If you're tired of feeling like you put so much time and effort and energy
into that dang Instagram reel only for three people to see it,
this episode's for you. Because we're talking about long form content. It's beautiful.
Reemergence. I have the amazing Mariah magazine on the Mindful
Marketing podcast today. We're going to talk all about it, especially those
of you who want the depth, they want the trust building, they want
the transactional content to disappear and actually create content
that has legs. Oh, we're going to get into this in the
366th episode of the Mindfulness Marketing Podcast. But first,
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Mariah, welcome to the show. Thank you
so much for having me. I'm so excited to see where we're going to
go in this conversation. Yeah, as I was telling you before,
I just like to be nosy and just pick people's brains publicly.
So I love that for us. But I want to start at the beginning of
your journey because I know you as like the SEO
person, but I want to get a sense of where you started in your business
and how you got to today. So I started
my business. It's going to be 10 years this summer. Actually, when this
podcast episode comes out, I'm going to just be celebrating 10 years
in business. The anniversary is in July and so I got into
the space when I was a young 22 year old little thing
and I quit college and I quit my job in the same month.
And I kind of, I was in school at the time for website development, like
an online program and they were teaching me table
layouts which like even at that time they Were very outdated. And I was
like, this shit's whack, y'. All. Like, I can't. And I was like, I'm
smart. I am also nosy. And like,
I am very research heavy. And. And I'm like, I feel like I could just
figure this out. So I ended up bullshitting an online HTML portfolio, and
I ended up landing a paid internship through
a Craigslist ad. And so I
landed this paid internship doing website design and development. And the
one owner of the company, it was literally like, it's a kind of like the
old school agency model where it was like,
pretending to be very professional, like, on the front end, but it was
literally just like two dudes hanging out, like they were four years
old than me. We were hanging out. And so the one
owner was a WordPress developer. And so he just kind of
took me under his wing and taught me everything that he knew about developing on
WordPress. And so I stayed with them for quite a while. He became my mentor
for SEO for WordPress development and all of that.
And then a year later, they ended up shutting down the business, started
funneling clients to me, and I was like, oh, okay. But earlier in
that summer, previously, I was like, I feel like I'm kind
of obsessed with this, and I feel like I can kind of do it on
my own. And so I ended up jumping into Facebook groups. At
the time, that's where I met, like, a lot of my first online business
friends was through good old Facebook groups. And I grew word of mouth
through there was getting website design clients and all of that. And
people would. We would launch their website and
then they would end up coming back to me. And they were like, but how
do I get found on Google? And I was respectfully, don't
know, can't tell you. Like, my job is done. The website looks great. You are
now on the Internet. Congratulations. And they were like, but how do I get
found? And I was like, I find an agency. Like, I don't know what to
tell you. And people kept asking me and kept
asking me, and I was like, I feel like this is something I should pay
attention to. So this is also in the beginning stages of
business where I had more time than money. So I started
blogging for my own business. I was blogging about what I was learning in the
online space. I was blogging about stumbling upon
at the time. Do you remember that one? Oh, my gosh. Oh, gee. Yes. I
loved it. I loved it. I'd be like, what am I gonna see today?
Yes, yes. And So I was creating tutorials
about how do you stumble upon to grow your business? And just like what I
was learning about Pinterest and what I was learning about blogging and WordPress and all
of that. And then I was like, wait a minute, how do
I get people over to these blog posts? I was like, I should probably figure
out SEO. And so I ended up creating this blog post that got on
page one of Google for like over 15, 20 keywords, ended up
bringing hundreds of email subscribers to me
a month. And as like a little 22, 23 year old, I was
like, I thought people said growing an email list was hard. What
do you mean? Like, it felt easy for me. I was just getting these people.
And that blog post ended up being on page one until
last year. Wow. For nine years
I never updated it because I ended up transitioning away from
like website design and development and going into SEO. So I didn't really care about
that. I actually ended up creating just like a free
newsletter sign up thing on mailchimp just so
those people could like jump on the list somehow.
And then I would like have another upsell in that follow up email to get
them over to my real list in case they were interested. But I don't want
to like the make my email list too busy with all
of these people. That just didn't make sense. And so at the I was
like, okay, I think SEO is a thing. So I started learning about
it and I fucking hated it. I thought it was the worst thing on the
planet. It was so overwhelming, it was so technical. What I
found was that most of the content was created
for advanced SEO people talking to other advanced
SEO people working on massive websites. I
didn't have a massive website, My clients didn't have a massive website.
And so that information didn't really make sense to me. And then
the other information that I found on SEO was created by
SEO agencies trying to be very vague and overwhelming so that you
just got annoyed and then hired them on retainer, which is a
scrappy little girl. No, ma'. Am. Like I'm not
doing that. So like I was like, okay, there really is no like
DIY SEO information for people like me in my
situation. Like an online line, business owner, small
business, not super huge, but also I'm not really local
either. Like I kind of playing in this middle ground. And so I
ended up diving in with the support of my mentor who kind of knew
SEO foundations through website development. And so I ended up
diving into SEO, breaking it down, putting it back together. In a way
that actually made sense. Started offering it to clients. They got incredible
results. And then I like to say SEO sunk its teeth
into me and hasn't let me go. And now I'm obsessed with it. Now it's
like I can see it so clearly on websites. I can see the
patterns, I can see the gaps. I can see why you're not getting results without
running any reports. I can take one look at your site and be like, oh,
that's why. And what I loved about website design and development was
actually the strategy of a website, the strategic setup. And I
remember going to a mastermind when I was maybe like three years in business, and
I was like, I want to be a website strategist. Like, I want people to
pay me for website strategy. And everything I was saying, they were like,
so an SEO expert. And I was so mad, I was
like, no, that's not me. And then
I, like, allowed myself to sit with it, and I was like,
wait a minute. Like, yes. Because with
SEO, Google search algorithms judge your website in over
200 factors. A lot of them are user experience.
It is website strategy. It's just not the thing that people think that they
need, but it's the thing that I sell on the back
end. Yes, we do the keyword research. Yes, we figure out how we want to
rank all of that. But the foundation of your site
is what actually drives the results. So long form
content coming back into play. I'm like, finally,
like, we have to. We. Our websites are
what all of your other marketing efforts should be pointing back to.
So why is your website not strategic and set up in a way
that supports your other marketing efforts and also gets you
found by search engines and AI? Yeah,
I love this. Okay, What I love the most about what you said
is I want to highlight this. This piece of, like, in your
strategy, like, your strategic positioning as a company is SEO,
because that's what people think they need. And this is where I find
myself a lot of time talking about social media because people come to me and
they're like, oh, Instagram reels. I'm like, cool. You think it's Instagram
reels. I know the real problem is, like, a marketing
ecosystem, but let's. Let's start with Instagram reels. And I feel like that's what you're
saying with SEO. It's like, people come to you and they're like, oh, I want,
you know, the latest thing is like, I want chatgpt to find me. And it's
like, okay, cool. I'll show you. We'll talk about
that. And also, once you're here, I'm gonna actually give you what you
actually need, which is what I love about what you do. And where I see
you show up with this is YouTube. So is that your, like, main,
like, talk to me about your strategy. My
marketing ecosystem here. Okay. So I
used to blog pretty consistently. And then I
was like, I want to start a YouTube channel.
And so I started my YouTube channel back in 2017, used
to create. I thought that I had to create videos every single week.
I thought that they had to be talking head videos. I thought that they had
to be like, Mr. Beast, Clicky and like, all of this
stuff to keep attention. And then I burned myself out, and it was awful. And
I was like, Fuck YouTube. I'm not doing this. I'm not making no money. It's
taking me forever. It's actually costing me money because I have to pay for an
editor. I was like, this is awful. So then I took a couple
steps back from it. And then around
2020, the new Google Analytics 4
came out. And I remember I was like, how do I
set up GA4? Like, I had no idea how to do this.
And so I went to YouTube and I'm trying to look for a tutorial, couldn't
find one. I was like, okay, I guess I'm just gonna have to figure it
out. Everybody's asking me. And so I went in, figured
it out, spent a couple days, whatever, recorded myself doing it, turned
it into a YouTube video, mainly so I could just send it to clients and
send it to website designers and people that were asking me. That video
blew up, ended up getting me across the threshold of
a thousand subscribers and the watch time in order to get monetized.
And so then I was like, how long can I ride this out?
And I remember at the time, I was making like 2, 50, $300
a month just from that video. And so I was
like, okay. But I still wasn't enticed to go back to YouTube
yet. Then after six months, seven months,
it starts to dip. Now I'm making $9 a month. And I was
like, fuck. I got a taste of the potential. Like, what is
sweet YouTube money? I was like, that's sweet YouTube Adsense money,
girl. Like, give me more of that. So then I started. I was
like, what? What if I, like, did this my way? What if I did?
I only did tutorials because those are easy for me. They cost me less
to edit because it's not clickbaity, like, moving Screens gotta stay
focused. Yada, yada, yada. I'm doing tutorials, I'm doing screen shares. You have to
watch the screen and stay engaged if you want to learn what I'm doing from
beginning to end. And so I was like, what if I just do tutorials and
what if I just publish every other week? And so that's what I did.
I've been consistent for that since
2021. Just about. I think that I missed maybe like a
week or two. And then I've been able to. And I mean, the ad
money fluctuates depending, but I've been able to stay. I
think the most that I've made was like 1100 in one month
from YouTube AdSense. And then it dropped down this past year, I
think to 500amonth in December, and now it's shooting back
up to a thousand a month. That's from me creating two videos a
month. These are tutorials. These aren't. I ain't reading a script.
I'm not pre planning. I do some YouTube SEO
keyword research. I make sure that I know what the hell I'm going to talk
about. And then I just rip through them, send them to my editor,
publish them. And so the interesting thing with using this to grow
my business is like, if you're a marketing strategist, you might be like,
girl, how does this work? Because, like, you're creating a tutorial, so
you're solving people's problem, literally showing them how to do it.
Why would they need to hire you? And also
why would they subscribe to the channel? Because you've already solved their
problem. That's where I heard you can't grow a successful YouTube channel
with tutorials. And I was like, I don't care. I'm not doing
anything else. And people ask me for videos all the damn time. And
I want to save my breath. Like, I could just whip it together in one
and then have a resource for these products that I'm creating.
And so I've been able to defy the odds.
I don't know, like, people find my YouTube videos, for
one thing, end up binging a bunch of tutorials on how to do certain things,
see that I'm an expert, and then are literally like, how
the hell can I get you to help me with my
SEO? Do you do consulting? Please help me. Like, I have had
big nonprofits, I have had people within bigger
companies, their marketing team, because marketing teams, a lot of people think that there's like
a shit ton of people there. Sometimes it's just a team of like three people.
And the one marketing manager is like, I have my hands in so many
pots, I don't know this very well. And I have to train my content
team. And so it's like they see that I know what I'm talking about
and then they just slide over to my website and end up being like, how
the hell can I work with you? And so YouTube is a huge thing that
I'm focusing on. I'm starting to do more YouTube lives.
Two, I don't want to have a podcast in a different platform. I would rather
grow YouTube and really step into. I'm doing brand sponsorships a
little bit more now and really growing that, but just having
kind of like a video podcast where I interview other SEO professionals
and like bring them on and conversations to grow
and learn about our industry. Which I feel like in my industry people are really
weird about it. They're just like, I don't want to talk with another SEO person
because they might take my clients. And I'm literally like, I can't help everybody. Like,
my, my books are booked. Y' all like need other people to refer people
to. And so to me, I'm just like, I love learning how people think about
things and so really using the YouTube
videos and tutorials with YouTube, SEO, YouTube lives. And
now I'm coming back to blogging. I'm starting to take
certain YouTube videos and certain newsletter ideas
that I have and I'm creating more long form
blogs on my site because their
resources that I literally input in all of my
digital products or people slide into my DMs all the time asking me
very similar questions, I send them the link to that. Or
like, if I'm doing summits or like being a guest speaker and like a group
or something like that. Like, I have all of these resources where then people
just end up seeing me as like, if I don't know, Mariah knows, like, she's
got to have something and like, that's what I want. I want you to see
me as the expert. And so how can I create these little resources that
solve your problem and position me as the person to help?
Yes. Oh my gosh. Snaps over here because I feel like there's
something about the power of generosity that a lot of people discount. You know
what I mean? And I come from that space too. So I, I. My first
job in marketing was I was an intern for an SEO agency.
And it was one of those agencies where it was like, it was a local
based SEO agency and it was, this was like
2012, 2013. So at the
time it was all like the shady stuff that people say don't do today. It
was like literally white text on white background with
like, people still do that keywords. Yeah, I just saw it the
other day. Oh my God. It's terror, like terrible advice.
And so that's where I, that's my background. So like, part of that too is
like we, we've, we've seen the traditional experiences and we're like, there's
gotta be, there's gotta be another way. And I love that you kind of like
created your own path and you also created multiple reven
stream. So not only do you have your consulting now, you have
money coming in from YouTube and you have the brand partnership. So
like there's, there's multiple things around this. So. And digital products
that people buy because they're literally like, hey, can I have the guide?
Do you have a resource? I got DM sitting there right now. I haven't answered.
Do you have a resource about this? Yes, 100%.
And next week I have Jessica Abel coming on the show to talk about
this concept of like services too. Because one of the things that
you talked about that I think people in our space like online business
kind of discount a little bit, is that you still make the most money from
services. Like, I don't care what people say about like scalable income. Like
the top 0.1% of people, sure, they're on the beach raking in
the money while they sleep. Most of us are like most
people. Services are still the, the fastest way to grow your business, the fastest
way to cash. And I love that you identified that too. It's not just
your YouTube channel is there just to live the
YouTube celebrity life. Like, you also have the consulting as well. It's like a
really holistic business model, which I adore. I adore
it. Okay. I have follow up questions though. Yes,
you talked about them being a tutorial. I want to
know how, like, what's, what's the way that you found the best
to get people from the tutorial into their world? Are you just leaning on natural
curiosity? Do you have strategic, like CTAs, like, what's your thought process behind
this? Yeah, so I have done one thing that I
think has strategically grown my email list. I have
not promoted my email list aside from podcast interviews and like
summits almost ever. I haven't done, like,
I need to grow my email list because YouTube does it and it's been doing
it consistently ever since. I started creating, like, my own
commercials. So I have two commercials. Am I. Because
I was watching these YouTube videos, and I was like, like, these YouTube content creators
got commercials for, like, a frying pan. Why can't I
be the frying pan? You are the frying pan. Like, I want to be
the frying pan. I'm going to talk about me. So I created these commercials,
and they're very strategic. They're not in every single YouTube video, because I
do have other videos that talk about things that aren't SEO, and so I don't
put them in there, but I have one video for a digital product where I'll
be, like, interrupting this video right quick because I created
something cool and I want to share it with you. And it's really quick and
snappy and, like, 90 seconds of it. So that lets
people know that I have products even if they don't sell, like, right away.
And then at the end, I have a separate commercial that makes people join up
my email list. And it was like, hey, you. You made it to the end
of this video. And if you're trying to figure out, like, what your next
step is for SEO, you should download my roadmap, because I literally just
break it down for you so you can stop wondering about it. And so my
video editor, I've only had to create those once, and I just write little notes,
and I'm like, can you pop in this commercial here and then that commercial here?
And she's like, yeah, cool. Love it. So that's, like, a really
strategic way that I do it. The other thing that I do pretty intentionally
is weaving client examples in, because
then it's not a hard sell. It's a soft sell. And now
people see, she helps clients. And I'll be like, my consulting
clients and my students, people are like, she can help me. This
is incredible. And then they come over and they just, like, check out my website.
Yes. 100% to all of this is why I wanted to have you on the
show. Because I talk about this all the time as, like, here's what I'm doing.
But I love when other people do it too, because I can be like, see?
See? It works. It works. I have, like, a few that I
cycle through. I'm like, if you like this video, you're probably gonna like this other
thing. It's just, like a natural segue. And
also for me, too, especially for my private clients, my consulting
clients, they have to vibe with me. Like, if you don't watch my
YouTube videos or listen to the Podcast, and you just, like, come in cold like,
you. We. We may not click. So a lot of my marketing, too, is
like. Like, I want to show people what it's like to work with me, because
I'm not, like, I wasn't traditionally trained in marketing. My degree is in
English literature. Okay. So, like, I don't. I don't know
the. The bro e marketing terms. Okay. The ro y of the
twr. I was like, don't even. I joke around that, like, I
barely know what ROI means. Like, we're not. We're not going all the way that
way. But I think it helps me, too, because when I do the tutorials, I'm
not, like you said, a marketer talking to other marketers. Like, I'm
the in between, you know, Like, I have the marketing practical experience,
but, like, I know what it means to watch a YouTube video and go, what
the heck are they talking about? Yeah. So I love that. I love that.
Okay, so they get into your funnel. They. They go
on a video, they see your thing, they sign up for the. The roadmap. Then
what happens? Like. Like a 6 email
sequence that's kind of like, pushes them to
something, but is more teaching them my philosophy
on. To me, that's the important thing.
If you just want SEO to get
paid tomorrow and you're not in it for,
like, you don't have passion around what you're doing, and you're only looking
at as, like, I want results tomorrow because I got to make money
tomorrow, and I'm looking for money and blah, blah, blah. Listen, business is about
money. I need money. Cool. We understand that. But, like, I want
people that value my unique perspective because
there is a lot of SEO agencies. Also, I'm not
an agency. I don't do done for you
retainers. If you want everything done for you, I'm not your girl.
So this funnel has to educate them on, like, what I do and
what I don't do. And so I'm very much like, I am a
consultant and an educator. All of my options.
The end goal is for you to take SEO into your own hands,
whether that's you, the business owner, your VA or somebody on your
marketing team. Team. I don't want you to need me forever. And
that is so unheard of in my industry.
Everybody's like, no, I want the retainers. I was like, I tried retainers for a
year and literally was so grateful when a client was like, we're selling our business.
And I'm like, thank God. Like, love y'. All. Glad y' all are
making money. This, this is for the birds. And, like, they were paying my rent
every month for me just to do, like, basic things that they didn't want to
do do. And so it's like, it's very important for me to share
my perspective on SEO, how I operate and
what I offer. So that's kind of what I'm teaching people
in, like, my email sequence along with, I'm very practical. I'm very
actionable, I swear. So I make sure to put some
cuss words in my email sequence because I don't want y' all getting my
weekly newsletter where I'm saying. And then you're like, she never said that before.
So it's like, I'm very intentional about the language and kind of like what I'm
teaching people, and then they just go into my weekly newsletter funnel. I
send a newsletter every week called Building Momentum. And
it's under this kind of thing where it's like, organic
marketing takes time. It's foundational. Allow
yourself to build momentum. Even if you only have one hour a week
to spend with SEO, those baby steps add up
and really making it actionable and practical for people. Yes. I
love this. It's like giving. Giving the atmosphere
in the room. And it's like, here, here's the vibe that you signed up for.
And yes, this is gonn be practical as well. I love that.
Okay, so back to the videos. One of the biggest
pushbacks that I'm getting from my. My clients right now is that
long form content just takes longer to create. Right? Like, sometimes
it's easier to, like, snap the selfie, pop a caption, post
that on Instagram. And I get that. So I want to talk
a little bit about some of the results that you're seeing from long
form content. Like, if we can get into the numbers, either you or some of
you, your consulting clients, I would love to hear, like, a success story.
Yeah. Okay. So long.
I need to share the perspective on this because we have to shift it. So
the short form content. Cute. Love that. People love it.
For me, it just. I don't like it. It's not deep enough. I'm a
deep. Like, even with my friends, I'm literally just like. And where do we think
that that came from? What did your mom say when you were little? Like, I
can't help myself. I'm deep. And so, like, I'm a researcher.
We're going layers underneath. And so the
only kind of, like, quick hit content that I really enjoy is threads, because
I can just word vomit like little snippets of things.
But even I, I'm looking at my threads, I'm like, these are 17 times
longer than what other people. Like some people can put one line and I have
several paragraphs. I'm just not like a short
winded person. But also I found a, that like reels
and short form content took me 17 times longer to
create than long form content because, and I'm sure that you've heard this
before, but like the shorter the thing, it actually
takes more time when you're trying to like
really get a point across. It's like writing a book. It's easier to create a
longer book because you just like word vomit some things. But if you have to
stay within a character limit, it's actually a lot harder to keep
the important things and know what to keep in order to get the same
result with less words. And so short form content for
me, as you can tell by the answer to this question, we didn't even get
there yet. I'm a wordy bitch. Like, I just, like,
I, I can't. And so long form content, how we want to shift
perspective is it's a shareable resource for
your people that showcase your expertise.
Short form content, it's not enough for
me as a consumer to munch up on. It's not enough.
Like I'm gonna see like, oh, you know, I did this, this cool thing,
I was like a speaker on this and blah, blah, blah,
and I'm nosy and I want
like a full blog post about your experience. What do you mean? What did you
like? What did you not like? Like all of that. And that long form content
builds trust because we are so used to that quick hit
that we're kind of just like scrolling past them for entertainment purposes. Where
I want people that like my depth, that crave the insights, that.
So I'm training my audience to expect long form content
from me because that's what I prefer to create. And so
I already gave an example with my intro. But like one blog post was
on page one of Google for nine years without me updating anything. And it got
me hundreds of email subscribers a month.
And then the other thing. So like even I'm not just talking about blog posts.
Like your digital product sales page,
my DIY SEO course sales page has been on page
one, teetering in between position one, two and three
for the past three years. My sales page for
DIY SEO course, which is literally exactly what the
sales page is about. Driving leads, driving people and Maybe they don't
buy because they don't know and like me yet. But you know damn well they're
hopping over to my YouTube channel, getting to know me, trying to see like
all of this. It's bringing people into my world. And so
like long form content just has a longer shelf life
for things and it allows you to share them.
I share blog posts, I share YouTube videos and like I said, my
courses, my digital products, they're super easy for like affiliates to
share if you can like have a cookie code over on there.
Like, it just makes it so easy to
share things. And I think that that's my favorite thing. I don't have to regurgitate
the same thing over and over and over and over again. Oh, you want to
know about SEO titles and meta disc descriptions? Here's the YouTube video and then here's
the blog post with it. So maybe I'll send you the blog post that has
the YouTube video embedded and then you can decide do you want to read the
post or do you want to watch the video? Because I don't care, I just
want you to get the information. And now I'm showing up on Google
search on page one and my YouTube video is showing up on YouTube search and
my YouTube video is showing up on Google Search. So now I'm getting
found in three different arenas. And the cool thing about like where SEO
is going to with AI mode, AI
overviews, all of that is before social
media didn't really translate into SEO results.
It was kind of like a. Yeah, social media drives traffic to your website.
Okay, cool. But like as an SEO person I was like, not really
that helpful to be honest. But now with AI, your
website is the training manual
for AI on your business. So
more strategic blog posts that you have, you are training these AI bots, you are
training Gemini, you are training ChatGPT on what you
are or like what you do, who you are, who you serve, and
the problems that you solve because you're giving them content to munch on. This
is how people are getting found in ChatGPT. Like it's because they have
the solid SEO foundation set up. The Googlebots
understand their site, they understand what problems they solve and they can connect
the keywords that are on their site with what people are searching in. Whether
that's in an AI overview, whether that's in ChatGPT, it doesn't
really matter. It's essentially all training people. So these
long form contents are easier materials for
these search bots, these AI bots to get trained on. Your business
where it's cool because social media is coming into
play into this kind of newer thing called brand
authority. So domain authority is benefiting in SEO and it's
basically like how authoritative is your domain name and like how we improve that
is getting backlinks. So links from other websites back to you,
all of that kind of boring, a little easy to
manipulate. There are like backlink farms that will
basically get you backlinks from anywhere you want, all of that. And so
Google is now, the way that it's going with these AI bots and stuff like
that, it's kind of like taking a look at your entire
digital footprint. And so TikToks, Instagram,
YouTube, LinkedIn, all of these posts are now getting indexed
text on Google searches. So now they are
improving your brand authority. And so now if you're
talking about the same thing. So we still need strategy here. We can't just like
go off talking about random that doesn't align with like our expertise.
But if these AI bots which pick up
on patterns, that's how they're different than search bots. They're more
pattern based. And so if it's noticing. Wow. Mariah talks about a
sale on her website. Oh, I'm getting trained on like her perspective of like
who she works with and how she works with on her services page and with,
with her blog posts and all of that. And oh wow, she's talking about this
on YouTube too because the AI bots can see the transcripts. Oh, and she's talking
about on LinkedIn threads, Pinterest, Instagram.
I don't do TikTok. I just, I don't fuck with it. And so
it can basically see. Oh shit. Mariah must really know what she's talking
about because I'm noticing this pattern around her brand.
But those little quick hit social media things aren't as
easy to share when people are looking for resources or they're looking
for answers to questions. Like I just had a consult with a client
who's very well known on Instagram and he was like,
I think we have to turn some of these into blogs because people keep asking
me the same question over again and like I can't find this social media post
about it. Yeah. Yes. Oh my gosh, I'm over here like,
okay, I have a million Bob questions. First of all, because I'm like, oh, the
nosy, the nosiness is like ramping up because I love
this and I feel like you put into words something that I've been really struggling
to communicate with people with part of the value of AI,
which is this concept of brand authority. Because I do find that
a lot of people are scared of AI, first of all, especially marketers.
It's like the AI taking our job, like rhetoric is being
passed around and I don't think that's necessarily true. To me it sounds like
when TV started becoming popular and radio was like, oh, like
TV is going to take over our jobs. And it's like, okay, let's just. We
evolve with it, right? We evolve with the times. And then podcast and then like
Sirius XM and all these different options came out. All the options
came out and we still have radio. Like it's still there. So I feel
like part of this is like you can either be against
it and like really fight for your position there or you can evolve with it.
I'm of the position of evolving with it, right? And so I love this idea
of brand authority versus website authority. Because
AI and like technology is just getting more sophisticated,
which benefits us. So if someone's searching for like something
specific, I hope that ChatGPT is like, oh, I got
you. Andre has been talking about this on her YouTube channel and on Instagram and
on her website. Just go to her. You know what I mean? Whereas before you
had to be so specific about like I need this specific
keyword on this specific key, like this specific page. And now
it's like it's just getting more sophisticated, which benefits us, which I
adore about this strategy and it makes me
really like want to double down on long form content as well.
Again because it like first of all just
lives so much longer than social media, but it like builds the brand
authority more, which I love. One of the things though that you mentioned that I
have a follow up question on is you mentioned other social platforms
thread specifically. Are you repurposing anything from like the
blogs and the YouTubes over to the other socials or like what's your, what's your
strategy there? People aren't gonna like my answer.
I'm not very strategic when it comes to that, to be honest. I kind of
like sometimes I'll like throw my YouTube video up there if like I want to.
And then other times I'm just like, oh, it's easy for me on threads to
just little bites that I find myself
saying on a client call saying in a YouTube video, having to write in an
email 14 times this week, week I pop it over to threads.
So it's kind of just a. I think people need to hear this. Here
we go. Less of strategic
repurposing. Yeah. And what about LinkedIn
link? LinkedIn is my dumping ground of like, when I
remember to post on there. Yeah, okay, but it's all like,
related. If I have like a YouTube live and I know that the person has
like a decent following on LinkedIn, I'll make sure to talk about the YouTube live
over on LinkedIn. But I'm usually when it comes to
LinkedIn, I'm either repurposing my threads like word for word,
or my email newsletter. I'm not creating unique content for LinkedIn.
Yeah, okay, so that is content repurpose. See, I feel like people, okay,
those of you who are OD listeners, you'll start to notice the pattern. I can't.
Almost every person is like, I'm not strategic. And then they lay out a strategic
strategy and I'm like, okay, yeah, that, that is strategic. I
feel like there is, it's, it's a little more. Are intuitive.
And a lot of the people I work with don't have that intuition that, that
you just, you're just like, oh, I like, I'm just gonna take it from the
newsletter and pop it over to LinkedIn. Like, a lot of people I work with
don't think that way. That's why they're listening to this podcast. They're like, oh,
I could just take my newsletter and copy. Paste it to LinkedIn. Yes,
yes. Put it somewhere else. I love that. I love that.
Okay, so future, future thoughts, what's
next for you? You keeping the every other week week cadence with the YouTube
videos. And then you mentioned you're adding in blogging. How frequently are you doing that?
Yeah, blogging is going to be like whenever I want
type thing. It depends on.
Yeah, yeah, I, I think that that's the thing. My entire
marketing strategy, aside from every other week on YouTube, which for
the past couple weeks, I have to get some brand sponsorship videos in there. So
I've been doing every week for like the past three weeks, weeks. And my
YouTube video editor, I'm pretty sure she hates me because she was like, girl, we
have been doing this for like 2 years every other week. And now you're like
doubling my workload and I'm like, hi,
thanks. So that is
a little. A tiny bit flexible on like, how many videos I
have to squeeze in in a certain amount of time. But mainly it's
every other week. YouTube Lives. I
think I would like to do once a month. Month. For now, that feels really
easy for me. I'm not trying to just add in random shit to fill up
my schedule. Blogging is more so
I would probably say once a month. So it's not going to be
every YouTube video. It's going to be YouTube videos or newsletter
ideas that, like, I get a lot of replies on that.
Like, I want to turn into something that lives for a very long time. Like,
there was this topic I just turned into a blog post about is
SEO only for Google? Because people so often,
us SEO people, we fucked ourselves over and we were using SEO
and Google, like, kind of interchangeably when it comes to things. But, like,
SEO actually predates Google. Like, SEO is like, it's
not dying, it's not dead. It literally is like how we use
the Internet. Like, it's how we use ebay, Amazon,
like, Etsy, all. If you're searching for something on the Internet,
Internet, it's essentially what it is. Like, people getting their
content found through the key words that they are putting
in certain places. And so I had a lot of people being like, well, SEO
is dead because, you know, AI is taking over. And I was like, chatgpt
search is literally a search engine, dude. Yeah, like,
SEO. Like, I don't know if you remember Ask Jeeves. Yes,
Y. That was a search engine. How to get found in the
search engine. It's SEO, baby. Like, and so
I ended up having that newsletter topic. I was like, yo, I need to. I
need to, like, word vomit this stuff. And so I ended up creating a blog
post on it, and now I link back to it and, like, certain things. And,
like, I'll send it for podcast show notes. I'll post about it on thread
sometimes and all of that. So my blog
strategy is a little bit more flexible. I
will overwhelm myself if I have too many parameters. And then
I end up just doing things to check things off the list. And then
again, my energy isn't behind it. I'm creating my own
prison. I am, like, too structured for my own good.
Where to me, I have one priority, which is YouTube.
That is my ride or die. If nothing else gets done, that has to get
done. And then my weekly newsletter, everything else
is kind of like, play. Yeah.
Yes. Play. Yes. You said the magic word. I love
this so freaking much. And for those of you who are listening, I hope y'
all took notes because there are so many ideas in here for how you can
play in your own marketing. It doesn't have to be this
rigid, structured thing and you can still be successful. I love
that. So for people who are listening, who are like, okay, I Need Mariah in
my life. You mentioned the SEO roadmap twice. And so I was like,
we're talking about the SEO roadmap, but how do we get it? Yes.
Yeah. So you can go over to my website, Mariah
magazine.com roadmap and it should redirect
you right over to the free roadmap. It's basically like just an
overview of the six steps for successful
SEO. And I do want to say that, like, the
foundations of SEO are the same thing
with AI. There is going to be probably things as we learn
about how the AI algorithms kind of happen and how they pull things, us
SEO freaks will probably figure out different ways to, like,
game the system and figure things out. And like, we just really enjoy problem
solving on the Internet. And so there will be things that like, eventually we'll have
to do. It's so new right now that what we're seeing is the
people getting the best results are the people that have a really solid
SEO foundation, like truly. And so what that means I break it
down in the roadmap and all of that totally free. And then I
have the three things that you should do right away
if you want to get started within the next hour
with your SEO. And one of those is signing up for a
Google Search console. It's a free tool created by Google. And
number two is Bing Webmaster Tool. So I have tutorials.
Don't feel like you gotta like, set all that shit up on your own. I
have tutorials. You can get the link in the roadmap, but
ChatGPT search is actually pulling from Bing's
search index. So if you are not in Bing's.
Yeah, if you're not in Bing Search Index and Bing doesn't know about
you, you are not going to get pulled into chatgpt Search.
Dang it. I have homework to do. I don't need. I don't. I haven't looked.
I have no idea. Idea. So if your website's been around the
Internet, Bing probably knows if you're not like,
not like if you're not de indexing your site. But you want
to have control over these things. You want to submit your site map. And I
know that this is probably gibberish to some people, but I go through it in
the roadmap, download it. And so it's
interesting because, oh, I just hear so often like, SEO is dead. And I'm like,
ChatGPT search literally doesn't even have its own Internet index.
It needs Bings. And then where do you think that
Bing came up and decided to develop their index. You think that
they just pulled it out of their ass? No, they were inspired and probably using
similar things to Google's index. Google is a massive business.
Too big for their own good, might I add. But it's
like these things aren't going anywhere. And so as business
owners, can we learn how to play
in the search world a little bit so that we can stop spending so much
time doing that doesn't move the needle and instead just like build
a foundation that feels strong and stable? Because like, I don't know about you,
but like, I didn't get in business to do everything. I just want to do
the stuff that matters. Well, yes. Okay. If y' all
heard me clicking, that's literally me downloading it right now. Because I'm like, wait, wait
a second, I, I have, I haven't even looked.
I've been ignoring Bing, so sorry. Bing. I'm gonna look into you
now. Mariah, thank you so much. I'll put this link
in the show notes too for y' all listening online.
Dre.com,366 and all of Mariah's links where you can
check her out online. But thank you so much for being on the show today.
This was great. Thanks so much for having me. Thanks for
letting me word vomit all of my perspective and talking about
SEO. I just really enjoy when I can have a space
to talk about this with somebody that also might get a little
lit up by long form content. And yeah, this
was fun. Thanks for having me. Yes, of course. And I have homework now, but
if you're listening and you're like, I want to do more of this in my
marketing, like this is my vibe. Also I have to tell you about the
Mindful marketing lab where one of our word of the years this year is play.
We are playing, we're experimenting, we're shifting as a marketing
is shifting. And I share my marketing experiments. So this whole Bing thing
probably going to be turned into a marketing experiment. I'm gonna put it in the
lab so you can see me working on my business alongside with you and all
of our members. Come on in the water Spine. Next week I will have
Jessica Abel on the show to talk about relationship based marketing, specifically the
importance of service based business owners and how to market your business
and your services. It's totally different than being a
celebrity or any influencer or content creator. Okay, so come on in for
that episode next Tuesday. I'll see you then. Bye for now.