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Keywordless Targeting, IndexNow, What SEOs Should Learn From PPCs w/Navah Hopkins of Microsoft — Transcript

by Experts on the Wire (SEO Podcast) · 10,720 words · 1,593 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00All right, everyone. Welcome back to
0:01Experts in the Wire. I'm super excited
0:03to chat with Nava Hopkins about PPC and
0:06SEO and everything happening in AI
0:08search. I want to jump right in. What is
0:10keywordless targeting and why should
0:14SEOs know about this?
0:16>> So, this is I think the best jump right
0:19in to question that we we could talk
0:22about. Uh so keywordless targeting
0:25as most folks understand it uh is using
0:29anything other than a keyword to match
0:33the human to the brand. Now that might
0:36be matching someone to a product that
0:38might be matching someone to uh a
0:41service whatever the case might be. Why
0:44I say how most people understand it is
0:46that the surfaces that are coming about
0:49in the AI era are evolving really
0:51quickly. um and how we think about even
0:55the idea of keywordless targeting is
0:57going to evolve really quickly. So as it
1:00stands today, it revolves quite a bit on
1:02understanding the landing page,
1:04understands quite a bit on understanding
1:06the human and their previous behaviors.
1:08It is very clued in um to also the goals
1:13that you may have set. So why this
1:15matters for SEOs to be aware of as a PPC
1:19sort of concept or SCA if you're in AMIA
1:23um the website and how easy it is to
1:26understand that website and how well
1:28it's matching is a really good signal to
1:30understand does Google does Bing does
1:35fill in the blank AI service like do are
1:38are they able to understand you so by
1:40plugging in your site into say a Pax
1:43campaign creator
1:44you can get a really good sense of how
1:47easy is it for Google, for Microsoft to
1:50understand me and my brand and
1:52potentially even for competitive
1:54intelligence to plug your competitor
1:55brand in there to understand how is your
1:58competitor uh understood and are there
2:00opportunities there to improve even more
2:03on on your own gains. I love that. And
2:06that's one thing I want to get to
2:08because I was working with a company and
2:10we had a meeting where I brought in the
2:12PPC person running all their advertising
2:15and they were like, "Oh, we got our two
2:17biggest leads last week from ads. What
2:19type of campaigns did they come from?"
2:20And he said, "Pmax." And that was the
2:22first time I ever heard that. And he
2:24explained that apparently Pmax is a way
2:26of dynamically sort of going out and
2:29serving ads to somebody that's maybe
2:30already interacted with the brand. but
2:32his his comment was that the quality of
2:36our SEO and organic content was helping
2:38to support that. So, can you unpack the
2:42keywordless targeting a little bit more
2:43and maybe even the Pmax a little bit
2:45more? Is keywordless targeting just like
2:47a concept or is it actually a type of ad
2:51that you can run? So, question number
2:53one. And then number two, I'd love to
2:55talk a little bit more about how the
2:56website can support better performance
2:59of that advertising. Sure. So
3:03take taking a step way back when a paid
3:07media person builds a campaign
3:09historically they would have built a
3:11campaign using keywords using location
3:14targeting using scheduling using
3:17audience targeting
3:19you name it like basically the who who
3:21do you want to target when do you want
3:23to target them where do you want to
3:24target them and then keywords were there
3:25too
3:27targeting is a concept it's not an ad
3:29type um it's I it's a setting idea that
3:33instead of relying just on the semantic
3:37keywords and the syntax of the keywords
3:40to get that keyword to ad landing page
3:42relevancy to match exactly to what
3:44someone is searching. Instead, you
3:46think, okay, these are the general ideas
3:49that someone who's useful is going to
3:52search. these are the ideas that I I
3:54want to be in the sphere of influence
3:56for, but I also want to make sure that
3:59I'm available to come up when someone
4:02searches for me and it's maybe not
4:03something I thought of. That's where the
4:05landing page is really critical because
4:07if your landing page easily describes
4:10your services and it's an easy page to
4:12index and to understand, you'll be in
4:14great shape. where I think not enough
4:17people were prepared for the AI era is
4:21that because
4:23PMAX and AIMAX and AI and AI tools need
4:28to look at landing pages to understand
4:30the service and for a really long time
4:32paid media folks would have their
4:33landing pages as no index no follow.
4:37>> That would mean that you're basically
4:39depriving a really key
4:42um insight to that AI campaign type. So
4:45I would just I would caution people on
4:48leaning too heavily on habits that
4:51served really well in the past. I mean I
4:52was the first person to be in the make
4:56your paid landing pages on a no index no
4:58follow subdomain and like keep it
4:59totally separate. As brand and
5:02performance are converging quite a bit.
5:06Um as as journeys are really shrinking.
5:09The value of having those standalone
5:12paid landing pages not only is shrinking
5:15from a strategic level, but it also
5:17could get in your way technically. So
5:19for the SEOs out there who are looking
5:21for additional insights of like how how
5:23to think about this, how to position it,
5:26you now have extra ammo in your arsenal
5:31to get more data sharing with the paid
5:33team. And even though they're not going
5:34to have full visibility with all
5:36platforms with Microsoft, you will have
5:37that full visibility into search terms
5:40so long as there was a click. Um, not
5:42all platforms offer that.
5:44Um, but even though you don't have that
5:46full visibility for every platform, you
5:48at least can still begin to um, get
5:51those learnings of what works well and
5:54what doesn't for uh, paid traffic and
5:57organic. Whether you're using free tools
5:59like Microsoft Clarity to understand
6:01that, whether you're starting to lean
6:03into AI reporting and the AI citations
6:06to understand what are the AI systems on
6:08the back end asking that your site is is
6:11being found. We're now getting a little
6:13bit away from keywordless targeting, but
6:14like these are the sorts of
6:16considerations that
6:19beyond just keywordless targeting for
6:21relevancy that like your landing page is
6:23easy to understand. Like there's other
6:25bigger questions that making sure that
6:27your landing page is really easy to
6:29understand, really great user
6:31experience, super high trust signals,
6:33like all of that's that's in order.
6:35>> Yeah. And I wanna I want to come back a
6:36little bit more to the landing pages and
6:38the web content. But first, you
6:40mentioned Microsoft, so we should tell
6:41people who you're currently with and
6:44what your role is at Microsoft and also
6:46a little bit of your background because
6:47I know you've had mostly an experience
6:49in PPC. You definitely have a lot of
6:52knowledge in SEO as well. So, I'd love
6:54to understand just sort of your
6:57expertise background, where you kind of
6:59came from, and then what you're doing
7:00now at Microsoft. and then I want to
7:02continue talking a little bit about
7:04landing pages.
7:06>> Sounds good. Um, so
7:11the biggest thing to to like think about
7:14when it comes to me is I am motivated by
7:17helping people. I wanted to be an
7:18English teacher when I was growing up
7:20like that that is that is was going to
7:21be what I was going to do and I realized
7:24I would be both poor and ineffectual
7:25going into the education system. So I
7:27switched to marketing and I had the
7:29privilege of getting to work in the SEO
7:31industry to begin with. The problem was
7:34I got in right at the cusp of Panda
7:36Penguin and felt
7:38>> I don't know how I feel about this.
7:41>> So I so I switched to um to paid uh and
7:44it's it's been really really great and
7:45I've had the [clears throat] work in
7:46software companies have had the
7:48opportunity to work in house uh work
7:50with work in agencies. Um but software
7:52has always been my happy place because
7:53you can have one conversation and help
7:55many. Yeah.
7:57>> Getting to the point of
7:59kind of this this journey that we find
8:01ourselves in of like AI versus like the
8:06world back in 2008 when I got into this.
8:10I think that there's a lot more value in
8:13strategic creative critical thinking
8:16>> that not enough people today maybe get
8:19access to. So, for example, um one of
8:22the things I would do with new hires is
8:24I'd get them to play board games with me
8:26because like you you train someone to
8:28manage resources, to learn a a set of
8:31rules and have to adapt to them really
8:33quickly. It's a really useful mental
8:35exercise for the brain. Um when you
8:37think about channels today in digital
8:39marketing, like it's effectively the
8:40same thing except money's involved. So,
8:42if you can get someone used to thinking
8:43about that, um, and if you can get
8:45yourself used to thinking about that,
8:47uh, without having to risk money, it's
8:50it's kind of helpful. I don't know if I
8:52answered your question, but
8:53>> that does set up some of your story and
8:55background and then take us to
8:57currently,
8:58>> your role at Microsoft. Uh, just explain
9:02that a little bit because I think that
9:03relates a lot to what you're talking
9:04about and can also support like,
9:06>> you know, why should we listen to NAVA?
9:08like you have so much expertise and your
9:10current role at Microsoft I think makes
9:12you a really great person to speak to my
9:14audience which is mostly SEOs but I
9:16think a lot of people just in search and
9:18trying to make sense of AI search. So
9:19I'd love to hear about your your role.
9:21>> Yes. So so my my role is product leison
9:24for Microsoft advertising Microsoft AI.
9:26Um I actually sit within the product
9:28organization not the marketing
9:30organization. Um, and what's so special
9:32about that is that it means that I have
9:35a seat directly in product and product
9:38marketing to ensure that voice of
9:40customer reaches folks. So when there's
9:43something that we're doing well, they
9:45get to know when there's something that
9:46we could improve, they get to know that,
9:48too.
9:49>> Yeah. Um, but even more importantly,
9:51when there are things that are clearly
9:52myths or there are things that are
9:54clearly getting in people's way, I can
9:56help translate it or if we're launching
9:58something, I I we can um have that
10:00conversation. So, my role is a mixture
10:03of what I like to call the loud work of
10:08getting up on stage, sharing things,
10:10having conversations with the wonderful
10:11forces for good like you and your
10:13audience. um writing my monthly columns
10:17uh for search engine general search
10:18engine land working on on on the board
10:21of the paid search association
10:23um doing kind of community outreach like
10:26all all those those various things
10:27social listening for for Microsoft
10:30>> and then there's the quiet work um of
10:32actually being in the room with product
10:34folks advocating for what will serve
10:36customers best
10:38being that voice of the customer uh and
10:41then also helping to think through like
10:45h how will this land? Um and and really
10:49putting that that hat on for agency,
10:51putting that hat on for in-house,
10:53whether it's the practitioner, whether
10:55it's it's the the team lead. So, I get
10:57to do a lot of really cool fun things.
10:59Um
11:00>> but it's it's all motivated by helping
11:02people.
11:03>> That sounds fun. Is there a big myth
11:05that comes to mind that you've had to if
11:08you're referring to a myth out there in
11:10the world that you're bringing back into
11:11the product team in Microsoft? Is there
11:12a big one that comes to mind
11:14>> as of recent?
11:15>> Uh so so one of my there's there's two.
11:19Um the first is that Microsoft is just
11:21for old people.
11:23>> Um it's really funny. Uh we have
11:26>> a beautiful population that ranges in
11:29ages. uh we have a wonderful audience
11:31that um tends to be more affluent, tends
11:35to uh have a higher education. Uh but
11:37what I don't think most people realize
11:40is that I think it's it's either 71 or
11:4273% of Microsoft uh users are 45 or
11:47younger.
11:47>> Oh wow.
11:48>> I did not know that. It's it it's just
11:50one of those myths that for whatever
11:52reason we've been pigeon holed as this
11:54is where you go to reach the old people
11:56and it's
11:57>> you can but but there's there's
11:59definitely more people there.
12:01>> When you say Microsoft user is that of
12:03any Microsoft product or you are you
12:05speaking about Bing
12:07>> what's what's what's who who you can
12:09reach through Microsoft advertising.
12:11>> Oh Bing has uh over a billion monthly
12:14users. Mhm.
12:16>> Um people think about Microsoft as being
12:19the super teenytiny,
12:21>> not terribly helpful and that's just not
12:24true. Um the other thing and that leads
12:26to the second thing uh is that um import
12:30is the easiest way to get started on
12:31Microsoft because there's so many
12:34incredibly useful Microsoft specific
12:37tools. Well, Microsoft uh import can be
12:40helpful and we have a Google import, a
12:42Facebook or meta import um and a
12:45Pinterest import.
12:47It actually can be a lot easier to start
12:49from scratch because of the rules of
12:51engagement that are subtly different.
12:53So, for example, ad group level,
12:55location targeting and ad scheduling,
12:57the fact that ads can serve in the time
12:58zone of the user or the account. um our
13:02impression based marketing where you can
13:05actually build targeting exclusion or
13:07bidding lists off of just an impression
13:09um our LinkedIn profile targeting like
13:12there's a number of things that are just
13:13really really interesting and one thing
13:15that was actually kind of funny um
13:18during
13:19uh GML this year Google announced a
13:22pilot for disclaimers meanwhile we've
13:24had disclaimers
13:26>> since 2021 uh Google is unveiling the ad
13:29serving AI overviews and AI I mode like
13:32we've had ad survot since 2024.
13:36>> So just helping to shatter those myths
13:38that like people like what are people
13:42not quite seeing or hearing?
13:44>> Right. So when you're talking about
13:46import, you're talking about a a
13:47mechanism to start advertising.
13:49>> Yes.
13:50>> Using a literally a feature to import
13:53data or your information or Yeah.
13:55>> Yeah.
13:56>> Interesting. Um, so that the
13:58background's great and I want to come
14:00back to you just a couple things about
14:01the landing pages and the Pmax
14:03campaigns.
14:05Uh, is there still a case for having a
14:09no index, no follow, no crawl landing
14:12page for advertising? Is there still
14:15place for that?
14:18>> Sorry. Um, uh, is there a place for
14:20landing pages
14:21>> for no index, no follow landing pages?
14:24And I'm impressed with the double
14:25tasking if people can hear the typing.
14:28>> So
14:30the no index don't no follow landing
14:32pages is really interesting.
14:37So long as there are human uh humans who
14:42will
14:44never use um
14:47AI anything
14:49>> Mhm.
14:50>> there probably is
14:51>> okay
14:53>> where I'm concerned candidly is that
14:57like we're going to a place where
14:58landing pages and websites might not be
15:00the main mechanism that people are
15:03accessing content. So, if we're getting
15:06kind of held up on this idea of no
15:09index, no follow,
15:11um, and like we have to keep traffic
15:15separate for paid and organic.
15:16>> Yeah.
15:17>> We're going to lose the the forest
15:19through the trees a little bit. Mhm.
15:20>> Um,
15:22>> so it's not that there's no place, but I
15:24would I would encourage people to be
15:25cautious about clinging to that as a
15:28best practice
15:29>> as AI surfaces become that much more
15:31important, as AI and campaigns become
15:34that much more important because
15:35ultimately going back to that
15:37keywordless targeting,
15:38>> landing pages are a critical part of
15:40that.
15:41>> Yeah.
15:41>> And if you tell the system that it can't
15:44do anything,
15:46>> um, specifically with the robot.txt, TXT
15:49um your landing page.
15:52>> You It's like taking a Ferrari and
15:54driving it through the mud.
15:56>> Yeah.
15:56>> Taking um a four-wheeler and asking it
16:00to do like a a a NASCAR race or
16:02something or something like that.
16:03[laughter]
16:04>> I love the analogy. Um now when you
16:07spoke about the quality of the landing
16:09page and my brain went to an assumption
16:11and I got excited. So I just want to
16:13make sure that I'm not overassuming
16:15something.
16:16I like to think that the work that I do,
16:19let's say, in a in blog articles or in
16:22resource pages in or in content
16:25marketing on a on a website is part of
16:28helping the advertising side of things
16:31understand what this company is all
16:34about, what the topics are all about,
16:36what their products and services are all
16:38about, who their customers are. Is on
16:41the ad side. Are they crawling and
16:43evaluating the entire website to get a
16:47better idea about how to target and run
16:49the PMAX ads? Am I thinking of that
16:52correctly?
16:54>> Kind of. Uh so if you allow for what's
16:58called file file URL expansion,
17:01>> okay,
17:01>> it will look at it look at the whole
17:03site and it will find those those new
17:05pages to to target. The thing is you may
17:09not want it to do that. So if you so if
17:12you have ads going to the blog for
17:16example or to a site map
17:20>> you probably don't want that to happen
17:22um you so
17:25>> to allow them to
17:26>> can I just finish the the the thought
17:28and and then you can you can chime in.
17:30>> So in order to prevent that there there
17:32are things that you can do called URL
17:34exclusions.
17:35>> Yeah. you can say, I just I don't want
17:37any URL from the blog or I don't want
17:39the sitemap or I don't want the homepage
17:41included. So that you're then able to to
17:43get that benefit.
17:45>> Interesting. So if you include like a
17:48blog article, then you're opening it up
17:50for them to run an ad to that blog
17:53article.
17:55>> Yeah. Like if if you make it eligible to
17:59be pulled. Yes. And and if especially if
18:03you outright target it. What I'm getting
18:05at is is the
18:07>> accidental inclusion
18:09>> of blogs or what pick pick your poison
18:13on the site. If you turn on final URL um
18:17expansion and you don't include rules
18:20which are the equivalent dynamic search
18:22ads of of like whatever rules you you
18:25want to uh set for what uh URLs can't be
18:29included
18:30>> then sure like
18:33>> it's possible but like
18:34>> most people don't want to send paid
18:37traffic to blog pages most people want
18:40to send traffic to service pages to
18:43collection pages to product pages. The
18:46reason to include a blog might be as an
18:50extension because you're you're you're
18:51giving someone more information.
18:53>> Um,
18:55it also can be helpful like for your own
18:59knowledge to plug the blog in and see
19:02how does the the PMAX campaign generator
19:06process the blog like are you
19:08>> being understood in the way that you
19:09intend. So, I would really encourage
19:12every SEO to actually partner with their
19:15paid friend and just borrow their c uh
19:19access to their account, not run any
19:21ads, but like just see how does the
19:24content translate? Do you agree with the
19:27creative that comes up? Do you agree
19:28with the positioning that comes up? Um,
19:31and if the answer is no,
19:33like maybe spend some time there. Um,
19:36and then on the paid side, the reason to
19:38send traffic to any part of your
19:42business is because you want that
19:44business.
19:45>> So, like it's it's really worth having
19:47those conversations. How well does all
19:50the whole part of your site do at
19:54helping people understand why you're why
19:56you're helpful? And that dovtales
19:58perfect to what I was going to ask which
20:00is you mentioned on a podcast interview
20:02that I listened to that or or article
20:06you wrote that [clears throat] I read
20:06that we should be gathering intelligence
20:08for SEO from PMAX campaigns. Yeah.
20:11>> And so you mentioned one which is I and
20:14see
20:15>> this is one reason I wanted to talk to
20:16you because I think more SEOs and PPCs
20:19should talk to one another.
20:21I have very little knowledge of what
20:24you're talking about when it comes to a
20:25PMAX campaign or setting it up and
20:28looking at the data you get.
20:29>> Let's take that step back. So a PMAX
20:31campaign is an aggregate of all possible
20:35ad types. So on the Google side that
20:38means search, that means video, that
20:40means local, uh that means Gmail. It's
20:45like the the the lot.
20:47>> Yeah. Yeah, on Microsoft it means
20:49search, it means display and native and
20:53video through our audience ads. Uh oh,
20:55like not video actually. Um on Microsoft
20:58we specifically don't force video
21:00whereas Google uh they do. That was a
21:03little misspe misstatement. Um there's
21:07also um what's it called? uh on on the
21:12search side uh we have something called
21:14multimedia ads that also serve on the
21:16right right hand rail or now um in the
21:18center of the search result page. So
21:20there's a number of different like ad
21:22types.
21:23>> Yeah.
21:23>> The premise of PMAX is that
21:27humans are very clever. Humans have
21:30really good strategy but humans also
21:33have biases. And so a PMAX campaign is
21:37really good at allocating your budget
21:39based off of your goals, based off of
21:41whatever creative. Um, and then
21:45if
21:47that is all correct,
21:51>> then that bias free piece comes in and
21:53can get you those incremental
21:54conversions. If however you're still in
21:57the process of figuring out who your
21:58ideal customer is like what sort of
22:00creative like needs to match or if you
22:02need to have very official creative you
22:05might lock into a standalone search
22:07campaign or standalone
22:09uh display campaign which now on the
22:12Google site is um just demand genen on
22:14the Microsoft side is audience ads um
22:17think things like that
22:19>> so when we're talking about pmax
22:22>> and its uh relation for SEO So
22:26Pax's whole like
22:31the whole hypothesis of PAX is what
22:35would it look like if the best parts of
22:38SEO which is empathy for the human techn
22:42technically set up correct experiences
22:45feeds clean hygiene and feeds came
22:48together and you took humanoriented
22:51strategy like guardrails for brands and
22:53said
22:54Yeah,
22:55>> most people are pretty happy with the
22:57results even if they have questions
22:59about how the results happened. Um, but
23:03like that's that's the general premise
23:04of PMAX.
23:06>> So, what do I let's say I'm working with
23:08a with a company and there's a PPC team,
23:12there's an ads team. uh how do I go to
23:15them or what would be the mechanisms in
23:17which I would actually get some of this
23:20intelligence and data from PMAX
23:24campaigns that are do I go to them and
23:25say give me access to your ads account
23:27and then if so what do I look for uh do
23:30I just ask them for a report what kinds
23:34of things should I be looking for in
23:36those campaigns for insight on how good
23:39like my pages are and the SEO is
23:43>> how good the SEO is.
23:45>> So the question is what do I need to do
23:49to make use of this intelligence that's
23:52in PMAX? You know, do I go to the ads
23:55team? Do I get access to the account? If
23:57I do, what do I go in there and look
23:59for? Uh do I ask for a report? What
24:02sorts of intelligence should I be
24:03looking for?
24:04>> Got it. So there's a couple of reports.
24:07Uh the first is make sure that your uh
24:10Google account has search console linked
24:13into
24:15um the Google ads account because then
24:16you can get uh SEO versus paid
24:21uh ratio of impressions to clicks like
24:23how often
24:25uh the SEO term would have come up
24:27versus paid. Um this particularly
24:29helpful in branded campaigns. Um,
24:33I also would really recommend looking at
24:38um search terms that are available um or
24:40or search term insights in the case of
24:43PMAX. Um, the reason why that's really
24:45helpful is that you can then see what
24:47actual humans searched. The thing is and
24:50and this is important as AI takes over
24:54more and more of those conversations,
24:56the ability to get the full query is
24:59going to be really really hard. M
25:02>> um
25:04>> and you mentioned
25:05>> Oh, go ahead.
25:06>> connecting Search Console and Google Ads
25:09on a thing I listen to and I said, "Why
25:11have I never heard of that before?" Uh
25:14and maybe I'm just been under a rock
25:17this whole time, but talk about that a
25:19little bit more because I to me that
25:21feels like an SEO gold mine to
25:23>> it is an SEO it is an SEO gold mine. Um
25:29the the main the main thing or the main
25:32reason why it it's not talked about is
25:36it's a hidden report in custom reports
25:40and you have to know to connect search
25:41console. And historically, it's been
25:44really hard to build those relationships
25:46between
25:47>> paid folks and organic folks that like
25:49you get that linking unless it's either
25:52paid and organic in the same agency or
25:54paid and organic teams in house. But
25:57like for whatever reason, we as humans
25:59have had like this weird relationship.
26:02So the first thing is is just like
26:05making that connection and and having
26:07that that um in service of the brand
26:10mindset. The other thing just to be
26:13aware of is that there are tools in both
26:17Google and Microsoft ads. Um in in
26:21Microsoft it's co-pilot. Um in Google
26:24it's going to be either ask advisor uh
26:27or uh Gemini
26:29where you can ask like what's available
26:31like what reporting is available? How
26:32how can I get this done? And I I don't
26:35think enough people actually ask the
26:37platform enough or or with the AI
26:39assistance enough what's available
26:42because even if it gets it wrong, which
26:45it can cuz AI will get things wrong, you
26:48still at least have something to go back
26:49to for support and and and whatnot, say
26:52like, "Hey, this is where this came
26:54from." And then they'll be able to not
26:56only help you um with your individual
26:58question, but like they'll also be able
27:00to say, "Hey, how did this happen?
27:02what's the root cause documentation that
27:04may have informed this?
27:06>> That's a great tip. You know, I very
27:08often don't think to just go ask the
27:10tool nowadays in the age age of AI,
27:14you know, what can I do with your
27:16platform? Uh, so you're saying when we
27:20run a PMAX campaign, it will give you
27:22information about what it thinks about
27:24your page, such as like the audience or
27:28like
27:30>> um it'll it'll give you um potential
27:32creative
27:34um so whether it's display creative,
27:38whether it's text creative. Um, and
27:42depending on how useful or not useful it
27:45is, that's a really good sign of whether
27:47you're understood. So, for example, I
27:49plugged in um a lawn care company and I
27:53plugged in just their homepage and their
27:56homepage actually had accurate um images
28:00on it that were talking about season
28:02specific lawn care more um it it was
28:07like for flood prevention and things
28:08like that. And the only images that got
28:10pulled and the only services that got
28:11pulled were snow removal. And it was
28:14just fascinating because it's like those
28:15images, those pages, like that content
28:17was just so much easier for the system
28:20to understand that it pulled that
28:22instead of what was actually like right
28:25there.
28:25>> Yeah.
28:26>> Um, so it's just a good reminder. Make
28:28sure that your alt uh text is is there
28:31for not only images, but for videos. Um,
28:34JavaScript is going to be a little bit
28:35harder
28:36>> um AI systems to to process and
28:38understand. So like just be mindful. Um
28:42but then the other thing too is just how
28:45easy is it for a fifth grader, a third
28:48grader to understand what it is that
28:51you're doing. So when you asked like you
28:52were this targeting I began with what I
28:56tried to make a a non-technical
28:58non-jargony like simple explanation and
29:00then went into the technical because
29:02most people can't process a a lot of
29:06technical information if it's not their
29:08specific field.
29:09>> That's right.
29:09>> And you also want to be mindful that not
29:12everyone learns best by reading. Um some
29:15people learn best by seeing. I happen to
29:17learn best by hearing. uh which why I
29:20love the sound of my own voice.
29:21>> Yes.
29:22>> So yeah, it's you just want to just be
29:24careful um how you think about your your
29:28various creative types.
29:29>> So I want to shift a little. So one of
29:32the reasons why well the reason why you
29:33came on my radar was Miriam Jessier on
29:36LinkedIn. They shared a really great uh
29:40takeaway from a presentation you gave
29:42recently. I think it was about a month
29:43ago. I'm going to read what they said uh
29:46in the LinkedIn post and then ask for
29:48your take on it and interpretation
29:51because this really caught my eye. So
29:54they said brand and performance converge
29:56in AI answers. This is the framing we
29:59need in the SEO community if we hope to
30:01make any headway getting through to the
30:03branding department.
30:06And this was a takeaway from a snippet
30:08of your presentation. So I'd love to
30:11talk about that a little bit more. So
30:13brand and performance converge in AI
30:16answers.
30:17>> Mhm.
30:17>> Yeah. Can you unpack that a little?
30:20>> Sure. So when I uh was looking to get my
30:27uh sweater, which was the opening story
30:30in in that talk, I specified a very
30:33specific
30:34uh brand and I I had my request. AI um
30:41in this case, Copilot could not provide
30:44me the specific product I wanted. But
30:47what it did do is it provided me two
30:50other examples of a potential products
30:53that is in in a nutshell
30:57a a brand discovery moment if I was open
31:00to a different brand as well as the
31:02opportunity to buy right in that moment.
31:04So the the conversion path is shrinking
31:08so quickly because people are going from
31:11ideas and conversations and just
31:13exploring things to
31:16in a matter of two or three uh beats
31:20into that conversation. Okay, I'm ready
31:21to go buy. I'm ready to to to give you
31:23to give you my money uh Mr. or Mrs.
31:26Brand. The the thing that that I that I
31:29think really clicked uh for Miriam who's
31:32amazing and everyone should go should go
31:33follow them. they're they're wonderful.
31:35Um is
31:38that the the content and the social
31:41piece is more about the human trust. So
31:44the trust signals that we confer
31:47um by recommending somebody by
31:51empowering someone and inciting them and
31:53giving giving them their their flowers.
31:56Those are signals just as much as the
31:58technical signals and and getting all of
32:00your tech SEO correct. Um, so in the in
32:04the other example that I showed, I
32:06showed um a maxi dress that co-pilot was
32:10ready to send me straight to one brand,
32:13but because the the the skew that I
32:16actually was ready to to buy and I
32:18thought was was a better fit for me, had
32:20a better price or and like better
32:22reviews on this other brand. That was
32:25another discovery moment of like, okay,
32:28I'm going to go with this brand. I'm
32:29going to go over here and and buy it
32:31here. So,
32:34being able to keep up with
32:38a a a conversion path that ideates to
32:42transacts and sometimes as little as 30
32:44minutes, sometimes even faster, like
32:46five or 10 minutes. You you can't use
32:49conventional funnels and tracking that
32:54are used to thinking in 24-hour cycles.
32:57>> So, long cycles In that case, I assume
33:00in the first example, it was two
33:02different brands entirely of two
33:04different products that were recommended
33:06to you other than the brand you already
33:09knew about and you were ready to
33:10purchase from that brand. What do you
33:12think that brand was doing wrong? If you
33:14could hypothesize why did that brand
33:16>> I don't have to hypothesize. Copilot
33:18told me what they did wrong because I
33:20asked it. I was like, why? Why
33:23>> what's going on? Copilot, where's the
33:25brand I asked for? And the specific
33:27answer is they didn't have a crawable
33:30product catalog to use. So because they
33:35didn't have a catalog, they like they
33:37tried they genuinely tried to provide me
33:40the brand. They couldn't. So they
33:43>> on the back end did did their their
33:45various queries that would have been
33:47those citation queries
33:49and then I had two other brands with two
33:52different products come up. So
33:56the feed hygiene and the product catalog
33:58point, I cannot overstate it. It is it
34:02is easily the most important thing. And
34:03what's really interesting is that you
34:05don't need to spend money to serve here.
34:08Like you can get your your UCP um
34:12universal commerce protocol set up for
34:16free um in various merchant centers if
34:18you're a Shopify customer. Like it's
34:21it's going to definitely be there
34:22already. Um, but the thing that I don't
34:26think enough people are are really
34:27thinking about is also the review
34:29component, the human component, because
34:31price is is important for sure. Um, but
34:34the reviews that people leave really do
34:38add weight. Um, because AI ultimately
34:41wants to be helpful or it's programmed
34:43to seek the most helpful option. It's
34:45not sentient. Um, so if you position
34:50yourself as the most helpful option,
34:52you'll be in a better spot.
34:54>> Yeah, that's very fascinating that
34:56co-pilot just told you what the problem
34:59was. So when you're referring to a feed,
35:01if I'm thinking about like Google
35:02Merchant Center, right, there's a
35:04product feed in that scenario, which
35:06companies can take use of for free,
35:09right? You can have free merchant
35:10listings in Google. So that's one type
35:13of feed that comes to Are there specific
35:15other types of feeds that come to mind?
35:18Like that's what you're referring to
35:19when you're saying Copilot didn't have a
35:21crawable shopping catalog.
35:26>> Sorry, what was the I missed the
35:28question in there. I
35:30>> So the question is you mentioned Copilot
35:32said they didn't have a crawable
35:33product.
35:34>> Yeah.
35:35>> Catalog. And we're talking about feeds.
35:37So, one feed that comes to mind is
35:39Merchant Center, the feed for Google
35:40Merchant Center.
35:41>> So, so Merchant Center isn't actually a
35:43feed. Um, merchant center houses the
35:46feed and Microsoft has one as well. Um,
35:50merchant centers are just the way to
35:52process that information.
35:54>> That's what I'm saying. You supply a
35:55feed to Google Merchant Center, right?
35:57>> Or or Microsoft Merchant Center. Yeah.
35:59>> Is that the same feed? Like literally
36:01the same type of feed. Okay. So, and
36:03what is that type of feed called get for
36:05anybody that
36:07>> does it have a name?
36:08>> Just a shopping feed.
36:09>> Just a shopping feed. Okay. Are there
36:11other types of feeds
36:14>> for Yeah. So, so there's like um there's
36:17feeds uh for auto like the auto
36:19cataloges, there's travel, real estate.
36:23Um you can actually build your own feed.
36:25Um I I did an article talking about lead
36:27genen in AI and that like you can
36:30actually build out with an Excel file or
36:32if you really want the the Google Sheets
36:35um with as long as it's the URL and then
36:39fill in the blank various categories as
36:41long as you keep that maintained in a
36:44standardized way you can upload that and
36:45give that additional context to your
36:48campaigns. So um this is not necessarily
36:52something that
36:54everyone is doing because it requires
36:56work and and thinking like the more the
36:58more important piece
37:00>> is is your landing page easy to
37:04understand like I would not worry about
37:05this the like the A+ work if you're a
37:08lead genen
37:09>> like I'd be much more concerned about
37:11CRM integration and the cleanliness of
37:14that data. But if you have all that set,
37:16your landing pages are immaculate, then
37:19yes, like feeds is is is an additional
37:21area. But for those of you in e-commerce
37:23or those of you in travel,
37:25>> um auto,
37:27>> absolutely. Yeah, exactly. Like
37:29absolutely you want to take care of
37:31that.
37:31>> Yeah. And that was kind of the question
37:32because uh I I my brain starts to think
37:35about the LLM.txt file, which is
37:39debatable. People don't seem to agree on
37:42if you should have one or not have one.
37:44And so the idea of having a feed for
37:46lead genen or something that's not like
37:48ecom
37:50in my mind that goes to the question of
37:52how do we know that our time is
37:53worthwhile to develop a feed or to use
37:57something that falls a little bit more
37:58on the speculative you know edge of
38:01>> so if you want to be found in the AI era
38:04>> where
38:06conversion rates uh at least Microsoft's
38:09data shows that it's um 25% greater
38:12relevancy
38:14uh for uh AI surfaces versus a search
38:17result page and then I think it's like
38:19194% better conversion rate um on an AI
38:23surface than search result page. So like
38:26the surfaces clearly convert the thing
38:28is the volume on the paid side is
38:30actually going to be lower than a
38:32traditional search result page because
38:33there is such a high bar to be relevant
38:35for that AI placement.
38:37>> Organically it's a little bit different.
38:39Um because organically if if you are a
38:41good answer like you're going to be
38:43there.
38:44>> Yeah.
38:44>> Um or ideally you would be there.
38:47>> I would put a stack ranking on tasks to
38:50consider or things to think about in the
38:52following order. The first is are you
38:55being crawled and indexed? Like are you
38:58even available
39:00to to participate?
39:01>> Yeah. If the answer is no, um there's a
39:04free tool called index now through Bing
39:07web master tools and being web master
39:09tools also has the AI citation report.
39:11There's also the clarity one. Uh folks
39:13aren't familiar with those. I can go in
39:15in depth in a bit. Um but basically the
39:17reason why this is so important is that
39:18you can ask Bing, hey, check on this for
39:22me. Like make sure that this is up to
39:24date. because if it's not up to date,
39:26that's where you get issues of incorrect
39:29information or just not even being
39:31found. The next pecking order uh is that
39:35you have
39:38said yes to AI commerce. Um so UCP
39:43>> um is a protocol that allows you to do
39:45business directly
39:48um um or allows you to do business um
39:51agentically or through the AI system.
39:54But if the human still wants to come to
39:56your site, they can. Um, so just making
39:59sure that you've said yes to those
40:00things, you should do. The final thing
40:03I'll throw out there that that is really
40:05important, um, is that you have set
40:09yourself up from an accessibility
40:11standpoint. Accessibility isn't just
40:15high contrast landing pages, buttons are
40:18buttons. like we're not using giant in
40:23the way formatting. Accessibility also
40:25comes down to how you're communicating.
40:28Um so if your language is difficult to
40:31to read and know I'm not going to get
40:34into the serif sans serif debate, but
40:35like if if it's really difficult to
40:37understand what it is that you do
40:41if if humans would struggle like AI is
40:43going to for sure struggle.
40:44>> So you're talking about ADA compliance
40:46accessibility.
40:47>> Yeah. How does an LLM So, I've been I've
40:53heard a myth, maybe not a myth. This is
40:55I'd love your take on this. LLMs just
40:58look at plain text. So, if you strip
41:00away everything and you just have the
41:02plain text that that's what they look
41:03at, are LLMs now also looking at or do
41:06do they look at the UX of a website when
41:09it comes to fonts and ADA readability?
41:14because
41:16>> so
41:18I'm not I'm I'm not gonna comment on
41:21like specifics because like it's always
41:23changing. Yes.
41:24>> I would encourage everyone to check uh
41:27Microsoft put out a really good
41:29>> um AEOG playbook. Um Miam's actually one
41:33of uh the guests in there. So again,
41:36shout outs to to Miriam. Uh, but the
41:38other thing I would definitely encourage
41:40folks to check out is the AI principles
41:44of your your LLM of choice. Um, because
41:48most of us at this point have set out
41:50what our AI principles are. So,
41:51Microsoft makes a point about talking
41:54about accessibility, inclusivity,
41:56accountability, security, like
41:59>> transparency. Um, and if you care about
42:06that, like that's something just to be
42:09aware of that like the the AI systems
42:11are are going to have uh that mindset.
42:14Uh, I'm not going to say that we're
42:16unique in having AI principles like
42:17pretty much most platforms do, but I
42:20would check against it. And then you can
42:21stack rank how much you prioritize
42:25based off of
42:27your AI of choices focusing or not
42:29focusing on those things.
42:31>> Yeah. And I'm a believer that we should
42:34care about accessibility and ADA
42:36compliance for humans. Like it's always
42:39interesting to me how a lot of people
42:41just have like a robots's first lens or
42:43like a crawler first lens, but to me it
42:45always seems like if it's something that
42:47humans would benefit from and allows you
42:50to reach more humans, that that's going
42:52to benefit you algorithmically, whether
42:54it's a crawler or an LLM. So, that just
42:57seems like something that you should do
42:59no matter what. Uh, and I was going to
43:01ask about index now. Is that something
43:03you can just sign up for for free like
43:06through Bing web master tools?
43:08>> Yeah, I don't that's another one of
43:09those tools I don't think enough people
43:11talk about it,
43:12>> you know.
43:14>> Well, well, not only is it like
43:16mindboggling that people don't talk
43:18about it enough um because the Bing
43:21grounding API uh powers most AI
43:24assistants. when you do a great job with
43:30Bing being able to find you and
43:31understand you, you've done the work for
43:33most other AI assistants. So again,
43:37leveraging index now is not a guarantee
43:40that you you're suddenly going to get um
43:43vast improvements in crawling and
43:45findability and all that, but like it is
43:48a way for you to say, "Hey, Bing,
43:52Microsoft, um I made a change.
43:56Please, please investigate." Um, and as
43:59a reminder, uh, what we consider a
44:01change is a net new content, a
44:04meaningful change, uh, to an existing
44:07bit of content or a deletion. Please
44:09don't delete content and get us to come
44:11say hi and investigate you. Like, it
44:14it's much better to either make updates
44:16or or add net new. Um, but if you have
44:19any questions, uh, there's a number of
44:22really really good resources. I'll I'll
44:23happy to send along to go with this.
44:26>> That'd be great. I can put them in the
44:27show notes as well. Uh I had a question
44:30about where did that Oh, so you
44:33mentioned in another interview that
44:36video is no longer an option.
44:39And so I'd love to talk.
44:41>> So it was in reference to uh I think it
44:44was an interview you gave last year and
44:45basically you were talking about how for
44:48companies for brands not doing video
44:52>> is not an option. Oh, I was like, "Doing
44:55video is not an option." I'm like,
44:56"What? When did I say that doing video
44:59was not was not an option?" No. Okay.
45:00So, I Yes, video is important. Um 100%.
45:05Still agree. Um the reason though that
45:08video is so useful is because people
45:12consume information in the way that they
45:15best process it. And there have been a
45:18number of studies that have shown that
45:1965% of humans learn best by viewing
45:24something.
45:25>> Um, again, I'm the minority by learning
45:27by by listening. And if you are asking
45:30people to read a big wall of text or if
45:33you're asking people to kind of infer
45:37things from static images when you could
45:40just give them a video that's really
45:41quick, super engaging, explains exactly
45:43who you are. It's much more useful. It's
45:45actually the same reason why text is
45:49where tone goes to die. Um like it's
45:52better to just hop on a five minute call
45:53and just have that conversation with the
45:55person and and get that clarity.
45:57>> Um videos do do a lot of that good. All
46:00of that said though, not all videos are
46:03equal. So when you're thinking about how
46:05to like allocate time, the best time
46:10spent is where your humans are. So if
46:12you know that your humans are on
46:15LinkedIn, for example, LinkedIn has been
46:18getting really into the short form video
46:20content game, um it is worth investing a
46:24little bit of time just to do some short
46:26form videos. On the flip side, if you
46:29know that your viewers are into
46:33podcasts,
46:35uh, video blogs or vlogs as as it were,
46:39um, you might invest those that time in
46:42the longer form content and then
46:44repurpose, um, the bits for for snips
46:47for whether it's shorts or on LinkedIn.
46:50Um, I think Substack also allows for
46:52videos.
46:53>> Yeah. Uh there's a number of of ways to
46:55to make it work
46:57>> and that's all just really good
46:58marketing like like I was talking about
47:00ear earlier if your audience is there or
47:04consuming something in a certain way you
47:06should be there as well. I'm wondering
47:08if there is a deeper reason in the world
47:12of AI to be investing in video. Uh one
47:16thing I had heard I don't know if you
47:18have any clarification around this. I
47:20had heard from a few sources that Google
47:23Gemini
47:24may look at YouTube short videos for
47:28training for LLM training data or to
47:30pull in information.
47:31>> So I need to be really clear. I I don't
47:33work for Google so I can't comment on
47:36>> I just on whether they do or they don't.
47:39>> Yeah. I don't know as a as sort of a you
47:41know industry peer colleague. I don't
47:43know if you had heard anything uh about
47:46that as well just you know out in the
47:49public.
47:49>> So what what I will say is
47:53there is a reason that you are seeing
47:57that you might be seeing more and more
48:00video content as sources in in AI
48:02surfaces. Mhm.
48:04>> It is great and and a a a great way to
48:09get found doing YouTube content, doing
48:13LinkedIn content, doing uh Reddit
48:16content. Um but in terms of like one
48:21type of content being weighted over
48:23another, like I just I genuinely can't
48:25say what Google does.
48:27>> Yeah. What I will say on the co-pilot
48:30side is that we have different models
48:33that like rely on different sources. So
48:37if someone wants a more thoughtful like
48:40indexed approach, you'll typically
48:42actually find more sources that are
48:45longer form content than if someone's
48:48looking for a quick speedy answers like
48:52you you find shorter form content. But
48:54it's not that you're going to get ranked
48:55higher or lower because you did short
48:57form content or long form content. It's
48:59just like what is the type of answer
49:02that will best meet that need,
49:04>> right? Are there other things that you
49:08think SEO are there ways you think SEOs
49:10and PPCs can collaborate that we have
49:12not talked about? Because that's you
49:14there's an unknown unknown territory for
49:16all of us. Like I don't know what I
49:18don't know. I don't know what's going on
49:21in the world of PPC and advertising that
49:23I could be learning about or
49:25collaborating with when it comes to
49:28doing SEO and and combining that with
49:30PPC. Is there anything else that comes
49:32to mind that we should be doing?
49:36>> The biggest thing is is have a shared
49:39clarity account. I know that might seem
49:41like really shameless self-plugging.
49:43Clarity is free.
49:45>> Uh we charge exactly 0. uh to to
49:48leverage Microsoft clarity. Um and what
49:50it does is it allows you to see uh how
49:52the humans who engage on your site like
49:55what they do, do they get stuck, do AB
49:57tests on landing pages. Um so it's the
50:00behavioral analytics and then also the
50:01AI reporting so AI citations um your
50:04crawl budget that's going to different
50:06AI bots, things like that. Mhm.
50:08>> The reason I think that is the most
50:09important for paid teams and organic
50:12teams to work on together is that
50:14ultimately the landing page experience
50:17is a thing that both have a
50:20responsibility to ensure is correct.
50:22Because ultimately if the landing page
50:26can't close the deal, it doesn't matter
50:28how great you were at ranking. It
50:30doesn't matter how clever that targeting
50:33was in the paid campaign, you you lost
50:36the person. So, we want to make sure
50:39that it's easy to do the thing that you
50:42wanted them to do, but you also want to
50:44make sure that
50:47the people you're getting are correct.
50:50So, clarity can also be really helpful
50:52to uncover if non-helpful bots are
50:55coming to your site. Um,
50:57>> so that's just a a useful thing to be
50:58aware of.
51:00Are you uh aware of any anywhere to get
51:03real prompt data? I know I believe I
51:07just saw Clarity announced that there
51:09you're providing more fanout query data
51:12in that or in Bing web master tools and
51:14that's great.
51:15>> I'll take that data, but is there
51:16anywhere to get prompt data?
51:19>> So prompt data is a privacy issue,
51:22>> right? Just like you wouldn't want
51:23people looking into every little thing
51:26that
51:28you conveyed from like a per a highly
51:32personalized assistant.
51:33>> I don't want somebody in my cloud
51:34account.
51:35>> Exactly. So if you don't want someone in
51:37your cloud account
51:38>> Yeah.
51:40>> So we're actively thinking about how can
51:43we reasonably and responsibly provide as
51:46much data as we can so that we're
51:47showing our work. But I I don't know
51:50that we ever want to get to a point
51:52where we are showing full prompts
51:54because if we show full prompts that
51:57that's a really big violation of
51:59privacy.
52:00>> Um because the types of things that
52:02people put into prompts, they're not
52:04just simple little keywords. Like they
52:05they are
52:06>> really thoughtful, sometimes highly
52:08personalized information. Like I'll give
52:10even an example um with my my my husband
52:14and I. Um, we were going through like a
52:18really rough period like like a year and
52:22a half ago
52:24>> and like I was asking like would I have
52:27been better off
52:30not marrying my husband? Now obviously
52:32the answer is no. Like my husband is one
52:35of the best humans in the world and like
52:36life with him is amazing and like I'm
52:39very grateful that I have an amazing
52:40lovely in him. Um but like that sort of
52:44personal
52:46>> Yeah.
52:46>> you you don't you don't want that being
52:48visible.
52:50>> Yeah. And I agree. I I think priv
52:52privacy is very important. So obviously
52:54that's a big concern. What can companies
52:57if you're a company that wants to
52:59understand how people are prompting and
53:02using LLMs? You know I thought of like
53:04do you survey people like how do you get
53:07an idea? because again I the there's a
53:10positive intent here which is to
53:12understand how to help people that are
53:14using these new surfaces and I don't
53:18know of a better way to do that than
53:19knowing how are people interacting and
53:21prompting and speaking to these things.
53:24So, here's the thing. You don't need to
53:27know what they prompted if you know what
53:30the AI searched to help them address
53:33that prompt. Because if you know what
53:35the per what the AI is searching in the
53:37background, you can get a sense of,
53:39okay, do I actually match that? Like, is
53:43coming up for this sort of citation
53:46useful to me and my brand. So, I I would
53:49argue that you actually don't need to
53:51know the human prompt at all. you need
53:52to know what what is going into that
53:56search uh on the back end that's going
53:58to ultimately inform the answer given to
54:00the human. But in terms of like actual
54:05like attribution is effectively what I
54:07think you're getting at. Yes. Ask your
54:08humans how they're engaging with you
54:11because
54:13most people actually don't do this. They
54:15don't take the time to ask,
54:16>> yeah,
54:17>> did did you f how did you hear about me?
54:20Where where did you find me? Um, and
54:22even if the answer is not the last click
54:26attribution
54:28source, that's still helpful to know
54:30because then you know, okay,
54:32>> this thing that I might have pulled
54:34budget from is actually still helpful.
54:37>> Where do you think the future uh the big
54:40existential question? Okay, so be
54:43prepared.
54:45Where do you think the future of the web
54:47websites? I know in another interview
54:49you talked about or or even now you
54:51talked about let's let's stop thinking
54:53about landing pages so much and think
54:54about the agentic scenario. You gave an
54:57example in another interview where you
54:58had an issue with your dog and you could
55:00have gone to like an agent and that
55:02agent would have helped you figure out
55:05what to do medically about the issue
55:06your dog was having. Uh so that's one
55:10part of to ask the question like do you
55:13see a future where there's no websites
55:16there's no you know web as we know it
55:19it's all agents like what how how are
55:22you thinking about that as we're moving
55:24into the future?
55:25>> So to put everyone's minds at ease I
55:28don't think there will ever be a world
55:29where websites fully go away. I just
55:32think that there most people won't
55:34engage with them. Um, and the reason
55:36most people won't engage with them is
55:38that websites as a tool are really
55:41clunky. Um, so a really good way to
55:44think about it is
55:47you can read Weathering Heights. You can
55:50go through the several hundreds of pages
55:53of melodramatic Heath Cliff screaming
55:56into the moors and Catherine totally
56:00being a horrible person to him.
56:03This is only funny if you've if you've
56:05actually read Weathering Heights or you
56:07can read the cliff notes
56:08>> or you could ask
56:11AI summarize Weathering Heights for me
56:13in a minute or less.
56:17Different people process information
56:19differently. And so the people that will
56:20still want to sit and read Weathering
56:22Heights or uh like even thinking about
56:24like Steven Colbear and Lord of the
56:26Rings like he goes back and rereads Lord
56:28of the Rings. Then then be people that
56:30watch the movies and book purists will
56:33say, "How dare you? You
56:35you're you're violating my my sacred
56:37text." And then there will be people who
56:39do do even more than that.
56:41Websites are going to be a constant
56:45layer because that's also how like the
56:48agentic layer on top of websites will
56:51will engage. and humans are showing a
56:56desire to want to engage in that way.
56:59But there will still be humans who
57:01choose the website. So um making this
57:03more practical and less bookreated. Um
57:06people who say yes to one-click checkout
57:09are like have already said yes to the
57:11first step on the path to agents. People
57:13who do not do one-click checkout or who
57:15do not do one-click passwords and and
57:17don't want to have that information
57:18saved. There's never going to be a world
57:21where the agentic future will be
57:24something that they'll say yes to.
57:26>> So for them, there still needs to be
57:28websites. It's just I wouldn't count on
57:30websites being how the lion share of
57:32your humans engage with you. It's it's
57:37how you protect the ones that still want
57:40a website, but then also how you
57:42communicate with agents, what your value
57:45is, the accuracy, things like that.
57:48It's interesting because I see so much
57:50of the other sentiment where for example
57:54you you probably know Google IO just
57:56happened and they made some big
57:57announcements about how they're
57:59completely chang
58:03uh the web is over as we know it or
58:04Google search is over like what it was a
58:07very clickbaity head headline. Uh, but
58:10somebody shared this news in Tik Tok and
58:13then I was reading all the comments.
58:15Every single comment, hundreds of them
58:17were like, "We don't want this. Enough
58:19of AI." Like they we they want the old
58:22Google. People want the the old web, the
58:25internet back where you can click around
58:27and discover websites and it had a charm
58:30to it and a fun to it. So, it's
58:32interesting how I'm seeing such strong
58:35sentiment in one direction, but then
58:38you're right. There are people I find AI
58:40useful,
58:42you know, in many applications. I went
58:45to an article you wrote and summarized
58:47it with Gemini so I could just take in
58:49what you talked about two years ago in
58:50that article much more quickly. So, it's
58:54it's interesting because I I'm torn. I
58:56don't love it or hate it. I'm somewhere
58:58in the middle and I think there's a lot
59:01of people that just refuse. They don't
59:03want it. They're like go to duck.go, you
59:05know,
59:06>> which ironically duck. Go is a partner
59:09with with Microsoft. So it's like we're
59:11we've we're we're all for it. Like
59:14absolutely
59:16go forever.
59:17>> Yeah. So to kind of wrap things up, I
59:20want to make sure are there any other AI
59:22based uh I don't know if I asked this
59:25question correctly, but are there any
59:26other ad features within Bing or
59:29Microsoft
59:30um that people should know about?
59:32Something that's exciting to you that
59:34you think is a big opportunity?
59:36>> So one thing that I I definitely think
59:38not enough people realize within
59:39Microsoft like a as been serving in
59:42copilot since 2024. I I think I said
59:44that already. But the thing that I
59:46personally find very exciting is
59:47impression based remarketing, which is
59:49that you can actually
59:50>> What is that again?
59:51>> Impressionbased remarketing.
59:53>> Okay,
59:53>> you can target, exclude, bid up or bid
59:56down based off off of someone just
59:58seeing your your ad.
1:00:00>> Now, why that's incredibly exciting is
1:00:02that if someone sees your ad on
1:00:04co-pilot, that counts for impression
1:00:06based remarketing that you could then
1:00:07target them on search. So why this is
1:00:11interesting? People who maybe have
1:00:14thoughts and feelings about
1:00:17um I want to just run brand to people
1:00:21who haven't ever seen my ad before. You
1:00:24can have an impression based remarketing
1:00:26list that then excludes everyone who's
1:00:29seen your ad before. Um, you can also
1:00:32vice versa, like if you want to make
1:00:34sure that you're targeting exclusively
1:00:38lower in the funnel off of someone who
1:00:40has already seen some messaging and get
1:00:43a more targeted offer, you can do that
1:00:46as a targeting mechanism. So, so long as
1:00:48there's at least one audience ad in the
1:00:50up to 20 um seed source lists, uh, so
1:00:55it's either an ad group or or a
1:00:56campaign, any campaign type can speak to
1:00:59any campaign type. So that's something
1:01:00that Google doesn't have. Um it's
1:01:03something that Microsoft built
1:01:05specifically because like we heard
1:01:07people that
1:01:09you need a privacy compliant way
1:01:12to to engage and sometimes the click is
1:01:16a really expensive way to preclude
1:01:18someone like you shouldn't have to wait
1:01:20for the click to build the remarketing.
1:01:23>> Um so that impression based remarketing
1:01:25is is is really really really cool.
1:01:27>> That's great. impression-based
1:01:28remarketing. The the one of the top PPC
1:01:31people that I work with and we
1:01:32collaborate on clients, he swears by
1:01:35Bing. We had a client shut off their
1:01:37Microsoft ads and he was on them every
1:01:40day until they turned them back on
1:01:42because they they perform so well. Uh so
1:01:45I think that's just good for anybody,
1:01:47even if you're an SEO. like I I often
1:01:50when I'm working with clients, I try to
1:01:52bring things to their radar that are
1:01:54outside of SEO because if they could
1:01:56benefit the client, you know, I that's
1:01:58just helping everybody. So, I think if
1:02:00you're an SEO listening to this and
1:02:02you're like, well, I don't run ads. Why
1:02:03do I care about that? I would mention
1:02:05this impressionbased retargeting to a
1:02:08client or your company or your site you
1:02:10work with because I think anything that
1:02:12you know helps in the advertising side
1:02:14is beneficial in one way or another to
1:02:16the SEO side. Uh so as we wrap things
1:02:19up, it's been great chatting with you.
1:02:21Uh I knew from the beginning I didn't
1:02:23provide so for people listening, I did
1:02:25not provide Nava any notes or questions
1:02:27ahead of time because I listened to you
1:02:30speak in other podcasts and I saw your
1:02:33material and I know that you can just
1:02:34have a conversation and that's what I
1:02:36love about people coming on experts in
1:02:38the wire. So, as we wrap things up, uh
1:02:41any place you'd like to direct people
1:02:43where they can find you, any call to
1:02:45action, this is your chance to mention
1:02:48anything and everything here.
1:02:49>> Yeah. So, first, thank you so much for
1:02:51for the conversation. This was this was
1:02:53really really fun. Um people can find me
1:02:55on LinkedIn. I do a monthly column on
1:02:57search engine journal and search engine
1:03:00land. Uh as I mentioned, I'm on the
1:03:02board of the paid search association. We
1:03:03have a slack group. I'm also very active
1:03:05in the PPC chat, women techo slack
1:03:08groups. Um, and I would encourage
1:03:11everybody if you are at all in the
1:03:15Boston area. I think uh Dan and I are
1:03:18are going to be there next week for SMX
1:03:20maybe.
1:03:21>> Yes. Yes. And I'm going to try to post
1:03:24this episode on Monday. So, if you're
1:03:26listening the day comes out, right, but
1:03:29it'll be tomorrow. So, we'll see uh
1:03:31maybe hopefully some people in Boston
1:03:32tomorrow. Um but uh no that's that's
1:03:36great and so uh what I'll do Nava if you
1:03:38send me some of those links or I'll
1:03:41>> we'll get them in the show notes for
1:03:42people as well. So uh the best place to
1:03:44find Experts on the Wire is Spotify full
1:03:47video and that's where all the show
1:03:49notes are and everything but you can
1:03:50also check us out on Apple YouTube etc
1:03:53all the places. So Nava it's been great
1:03:55having you on Experts in the Wire and
1:03:57we'll talk to everyone next time.
1:04:00Cheers, Dan.

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