Your Digital Marketing Coach with Neal Schaffer

Boost Your Online Visibility with Google Knowledge Panels and Social Media Signals with Dennis Yu

• Neal Schaffer • Episode 383

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Unlock the secrets to boosting your online visibility and making your brand irresistible with Google Knowledge Panels. I sat down with digital marketing expert Dennis Yu to uncover the transformative power of social media signals in search results. Learn how genuine customer engagement and user-generated content can elevate your Google-ability and cement your credibility in the digital landscape. With a focus on authentic content across platforms like YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram, Dennis provides valuable insights that will propel your brand to new heights.

Our conversation unpacks the essence of digital marketing, emphasizing the pivotal role that data and social media play in achieving marketing success. Drawing from decades of experience, Dennis highlights the nuances of algorithms used by giants like Google and TikTok, revealing how these systems interpret signals beyond mere website data. Explore strategic tactics for outpacing competition on platforms like Amazon and Netflix, and discover how embedding recognizable elements in your content can become a game-changer in the ranking race.

Dennis also sheds light on mastering Google relevance, urging businesses to focus on location-specific content to bolster their digital presence. With a thoughtful discussion on AI's role in marketing and updates from Facebook and Pinterest, Dennis provide a comprehensive look at the current trends and strategies shaping the industry. From tackling common mistakes to enhancing signal strength with authentic connections, this episode is packed with actionable advice to strengthen your online footprint without the constant pressure of being an influencer.

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Speaker 1:

Google Knowledge Panels. You might have seen these informative boxes pop up in your search results, but do you truly understand how they can transform your online presence and elevate your brand's visibility? In this episode, I am interviewing the one and only Dennis Yu, who will guide you through the intricacies of mastering Google Knowledge Panels and reveal the impact of social media signals on your search results. From leveraging authentic content and real-world connections to harnessing the power of platforms like YouTube, twitter and Instagram, we will uncover the secrets to becoming more Google-able. Plus, dennis will share insights on the importance of genuine customer engagement and the role of user-generated content in building credibility. We have all this and lots more so stay tuned to this next episode of the your Digital Marketing Coach podcast.

Speaker 2:

Digital social media content, influencer marketing, blogging, podcasting, vlogging, tiktoking, linkedin, twitter, facebook, instagram, youtube, seo, sem, ppc, email marketing there's a lot to cover. Whether you're a marketing professional, entrepreneur or business owner, you need someone you can rely on for expert advice. Good thing you've got Neil on your side, because Neil Schaefer is your digital marketing coach, helping you grow your business with digital. First marketing, one episode at a time, this is your digital marketing coach, and this is Neil Schaefer.

Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, this is Neil Schaefer, your digital marketing coach, and welcome to episode number 383 of this podcast. Episode number 400 will publish the first week of 2025. So we are gearing down towards the end of the year. We are now into Q4.

Speaker 1:

And, real briefly, before we get to the interview, some news that I've been following that I wanted to share with you.

Speaker 1:

First of all, obviously, ai, we know, is an important part of our marketing today and of going forward, and you probably already heard that OpenAI raised $6.6 billion in its latest funding round, bringing its valuation to $157 billion, and I know that there are other AI solutions out there, but you want to be investing your time with the gorilla and OpenAI, clearly, with this valuation, is the gorilla.

Speaker 1:

Obviously, this highlights the increasing demand for AI innovations and solutions, and OpenAI will continue to expand their influence in various industries. What I'm excited about is this raised capital is expected to be used for further development of its AI models, research and scaling infrastructure. It goes without saying that this valuation underscores OpenAI's position as a leading player in the still rapidly evolving AI space. So I recently did a webinar on AI and marketing and I really focused not on third-party tools, which I was a bigger fan of at the beginning of generative AI, but right now I'm really focusing all of my AI efforts on chat, gpt and I suggest you do as well for a lot of reasons, but this becomes one more of them Also in the news, facebook had an amazing announcement that said they actually paid creators $2 billion in 2024, emphasizing that they are committed to supporting content creators.

Speaker 1:

When we talk about the creator economy and influencer marketing, we don't really talk about Facebook, but it is still a really, really important platform and I think in the United States it's considered sort of an old person's network, but in most parts of the world it is still very much a young person's network. So, if you didn't know, there are various ways to monetize on Facebook, just like any other platform, with Reels, bonuses, ad revenue sharing and fan subscriptions. What really Meta is trying to do and obviously Instagram is part of it but Facebook is as well to compete with YouTube and TikTok, offering creators more ways to earn directly from their content. And clearly every social media platform is prioritizing creator partnerships to drive engagement and growth, which means that the creator economy grows. Creators yield more influence in the newsfeed and I believe, as businesses, we should be engaging even more with creators because they are having even more influence. It's this perfect whirlwind of different factors that keeps on driving this creator economy and really the influence of creators in the newsfeed higher and higher and higher, and that includes Facebook, which is the aha epiphany moment for me when I heard about that. Also interesting news. Now. Pinterest is not the biggest of social networks, but they just announced their biggest upgrade to their advertising platform in a while. It's called the Performance Plus Suite and it's using AI and automation tools to optimize lower funnel ad performance, streamlines campaign creation, requires fewer inputs and helps you leverage generative AI to enhance product visuals. There's a lot that went into this update and, with the holiday season right around the corner, if you are an e-commerce product or you're targeting especially a female demographic, then obviously you'll want to check this out. Pinterest is still very much relevant right now. Of all the social networks, pinterest is the number one driver of traffic to my site, neilschafercom, because, as Pinterest experts know, pinterest is not a social network, it is a search engine. And well you know. Go back to my episode with Kate Aul. This was episode number 267. It was two and a half years ago, but still the title was Pinterest Marketing. It's Time to Diversify your Social Media Marketing. Kate Aul is the CEO and founder of SimplePim Media. She is just the thought leader in the space, a dear friend of mine and a really amazing individual.

Speaker 1:

If you want to be the first to hear about these news, make sure you subscribe to my newsletter. Go to neilschafercom slash newsletter, where I cover these and more advice, and I'm just looking at this week's newsletter talking about link building strategies, sms and email marketing, touchpoint analysis for your social media, ai and CRM, ai and podcasting, how to lower your cost of email marketing. Every week is filled with. Really it's a mix of the news that you should know about as a marketer, small business owner, entrepreneur, but also some really tactical advice that I find really interesting, that I curate from the internet but also share with you my own content that I publish on a regular basis as well. So, once again, that is neilschafercom slash newsletter For personal updates.

Speaker 1:

Well, finally, this week, october 1st, as I mentioned on my last podcast episode, I finally published Digital Threads. So this is the small business and entrepreneur playbook for digital first marketing. It is the book that I wish I had when I started doing marketing consulting and when I started my current role as a fractional CMO, and I think that if you are involved in digital marketing in any way, there's going to be some takeaways from this book. So you can now find it at most bookstores in ebook form, in paperback form. The companion workbook paperback finally made it onto Amazon today, actually, as I record this, and the hardcover and audio book should be available in the next week or two, so really excited. Obviously, don't forget about maximizing LinkedIn for business growth either, and I plan on adding more content and expanding that, but right now I'm really focusing on digital threads and hoping that it helps a lot of people.

Speaker 1:

All right, so today's interview is with Dennis Yu. Dennis is known as one of the world's foremost experts in Facebook advertising. He's the founder and CEO of Blitzmetrics. He is also the co-author, with Perry Marshall, of the Definitive Guide to TikTok Advertising, and this dude if I may call him dude, he's a great guy, has been around a while and really knows his stuff, especially when it comes to algorithms, and you're going to hear a lot about that. We had a great conversation. I don't want you to wait anymore, so, without further ado, here's my interview with the one and only Dennis Yu.

Speaker 2:

You're listening to your Digital Marketing Coach. This is Neil Schaefer.

Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, this is Neil Schaefer, and welcome to another live stream edition of the your Digital Marketing Coach podcast. There are a number of authors, experts that are out there in the world of social media marketing, but one guy who has been out there for many, many years, who I've had the chance to meet in person and who even people in my Digital First Mastermind group say we use his three-by-three ad matrix for Facebook ads. He's known as a premier Facebook ads expert. I also co-written a book on TikTok ads. But more importantly and I don't know if he remembers this, but we'll bring him on stage momentarily I got introduced to him a long time ago from a guy that I met here in Southern California who also spoke Japanese, had an interest in Japan, worked for a Japanese company, and we were actually talking about launching a company at one point.

Speaker 1:

But he's like hey, you got to meet this guy named Dennis Yu, who is our guest today, and it turns out that the guy that I became friends with, we both went to the same high school and he said yeah, dennis went to high school with me as well. So, dennis, I don't know if you remember, but we actually went to the same high school. When I went, it was called the Rolling Hills High School Titans. I think you might've already become plentiful high school when you went, but at that time Jeff's like man. The guy works at Yahoo. He's a total internet marketing whiz and I've just been following him from afar, seeing him speak in and we were just talking before this in, like you know, 20 countries over the past two months. World traveler, someone who was sought after by you know executives at Fortune 500s for his expertise. Well, without any further ado, I don't know what else I can say, but let's just bring him on stage. Dennis Yu. Welcome to the your Digital Marketing Coach podcast, my friend.

Speaker 3:

Awesome, neil. On my resume I'm going to say that I know Neil Schaefer.

Speaker 1:

I think it's the opposite, my friend. So a lot of people know you for a lot of things and when we were planning this episode, I assumed maybe you wanted to talk about Facebook ads, maybe TikTok ads, but you wanted to take a different direction, about becoming more Google-able. But before we begin that, can you give our audience a sense of where you came from, where you've been and how you got to where you are today?

Speaker 3:

Yeah Well, you know you've been in Asia a lot and I'm as Chinese as Panda Express. I was born and date in Ohio, but I was good at math. That's the one thing I did get from my Chinese parents and I did calculus when I was like eight. Wow, and I competed in math contests and I did statistics and I did math for fun. I went to math parties. You know what they do at math parties, neil.

Speaker 1:

I have no idea.

Speaker 3:

Math, and so I happened to be in the right place at the right time, with all this internet stuff and my background in statistics and analytics and data and whatnot was perfect for Yahoo, and I built the analytics, which is really kind of neat. All this data. We had log files bigger than commercial databases could handle. We didn't have any security issues because, neil, if you got the files, you couldn't even open them. They're that big and we had to figure out what people were doing and serve ads and create targeting clusters and also protect the search results from people trying to trick us, because I was a search engine engineer. So, as a search engine engineer over two decades ago, I had to see it from the side of these users that were looking for things and not show them spammy stuff that SEO people would show. And I had to make the advertisers happy because they were spending money. So there's an algorithm to give the user the results and there's an algorithm to basically the same algorithm to figure out what ad to show people, and that's how we made money.

Speaker 3:

And then Google ripped us off and you know Google's whole money engine of ad words and people spending money bidding on keywords and whatever you know that came from Yahoo, right, they completely stole it from us.

Speaker 3:

I did not know that. Yeah, and there's a whole lawsuit around it and everyone knows, everyone in the industry knows, but for some reason their PR is so good they made it seem like it was their idea, but they completely ripped it off from us. But anyway, I learned about data and behavior and targeting and monetization. And social media came along and then we almost bought Facebook, but Mark Zuckerberg was a jerk and you saw it happen after that. But it was the very same thing that worked for me as a search engine engineer, worked for me as a social media marketer analyzing data, kind of, and how you set up ads and conversion tracking and passing back you know, pixel firing data. So all these things like Facebook ads, Instagram, tiktok ads are all actually the same thing as what I did 20 plus years ago. It's just buying from a different system, but the mechanics of how you buy ads and monetize and make money are exactly the same.

Speaker 1:

That explains why you've always been on the paid media side. But yeah, that's playing to your strengths and, having worked early on those algorithms, I can see how this comes a lot easier for you than to a lot of people. But, Dennis, what's amazing is that you've also created teachable moments and I know you're speaking and you speak in a lot of developing countries as well of being able to, from a very, very intelligent perspective, be able to for lack of a better word dumb down the principles to teach companies how to do it themselves. I commend you for being able to do that. What, in your experience, helped you not just you know, understand intrinsically what the algorithms were about, but learn how to best teach that to empower others, Because I look at that as another one of your special skills.

Speaker 3:

So this is going to reveal me as a geek or dork or whatever you want to call it, but I had a friend who lived across the hall from me when I was in high school and his name was Arnaud de Rottenheim. He had a PhD in mathematics and he and I would just geek out about math and he said you know, the first time you do an integral, you kind of go through it and you learn how to do it. By the 10th time you're faster. By the hundredth time or thousandth time you know how to do it. You start to understand the actual process behind it almost naturally. And by the millionth time you've done an integral or whatever the math thing is. You've reached this like high Mount Everest kind of peak of, if that. And he just does math all the time. He loves math, I mean multiple PhDs and I thought there's something just beautiful about this, because when he and I talk there are complex math things we talk about. But there's something philosophical when you talk to people who are at the very top of their level, to people who are at the very top of their level. And let me tell you, because you're able to simplify, you know, einstein says that you know. Complex things are made easier and impossible things are made possible when you do it enough times, and the mark of whether you know something is if you can say it simply. So here it is.

Speaker 3:

Here's my distillation of 35 years, 70,000 hours in digital marketing. Success, in paid and organic, is based upon first having actually doing the thing that you do, proof that you actually do it well, and that will rank organically on TikTok and Facebook and YouTube and Google and whatever. And on the paid side, it's an amplification of the fact that you already do a good job for your customers. You're a plumber in Denver, colorado, you're a veterinarian in Costa Mesa, whatever it is. It's such a this understanding only comes from having spent billions of dollars on ads and seeing the data from other people's spending the money looking at their ad accounts, looking at their analytics, looking at their Google my Business, looking at any of their data sources. Because the algorithm, like Google wants to show you like, let's say, neil, you're in Orange County and you're looking for good Korean barbecue Like Google wants to actually show you the best result. And how does it tell? By its interpretation of the signals. But the signals come not just from people leaving reviews or looking at Yelp, but there's signals that come from where people are.

Speaker 3:

You know that the whole lawsuit that happened a month ago in the data breach with Google, where they revealed that it was the Chrome data, like people's click data and what their behavior, is actually the biggest driver of all this SEO stuff right, and the signals that come from looking at social media data actually drives search results. Signals that come from looking at social media data actually drives search results and it creates corroborating loops of evidence where if I know that, let's say that you know because you speak fluent Japanese and Chinese. My first language was Chinese until I learned English at six. There's signals that occur based on people walking around and on their cell phones and websites, which is like one part.

Speaker 3:

But a lot of people think that ranking on Google is about websites. No, it's all this data it's pulling in every single kind. You would not believe how much data they're pulling it and trying to make. And just the data that we pulled in 20 something years ago. I can't imagine what the Google people are pulling in now. So, to rank on Google, make sure there's noise and signal in social media. So to rank on Google, make sure there's noise and signal in social media, that's a huge aha moment. That is simple. But, neil, how many people who are social media experts that you and I know actually know that? Or they think it's a trick or some algorithmic kind of thing?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think it's simple. People are still at that hack level, like let's hack the algorithm, and it's usually very one-dimensional, whereas what you're talking about is as omni-channel. It sort of redefines what omni-channel means. It's people literally with a phone that has Chrome open, walking into a store and Google being able to access location-based data as one such signal.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and that data shows up everywhere. So why do you think you know? Remember when Facebook used to be a website and then they had moved to mobile and there was a mobile news feed, and then they required you to install the Facebook Messenger app instead of using the Facebook website. Why did they want people to use the app? Why did they say they did? And what was the actual reason? Yeah, get data right.

Speaker 3:

Yes, what they said was oh, it's a better experience in the app and you can do all these other things you can't do, which is kind of like dangling the carrot. The stick was if you don't do this, you can't play the game. And they're on a mobile app. You know where they are. You literally know, like, if they are, you know walking, or if they're in a car, they can tell. There's all kinds of things listening all the time, all kinds of stuff. So when you realize that all this data gathering provides more signals, that helps on an organic standpoint and on a paid standpoint, Like TikTok.

Speaker 3:

I've made a bunch of TikToks that have gone super viral, and you know why? It's not because I'm really good at getting attention or singing or dancing. It's because I intentionally will place pictures and videos in the background background, or you know, TikTok will see I'm at Jake Paul's house, and so it does facial recognition, image recognition, and then matches it with Jake Paul or the other people that I'm with I do that intentionally, because that is a ranking factor, right, and the other social networks are starting to do that.

Speaker 3:

Here's another thing. Here's another aha thing that only comes from I've never heard anyone say it you ready, let's go for it. The very thing that drives the recommendations when you're on Amazon and looking to buy supplements, for example, vitamin B3 pills, or when you're on Netflix and you're looking for that next movie and it's making these recommendations to you. Or when you are on Google and you're searching for things. Or when you're on YouTube and you watch this one video and it recommends these other videos. Or you're on TikTok and you're scrolling. Those are all the same algorithm. It's a collaborative filter, right, it's a lookalike. On the ad side, it's a lookalike, because what is advertising? Try to find people that are just like these people that I'm passing through the conversion API or whatnot. Right, here are my customers. I'm uploading the list of them, an email of them. I'm connecting my CRM to Google, to Facebook. I'm passing you my data. I'm passing you when the phone rings. I'm passing you call, real data to track how many phone calls were over one minute. I'm telling you who my customers are. Find more customers like that.

Speaker 3:

Isn't that not the same thing when you look for something on Amazon or you listen to a song on Spotify? Or it's an algorithm trying to match people to you, to you as a user, whether it's ads or organic right? Once you have that realization, the green lines in the matrix fade away and you see the woman in the red dress and you realize. You know what this isn't about search. It isn't about social. It isn't about the latest algorithm to go to use Instagram reels. It's none of that. What it is is do you generate the signal across multiple channels that corroborate themselves, that show you actually are the best roofer in Santa Monica, because you know I need a new roof or whatever and I'm searching for roofer? What signals can I see to show that this business XYZ Roofing, neil Schaefer Roofing is actually a good roofing company? It's not their SEO, it's whether they actually have a good reputation and these things. And does it show up Like do you claim your crunch base and your Quora and your Instagram and your Twitter and your TikTok I'm a roofing company. Why would I do that? Because you want to generate the signal, not because you're trying to be a social media whatever with 100,000 followers, right? How do we get that into people's heads? These businesses come to us all the time and they want some. Dennis is a social media expert. No, I'm not. I'm just trying to feed the data back into each of the systems so that we rank on Google and so that our ads can. I'm just, I'm literally just trying to get all the proof that you actually are good at painting and roofing and whatever it is that you do mainly local businesses, but it could be whatever we've done for Starbucks and Ashley Furniture and Adidas and whatever, but we're just passing. This is literally. I know I'm sort of like getting pissed, because I love to rant about this, because it just drives me nuts. Maybe you haven't, maybe you know how to solve this problem, neil, but my job has always been the last 35 years is to take all the data that shows you are good at the thing that you do and push it out there to be seen. Is there proof? Is it on your phone? Do you know why I use Google Photos, Neil? I want Google to see the thing right. Why do you think I use Gmail? Why do you think we put stuff on YouTube? Why do you think we push everything to GMB? If I want to rank on Google, I want it to see that I am innocent. Judge Google, I actually am good at roofing in Santa Monica or whatever.

Speaker 3:

Pest control in Portland, oregon. Yeah, there's lots of proof of that. Here's my vans. Here's proof of my technicians spraying. Here's some information about what do you do about ants and raccoons. And there's all this proof. My buddy, ken Vanagen, runs EcoCare Pest Control and he's got lots of proof. There's him and I and Linda, his wife, and we're hanging out and having dinner in Portland. There's so much proof. It's not AI-generated, it's real proof, real customers, real stats. His son, michael, is learning marketing using our Dollar Day program. There's all kinds of proof of this and so they're number one in Portland.

Speaker 3:

Pest control because I'm good at SEO. No, because we have lots of proof across many channels, not just the website, many places, and it had nothing to do with any social media experts. There's a kid, danny Liebrand, who's 19 years old, that runs an agency serving pest control and he's the one doing the work for Ken and all these other people. He works with pest control companies, this Danny Liebrand kid, and he's following all our techniques to make people Googleable and whatnot. He's not an SEO expert. He was never a search engine engineer, but he goes to each of these pest control companies and he says what proof do you have that you serve Gresham and Portland and Beaverton and all these other areas?

Speaker 3:

Do you have proof? Do you have proof? Get rid of the stock art. Do you have pictures of your vans, of your people doing the stuff? No, no, we didn't hire a professional photographer yet. We didn't hire the social media expert yet. You don't need that. Your people that are going around in touch with your about you know bugs what about her? She gives all this advice about you know mosquitoes during the summer. Why don't you have her explain the very stuff she already explained? Oh, but she's not media trained, doesn't matter. Does she have a phone? Yeah, do that. Put it all in one folder and let's put it out there on the internet. Then we'll run ads against it. Feed the signal back, you know, pass through the calls and whatever, and all your social media and SEO and whatever all working together. Now you see what I mean. No, I've never heard anyone say that. I feel like it's so simple and fundamental.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's amazing because what you talk about is simple yet complex, yet so eloquently said, and it really comes down to if you really are who you are, if you really are the expert that you are and anyone who's been in business for a few years is an expert in what they do it's just a matter of showing up digitally and proving it and then, obviously, using that paid media to then accelerate the algorithms understanding and audiences seeing you as well.

Speaker 1:

So, yeah, I think that is just the simplest way of explaining because, at the end of the day, even a lot of SEO experts will say it comes down to the content, which should be proof of what you do, as you said.

Speaker 1:

And, yeah, you don't need to hire the expert because the IP is all within your head the head of your employees, that reactionist who's been answering customer questions for 10 years, or the person out in the field doing the actual spraying. So, dennis, that was awesome, and I think the title of this episode is how to Become More Googleable. I think we understand now the importance of being Googleable, feeding the algorithm, and is it just as simple as wherever your target customer might be digitally, of showing up there online, of putting out that content that shows proof of who you are, what you do, your expertise, putting some paid media to accelerate. Is there anything that we might be missing? And obviously there's a lot of details if we were to go by each one of those things, but in a 360 degree view of it, is that basically what you see or are there any missing pieces?

Speaker 3:

It is, but people goof it up. So let me give you one example that will kind of paint all the mistakes that people make in this area. So if you, neil, don't like how you look for some reason and in the mirror you know whatever, you have a gut maybe let's just say are you going to say, well, the issue is a mirror, I need to buy a new mirror. This mirror is bad. You step on the scale. You don't like the number. It says I need to get a new scale. No, the issue is not the scale of the mirror. The issue is the thing, the input, right, you, what it can see. You know what you stand on like, you know. So if I am that Portland pest control company and I don't rank on Google or no one's clicking on my social media stuff, it's actually a relevancy issue and a signal issue. So I need to. So if I'm showing pictures of and little making 15 second vertical videos of hey, here's how you take care of ants, or we've got this raccoon problem because there's trash everywhere, well, when people are scrolling on Facebook or on YouTube or whatever, and you see, you know Ken saying, yeah, if you've got, you know, raccoons, make sure that you put you close the lid on your trash can or something. I'm sure that's great advice, but this guy serves Portland Oregon, so he doesn't say anything about Portland. He should say you know in Portland that the trash only comes around once a week. It used to be twice, but they cut the budget right. Or in Portland we seem to have a lot more squirrels, because you know it's closer to the forest and this other area, and in the squirrels like to get in your trash because you know, and also in Portland, we have this special kind of squirrel. You know, I don't know whatever it is, but say things about Portland and then, if you're making that post on whatever channel TikTok, you know, twitter, linkedin say one of the things in Portland Oregon, not Portland Maine that we noticed is this and this and this. So there's no specific signal.

Speaker 3:

So I see these guys, like my buddy, roger Wakefield, just sold his plumbing company. Great guy, he's a plumber, right, you know who he is. He's a social media guy now, but he's also a plumber, for 35 years, indeed. And he can make issues like hey, if your toilet's clogged up or if you need to replace the pipes or whatever, I'm a plumber and this is what you would do and this is how you fix it. And so he's got millions of views, right. But his YouTube, even though he's got what? 700,000 followers, and then across social media, several million, if you type it literally, you type in plumber, plumbing, into YouTube, he ranks, he dominates that thing, right. But when he started doing that, did that help his business? He was in Dallas doing plumbing, but of the people that are here, this is an example. So, of the social media videos that he's making, because he now is a social media influencer, right, how many of them when he made a video, what percent of that audience actually helped his Dallas plumbing company?

Speaker 1:

Oh, I'm going to say probably because when on YouTube you're reaching a global audience. So I'm going to say very few, but I might be wrong.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, almost none. Yeah, because the people that are watching are learning about, you know, clogged toilets and whatever it is, but how many of them are in Dallas? So, all you guys that are making social media, this and that, are you trying to become an influencer where you're just trying to reach the world, or are you trying to reach people in your town? Right, if you are Kim Butler and you're in, like Shreveport, and you do financial services, you sell life insurance, then you want to target people in Shreveport. You don't want to target people all over the planet.

Speaker 3:

And so simple things like this, like if you make a TikTok or Facebook or whatever, and you know how you can put like a little like a thumbnail, basically, and put the words across the top, right, just say attention, dallas, texas, if your toilet is broken, my guys can come fix it. 214, which is a Dallas area code, 214, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You're making it super relevant, right, and it could be as simple as that, but remember, it's all the same thing on relevancy, and if you show the algorithm, meaning on Google or paid organic, that you get at least 10% of people engaging, that seems to be the magic number across all the data I've seen.

Speaker 1:

Then they say like this is really relevant right, yeah, and it's funny talk about the algorithm. Even you know this Instagram Live, lisa. Thank you so much. Lisa Pattenden, and you know she's like I think it's more like how to own your spot on Google rather than how to become more Google-able. Well, we could say the same thing. But she also said mirrors are haters, and I see more and more as she keeps commenting. So, once again, the algorithm, the signal it rewards you when you have that content that others actually want to see. Just case in point, just want to throw that out there. It's that simple.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it's not about singing and dancing and trying to get attention and this kind of thing. I'm looking at your live right here. Wow, this is really cool. So if we're generating a signal that has high engagement, then the algorithm wants to reward us. Because when you're on a free platform, using Google for free, using Facebook for free because the users use it for free, because advertisers run the thing right, support the thing, that's who's paying for it? Well, the algorithm needs to keep people on the platform in order to continue to serve ads at them. So if it works well organically, then it can be boostable. If it doesn't work well organically and then people are running ads against it, that's a bad user experience, even though it does make money for the network. And I know people say well, facebook just wants to make my money, that's why my organic sucks. You know they're forcing me to run ads. Absolutely not true. You need to have the engagement. So I keep saying to people you say the issue is your ads aren't converting because you're selling industrial piping in Houston, texas. It's not it at all. It's because your relevancy isn't high enough.

Speaker 3:

So I have a friend who runs the digital marketing for Moffitt services. They do fueling custom. Her name is Landry and she it's an old company run by old guys who do fuel, like trucks that do refueling for diesel. Like that's pretty boring, right, neil? Awesome, I love it. So you know, let's. So you, you've got a big facility, a hospital, for example, and the power goes out and you need diesel generators that, and those generators need fuel to like, if the power goes out out, you need to turn the generators on right. And her company, moffett services, does the diesel fueling supply for tesla and like for all their rockets and their various facilities. Like that's pretty cool, right. And it's like just like, wow, really like how did you get tesla as a client even though, like you're fueling their, you have all these trucks that fuel their diesel, they have diesel things and you need to, which I think is ironic or some of the biggest companies in the space, and I think that's really kind of interesting. And guess what? When you look at her SEO, she ranks for diesel refueling, so-and-so mobile diesel, so-and-so price of diesel. What is the difference between this kind of diesel versus that kind of diesel? I don't know, but she knows and she's written blog posts, not through ChatGPT, but by interviewing the actual engineers and people that go out Like, oh, they had a hurricane thing going on and now they need all this mobile refueling for these crews that are replacing things that got damaged, crews that are like replacing things that got damaged. And that's very interesting and very relevant to the people looking for diesel refueling trucks right, because the relevance is super high.

Speaker 3:

I looked at her stuff. We met in Houston a couple months ago. I looked at her stuff and I said dang Landry, you're crushing it in SEO. She said I am, but I don't know anything about SEO. Yeah, but look at your, but I don't know anything about SEO. Yeah, but look at your engagement rate, look at who is engaging. It's not that how many comments you got, it's not how many likes there were. You might as well put cat photos out there if you're looking for that, but it's super relevant to your customer. And because you're ranking on all these keywords and because it's driving a lot of your business and a lot of referrals. Even where they don't do refueling, like in LA, they rank on like mobile refueling in LA, like what? They don't even have a facility in LA.

Speaker 3:

But I said you're doing everything. Great, right? You're doing all the key things I am. Yes, you are now run ads against it because it's already working organically the signals. There is same algorithm. Run ads, yeah, but I use this ad agency and they've made it. They've said it's so difficult. You want to try to run ads. You might mess it up Like no, no, no, Landry, look at all your top posts. Whatever's done the best on Twitter, facebook, tiktok, whatever it is, rank them all. Whatever's done the best in terms of engagement or in your Google Analytics was driving the most phone calls or leads or people filling out the form saying yes, I need mobile refueling. Run a dollar a day against that. Of every 10 posts, usually one will be a winner. Meets the 10% rule, right, it's great. And she fired that other agency and then texted me and she was so happy about that and I said see, I knew you could do it Amazing.

Speaker 1:

Dennis, so many amazing takeaways, but yet so simple, right, but we often look for, sometimes we seek out complexity, make excuses, mirrors or haters, as the comment said. But, dennis, I want to ask you and I know that you have limited time today, so I want to take advantage of it go a little bit of a different direction, because, as you know, search engines themselves are going under change as we speak. Probably and we've seen various algorithm changes over the last two decades, but probably, I'm going to guess this is might be the biggest change with generative AI search, and my website is one of the websites even though I have zero AI content is one of the websites that got hit right Out of many websites. Some websites did better, some did worse, and I'm just curious what you see. Is it still as important?

Speaker 1:

And then we have the case of large language models. Do we want to give our content to them? I'm still a fan of that. If you want to be discoverable, you sort of need to do that. But have you changed your view in the last six months as the search engines have changed, or is it all still the exact same?

Speaker 3:

No, it's even more important. On these principles. Let me show you why. Okay, this is sort of a mind blowing but obvious thing Once you. Almost nobody knows this, which blows my mind. So I'm going into Google and I'm typing in Neil Schaefer. Okay, so look at what happens here. Looks like me. There's your website and then there's a knowledge panel here at the top with the three dots next to it, and then you can see there's pictures of you and there's your socials that are there. So I haven't even gone very far yet, but let me ask you, neil, do you think your social media impacts your Google ability? Do you think it does? Let's just scroll a little bit and see what there is. There's some books that you have. There's your YouTube, your Twitter.

Speaker 1:

LinkedIn Do you?

Speaker 3:

think that affects your social media. They're always going to show up at the top. Yeah, look at what's showing up here, do you think so? And then here's some of the latest videos and tweets and things like that. People are also looking for these other social media people, right? Do you think social media is one of the signals that Google's using? Maybe Instagram, these other places? Yeah, do you think so? Yeah, okay, so if that's the case, and then you have what's called a knowledge panel. So I know it's probably hard for the audience to see, but these are colored boxes. This is not a regular set of search results where it's like 10 blue links, one, two, three, four, five, you know, choose one of them. Instead, it's a series of colored boxes here. So what does this have to do with AI?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, on the desktop they show up on the right-hand panel, but yeah.

Speaker 3:

Right, those are called knowledge panels, which are pieces that get surfaced from the knowledge graph, which is the big database of all the things companies, people, objects, pictures and when people are searching for things, it's pulling from this database called the Knowledge Graph and trying to say this so, neil Schaefer, there's other Neil Schaefer's, but this, this is is this thing Neil Schaefer? Yeah, this is Neil Schaefer. This tweet or video, is this Neil Schaefer? Yes, it is. So it's trying to associate everything together. Back to this thing called Neil Schaefer, which is like this it's got an entity object ID called Neil Schaefer, which is like this it's got an entity object ID. It's like a social security number and it's trying to think of it as like the skeleton we're trying to put meat I'm trying to like. Is this thing related? So here's an Instagram live of Neil and Dennis. Should that be associated with Neil Schaefer? Yes, how about Dennis Yu? Yes, it should be. So you see how it's like trying to connect. The machine is trying to connect all those things together, right?

Speaker 3:

So when you do things that destroy the signal or pollute the signal, such as creating what's called synthetic data, you're actually shooting yourself in the foot. So when you use ChatGPT saying write 10 things around funny phrases that people say in Japan that actually are insulting, or whatever you are. You know you've got your new digital book right and you could have ChatGPT write headlines. Just generate stuff out of thin air, which is called synthetic data, synthetic content. You're actually screwing yourself because it's muddying up the pure signal that you actually do the thing that you say, that you do. Proof of this. Two years ago, google released an update to their call it the 170-page quality rater guidelines. Every year they update this thing, but they said, instead of EAT expertise, authority trust, it's now E-E-A-T. They added this extra E and all these SEO people don't understand it or they argue it, and that E is for experience. So now it's experience, expertise, authority trust. What is experience? Proof that you actually do the thing you do Photos, videos, podcasts Not chat GPT generated or Claude, or oh no, my favorite one is Anthropic or whatever is good for you, right?

Speaker 3:

No, we don't just generate stuff because people go willy-nilly abusing the AI because it can generate millions of web pages yeah, it can, but star, that's generative. Large language models kind of implies that you're going to use it to spam the internet with AstroTurf. Start with the raw ingredients. So, neil, name any kind of thing. Name any kind of you know person or activity. Name something and I'm inside my Google photos, I'm going to prove it to you. Names anything. Name a food, name a place, city in the world, anywhere, anything. Okay, ramen in Irvine, california. Okay, so ramen. I'm typing in ramen, irvine and now Google is searching oh shoot, I don't have any ramen in Irvine. Well, let's look at ramen. Then you can do ramen Las Vegas or wherever you want, here's ramen.

Speaker 3:

So I'm searching ramen, and now it's pulling up all the instances of when I've eaten ramen, which I've eaten a lot in lots of places, just not in Irvine, and if I grab any one of them, I'll grab. And this is Google Photos. Right, this is Google Photos, and here's let's see what's a tastier looking one. How about this one here? Okay, so here's one. And now there's information associated with that down here, this metadata Okay, this is when you realize the matrix is actually part of this whole thing. Actually, this is pho, so, but it looks like ramen, but there's the information on where it is and where. And then who else is in the picture?

Speaker 1:

if there is people and we're still just in google photos. We're not in google or this is local to you, but all that data that exists, yeah, so here's another one.

Speaker 3:

Another ramen with my keyboard. I love taking these pictures.

Speaker 3:

I love the corn and the ramen good stuff. Oh, it's amazing to show you and so you can see. This is exactly where it was right In this particular place. So what is Google doing? It's associating that piece of content photo, video. It's trying to put the context around it Like this is where it was. This is what's in there. It's tied to you know, and so you see how it's like trying to connect objects in the knowledge graph. This is Dennis and Alex Brandt having ramen. Alex is a pilot for Allegiant Dennis. This is Dennis and Alex Brandt having ramen. Alex is a pilot for Allegiant Dennis is this? It's at this ramen place, and Dennis also left a review saying five stars. I really like how they give you the double pork option. You know it's trying to take anything, this piece of content, and associate it with real world objects.

Speaker 1:

So, dennis I mean, based on that, and maybe this is part of your strategy every time you speak somewhere on stage, people are taking pictures of you.

Speaker 3:

You're getting tagged in Google photos generating more signal and I know the algorithm picks up on that. I don't know exactly how, because some of it's secret, but think of it this way. So everything that I'm doing, like when I interview people and you can see, here's the people and I'm creating greater and greater connections to the people you know, like you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with, like that's what I'm doing. So I want to be known for digital. I'm hanging around digital people, I'm at digital marketing conferences. I'm a search engine engineer.

Speaker 3:

Well, clearly there's proof because I'm associated with people who work at Google and Yahoo and whatnot. There's clear proof that ties me to those objects. It's like there's a crime scene or whatever it is. I want to be placed at that crime scene. You know what I mean. I want proof that if a forensic investigator were to go look at the carpet and pull hair and fiber samples, they'd see, like Dennis Yu is actually here. Right, archaeologists, if they were to go to social media marketing world way in the future, it's like, yeah, michael Stelzner and Neil and Dennis were actually here. Can marketing world way in the future? It's like, yeah, michael Stelzner and Neil and Dennis were actually here. Can we determine from the archaeology that they were in San Diego? And speaking about social media, yes, we can, because we looked at YouTube.

Speaker 3:

I'm trying to leave clues, so many clues. That's what we're trying to do, right? So if we know that's the case and we're creating content that is associated with real things, then when you use an LLM whatever your favorite one is to generate some stuff, how many real connections are there to people and places and topics and things? And like there's like none, because it's just synthetically generated out of thin air. Right, and look at the signal strength of my content. And so when I teach Danny, who does pest control and he does it for Ken Van de Geen and and he takes pictures. He rides along and takes pictures of the vans and how they're spraying for ants and how it's eco-friendly and it doesn't kill the dog because, you know, will it hurt my pets, my golden retriever there's lots and lots of signal around that, as he's doing it, we're now going to downtown Portland and so the algorithm, meaning Google and Facebook and TikTok, can see that, based on the video, it's oh, this is actually Gresham or this is downtown or wherever it is right. Clear signal there it's because it starts with the video, right, then the AI can work on that raw content and do. That's where you use the AI is to help process the raw content, but you start with the raw content. So people that don't start with raw content are getting hammered. So there must be some stuff in there, neil, of your content that you got hit with the March core update that you mentioned. You must have some stuff there that doesn't tie back to the raw content. That's why things like schema are so important.

Speaker 3:

I use rank math and link whisper and whatever I do that stuff, because I never want to run afoul of Google thinking you know what, could this be a deep fake? Is this real or not? Google's not exactly. I mean, they told me privately that they can spot chat, gpt and you know fake content, but they're not a hundred percent right. So I'm trying to like overwhelmingly, give judge Google more evidence. So it's like clear, it's very obvious, like yes, judge Google, I really do the thing. I say that I do. I really have had ramen in Irvine. I have not, apparently, right, or maybe I have. I'm pretty sure I at some point I've had. I have to have had ramen in Irvine, but is there any proof of it? What if I wrote a blog post saying I love ramen in Orange County in Irvine and it's near the John Wayne Airport, and the chat GPT wrote all this? Would that actually be proof that I've had ramen in Irvine?

Speaker 1:

No, the visual, the audio and the experience of being able to say in your own words which but the AI can generate a big picture of a bowl of ramen noodles and it's so real looking and all that, but is it real?

Speaker 3:

No, and even if Google can't tell if it's AI generated, does it actually tie? Oh, it was ramen at Neil Schaefer ramen. Oh, okay, and then I can see that Neil Schaefer and Dennis actually got the review at that place. Oh, now there's more signal proving I actually have done the very thing right. And so is this an SEO thing or is this a social media thing? Is this an ads or organic thing? What we're talking about, that's pure signal strength, right? Am I passing?

Speaker 1:

the data back. Yeah, it's funny. I remember, many years ago, pete Cashmore, the founder of Mashable. It was a famous quote of his, and I don't remember the exact quote, but it was something along the lines of that if you want to remain private, it's going to be to your disadvantage in the world, and this is at the time of people checking in on Foursquare and just the beginning of the ability to send these signals. And if you want to be Googleable, getting back to the topic, or be found or be known, you have to send the signals. And the more authentic, the more appropriate, the more relevant those signals are, and I think that you know hearing you say that. Dennis, now I understand more of how you operate and it makes a lot more sense. I just thought you were just like crazy, just prolific content creator, but now I know what drives you to do that. It's natural there's an ROI in doing that. There's a caveat there.

Speaker 3:

But think about this. So, neil, most people they see you and me. We're constantly like live streaming and taking pictures of our food. Like live streaming and taking pictures of our food. I don't want to be a social media influencer. I don't want to be out there all the time. I'm just a introverted business owner and I just want to do the thing that I do because I value my private life.

Speaker 3:

Great, you can do that, because what signals the most valuable? Is it the business owner or whoever making content about themselves, about the service they do? No, the best signal is the customer signal. So you could be invisible, but if your people, if your customers, if your community, if your pastor of the local church, if the soccer team that you're involved with, if you're elevating you know what? I take my kids on Friday to this Italian restaurant and meet so-and-so who's the owner, and we have the pepperoni with double pepperoni, pizza, whatever linguine with clams. If you're elevating them and if they're talking about you, the most valuable signal is them talking about you.

Speaker 3:

It's not because most people think, oh, I don't want to be prolific on social media and I'm not trying to be an influencer. You don't even have to be. My favorite thing to do is elevating other people, because I'm trying to capture proof, neil, for my friends. I want my friends to, I want their businesses to grow, so I'm making sure that their customers are that. Somehow, these people, they're friends of mine, they own these different businesses. It's not that I want to interview them, I want to enable their team to have a collection process to put all this stuff in a shared folder, not just the business owner. Now I'm a business owner. I have to make three videos a week. No, you don't Right. You see how this drives me nuts. How does people not understand this?

Speaker 3:

The best signal is the signal of you actually do the thing you say you do is your customers talking about you, not testimonials, but just like day-to-day. You know, oh, we're visiting Sue's house and she's got termites and say, sue, what's going on with the termites? Oh, well, you know, blah, blah, blah. See, that's way more authentic than we're really good at termites. You know, call EcoCare Pest Control in Portland Oregon and we'll send someone out right away. We've been doing it for 15 years and we're really good. And blah, blah, blah. Call us if you have a termite problem. That's a freaking advertisement.

Speaker 1:

That's not real right. Yeah, that's why I dedicate a chapter to, in the grand scheme of things, these are all examples of user generated content, ideally coming from your customers in a variety of ways. But, yeah, that is something that is so obvious yet so missed, yeah, and I'm really excited to get that out in the world soon. But, dennis, this has been great. I know you literally have to split in a few, but I wanted to give you the opportunity. I think we covered a lot, man. I think we covered a lot more than we planned to. And I don't know if you play any instrument, dennis, but I'm a drummer and this is the closest thing to a jam session in the studio. We just came in and we just riffed off each other. So, thank you, this has been a lot of fun. Thank you, neil, you know, is there anything we missed? And to end it off, I mean, where do you want to send people to to learn more about you and maybe to work with?

Speaker 3:

you. I want everyone to be Google-able, so Google me. Dennis Yu spelled Y-U. There's a lot of Dennis Yus, but I rank number one. I have a knowledge panel, just like Neil, and if you want to connect with me on LinkedIn or you want to email me or whatever, I'm happy to chat. I do consulting, but what I really like to do is help these young adults who've started agencies, and each of these agencies is in one area, just serving plumbing companies or pest control or landscapers or roofers, and I just admire the heck out of these young adults and young is in young at heart. So some of them are like 40, something right, and I love seeing them win because they're focusing on that particular kind of customer.

Speaker 3:

So if you are a painter, come see me. We'll do an audit and I'll send you to the company that I trust that follows this agency, that follows our processes, to make sure you're Google-able. I want you to understand that you can take it in-house too. You don't have to use our people. You can leverage all the stuff that we have. We published it out there. You can literally Google like how do you get a knowledge panel? How do you do your GMB? How do you run dollar a day Facebook ads. It's all out there. It's on YouTube. There's thousands of videos where we're sharing how to do it. It's all free, but if you want it done I'm proud of all these young agency owners and I know they'd be happy to help you if you are a good person and aren't hard to work with and that kind of thing.

Speaker 1:

Awesome Dennis. So there you go, google him there's DennisUcom, there's Dennis on LinkedIn or wherever you are, he is Dennis. Thank you so much. This has been awesome. I hope people reach out to you, and I know I remember when I met you at Content Marketing Conference in Las Vegas I think 2017, you were talking about how you wanted to empower young professionals with the knowledge, and it looks like you've been able to do that and now come to the next stage, where now they have their own ad agencies, and I know you continue to just foster goodness and education in the world. So thank you so much. It is not going unnoticed, and thank you again for being on the podcast today. I look forward to keeping in touch, my friend.

Speaker 3:

You're amazing, neil, and then we're going to repurpose this to YouTube. I'm going to make sure this content we have, this advice, is Google-able, and I'm going to put my money, neil, to promote this podcast. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much. Thank you, neil. All right, take care. All right, I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. Dennis and I actually have a lot in common and, yeah, it's amazing if you follow him on social media. He is amazing not only for the work that he does and all the countries that he speaks out, but even his personal fitness is really inspiring. So definitely a great guy to follow and to connect with. And, yeah, what else can I say about him? Hey, make sure. If you haven't hit the subscribe button, we have a lot of great episodes coming up.

Speaker 1:

My next interview is going to be with the one and only Dan Gingas, who is one of the thought leaders in customer experience marketing. We always have a great conversation and you're going to want to tune into that. Have some more as well. Nancy Harhut, who is the author of Using, or how to Use Behavioral Science in Marketing she just spoke at Inbound. She is this amazing thought leader You're going to learn a lot from. You know amazing interviews coming up, so make sure you hit subscribe.

Speaker 1:

And if you read Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth or Digital Threads, I would be honored. I mean, I talk about this with the podcast as well. But I'm really trying to get reviews of these books published on Amazon and other retail sites so that people can know that the books are legit and they can learn something from it. So I always get asked Neil, is there any way I can help you? Well, and I usually say hey, when there's a time I'll let you know. Now's the time when I can really use your help. So if you end up doing that, please, please, send me a screenshot so that I can thank you. I do a lot of special things for those that support me. So, yeah, I think it'll be in your best interest to let me know if you go out of your way, even if you have just a minute, I would sincerely appreciate it. But hey, well, that's it for another. I hope you agree. Exciting episode of the your Digital Marketing Coach podcast.

Speaker 2:

This is your digital marketing coach, neal Schaefer, signing off. You've been listening to your Digital Marketing Coach Questions, comments, requests, links. Go to podcastnealschafercom. Get the show notes to this and 200 plus podcast episodes at neilschafercom to tap into the 400 plus blog posts that Neil has published to support your business. While you're there, check out Neil's digital first group coaching membership community if you or your business needs a little helping hand. See you next time on your digital marketing coach.