Podcast With Steven Khanna

SEO Sales Secrets – Steven Khanna, WhitePress Reveals All

Show Notes

Unlock the secrets to dominating search engine rankings with our latest episode, "SEO Sales Secrets: From Restaurants to WhitePress." Whether you're a seasoned marketer or just starting out, this video is your ultimate guide to SEO strategies for 2024. Learn from industry experts like Steven Khanna, who transitioned from running restaurants to leading the English Markets at WhitePress, as we delve into how to rank your website number one and drive more organic traffic.

Discover step-by-step guides to enhancing your SEO game, from mastering link building and content strategies to leveraging AI in digital marketing. Stay ahead of the curve with insights on how Google's updates impact your strategies and which practices ensure a #1 ranking.

Are you ready to transform your website's visibility and achieve top search engine rankings? Tune in for practical tips and proven techniques that'll empower you to make informed SEO decisions. Don't miss out on this opportunity to future-proof your SEO efforts.

Want personalized guidance to rank your website number 1? Stay tuned for more insights, and let's conquer the SEO world together!

Chapters:

00:00 - Intro

00:59 - Journey from Hospitality to SEO

04:46 - Hospitality Experience and SEO Success

10:48 - Head of English Markets at WhitePress

12:28 - Overview of WhitePress Services

16:21 - Staying Ahead of Google Updates

19:20 - Evolution of Link Building

23:10 - Importance of On-Page SEO in 2024

26:20 - Common Link Building Mistakes

29:58 - Significance of Evergreen Content

33:51 - AI's Role in SEO

37:00 - Challenges in the SEO Industry

40:18 - SEO Advice for Beginners

43:55 - Valuable Career Lessons

46:27 - Influential Mentors in SEO

48:07 - Staying Updated in Digital Marketing

49:30 - Finding More About You and Your Work

Transcript

Intro

0:00 hello everyone and welcome to the latest episode of the agency Insider I'm your host na Kel CEO of pace traffic and

0:08 today we have a special guest with us Steven kanana the head of English Markets at White press Steven is

0:14 renowned expert in content strategy and digital PR and he has a wealth of experience in sales and SEO

0:24 [Applause]

0:30 [Music] stepen welcome to the show nav thank you

0:37 very much for the introduction made I'm not sure I deserve all of those generous words but yeah uh much honored to be

0:45 part of the podcast and hopefully with my minuscule experience in SEO but

0:51 fairly large experience in in sales I can add some value to your audience so thank you for having me thank you so

Journey from Hospitality to SEO

0:59 let's start by diving into your background a bit can you tell us about your journey from hospitality and luxury

1:05 restaurants into SEO and white press yes yes uh quite a quite an interesting

1:11 story and it all be it started in Poland I'm actually not in Poland right now I'm

1:17 in Sunny Croatia having a much needed break with my loved ones but yeah I'm

1:22 I'm I'm married to a Polish lady we moved to Poland 9 years ago my background as pretty much everyone knows

1:28 in the SEO industry has been running restaurants back in the UK for more than 20 years and then once you move to

1:35 Poland which is clearly a non-english-speaking country there not too many choices left for blogs like

1:41 myself you know experts who move there so I then started teaching English did

1:46 that for a bit got back into B2B sales again surprisingly we've got this very small expert community in this town

1:54 where I live and it's called a language exchange community so I was sitting there enjoying my gen and tonics every

2:01 Friday and Saturday as I normally do and my boss at White press uh Tom damansky

2:06 who's the head of international growth he was he was there we started talking he texted me a couple of days later that

2:13 if I'll be interested in SEO and Link building and I was like I have no idea

2:19 what the is SEO I've got no idea what is link building I still went in because I was looking for a change it

2:26 took me six meetings about six months to make up my mind right do I want to have

2:32 a crack at this because you know for a normal random Joe walking down the

2:37 street you don't you can't explain in a clear manner what is SEO people like you

2:42 and me know exactly what's happening but even till day people have got no

2:47 idea Bo is SEO and they all end up saying alsoo you work for Google is it and I normally go just to cut the

2:54 conversation yeah yeah yeah we kind of a subsidiary arm arm of Google so he offered me the job I said fine let me

3:01 let me try it uh and here I am two and a half years later um you

3:07 know drew the market from pretty much no active clients to over now what over 100

3:15 active clients doing over 400,000 Mr for the last 18 months in the international

3:22 market in by press we the biggest ones uh and we operate in 29 different markets it's been a journey Blood Sweat

3:30 tears of lots of long working hours you know 14 to 16 hours a day 7 days a week

3:36 and my wife just just you know used to pull her hair out that at 4 in the morning I'm responding to emails or text

3:43 messages when my phone uh you know buzzes but I think very quickly I

3:49 figured out that was needed because you know it within the space of guest posting Niche edits content writing a

3:56 little bit of digital PR the industry or this specific sector is

4:03 is it's a rat race there's so many people out there how do you stand out while offering the same strategy pretty

4:10 much same inventory of of websites pretty much similar style of content how

4:15 do you stand out you got to be different that's why it took me so many hours

4:21 every day to get to a point where I got to and now uh to be honest my Outreach

4:27 strategy for new clients is no strategy because they all come to to us I've I've

4:33 built that solid network of clients where they refer me to their clients to their mates because the SEO industry is

4:40 small but yeah I'd love to I'd love to kind of take more questions from you and probably answer them in a more

Hospitality Experience and SEO Success

4:46 structured manner so how did your experience in Hospitality translated into success of

4:53 SE yeah yeah um to be honest it was n that

5:00 easy and there are two two reasons I say that is very quickly within month two I figured out because of the way the

5:07 industry is yes it does require hard but then there not too many people within

5:13 the industry with my diverse experience with what we used to call it in in our

5:19 restaurant world is how do you quickly quickly qualify lead or in in our terms

5:25 a customer sitting on one of the chairs in our restaurant to try and see what's the worth what's the value and I know a

5:33 lot of people G don't don't value the restaurant industry experience a lot but trust me when I say this half of my

5:40 Workforce in white press right now who work for me they're all from the restaurant world we're all Street Smart

5:46 we have the ability to read people really quickly we read situations very quickly we are on the ball we consume a

5:54 lot of knowledge and we pivot and we shift based on how the industry changes

6:00 extremely quickly but we're also very good with delivering what we promising

6:07 and that comes from the world of restaurants which is again so

6:12 competitive uh as you probably might know 95% of the businesses worldwide

6:18 which close within the first six months are the are are restaurants so if you're successful in that Cutthroat industry to

6:26 be honest any other industry seems fairly easy and then the second part which I wanted

6:31 to say everyone complains within the world of SEO people are really good with their SEO knowledge you know whether

6:38 it's link building link velocity diversification of your anchor text and all of that nich relevance links but

6:44 they're not very good at sales they're not very good at talking to people and I think at the end of the day we're all

6:50 dealing with people no matter what service or what product we selling so my motto has been standard from day one is

6:59 quite simple get them to like you if they like you they'll trust you if they trust you

7:05 they'll give you their business it's it's it's a simple mantra for me right

7:10 that I think that's good and you are absolutely right people SEO send to be more techy introverts usually not cut

7:17 for sales I would say same for myself as well so yes yes that is absolutely true

7:24 but this is an interesting thing I never thought I mean somebody from restaurant and you said you so many people people

7:29 move from restaurant works yeah yeah yeah because for me I

7:35 tested my Approach on myself it worked and I was like right

7:42 which other diamonds in the restaurant world are struggling to get weekly hours in their restaurants but I'm sure

7:48 they're going to smash it in the in the link building space gave them a call I said mate it's a proper contract cuz you

7:55 know the restaurant industry is bastardized waiters are are are treated like like shite a lot of times so I what

8:02 what we really need in any sales sector let alone SEO is people who've got a

8:09 fantastic sense of humor they're really good with their words and the language they use they're very quickly able to

8:16 read situations and they're able to impress people and I know the next thing I'm

8:22 going to say is very cliche but I think people don't do it enough which is first

8:27 impressions or last impressions I'm an old-fashioned guy you know I'm not a spring chicken I'm 48 uh probably

8:34 crawled out of my cave but then some Universal truths which exist within the world of SEO right I have always stuck

8:42 to my guns because I've spent good amount of time you know running businesses with annual revenue targets

8:49 of 63 million pounds back in the UK running teams of upwards of 63 people

8:56 which is Kitchen restaurant bar and all of that if it worked there surely a lot

9:02 of that could work in SEO as long as you're clever enough to identify certain

9:08 similarities apply certain approaches but then as it's very important in the technical SEO space that you should be

9:14 testing all the time that's exactly what I do as well like we keep testing our Outreach strategies our email templates

9:21 we've got believe it or not 17 mini strategies when we going into a

9:27 discovery call with our clients and of course it took a while to build up that huge file of Sops and sales managers had

9:33 to be trained on that and they are down to very specific detail which analyzes

9:39 body language facial expressions the tone of the voice of how they've answered and all of that in order to

9:46 generate a response from my sales managers in order to say the right thing

9:51 so that it gives them that trust and belief that white press is the right partner of course all of that does not

9:58 matter if we cannot deliver the campaign that goes without saying you got to deliver your kpis but because there's so

10:06 much competition out there you know you have to put out you have to put on a show you got to be out there you got to

10:12 be chatty you got to be funny you got to be building relationships you got to be going to conferences the amount of

10:18 conferences I've gone on to in the last two and a half years is absolutely phenomenal just today I don't know if

10:25 you noticed on my LinkedIn profile I did a short episode episode with Chris pantelli from Linko and he's he's he's

10:34 put a snippet there calling me stepen is the conference SEO conference king with

10:40 a crown on my head that's nice okay so now what does

10:47 this I've honestly head of English Markets at White press so what exactly

Head of English Markets at WhitePress

10:53 does it mean you yeah for the audience who probably does not know exactly the

10:58 white press is quite simply a self self-service Marketplace operating in 29

11:04 plus countries for the last 11 years it's actually a Polish startup but we've

11:09 become very big very quickly so we employ what over 200 people now uh in

11:14 white press we got 12 physical offices all around the world last year's Revenue was upwards of40 million euros yeah we

11:21 keep we keep diversifying our services as in when there's a further Google update coming but then we we quite

11:28 different that any other standard Marketplace out there which is all about you know creating a massive inventory

11:35 but not paying too much attention to the Quality websites being onboarded so we've got 27 control points before we

11:42 actually decide on any website to be onboarded on wi press but then there's a lot of value added services so if people

11:50 don't want to operate their own account because they just don't have the time especially in the UK market and there's

11:55 247 account management from our end there's no incremental fee for for R post payment methods and all of that you

12:01 name it custom Outreach a bit of digital prer lots of SE optimized content so I

12:07 look after the English Markets dominantly which are the biggest ones so us UK Australia New Zealand Canada and

12:17 as in when we feel Ireland of course as well and as in when we feel any other

12:22 first english- speaking country needs to be added to that pot we we grow it yeah

Overview of WhitePress Services

12:28 okay so so what does white press do exactly for our uh it it is a

12:34 marketplace where you can go and buy links and anything else yes by Links

12:40 content writing uh we've got a team of what 64 uh inhouse copywriters now

12:47 across various sectors all Native no matter what language they are so we do lots of content writing as well we've

12:53 just added on new Services which is very white hat custom Outreach like link

12:58 packages so to speak so we've started that we've also started doing and I'm

13:04 sure you know about that power posts so we rather than a guest post which

13:10 sometimes does not really get any traffic what we trying to do is when someone comes to us with their link

13:16 building query and the URLs they want improving we try and Target longtail

13:24 keywords with enough search volume and then we do NLP optimized content we post

13:31 it on strategic websites fire it up with some tier2 backlinks lots of social engagement so we start ranking those

13:39 Target pages on those specific longtail keywords so there's a quicker Roi we've

13:44 done several case studies so anything between four to six weeks only um we've

13:50 seen results of people you know ranking for those longtail keywords which clearly then gives a better Roi and a

13:57 quicker Roi for people uh rather than standard traditional link building and which could be anything

14:04 between 6 to 12 months when it comes to moving the need so so what you meant to say is

14:10 you somebody subscribes to you you post those uh writeups on thirdparty website

14:17 correct correct and then they link back to the C the client websites and those back those links of course have called

14:23 those post have called to action and everything and Link back so you find that much more beneficial % one that's

14:30 that's especially after you know all the Havoc Google has caused this year with

14:35 all the updates and all so this seems to be uh the next best thing you know we've got a large testing team in white press

14:43 so when the first update happened this year uh we quickly hired four more

14:48 people in our testing team so it's a team of 12 now and we then very because we' heard about these guest post on

14:55 steroids kind of thing and we obviously own uh our own websites we got our own

15:00 inventory we did lots of testing there and very quickly uh moved the needle for

15:06 example for your audience for yourself if you type in Google right now the best

15:11 SEO salesperson or best SEO sales guy you'll see my name coming up there I

15:17 even I even own a snippet there which is which is crazy so so we've done all those those testings we've tested it on

15:24 on our own inventory but we've now launched it in the English Market it's obviously it's not as cheap as you

15:32 know getting guest posting on uh any third party standard website

15:39 because this requires a lot more work needs carefully curated content then finding the right Niche relevant

15:45 websites then of course the social engagement the tier two backlinks which have to uh fire it up so it it it takes

15:53 a while but then if you measure it over a 12-month period it's far more cheaper

16:00 but far more beneficial because more clicks equals to more leads equals to

16:05 more Revenue so then people are happy investing that okay that's something new

16:11 I have not seen many agencies doing it but yeah seems like a unique and meaningful approach to me at least

16:17 keeping in mind the Google updates keeps on coming up right now now so my

Staying Ahead of Google Updates

16:23 actually next question you almost answered half of it because my question was with Google's algorith

16:29 constantly evolving how does white press stay ahead of the curve and ensures

16:34 successful deliveries to the clients so one is this so is there any other changes or any other offerings you did

16:41 uh or do based on the uh update yes yes so very important internal change we

16:49 doing so we almost towards the end of building an internal tool only for white

16:55 press in order to quickly identify websites across multiple languages who are open

17:01 to the idea for guest posts or link insertions because currently we were using the standard tools which any other

17:08 agency out there would be doing with their Outreach team but based on our

17:14 targets and the growth we've had year on year uh we need to deliver 68 million euros this year for example now that

17:23 requires an even larger inventory we've got enough clients we sometimes don't

17:29 have enough websites to link to so what we're doing is uh we're almost to the

17:35 end uh never seen before Outreach

17:41 tool which will scrap the internet PRP the entire

17:47 data and bring us websites which will be delivered to the Outreach team so we did

17:54 some testing and in terms of conversion ratio it improved our conversion by

18:00 37% compared to standard methodology and it cut the the time down so if if to

18:08 qualify one website to outreach as a first email for guest post was taking

18:13 one Outreach specialist about 11 to 13 minutes now it takes that

18:20 specialist three and a half minutes okay so did you introduce AI

18:25 into it uh no it's only internally for white press we haven't launched it internally because they're still doing

18:31 some final knit bits are we going to open it up to the public I don't know will it become something like pitchbox

18:38 in the future I really don't know for now we're focusing primarily just to you

18:44 know make it useful for for white press in order to achieve our targets keep our clients happy so yeah that's that's

18:51 another big change which is going to happen which hopefully will keep us ahead apart from as I said we've started

18:56 doing digital PR uh the L packages which is the wh hat manual Outreach uh which

19:02 is part of our platform now anyways so yes we diversifying we want to to be the

19:07 One-Stop shop when people think of links and people think of uh link building not

19:13 just guest post and Link insurgence so yeah that's that's the biggest change so I mean of course you've been working for

19:19 two and a half years so over these last few years how has the link building landscape

Evolution of Link Building

19:25 changed uh of course it has changed no doubt and what are your goto link

19:30 building strategies now in 2024 for uh different type of businesses that are

19:37 still effective yeah

19:42 yeah we've we've had occasions since the updates where our older clients still

19:48 want to keep the link velocity and Link acquisition at stupid Levels by leaving

19:54 a very strong footprint so we've actually stopped doing that at all because we don't want to burn the

19:59 client's website so there was a time before the updates our standard client

20:06 would be doing 20 25 links but with a with some link diversification so we'll

20:13 have about 90% do follow 10% no follow thrown in there you know various Das and

20:19 DRS uh anchor diversification as well before the update we used to go slightly

20:27 more riskier for example example our biggest client always wanted their anchor text in the first paragraph uh

20:34 and they give us $150,000 every month so we stopped doing that because that's

20:39 playing with fire Now link velocity or link acquisition speed we've dropped it

20:44 now to 10 to 15 links uh every month but

20:50 and we're also very careful uh when those links should go live within a

20:55 4-week period so the less of a footprint which is being left the better it is uh

21:01 for the client uh we've done that for sure within all the sectors we cater to

21:09 gambling and betting clients they still don't seem to care they just they just

21:15 want those quality links for obvious reasons for them it's right get more R

21:21 means people will invest more money so even if they end up losing an X URL or a

21:26 specific website considering it's a it's it's it's it's a group of Casino sites

21:32 they manage they're happy still burning that website because the RO and Y or the

21:37 return on it would be X 5x 10x but any other sector we've told them to be very

21:45 careful with this but also the niche relevance and every link building agency

21:50 talks about it but it has become really really tough when when now they talk

21:56 about Niche relevance the amount of checkpoints they need to do our clients when we send them

22:03 sourcing is just unbelievable like they've got so picky over everything

22:08 with the style of website it just it got too Technical and then and those are times

22:15 and we need we need to tell them I said guys with this speed you know there's a limit to the websites out there you know

22:21 so you either don't do link building and I'd recommend you go and start spending money in Performance Marketing don't

22:29 invest don't waste your money then because this way you're not going to get anywhere you know so is there risk in

22:37 when people use marketplaces or even you know guest post whether it's paid or not paid there's

22:43 risk in everything during the Google updates people with legit websites fantastic quality content even they got

22:50 burned so you can never predict that you know so yes it's more being very careful

22:56 with which websites we l L to there are a lot more control points which have gone in as I said as a one last line

23:03 Casino betting gambling clients they don't give a they're still contining so so uh it says that more

Importance of On-Page SEO in 2024

23:12 clients in the US or the SEO agencies in the US believe in on page SEO they

23:18 believe lesser in link and more of the UK guys believe in backlinks leather in

23:24 on page so I just want to do I stand corrected or no no you you're 100%

23:30 right um I'm not going to name names there but we were as a testing ground in

23:35 order to further penetrate in the US market because we've never gone to any conference there up until recently so we

23:43 decided to okay fine let's invest some money and I sent couple of my sales managers in this conference in in New

23:49 York okay the amount of hate we got there was just shocking it was oh my God

23:57 like so there was this one specific occasion where a gentleman comes up speaks to Eddie who's my Irish sales

24:03 manager very happy chatting really friendly but the moment they were about to take a selfie he realized our

24:10 background there which was a white press and he's like oh you're all about the links and the marketplace no no no I

24:17 don't want to be with you and the bloke simply ran away and then the and the organizers then came up to us and said

24:23 guys yeah we're not sure if the Afterparty dinner tonight is a good place for you guys to be

24:29 and we've we never we were literally kicked out of that event because we the

24:35 marketplace and we were one of the sponsors so yes we've we've we've been

24:40 Delta harsh blow when it comes to but I don't know what what I'm sure na you

24:46 know a lot more but I've always been told between the east coast and the west coast and I can't really remember which

24:53 coast is more link building friendly is it the east or the West Coast Sur there's one Coast I think it's more to

25:01 do with the uh West Coast but again it depends what kind of I mean I I I think

25:08 it's more of the agency so I have agencies as a client who says no links I mean we just want on page nothing else

25:14 they think technical will move the needle so I I I always said on pages 10%

25:22 add of the day backlinks matters that's what Google is built in Google themselves tested if they turn on of the

25:28 backlink results are shitty and we know that that's not going to whatever Google says end of the day it's built on

25:35 backlink their Al gorm primary job is that voting for the next side so

25:40 parameters might change on a scale of 10 we started at one we might be at eight

25:46 but the I don't think anything else changed yeah yeah and I and I think the reason that approach is of course Google

25:52 being predominantly a us-based entity a lot of the SEO experts from the US talk

25:58 so much about on page SEO but it's weird they've all turned a blind eye because

26:03 for me backlinks the value of backlinks is equivalent to again an I'm going to quote an analogy from my restaurant days

26:11 is Trip Advisor reviews Trip Advisor reviews makes you rank higher and

26:16 backlinks do exactly the same job yeah that that I agree completely agree with

Common Link Building Mistakes

26:21 that now I mean I've seen some of your talks you often you often advocate for

26:27 sustainable link building practices right now what are some common mistake business makes in their link building

26:34 strategies of course besides not dropping the link velocity or dropping

26:39 first paragraph but what are some of the common mistakes you see which occurs

26:45 yeah yeah the first thing is expectations when people start doing link building and I'm sure your agency

26:52 your sales people account managers face the same problem they come in with which is and

26:58 I'm talking newest clients brands or in particular we want links on fobes on BBC

27:04 whereas their own website is built in an absolutely disastrous manner but then

27:10 also when it comes to and I'm sorry I'm going to repeat the link velocity bit because that happens quite a bit uh

27:16 within within white press is they it's it's two extremes they either want to go

27:21 too Niche so they don't build anything or they want to go too aggressive and they don't really care as to what we

27:29 saying when it comes to case studies like finding that middle ground becomes quite difficult so to be honest in order

27:38 for them sometimes and and I'm I'm going to kind of shoot myself in the foo hair a little bit but I'm going to say this

27:44 because end of the day it's our job to keep our clients informed sometimes when

27:49 we see the kind of Link velocity they want to do we on purpose slow it down we

27:56 say the editor hasn't responded the guy's gone on a holiday they're doing through technical on pay changes now the

28:02 updates have done this just to have that spacing out there because you know it the moment something happens they come

28:08 and blame the SEO guys or it's because you guys you you you should have been more aggressive it's easy to blame the

28:14 SEO guy you know so that's that's one major factor we struggle in or the common mistakes people want to do but

28:23 also the anchor diversification and the anchor Texs they want

28:28 within the article is just oh my God they want

28:33 to not very promotional yet they want everything to be written in the content

28:39 about them and they don't want any other external links pointing to any other

28:45 competitive website yet they want the best website up there and the anchor text has to be screaming that you

28:52 clearly paid for that link in the first paragraph or even sometimes in the

28:58 introduction and I was like guys seriously sake listen to yourself you're contradicting yourself on every

29:05 stage but I think I know why the reason because I think we get through when we

29:11 speak directly to the brands a lot quicker compared to when we are catering

29:16 to the SEO agencies now because those agencies have their own targets and

29:21 their own pressures sometimes they don't tell their clients the exact truth and they just continue with it so we find it

29:29 a lot more hard convincing the SEO agencies compared to the brands because

29:34 end of the day the SEO agencies and I'm sure they do have that subconscious

29:39 feeling or what kind a link building Marketplace or a link Builder tell us about what's right or wrong and my

29:46 answer to that is I'm sorry I think we are the only people who can tell you what's right or what's wrong because we

29:51 do that so many times across multiple sectors so so yeah hopefully it answers

29:57 the question right right so you initially talked about the content and how you are using

Significance of Evergreen Content

30:03 longtail for the content and you also often emphasize the importance of

30:09 Evergreen content can you explain to our listeners what Evergreen content is and

30:15 why it's crucial to for surviving Google core updates yeah yeah surely so uh

30:22 again this is a strategy we have included in our campaign planning which

30:28 we Implement every 12 months uh all the all the Articles we've written and we

30:33 post on thirdparty websites we surely do a bit of content pruning uh on on those guest posts

30:40 because the moment we starts you you know it fresh content is always always

30:47 favorable for Google and because we've got those really strong relationships

30:52 with all the websites because we don't appoint any third uh any resellers on our platform at all you need to be a

30:59 legit website owner in order to be working with white press That's the first standard I don't care you could be

31:06 coming up with the most fantastic websites as a reseller because we've clearly seen we get things in a quick

31:13 efficient and a SEO friendly manner when we talking directly to the editor or the

31:20 the website owner and that's that's why this content pruning was important we we

31:26 used to go back we used to see because of certain testing analytics and certain

31:32 Updates this paragraph a four lines six lines there on this guest post could be

31:39 changed either the editor does it free of charge for us or there's a a minimal fee of $10 $15 in order to just keep

31:47 that content always attracting lots of viewership so when I when I used that

31:53 phrase of Evergreen content uh when I was on on one of the podcast this is exactly what I meant where

32:00 content pruning when links go live I can't think of a lot of agencies or

32:06 Brands out there who do content pruning once the link has gone live I can't think of too many me me neither right

32:15 now so when you make these content live so I mean as a guest post the best practices is that you put a guest post

32:22 on a third party but ensure that site also that blog also gives links to that

32:28 particular post from other of its in inner post to give it a boost not to be

32:34 put it as an orphan page so do you guys do that as well correct yeah yeah it's very important Oran Pages it used to be

32:42 um our Achilles heel long time ago but we've made sure that when guest posts

32:47 are being written there are relevant internal links in there um um apart from

32:54 one or two authoritative external links which need to go out and even if they're pointing a competitors website then it

33:02 should be done because it's a guest post primarily meant to improve your domain

33:08 Authority and Google will always look at it favorably in a neutral manner if you do have those uh competitive links you

33:16 know and again it's all about being clever with how you write the content so

33:22 even if you've if you've written and you've got six other competitors but if you're

33:28 website your service is talking in glowing terms but yet you've tied the boxes of how Google wants it still does

33:35 the job yes yes yes absolutely right in fact uh when we do guest post for

33:40 clients we ensure at least two of the links are Authority sites otherwise it doesn't at all look natural correct

33:47 correct it looks very unnatural just giving a link to one so yes you right on that so how do you see the role of AI

AI's Role in SEO

33:55 and automation when it comes to link SEO and content marketing yeah well it's

34:01 it's a burning topic which has been going on since the introduction of chat GPT and every other AI tool now out in

34:09 the market my short summary to it is automation is extremely important in the

34:15 volume of work us do in the SEO and Link building industry but as a wise man once

34:22 said balance to everything in life is extremely important so so the lazy ones

34:28 would be over dependent on AI and then just they're just going to ruin it whereas the clever ones people like

34:36 yourselves would Leverage The Power of AI and automation apply the human nuances the

34:44 human control points to it in order to elevate now of course we use a lot of AI I mean predominantly this is one thing

34:52 we launched eight months ago in our non-english markets in our platform which is a AI media planner it's not

34:58 been launched in the English Markets yet so rather than going through the entire inventory by using the filters we've got

35:06 three custom strategies whether it's related to Quick wins longtail keywords

35:11 and a third one I can't remember because it's not really my markets they input whatever data they want and our platform

35:19 already curates or short lists um u a

35:24 list of websites for them and they literally in five clicks they can launch a campaign which is 50 sites wide for

35:32 the next 3 to four months whereas they have to spend easily two hours

35:38 qualifying and looking at all those websites individually so of course what we've done is used AI but we've done it

35:45 in a way where we listen to our clients listen to a lot of that feedback and

35:51 came up with a further feature on the platform which enhances the user

35:56 experience and I think this is exactly how other people should be doing within

36:01 SEO internally and externally now when it

36:06 comes to your specific point about how does AI play a role in link

36:12 building if you ask Julian Goldie it's fantastic Julian's famous for that have

36:18 we ever done it will white press yeah yeah I don't want to give you a mixed answer here we haven't tested it I don't

36:26 know I obviously Julian Goldie again is a good mate and I do need to sit down with him over a gin and tonic and kind

36:33 of pick his brains because he talks a lot about you know generating back links through active use of AI but I want to

36:40 know what does that mean what kind of links are coming back does this move the needle is the ROI being being being

36:47 achieved and I'm sure because he's he's great I love him I'm sure he's doing a great job uh but within the world of

36:54 wide press I don't know yet to be honest yeah okay okay now what are some of the

Challenges in the SEO Industry

37:00 biggest challenges you see in the SE industry specifically the link in

37:06 building industry or Marketplace uh yeah uh the last four months five months I

37:12 was sleeping very peacefully because the business was thriving since the updates my sleep definitely has been affected

37:18 because we all know everyone's seen a decline people are scared but then neate

37:24 as long as there is no further bigger core update happening I think it'll all

37:30 come back to normaly when it comes to investment within link building within

37:36 the next two to three months because if you look at it objectively no matter

37:41 which sector industry when you've got for example when you have the US elections happening the stock market

37:48 always drops people kind of wait and watch a little bit the trust comes back and then

37:56 it goes back up as as long as links are important and Google will provide and

38:01 it'll be an important ranking factor which it is I personally believe beginning October I think any

38:10 SEO agency which is doing link building will perhaps start to see that rise

38:16 again where people will kind of forget what happened in the first half of the year and they'll start reinvesting I

38:23 think that's what's happening based on the feedback we get from our clients they all say oh yeah percentage of the

38:29 budget was pulled by the leadership they want to wait and watch so yes it happens

38:35 every time there's an update LinkedIn blows up Tik Tok blows up Twitter blows up we all keep saying SEO is dead links

38:42 are dead link building is dead and I'm I'm sure you've heard it probably a thousand times in your last 22 years and

38:50 I'm sure it was even worse when the penguin update happened I'm sure people would have said the same you know so

38:57 I'm not too worried to be honest I I did my first Su dead session in

39:04 2010 conference I on that so so uh now

39:09 question do you believe in pbn I believe in pban in the non-

39:14 English market and I can say that confidently because all are non- English Markets they love pbn oh my God it's

39:22 like for them pbn is the Holy Grail for for acquiring links and then

39:27 it is actually true right and then I try and sometimes slip in pbn to my English

39:33 clients and they like Steve and they're like are you drunk well you you don't work for white press what's going on

39:39 with you why are you sending me these links so I'm actually jealous of the non-english markets so some of my fellow

39:45 managers who are the non-english uh Market managers I said you you've got it so easy you know it's all

39:52 about pricing you send them anything you want and their conversion of accepting

39:57 it is 80 to 90% of the sourcing you send mine is 11 to 177% if I'm lucky uh if

40:06 I'm having a good time so yeah pbn still work really well you know as I said white press is predominantly a Polish

40:13 company they love their pbn okay okay so now my question is for an what advice

SEO Advice for Beginners

40:20 would you give to a marketers who are just starting SEO or content marketing I

40:25 know not to Manny will be doing so but still if somebody is starting what advice would you like to give yeah yeah

40:33 obviously consume a lot of content and information however every time you come

40:39 back watching a YouTube episode reading books please come back and try and test

40:46 few things on your own to see if it works or not and you know it na I go to

40:51 so many conferences and people come back and they talk sometimes when in the

40:57 foer when they're having tea coffees James dly another good friend of mine he gets also really really upset and

41:04 annoyed of that when someone comes up to him and States an approach which they

41:10 applied on whether it's technical SEO whether it's link ins serion whether

41:15 it's power post and then he asks them when was the last time you actually tested it and then they go that was like

41:22 24 months ago and then he also says you know you shouldn't be going around talking to other people in the SEO

41:28 Community saying that these things work because clearly you haven't tested it

41:34 and that's where all this confusion whether SEO works or it doesn't work

41:40 come into the picture and I think whether it's season season professionals like yourselves fairly newbies like

41:47 myself or brand new people starting in content marketing I think we all have a

41:53 very strong responsibility within the SEO community that before we advise something to

42:00 people we need to be absolutely sure that we have tested it yet every time we

42:06 give an advice of what works or what doesn't work it has to be with the pincher sold we can't just go around and

42:12 keep saying of course it works because no I'm sorry tomorrow Google's going to come out and manually Target you if

42:20 you're going on state talking all the time and kind of you know chest out

42:25 so what I'd say to all the new out there yes please consume a lot of data but pick two three four absolute legit SEO

42:34 experts out there Kai for me is amazing Samantha guio love him to bits you know um people

42:42 like him people like Julie people like Julian Goldie people like yourselves

42:48 where build that connection if you can attend

42:54 lots of conferences or few conferences pick two or three really good ones and that's one thing I didn't mention it

43:01 earlier uh the power of networking within the SE Community is is so so

43:08 important I've built this entire Empire in white press because of going to conferences if I wasn't going to

43:14 conferences I probably would still be struggling doing maybe 40,000 pounds Mr

43:20 not 400,000 because every conference I've gone to for me everyone was a lead there and then it was all about

43:27 connect put the hook in build a relation and even if you don't do a business at

43:33 least you're going to hopefully win a friend in the SEO Community who would at least REM remember you pass on some

43:40 valid knowledge to you but also later on maybe recommend you all the all the new

43:46 kids yeah uh be careful with what you watch and what you listen

43:52 to okay that's an interesting take so let's shift gears away and talk about

Valuable Career Lessons

43:57 your personal experiences and insight what is the most valuable lesson you have learned in your career what your

44:03 career or in general in general in general yeah never never ever think that

44:09 you know everything and you know it all because you know uh and N you would know

44:15 it it's a saying from the world of cricket when you think you you you become the best batsman or you're the

44:21 best cricketer it's got a very funny habit of putting back putting you on

44:26 your ass literally the next ball the next over the next day so this is one

44:31 thing learn continuously because and I'm going to quote a famous person when I'm

44:37 going to say this uh if you're not innovating you're evaporating Innovation only happens if

44:44 you're continuously learning you your network continues to grow for me network

44:50 is key Network 100% equals to your net worth I

44:55 can guarantee and my team sometimes is surprised that every time we run into an

45:00 issue even if it's not link building related but our client has asked a

45:06 strange question I somehow seem to know the best person on the planet for that thing within the world of SE who happens

45:13 to be a good friend of mine is on speed dial so uh value every second every

45:21 minute when you're speaking to fellow professionals no matter which industry you're in because the big the better

45:28 relations you build the more you learn and the more you learn the more you'll be able to talk confidently about it

45:37 test things yourself and that's when you come across as a reputable and

45:43 trustworthy person slash brand you know I'm sure nav you've done the same when

45:48 people think of navn they think of the guy knows exactly what he's talking about he knows SEO like the back of his

45:55 hand we can literally take every word of nav need and trust that what he's saying

46:02 works or does not work but that happened through you you constantly learning I'm

46:07 still sure even if you know everything I'm sure you still consume a lot of data you still learn one or two new things

46:13 every day true and I'm still excited to learn and consume I'm I still think and

46:19 that is everybody should think as a newbie in their field so that's what keeps you grounded correct correct

Influential Mentors in SEO

46:27 now who has been your biggest Mentor or influencer in the Su industry there quite a few actually uh

46:34 so I'm going to take three or four names here um James dly and Carl Hudson from

46:40 seeru business Legends they just leverage SEO but I love the way they

46:45 think both dly and and Carl extremely sharp they spot opportunities so they

46:51 they've kind of very recently mentored me in order to

46:57 realize a bit more of the potential out there Charles Flo for giving me the time

47:03 very early in my white press career in order to connect me to certain key

47:08 people out there and also to you know gain more knowledge from him you know

47:14 we've gone out partying several times uh great great great guy and then you know

47:19 some of the other Legends out Kyle rof such an amazing amazing human being always there to help Matt digity again

47:27 an absolute Legend quite recently Julian Goldie corai every time we meet in a

47:32 conference he always talks about Steve how drunk you are for you to cause me

47:38 problems because he keeps saying Steve you know that you're very dangerous for my for my marriage obviously he says it

47:44 in a in a in a friendly way and then lastly uh the name I'm going to take is our polish Legend here Robert nichell

47:50 Robert's being really really instrumental in again helping white press but also having some really good

47:56 conversations with me uh so yeah some some of these names and I'm sure soon enough in the next six months NAIT your

48:03 name's going to be on that list as well that's so kind of you so so how do you keep yourself

Staying Updated in Digital Marketing

48:10 updated in this world of digital marketing or SEO do you read anything specific or the how do you keep up it

48:17 yeah so I do about an hour and a half in the morning and then 2 hours in the

48:23 evening every day I watch all the all the channels all the podcasts out whether it's Julian's whether it's

48:30 Charlie's whether it's Cal Kango whether it's yours whether it's fery Kon um a

48:36 lot of that I don't like reading a lot but I like watching what they saying and

48:43 then looking at the case studies when when when they so yeah that's pretty much for me every day if I don't do that

48:50 I feel I'm already behind a week okay so you are not into book reading so I won't ask you any books you

48:57 recommend but any websites you recommend books I mean it's not that I don't read at all but you know Steve tot's book for

49:03 example that's that's amazing Charles Flo keeps record keeps uh publishing I

49:09 think there's one which he did talking about AI strategies recently and I seem

49:15 to forget the name of it that was the one I read recently as well also Jason Hennessy the award-winning one who

49:22 hasn't read Jason Hennessy's book yeah this yeah right yeah these these three

49:28 these three spring up okay okay with that we come to the end

Finding More About You and Your Work

49:33 of this episode I took a lot of your time and thank you Stephen for sharing your insights with us today it's been a

49:40 pleasure having you on the show and finally where can our listeners find more about you and your work yeah yeah

49:47 first of all yeah thanks for having me easiest way to find me is just uh connect with me follow me on LinkedIn

49:53 I'm quite active on LinkedIn white press's landing page has has my contact details there as well but I'm sure

49:59 you'll find me uh in one of the after events in one of the SEO conferences

50:05 there's a reason why I'm called the SEO conference King is because I go there for the parties in particular right

50:11 right right okay thank you very much and that's all for today's episode of the

50:16 agency Insider thanks for tuning in and don't forget to subscribe and leave a review see you next time cheers guys

50:23 thank you