Discussing SEO Strategies with Kris Reid on the Efficientpreneur Show
Kris Reid, founder and CEO of Ardor SEO, chats with Ahmed Al Kiremli of the Efficientpreneur Show about how Kris shifted from working in the finance industry to doing search engine optimisation (SEO). Their discussion covers the basics of SEO and some of the things a website owner has to do to get found by their audience online.
Who Is Ahmed Al Kiremli
Ahmed is an entrepreneur and a business mentor who talks to other entrepreneurs and innovators from around the globe on his show. He helps people improve their enterprise and scale for profitability online, as well as give them advice on how to run their business better. He is an accomplished author, having written “The Efficientpreneur”, which is a best-selling book. He is also the man behind the Efficientpreneur Club, which is an exclusive business coaching club that offers members one-on-one help for their business.
Starting Over and Finding a New Beginning with SEO
The discussion between Ahmed and Kris begins with a short introduction from the latter. Kris talks about how he, along with others just like him, found himself unemployed and struggling to make ends meet after the 2007-2008 Global Financial Crisis. This found him moving from the UK to Russia, creating an online game and gravitating towards SEO.
Originally from Australia, Kris Reid now owns and operates a highly successful SEO company that is based in Southeast Asia. With offices in Cambodia and the Philippines, Ardor SEO is considered one of the go-to companies for both SEO and online content needs. All of these began with the need to make a living in a country he couldn’t speak the language in and the rest, as he says, is history.
Understanding the Basics of SEO and Google’s Algorithm
A question about Google’s algorithm and what it looks for in websites becomes the next topic of discussion. Talking about how a site can look good in the eyes of this top search engine launches Kris into how SEO plays a huge part in a site’s success. He talks about how difficult it is to figure out Google’s algorithm, but the main thing to strive for when it comes to Google’s discernment is relevance.
The basics of SEO dictates that, aside from quality content, your site needs to have a few other elements that Google’s crawlers will want to find. These include backlinks, on-page elements like header tags and title tags, and more. The biggest challenge site owners have when it comes to SEO is getting backlinks from authority sites. Getting these links back to your site indicates that your site is also an authority in your niche.
Other SEO basics that are discussed in this interview include keyword usage, how ranking on Google can affect your site, and how important all of these elements are. Social media signals are also taken into account, with some emphasis on what these can and cannot do for your site.
How to Find a Good SEO Company to Trust
One of the questions Ahmed asked Kris is, “How can a company find a reliable SEO provider for their site with all the SEO providers popping up everywhere?” Kris answers this with a discussion on what you should look for when hiring an SEO company.
As a rule of thumb, if a company guarantees that your site will rank first on Google in any amount of time, you should run for the hills. No reliable SEO company would make such a claim, since there are no guarantees that such a thing can happen with the way Google operates.
A good SEO company will focus on creating quality content that is relevant to the site’s niche. They will also set realistic expectations that aren’t impossible to attain and ensure that a site’s on-page as well as off-page needs are handled well. One indicator of a reliable SEO company is that they don’t charge peanuts for a job that is not that easy to do. If an SEO company guarantees top ranking and charges you way less than others, be wary of them and what they do.
Key SEO Takeaways from this Podcast
As the interview progresses, Kris and Ahmed touch on a number of topics that can help you better understand what good SEO does. These include the role of social media and other elements that can affect the performance of your site. Here are some things you can learn from their discussion:
The role of keywords in SEO
Keywords play a big role in helping your site perform well. They are what people use to find you and what search engines also use to help people find you.
The keywords you use, along with the titles of your content, should be chosen carefully to ensure you get the right traffic to your site. If you don’t put careful thought in picking the right keywords and titles, you won’t be getting the revenue-generating traffic you need for your site.
What social media can do for your site
Social media backlinks can help your site become more relevant in the eyes of Google and make it rank better. According to Kris, these links will drive more traffic to your site. It increases your visibility and can help generate revenues for you. However, he says that they don’t have any link juice that can impact your site’s SEO.
Relevant and irrelevant backlinks
Backlinks to your site can help prove how relevant you are to your niche. The quality of your backlinks, however, is important. Backlinks that Google will consider relevant to your site and can help your site rank better are “do follow” backlinks that come from other sites that link back to you through their content.
Irrelevant backlinks, however, are those which are not within a partner site’s content. These include links that are found within the comments section of authority sites and those which come from social media posts. Links that come from forums and other similar online portals are also irrelevant in terms of SEO. Regardless, they are also goood for driving traffic to your site.
How mobile has changed the way sites are being made
Google has also given website owners incentive because of creating highly responsive sites. In a way, the search engine giant imposes penalties on sites that are not mobile-friendly.
This move began in 2015 and has since been acted upon by websites everywhere. Platforms that people use to create sites have also done their part in ensuring that sites show well on mobile devices. WordPress, for example, is one such platform that already embraces mobile-friendliness.
Importance of user experience in the eyes of Google
Another important factor to remember when developing a website is user experience. If your site has lots of 404s, Google will see it useless.
To ensure that your users have a great experience while visiting your site, make sure that all your 404s are redirected to relevant or similar pages. You should also make sure that your site is easy to navigate, loads fast, and has usable content for visitors.
Understanding long-tail and short-tail keywords
The main difference between these two keyword types is the number of competitors that use them. For example, the keyword “plumber” will have a lot of competition online due to its general nature. It will be difficult for you to rank for such a keyword, given the number of sites that are trying to do the same thing. The keyword “cheap plumber in Brisbane”, on the other hand, will have less users and less competition. It is also more concise and will attract more targeted visitors to your site.
The Bottom Line
SEO is an industry that is not difficult to get into. But, for you to be considered a legitimate SEO company, you need to know the ins and outs of the trade. You also need to be prepared to constantly learn as Google tweaks its algorithm. This means that what it views as relevant changes as time goes by.
Whether you’re new to SEO or are looking for an SEO company to hire for your site, you should always remember that it is an ever changing landscape. Only those who are willing to evolve along with this industry will survive and make it. While the topics discussed in this interview are still relevant today, you cannot say the same a few years down the line.
According to Kris, you need to learn as time goes by. To stay on top of the SERPs and the SEO game, constant learning is a must. This is what Kris lives by and what Ardor SEO does. This is what keeps his company on top of their game and why lots of companies rely on them for their content and SEO needs.
If you want to learn all that Ahmed and Kris discuss on this podcast, you can listen to the entire episode on the Efficientpreneur Show.
