Rand Fishkin, Wizard of Moz | @randfish | rand@moz.com
The Invisible Giant
That Mucks Up Our Marketing

“If anybody dares to step outside of the box, the
retaliation is swift. I have to say, after 50 years of
feminism, the retaliation against “tomboy” girls has
softened some over the years. The retaliation to
“mama's boys” and “sissy boys” is just as violent now
among peers as it has always been.”
- Terrence Real, Author of I Don’t Want to Talk About It:
Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression

The Invisible Giant Via halo .

Cultural Conditioning

It’s not just gender norms.
The culture we live (and work) in
biases all our actions & beliefs

Like fish in water, we don’t realize we’re
swimming in it. Via Oliver Tarling

It’s why (despite all the data that in-office work is less productive, misery-
inducing, & lower quality) most of us still commute.

It’s why, even though we know it’s net-negative toproductivity,
many of us work 50, 60, or 70+ hours in a week.

It’s why, even though we know the archetypical “brilliant asshole” drags down
team performance, they keep getting hired.

It’s why, despite awful odds that an investor-backed tech startup will
produce returns, tech entrepreneurs like me think that raising money is a
celebratory milestone and a goal to strive for…

WhatAbout…
Marketing?

Let’s go from
Strategic Tactical

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe:
Investments Must Be
Measureable

Easiest-to-Measure Channels:
1) Pay-per-click advertising
2) Social media advertising
3) Retargeted/remarketed advertising
4) Email marketing
5) Direct mail advertising

Hardest-to-Measure Channels:
1) Word of Mouth
2) SEO
3) (organic) Social Media
4) Content Marketing
5) Public Relations

What if those channels are easy to measure because
the more measurable they are, the more money
powerful corporations make from us?!

Solution: Invest X% in Hard-to-Measure
Marketing Channels
Paidads+email
Social+contentmarketing
SEO
Events+PR

Use Geography,Audiences, and/or Time-SeriesAnalyses to
Monitor Brand + Traffic Lifts
Nest can see exactly
how their PR launch
impacted search
activity via Google
Trends’ upgraded
toolset

With tools like Fresh Web
Explorer, Talkwalker, or
Mention, you can track
media mentions too.

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe :
Channels Must Be ROI-
Positive

The Story of Whiteboard Friday…

Over Time, Effectiveness Improves!
2008
WBFisourworst-performing
blogposteachweek
2017
WBFisourbest-performing
contentpieceeachweek

Solution: Focus on Potential;
MeasureAgainst Trajectory
Today
Long-Term
Potential
1Year 2Years
EstimatedGrowthRate
ROI-Positive
If you’re here after three
months of work, you’re on a
powerful trajectory, even if it’s
not ROI-positive yet

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe :
Marketers ≠ Technical

Software Engineering IS NOT the only way to be
“Technical”

Can You…
Scan HTMLcode for basic functions?
Pull data viaAPIs inside Excel?
Insert code snippets with Google Tag Manager?
Audit websites to find technical issues?
Use web crawl tools to export desired data?
Test Google’s indexation of a page’s content?

Everyone Has Skill Gaps

You Have Options…
Learn
Hack
Outsource (or internally source)
Recruit
Substitute
WorkAround

The Beauty of the Web is
HowAccessible These OptionsAre:

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe :
Search Investments Are
Either SEO or PPC

SEO:

PPC:

Percent of Google Web Results w/ only these two
types of results:
54.7%

Percent of Google Clicks Going to Other Types of
Results:
>11%

The Rest?

#1: Knowledge
Panels

#2: Related
Questions

#3: Local
Packs

#4: Images

#5: Sitelinks

#6: Featured
Snippets

#7: Top Stories

#8: Videos

#9: Tweets

WTF???!!!

Rand… Who the heck wants to get RID of flying
squirrels?

Breakdown of Searches
on Major Web Properties
(May 2017)

Google.com
Oct2016 May2017
Facebook.com
Reddit.com
YouTube.com
Imgur.com
Bing.com
Wikipedia.org
Gained/Lost
59.2%
6.5%
5.4%
4.5%
2.2%
2.2%
1.4%
Yahoo.com 6.0%
62.6%
5.9%
4.1%
4.7%
1.5%
2.1%
1.4%
5.0%
+3.4%
-0.6%
-1.3%
+0.2%
-0.6%
-0.1%
+0%
-1.0%
Amazon.com 1.3% 1.4% +0.1%

Search Marketing in 2017 Has to Consider:
Google Images
Google Maps (& Local-Biased Results)
YouTube (originating searches & in GG results)
Which SERP Features Show For Your Keywords
Amazon, Facebook, Reddit, Bing
Where Search Demand Originates

Ranking well in Image
Search often doesn’t bring
much traffic or value
Image Search
Pro Tip

But… If you’re in a
vertical where
commerce is tied to
visuals, it can be
quite powerful

Likewise, if lots of
content creators
want your visuals,
ranking here can
yield loads of links

Text in images is one way to draw in clicks
for the right kinds of queries

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe :
Organic Reach on Facebook
Ended in 2014

TheAverage Stats Look Pretty Bad
Now hovering
under 2%

But You Don’t Have to BeAverage!
I’m Averaging
35.9% Reach!

#1: Earn Your Follows Through Shares

#2: Be Wary of the “Bad Post” Hangover
Slumps follow poor
performing posts
And stronger reach
follows better posts

#3: Find Content & Sharing Patterns
That Work, Then Stick With ‘Em

#4: Build YourAudience Off FB,
Engage YourAudience On FB

PRO TIP:
Organic FB posts work best for small->medium orgs. If
you’re a bigco, take Avinash’s advice; pay.

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe :
Content Marketing Means
Publishing on Your Website

But What If Your Site is…
New
Light on LinkAuthority
Lacks a Usable CMS
Controlled by a Team/Client Who Won’t Let You Do
What Needs Doing?
Subject to Nasty Legal or Brand Restrictions

Many Websites:
A) Offer Guest Publishing Opps
B) Rank Like a Boss
Accepts guest
contributions

Loads of Sites to Publish to For Rankings:
Via Solvid.co.uk

I’d Strongly Consider:
Quora.com
LinkedIn.com
YouTube.com
Pinterest.com
Reddit.com

STOP thinking of guest publishing as purely a way to
get links.
START thinking of other people’s platforms as a
way your message can spread 

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe :
Google Rankings = Links,
Keywords, & Technical Issues

Few Links Outranking Lots of Links?

No KWs Outranking Solid KW Targeting?

What’s Google Ranking
These With?
Sure, this might be the most
interesting or click-worthy piece,
but it has poor KW-targeting and
little link authority?!

The New Ranking Factor:
Searcher TaskAccomplishment

This is a good SERP – searchers
rarely bounce, rarely short-click,
and rarely need to enter other
queries or go to page 2.

This is a bad SERP – searchers
bounce often, click other results,
rarely long-click, and try other
queries. They’re definitely not
happy.

Via Steve Hammer

Focus on Signal:Noise Ratio – Don’t Let Bad Pages
Drag Down a Good Site
Quantity of Pages
Earning SERP Visits
Relative Time on Site,
Bounce Rate, Pgs/Visit,
Searcher Satisfaction
Site’s Search
Engagement
Reputation
=

3 Options for Pages Like These:
1) Improve them
2) Remove them (404)
3) Redirect them (301)

Marketing Culture Leads Us to Believe :
When Google Takes Your Search
Traffic, You Can’t Earn It Back

They Tirk ‘Er Trafix!

When Google Gives You Lemons

Rank in Google’s
“Lemon” Knowledge
Panel
Take that ya Googley
traffic thieves!

It’s Possible to Earn Traffic from 90%+ of
Google’s Click-Siphoning SERP Features
You can do SEO
to show up here
And here

And here

Here And here Here too Also here Yup!

16 Features Every SEO Should Consider:
Videounits
SERPFeature Type How toGet In
“PeopleAlsoAsk”
FeaturedSnippet
MapsBox
KnowledgePanel
TopStories(News)
Images
Apps
Create&optimizeonYouTube(or,rarely,Vimeo)
Branding–getsearchedforwith/afterthequery
Phrasing&positionofshortanswerincontent
ClaimGMB,getlinks,earncitations,benearby
Earnbrandassociation,usestructuredmarkup
GetinGoogleNews,earnlinks,titlew/KWs
Relevantimages,altattributes,&directembeds
KWsintitle/description,getpopularinappstores

Books
RelatedSearches
Tweets
SearchSuggest
Sitelinks
SectionSitelinks
In-DepthArticles
Carousels/ListResults
Writeabook,useKWsinthetitle,haveanISBN
Besearched+foundcommonlyw/theKWs
Verifiedaccountshelp,useKWsintweets
Asw/relatedsearches,alsogeo-sensitive
Getlinks&visitstoseveralpoppgs;usemarkup
Growpopularsubsectionsw/popularsubpages
Authorlongerpiecesthatreceiveattention/links
Belistedalongsidecommonsetsontheweb
16 Features Every SEO Should Consider:
SERPFeature Type How toGet In

Analyze Which Types of SERPsAppear Most in the
Keywords You CareAbout
These show me how many of
each SERP type appears in the
results for this keyword list (via
KW Explorer)

Then Determine What Verticals & SERPTypes You
Need to Optimize For
Aiming for these PAA
boxes (People Also Ask)
might be a great content
marketing strategy for
SEO

Next time you’re making a strategic or tactical marketing
decision, ask yourself:
How is cultural conditioning
biasing me?
Not “if”

Rand Fishkin, Wizard of Moz | @randfish | rand@moz.com
Bit.ly/giantmuck