1:04:29story about us or list us as a partner
1:04:30and maybe we could do something else
1:04:32together. And they trust us. And then
1:04:34you climb up the chain. You get bigger
1:04:35and bigger guests. Like when I started
1:04:37this podcast, I didn't think I was going
1:04:38to have Gary Vaynerchuk on the show. I
1:04:40didn't think I was going to have Craig
1:04:41Campbell on the show. And like and you
1:04:44know you just you get bigger and bigger
1:04:45people. And um
1:04:48and
1:04:49that's what it's about. That's like
1:04:50that's amazing what you're doing. That's
1:04:52so And honestly those links Like be
1:04:55honest with me. How much better are
1:04:57those links than like the Black Hat
1:04:58stuff where you actually get like real
1:05:00journalists like
1:05:02>> 10 times better. They're They're
1:05:03obviously coming from real trusted
1:05:05websites that are
1:05:07DR 90 whatever, you know.
1:05:10It Things just happen a lot quicker and
1:05:13a lot faster.
1:05:15And you're a lot more trusted. And
1:05:18that
1:05:20>> And it repeats. You can
1:05:21>> do it again and again and again.
1:05:23>> Um, but like you say, know, if I get a
1:05:25top-tier footballer on,
1:05:27the the journalists are begging me,
1:05:29Craig, who have you got on next? Who
1:05:30have you got on? You know,
1:05:32what have you got for me? I need
1:05:33something different, you know? And uh
1:05:36it's it's insane how it works um out
1:05:39there. And like you say, you've just got
1:05:41to be creative with it. And And for me,
1:05:44I'm at an age in my career where I've
1:05:45done all the goofy stuff,
1:05:47tried this, done that, blown up this,
1:05:49you know, done all the blog commenting.
1:05:52It's
1:05:53you know, doing it this way
1:05:55is a lot easier, a lot faster, a lot
1:05:57simpler. Uh
1:05:59but like you say,
1:06:00there is additional work that goes into
1:06:02that and getting those guests and going
1:06:04to do the podcasts.
1:06:06And that's the biggest thing. People
1:06:07don't want to do any work. They want the
1:06:09links to land in their plate and you're
1:06:11not You're never going to get that, you
1:06:12know. The reality is
1:06:14the New York Times is or, you know,
1:06:16whatever you
1:06:18you're trying to get yourself on,
1:06:19they're not just going to drop
1:06:21you on their website. You You're going
1:06:23to have to offer them some value as
1:06:25well. And you know, whether that comes
1:06:26under stories or or whatever you're
1:06:28going to do. So, you know,
1:06:30it it is it's all about turning up and
1:06:32and, you know,
1:06:34doing a bit of hard graft. And of
1:06:35course, uh you know, that's where a lot
1:06:37of the kind of goofy stuff goes out the
1:06:39window and
1:06:40uh
1:06:41and life just becomes a bit easier. It
1:06:43It It's crazy to say that, but
1:06:45um yeah. That's That's how I You know,
1:06:48that's my to to answer answer your
1:06:50question in a nutshell. That is my go-to
1:06:53kind of link strategy for now, but
1:06:55obviously it's taken me 25 years of
1:06:57doing SEO
1:06:58to be able to
1:07:00have the mindset, the patience, the the
1:07:02foresight and everything else to to now
1:07:05navigate through those waters and be
1:07:07able to do it
1:07:08the way I'm doing it now.
1:07:10>> Well, you're doing SEO like a PR person.
1:07:13And that's the best form That is the
1:07:14best form of SEO.
1:07:16Like um that's it's holistic marketing
1:07:19is the best SEO. Holistic marketing with
1:07:22an understanding of keywords and
1:07:23backlinks and authority
1:07:25is and just basic SEO technical
1:07:28fundamentals. That's the best way to do
1:07:30SEO.
1:07:31>> Yeah.
1:07:31>> no like if you're going viral, if you're
1:07:34getting interesting stories, if you have
1:07:36a viral linkable asset, there no link
1:07:39building budget is going to get you
1:07:40that. I'm sorry.
1:07:42It's not. And and now you can hit up
1:07:44these journalists on repeat and say I
1:07:45have a new story for you for you and you
1:07:48can just get repeat like there's there's
1:07:50nothing better than that. But
1:07:51unfortunately, the audience wants to
1:07:53hear the stupid stuff. The audience
1:07:55wants to hear the the Craig Campbell is
1:07:58automating link building, which they
1:08:00want to hear. And I I read that you are
1:08:01automating link building. How do you
1:08:03automate link building, Craig Campbell?
1:08:06>> So it's not me personally who's
1:08:08automating it. I am the face behind a
1:08:11brand called Backlinko,
1:08:13which
1:08:15previously built SEO Autopilot and SEO
1:08:18Neo.
1:08:20Um now
1:08:22the reason
1:08:23that they built that in the first place
1:08:26was because you've got tools like
1:08:27automated link building tools like Money
1:08:29Robot.
1:08:30And the guy is an SEO who is always
1:08:33using Money Robot. And the biggest
1:08:34problem
1:08:35or biggest frustration he had with Money
1:08:37Robot was
1:08:40the lack of fresh inventory
1:08:43was the biggest problem.
1:08:45So that 's why he decided to build SEO
1:08:48Autopilot and SEO Neo because he was
1:08:50able to, you know, being his own tool,
1:08:53he could control fresh inventory and
1:08:55everything else that that you know goes
1:08:57on there. And
1:08:59so yeah,
1:09:00you know, they they have built
1:09:03Autopilot Neo and now have recently
1:09:05launched Backlinks, which is their own
1:09:09tool. You know, it's Web 2.0 and a whole
1:09:11bunch of other stuff all mixed in. And
1:09:14of course, they're adding
1:09:16I don't know the exact figures, but
1:09:17several thousand new
1:09:20domain names per month
1:09:23to that inventory as well.
1:09:25And it's literally a push-button
1:09:26exercise. So you can put in your
1:09:30you know, URL. You You can also you
1:09:33know, put in your YouTube channel and
1:09:35various other things. It will scrape
1:09:37your keywords, it will scrape your
1:09:38videos and everything else
1:09:40and then go and do it all for you.
1:09:42Literally push-button exercise and
1:09:44there's a video on my YouTube showing
1:09:45you exactly how simple and how easy that
1:09:47is. Um now
1:09:50I'm not going to sit here and say it's
1:09:51giving you the the New York Times. Uh
1:09:54and I keep referring to the New York
1:09:56Times. I don't know why. It's not giving
1:09:58you links of that stature. Of course
1:09:59it's not. You know, it it it's web 2.0s
1:10:02and and you know, all of those type of
1:10:04links that So they're not
1:10:08they're not high-powered PR links or by
1:10:11any stretch of the imagination. Of
1:10:12course they're not. But these links do
1:10:15serve a a a purpose and and the market
1:10:17like we said before for power and stuff
1:10:19up, for retaining stuff in Google's
1:10:20index.
1:10:21And you know, there's obviously wiki
1:10:22stacking in there uh and there's various
1:10:25other things for uh map listings and
1:10:27directional requests and everything else
1:10:29all built into the tool as well. You can
1:10:31do brand awareness stuff on all of these
1:10:34websites as well. So there's a whole
1:10:36heap of stuff that you can do on there
1:10:39and like I say, it is not doing uh
1:10:43digital PR to top tier publications. I
1:10:45want to make that part very very clear
1:10:47uh
1:10:48because that's what people come back to
1:10:51me going, oh Craig, you're promoting
1:10:52this and you [ __ ] said it done brand
1:10:54awareness and you know, it gave me this.
1:10:57It's still doing brand awareness. It's
1:10:58just not on the websites that you think
1:11:01you should be getting for 50 quid a
1:11:02month or you know, 100 quid a month to
1:11:04use the tool. You know, let's be
1:11:05realistic about it. Um so you know, it
1:11:08it's a much simpler newer version of of
1:11:11the likes of Money Robot um and and
1:11:14tools like that. Um and just you know,
1:11:17it's been built
1:11:18SEO autopilot.
1:11:20You needed proxies, you needed uh you
1:11:23know,
1:11:24emails and everything else to get that
1:11:25thing to work and do its thing. And
1:11:28it was just clunky and SEOs didn't want
1:11:30to go to all that trouble to make it
1:11:32work. So,
1:11:34for now, they've made it a hell of a lot
1:11:35easier where it is literally putting in
1:11:37the information and click the button
1:11:39start button and off it will go and do
1:11:41all of your stuff for you and it'll give
1:11:43you a big PDF
1:11:44um of all all the links that it it's
1:11:47going to do. And even if you were to go
1:11:48out and buy citations,
1:11:51you can go in and just give all of your
1:11:52citations a blast with that stuff as
1:11:53well and it'll go and do them all for
1:11:55you. Um so very sophisticated
1:11:58uh
1:12:00nifty little tool that that is going to
1:12:01make people's lives a hell of a lot
1:12:04easier. So, that is the automation, but
1:12:06like I said, I don't want to sit there
1:12:08and make out like it's
1:12:11you know it's doing something it's not
1:12:12and and I think when you speak on these
1:12:14kind of things,
1:12:16people twist what you've said and or
1:12:18don't understand what you've said and
1:12:19try and make
1:12:20you know make it like you said something
1:12:22else. Um you know it is what it is um
1:12:26and you know it is a tiered link
1:12:27building tool, but I think there's a lot
1:12:29of value um in doing that, you know
1:12:31certainly from an indexation point of
1:12:33view or even you know blasting your PBNs
1:12:35with that stuff or whatever your
1:12:37strategy may be,
1:12:39you can utilize that tool to do it.
1:12:43>> In uh in 2019, you said you bought a
1:12:47website for £10,000. You spent £4,000
1:12:51improving its content and links and then
1:12:53you you sold it for £48,000
1:12:56within 4 months. So, spend of £14,000
1:13:00and then within 4 months you sold it for
1:13:03£48,000. Can you share that story and if
1:13:06the strategy still works today?
1:13:08>> Um it's not going to
1:13:10fortunately work uh today. I mean it it
1:13:13will work to some degree, but you know
1:13:15at that time it was you know the old
1:13:18Amazon affiliate websites
1:13:20and uh
1:13:21you know you were getting good
1:13:22commissions and everything at that at
1:13:23that point as well. Um
1:13:26now what I was looking for was
1:13:30an SEO
1:13:31or not an SEO,
1:13:32an enthusiast who thought they were
1:13:34going to make these niche websites, who
1:13:36put lots of content on there because
1:13:38content was my biggest pain point.
1:13:40Writing content or getting someone to
1:13:42write the content was the biggest
1:13:43[ __ ] pain in the ass. So I was
1:13:45looking at these marketplaces and you
1:13:47know, I seen this website and the guy
1:13:48had poured his heart and soul into it
1:13:51in terms of writing the content and you
1:13:53know, and everything else. He hadn't
1:13:54monetized it properly. Uh he didn't even
1:13:57have the right Amazon links on there. He
1:13:59didn't understand internal linking. He
1:14:01didn't understand backlinks. So
1:14:03when I see that and I see the keywords
1:14:06that potentially could rank for with a,
1:14:08you know, a little bit of a push,
1:14:10I'm like wow.
1:14:12Um you know, so
1:14:13what does he want? You know, the guy's
1:14:15saying to me I want 10 grand for it. Now
1:14:17was there 10 grand worth of content on
1:14:18that website? Absolutely. Of course
1:14:20there was. There was like hundreds and
1:14:22hundreds and hundreds of articles on it,
1:14:24but the guy just wasn't
1:14:26savvy enough to
1:14:28to make it work. Um and you know, for
1:14:30many years I used to do that and and you
1:14:33know, I
1:14:34I've said it at presentations, I felt a
1:14:35bit like a vulture um at times because
1:14:38you are looking to take advantage of
1:14:40someone who just doesn't know or doesn't
1:14:42know how to monetize or do the backlink
1:14:44link inside the things cuz
1:14:46even just now, you know, you hear a lot
1:14:48of people doing really good on page,
1:14:49good technical, good everything,
1:14:51but they fall down on the backlink side
1:14:53of things. So for me uh that was the
1:14:57easiest part for me. So being able to
1:14:58plug that side into
1:15:00all of the hard work that that guy had
1:15:02done and and monetize it and you know,
1:15:05get Amazon affiliates on there and
1:15:06everything else,
1:15:08I was able to then flip that on because
1:15:09at the time
1:15:11um you were getting between 35
1:15:14and 50 times your monthly uh
1:15:18money um from websites like Empire
1:15:21Flippers and everything else. And uh you
1:15:23know, being able to scale that up and I
1:15:25of course I did go in and add more
1:15:26content to it as well uh and various
1:15:29other bits and bobs and get rid of a lot
1:15:31of the dead wood cuz there were hundreds
1:15:33of articles on there, and a lot of them
1:15:35were not doing anything. So, you know,
1:15:38what I'd have to do is prune a lot of
1:15:40that content and you know, do bits and
1:15:42bobs like that as well. But, you know,
1:15:43very very quickly I was able to to, you
1:15:46know, turn that around and then
1:15:48obviously sell it onto someone else. And
1:15:51you know, for for years
1:15:54I I kind of done that strategy, but
1:15:56there came a point, I think it was
1:15:58I can't remember the exact timing, but
1:15:59it came to about the end of 2020.
1:16:02[clears throat and snorts]
1:16:03And Amazon cut the commission again.
1:16:06They'd done it
1:16:07twice in the previous couple of years
1:16:09before that as well
1:16:10to the point where that strategy was no
1:16:12longer effective. Now,
1:16:15that was in a different era. We didn't
1:16:16have AI to write the content, so I had
1:16:18to pay a content writer to, you know,
1:16:21write this, write that, write that all
1:16:23day long, bang bang bang bang bang. Now,
1:16:26is that still effective today? Probably
1:16:29not, because you know, you had the
1:16:30helpful content update and a lot of
1:16:32these websites ranked for like the best
1:16:34cookers or the best golf balls or the
1:16:36best golf jackets or whatever it might
1:16:38be. Now,
1:16:40is that strategy still viable just now?
1:16:44No, because obviously the commissions
1:16:46are so low on Amazon. Now, could you do
1:16:49stuff like that? Yeah, but it's probably
1:16:51just not worth your while, because you
1:16:52you know, I I've got friends who do
1:16:54Amazon just now and they're like, Craig,
1:16:55I've sold 50,000 worth of products,
1:16:59you know, to Amazon, you know, in terms
1:17:00of what Amazon would make from it,
1:17:02and I've been paid about,
1:17:04you know, 1,200 quid. You know, the
1:17:06commissions are shite. So, you know, the
1:17:08risk against the reward of going into
1:17:10something like that is is extremely
1:17:12difficult now. And
1:17:14like I say, the biggest thing I was
1:17:15looking for was
1:17:17someone who had written unique content
1:17:19that ranked and had traffic, and but
1:17:21they just didn't know. You know, it
1:17:23might have been stuck in position seven
1:17:24or position eight or whatever it might
1:17:26be. And all I'm going to do is give a
1:17:27little blast and, you know,
1:17:29get it get it up to position one for a
1:17:31lot of those search terms. So, like I
1:17:32say, it was a bit like a vultures game
1:17:34for a while.
1:17:36And I done that, but you know, one of
1:17:37the reasons I sold that website very
1:17:39quickly is
1:17:41[clears throat] I bought the website
1:17:44on a whim. I was bored and I bought it
1:17:47in a whim.
1:17:48I didn't really
1:17:49give a [ __ ] I just wanted to to buy a
1:17:51website.
1:17:53And it was a golfing website.
1:17:55And the problem I have with that um was
1:17:57it was a UK based website
1:18:00is golf
1:18:02products only sell from March until
1:18:05September, October.
1:18:07And then the sales
1:18:09dipped down
1:18:10very very quickly. Um, so I was aware of
1:18:13that. So I scaled it up to the highest
1:18:15possible point
1:18:17knowing that it was obviously going to
1:18:19tail off. I didn't want a website that
1:18:21was in a seasonal niche. I want a
1:18:23website that's going to make me money
1:18:24all year round. So scaled it up very
1:18:26very quickly, flipped it on, and then
1:18:28obviously
1:18:29uh someone else had to deal with the
1:18:30seasonality or or whatever it was going
1:18:32to be. So
1:18:34yeah,
1:18:34I bought it and then realized that it
1:18:36probably wasn't the right niche, that
1:18:38particular website. Whereas if I'd done
1:18:40anything else like diesel generators or
1:18:43hunting scopes or whatever, people are
1:18:44buying that [ __ ] all year round. I
1:18:46stupidly bought a [ __ ] golf website.
1:18:48I don't know why. I don't even like
1:18:50golf. Um, but it was purely you know, a
1:18:52business financial investment. You know,
1:18:55it doesn't matter to me whether it's a
1:18:56golf website or
1:18:59a [ __ ] camera website. It makes no
1:19:00difference to me. SEO's SEO. You know,
1:19:02it
1:19:03really doesn't matter. I'm not touching
1:19:04the product, so I don't give a [ __ ] But
1:19:07you know, that that was another lesson
1:19:09that I learned where I just jumped in
1:19:10two-footed
1:19:12and
1:19:13bought a seasonal website. And again,
1:19:15part of that presentation that I gave
1:19:17was trying to avoid websites with
1:19:18seasonality because
1:19:21it's not really what you want as a
1:19:22businessman.
1:19:24>> Last year, so speaking about you talked
1:19:26about AI content now. Um, so last year
1:19:29you said you tested publishing unedited
1:19:31unedited AI generated content on
1:19:34multiple websites.
1:19:36And after about 6 months, every site
1:19:39suffered an algorithmic penalty.
1:19:41>> Yeah.
1:19:41>> share what happened there? Because like
1:19:43I think a lot of people are like they're
1:19:44still like yeah,
1:19:47push it out, push out the AI slop.
1:19:49>> Yeah.
1:19:50>> is that a viable strategy? Is pushing
1:19:51out the AI slop a viable strategy,
1:19:53Craig?
1:19:55Maybe for the short term, but you know,
1:19:57it's one of those things that is going
1:19:58to get slapped at the end of the day.
1:20:02You know, and and you know, what we
1:20:03wanted to do, we were using a tool auto
1:20:06blogging
1:20:08was it SEO auto blogging or auto
1:20:10blogging SEO or whatever it was going to
1:20:12be. And then Dean
1:20:14Duly was involved in this website
1:20:15actually. And you know, the job was to
1:20:18create a website and we put 1,200
1:20:20articles on it.
1:20:22Like
1:20:23pure
1:20:24AI slop. We didn't give a [ __ ]
1:20:27Smashed it out there. Now, of course,
1:20:29the traffic did take a massive upwards
1:20:32turn.
1:20:33And then, you know, as I say, six months
1:20:35later, it it got slammed and and the the
1:20:38the stuff never came back. Now, what we
1:20:39wanted to we were expecting and
1:20:42anticipating that to happen.
1:20:44What we wanted to try and see was if we
1:20:47took that AI content off of there and
1:20:49put other content on, would we be able
1:20:52to recover that website?
1:20:54We couldn't.
1:20:55Could not for love nor money get that
1:20:58website to come back. Now,
1:21:00from there, we just wanted to understand
1:21:02if you do do that, are you going to
1:21:04damage your domain name long term even
1:21:06if you took that [ __ ] down?
1:21:08The answer for us was absolutely we
1:21:10could not recover that [ __ ] thing at
1:21:13all.
1:21:14And sure, you know, there there's people
1:21:16out there who'll say,
1:21:17yeah, full of [ __ ] Craig. You know,
1:21:19I've got this AI website, blah blah blah
1:21:20blah. And sure, you may have slipped
1:21:23under
1:21:24you know, an algorithmic update or
1:21:26whatever it's going to be, but it's only
1:21:28a matter of time where you are going to
1:21:29get hammered for it and and you are not
1:21:31going to recover. You are going to have
1:21:32to go and get a new domain name and
1:21:35rinse and repeat and rinse and repeat.
1:21:36Now, you ask is that a viable strategy?
1:21:39Maybe for some people in certain
1:21:41countries or you know, whatever, maybe
1:21:42someone enjoys doing that, but as I get
1:21:45older, do I want to keep working harder
1:21:47and reviving stuff? I would lose the
1:21:49motivation, you know, if I if I had a
1:21:51website for three, four months and I got
1:21:53it up to £10,000 a month just as an
1:21:55example, and then it gets slapped
1:21:58and I'm going, [ __ ] I'm going to have
1:21:59to do all that again, bang bang. And you
1:22:01know,
1:22:02you can talk about AI slop, there's
1:22:04still an element of work that goes into
1:22:06that and you know, prompting and
1:22:07everything else. Um, you know, so are
1:22:10are you going to lose motivation? Are
1:22:12you going to lose the will to live?
1:22:13Absolutely. And and I don't see it as a
1:22:15viable strategy, but like I say, uh, I'm
1:22:18sure there's guys out there who will
1:22:19disagree with me and say, you know, it
1:22:21absolutely is and and you know, maybe
1:22:23they've got teams or or whatever and and
1:22:25they just churn and burn that stuff and
1:22:26you know, there are people who do churn
1:22:28and burn websites, um, but it's not for
1:22:30me and I I found that
1:22:32uh, that we we couldn't recover it
1:22:34either.
1:22:35>> The wisest the wisest uh, business
1:22:38people are not churn and burn. They
1:22:40build a brand that can compound because
1:22:42the consequences of having to start a
1:22:44new brand or get into a new niche are
1:22:47really catastrophic because you have to
1:22:48learn everything from the start.
1:22:50It's it's so much easier to to just like
1:22:53scale, like multiply your revenue and
1:22:56cut your and cut your costs
1:22:59if you stay within the same niche, stay
1:23:01within the same the same site.
1:23:03Um, so much easier. Are there uh, so are
1:23:06there black hat SEO tactics that you
1:23:08would actually use on a money site that
1:23:10you are operating long-term?
1:23:13Are there any tactics? There's no black
1:23:15hat SEO tactics that you would use on a
1:23:17money site or a money brand. Let's say
1:23:19even a brand. Maybe it's not even the
1:23:20website, but it's the brand.
1:23:23>> I mean, would I go out and get an
1:23:25expired domain name and leverage that to
1:23:28to do something? Of course, you know, I
1:23:30don't know if that's seen as black hat
1:23:31or not, you know,
1:23:33it's it's it's it's
1:23:34it's it's
1:23:36you know,
1:23:37you know, something like that, would I
1:23:38absolutely do it? You know, if I and
1:23:40I've done it, you know, I I I I gave and
1:23:43I again I've done a presentation on
1:23:44this.
1:23:45There was a hotel chain that went bust
1:23:47in the UK
1:23:48um [snorts] years ago, and the hotel
1:23:50chain was worth about 150 million. Um
1:23:53and when they went bust, it was all over
1:23:55the press and you know they had a lot of
1:23:56backlinks and everything talking about
1:23:58them, you know everything else. Now
1:24:01when I seen that company go bust, I then
1:24:04started watching their domain name and
1:24:06when it was going to expire. Now I took
1:24:08that domain name now they they had a
1:24:09Wikipedia page for that company. They
1:24:11they had a knowledge panel. They had you
1:24:13know backlinks that I would kill for,
1:24:16you know from the you know all of the
1:24:17kind of top publications and everything
1:24:19else. Now for me it would be stupid
1:24:24not to leverage something like that. Um
1:24:26now what I done with that particular
1:24:28website was I put it back up uh
1:24:31not the way it was but you know my own
1:24:33version of it and and it was a
1:24:34booking.com affiliate website because
1:24:36the hotels were gone that they were
1:24:38originally on there.
1:24:39But was I able to monetize that and make
1:24:41money? Absolutely and you know some
1:24:43people would probably say that is black
1:24:45hat but again I wouldn't consider that
1:24:48black or grey hat. That's just common
1:24:50sense. If you've done work for 10 years
1:24:53and you know
1:24:54whatever's happened bankruptcy or or you
1:24:57just gave up or whatever it might be
1:24:59can I can I leverage what you've done uh
1:25:02or or does it just go in the bin? And I
1:25:04think you know as a human being I'd be
1:25:06stupid not to take advantage of you know
1:25:08your hard working effort if you're just
1:25:09going to throw it in the bin. And you
1:25:11know and it's perfectly legal to to buy
1:25:13an expired domain name so I don't really
1:25:15see that as as black hat but obviously
1:25:17there'll be people out there that would
1:25:19see that.
1:25:19>> let me ask you this. Would you do
1:25:20something like maybe you have your your
1:25:22long term money brand and
1:25:25you recreate the content in some way on
1:25:29um your long term money brand. You buy
1:25:31the expired domain and then you redirect
1:25:34all their ranking pages to the pages on
1:25:36your domain.
1:25:41>> I mean I have done it yeah. I I have
1:25:43absolutely done it but would I do it
1:25:45with my card website and stuff just now?
1:25:47No, I probably wouldn't. I don't need
1:25:48to.
1:25:49You know, it's one of those things where
1:25:51>> worth the risk.
1:25:52>> Yeah, it's not worth the risk. Now, do I
1:25:54need to do that just now? Can I do it?
1:25:56Absolutely. If [snorts] I was finding it
1:25:59hard to get backlinks,
1:26:01then my decision may change.
1:26:05But do I have to do it just now to get
1:26:06backlinks or can I just keep doing what
1:26:08I'm doing and and not have to worry
1:26:09about anything?
1:26:11So, you know, you've got to weigh up the
1:26:14the situation you're in.
1:26:17Would I get penalized for doing that?
1:26:20Don't think so. To be honest, I've never
1:26:22seen a penalty for that. But would I do
1:26:24it on my my my card website just now?
1:26:26No, it's just not worth the risk. Like
1:26:28you say,
1:26:30there might only be a 5% risk or
1:26:31whatever it may be. You know, it's it's
1:26:34legal to take an expired domain name and
1:26:36do the redirects and everything else. Of
1:26:37course it is.
1:26:39However,
1:26:40you know, Google isn't the law. You
1:26:42know, they they they just don't want you
1:26:44manipulating their algorithm and if they
1:26:45caught you for that, there could come a
1:26:47period of time where someone says
1:26:49anyone who does that
1:26:50you know, is is is going to get a ding.
1:26:54So, I wouldn't be be risking it if I
1:26:56didn't have to, but like I say, some
1:26:58other people say
1:27:00Craig, no one's ever been penalized for
1:27:02that. You're full of [ __ ] again, but you
1:27:03know,
1:27:04no, I I wouldn't be doing it.
1:27:06>> I think the people I think the people
1:27:07who would say you're full of you're
1:27:09you're full of it are people who have
1:27:10not built any long-term businesses or
1:27:13are not trying to build long-term
1:27:14businesses themselves because when you
1:27:17understand the rewards that you get from
1:27:20operating for staying in the same niche
1:27:23and operating a business for years and
1:27:25how things can compound, the potential,
1:27:27when you understand that you don't want
1:27:29to get in you don't want to risk getting
1:27:31in the way of that for a little silly
1:27:34gain.
1:27:35And
1:27:36yeah.
1:27:37>> Exactly.
1:27:39So, no,
1:27:40you know, I wouldn't be risking that and
1:27:42I wouldn't be doing anything else that
1:27:43that potentially can harm or risk
1:27:46everything. Like you say, I think you
1:27:48know, realistically,
1:27:49good
1:27:50organic growth is what you want. And you
1:27:53don't want to be solely reliant on SEO
1:27:55either. That's why, you know, I'm in the
1:27:56perfect niche where I can live stream, I
1:27:58can use social media, I can do various
1:28:02other things to to to funnel traffic in
1:28:04there and I'm not over overly reliant on
1:28:07the the SEO side as well. So I am
1:28:09building something
1:28:10and I I think, you know, just with the
1:28:12way everything's going and AI overviews
1:28:14and everything else,
1:28:16can we fully focus on SEO anymore or or
1:28:19are our clicks being taken away?
1:28:22You know, obviously
1:28:23>> I think in your I think in your niche
1:28:24you absolutely can because like people
1:28:27are not going to
1:28:29the AI is not going to give them their
1:28:31age trading card. The AI is going to
1:28:33tell them a place to buy their AI age
1:28:35their their age excuse me trade trading
1:28:37card.
1:28:38>> Yeah.
1:28:39>> the the AI is going to redirect the
1:28:41people who want it to you.
1:28:44>> Yeah. So I mean it depends obviously in
1:28:46your niche, but the point being is
1:28:49I am now in a position where I don't
1:28:51want to be over reliant just on organic
1:28:53and I think a lot of the websites I had
1:28:54previously, Amazon affiliate websites
1:28:57and various other websites, I was 100%
1:29:00all out on
1:29:02you know, and and I felt it when Google
1:29:03were doing the updates and you know,
1:29:04your rank against
1:29:06your revenue drops and you're like for
1:29:07[ __ ] Um so, you know, I think over the
1:29:11over the years I've always tried to you
1:29:14know, I've got another business um that
1:29:16primarily uh most of the traffic comes
1:29:18from paid ads. Um now there there's a
1:29:21couple of reasons for that. Um you know,
1:29:24the the old website is built in Ruby on
1:29:26the Rails and it's just too much hassle
1:29:27to rebuild it, but it's got a back end,
1:29:29it's an e-com store that's got the all
1:29:32the uh
1:29:34Royal Mail and various other suppliers
1:29:36all attached to the back of it and it's
1:29:38just a hassle to get it rebuilt. But you
1:29:40know, we spend X on paper click and make
1:29:44Y back and it's highly profitable. It's
1:29:46you know, it's a very very niche market.
1:29:48Um people say why you not doing SEO?
1:29:50You're an SEO, why you not doing it? Why
1:29:51are you not doing it? Logistically,
1:29:54you know, the back end of that website's
1:29:55been built over a 15-year period. Uh,
1:29:58and it's it's borderline dysfunctional.
1:30:00Our developer hates us. He wants to
1:30:02leave. Um, and he's like, I don't want
1:30:05to manage this website anymore, but the,
1:30:07you know, the the other guy that's
1:30:08involved is just like,
1:30:10we can't. You know, I've spent x amount
1:30:12of money building this, building that,
1:30:14and having all this back end
1:30:15functionality to do everything we do.
1:30:17So, you know, for me, I I'm quite happy
1:30:20with that business and, you know, it's
1:30:21you you we invest x and you get y back.
1:30:24And again, it's a nice little uh revenue
1:30:27stream there. So,
1:30:28again,
1:30:30not overly reliant on SEO. I'd love to
1:30:31go in and do SEO too, but
1:30:33you know,
1:30:35we would cause ourselves some serious
1:30:36damage um by by doing that and taking it
1:30:40away from Ruby on the Rails and and and
1:30:41loss of revenue and everything else. So,
1:30:43it's it's it's a hard one to to swallow.
1:30:46Um, but yeah, it's uh all about,
1:30:50you know, thinking of return of
1:30:53investment and and risk against reward
1:30:55for me now.
1:30:56>> Is there
1:30:57do you Is there a well-known SEO best
1:30:59practice you think is completely useless
1:31:02but agencies keep recommending them
1:31:03anyway?
1:31:08>> God.
1:31:10I mean, I don't
1:31:12I don't know. No,
1:31:13I can't think of anything off the top of
1:31:15my head. Now, I do look at certain posts
1:31:17and I go, [ __ ] me, this guy's
1:31:20you know, selling some absolute dog [ __ ]
1:31:22here, you know, like, you know,
1:31:24extensive auditing and stuff. Now,
1:31:26I'm not saying auditing's not important.
1:31:28Um, you know, of course, technical SEO
1:31:30is important, content's important,
1:31:32off-site's important, and everything
1:31:34else.
1:31:35But, you know, I I do see a lot of
1:31:37agencies over a lot overly complicating
1:31:40things or become becoming overly
1:31:41technical and, you know, emphasizing
1:31:43that, you know, the audits is the
1:31:46the holy grail. Uh, and it's not, you
1:31:48know, there's so many other moving parts
1:31:49to SEO. Um, but you know, I don't really
1:31:52think agencies are doing
1:31:55certainly not from from where I'm from
1:31:56where you know they're doing the usual
1:31:58stuff you know your links your
1:32:01SEO and everything else they're all
1:32:03trying to pedal the good stuff whether
1:32:04they do a good job or not it's a
1:32:06different story um but you know I don't
1:32:09think agencies are peddling that much
1:32:12crap to be honest you know I think a lot
1:32:13of websites do need good technical good
1:32:15content strategy good uh branding and
1:32:18and and everything else that these
1:32:20agencies are pitching you know and I
1:32:21think building a brand and everything's
1:32:23super important as well and you see a
1:32:24lot of agencies going yeah branding
1:32:26branding branding
1:32:28and you know I think building a brand is
1:32:29is is
1:32:30is massively important you know not just
1:32:32necessarily from a link building
1:32:34perspective or anything else but I think
1:32:35just from a Google trust perspective um
1:32:38you know it's super important and you
1:32:39know I think that's a big part of things
1:32:41um so
1:32:42>> searches branded searches really matter?
1:32:44>> Yeah.
1:32:45Um you know I think just from a trust
1:32:48you know if Google see you know Edward
1:32:50Sturm
1:32:51you know being searched for all the time
1:32:53are they going to go
1:32:55this guy's a real deal we're going to
1:32:56give him a bit more or a bit more of
1:32:57course they are [ __ ] sake you know it's
1:33:00uh
1:33:01you know for me I think you know branded
1:33:03search is is massive in terms of a trust
1:33:06signal so you know and you could argue
1:33:09there I see a lot of people banging on
1:33:10about branding but they're not talking
1:33:11about this or they're not talking about
1:33:13that or they're not talking about uh you
1:33:15know
1:33:16[ __ ] answer engine optimization and
1:33:18all this kind of stuff
1:33:20you know everyone's got their own agenda
1:33:22and their own angle and I think you know
1:33:23for for a lot of the parts you know all
1:33:25of these things are are massively
1:33:26beneficial to any business and and it's
1:33:28like you or I we're not taking every box
1:33:31you know you could pick I could come to
1:33:33your website and pick all sorts of holes
1:33:34in it I'm sure I could I might be wrong
1:33:36on that on you personally but
1:33:38>> trust me you could.
1:33:40>> It's the same with me people say Craig
1:33:41why did you not do this why did you not
1:33:42do that just don't have the [ __ ] time
1:33:45uh or you know whatever so you know I'll
1:33:47get round to it um or whatever so you
1:33:51know not no no one out there's got the
1:33:53perfect strategy and I think you know
1:33:55just if you've got a business um you've
1:33:57to try and take as many of those boxes
1:33:59as you possibly can, whether it be brand
1:34:00building, off-page, on-page, technical,
1:34:03uh and so on and so forth. And, you
1:34:05know, sometimes budget just doesn't
1:34:07allow businesses to do everything that
1:34:09they would love to do. And And that's
1:34:10one of the biggest things I see with
1:34:12agencies, you know, they're out there
1:34:13saying promising the world,
1:34:16but they're only charging 500 bucks a
1:34:18month. And you're like, you cannot do
1:34:20all of this for 500 bucks a month for
1:34:22[ __ ] sake. Um you know, all of these
1:34:25things take time, effort, and money. Um
1:34:28and and that's the one thing I see
1:34:30agencies uh that you know, that
1:34:32potentially frustrate me is they're
1:34:33they're they're making it sound easier
1:34:37than it actually is um or or you know,
1:34:39and you know, undervaluing the the
1:34:41people who do good work or whatever it's
1:34:43going to be. And like you say, even just
1:34:45building up those connections with
1:34:46journalists and everything else, that
1:34:47takes time, effort, and you know,
1:34:49sometimes the journalists is wanting you
1:34:51know, I can now I'm in a position where
1:34:53I can give a journalist a story. I know
1:34:55he needs stories
1:34:57to to get the impressions and the clicks
1:34:58that he needs to keep his job.
1:35:01Now if I've got the stories, that's
1:35:02great. I don't need to pay money.
1:35:04But if I don't have the stories, that's
1:35:05what the old brown envelope has to come
1:35:07out and these things cost money.
1:35:09You know, and and and you know,
1:35:11a lot of people
1:35:12don't realize that and you know, they're
1:35:13they're promising the world saying
1:35:14they'll get, you know, links in this and
1:35:16links in that. And you know, they're
1:35:18only charging, you know, the the
1:35:19customer 500 quid a month. And that's
1:35:21one thing I see agencies doing a lot.
1:35:23And
1:35:24I'm not saying every agency does that
1:35:25and you know, every agency owner's bad.
1:35:27There's good and bad in everything that
1:35:28we do. Um but yeah, I think overall, you
1:35:33know, a lot of people are pitching
1:35:35what would be deemed as good services,
1:35:36but it's a different debate as to
1:35:38whether they do good work or not.
1:35:40>> How did you originally get um
1:35:43get like heard by journalists? So like
1:35:46let let say you're starting when you
1:35:47started the podcast, you had some people
1:35:49coming on sharing their uh sharing their
1:35:53stories, sharing their opinions, and
1:35:54you're like, yeah, this is this could be
1:35:56reported on by journalists, but you
1:35:58don't have the journalist connections
1:35:59yet. So what did you do? Did you just
1:36:01message um like the tip tip forms? Did
1:36:06you find journalists contact? Did you DM
1:36:08them on IG? Like what did what did you
1:36:10do?
1:36:11>> The the honest answer is uh
1:36:14one of my friends is a ex-professional
1:36:16footballer, so he had all the contacts.
1:36:18So it was relatively easy. I'd I'd love
1:36:20to sit here and tell you a story where
1:36:22I reached out to them all and done this
1:36:24and done that and built that
1:36:25relationship. No, I cheated. You know,
1:36:27my friend knows them
1:36:28um and has
1:36:30the phone numbers and stuff. So
1:36:32again, life was relatively
1:36:34easy in that aspect. But obviously, if
1:36:36you're not in that fortunate position
1:36:39uh where you can do that, then you're
1:36:40going to have to
1:36:40>> But you still could. Journalists
1:36:42journalists journalists check their they
1:36:44check their inboxes. They check their
1:36:45DMs. Um and if you you could still send
1:36:48a good pitch and and just say, hey, this
1:36:50is like you don't have to send them the
1:36:52episode where it's out, but just say
1:36:53like this is me. They can see your
1:36:55podcast and see that it's legit. I'll
1:36:57give you the story so you're the first
1:36:59to report on it. Um could you link to my
1:37:02site and to the podcast? Okay, sure. If
1:37:05if I report if I share the story, if I
1:37:07write the story, yeah, I'll I'll I will
1:37:09fulfill those obligations.
1:37:10>> Yeah.
1:37:11>> then they do that and then it goes well
1:37:13and you're like of maybe a few weeks
1:37:15later, got another story for you. And
1:37:17now you have a relationship with them.
1:37:19>> Yeah. But you know, even just now when I
1:37:22when I talk to some of the journalists,
1:37:23it's like an Instagram DM. A lot of them
1:37:25will follow me on Instagram.
1:37:27Um and they're just like, do you want
1:37:28this? Do you want that? I was talking to
1:37:29this guy on WhatsApp or whatever. You
1:37:31know, I'm not going into the news desk
1:37:33trying to pitch and all that kind of
1:37:34stuff. Um and I don't think that's the
1:37:37wisest thing you could ever do anyway.
1:37:38Like you say, people's DMs are open,
1:37:40people's LinkedIn's open. Different
1:37:42journalists in in different countries
1:37:43and everything are going to
1:37:45be more accessible on
1:37:47different platforms. But certainly from
1:37:49a
1:37:50sports journalist uh
1:37:52side of things here in the the UK,
1:37:55Instagram is probably or WhatsApp's the
1:37:58the the key part. But like I say, I'd
1:38:00love to come up with some [ __ ] story
1:38:03that, you know, I I I devised this
1:38:05great plan to smooze them all, but nah,
1:38:07someone put me in touch and it was it
1:38:09was very easy.
1:38:11>> Yeah, but but you can um
1:38:13can you can so people can do that.
1:38:15People can get can build those
1:38:16relationships and they do all the time.
1:38:18Um so I like I and just the fact that
1:38:21you understood enough to leverage the
1:38:23opportunity that you had and to to make
1:38:25the use of it like you did. I want to
1:38:27ask about um so you said uh that AI and
1:38:30so so yeah, we talked about um
1:38:33scaling AI content not a good long-term
1:38:35strategy and very risky, but you said
1:38:37that
1:38:38AI and automation will be central to
1:38:40scaling online businesses, but humans
1:38:42still need to manage them. So I want to
1:38:44ask which SEO tasks would you actually
1:38:47trust AI to do completely unsupervised?
1:38:51If any.
1:38:52>> Man, I
1:38:54see if I'm being honest, Edward, I don't
1:38:56think there is any. I think I still uh
1:38:59you know, you mentioned it earlier um
1:39:03even if I was to get it to go and do
1:39:04keyword research, for example,
1:39:06how do I know James Dooley's not
1:39:08manipulated that? How do I know
1:39:11that I'm going after the right keywords?
1:39:13I think you still need that
1:39:15just just at the moment, I'm not saying
1:39:17that in six months time someone won't
1:39:19come up with something that, you know,
1:39:21can do it better or whatever, but I
1:39:23still think I and maybe it's a me thing,
1:39:27I still need to see what those keywords
1:39:30are and everything else and check it
1:39:31because
1:39:32there's just so much [ __ ] on there.
1:39:34So there's nothing that I would just let
1:39:36AI go and do for me. Um you know, I I'm
1:39:39I'm like anyone else. I you know, I use
1:39:40Grok bot to check my emails in morning,
1:39:43summarize, you know, the stuff that I
1:39:44need to get to and all of the other cool
1:39:47stuff to free up some time and throw all
1:39:48the junk in the bin for me uh and so on
1:39:51and so forth.
1:39:52But
1:39:53even at that uh you know, even Grok bot
1:39:56will will
1:39:58it will draft some email replies for me
1:40:00as well. I still physically check
1:40:04what that [ __ ] says before it goes
1:40:05out in my name. So, you know, I am a
1:40:08cautious kind of guy and I don't think
1:40:10AI's quite there yet. And I, you know, I
1:40:13I'm sure most people will agree anyway
1:40:15um you can't be solely reliant on that
1:40:17to do
1:40:18any full task, no chance.
1:40:20I'm sorry.
1:40:21>> Dude, it's it's a great it's a great
1:40:22answer because a lot of shills will come
1:40:25on here and say, yeah, I have these
1:40:27amazing automations.
1:40:29Um you can give me your email and I'll
1:40:31give it to you or like some something
1:40:32like that or um or they'll just lie and
1:40:35say, yeah, we'll we'll build this for
1:40:36you and they know like nah, they
1:40:38shouldn't be doing it. And here like you
1:40:41are like a seasoned black hat, a very
1:40:43seasoned SEO
1:40:45telling the truth.
1:40:47And um
1:40:48and uh yeah, it's uh this this awesome.
1:40:51Okay, my last question,
1:40:53Craig, so um after 25 years in SEO,
1:40:57what is something you believed for most
1:41:00of your career that you've completely
1:41:01changed your mind about? Though I feel
1:41:03like this entire this entire
1:41:05conversation was was kind of that, but
1:41:07maybe there's like a
1:41:08something else.
1:41:16>> I used to be a big believer
1:41:18that Google were
1:41:20being helpful um to to people for many
1:41:22many years like trying to you know with
1:41:24the Google patents and you know the
1:41:26guidelines and and all the narrative and
1:41:29the PR that came out from Google.
1:41:32I was stupid enough to believe that
1:41:34you know
1:41:3570% of that was along the truth
1:41:39uh or or or somewhat close to the truth
1:41:41or whatever.
1:41:42Um
1:41:44I just don't believe anything I see
1:41:45anymore um or hear um from from
1:41:49that side of things that you know I need
1:41:51to see proof
1:41:53uh of things working and uh
1:41:56you know I I've seen some strange things
1:41:58where
1:42:00I had a guy
1:42:02be able to close down my GMB listing
1:42:05because he went in there, suggested an
1:42:07edit put that the business wasn't
1:42:09opening till a date in 2028, for
1:42:12example, it made me disappear from the
1:42:14serps. Now,
1:42:16that is beggar's belief that that was
1:42:18allowed to happen by Google.
1:42:20Um, you know, and Google would argue
1:42:21that could never happen. That's
1:42:23[ __ ] The [ __ ] it. I seen a guy
1:42:25doing it to be. I had to wake up every
1:42:26day
1:42:27that that you know, there's so many
1:42:28loopholes in Google and I think Google
1:42:30is just one big [ __ ] up thing with
1:42:32algo you know, filter after filter after
1:42:34filter all piled on top. I don't even
1:42:36think Google know what they're doing uh
1:42:38half the time. And you know,
1:42:41I used to have this belief that they did
1:42:43know what they were doing and they were
1:42:44such a powerful and sophisticated tool.
1:42:47Now, you might argue that they are and
1:42:48and you know, all of that kind of stuff,
1:42:50but I literally don't believe anything
1:42:52and I don't believe that they know what
1:42:54they're doing. I think it it it is one
1:42:56big mess of filter after filter after
1:42:59filter after filter and and and the
1:43:01whole thing is is just an absolute
1:43:05joke of a system. And you know, I used
1:43:08to
1:43:08keep my eye on you know, the you know,
1:43:10the I'm not going to name names or
1:43:12whatever. I don't want to do that, but
1:43:14you know, the people who spoke on
1:43:15Google's behalf and I used to believe
1:43:16what they said and you'd be like things
1:43:18are going to get better and you know,
1:43:20they are going to clean up on this and
1:43:21they're going to do that and they're
1:43:22going to do that and you know, nothing
1:43:24ever [ __ ] happens and you're just
1:43:25like
1:43:26you bastards. Um, so you know, that
1:43:28that's the the one thing where
1:43:31probably
1:43:32I gave them the benefit of the doubt for
1:43:34far too long. Um, and you know, now when
1:43:37anyone tells me anything or you know,
1:43:39such and such an update's happening, I
1:43:41need to look at the data to see and
1:43:43interpret that data myself and uh it's
1:43:45it's a sad state of affairs that you you
1:43:48know, you can't trust anything that
1:43:49comes out of um
1:43:52that side of things. But yeah, I always
1:43:54thought Google were doing good for the
1:43:55world. They just don't want us
1:43:56manipulating our system and and listen,
1:43:59I understand it from a business
1:44:00perspective. If you're trying to
1:44:01manipulate my system, Edward, I'm sorry,
1:44:03but I'm going to be telling you anything
1:44:05but the truth. Uh
1:44:06it's relatively simple and
1:44:07straightforward.
1:44:08>> you know, but I've been but I'm seeing
1:44:09that too. So how come how come you have
1:44:11such a problem with them? And And to be
1:44:13fair, like the people who you're who
1:44:15you're talking about, the public faces
1:44:17of Google Search, they don't work on the
1:44:19algorithm. They get their information
1:44:21from the people who work on the
1:44:22algorithm, and they're very frustrated
1:44:23because they're not told everything
1:44:24either.
1:44:25>> Yeah. I mean
1:44:26I I don't have an issue with them.
1:44:29The biggest thing, you know, business is
1:44:30business at the end of the day, and
1:44:32you've got to protect your assets, and
1:44:34Google's obviously their asset and their
1:44:36employee
1:44:36>> we literally had like a 2-hour podcast
1:44:38about talking about all the ways that
1:44:40people manipulate Google. And so it's
1:44:42like what are they supposed to do?
1:44:44>> Um but, you know, like I say, you you
1:44:47just
1:44:49the way you're brought up, you you you
1:44:51you'd think an organization like Google
1:44:52would be
1:44:54somewhat teaching
1:44:56somewhere close to the truth somewhere.
1:44:58I'm not saying everything has to be the
1:44:59truth.
1:45:00Um
1:45:01but listen, as I say, business is
1:45:03business. Uh and and and and, you know,
1:45:05the biggest piece of advice I could ever
1:45:08give anyone is just try and read between
1:45:09the lines and try and
1:45:11understand Google's perspective, but
1:45:12also understand our perspective as SEOs.
1:45:15We we want to to get traffic. We want to
1:45:18get rankings to make money.
1:45:20Google are not going to tell us anything
1:45:21that's going to help us in any way,
1:45:22shape, or form because all we're going
1:45:24to do is manipulate stuff. And listen,
1:45:26that's the game. You you you're up
1:45:28against and like I say, I spent far too
1:45:30long
1:45:31uh
1:45:33just believing that
1:45:35uh
1:45:36things would happen and things would
1:45:37change and they didn't. And
1:45:39that that's my only little thing I would
1:45:40say about it, but the game's the game
1:45:42and uh
1:45:44it is what it is.
1:45:45>> Yeah, but you also like how do you
1:45:46reconcile you know, it's just they don't
1:45:48know what they're doing, filter after
1:45:50filter. It doesn't work with I'm not
1:45:52going to use Black Hat on a
1:45:56brand that I want to operate for a long
1:45:58time because it's not worth the risk.
1:46:00>> Yeah. I mean
1:46:02at the end of the day, uh you know, you
1:46:05you can use Black Hat and you see people
1:46:07get away with it for ages and ages and
1:46:08ages, but I think with age, you just
1:46:11want less hassle and less risk and it's
1:46:13all down to risk at the end of the day.
1:46:15And, and, you know, as a younger guy, I
1:46:18was I didn't give a [ __ ] Uh, I I had
1:46:20less responsibilities. I wasn't that
1:46:23fussed if a website blew up or or
1:46:25whatever. I wasn't thinking straight.
1:46:26Call it what you like. I think maturity,
1:46:29uh,
1:46:29you know, kicks in after a period of
1:46:31time and you you say, do you know what?
1:46:34I want less hassle, less risk.
1:46:36And that's it. I want a quiet life. I
1:46:38don't want any trouble.
1:46:40End of story. And, uh, you know,
1:46:43don't wave don't you know, don't stick
1:46:45your head up there and and you know,
1:46:46start saying things about people or you
1:46:48know, hey, Google's full of [ __ ] or or
1:46:50whatever it may be because they will
1:46:52come along and [ __ ] ding you anyway,
1:46:54you know, uh,
1:46:55if you were to do that. So that's why
1:46:57you need to try and keep your head, uh,
1:46:59below, uh, and and I think that's
1:47:03something that I I consciously try and
1:47:05do now and, uh,
1:47:07and and just try and lead the quiet life
1:47:08and like I say, everything's risk
1:47:11related, um, in my brain now. Am I going
1:47:15to get
1:47:15any potential trouble here? And if I
1:47:18if I am,
1:47:20I don't want to take that risk.
1:47:22>> Craig's camera cut off, but that's okay.
1:47:25We're at the end of the episode. Craig,
1:47:27thank you so much. Where can everybody
1:47:28find you?
1:47:30>> And you can get me on
1:47:32craigcampbellseo.com
1:47:35and on there it has the links to all the
1:47:37social profiles anyway.
1:47:39>> Let's go. Craig, this was this was
1:47:41unexpected
1:47:43and so much fun and I really I I felt
1:47:46like you were very honest
1:47:48with uh, with a lot of the things that
1:47:50you shared and I really appreciate how
1:47:52candid you were and um, just your time
1:47:55and and everything that you talked
1:47:56about.
1:47:58>> Worries. It's been a pleasure, Edwards.
1:48:00Uh, thanks for having me on and uh,
1:48:02maybe we can do it again in the future
1:48:03sometime.
1:48:05>> I hope so. Maybe we'll
1:48:06it would be great if we could do an
1:48:07episode with you and James cuz you and
1:48:10James talk all the time. James has been
1:48:11on the show many many times.
1:48:13>> Yeah.
1:48:13>> That'd be a lot of fun. Maybe we'll get
1:48:15David Quayle in the loop. Let's get
1:48:16Charles- We'll get Charles Float on
1:48:17here, too. It'll be an absolute party.
1:48:20Oh, that'd be crazy. Oh my gosh. It'll
1:48:22be a crazy episode.
1:48:24>> Why not?
1:48:25>> Why not? Why not?
1:48:27Um all right.
1:48:28This is episode 1,217
1:48:31of the podcast. 1,217
1:48:35days in a row doing this podcast.
1:48:38No days missed. Let's go.
1:48:42If you watch this on YouTube, thank you
1:48:44so much for watching. If you listened on
1:48:46Spotify or Apple Podcasts, thank you so
1:48:49much for listening. And I will talk to
1:48:51you again tomorrow.
1:48:53Bye now.

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