 Thank you, thank you So is everyone having fun so far Good good good. Okay, so let's get this party started You're optimizing the wrong things. Oh, this is actually the first slide so my talk is about your business your product your service Because I think a lot of people actually have the right idea about what's important for their business And what priorities their business should have but once they actually go and do the work That's something completely different. They actually end up doing different stuff because there's a lot of distractions out there Right, there's a lot of companies fighting for your attention Wanting you to do stuff in their tools in their business to make them money So what I want to do is hello is actually make sure that You are focusing on the stuff that's right for your business that you're not optimizing the wrong things so First thing Don't a be test people are gonna hate me for saying this I'm saying this well Google Optimize actually being discontinued to dinner this year And that's what kind of triggered this thought for me because I'm like should we actually Replace this with something else with a different tool that will probably cost us money and I don't think you should because a be testing has become sort of synonymous with conversion rate optimization, which I also don't really agree with because there's a be testing in and of itself doesn't actually make sure that people Will buy your product more that people will keep buying your product more You know what does that it's actually improving your product. It's improving your branding It's making sure that you're surfacing your customers in the right way You can't think that Just a be testing is a is an end goal. It's not So you need to improve your product and make sure that you keep doing that in the right way Now there are obviously sometimes Ways that you can actually do a be testing but I think that the most important part here is that it keeps you away from the focus of Just doing what's best for your business, which is improving your product So I think that that's one of the reasons that I would say, you know, don't a be test and This is one of my pet peeves that I think You know, if you do it, you need to do it right and it will take a long time for you to actually Need a be testing in the first place Because before you actually can make this work, you have to make two very at least two variations of everything that you're doing so That's a lot of time and effort that you're gonna spend on actually building Different variations and which will not get a return on investment for up until you actually have enough revenue and these marginal changes might actually make you enough money to explain the investment that you're doing that you're making on the testing and on the AB variations So Especially in the first I think like a couple of years of your business I think you should focus on just improving your product and making sure that you're doing that right instead of Jumping into this because all of this is gonna be marginal Then I have another one that people will despise me for Which is don't advertise I Well, you know, I'm the CEO of yours. So obviously you you would expect me saying this, but I really really do not like advertising Let me try and walk you through why I think why I think advertising is not really great reason number one Advertising is buying exposure and I think you should shoot and could get exposure in a much more Sustainable way, right? You can't if the problem with advertising is you're buying exposure, but the minute you stop paying you lost your exposure all the work you've done on you know maintaining and updating and optimizing all your ads It's just basically gone the minute you stop working. Did you stop paying and that's not really a great proposition to me and then to My free reasons by the way to is I'm almost forgetting But the two two two is that it's really hard to actually stop Advertising once you start and start advertising You can't really stop because your business has already done a Lot of your business has already grown, right? So so you might make enough money on different sources on You know, let's say organic That might be that might definitely be the case, but there's nothing Nothing that will stop you from actually stopping those ads because Well, there is a lot of that will stop you from stopping those ads because your row ass So your return on ad spend is pretty good and great, but it might actually be cannibalizing what you're doing on Other things right so might actually be cannibalizing your organic traffic might actually be cannibalizing a lot of things But will you actually be able and we actually dare to stop advertising at that point? because it's still a very It's making you money, and you have to risk not making that money to find out whether it's actually worth Whether it's actually worth it basically so Advertising is a thing that that can definitely help you if If you know you want to kickstart your business it could definitely help you but at that point It's really hard to stop and if you're Well, you know advertising in one place where you could be doing it is for branding purposes So people don't you know advertise on your brand name. That would be a great way to actually not You know make sure to Make sure that other people's are not advertising on your brand name But those are basically in my mind the only two reasons that you should be doing this at least in the early stages of your business So Advertising is not a sustainable marketing effort and What I think is a sustainable marketing effort is SEO you need to be thinking about what makes your business stand out What makes your business actually? worth while for your customers and your audience and You need to focus on that you need to focus on those things to make sure that they are actually Engaged You don't need to optimize For for for you know, you don't need to buy your customers you need to convince your customers to be your customers and That's what you need to that's what you need to focus on especially in the early years of your business I also could have called this talk. Let me talk about my pet peeves because this is another one Don't get me wrong I really love data I really dislike what people think That people think data is You know insightful or useful in and of itself because I don't I really don't think it is There is no way that data can actually Do something for you data driven is not does not mean anything to me because Data doesn't drive anything. You are driving your business. You are actually the one You know making your business right that data doesn't do anything until you want it to until you ask it questions So you need to ask the right questions to make sure you get to the right data and that's really very important To ask the right questions so ask the right questions To make sure that you are looking at the right data and not just pouring over your data for days on end and Wasting time and wasting energy because that's what you'll be doing and asking the right questions can actually be hard because As soon as you as soon as you're in that data Well, you'll get distracted by the data and you'll end up a walking and sycopedia about your business of useless facts But you it's also hard to just think about okay. What's what are the questions I should be asking? What are the things I want to know, but these are the important things to do and a great way of doing that would be talking to your customers So talk to your customers about what makes them buy or not buy your product ask your customers what they think and The things that they will get back to Or you know the questions they will get back to you is probably are probably more useful questions Then you would have by looking just looking at your data Because that's not the useful kind of tactic to you to have in this in the situation. So Ask your customers the questions and then when they get back to you You'll get some you'll get some questions back or you'll get some ideas back and people will say I would like this or I would like that and If they do you might have get an idea about okay, I want to prove this in my product I want to fix this bug I want to add this feature and then when you want to add a feature you'll have to think about data again You have to think about how does this feature? actually become successful What is actually success? how do I define success and How do I actually make sure? That I can measure that success Because if you don't know if if you don't know about that and you can't answer those questions How would you know that the feature you build is actually useful or if it's actually the feature that you wanted to build or that? Your customers wanted you to build These are very important questions to ask and all of this is data as well. It's just very much more focused than Going into Google Analytics and looking at stuff So I think it's I think it's important to do that and that will give you focus That will give you focus on your data and you'll be looking at the right stuff It was saving energy and time again to make sure that you're looking at the right stuff and also not looking at a Lot of data and getting confused about what might be happening where so keep focused on The important data and you don't need the rest of that data Now when you're talking to your customers I think I Think there's a there's a lot of things that you will find out. There's some nuance to what customers will be saying I don't think they'll always have a Clear idea of what they're actually asking for I think a lot of the times you'll you'll you'll get back like okay Your product is not really that Modern or your product is not really that sleek or it's not really pretty and I think that that is exactly where you kind of need to Focus on okay, what what is it? They're actually saying because making a product prettier or more modern doesn't actually do anything for its use Right, it doesn't make it easier to use doesn't make it better to use it You know basically does nothing for how well your product works So it's not that important, but it could be That those customers are saying are actually saying something else or they're saying they want a more modern or more sleek or more easy or more pretty, you know a prettier design or whatever because They actually find it hard to use because they find it a bit difficult to navigate and That's why where I think you Need to ask a bit more questions of your customers and just also really realize. What are you actually saying? I? Think our new yo secio you ice and settings wise actually a great example of that because we've made our our settings why a lot more Modern a lot more sleek a lot more all of those things But that was never the goal the goal was to make it a better product The goal was to make it easier to maintain for ourselves and easier to use for the customers and easier to find settings for customers and that's what we did and our focus was Making the thing better and I think that's that's what always should be the focus. I'll be saying that a lot So SEO is Not a trick. I think a lot of people still think like okay SEO is something that you need to do to get found on search engines okay, yes, that's true, but What it actually is is about getting the right content About a certain subject to your audience and then you yes being found the best for that type of subject but It is not it is not a trick. It is actually a very sustainable way of doing marketing Because all the effort you you'll put into SEO will last you for Years to come basically It'll make sure that you will be found Two years down the road as opposed to I just stopped paying and I'm not found anymore which is Advertising which I dislike talked about that so I Think it's very very important that and then to realize that this is a very important This is a very important step, but how do you then do that because the most important thing here is actually Your content because yes, there's also a lot of technical SEO But you could be using your studio premium for that and we'll solve like 99% of those of those issues And then after that you can focus on content You can focus on the stuff that really matters because content is where you actually Explain what your product does where you actually say okay? These are the things that We do that others don't Where you explain okay? This is what I offer. This is this is what I do And that's the important part right because that's where you sell your services. That's where you sell your products and It's hard to figure out how am I actually gonna Find out what I should be writing about you should be writing about your product, but how are you gonna? hook that up and into the content and That's actually where a course in our Yoast SEO Academy comes in comes in handy, which is our keyword research course and it should Really help you to just get to the right keywords. It's basically a step-by-step tutorial Where you what which will go through and you'll find out what keywords you should be focusing on Based on what you want to do with your business. What's the most important thing? So once you figure out what you are writing what you're writing about and What you're gonna be focusing on in your content You need to start writing that content and then we're there to help you again because we have three different Content analyses we have SEO analysis. We have the readability analysis and we have the inclusivity analysis and All of those even though just the first is called SEO analysis are actually important for SEO Because it's it's important because what we do is we give you feedback on this is what you can improve This is what you can Actually do better and we you can do better on being findable within Google or other search engines you can do better on Readability accessibility basically of of your of your content Making sure you reach more people that way and inclusivity to make sure that you're You know making sure that most the most possible people like what they're reading and how you're writing So all of this will actually improve the quality of your content And that's exactly what what we should be doing. We should be focusing on that quality quality of content, but also quality of product so Focus on focus your content on on that quality and You'll be set to go SEO wise now this is a very interesting one to me because I feel like People have been doing business for millennia, right? But within especially within the online e-commerce ecosystem It seems like people are reinventing the wheel constantly. They're not looking back They're not they're not really checking out what past businesses have done. I mean, yes, the context is different You have a different context of it's it being online But other than that it's still business. You're still selling person to person basically So why are we continually reinventing this wheel? So for myself, I I do like to keep a little thought experiment in mind and I try to do that often It's where basically I I think about the host as a brick-and-mortar store in just a normal real-world Street setting street in shopping street setting, right? So there's people walking down the street and Your store is there. What makes them actually Convinced that they need to go into that store That's your shopping windows and probably your sign that's above the door or near there and Those are the things that you need to optimize. So those are basically your search results, right in search engine result pages Those are the things that will convince people. Okay, so they actually have what I need because I can see their offering and I understand what they're offering But what happens when people actually then enter the store? What is the first thing? That should happen. What kind of experience should they get? Should they walk in and have all the cameras be zoomed in on them or you know drones or whatever and and should to be followed everywhere they go should they be Followed and and filmed where while they're picking stuff up and putting it down and putting it in their cart Would that be a normal situation or maybe should someone come up and say hello, can I help you or How can I help you? Think about what would be feeling normal in a normal situation in a real-world situation And then think about what you're focusing on for your online business Do those two match or are you maybe? doing stuff online because you can but not necessarily because you need to I think about that a lot because because The the difference is just Weird to me the difference sometimes between online and offline is a weird situation And it helps me to refocus on what I actually think is important to refocus on okay, so this is not This is not the thing that I actually want to do. This is not the thing that I want to do it because it's interesting and it Gives me more insight, but it's not really the thing that will help the business grow It's not really the thing. That's the most useful most useful so when you think about that kind of Fart experiment I Also, I always go to speed as well because I think speed especially online is very important You have a website and it needs to be fast Everyone kind of knows that but I think the fart experiment of making it an offline experience Kind of really exemplifies it because what happens if they enter the store and the first five seconds? They can't see anything or the first five seconds the store is slowly coming into focus That would be a very disconcerting Situation right for if this would happen real life, and that's basically what you're doing people are People live what we all live in a world where everything happens instantaneously, so we can't really Expect them to think it's normal to wait for stuff Because it's not for them Nothing nothing is you know, you don't have to wait for anything Well, you have to wait before you reach your destination, but then everything else, you know as soon as you already decided I want to go into the store You're there so Optimize for speed to just make sure that you're not really breaking that real That real life experience because the more you break that real life experience the more you will actually be No, it will be a detriment to your business basically because people will feel less at ease Now there are different ways of optimizing for speed as well, so you could have support tickets and you can think about your You know response time You could also think about okay. I have a service and I want to Actually Make sure that I deliver this service on time Amazon has a great treat for that which is Under promise over the liver which I always really like Because it helps you focus on the right things right so you know, so I want to I want to deliver this for my customer It'll take a week I'll give it two weeks and say to the customer I need two weeks Because a something might happen, but B chances are I'll over the liver and the customer will feel like it's a Speedy Assignment right like it's done in a speedy way and that's good that makes them feel positive about it and It didn't really cost you anything on your side either, so that's I think there's multiple ways of optimizing for speed But the real world examples really helped me in my case to To make sure that I'm still focused on the things that we should be focused on now optimized support That is another one that That I another one that I think is very important because I've been talking about product. I've been talking about Services and stuff like that, but I think support should always be a part of that It should not be forgotten when thinking about what's Important for your business Because you can improve your product all you want, but if people come to you and Ask a question and you don't respond in the way that they like They might walk away to other people Even though your product might be doing pretty well and might be very stable or whatever if you can't help them the way They want to be helped Then they will still leave So think about what will happen like I'm optimizing my product. I'm building a product. What will happen if people actually start asking questions How will I respond? How quickly will I respond? Should I manage people's expectations about how quickly I will respond or in what manner I will respond? Have you thought about how people can reach you And how you want to be reached All of those things Are very important to make sure that The entire experience of your product is just good Because without without having great support you still can't have a great product even though the product in and of itself might be great and This has focused on you. I'm it's basically about Your competitors So I think it's important that you Really look at your competitors and really Look at what your competitors are doing But I Would urge you not to be guided by what your competitors are doing so they can maybe Inspire you to do certain things or they can they can give you ideas like okay I can build I can build this as well Or I can build this better Or I can build this differently But as long as you keep in touch with You and what you want your business to do and keep in touch with what do you think Makes your business stand out That's fine You just don't want to You want to Have the creativity basically rule what you're doing and the originality You want that to rule what you're doing instead of the fear of Maybe not having what others have Because that's okay others can have stuff that you that you don't Because that makes you different so Focus on you and make sure that you're you're focused on what you think makes you stand out as a business Well, I've I've said it a couple times before Um focus on quality. I think that's the most important takeaway actually from this from this whole talk Focus the focus on quality and focus on the things that Are important for your business focus on the things that Make sure that your business thrives and do not get Distracted by all of the other things that are happening in the world and all of the things that might seem interesting but are really not because the quality and the Stability stability basically of your product or of your service or whatever you're doing is The backbone of your entire business you can't really do without having a quality product Because that that won't be sustainable, especially if you want to be You know the best you don't have to be the best at everything just the best at what you do the best at what you stand out in I think that's very important and This is just this is just it it's focus on quality and Do what's right for your business That was actually my talk um and I think there's time for questions. There's still some time for questions now and and uh I will be back at the booth actually as well after the talk if anyone wants to talk about and talk to me Or ask me any questions about that if you can't find the time now And I want to thank you for listening