Yes, AI helps you come up with ideas. And, AI helps you create content faster. And yes, we have an AI writer at Ubersuggest (and I will go into how I use AI later in this article… but still…) But if you use AI to write your content, in most cases you will get less traffic. Let me break down some stats… AI VS Humans With AI we found that it can’t just whip up content that you can publish and be off and to the races. It still takes time to use AI. From modifying the content to putting it in your CMS to adjusting the format, creating content takes time whether you use AI or not. Here’s how long it takes to create content using AI versus a human. When using AI we found that you can write content, post it into a CMS, and publish it all within 16 minutes. Humans on the other hand took an average of 69 minutes. But there are some issues that most people don’t talk about. The first is AI takes what’s on the web and “regurgitates” the same old info. People want to read something new… The second is we found that 94.12% of the time human written content outranked AI-created content. But if that doesn’t convince you why you are wasting time using AI to create content, look at this experiment we ran. Traffic Over Time We decided to run an experiment. We took 68 websites and created 744 articles. Half with AI and half by humans. For both batches, we did keyword research and tried to target keywords with a similar keyword difficulty, and similar lengths in content. On a side note, if you struggle to get AI to write articles at the length you want, just have them write sections at a time. We then published the articles on these 68 websites and tracked how much organic SEO traffic each article generated on average over time. Look at the results. By month 5 an AI article was generating 52 visitors a month while a human-written article was generating 283. Now I know what you may be thinking… “Neil, it is easier to crank out content with AI, even if it generates less traffic, just crank out 10 or 100 times more articles and overall you will have more traffic.” Well, there is an issue with that. If you put a lot of low-quality or mediocre quality out, you’ll find your overall site decreases in traffic and rankings. The last time we pruned and cropped our content we saw roughly an 11% to 12% increase in traffic. Just look at what happened to About.com when they leveraged the same strategy. Now if that doesn’t convince you, maybe this will. Look at how much traffic is generated per minute spent. Either way human content is producing better results. But Neil, I hate writing I prefer using AI… If you want to use AI to help create your content, by all means go ahead. But I recommend that you heavily modify it. Where an AI writer can be helpful, at least from an SEO standpoint, is that it can help you integrate the right keywords. That way you can rank for the correct terms and create content that is generating traffic. So here is how I would use it if I was going to use an AI writer. Step 1: Head here. Step 2: Put in your keyword and click “start writing now”. Step 3: Select the title that resembles the article you want to create. Step 4: Select the introductory paragraph that most resembles what you are trying to write. Step 5: Select the headings that you think are most relevant. The tool with pick headings that also contain keywords. Step 6: The AI writer will produce content for you. It will give you a head start. Now go and thoroughly modify it. Make it your own, add in the E-E-A-T, and talk about new stuff that others aren’t sharing. Where we use AI The big area we use AI when it comes to content writing isn’t the writing part. It’s the research part. For example, at NP Digital we used AI to help UTI boost their traffic. Instead of AI writing tons of content, we leveraged it to help us do research for all the cities UTI has campuses in. This allowed us to scale the creation of their local pages, and ensure the quality was high by including data, stats, and other elements that would be useful for someone performing a local search. We even won an award for the work we created from the Drum Awards. Conclusion AI can be used to help you, the issue is most marketers are relying on it to fully create their content for them. AI is great, but it’s not there yet to just do everything for you. And even if AI was perfect, if it doesn’t talk about something new that people haven’t seen before it won’t produce the results you are looking for. So, are you using AI to create your content?

There are few better traffic sources for SaaS companies than organic search. You can acquire users for free, they often come with an intent to make a purchase, and you can scale it easily.    But how can you make sure that your website dominates the SERPs? And once it does, how can you make sure that visitors stay on your site and become customers? SEO for SaaS companies must take into account the unique features of the industry. SaaS brands have a very different target market and customer journey than, say, a local business or a law firm—and your SaaS SEO strategy needs to reflect this.  In this post, I’ll show you how to build one. We’ll discuss the benefits of SEO for SaaS businesses, why SaaS SEO is so important, and how you can build a strategy starting today.  What Is SaaS SEO? SaaS SEO is a form of search engine optimization that helps software-as-a-service brands rank higher in Google. It’s all of the activities that help increase search engine traffic like: Keyword research Content creation On-page SEO Link building The difference is how you approach them.  While Google’s ranking factors remain the same, you need to factor in the opportunities and challenges that are particular to the SaaS industry.  Let me explain… The SaaS Industry and What Makes It Unique for SEO The SaaS industry has its own specific quirks and needs, and it’s important to be aware of these nuances when optimizing your SEO strategy. For one, competition is fierce—there are a lot of businesses offering similar services—some with significantly larger marketing budgets. There are also comparison sites like Capterra and G2 that have such strong domain authority that they regularly rank for product-related queries.  Oh, and don’t forget that your competition is global, not local.  Additionally, the customer journey can be lengthy due to research and decision-making processes that may take weeks or months.  This means that it’s important to focus on long-term SEO strategies, such as content marketing and technical optimization, rather than a “quick fix” approach.  It also means you need to create content for every stage of the journey. It’s not enough to create top-of-the-funnel content to attract people and hope they convert. You need to create product-focused content to show readers why they should choose your tool over a competitor.  It’s unlikely that you’ll get a conversion the first time someone visits your site—just look at the image below from Salespanel—so you need to design your SEO plan to build sustained authority in your space over time. That way, your website will continuously be visible in search engine results, and you can determine how to best attract potential customers to your site. It’s not just new customers you have to think about, though.  Because SaaS brands use a subscription-based business model, you need to be constantly thinking about how to retain customers. Your B2B SaaS SEO strategy will need to reflect this by creating content that simultaneously attracts new users while educating existing customers and showcasing your authority.  Benefits of SEO for SaaS Businesses When done well, SEO can have a huge impact on your SaaS marketing efforts. It helps you get found by potential customers who are actively seeking out the services that you provide. And in a world where it seems there are a million software solutions out there, SEO matters more than ever. Here are some benefits of SEO for SaaS brands: Increased brand visibility and credibility. The more your content appears in the search, the more reputable your brand will become. This can be a deciding factor when potential customers are choosing between you and a competitor.  Scalable traffic. There is a huge compounding factor with SEO. The more content you create and the more links you build, the more your month-on-month traffic will grow.  Lower-cost acquisition. Putting more effort into your SEO reduces your dependence on paid marketing. And as an industry with high ad costs, anything to alleviate some of that spend will be helpful for SaaS companies. Increased product awareness. The more your product shows up in search engines, the easier it will be for your sales team to talk about your product because customers will have probably seen it before. Helps to convert prospects from other channels. The content you create for SEO is multipurpose and can be used by sales teams to convert prospects from other marketing channels like social media and PPC ads.  Improve your user experience. A lot of SEO tasks will also improve user experience like optimizing for speed, navigation, and readability. This helps ensure that potential customers stay on your website longer and are more likely to convert. Devoting time to SEO will also help your company stay ahead of the competition. Search engines are constantly changing their algorithms, so regular updates to your content and new links will keep you ahead of the game. Why SEO Is Important for SaaS A SaaS SEO strategy isn’t optional for most brands. It’s essential.  The SaaS market is so large and competitive that you can’t afford not to have an SEO strategy. End users are expected to spend in excess of $232 billion on SaaS solutions by the end of 2024. If you want a piece of that pie, then you have no choice but to invest in SEO in order to compete.  More and more buyers are searching online for products, too. Over a quarter of buyers’ time is spent researching independently online. That means if you want your product to be on your audience’s shortlist, you need to be appearing in search engines.  Finally, SEO is pivotal in dealing with the long sales cycles that are typical in the B2B industry. The average length of the B2B sales cycle is just over two months. A single paid ad isn’t going to be enough to keep your prospects on the hook. You need a regular stream of content that showcases your authority and keeps your prospects in your funnel

With the rollout of generative AI in search, there were a lot of mixed emotions among digital marketers. From unbothered to nervous to excited, the emotions and attitudes towards Search Generative Experience (SGE) ran the gamut.  Now that digital marketers have had time to settle into the news, how have those attitudes changed? In this post, I’ll discuss the real feelings and attitudes towards SGE as reported by digital marketers themselves. I’ll also dive into the confidence levels of these same digital marketers as well as share ways to reduce fears about SGE (hint: preparation is key!). Let’s dive in! Key Takeaways About Attitudes on Google SGE  More than half (53.1 percent) of digital marketers rank their knowledge of SGE highly (an 8 or above on a scale of 1-10). Marketers with SEO as a regular part of their job rank their knowledge as 9 out of 10, while freelancers rank their knowledge as 10 out of 10. 75.3 percent of digital marketers feel confident or very confident in their knowledge of SGE and their ability to implement SEO strategies that align with new requirements. For in-house digital marketers, the percentage who feel confident or very confident jumps to 80.6 percent. 74.4 percent of digital marketers feel prepared for the impacts of SGE, with a strategy in the works or already being executed. More than half (54.9 percent) of digital marketers have positive feelings around SGE. 29.8 percent of digital marketers have neutral (e.g. curious, unbothered, other) feelings on SGE. The remaining 15.3 percent have negative (e.g. anxious, nervous, upset) feelings or fears about SGE. The data suggests a correlation between preparedness and confidence about implementing SEO strategies for SGE. Our Methodology  My digital marketing agency, NP Digital, recently surveyed 1,000 digital marketers about their attitudes towards search generative experience. The target audience was digital marketers who work in SEO (in any capacity) across multiple industries. This includes agency and in-house digital marketers, as well as freelancers. We asked respondents to rank their knowledge level of SGE. We also asked the respondents how confident they were in their ability to implement effective SEO strategies in the face of SGE, as well as how prepared they felt. Finally, we asked respondents about their feelings on SGE in general. Are Marketers Confident About Handling SGE?  Before we get into the attitudes towards SGE, let’s discuss the confidence levels of those who will be the most impacted by its roll out: digital marketers. The team at NP Digital asked survey respondents to rank their knowledge level of SGE on a scale of one to 10. Most marketers said their knowledge was on the higher end of the scale. The top three answers were: 8 (19.7 percent) 9 (18.4 percent) 10 (15 percent) When we skew the results towards those who consider SEO a regular part of their role, though, that confidence level rose slightly with the top answer being 9 (29.8 percent). Interestingly, freelancers felt the most confident about their knowledge of SGE. In fact, more ranked their knowledge level a 10 than any other number. Perhaps more important than knowledge of SGE, though, is confidence in your ability to implement SEO strategies that align with its requirements. So how confident were our survey respondents in their abilities to do this? The majority (75.3 percent) were confident they could align with SGE requirements. When we focus on in-house professionals, we see even higher confidence numbers: 45 percent feel very confident 35.6 percent feel somewhat confident 19.4 percent do not feel confident Now you may be wondering, what drives those confidence levels? Well, most marketers say they are prepared for SGE. Of the 1,000 respondents: 18 percent are already executing their strategy for SGE 32.5 percent say they have a strategy ready to implement 23.9 percent are in the process of finalizing an SGE strategy 15.8 percent are only just beginning to develop a strategy Having a plan in place will certainly boost confidence levels in the face of change. Breakdowns by Industry  If you’re an in-house digital marketer, you may be curious as to what industries are represented in the survey results above. We surveyed marketers across many different industries, including professional services, technology, B2B, hospitality, healthcare, and others. And how about company size? We’ve got the bases covered there, too. Our survey respondents work for small, medium, and large businesses. Just over half (51.7 percent) work for businesses with more than 100 employees. Emotional Responses to SGE  We’re digital marketers, not robots! So of course, we all have some feelings about the introduction of SGE and its impact on SEO, search traffic, and other metrics. And while some digital marketers are concerned, the most common emotions associated with SGE in our survey were positive. Here’s the breakdown of the good, the bad, and the neutral emotions expressed by marketers just like you: Excited (33.7 percent) Curious (13.3 percent) Unbothered (13 percent) Pleased (11.8 percent) Hopeful (9.4 percent) Anxious (6 percent) Nervous (5.8 percent) Upset (3.5 percent) Other (3.5 percent) I mentioned above that level of preparedness seemed to influence confidence levels; the same can be said for emotions. Those who said they were anxious (6 percent) or nervous (5.8 percent) also said they were not very prepared and a strategy was just starting to be built out. What Digital Marketers Can Learn from Attitudes on SGE  The confidence, preparedness, and attitude of your fellow marketers can teach us some valuable lessons. In general, marketers who are more confident and have more positive attitudes toward SGE also happen to be more prepared. What does prepared mean in this sense? Not only do they understand SGE, but they also understand the realistic impact of SGE on search. It is not Google’s intention to take traffic away from reputable, high-quality websites. Instead, their goal is to answer searcher questions in the most efficient way.   When you approach content marketing and SEO from the angle that it will improve searchers’ experience, you begin to see

Did you know that 53 percent of web traffic is organic traffic? This means the majority of traffic comes from an organic search engine results page (SERP) listing. The best way to ensure that traffic is coming to your website is to take up space on the SERPs. This of course means ranking on the first page and, up until recently, it also meant utilizing rich results to increase the visibility of your listing. With Google’s FAQ and HowTo structured data updates, though, an expanded listing is no longer possible.& In this post, I’ll share what Google’s latest update is and how it’s impacting websites. This will include a look at my own digital marketing agency’s website performance post-update, as well as three of our clients. Finally, I’ll share ways that digital marketers can react to minimize the damage. Key Insights on the FAQ and HowTo Structured Data Update On August 8th, 2023, Google announced significant changes to FAQ structured data and HowTo Rich Results. NP Digital experienced a decline in FAQ-related clicks (73% YoY) and impressions (69% YoY). HowTo-related metrics showed a substantial decrease: 77% YoY in clicks and 71% YoY in impressions. NP Digital also examined the results of 3 clients: Client A (Luxury Watch Marketplace): Experienced a sudden drop in clicks and impressions on August 8th. HowTo results were still available on desktop at that time. Client B (Lender Comparison Site): This client saw a spike in March followed by drop-offs in April and August. There was an August drop correlated with the removal of FAQ and HowTo structured data from mobile SERPs. Client C (Online Personal Finance Company): This site experienced a significant drop in mobile clicks and impressions on August 8th. Desktop performance was stable until September, then decreased with HowTo removal from desktop. Digital marketers should expect a marked decrease in clicks and impressions due to the removal of FAQ and HowTo structured data. Despite the impact, there’s no need to proactively remove structured data; there are no penalties. Clicks and impressions may stabilize over the next few months but might not fully recover. What Do We Know About the FAQ and HowTo Structured Data Update? Before we dive into the details, let’s first cover the basics. What are FAQ and HowTo rich results? These are the expanded results that would show under select SERP listings, as shown below: Where do they come from? They are added to websites by webmasters in a code called schema markup. When crawling the site, Google takes this markup and turns it into rich results which is the plain language version that you see above. These rich results helped certain listings to stand out while also providing additional information to searchers. So, what happened? On August 8th, 2023, Google announced that FAQ structured data would no longer be available for the vast majority of websites or SERP listings. Instead, it would be reserved for high-authority government and health websites. This update rolled out on both desktop and mobile. On that same day, HowTo rich results were limited to desktop users only. Google updated their announcement article on September 14th, 2023, to state that the HowTo structured data changes now apply to desktop in addition to mobile. While the FAQ rich result may still show on government and health websites, the HowTo rich results are effectively deprecated after September 14th, 2023. Following this change, numerous dimensions and reports will be removed from Google Search Console. Namely, the HowTo search appearance dimension within the performance report and the entire rich result reports. Changes NP Digital Found to FAQ and HowTo Structured Data Performance When it comes to evaluating the impact that a Google update has on websites, we must consider various performance metrics. For most updates, we look largely to clicks and impressions. It’s no different with this update, which has shown to have major implications for websites across industries. My agency, NP Digital, has been impacted. The removal of FAQ rich results from SERP resulted in a 73 percent year-over-year (YoY) decrease in FAQ-related clicks and a 69 percent YoY decrease in impressions. It didn’t stop there, though. Since the HowTo update was completed in the middle of September, NP Digital has seen a noticeable decrease in performance metrics. Most notably, a 77 percent YoY decrease in HowTo-related clicks and a 71 percent YoY decrease in impressions. An interesting thing to note is the marked decrease in both clicks and impressions month-over-month since the beginning of the year: It’s not surprising that Google would begin to phase out FAQs and HowTos even before announcing it. After all, they want to see how such a change would impact their own performance metrics. As I said above, NP Digital isn’t the only website to see a marked decrease in SERP performance. For a better understanding of the overall impact, let’s look at three of NP Digital’s clients. Client A Our first client is a global, pre-owned luxury watch marketplace. On August 8th, the same day as the FAQ structured data update was fully implemented, they saw a sudden and significant drop in both the number of clicks and the number of impressions they received from SERPs: Notice above that we’re just tracking desktop performance. At the time when the decrease was most noticeable, HowTo results were still available on desktop. This means that on September 14th when the HowTo structured data update was expanded to remove it from desktop, too, this client likely saw another significant drop-off. Client B Our second client is a product comparison site where users can compare financial offers from multiple lenders. Here, we’ve captured mobile device data. Client B has a more interesting history, with a massive spike in clicks and impressions in the middle of March. It also has two noticeable drop-offs, first at the beginning of April and then, more drastically, on August 8th.  Why might this be? The spike in clicks and impressions could be for several reasons, like an indexing of

Have you heard of prompt engineering? This latest job is all about refining generative AI prompts so they provide accurate, reliable, and credible information. Data-led startups are asking for prompt engineers to join their teams and over the next few years, businesses across a wide range of industries will start to request them too! What is prompt engineering, and how do you become an AI prompt engineer? I’ll answer these questions and relay insights from some leading lights in the prompt engineering industry on how this new role has impacted the marketing sector. Prompt Engineering Essential Insights Prompt engineering involves creating prompts to guide large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, similar to providing context for effective search engine results. Prompt engineering helps digital marketers make more targeted and engaging content, as well as saving time. SEO tools like AnswerThePublic can enhance prompt quality and resonance with the target audience. Experiment with different prompts through testing, allowing for variations in length, target audience focus, features, benefits, and calls to action. AI prompt engineers are becoming a viable career, requiring a combination of skills such as passion for AI, programming, clear communication, and marketing/psychology knowledge. Staying updated on AI regulations and incorporating empathy into AI content will be essential for prompt engineers. What Is Prompt Engineering?  Prompt engineering is the science of creating prompts to guide the responses of large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT. Think of providing a prompt to ChatGPT like searching for something on Google. The more context you can give Google, the more likely the results will match what you’re looking for. Prompt engineering works in the same way. Ankit Prakash, founder of Sprout24, a platform that provides insights about SaaS products, including ones that generate and use AI, puts it succinctly: “Think of prompt engineering as a translator. It allows us to convert human [i]nquiries into a language AI can understand and respond to effectively.” How Does Prompt Engineering Impact Digital Marketing?  How is prompt engineering helping people who work in digital marketing? It helps them create more targeted and engaging content. Personalization in marketing is the key to high conversion rates. Prompt engineering makes it easier than ever for marketers to create content that resonates with the needs and pain points of their target audience. Prompt engineering can also help digital marketers save time as they can create clear and efficient prompts faster, spending less time refining the output. This means less time spent on repetitive tasks and more time spent focusing on the bigger picture. 3 Tips for Better Prompt Engineering If you’ve ever used a generative AI tool like ChatGPT, Bard, Midjourney, or DALL-E to create content (and three out of four organizations already do), you have given it a prompt to get started. This means you’ve already been doing some prompt engineering, even if you didn’t know it. Here are my three expert tips to carry out prompt engineering like a pro. Use the Right Tools Whether you’re creating SEO-optimized content or want to ensure your output is clear, accurate, and credible, there are a wide range of tools available. For example, take ChatGPT and SEO—you might want to ask ChatGPT to include specific keywords in your prompt to maximize the odds of your content ranking in the search engines. AnswerThePublic is excellent for this as it uses autocomplete data to tell you what people are looking for in Google, YouTube, and Bing.  This also means you can ensure the prompts you use resonate with the needs and wants of your target audience. Why not check out my AI tools to not just enhance your prompts, but to enhance how you use AI? Here are some of my favorites: AIPRM. Discover a library of prompt templates and share your own with other AI users. ChatGPT Prompts for Developers. This tool offers pre-written prompts to inspire you to write high-quality code. ClickUp AI Writing Assistant. This tool gives you pre-made prompts to help you create you best content and enhance productivity. PromptPerfect. This plugin helps you write more concise prompts with less risk of misinterpretation. Prompt Perfect: This tool helps you optimize your prompts to make them more accurate and relevant. Break Tasks Down Imagine you’re creating a Google Ads campaign to promote a landing page on your site. The project sounds large and daunting, so you break it down into smaller chunks to make it more manageable. For example, researching the keywords, writing the ad copy, deciding which assets to use, and so on. The same logic applies to the prompt engineering process. Let’s say you want to create a long-form blog post. The best way to approach the process is to split the blog into sections (for example, an intro, an outro, and multiple header sections) and prompt engineer these sections individually. Another strategy is to create a detailed outline where you ask the AI tool to consider individual steps in the process. I’ll talk more about specific prompt engineering techniques later in this article. This doesn’t just give you more control over the process but means the AI tool can create better content. AI tools have attention spans like we do  – if they lose focus, it can lead to disjointed content and inaccuracies! Try Different Things Prompt engineering is all about experimentation. Even making small tweaks to the prompts you provide can make a massive difference to the results you get. A large part of the prompt engineering process is testing. AI prompt engineers will experiment with different prompts and see which output people respond to best. This helps them identify which prompts are most effective. For example, let’s say you’re a digital marketer that wants to use AI to create copy for a Facebook Ad. You can ask the AI tool to create adverts that: Are different lengths. Focus on different target audiences. Target different features and benefits. Have different call to actions. You can then run each advert and see which one leads to the most conversions.

Financial advisors do valuable work, but in many cases, it’s flying under the radar. More than half (57 percent) of Americans are currently going without financial representation.  That’s a huge gap in the market, so how can you work to fill it? With effective digital marketing strategies and techniques. In this post, I’ll introduce you to the need for digital marketing for financial advisors. I’ll then jump right in, showing you how to use data to find your target audience and, most importantly, target them with various digital marketing strategies. Finally, I’ll share the best marketing channels for financial advisors so you can get off to a running start. Top Tips for Financial Advisor Marketing  Trust and credibility should be the focus of financial advisors, especially when using marketing to establish their brand and grow their clientele. Topics like finance fall into the YMYL (your money or your life) page type, which receives greater scrutiny from Google. Customer profiles are just as necessary for financial advisor marketing as any other industry. Customer profiles enable you to narrow down the best marketing channels for you to target. The best practices for marketing as a financial advisor include targeted client segmentation, a strong digital presence, consistent personal branding, online and offline networking, and regular performance data analysis. Why Do Financial Advisors Need Marketing?  Like any industry, financial advising can benefit from marketing for a few general reasons: promoting brand awareness, building credibility, and growing your clientele, just to name a few. Beyond that, though, marketing for financial advisors can help to establish them as trusted sources and thought leaders. This is important for such a client-centric industry, and one that requires significant trust and transparency. If done correctly, marketing can position you as the authority within your financial advising niche. What Makes Marketing for Financial Advisors Unique?  Perhaps more than any other industry, trust and credibility are crucial to the success of a financial advisor. If you can’t instill trust in clients, then you won’t have any clients to speak of! Marketing for financial advisors, then, needs to focus heavily on those elements. You’re not only selling a service, but you’re promoting yourself as a trustworthy and knowledgeable advisor. The emphasis on trust, expertise, and personalized service distinguishes financial advisor marketing from other industries. Of course, we can’t discuss financial advisor marketing without discussing YMYL. YMYL (your money or your life) is a type of content that can directly impact the readers’ financial stability, well-being, safety, or health. Financial topics are a part of this, but YMYL topics also include medicine, weather, current events, and more.  YMYL pages are given greater scrutiny under Google’s search quality evaluator guidelines. Hency, why trust and credibility are so important.   Customer Profiles for Financial Advisor Marketing: Our Data  Believe it or not, there is not one “best” target audience for financial advisors. You can have people from all walks of life interested in your services, but you must know how to reach out to them and meet their needs. So where do you even start? That’s where data can help. The team at NP Digital, my digital marketing agency, sent out three surveys regarding finances and financial goals. We collected the responses of 1,000 people. Each section below will highlight a different customer profile that I created based on the data collected. These are just a few examples of the audiences you may want to consider targeting. I will then go into detail on how that customer profile can be implemented as part of an overall marketing strategy for financial advisors. Customer Profile One: Security Seeker  Name: Sarah Age: 35 Gender: Female Financial Habits: Sarah primarily uses her savings account as an emergency fund, a habit she shares with 71 percent of other survey respondents. She has only one savings account and uses it for all her savings goals, reflecting 31 percent of the respondents. Sarah is well-educated about financial terms like APY and uses it as a deciding factor when selecting savings accounts. This is similarly the case for 41 percent of women and 55 percent of men. Her top uses for savings accounts include emergency funds, vacation or travel, and major purchases. Sarah understands the importance of actively growing her savings and makes informed decisions about her financial goals. For 17 percent of survey respondents, that means using a financial advisor to help them manage their money. Sarah is a dream client for financial advisors, as she has general financial literacy, and therefore understands the importance of working with a knowledgeable advisor. If she doesn’t currently have an advisor, she is likely to reach out on her own to learn more about financial advising services. The goal is two-fold: First, she needs to know that you exist. Second, she needs to see the value of your service over your competitors. How can you achieve that? For general awareness, paid marketing campaigns can be of great help. Paid campaigns on Google and social media will plant the seed in Sarah’s mind. Once Sarah is ready to take the leap, you can implement retargeting campaigns to recapture her attention. Customer Profile Two: Financially Stretched Striver  Name: James Age: 40 Gender: Male Financial Habits: James falls into the 22 percent of respondents who can pay bills on time, but lives paycheck to paycheck and has debt. He prioritizes paying bills promptly but struggles with financial stability due to living expenses and debt. He has one savings account but cannot actively grow it, like 27.5 percent of respondents. His primary financial goals include getting out of debt and achieving a more comfortable, less paycheck-to-paycheck lifestyle. James represents individuals who are working towards financial stability and need support in managing their debts. Of the four customer profiles, James is the least likely to work with a financial advisor to handle savings and investments. He may, however, seek out financial advice regarding debt management and debt payoff. So, how can you let James know that you can help? A

When Google initially announced the use of generative AI in search in May 2023, there was a wave of panic in the digital marketing world.  As digital marketers became familiar with the technology, though, the predictions on the impacts of Search Generative Experience (SGE) began to shift. That’s not to say that everyone is happy or unbothered with the rollout, but the predictions are trending positive. In this post, I’ll share the results of NP Digital’s survey on SGE impacts. Marketers answered questions like “how will SGE impact SEO” and shared their predictions. So, if you’re ready to learn more about SGE’s potential impact and how you can prepare yourself, read on. Key Takeaways About the Impact of Google SGE  Almost one-quarter (21.7 percent) of digital marketers said they expected SGE to significantly impact their current SEO strategies. When discussing SEO strategies most likely to be impacted by SGE, marketers said keyword implementation (23.5 percent) and technical optimization (22.5 percent). More than half (52.4 percent) of respondents feel SGE will positively impact their organic traffic. On the flip side, 30.8 percent of digital marketers anticipate detrimental impacts from Google SGE. Almost one-half of digital marketers plan to enhance user experience on their site (45.2 percent) and increase focus on content creation (43.5 percent) in anticipation of SGE’s impacts. Our Methodology  The team at NP Digital, my digital marketing agency, surveyed 1,000 digital marketers in January about their predictions on the impact of search generative experience on search. The target audience was digital marketers who work in SEO (in any capacity) across an array of industries. We asked respondents to rank how impactful SGE would be on SEO. We also asked respondents to identify which areas of SEO would be most impacted. Finally, we asked the respondents to share their resource allocation strategies as they prepare for SGE. What Digital Marketers Predict About Google SGE  So what do digital marketers predict about Google SGE impact? We asked respondents to rank SGE’s anticipated impact on their SEO strategies on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being not at all and 10 being significantly. The top answer (21.7 percent) was 10. What aspects of SEO, exactly, did they expect to be the most affected by SGE? The number one answer (23.5 percent) was keyword implementation. Other top answers included technical optimization (22.5 percent), user experience (17.4 percent), and content creation (17.2 percent). It’s true that SGE will likely impact these various SEO strategies. However, despite the challenges, digital marketers tend to have positive predictions about the general nature of SGE and search. 49.3 percent of respondents feel SGE will help small businesses in search engine results pages (SERPs). Recent data backs up this prediction—94 percent of SGE links are different than those on page one. Smaller brands with lower domain authority now have a shot to appear on page one, even if their content is ranking on page two or below.  66.5 percent of respondents feel SGE will deliver more accurate results than existing Google results. And more than half (52.4 percent) of respondents feel SGE will positively impact their traffic. Of course, not all predictions are positive. About 31 percent of digital marketers think that SGE will result in major or slight drops to their organic traffic performance. Breakdowns by Industry  As previously mentioned, the digital marketers in our survey represented several industries. This includes both in-house marketers and freelancers. See the full breakdown below. Anticipated Strategies for SGE  Even though many digital marketers in our survey have positive feelings about SGE, they still want to ensure they’re prepared for its impacts. So what anticipated strategies do digital marketers have for SGE? Here are the top five resource allocation strategies chosen by respondents: Enhance user experience (UX) on the site (45.20 percent) Increase focus on content creation (43.50 percent) Invest more in technical SEO (39.70 percent) Research AI/machine learning (27.50 percent) Build a stronger backlink profile (21.20 percent) While most digital marketers are prepared, not all are. Roughly 10 percent of respondents said they don’t plan to do any resource allocation while preparing for SGE.   What Can You Learn for Your SGE Strategy?  While predictions and attitudes about SGE tend to be positive, that doesn’t mean you should be unprepared. So, what can you learn from our survey respondents?  The first thing is to not panic. There is a lot of doom and gloom online surrounding SGE, but when we ask the professionals about their attitudes and predictions, it’s largely positive. In fact, many digital marketers think SGE will have a positive effect on traffic and be a better experience for users. The second thing is that while keyword implementation is predicted to be one of the largest impacts of SGE, you don’t necessarily need to double down on your keyword strategy. Instead, you should focus on other areas of SEO (like technical SEO) and even user experience. You’ll likely see traffic fluctuations at first. Expect those fluctuations to settle down. Don’t destroy the progress you’ve made by revamping your focus keywords prematurely. Instead, implement other changes that improve user experience and focus on creating high-quality content. FAQs  What impacts of Search Generative Experience on search do digital marketers anticipate?  With the rollout of SGE, marketers anticipate an improved search experience for users and organic traffic growth for smaller websites. There are marketers concerned about negative organic traffic impacts for websites, though.  What strategies should you implement in anticipation of Google SGE impact?  Focus on making improvements that would be beneficial even if SGE didn’t exist. According to digital marketers, the top three strategies for SGE include on-site user experience optimization, content creation, and technical SEO optimization. Conclusion  While we can’t possibly know the true impacts of search generative experience on search until widespread implementation, we can use our shared knowledge to make educated guesses. Marketers expect the impact of SGE to be significant, but largely beneficial for users and website owners alike. Most are preparing for SGE already,

Having the right SEO tools in your arsenal can set you on track for online success. However, with so many tools on the market, knowing which one (or ones) to choose can be overwhelming. Enter Mangools and Ahrefs.  Mangools is scrappy, lean, and long-tail keyword-focused.  Ahrefs is a backlink analysis powerhouse that also packs a punch in other areas of SEO. Which is right for you? I will help you find the answer by comparing Mangools vs. Ahrefs.  I’ll delve into the features that set them apart, testimonials, and pricing so you can make an informed decision. After reading, you’ll know which best suits your digital marketing needs. Ready? Then here we go. Main Points Mangools and Ahrefs are renowned SEO platforms marketing pros use to create strategies and measure campaign performance. Mangools’ five main features focus on keyword research, search engine results page (SERP) analysis, SERP rank tracking, backlink analysis, and SEO metrics. Ahrefs’ vast set of features includes tools for backlink analysis, keyword research, performance tracking, content gap analysis, and more. Mangools’ pricing starts at $19.90 per month (when billed annually), while Ahrefs plans begin at $83 (when billed annually).  Ahrefs pulls data from more than 20 billion keywords, 3.1 trillion backlinks, and 14 billion pages in its context. Mangools has a database of over 2.5 billion related keywords, 100 million competitor keywords, and more than 30 million SERPs. How to Use Mangools for SEO Our Mangools’ SEO journey begins with an overview of your current SEO status. Use the SiteProfiler tool for a high-level look at backlinks, SEO data, and your domain authority. This helps assess your site’s strengths and weaknesses and gives you a good starting point. Next, find relevant keywords with the KWFinder tool. Enter your niche seed keyword and get data on search volumes and difficulty scores. You can select the keywords that best fit your SEO and content strategies. That’s just scratching the surface of Mangools’ functionality. Let’s explore its other features and how they can turbocharge your SEO efforts.  Features Mangools has five main features. We already covered SiteProfiler and KWFinder (and we’ll dig deeper into those next). The others are SERPWatcher, SERPChecker, and LinkMiner. You can access all the tools for free from Mangools’ website or by installing the Mangools extension for Chrome or Firefox, but you’ll get a prompt asking you to create a free account when you enter a keyword. Note that free accounts limit your number of daily searches to five. Now let’s dive deeper into each tool. KWFinder: Mangools’ keyword finder enables you to find long-tail keywords with low SEO difficulty. You can also use it to perform keyword analysis, research competitor keyword strategies, track long-term search trends, and identify high-impact local keywords. You can also use it to import keywords in bulk and organize keywords in lists.  SERPWatcher: Mangools says, “SERPWatcher is a rank tracking tool that makes other complicated tools look like they’re from the [’80s].” With SERPWatcher, simplicity really is the name of the game. Just enter a domain name and click “Start tracking” for insights into how your site ranks in the SERPs. SERPWatcher metrics include the Performance Index, which tells you your site’s organic traffic potential based on current keyword positions and those keywords’ search volumes. You can even get daily ranking updates, easily share interactive reports, and track your rank position by geographic location.  SERPChecker: Find local SERPs for over 50,000 geographic locations and exploit your competitors’ weak spots with Mangools’ SERPChecker. All you have to do is enter your keyword, country, and device type and click “Analyze SERP.” It checks 45 SEO metrics and “spies” on competitors to see if you can outperform them. SERPChecker can also measure the effect of rich snippets on your click-through rates (CTR) and show you how Google SERP features impact your site’s organic search results. Its database has over 30 million SERPs, with about 100,000 added monthly. LinkMiner: This tool is great for finding backlinks and tracking new and lost links. Enter your domain or URL, click “Find backlinks,” and you’ll get results. You can also check the quality of your and competitors’ backlinks through Mangools’ Link Strength metric. This is also handy for checking whether your links are valuable or if you need to disavow any spammy links.  In addition, you can add favorite links to a list, conduct advanced backlink analysis, and get live link placement previews. SiteProfiler: As I mentioned before, SiteProfiler is a great place to start assessing your site’s SEO health. This tool lets you check the authority of domains or URLs. Just enter your details and click “Analyze website.” Mangools uses Moz and Majestic metrics and Alexa Rank and Facebook shares to give a clear picture of the trustworthiness and authoritativeness of your site. Pricing Mangools pricing structure includes four subscription tiers: Entry, Basic, Premium, and Agency. Prices range from $19.90 to $89.90 monthly if you opt for an annual billing. Month-to-month subscriptions range from $29 to $129. A free deal is available, too. It gives you five lookups every 24 hours, with 15 related and five competitor keywords per lookup. Mangools also offers additional free tools beyond the main suite, including their SERP simulator and SERP volatility tracker. Customer Thoughts Mangools shares many customer success stories and positive reviews on its website and across the web. Many cite its intuitive user interface, simple keyword research functionality, and ability to uncover long-tail keyword opportunities. According to one Mangools review, PCMag Assistant Editor Rob Marvin says, “KWFinder earns its reputation as one of the best SEO tools out there for doing long-tail keyword research.” Orainti International SEO Consultant Aleyda Solis calls it a go-to tool “to easily identify keyword opportunities to target.” On the flip side, some reviewers mention that Mangools lacks the resources for an extensive database like Ahrefs or Semrush. Others question the accuracy of the platform’s data. How to Use Ahrefs for SEO While Mangools is all about simplicity, Ahrefs is a much more robust

The average page load time is 2.5 seconds on desktop and a whopping 8.6 seconds on mobile. With the optimal load time being 0 to 4 seconds to capture user conversions, there is certainly some work to be done by many (if not most) e-commerce sites. You can take the piecemeal approach to website speed optimization. That is, working to optimize one issue (e.g., too large images, time blocking JavaScript, etc.) at a time. However, this approach is costly in terms of time, money, and revenue loss. So what’s the alternative? The NitroPack WordPress plugin! In this post, I’ll outline what NitroPack is and how it works. I’ll then share why my digital marketing agency, NP Digital, uses it and recommends it to our clients. This will include a look at two client case studies to show you just how powerful NitroPack implementation can be. Finally, I’ll show you the steps you need to take to add NitroPack to your WordPress site. Let’s dive in! Essential Insights on NitroPack and its Impact NitroPack is a cloud-based web optimization plugin designed for platforms such as WordPress, Magento, and Opencart. NP Digital prefers NitroPack due to its all-in-one, easy-to-use nature and compatibility with major platforms (WordPress, WooCommerce, Magento). By using NitroPack, NP Digital experienced significant page speed improvements for multiple clients, helping Core Web Vitals scores.: Client A (Specialty Cabinetry Retailer): NitroPack implementation led to drastic improvements in web core vitals, such as LCP and CLS, within three months. Continued improvements were observed even post-initial implementation. Client B (Advertising Platform): NitroPack implementation resulted in a significant increase in the quality and quantity of “good” mobile URLs. Improvement in mobile user experience is crucial, given the significant percentage (31.13%) of total web visits on mobile. There are other page speed optimization plugins for WordPress, such as WP Rocket and WP-Optimize. NitroPack is favored over other options based on its features, user reviews, and overall effectiveness. What Is NitroPack and How Does It Work? NitroPack is a cloud-based web optimization plugin available for platforms like WordPress, Magento, and Opencart. The goal of NitroPack is to optimize websites to decrease page loading time and improve customer experience. As a result, the optimizations also tend to improve a site’s Core Web Vitals scores. How does NitroPack work? NitroPack does much of the same as a human web optimization specialist. However, it does it in a matter of seconds and it maintains the optimizations as long as the plugin remains active. Here are just a few of the optimizations made by NitroPack: Caching. Web caching ensures that commonly accessed content is stored locally and delivered more quickly to the end user. Built-in CDN. Where do your cached resources reside? In most cases, within a third-party content delivery network (CDN). However, NitroPack has a built-in CDN which means you don’t have to pay for, or configure, a third-party connection. Image Optimization. Image optimization decreases the size of images, either through actual resizing or size compression. This decreases load times for faster delivery. Resource Loading and JavaScript Execution (Defer JS Loading). By deferring the loading of resources until they are needed (i.e., user interaction is detected), NitroPack reduces web page loading times. Critical CSS. When you defer non-critical resources, you also ensure that critical resources (i.e., above-the-fold content) load first. NitroPack ensures critical CSS is loaded in line with the page’s head tag so it loads quickly and improves performance. Lazy Loading. Why use up bandwidth on images, videos, and iFrames that are currently out of view? With lazy loading, you’ll prioritize content for a streamlined user experience. Code Optimization. Using both combining (to reduce redundant code) and minification (to reduce code’s overall size), NitroPack ensures your code still functions as it should but in a more efficient manner. All of the above features, and more, combine to quickly optimize your website and improve page speed. Why NP Digital Uses NitroPack for Page Speed There are many page speed optimization plugins available for WordPress, so why does NP Digital use the NitroPack plugin? NitroPack is an all-in-one, easy-to-use page speed and site optimization plugin. It works with major platforms (e.g., WordPress, WooCommerce, Magento) and it’s easy to install and implement even if you have zero coding knowledge. Its extensive list of compatibilities also makes it easy to implement for the majority of our clients. NP Digital’s Results for Clients With NitroPack Using NitroPack across multiple clients, the NPD SEO team have been able to drive significant page speed results for WordPress native websites specifically surrounding the core web vitals. Once the NitroPack WP plugin was installed, NPD monitored various client performances to see significant increases. Client A Our first client, a specialty cabinetry retailer, came to us with a problem. They were noticing large traffic dips. By analyzing a few of the product pages using PageSpeed Insights, there was a noticeable page speed issue, as well as struggles from a core web vital perspective: The NP Digital team recommended NitroPack as a result of our findings. The NP Digital team then tracked the performance of the website once NitroPack was implemented. Within three months, there was a drastic improvement in web core vitals such as largest contentful paint (LCP) and cumulative layout shift (CLS).  What do these have to do with website performance exactly? Largest contentful paint is the time it takes (measured in seconds) from when a user initiates page load until the largest image or text block is rendered within the viewport. In short, it’s the time until the main content of the web page is loaded. Cumulative layout shift is a measure (scored using a calculation) of how much the layout moves around unexpectedly when a user is on one of your pages. This usually happens when large blocks of content load slowly and then shift other content as they load. The less shift there is, the better the overall user experience. There was also an overall improvement in page speed and a massive reduction

Just look at how much content is published on each platform daily: TikTok – 23 million YouTube – 216 million Facebook – 350 million X – 500 million LinkedIn – 2 million Instagram – 95 million Let that sink in for a second. Just between those 6 social networks, over 1.1 billion new pieces of content are being published. That’s why social media doesn’t get as much engagement as you may want. Sure, their algorithms aren’t as friendly to organic as they used to be… but the real issue is there is a lot of content from people to choose from. So, they expect more if you want their attention. In the last 30 days, we analyzed 5,204,391 social media posts and 59.41% of them had no engagement. That means no likes, no shares, or even comments. That’s crazy to think about. It means a lot of people are wasting their time. When you post content, chances are it’s going to be drowning in a sea of noise. So, should you stop creating content for social media? No, you should create content because it’s a great channel to market a company, product, service, or personal brand. What you really need to do is adjust your strategy. If you don’t you’ll just be wasting your time. For example, here are some big wasters in social media: Time waster #1: Seeing what others post that is popular and posting something similar doesn’t work as well as one may think. And trust me, I’ve tried it a lot. The main reason it doesn’t work is because you are posting something that isn’t really new. Plus other people have already seen it because it was popular on someone else’s profile. Time waster #2: Posting tons of content each day and hoping something sticks. Not only are you wasting time, but the algorithms will crush you for this. If you post a lot of junk content and then good content, the good content won’t get the reach it deserves because your crappy content is sending bad social signals. The only way you can post tons of content and not really get penalized for it is to do it on X. That’s what I do, test a lot on X and then ONLY post the good stuff on other social networks. Time waster #3: Creating highly produced content. No matter how nice your content looks, it doesn’t guarantee success if the content itself sucks. To prove this, we analyzed 102,394 reels on Instagram and we looked to see if people consumed more reels that added visual design elements. Or if they consumed content that didn’t have visual design elements. As you can see the majority of the short-form videos that performed well weren’t highly produced. Just shows that in most cases spending an arm and a leg or production won’t just waste time, but it also wastes money. Time waster #4: Posting tracking and analyzing data. What works on one social network won’t always do well on another. The type of content that you think will perform well, in many cases won’t. And the type of content that gets the most engagement usually doesn’t generate the most sales or leads. By having tracking in place and analyzing past social data, you’ll have a better understanding of what helps hit your marketing goals. So, what do you have to do? There 7 things that really move the needle when it comes to social media. They aren’t always easy, but they really do produce results. Tip #1: Post something new and fresh that people haven’t seen. I know it is hard to come up with new stuff. Typically what I like doing is reading industry websites for at least 10 to 20 minutes a day as it will give you ideas. I also hold brainstorming sessions with friends and team members. If you spend time thinking about what people want to hear but no one is talking about, you’ll start coming up with new ideas. Tip #2: Don’t be afraid to have your own opinion… it makes your content stand out. I’ll make bold statements like “You are wasting time creating social media content”. I’m not trying to create clickbait… I’m just saying what many aren’t willing to tell you. I don’t think it is a waste to use social media… but I’ll tell you that you are wasting time with what you are currently doing. People want to hear opinions. It also helps brand you as an expert. Tip #3: Provide value, from education to stats and data, and make sure people walk away with something. With AI, it makes it even easier to come up with data. For example, we have tons of data on Ubersuggest and Answer the Public. With AI, it helps us come up with insights faster from our data than it used to be. If you don’t have access to your own data, you can use AI to help you do more research. Just check kout ScholarAI. It has access to over 200 million research articles. Tip #4: Only leverage trends when it is related to your industry Trends are huge, and it is a great way to get a lot of social traction. But the issue with how most people leverage trends is they talk about stuff that isn’t related to their product or service. For example, you don’t see me talking about Politics or war even though a lot of those topics do well from a trend perspective. Focus on content that can go viral, makes you look like an expert (hence it has to be on your space), and can drive revenue. You can find trends in your industry through Answer the Public and Exploding Topics. Tip #5: Collaborate with other people within your space (it will amplify your reach even if they don’t have tons of followers). I have a podcast called Marketing School. We recently recorded a podcast with a few other marketers who have their