Grow Your Vegan Business with the Help of the Coolest Guy in SEO
Are you managing or planning to launch a vegan business? You can use search engine optimization (SEO) to grow it fast online. Listen to this Vegan Danielle podcast episode with the Coolest Guy in SEO, Kris Reid, to get the tips that you need.
Who Is Vegan Danielle?
From flipping burgers at McDonald’s to dealing with inner demons, Vegan Danielle has come a long way to become a full-fledged vegan practitioner and activist.
On her website, she shares news about the industry and some vegan recipes. She is a cook using the tips she learned from her maternal grandfather, who was also a chef, and from working in many restaurants before.
In 2017, she started a podcast called Vegan Danielle. In her show, she invites subject-matter experts and other reliable guests to talk about many relevant topics from fitness to wellness.
From time to time, she also shares her personal experiences before and after becoming vegan to help those who want to make the switch.
From Eating Animals to Veganism
The journey to being the Coolest Guy in SEO wasn’t simple for Kris Reid. Born in Australia, he later moved to the UK, where he worked as a software engineer for the finance industry.
Although he was paid handsomely, the job was also soul-sucking. When he had the chance to leave it, he used his skills to develop a game.
He needed a way to promote it, though. That’s when he learned about SEO, especially backlinking.
He found it more appealing—and profitable—so he dropped his game. He then created a system for backlinks and took a lot of orders.
Eventually, he moved to Southeast Asia and became a yogi, practicing Ashtanga yoga.
Because he was doing the same thing every day, he could really tell the difference in what he ate.
“I found that meat was inflaming my body, so I stopped eating meat,” he said.
When you stop eating meat, it opens your eyes to things. That’s when he started researching veganism and discovered plenty of nasty stuff about the meat industry.
Kris started as a vegetarian, but his talk with Eric Brent of Happy Cow eventually pushed him to transition to veganism. He has been a vegan for the last four years.
Using his mastery in SEO, he and his company, Ardor SEO, started to work with the vegan industry, since it resonates and is aligned with his goal. After all, SEO is the same regardless of the niche.
What Is SEO?
In this podcast episode, Kris goes on to dive deep into what SEO is. Many website owners build webpages without knowing or understanding the reason. Some also try to rank using their brand names when people search for products and services, not brands.
How do you do it? According to Kris, you should first find what people are searching for. Many, though, struggle with finding the right keywords to use.
Kris advises that new domains and sites should avoid big and broad keywords since they are highly competitive. Between short-tail (e.g., “vegan”) and long-tail (e.g., “where to buy vegan boots”) keywords, choose the latter since they are easier to rank for.
These keywords are also more intentional and specific. In other words, they’re more likely to deliver the right people to your vegan site or store.
“At the end of the day, it’s not about the number of sites you have but the number of customers you bring,” he shares.
What Are Penalties?
Kris also says that Google doesn’t like SEO since it’s organic. The company doesn’t earn money from it. They generate income through ads, so they constantly tweak algorithms so people will click on ads even if paid advertising delivers less than 10% of traffic.
These changes in algorithms are also necessary to deliver the right quality results to internet users. Gaming the system, such as creating thin content, means a smackdown that can hurt your site and ranking.
“To avoid penalties, just focus on providing quality, and you’ll be fine. Write good content and get good partner links,” he advises.
How Do Backlinks Work?
When it comes to backlinks, two factors are essential:
Your backlinks should come from authoritative sites. Think of NASA, for example. It’s a recognized, trusted agency in the world.
However, relevance also matters. If you’re a vegan business, getting a backlink from NASA weighs less than a link from a farmer’s market, for instance.
Kris also stresses on local searches—that is, Google may prioritize search results that match where you are. It may then help to get backlinks from local sites. These refer to pages where your target market is located.
As the Coolest Guy in SEO, he also shares one effective strategy for the vegan industry, say, activists fighting fur trade. These groups need to generate media buzz and attention to create power and gather support.
Kris shares these steps:
How about Page Rank?
Page ranks are different from search results, but they can influence where your website appears on the search results pages when internet users type in the keywords.
While Google isn’t the first search engine, it’s the first to develop a more credible system in showing websites.
Before, marketers could trick the algorithms so they appeared number one. For instance, they could repeat the same keyword again and again (known as keyword stuffing). To correct that, Google has looked into more stringent factors, such as the quality of backlinks and content. This way, the search results only show valuable pages for the users.
Google used to show page rank scores, but it eventually removed the numbers to prevent marketers from manipulating results.
Kris also emphasizes the importance of backlinks in page ranking. He says, “The more links you have, the more authority you have, the easier it is for you to rank.”
Are More Keywords Better?
Kris admits there’s no easy answer to this question. Instead, he shares one of the common crucial mistakes marketers make: they tend to talk more about themselves.
Internet users don’t care a lot about your degree or experience. What they’re more interested in is what you can do for them. How can you solve their problems?
From an SEO standpoint, adding keywords to the titles and H1 tags can already help. So does providing a conclusion that says how you can help your customers.
In the end, it’s best to focus on the most important things on your website, such as the structure, content, and backlinks.
Why You Need Reputation Management
The right SEO can generate leads for you for years. It can also grow your business. With this, you may meet a lot of “haters” and competitors who want to bring you down.
Kris says that you can use SEO techniques to create, protect, and preserve your online reputation. With it, you have more control over your message.
This discussion between Danielle and Kris is packed with other amazing tips to grow your vegan business.
Find “Episode 221: The Coolest Guy in SEO” and click “Read More” below the short description of the episode. Stay until the end as Kris has an exclusive thank-you offer to vegan business owners out there. You surely don’t want to miss it.
