Oct 10, 2018
Today, my guest is Deepak Shukla from the SEO agency, Pearl Lemon.
We take a deep dive into SEO strategy. If you want to learn how to gain mega free traffic with the SEO skyscraper technique, this is the podcast for you!
The best part is that anyone can use this technique to grow their organic Google search traffic. You just have to know how.
In our conversation, we talk about what the skyscraper technique is, why it's so successful, and how you can build your entire business around it!
If you're trying to grow your traffic in a meaningful way, definitely listen to this!
Resources:
Blogger Genius #013: What Bloggers Need to Know to WIN at SEO with David Christopher
Transcript: How to Gain Mega Free Traffic with the SEO Skyscraper Technique with Deepak Shukla
Host 0:03 Welcome to The Blogger Genius Podcast brought to you by MiloTree here's your host Jillian Leslie.
Hello everyone welcome back to the Blogger Genius podcast. Today we are diving deep into SEO and my guest, you're gonna love his accent, is Deepak Shukla. Did I pronounce that correctly, Deepak?
Deepak Shukla 0:25
You got it perfectly, Jillian.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 0:28
He is an SEO expert he's got an SEO agency and I love this, he
hangs out with his cat named Jenny and he runs ultra marathons. So
Deepak , welcome to the show.
Deepak Shukla 0:43
Jillian, thank you for the wonderful introduction and of course for
letting me be on your show.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 0:48
Oh terrific. Terrific. Or, as you like to say. Brilliant.
Deepak Shukla 0:53
Yeah, brilliant.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 0:54
We're just chatting about how I really like your accent.
So Deepak, what I was hoping to do in this episode is really think strategically about SEO.
SEO strategy for bloggers
So again, people who don't know SEO, Search Engine Optimization, it is how your content gets found on Google.
There are some previous podcast which I will link to in the show notes, where we talked about overall SEO strategy. But let's go deeper Let's be more specific.
We talked offline about ways to do that, ways to really strategically go in there and optimize certain posts especially posts that make money.
So Deepak, first okay sorry, let's just do a quick intro of how you got into SEO and then let's go into some strategy.
Deepak Shukla 1:52
Okay amazing Jillian, Thank you. So hey Jillian's audience, Deepak
here, of course.
I got into SEO between five to seven years ago. It all began from classified ad sites here in the UK. What really happened was, I basically was listing and ad as a private tutor on a classified ad site.
And I really quickly discovered that if I changed and added keywords ultimately into the title of my advert, I would literally get more phone calls, seeing if people wanted some tuition.
And that really started my journey into the world of SEO because I thought, aha, this is really interesting. Does this also work on other platforms?
And as I began exploring more, and I went up the ladder of complexity, moving from classified ad sites, to social media platforms. And then trying to figure out how does this work on something like Google, it led me to, well, in some respects, where I am today.
Here on the podcast with you, running the the agency Pearl Lemon, and you know, just working, with the clients that we have to, as you probably can imagine. Trying to get them as high as possible on Google for a real range of keywords.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 3:35
It's interesting that you find it fascinating because I think a lot
of people in the audience don't find SEO fun.
People in my audience are creators, and really love that part of the job. And so what I want to do is give them ways that they can do this with a real strategic eye.
So you were talking about the strategy that you called?
Deepak Shukla 4:09
The scraper technique.
What is the SEO skyscraper technique?
Jillian Tohber Leslie 4:12
So what is that?
Deepak Shukla 4:13
Absolutely. So it's something that's been around for a while. And
it's something that Brian Dean from backlinko popularized, or he
coined that specific term the skyscraper technique.
And it works for anybody who is just starting out, as well as already established in some way. And really looking for how to get a kick out of content that you've already got, or products, whether they are affiliates or direct. They're already selling.
Skyscraper technique -- make it the most authoritative piece of content out there
And ultimately, what the whole principle centers around is looking at a particular sector or segment within your niche, and producing or improving a piece of content that you had, that already exists to just ultimately make it the most authoritative piece of content out there.
So for your creative audience, of course, what's going to be wonderful about this is what I'm actually asking you to do is, where you have, for example, a let's say, you know, 900 word blog post that you figured out makes you maybe even $200 a month.
Then, the real beauty of something like that is going back to a blog post like that, and figuring out how you can make that blog post as informative and as in depth as possible. And taking it from, you know, 500 words to potentially 5000 words. Now, I'm not talking about filler content here, let's be clear.
When I say filler content, I don't mean to say then that you should try and expand your word count to ultimately say the same thing across, you know, the whole 5000 words.
Skyscraper technique --getting into a much greater level of granularity
I'm talking about getting into a much greater level of granularity to really ensure that you produce a piece of content that people will spend even more time on page with. That will lead Google to, you know, really recognizing what you're doing with that piece of work. And then using that as as phase one.
So, you know, if you've got a blog post, it's already packed, generating an income or you at some point, look at your Google Analytics. And you realized I have a post on, you know, you know, a T shirt,
Jillian Tohber Leslie 6:31
Let's do a real world example. Because we had talked about it.
Okay, so let's say you are a mom, blogger, and you blog about kids
fashion. And you have one blog post about, if your kid is going to
take a class photo, or, you know, like school photos, like, what
should your kid wear?
Deepak Shukla 6:58
Perfect, perfect. That's an excellent example. It was indeed the
one we're talking about off air. So if you've got, if you've got a
blog post about you know what to wear for your kids school photo,
then, you will probably already have a sense of, Okay, these are
the keywords.
So, you know, photo and you know, clothes for school photos, for example, clothes for school photos could be, for example, the keyword. So it'll be really interesting in the instance of a blog like that is type that into Google, you know, clothes for kids school photo or clothes for children school photo.
Think about high level, what are the variations around this keyword, and open up a couple of tabs in Chrome, or Firefox or Safari and just having a look at what comes up on page one.
Skyscraper technique -- look up keywords you want to rank for
Have a look at what comes up on page one of Google and you know, on the basis of that you can quickly begin to kind of skip through the pieces of content that exists and, and really perform a simple SWOT analysis. What you're really looking for is ways that you can add more, reliable, more informed data as to all of the considerations around clothing for a school photo.
So, perhaps it could get as granular as you know, how you should prepare the clothes and whether you should iron them, whether you shouldn't, and going through that process will do a couple of things for you initially.
Number one, it's going to, of course, increase the content, which will typically increase the time on page that people spend reading your content. Because you've already got visitors are coming to that blog post that they're going to begin spending more time actually going through it.
Number two, it's also going to allow you where and when. And if you want to, to add maybe another link or two to a related product, or perhaps just the same product lower down in the blog post.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 8:51
Okay, so it's an affiliate links you're talking about?
Deepak Shukla 8:54
Exactly. So whether it's an affiliate link, if you've got, you
know, your own range of clothing, whatever it may be, but you can
add a link to something that you generate some revenue from.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 9:05
Wait, can I just interrupt for just one second?
Deepak Shukla 9:07
Yes, go ahead.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 9:07
I was looking on Amazon yesterday, in terms of their affiliate
program, and I saw that if you are promoting clothing on Amazon,
you make the highest percentage in affiliate fees, it's like 10% of
the sale.
So this is not a bad idea. If you're thinking, what should I promote? And you can somehow related it to clothing with Amazon Associates, that is a good category to be in.
Deepak Shukla 9:39
Brilliant, brilliant, absolutely so fantastic. But that underlines
you know, the return that you can get.
So let's say that you've done that diligently. You spend a hard weekend and you've got a fantastic new piece of content with three affiliate links to products that you think makes sense.
What the next step is, and this is the part I think that you know, as creative people that we don't really think about as much, because it's normal that you wouldn't, but this is where you can really make the big wins.
So you remember the, the search term that we just spoke off, which is, you know, best clothes for kids photo, or some variation of tha. What we do now is to go back to all of those blog posts are already on page one. And now with your improved piece of content, we know that we've got something that really, you know, is worthy of being right at the top there.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 10:30
Okay, and you are saying that initially, this post was 900 words,
which, by the way, is a pretty long blog post. And that it needs to
be much, much longer?
Deepak Shukla 10:42
So this is the thing. It doesn't need to be much, much longer, it
really needs to be as long as it takes to become more authoritative
than anything else that currently exists out there.
And the real focus of this actually is we're not talking about, you know, producing great regular content in this context. We're talking about producing one piece of content that could ultimately change the kind of financial fortune of the business because it can generate so much traffic, and therefore affiliate sales, and therefore, you know, all of the other things that come with it. And that's really the end goal of this particular post. So, yes, it could end up as you quite rightly said, Jillian.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 11:22
10 times or five times as long.
Skyscraper technique -- make the best piece of content on this subject that's out there
Deepak Shukla 11:24
Exactly, exactly. This does not mean that every post you make needs
to be five times as long because I'm also a realist, that's never
going to happen. Or it's very unlikely to happen and that's not
what's required here.
Brian Dean again from Backlinko has written maybe a very small amount of blog posts all together. But he's got incredible rankings across all of them, because he's focused on producing only skyscraper content.
And then he's gone through what we're going to talk about now, a process to really just tell the world about this piece of content being ultimately the best piece of content on this subject that's out there.
So, you know, for the clothing for school photos, in this instance, you would take those blogs that already exist on page one.
And this is a really simple thing.There's, there's a tool for example, called SEMrush There's a couple of three, ultimately, SEO tools, you don't even really need a paid account. So don't worry about any of that. All you need to do is to plug that URL, plug that URL into SEMrush.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 12:27
Wait, which URL? Mine or my competitors?
Deepak Shukla 12:31
Yes, exactly the URL of all your competitors, say five to seven of
your competitors that are on page one for that actual keyword. The
exact URL of their blog post. And ultimately, what we're looking
for is to see where people have linked to that post.
Look who is already linking to the best content
Jillian Tohber Leslie 12:49
Okay.
Deepak Shukla 12:50
So we want to find out who are the people that are linking to that
post now.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 12:53
So for example, kids clothing to wear to class photo. Do I want to
do that search and take the number one post and then do a similar
search and take the next number one post, or do I want to just kind
of assume it's going to be this certain kind of group of keywords
and then do like the first five?
Deepak Shukla 13:18
Absolutely. So either is completely fine. There's no hard and fast
rule. What I do is explore literally just two variations of it and
take four to seven of the posts. Because already that will be
significant enough what you're aiming to do.
Ultimately, the end goal is to see who's linking to that post. Using a tool like SEMrush, there's Ahrefs. If either of those aren't familiar than you could literally Google something as simple "check backlinks" or "backlink checker." And there's a range of free tools that will initially give you a couple of the links.
And between the four to seven posts that you plugged into whatever tool you want to use, you'll begin to ultimately produce a list of blogs or websites that are linking to this post that you found on Google.
And now that you've got that, that's basically your arsenal to go out. And to reach out to them and say, hey, I noticed that you link to you know, mommy'sfashionblog.com talking about kids clothing. I've actually written a blog post, it's really similar to that. And I've also mentioned x, y and Zed thing. I just thought I'd share it with you, if you're interested in perhaps taking a look at it and linking to it. And something to that effect can become extremely powerful.
Find people already linking to your competitors pieces and ask for backlinks
Because if you robustly follow that process, over a course of time, people should, in principle, begin linking back to it because one. You've found someone who's relevant to that already interested in that content, because they provided a link to it. And therefore three, the number that the rule of numbers, if you follow up, let's say with 15 people, three to five of them, potentially could link back to you. And that's really what's going to help you gain authority for that single blog post that you just now turned into a 5000 word piece of content.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 15:15
Okay, so I have a couple questions. First of all, can you talk
about Google and how it does think about backlinks?
Deepak Shukla 15:25
Yeah, definitely. And so, you know, one of the ways to really think
about it is, Google is obviously looking at millions, hundreds of
millions of sites all the time.
So the quickest way for Google to really form an assessment of your website is to see who's talking about your website, it's really the simplest way for them to ascertain trust in you.
Just in the same way we go based upon word of mouth recommendations. Google does the same thing. The way that Google does it the language of Google is of course websites, and looking at well who's talking about Jillian.
Ah, Deepak is talking about Jillian. We trust Deepak and therefore that by proxy, means that we trust Jillian a little bit more, so we're going to be more favorable with her content.
So when you begin to think about the kind of ecosystem of SEO, it's really as simple as that. I mean, that's one of the most powerful things that will never decay over time.
There's also tactics and strategies you can do on-page. You can do this, and you can do that. But that whole word of mouth, and therefore kind of reference is extremely powerful. And this process that we've just described is probably one of the most powerful processes for establishing that word of mouth that Google's looking for.
Relevant word of mouth, of course, because the other thing that Google might look at, is that, okay, Jillian is in the space of, you know, digital. But then we've got Tiffany, who's talking about Jillian. But Tiffany really runs a jewelry store. So this doesn't seem like a useful reference. That seems odd.
So we need to just make sure that we reach out to people to tell them to link to our content that are within our industry, because, of course, that's the second thing that we look for. And, it's the same process as the way we think about any recommendation that we get offline.
And when you kind of draw that analogy I have found for me personally still, that it makes the process of SEO become a lot simpler when I think about it in those terms.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 17:33
Got it. Okay, so here's the thing, I think my audience and like
myself, we use Yoast. We use the free version of Yoast, and we are
optimizing keywords and when you get that little green light, you
go, Yes, I did, SEO.
Deepak Shukla 17:47
Yeah.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 17:50
So I feel like I did it. Okay, I'm done for that post. And you're
saying no, not really.
Deepak Shukla 18:00
Exactly. So what you've done there is, if we think about a dress,
right? What you've done is really ensure that your dress is well
ironed and it's perfumed evenly , and it looks appealing from,
let's say, three, five meters away because of the cut. That's
brilliant.
However, what's really going to get you recognition for all of the effort that you put into preparing your dress is by taking your dress to the dance.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 18:29
And having people comment on your dress and going, Oh, my God, your
dress is gorgeous.
Deepak Shukla 18:33
Exactly, exactly. Because then that's how you get into, you know,
Tiffany's magazine, or whatever else it may be. And that's when the
world will recognize you, for oh my god, what an amazing dress.
And what we tend to do is focus on on the part that, we can do from home, right, work on the cut. Work on the colors. Work on the work on flavoring.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 18:54
And model in the mirror.
Deepak Shukla 18:56
Exactly, exactly. But the mirror isn't what's going to get us
recognition. It's going to get us comfort. But we got to take the
dress to the dance.
Learn about how MiloTree can grow your social media followers and email list
Jillian Tohber Leslie 19:04
I wanted to take a short break and say that if you're enjoying the
blogger genius podcast, then that says something really special.
What it says is you take your business Seriously, this is not a
hobby for you. And if you haven't checked out MiloTree I recommend
you do. MiloTree is a series of smart pop ups you install on your
site that asks your audience to follow you on Instagram, or
Facebook or Pinterest or YouTube or subscribe to your list.
It will put that job on autopilot so you can focus on the other aspects of your business. We offer your first 30 days free. So there's really no risk to you. And I think you'll like it. So now back to the show.
Okay, so here's the thing when you're telling me that I have to reach out to people about possibly linking to my post, I'm cringing.
So talk to me about strategies, because so now like writing some cold email saying, Hey, why don't you link to my post. I get those emails for Catch My Party, our first business and I kind of go oh, I'm not going to do that.
Skyscraper Technique -- how to ask people for backlinks
Deepak Shukla 20:14
Yeah, absolutely.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 20:15
So tell me ways that I can do it where I don't cringe and where I
might have more success. What's in it for the person? How can I
sell it to somebody to say this will benefit not just me, but also
you?
Deepak Shukla 20:29
Absolutely Good question. It's a fantastic question. So there's a
couple of strategies that I'd outline and you raise a really
excellent point, Jillian that, you know, it's uncomfortable. Just
asking someone to kind of do me a favor.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 20:43
Yeah, you don't know me.
Deepak Shukla 20:44
Yeah exactly.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 20:45
I'm an introvert, I want to stay like in my pretty dress in my
house in the mirror. I don't want to go to the dance.
Deepak Shukla 20:51
Exactly, exactly. So there's a couple of things, let's extend that,
that analogy. And so one of the things you could do, go to go to
the dance. But don't worry just yet about wearing your dress. Go to
the dance simply as an observer who isn't going to be in the
spotlight. And you know, you've got this list.
The value of engaging with other people's content
Now you can have a look at some of the content if you want, and start engaging with it as a means of building the relationship. That's the first one and then of course, all the good things follow.
A lot of people will probably say that Deepak, I'm too busy to even go to the dance as an observer, because I've got so much so much stuff going on in my house. So that's option number one.
Option number two, is to really have a look at what, what is it I want something, right. So, I want to go to the dance. And I want the spotlight so that people start writing up everything they can about my dress.
However, to make sure I can even get, you know, get a ticket and get in, I need to present my resume. So, the other thing to think about is, well, what is it that you can offer to anybody that you link to, and just a broadly think about it. If they've got content online, they've got their own brand exposure they're trying to build.
Offer a link in return for a link
So that's the second thing that you could do is think about, well, you know, what could offer them? Could I offer them a link? Could I offer them something for free? What kind of exchange can I give, or what kind of value can I add? That's the second thing that you can consider.
The third thing that you can consider is maybe instead of you going to the dance, why don't you ask a friend to go to the dance, and maybe make an introduction that way. So what I mean by that is you could have someone else reach out, and you know offer it as a suggestion because then it's always different right it comes across as a recommendation
So what I mean by that, Jillian, is in the same way that you know I've got Dina, my friend, literally, and she she's a big fan of you know, the stuff that we do at Pearl Lemon. So sometimes whenever she comes across stuff that she thinks is really interesting and useful, she literally reach out and say, Hey, you know, I like your blog. I just love to introduce you to you know, my friend, Deepak. And that would be the other option that I'd say you could take.
Have friend reach out on your behalf
Jillian Tohber Leslie 23:18
Is she the one who reached out to me?
Deepak Shukla 23:20
Exactly, yes.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 23:21
Okay. She said, Hey, you should have my friend, Deepak, on your
show.
Deepak Shukla 23:27
Exactly. And here we are.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 23:28
Here we are. Look at that. Okay, keep going.
Deepak Shukla 23:31
Yeah. So that's, I think, to be honest with you, that has been what
I've seen to be the most effective strategy, that when someone who
is an actual friend, who supports what you do, does actually write
on your behalf, it always comes across more meaningful and more
caring when someone does it on your behalf, especially if they
believe in what you do.
And then it takes away the difficulty of I don't want to. I'm not going to send a cold email, let's be realistic, it's all good and well, but there's no way in hell, I'm going to do it. So I'd say that, that's the other option.
But or if you are prepared to cold email, you know, Deepak, you know. I want to just send it out to 100 people, then that's, you know, what they call the kind of hit and hope approach, where you send out enough, and you will get some response.
But that brings, of course, its own problems. All of which I'm sure your audience can imagine, in their own mind. But if you if you take kind of one of those strategies, something will work for you. And, and I promise you, this is the probably the most important thing when it comes to making sure your your dress gets a recognition it deserves.
You've got to take it out to the dance and that's actually also why we didn't mention of course Yoast, and kind of some of the onsite stuff which I'm sure that some of your audience already do.
Create less, promote more as a blogger
Jillian Tohber Leslie 24:49
Right. Okay. So, Deepak this is the thing that is kind of blowing
my mind as a creator, guess what we like to create, we'd like to
create a lot, and I keep hearing this over and over again, which is
create less promote more.
Deepak Shukla 25:07
Hmm, I think that you can promote more initially, to then create
even more down the line. I think maybe it's just a question of how
you look at it. Because the worst thing for me in the world is to
produce all of this fabulous stuff as a creator, and then don't get
any of the recognition you deserve.
At some point, bills will come in, or you'll just get tired. You say, you know what, I worked really hard on this dress, I produced 14 dresses, no one's even said a thing. Or there was one comment on my Instagram posts. I'm tired, Jillian. I think I just need to go and think about doing something else, where at least I get some recognition.
So I think that's, as creators, I think, our fuel is recognition, many times more than more than the money itself. It's about getting recognized for the creative process. So that's why I'd say, hey, I want all of you to get to the dance. Because I want you to be recognized for the excellent things that you do in the value that you add.
And if we don't do it today, at some point, I can imagine that you just stop creating. And that would be a crying shame. So I think that, hopefully, that provides some context as to why initially, you can really work on that promotion side, because once you've got that audience. Once you begin or you put in the initial work, it just becomes its own snowball. It becomes its own engine for growth.
And then you can just really go into that creative space. And and people will follow you because they know your name. And that's what we really want to happen.
Take your most popular posts and turn them into skyscraper content
Jillian Tohber Leslie 26:46
Got it. Okay. So if, for example, let's say I don't have that many
posts. I then take my most popular of those posts and start really
working that one post?
Deepak Shukla 26:58
Yeah, yeah, that for me, is, is the biggest thing. So it's not the
case that you need to promote all of your posts. Not at all, it's a
case of doing this process once and doing it really robustly and
then seeing what results you get from it.
And if it doesn't, you know, it's not the case, it's going to work instantly. But then take a break. Go back into the creative side, and then come back to it.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 27:23
Got it
Deepak Shukla 27:24
Come back to it in maybe another, do this process once every two
months, once every three months, whatever makes you feel
comfortable.
If it's once every three months, that still means that, you know, within 12 months, you're going to produce four amazing pieces of content. And you're going to reach out to people. That will, the reach out part would definitely really massively help you.
So you know, if that makes it less scary, definitely do it that way. This is not about quantity of posts, it's about the quality of one individual post.
You know, there's a shutterstock competitor that built their whole business around a single post, that really was getting many, many views. And they decided to pivot the whole business based upon a blog that people kept landing upon.
So there's a lot of data to support this approach that really would, you know, help your audience just be able to ultimately in the end, create more and do the things that they love.
Be intentional when making skyscraper content
Jillian Tohber Leslie 28:21
Yes. And I have to say, it is about being incredibly intentional.
It is about looking at your numbers. So seeing like, Okay, this is
my top post, If you have affiliate links to definitely figure out
which post is bringing the most money, and going after that blog
post. Or if you sell a product, to go after those posts because
that that is the low hanging fruit for you.
Deepak Shukla 28:51
Yeah, absolutely. I completely agree. And, you know, if you just
think about it, like a cake stand, and you've got your best selling
cake. That's going to be the cake you're going to put front and
center. That's going to be the case that you might ask your
daughter to come along with you to the cake fair. Maybe to you
know, tell the others at the other parts of the fair to come and
check out this one cake.
It's the same principle. That's the low hanging fruit, that's the thing that can get you over those humps where you feel you're not getting the recognition that you deserve because step by step people began will begin just coming to your cake stand all by themselves.
And it's such a amazing feeling when people approach you and they say, wow, you know, that piece of content or, that advice you gave me was was was really brilliant.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 29:38
Can you build a business off of, say, one of these posts?
Can you build a business using the skyscraper technique?
Deepak Shukla 29:43
Yeah, you can.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 29:44
You can really build a business off of this?
Deepak Shukla 29:46
If you produce something that's an amazing piece of content that
you can build enough references to write backlinks really, you
know. Backlinks is a word that I don't like the word to be honest
with you. References is a better word.
If you can build enough references where people really say, you know, what you wrote Tiffany about kids clothing for photos really was excellent. And that's what I recommend people read when they're making that decision. It can do so many great things for you.
Just in the same principle that businesses can be built around one platform, whether it's instagram, or Pinterest. You can do a lot and go a long way with a singular really top performing blog post, and then begin to do more things.
As a consequence, the first thing that you're probably going to do is try and replicate the process again. Once you see that it works, you're going to be like, Oh, my god, I didn't believe it. It actually got some traction. Let me try it again. And, I think just taking that first step and getting through that, that that process is going to be so empowering.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 30:58
Yes? Now, what about this concept for SEO, which I always hear? So
let's say I do this post, right? It's about kids fashion for class
photos. And I'm able to do it and it does really well. Then do I
want to create a post? Or maybe I've already created this post. But
let's say it's kids fashion for Christmas card photos?
Deepak Shukla 31:24
Absolutely.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 31:25
And then I want to kind of make this waterfall where I can then
link to myself? And is that of value?
Deepak Shukla 31:47
Exactly. I think that, you know, if you if there's enough of a space to go down niches then absolutely brilliant. What I would say is it that's an excellent approach.
Build content around niches
Deepak Shukla 31:47
And just check. For example, as you said, for like the Christmas
photo. Have a look on Google as to what comes up. Have a look to
see if there's any interesting content, and seeing if that feels
like there's a demand for it, if there's actual blogs that
relate.
And again, you know, outside of getting into maybe keyword planner, and having a look at search volumes, the simplest way to ascertain search volume in this instance, is to literally type in. Okay, let me have let me see what comes up. Now I've got this great piece of content about clothes for school photos in general. Now, let me dive into a sub niche.
Let me look at what happens for Christmas photos, and see what comes up on Google, and see if there's direct content. Entire blog posts dedicated to it. And that would give you a sense of a flavor. And, on the basis of what you see, you can decide to produce kind of a similar piece of content that relates now to Christmas, and really begin to own that space of when it comes to photos, when it comes to preparing my children for photos.
You know, Tiffany's blog is the blog that I keep landing on. And Google again, will view that more favorably and because it's what's considered to be an associated keyword.
Just in the same way that if you go into a salon, and you get excellent advice about you know, how to treat damaged hair, you're probably also going to ask her. What do you think about damaged skin? Because by association, you assume. Well, you know, my hairdresser really helped me with my hair. I might as well ask her about my skin as well, because, who knows, you might be good.
Use associated keywords in building content
Google views a lot of these things in the same way. So associated keywords will begin to index and rank faster. So it's a really good strategy to follow. And by consequences, you said, Jillian, people then just begin to follow you because you're producing all of this good stuff.
So as we described with with Backlinko, and the skyscraper content, everyone eventually begins to follow Brian Dean, because Brian Dean produces all of this good stuff. So I think that's an excellent route that you just described.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 34:01
I was coaching somebody yesterday about their business. And she
started with a brick and mortar store, and it had a whole variety
of products. And so she translated that over onto a website, and
has a whole variety of products are all within kind of an area of
like, gifts and stuff.
There's one area of gifts that she loves, and that she does well on, however, in her brick and mortar store. It's like, you can't build a whole business like on this one area of gifts. So in her brick and mortar store, she has to sell a variety of gifts.
However, I said to her yesterday, she's talking to me. There are a variety of competitors in this whole space. And I said, go toward that one specific area of gifts. You could tell that she was nervous, like, could I build a whole business around it? And I said, Yes, on the internet, you can.
Now what you're saying is, if you do SEO really well, you can.
Deepak Shukla 35:05
Definitely, definitely, I definitely agree. And, you know, to this
lady that you are coaching, it's, I think it's an excellent
approach that you can choose to, especially if she's a fan of it,
which means that she's probably going to do better.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 35:21
Yeah, we talked like, all of a sudden, she lit up, like, these are
the kinds of gifts I love. And I was like, okay, you can build your
business around that.
You can build your business around a niche
But as creators, let's say you're a recipe blogger, you feel like, somehow I'm gonna be really broad. So if I'm, you know, she'll say, I'm niche. I'm gifts, but it's like, oh, no, you don't have to just be gifts, you could be this certain kind of gift?
Deepak Shukla 35:47
Absolutely, definitely. And if she's a raving fan of it, then you
know, all that she needs to check online is, are there other people
like me. Are there other raving fans, and, more than likely there
will be. We only need 100 loyal subscribers that regularly buy
content from us that you can build a business around.
So I definitely think it's an excellent approach to take and really getting down into those niches beginning with, that initial piece of skyscraper content, seeing what results you get from it, and then making a decision based upon that to go further down the rabbit hole and decide. What I'm going to focus on this area even more, because I've already gotten good results.
So I definitely think it's an excellent way to go and gives us a huge space in general. Anyway, so, going into a niche just sounds like it makes sense.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 36:42
How quickly would this start to pay off like, I do it, right. I
invest like, a whole weekend on one post. And I do a bunch of
research, and I write a really good post. And I even take more
photos. I add more links. I create ultimate post. Because, again,
we're creators. So chances are, we can do a good job at this, and I
even make a video and I put it in the post.
And then I figure out who is linking to similar kinds of content. And I reach out to those people, and maybe I offer them links back or promotion. Or or I just to say, I will be indebted to you for life if link to my to my post. What should I start looking for to know if this is paying off?
How to know if the skyscraper strategy is paying off
Deepak Shukla 37:32
Absolutely, it's a great question. So as a couple of things, I'd
say that you track. So number one is you have, of course, the
target keyword in the actual post itself. So you can track where
your ranking for that keyword.
And again, the same tools that we just described. Maybe plugging it into to SEMrush, having a look at seeing if its ranking or where its ranking how it's doing.
Number one, that's one place, you could look if you want to. And you probably already a little bit familiar with that tool. Because by the time you've reached out to people, you know, at least have have us have a sense of, Okay, this is basically how it works. Cool, I get it.
The second place that you can look, of course, is the place that you looked at, initially, when you discovered or decided which was the best posts to work with. Which was either your sales numbers, which will tell you well, this post must be getting the most traffic because I'm making the most sales from this product. Or Google Analytics, which is telling you, this is the page or this is the blog rather, that's giving you the most results.
And then it's a case of tracking it, over time, the first month, the first two or three months and really seeing what results you're getting in terms of page views. In terms of time on page.
One of the things you'll be able to see, hopefully, immediately is if you're already getting traffic. Lt's just say you're getting 200 visitors a month to one blog. And that results in I don't know, $79. And then as a consequence, you decide for x the amount of content that you write. You should see the average time on page goes up. And hopefully your revenue could even go up as a consequence of them just spending more time on the page.
So they're more likely, for those who haven't yet bought or are on the fence. They decide to buy, or the more people from your site begin to find it.
So there's quite a few ways I think that you can check to see if you're beginning to get results from your work.
Why you'll want to repeat this strategy when it starts to work
And if you say, I've just released it. I've got four links, I want to see what happens tomorrow. The Google Analytics and looking at the time on page, I think, would be just a useful way of seeing, wow, people are now spending, you know, instead of 2 minutes, 42 seconds on this page, then they are spending 3 minutes. And that made me an extra $11 a month, which is brilliant, because hopefully I can make an extra $11 every month. What will happen if I do this the same thing to to another blog post.
And that's typically what tends to happen. That it creates, as you said, its own kind of waterfall effect. And you find yourself replicating the activity anyway, because you realize, Oh, my God, you know, I got four more comments in this blog post. I made 11 extra dollars and I'm making an extra $11 every month. The last three months, I clearly need to try and just do the same thing across a couple of other posts and see what happens.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 40:30
That's terrific. Okay. And then one last question, which is I do
this to a post. And I start making more money. And you might not be
able to answer this, but how long will this last?
Deepak Shukla 40:45
It's a good question. It will last I mean, broadly speaking, I
think that it will last as long as someone else doesn't do the same
thing that you're doing.
So let's hope nobody else listens to this podcast, that your competitors are not listening.
The gap between knowledge and acting upon knowledge is so monumentally huge
Yeah, you know, the gap, as we all know, Jillian, between thinking and doing is absolutely huge. And it's gargantuan. So I always say, give everything in the house away. Because the reality is that the gap between knowledge and acting upon knowledge is so monumentally huge, it's much greater than the knowledge itself.
Deepak Shukla 41:27
So I would say, for those few that do act upon it, bravo, and all
credit to you. You will get results. And I think that, once you've
done it, it will stick around for a while. Aand you know, what's
probably going to happen anyway, you're going to want to do more of
it because you've got results.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 41:46
Yes, yes!
Deepak Shukla 41:51
There's no greater motivation than success. So I imagine that if
they get some results, they're going to want to contact even more
people and even more people, and then things may organically begin
happening themselves. Because when people search and find your
piece of content, they'll link to it anyway. That's the beautiful
part of it when you work hard for the first 10%, but then the next
15-25% comes all by itself.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 42:17
Yes. Oh, Deepak. This is wonderful, you've totally motivated me. I
am going to do this one strategy we've been doing with
MiloTree.
MiloTree is, you know, is our pop up app. And we offer a WordPress plugin. And we we think our product is really good. I just have to say, we are true believers in it. And so we've been reaching out. We've been doing searches on the best WordPress plugins. Yeah. And we have been reaching out to bloggers who write those.
How we reach out for backlinks with MiloTree
Deepak Shukla 42:49
Brilliant!
Jillian Tohber Leslie 42:51
We have a really generous affiliate program. So that's kind of our
way to say, Hey, you know, check out our program and we'll offer
it. And we'll say if you want a couple months free to try it out,
please do.
Deepak Shukla 43:03
Yeah, yeah.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 43:05
Then we say and we offer $20 per conversion.
Deepak Shukla 43:09
Yeah, brilliant. Fantastic.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 43:11
So, that is like, a new strategy for us.
Strategy: Leave a comment for people on their blog or about their product
Deepak Shukla 43:15
And the other thing that you could do to make it even greater is,
if you've got, for example, a virtual assistant. Because, you know,
this is something I found that nobody does, which is say that, you
know, you can do all of these things. And I've also commented, you
know, on three blog posts on your site. And I've also, you know,
written you a nice review on Google. This is something that I found
to be extremely powerful in building goodwill.
Because typically oftentimes a product that they're pushing, and or a service that they offer. And when you figure out what that is, and you leave them an excellent review online, they will, they will move mountains for you.
And I've been doing this with some of the people, some of our clients, businesses. And also our own that before I even approach someone, or when I know I'm going to approach someone, I leave them a review before even approach them. And then linked to the review in actual email. And now and they go crazy about it, because no one does that. And reviews are so important when you have a service that you're trying to offer.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 44:24
Where are you leaving these reviews?
Deepak Shukla 44:25
Oh, so like, for example, a Google Business Review. Like the Google
reviews because they appear on the front page of Google when
someone's looking up a service. And all you can write simply say,
you know, I had the pleasure of stumbling upon John's content, read
this blog post and it's been extremely helpful in clarifying some
things in my business.
So that's technically accurate, it's accepted by Google and it is a workaround of the question that you might think Deepak isn't that a little bit unethical. Well no, because you probably will have read that blog post and you will have identified something that is interesting to you. So you can simply write about that whether it's anywhere that you can leave a review.
If they've got a plugin, leave it on WordPress if they've got something on captara, leave it there. If they've got, wherever you can leave a review. Just find a place to write something. And as creators you're going to be excellent at producing quick snippets of content, and then follow up and say, hey, Tiffany, I love your blog. I actually already left a comment because I thought it was fantastic. It's already helped me. I'd love to introduce you to my affiliate program. And you're so much more likely to get responses because nobody does.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 45:34
That is so good. Because remember, I feel cringey about reaching
out. But that because I feel like I want to be able to offer
something. That is brilliant.That is terrific.
Deepak Shukla 45:46
Yeah, absolutely, public recommendations live forever online. And
that's how you can scale social proof, it's like wow!
Jillian Tohber Leslie 45:57
And be authentic.
Deepak Shukla 45:59
Exactly.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 46:02
So how can people reach out to you?
Deepak Shukla 46:04
Brilliant. Hey everybody, just just check me out on YouTube if you
want to see. There's a lot of stuff there, Deepak Shukla, Google
Deepak Shukla, if you like, Google Pearl Lemon, if I'm doing my job
at least half decent in any way you will find me to just type my
name into Google or YouTube or by a company name either is
completely fine and you will find me and you can approach me
however you want to.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 46:53
Can I invite you back so that we can do this again like a deep dive
for another SEO strategy?
Deepak Shukla 47:04
That would be amazing. I'd be honored Jillian. That sounds
fantastic.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 47:09
I feel like I have learned a tremendous amount.
Deepak Shukla 47:13
Oh wow and you said it on air so I'm chuffed and flattered thank
you. You know really I want your audience to win at the things that
they do. I just you know it's it's it's just a wonderful thing
seeing others rise. I think and you know if I can continue to be a
part of any of their success I'm in
Jillian Tohber Leslie 47:35
Awesome. Well Deepak, thank you so much for being on the show.
Deepak Shukla 47:39
Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Jillian for having me on. And thank
you, everybody, for listening.
Jillian Tohber Leslie 47:45
I hope you enjoyed this episode. And if you're liking the Blogger
Genius podcast, please head to
iTunes and give us a five star review. It will really help. It
will help other people be able to find the podcast. It will help me
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