The Yoast SEO podcast

Mike King on increasing CTR with personas and the power of internal linking

Wed, 15 Sep 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Mike and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

0:54 – Who is Mike King?
4:01 – Importance of talking at conference for business
5:34 – Technical SEO renaissance
10:40 – The future of natural language generation
15:01 – Should SEO starters use tools or not?
17:33 – The power of internal linking
21:32 – Increase CTR by using personas in SEO
27:21 – An example of the iPullrank personas
31:01 – Mike’s rapper career, and more of his future plans

Marcus Tandler on user experience, and a carbon neutral internet

Wed, 21 Jul 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Marcus and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

2:01 – What do Ryte and Marcus do?
5:19 – How website UX is important for SEOs
8:37 – How the field of SEO changed into holistic SEO
14:14 – What Ryte does to make the internet more carbon neutral
18:35 – Blocking crawlers to save energy
21:51 – Where is Ryte going in the next few years?
23:51 – A good thing about the differentiating of SEO tools
28:50 – How Ryze predicts important KPIs
35:46 – Is website speed a big ranking factor?
38:09 – Discover the patterns in Core Web Vital updates

Cindy Krum on passage ranking, PWA, voice search and MobileMoxie SEO tools

Wed, 07 Jul 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Cindy and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

1:18 – Passage ranking: Google indexing text fragments
4:02 – Progressive Web App (PWA) in search results
8:26 – Making indexed information accessible for all languages
11:52 – Cindy’s take on the future of SEO
14:06 – All about MobileMoxie’s (new) tools
16:07 – The benefits of MoblieMoxies ‘page-oscope’
19:18 – How coders help Google by adding markup
22:52 – The importance of Core web vitals
25:56 – New idea: a JSON-LD version for a URL
29:30 – Why everyone, including big brands, should use WordPress
30:57 – The future of voice search
34:45 – New idea: Markup the first paragraph of news articles as speakable.

Lily Ray on the future of E-A-T, paid ads, E-commerce spaces and SEO

Wed, 23 Jun 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Lily and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

4:21 – What is a good future proof SEO strategy?
6:25 – How to improve your E-A-T and the role of schema in this
11:13 – How to measure if E-A-T changes have an effect
12:54 – The influence of Google’s intent and it’s core updates for E-A-T and site-ranking
19:06 – Actionable tips on how to build trust on a certain topic
20:10 – The next steps of Google on; E-A-T, E-commerce, SERPs “People also ask” and Paid Ads
26:29 – Why SEO is getting more important than paid ads
28:52 – The benefits of using WordPress and Yoast for E-A-T and structured data
31:58 – Is it profitable to start a new e-commerce space nowadays?
36:24 – The closeness and helpfulness of the SEO community
39:24 – The one thing that people should do to improve their E-A-T

Nichola Stott on running, hiring and evaluating an SEO agency!

Wed, 26 May 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Nichola and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

1:47 – When should you hire an agency?
7:52 – Should you keep doing parts of SEO yourself as a business owner?
12:24 – What you should look for in and expect from an agency?
15:12 – What a good client looks like for Erudite agency
17:04 – Budgeting for your SEO and content strategy
19:13 – What to expect when starting to work with an SEO agency?
21:35 – At what point does a business not need an agency anymore?
24:19 How often do agencies and customers communicate?
26:27 How to keep your agency up to date on the latest news and research in SEO?
34:02 – In what way do easy-to-use CMSs change agency work?
40:44 – The most important KPIs for an agency to report on

Marieke van de Rakt on readability, product marketing and leading Yoast

Wed, 12 May 2021 11:00:00 +0000

Marieke and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

1:20 – How Marieke became the CEO of Yoast
4:20 – The origin of the readability analysis in Yoast SEO
7:52 – The importance of readability
12:53 – Readability analysis changes in the past 5 years
18:12 – Product copy and SEO
26:14 – Using video in your marketing
28:39 – What led up to Marieke becoming the CEO of Yoast?
31:40 – What a conversion rate and Marieke’s PhD conclusion have in common
38:42 – How Marieke sees the core values of Yoast

Kristopher Jones on entrepreneurship, investments and ecommerce

Fri, 30 Apr 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Kristopher and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

2:55 – Building and scaling a business
7:24 – How Kristopher deals with career paths of people in agencies
13:39 – What challenges do Kristopher’s clients struggle with?
19:07 – Investing in companies
20:38 – Kristopher’s technology accelerator buildings
23:59 – The hybrid working environment
27:34 – Kristopher tells about Special Guests, his entertainment booking platform
35:22 – Why eCommerce businesses are on Kristopher’s investment wish list

Kevin Indig on SEO at Shopify and ecommerce

Wed, 21 Apr 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Kevin and Joost will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up.

2:52 – Kevin explaining his passion for SEO
4:48 – How Kevin starts an SEO process
10:02 – Alternatives to Google’s search engine
13:58 – How the SEO world becomes more interesting as a whole
24:55 – How Shopify merchants can use video for SEO
27:23 – The way Shopify sees the success of its merchants
31:59 – Shopify’s growth during the pandemic
36:42 – How Kevin spends his time on SEO at Shopify
39:55 – What added SEO value Shopify offers merchants

Phil Nottingham on improving your online video strategy

Wed, 31 Mar 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Phil Nottingham is a video and brand marketing specialist. In this episode, Joost and Phil will cover the following topics related to video SEO and online video strategy. Timestamps indicate when the topic comes up in the recording.

Topics:

3:37 – What makes Video SEO so hard?
6:40 – Scaling up with video
10:26 – Hosting your videos on YouTube
15.16 – Combining multiple content forms in a strategy
18:17 – Video strategies for Facebook
20:00 – Facebook live and YouTube live
21:55 – Long-form live video content
23:57 – General applicable forms of video content
27.05 – Acting tips
30:05 – Using an autocue or not?
33.00 – Technical side of Video SEO
38.40 – How Phil keeps up with video developments

Kate Toon on improving your SEO copywriting skills

Fri, 19 Mar 2021 14:00:00 +0000

Joost and Kate will cover the following topics during this episode, with timestamps indicating when the topic comes up:

Topics

4:04 – What makes SEO copywriting hard
7:00 – Kate’s fear of public speaking and why she loves Clubhouse
14:57 – What has changed in SEO copywriting in the last decade?
23:20 – How can we make people better at SEO copywriting?
25:00 – Kate’s writing process
29:35 – Improved readability and SEO through page layout
35:05 – What about structured data and backlinks?
38:32 – Pick the CMS that fits your needs

Follow Kate on Twitter or check out her website!

Rand Fishkin on building a business in the online marketing world

Wed, 03 Mar 2021 14:00:00 +0000

These are the topics that Rand and Joost talk about in this episode, with minutes indicating when that topic comes up in the recording:

1:37 – What is SparkToro
3:52 – Building an online marketing business
11:16 – Are the current big SEO tools competing for the same audience and does that make specialization the way to go?
14:43 – The maturity of the SEO space: pay attention and you’ll notice the cycle
17:09 – There’s no SEO in SparkToro’s marketing
21:08 – How SparkToro’s audience comparison tool works
23:15 – Rand introduces a new SparkToro feature that will show a change in audience interest over time
24:28 – Publicly launching minimal viable features versus the complete feature?
26:37 – How to market new features: target the mass or seek amplifiers?
32:47 – ‘Old’ SEO and marketing principles that still are applicable today and probably will be forever
35:26 – How Rand got such a big Twitter following and how reach and engagement work for him
40:09 – Rand’s most important channels
45:23 – Joost explains WordProof

Jes Scholz on SEO beyond Google Search

Wed, 17 Feb 2021 14:00:00 +0000

What if your target audience is located in a market that only knows the internet as Facebook or where Opera Mini is the main browser? Jes Scholz (International Digital Director at Ringier) will share her global experience and simultaneously make you aware of the small and much closer-to-home SEO tactics that will lead to owning a topic. Yes, a topic, not a keyphrase! That’s one key takeaway from this episode for you already.

These are the topics that Jes and Joost will cover in this episode, with minutes indicating when that topic comes up in the recording:

1:55 – What the online marketing looks like in markets without Google and Apple
4:50 – How Jes sees and uses Google Discover for her customers
9:10 – The perfect knowledge graph is the one that connects your brand’s entities to topics that interest your audience
16:40 – Influencing the knowledge graph (and the perks of being a publisher)
19:30 – Is investing in Google Discover worth it?
23:47 – How to deal with all different image sizes on platforms like Google Discover and social media?
27:44 – what role does Google Lens play in the Google ecosystem?
32:25 – The importance of Schema and API for news and e-commerce sites

Purna Virji, on building your brand on LinkedIn

Wed, 10 Feb 2021 14:00:00 +0000

From journalism, via SEO at AOL to SEA at Microsoft and currently working at social media platform LinkedIn, Purna has seen a lot of aspects of online marketing in her career so far. Let her experience be your guide towards reaching your branding and engagement goals. Purna will tell you how to combine the best of these worlds. Think of improving your organic traffic by running SEA experiments. Or creating brand awareness by leveraging your key employees’ personal LinkedIn profiles. Sounds crazy? Purna and Joost will help you understand by providing practical advice and inspirational examples.

These topics are covered in this episode:

How SEA results can help to improve your SEO
Identifying your white space as a company
The value of key employees on LinkedIn
How to grow engagement
LinkedIn advertising
Other forms of content on LinkedIn to start using

Jason Barnard, on taking a deep dive into Brand SERPs

Wed, 20 Jan 2021 14:00:00 +0000

It’s not a coincidence that we mention that there are a lot of Jason Barnards out there. In this episode of the Yoast SEO Podcast, you will learn why it’s important to know if you have namesakes, just like Jason does. The Jason Barnard Joost is talking to in this episode is a digital marketer, but also a musician and cartoon blue dog. He specializes in Brand SERPs(Search Engine Results Pages), which is the first thing people see when they search for your brand online.

This is what you will learn by listening to the podcast:

The importance of the About us page on your website
How to discover if your brand has a brand SERP or if one is starting to form
How to explain to Google that you are a certain entity and your namesakes are not you
Maintaining your knowledge panel
The importance of rich site links in your brand SERP
That knowledge panels differ around the world

Jon Henshaw, on hreflang, Coywolf and Apple

Wed, 06 Jan 2021 14:00:00 +0000

As he states on his website, Jon has been involved with website development and internet strategy since 1995. A lot has changed since then. He is currently working at ViacomCBS as a Lead SEO Analyst and is the founder of Coywolf – a marketing and technology news platform.

This is what you can expect to learn in this episode:

How the SEO toolset landscape changed over the past years
What Coywolf is and does
Why hreflang actually does not help with optimizing your website for international searches
Will the Apple Search Engine alter the search landscape?

50% discount on a Coywolf subscription

Because Jon enjoyed recording this podcast so much, he created a coupon that provides you with a 50% discount off the first year of Coywolf. A regular subscription is priced at $84 a year, but it’s reduced to $42 for our dear listeners! You only need to enter the code yoast upon checkout on the website.

Aleyda Solis, on international SEO

Wed, 23 Dec 2020 14:00:00 +0000

This episode offers you a deep-dive into the mechanisms behind Search Engine Optimization. Aleyda is an expert when it comes to getting found online by the right audience for your business. In this episode, she will share her broad, international SEO knowledge. Including tactics for optimizing your local or multi-language websites and videos.

A glimpse of the discussed topics:

The future of remote working
How SEO is evolving into a general marketing strategy
What to take into account when striving for better video results
Difficulties regarding optimizing your website for local and language-based search

Enjoy this episode!

Christi Olson, on Search Engine Marketing

Wed, 09 Dec 2020 14:00:00 +0000

In this episode of the Yoast SEO podcast, Joost talks with Christi Olson, Global Media SEM Team Lead at Microsoft. Joost and Christi discuss their views on Search Engine Marketing.
A glimpse of the discussed topics:

3:35 – Name changes of Bing and the components of the algorithm
6:50 – What SEOs can learn from SEA tactics – and the other way around
14:06 – How did Search Engine Marketing tools evolve? What changed for the better and which updates do not seem to make anyone happy?
26:53 – How can the current Microsoft toolset help you to rank better on Search Engine Result Pages? Both paid and organic.
32:20 – Christi shares some sneak peeks into Microsoft e-commerce tools that currently are being developed.
36:50 – Christi’s advice for business that don’t know if they should invest in SEO or paid search?
41:20 – Important Bing Webmaster tools updates from the past months