E-mail:
jsem@patrikpilous.cz
Conferences are there to inspire us and get us out of our usual ruts. Restarts even has it in its name. Most write-ups and social media posts reflecting on conferences are summaries, descriptions or commentary. I will try to approach it a little differently. But first, a video to soak up the atmosphere.
1) Make time for testing and experimenting
About a year ago, I realised that at work I often just repeat methods that work and rely on my own experience. That is certainly not wrong, but it must not be the case 100% of the time. A marketer should constantly try new things and methods and broaden their horizons with other perspectives. When I asked Pavel Ungr at this year’s SEO Restart: And how much time have you spent over the last 3 months trying out and exploring AI? He replied quickly: Well, almost all of it. Being an authority in your field means you are constantly moving forward.
2) Build a knowledge base
Write down and categorise, in a structured way, what works for me and what I should try. I have been doing this in Keep for quite a while, and I miss some features there. There is a lot of talk about Notion now, so maybe in the summer, when I have time, I will try moving everything over.
How do I currently categorise content in Keep, in simple terms? I combine two types of categorisation. One relates to the project the item concerns. The other is based on its nature and character. That means inspiration, books, marketing tips, investing, SEO tips…
3) Break patterns
Some things in marketing are good when they are predictable. That certainly does not apply to link building, though. Mass link exchanges and publishing the same old articles with three links from generic keywords pulled from Google Search Console. That really does not work any more.
The story is that link building is a somewhat illegal activity. A bit like steroids in bodybuilding. It is forbidden, but everyone who is serious about it does it. Over the last year, Google has tightened up significantly, and several updates threw me off balance too. Those who were injecting steroids (doing link building) too obviously got cut off completely.
The recipe for continuing with link building in 2023 is to break clearly recognisable patterns. Try to make links more user-focused, do interviews, get brand mentions and also link through your brand much more. Oh, and stop relying on link building as much as we used to.
I think it now pays off to create value-adding content for a carefully selected website instead of 3 one-page articles published in second-rate magazines. Add original, useful content with a brand mention on your topic, original and in-depth in the area where you are best. I believe the link building effect today will be similar, even though nobody can measure it. But this article can also reach your audience and have a sales effect.
Personally, I want to focus more on the quality of links rather than going for quantity, as I eagerly did before. For larger projects, it is certainly also a good time to combine PR activities and link building. Perhaps there could even be a role where one person handles both PR and link building. The synergy is clear, but unfortunately I do not know anyone like that here.
4) Using AI to create content
You simply cannot ignore this trend. In my bubble, almost everyone has at least tried ChatGPT, and a large proportion use it in some way on a daily basis.
I have started too. As I write in point two, I carefully note down which commands and prompts work. It is also good to categorise them by use.
I am also testing the performance of content that is 90% AI-generated, and after some initial failures I got to the point where Google even included this type of article in Google News. However, the tests show that the more care you put into the article and its creation, the better it works. In the end, you spend about the same time as if you had written the article yourself.
5) Argumentation, explanation and lobbying
Zdeněk Nešpor spoke about this topic, and it is worth thinking about. Zdeněk said that for an SEO specialist on a large website, it is more important to master logical argumentation and persuasion. For an SEO consultant, this is more important than technical skills. But we can apply this to marketing as a whole. I realise myself that I have not fully honed this skill. I often present ideas, but after the second rejection I lose interest and tell myself, “Your loss, mate, it’s a good idea”.
Often I do not map out the line of argument in full detail, but above all I cannot keep reminding people of those ideas endlessly and push them every which way. It is worth thinking about.
If you are convinced your ideas are right, try preparing a document with a clearly structured argument and a clear focus on the benefits and the possible return on investment. Have it reviewed by another competent person and a graphic designer as well. More eyes can point out possible gaps or things that are not fully explained.
It often happens that experts skip some of the main ideas because they seem obvious to them. But this document is for people who will look at it from a different perspective. A good visual design can only help your cause, and presentations or documents often lose authority and credibility because of terrible design. And that is a shame.
I will not write any more, as I set aside only half an hour for this article, and not a single letter was generated by AI 🙂
