Olga & Nikki
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[00:00:00] Hello everyone. It's Olga Zarr from SEOSLY. This is the SEO Podcast by #SEOSLY. Today I have a very special guest. This is Nikki. Nikki, how are you doing? Hi. I am really good. Thanks. Yeah. Going well. Busy week, but I'm excited to be here and chatting with you today. Yeah, yeah, me too. Me too. I've been meaning to invite you for a long time, but I always ha have so many things, going on and, but I finally did it, so I'm happy we are recording this.
[00:00:32] Okay, Nikki, so can you tell me, what you do right now? And how you get started. When you get started. I want to like know your SEO story in, in much detail. Yeah, sure. Uh, so right now I'm working basically two jobs. Oh. So I work as a, um, SEO freelancer, um, doing all of the stuff. So audits. I've got clients, um, that I work with on retainers as well as obviously, you know, a lot of ad hoc work, but I also work as a.
[00:01:04] At an agency alongside this, uh, as a tech SEO specialist. So I'm balancing the two. I work for Journey further. Um-huh. They, they're aware of my freelance work. I'm very happy for me to continue doing that, which obviously is great. So I balance the two. So I wake up in the morning, I do seo O and when I got sleep at night, I'm also doing sel uh, sometimes dreaming about spreadsheets, which is very boring and very annoying at the same time.
[00:01:31] Yeah. I'm having the same thing. Yeah. I. Exactly the same. And also for, for a long time I was doing like both having a job at the agency and doing freelancing, but I finally had to choose, I was unable to continue this way. Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. It's, um, definitely, you know, past that point of, of making that decision.
[00:01:56] But it's, it's always a tough decision, isn't it, when you've gotta like make the leap. Yeah, totally. It's scary. Totally. Totally. And in my case, it didn't, change, the amount of work I do. I would say I even work more now, so, But that's okay. I can believe it. I always see you doing more and more, even with like your YouTube and this podcast and everything else.
[00:02:17] I'm like, does all go ever stop? I don't think you do. Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. It's crazy. I'm trying to kind of, cool down a little bit, but it's hard. Okay, Nikki, but this show is about you. Tell me when you get started and how you get started. What brought you to seo? Uh, I got started about seven or eight years ago and I fell into it, which I feel like is the case with most of us who work into seo.
[00:02:43] I don't know anybody that actually I. You know, woke up one day and decided SEO's what I want to to do. I'm sure there are, I just haven't met them. So, uh, when I left university, um, I worked for a music company, so was working with, within the mu music industry, and I was doing marketing for them and the musicians that they work with.
[00:03:05] So that was very much. Um, getting their artists into online magazines and getting them into podcasts, um, on, uh, podcast and playlist on the likes of Spotify and all those other types of, uh, streaming stores. And because I was doing the marketing, when the manager, when the CEO decided we need a new website, he just came to me and said, Nikki, you can do that.
[00:03:29] And I'm like, I don't know the first thing about websites, but yes, I can do that. That won't be a problem. Uh, it was a word WordPress website. So, I did the best I could building it from there, just playing around with lots of things. I built like a local staging version of the website on my very enlarged iMac screen, which pulls problems later on when we were using smaller screens and things didn't look the same, but didn't know that at the time.
[00:03:54] I, um, But yeah, so I broke a lot of things. I learned a lot of things and it went from there. Really, it's after building that website, figuring out what the problems were when it eventually went live, and then we needed it to, to rank. Of course, you know, we needed to bring in more business, so I needed to figure out how to do that.
[00:04:16] So I did. I started learning, uh, through people on online, on Twitter, following people, reading blogs, and. Because I felt like I learned so much building this company website, I created my own website, which is just nikki halliwell.com. It's still there now. It looks a lot better now than it did back in the day.
[00:04:35] Um, but that's what I started and I was just messing around with things. It wasn't even an SEO website at the time. Um, but yeah, and it's through. Experimenting on that website with what people had told me or what I'd read online, that I was able to figure things out for myself and then start to implement them.
[00:04:53] And then I would do it on, on the company website, um, which went very well. Um, but when I left that company, it was a case of what do I, what do I wanna do now? And I wasn't really sure, uh, I knew that I liked Essie o, but. I didn't even know that that was like a career option. I thought it'd be a similar sort of thing working in house.
[00:05:14] I didn't know that agencies existed, uh, at that point. And then I found, uh, an agency, um, in Manchester and that was the first one I, I worked for and I've worked with with agencies ever since really? And, and grown and, and learned from there. Yeah, it's probably agencies are the best place to learn, like hands-on seo.
[00:05:35] So in how many agencies have you worked? Um, 1, 2, 3, 4. About five. Oh, nice. Five or six, give or take one. Yeah. About five or six. Yeah. And can you share some of the things you, you liked there? Some of the things you learned, from your SEO O Agency kind of part of your career?
[00:06:00] Basically what you said. So it's definitely being hands-on. You get thorn into the deep end a lot. And it was through my first agency while I was learning everything, cuz everything that I'd learned on the company website when I went to music, it was okay. But it, you know, it wasn't what we would do now as, as SEOs probably.
[00:06:19] Um, so that was like my first experience of properly learning SEO and what all the various tools were as well. Cause I didn't know half of the tools, I was just. Making it up as as I went along. So yeah, definitely getting to, to know all the tools and that's when, when I got more into into tech seo, when I saw that site speed was a thing, then that site speeded mattered and all of that fun stuff.
[00:06:40] But I like that it's always something different in agency side as well, cuz you're working with lots of different clients on a daily basis. It's very similar to, to freelance. So you're working with lots of different people, lots of different industries, and they all have different challenges. Yeah, totally.
[00:06:54] And that's exciting to me. Just getting to, to see what works for one client in one industry and how different rules even sometimes apply for, for other industries, there's certain things that you can and cannot say on, uh, on some websites, even though that's their target keyword, that is the one thing that they do, but they can't actually mention that keyword on their website, which I've, I've come across, uh, before in, in regulated industries.
[00:07:17] So it's just figuring out different pieces of the puzzle and, and how to challenge each thing differently. And that's, That's what I like about SEO really. And the agency, agency life just, just fits into that really well. Yeah, totally. Totally. And regarding, university, what did you study? So you had no like technical background.
[00:07:36] I. My, at university I did music technology. Okay. So that was about like recording in like music studios, and that's what I thought I wanted to do. That's what I did at college and that's what I, I went on to do a, a university. So lots of messing around with, with microphones like we're doing on, on this podcast here.
[00:07:55] But you know, recording people. In, in studios, and that's what I wanted to do. Or what I thought I wanted to do was, was be a music producer and I had these visions of working with all these famous artists in these big, big studios. Um, so it, it was like tech in that respect, but, you know, definitely not computer based.
[00:08:12] Sure. So I need to ask, do you have. A podcast or are you planning on creating one? I did. Um, so over lockdown, it wasn't seo, um, but it was over lockdown. So me and my wife have, uh, another website, um, that's talking about like L G B T uhhuh, uh, issues. And we, we were also really into like true crime, uh, as well as like queer history.
[00:08:39] So we, we blended the two and that's what we did over lockdown was we would talk about. LGBT history one week, and then the next thing, I think it might still be on Spotify uhhuh. Um, but yeah, we talk about L G B T history one week, and then the next we talk about. Like true crime, but it would be mm-hmm.
[00:08:58] Something that was like against the L G B T community or committed by the L G B T community. It was really interesting. But then after lockdown it just became too much to, to continue doing it. Um, and now we just continue it with, with the website, which probably needs a, a little bit of love. Uh, cuz it's, it's been a minute, but yeah, that was, that was what I did.
[00:09:19] I haven't really thought about doing an SEO one. Um. But I don't know, maybe in the future we'll see Uhhuh. And does your wife do SEO as well? No, she's a copywriter, so Oh, it's, that's a nice blend. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. We, we, we work quite well together. Um, she does, she's not interested in sel. I've tried. Um-huh.
[00:09:39] She goes, she goes as far as, you know, her copywriting and, and her keywords, but it's too technical for her. She'd just rather uhhuh, rather stick to what, what she does best, and it works for us, you know? Yeah. Especially on, on the freelance side, I'm able to pass work to her and, and she does the same to me, so it's like, it's, yeah.
[00:09:55] Like you say, it's very complimentary. Yeah. Cool. And, uh, so regarding your freelancing, so, what exactly is it that you are now offering and in addition to your, your company website? I think you have a website about audits only as well, if I remember correctly. Right. So do you also have like other websites, like affiliate websites of stuff like that?
[00:10:18] Yeah, I've lost count. Oh, and probably like any seo, I've owned far too many domain names, and some of them just sit there and I wonder what to do with them. And it's like, one day I'll do that website and it just sits there. Oh yeah, totally. I know, it's, it's a problem, isn't it? I think we need like, instead of.
[00:10:35] Gamblers anonymous. We need like domain names anonymous. Yeah. When it becomes a problem and we're just addicted to buying them. Uh, so yeah, I've got, uh, my consultancy website, which is, uh, just nikki halliwell.com. So that's, um, for like my retained clients and lots of like ad hoc stuff that, that might come in.
[00:10:52] So I offer, as I say, consultancy duty orders through that one as well. Um, Like migration work, you name it, it comes through that. But yeah, I do have a, um, audit specific website, which is tech seo audits.com. Um, and that's like my newest one really. So that specializes in audits. We've got various different packages that I offer on that one, depending on the size of the website that you have.
[00:11:17] But what I'm really trying to do with, with that website was tailor it a lot more to. To the companies and, and the individuals that, that were asking for, for audits. Cuz the problem that I find is people would just make an audit and deliver it in whatever format worked for the seo, but then that doesn't really work for, for the client.
[00:11:36] Yeah. So what I'm able to allow people to do through that is literally as part of the checkout process, is choose what works. So when you know what sort of audit you want, whether it's like a, a basic one or you want an in depth one, you can choose if you just want it in a spreadsheet format. Because that, that does work for a lot of people.
[00:11:50] But if you're delivering it to, to higher stakeholders or need to be able to present this to other people, you might need it in, uh, in a, uh, a presentation format. So you can choose that, or if you want it in, in a Word document as well, you can choose that. So you get to customize exactly what works for you.
[00:12:06] Um, obviously that has an impact on the price, um, but you know, you know exactly what you're gonna get then. And it's, you can customize it a lot more. And that's what I do with, with all of the audits on there. That includes, uh, backlink audits. There's also keyword research, um, and all of that fun stuff as well as a couple of more products that, that are coming soon to it.
[00:12:24] But yeah, I found that it, it really works well and, and it. Instills a lot of confidence in. Yeah. And people that are looking fors, they, they know what they're getting. Yeah. That, that's a very good idea to kind of offer different formats because I usually ha had, had, I, at first I was offering audits in the form of, uh, Google Sheets.
[00:12:45] Then I kind of started to offer as Google doc with a lots, with lots of explanations. Yeah. But then I came to realize that some clients wanted this over that, and, and I started to offering like two simultaneously. But what you're saying about the presentation, that's, that's also like, like an important, important, formats.
[00:13:05] And can you tell me which ones do you sell the most? Which ones are the most popular? Which ones you prefer the most? I prefer the spreadsheets, uh, the most. Um, so like if you choose one of the others, you get the spreadsheet as well. Uhhuh, you just get it in the additional format so you can share that as needed.
[00:13:23] Um, I, yeah, I prefer the spreadsheets cuz that's personally how my brain works and I like the way that it, it's set out and it's, you know, it, it does look good. It's, it's understandable for, for people at all sorts of, um, levels in the business and experience anyway. I mean, I was presenting an audit.
[00:13:41] Yesterday, um, to like a High Street brand and they just had the spreadsheet version and, and they loved it and they didn't have any problem with understanding it. But it just depends on what they're then going to do with it. Obviously if they're presenting it to other people, then they might need it in the other format.
[00:13:55] Um, but the, the word document is, is the second most popular cuz people are able to, to read it and really get down in, into the details and understand it fully. Mm-hmm. I find that the presentation format is only really used when they need to present it to. Like leaders in the business who just need the highlights, uhhuh, and they don't need to actually see.
[00:14:16] Yeah, the specific details, they can have the details, but you know, when it's, when it's being presented in a meeting, it's a lot easier for them to get the information they need from, from a presentation. But I mean, that's, that's why I did it cuz I was getting the same thing as you and it was like, you know, do I do it in this format or this format, or then I put all this time into the Word document and then I can see that people are not actually reading it.
[00:14:37] So it's like, well why did I put all that time and effort into it? Whereas with creating this website, people are able to, to choose what works for them. And, and I know what's expected of me. They know what they're gonna get in, and it's, yeah, just, just more transparency, which is what I'm, I'm trying to do with, with a lot of the, the work and yeah, so far so good.
[00:14:56] Yeah, hopefully. Cool. And, and how do you promote this website? Do you just SEO it? Is there a block, to this website? I don't remember. Yeah, there's a block. Um, My wife helps out with that content. Interestingly enough, we, uh, we, we do it together. Um, so yeah, there's a blog. I do socials, um, and chat on things like this.
[00:15:19] Um-huh. But also, um, I've started, uh, I'm still a little bit embarrassed about it, um, but I've started like a, a TikTok, uh, talking about. SEO and, uh, it's a lot more basic on TikTok, which is interesting. So a lot of the things that do well is literally what is keyword research, why do I need backlinks and why do backlinks matter?
[00:15:38] So it's a lot of the more basic stuff that that does well on there. But then I'm able to, to syndicate that content out onto, uh, Instagram and also a little bits on YouTube, just as like YouTube shorts. Um, I'll probably extend that insert into longer form videos at some point. But yeah, it just feels awkward a little bit doing it on, on videos.
[00:15:58] And it's something that I'm, I'm still getting used to. I've only been doing that for, for just over a month. But it, it does do well. It's just like a, a slower, a slower progress on those, like a, a slower burn. But it, it's, it's fun. It's, it's fun to do so we'll, we'll see. So you have your own YouTube channel?
[00:16:13] Mm-hmm. Okay. Okay. So I, I have to add it to notes, but this notes Okay. Okay. Uh, that's, that's interesting. And can you tell me more about the, the Excel, uh, spreadsheet? Like, do you, like put all the, , all the data into one spreadsheet in different tabs, or do you refer to, to like, other, other files? I'm, I'm just, Curious about like, how exactly your, your audits look, if you can of course share.
[00:16:44] Yeah, of course. Yeah. So, um, yeah, it's, it's all in the one document within various tabs. So I have like a summary, uh, at the, at the start. Uh, that's one tab with like the top level metrics that, that people, uh, like to see. Uh, the next one is basically the, the list of checks that I've gone through as part of the audit.
[00:17:04] That has lots of detail on that. The next one is everyone calls it something different. You might call it an issue log or findings or whatever. Personally, I call mine matrix because not only is it an an issue log, but then I use that to like prioritize each of the orders. Um, and I've got various different, um, methodologies that I use for determining which is the top priority items.
[00:17:28] Then I have the roadmap, um, which is laid out. Based on the client. It's not just red items go first, I, I mix it up and, you know, that's, um, that's different for each one and everything else. Mm-hmm. And then, yeah, after that you've got all the tabs of, of the various issues. Um, and again, that, that just came on the back of.
[00:17:47] Dealing with clients, you know, it's frustrating for, for us and for them to have to be like, right, I'm working on this. Where do I find these URLs? You've told me that there's an issue with canonicals. You've told me that there's an issue with page titles. Where do I find them? And then I've gotta go back to my call and export them or find my spreadsheets.
[00:18:02] Yeah. And send them across. Whereas if you do it all at the same time, number one, that's automated as part of my audit. So I just upload, um, the URLs that I find and then it automatically counts them. And then obviously I, I talk about 'em in the audit, but also, yeah, it means that, The client knows that everything's there and, and ready for, for them to deal with.
[00:18:20] And then when we come to work on them, it, it saves time for me as well. Cause I've, I've got the data there from, from the time. Um, and then I can just work through, through each audit. Mm-hmm. Um, and yeah, and that's, um, that's how I tend to do it. I mean, it's, it's always changing. It, it gets updated a lot with obviously latest developments in the industry and, and things that, that clients ask for as well.
[00:18:43] Yeah, sure. And can you estimate how many audits you have performed so far? More or less? Uh, I don't even know where to start. Oh, um, hundreds. I've, I've not been asked that question before. Um, yeah, hundreds. If, if not more. I've, yeah, I've definitely lost count. Do you know how many you've done? I've lost count two, but I think, uh, more probably now more than 200.
[00:19:08] But, but yeah, I, I, I stopped counting at some point and I will know. Never know. Probably. No, no, I don't think I've want to know, cuz then it would be like, okay, how many hours has that taken me? How many hours have I spent? How many days basically have I spent just doing SEO audits and yeah, I don't think I want to know that.
[00:19:27] Yeah, totally. And regarding hours, , how many hours on average? Of course, it depends. Do you spend doing an audit? Uh, I told myself that. I wasn't gonna say it depends on this, uh, podcast, but I've just, I've just, uh, you have to, um, I know, um, yeah. Um, for, for like a smaller website with like a basic audit, probably like a, a couple of days and then up to like a more advanced audit.
[00:19:54] It can be, um, I dunno. Like four-ish days. All in all. Yeah. Four. Yeah. Um, weeks, months, years. Um, Uhhuh, yeah. Years. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, yeah, it can be about a, about a week, um, for, for a larger audit. Mm-hmm. And, uh, do we also do E E A T audits or traffic drop assessments? Yeah. So, um, That's included in my main audit.
[00:20:25] But yeah, if you want more of like a deep dive into it, then, then yeah, I can definitely do those, do those separately. Um, don't really get many people looking at E E A T, but yeah, definitely like the, the traffic drop, especially on the back of migrations. Yeah, that's a, that's a common one. It's like we did this without SEO help and our traffic has dropped and we don't know why.
[00:20:43] Yeah. It happened. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. Totally. And can you, can you recall some of the like weirdest. Mistakes, issues. You, you have seen in, in the, in last, I don't know, 100 audits You did. Um, some of the weirdest, I mean, the, the typical is always, you know, when the, with the website going live, no indexed. And it's like, we don't know why we're not linking.
[00:21:06] And it's like, well I do. You can see that nice and easily. Um, that's a pretty common one though. Weirdest. But yeah, there's like a lot of like hraf lung issues mm-hmm. And things just, just not. Set up correctly at all with, with that cookie banners also actually causing more issues at the minute.
[00:21:22] And also just uhhuh like there. There was one recently where there was like metal refresh. There was like metal refreshes that were involved and it came on the back of a weird. Happy that happened at the same time as the deployment of the new cookie banner. So the URLs were changing between UK and us, and they couldn't figure out why.
[00:21:42] And they thought it was a JavaScript redirect, but when, when you properly looked into it, it was, it was just this weird meta refresh Oh, that they were coming up to. Yeah. I'd never seen that before. And hopefully I won't see it again. Because that was, that was a weird one. And it was, it was quite annoying.
[00:21:56] But yeah, we, uh, we got there in the end, but. Yeah, there's, there's all sorts that come up. There's, there's no two audits the same is there, there's, there's always something weird about other one and you're like, oh, this audit won't take me long. And then you find something and then you go down a rabbit hole and hours later you're still looking at the same issue.
[00:22:13] Yeah, totally. Totally. Okay. And what are your favorites as your audit tools? The ones without which you couldn't,, perform an audit? Tools, uh, well, screaming Fog is the go-to. That's like my old faithful, um, spend, uh, a a lot of time with with that one. Uh, I also really like site bulb, Uhhuh. I like the, the level of detail that, that they go into.
[00:22:36] And oncall is one that we started using recently at, uh, at Jenny further, and that's gone really well for us. And just with obviously it being a larger, um, sorry. With it being a. Cloud quality for, for the larger websites. Mm-hmm. Uh, that makes it a lot easier for them, obviously. Uh, Google Analytics and Search Console and all those typical sort of tools.
[00:22:57] Um, site speed. I like, uh, GT metrics for that. Uhhuh, that's, um, that's like one of my go-tos. Obviously. We use like page speed insights as well as webpage test various chrome extensions. Yeah. That I use. And so do you think speed is, is important as long as you're doing it for the right reasons? Yes. Uhhuh.
[00:23:21] And what I mean is you're not doing it just to get a green tick or to get a perfect a hundred out of a hundred score. Um, if you're doing it for that, then no. But if you're doing it to actually benefit your users and you know that it's a problem and you know you're gonna help them convert, then, then yes.
[00:23:38] Yeah. Perfect answer. Yeah, I, I don't think that's gonna change either. I mean, a lot of people were, were talking about that, weren't they with like the mobile friendly test and other ranking signals being, being removed. They're like, site speed doesn't matter anymore. It's like, no, it's always gonna matter.
[00:23:52] And, and in my opinion, that's, that's why they're removing it. It's because of a lot of people are just chasing it to say on Twitter, I've got a hundred out of a hundred. I'm mobile, my website's perfect. But it's, it's actually not. If you try load it up. Yeah. And I think that's a good thing. You know, there's tools like Debug Bear as well, which we also use.
[00:24:11] So you can see like the, the site speeded, um, performance over time and, and how that's changed and what's actually impacting them. I think that's, that's a really, really good tool for doing that, actually. Um, yeah. But yeah, it's if, if you're doing it for the right reasons and yes, site speed's always gonna be important.
[00:24:26] Okay. You know, it it, sorry. I was just gonna say, if, um, if your website loads slower than your competitors, I mean, who are you more likely to, to buy from at the end of the day? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's a great point. And, uh, one more question about audits. Uh, everyone, every auditor approaches, audits a bit differently.
[00:24:45] Can you walk me through your process, like from start to beginning? Like how do you get started? Is it like, what do you do? Like, you, you have a site, you, someone bought the audit, and how do you get started? I start by having to play around. Um, I just, Use the website, get an understanding of, of what the main landing pages are and what the, the focus of the business is.
[00:25:09] Are they, I don't know, selling weddings, is it a wedding venue or is it an e-commerce store selling shoes? You know, obviously everyone's different, but I think I, I try and put myself as best I can in the shoes of a user and be like, right, I wanna book a wedding. So how do I go through that process? Yeah.
[00:25:26] And think about what questions I might want answered and go through that. And then, You know, is it, is it a contact form to convert on that? Or am I trying to buy a new pair of trainers and am I able to filter down to find a blue pair of my favorite brand in my size? And is it, are they gendered men or, or, and women or you know, how does that affect the URLs?
[00:25:49] And I follow that as far as possible through down to conversion without actually spending money, unless I actually want to, um, Sometimes, you know, I get like a, a, a code from them. So I'm able to actually follow through the, the full checkout process. Mm-hmm. Um, then I call the site, I'll set it up in whatever call I'm using and, and have a look at, um, analytics as well, and then slowly start to, to bring it all together.
[00:26:16] Into, into the spreadsheet and build it out from there if we need to. But the, yeah, the, the number one thing is actually using the website like a user, cuz that's, yeah. That's what matters most at the end of the day. Yeah, totally. Totally, totally. I, I remember at the, at the very beginnings, uh, of my SEO career at the agency, uh, One of the first audits I did, I, I remember that I wasn't like really going through the website.
[00:26:40] I was just simply going through, through a checklist and mm-hmm. And a crawler without actually interacting with the site. And now I think it is like fundamental, the first thing you should do is to actually like, look at the site from, from the, from the perspective of a real user. Yes. Because we as auditors, we can often just, uh, browse the site for 30 seconds and we'll find some SEO issues already.
[00:27:06] You probably know that feeling. Yes, a hundred percent. It happens all the time. Um, even just like simple things, isn't it like the convert button? I mean, like, I had it a simple, well, relatively simple one, uh, recently, whereas when I looked at the website on mobile, which is the important distinction as well.
[00:27:22] Yeah, don't just look at it on our devices. We need to have a look and see how it performs on mobile. But I had it recently when you, you added stuff to cart and went to checkout and this was on like a health and beauty sort of website. Mm-hmm. So you added it to the cart, you are good. And then when you went to press the, the checkout button, uh, no it wasn't, it was the, it was the pay button, so it was right at the end of the conversion process.
[00:27:45] The chat bot was right in the way. So you couldn't actually get to the pay button because of the chatbot. And even when you, you closed the chatbot down, it was still there in the corner of the screen, like in, in some capacity. So you couldn't get to it. I mean, the only way, um, eventually was to like rotate my phone and then I could just about get to it, but it was just, Yeah, exactly.
[00:28:08] And it was like, this is, this is ridiculous. That's, that's why you're performing so poorly on, on mobile. But then on desktop, that wasn't an issue and I'd never spot that. Um, had I not tried to do that on mobile as well and the, the business wasn't even aware of it. Obviously the customers were, cuz that's why they were, were struggling and they were.
[00:28:25] Probably shopping with, with competitors after, after not being able to get past that. But yeah, the, the business had no idea, but thankfully we were able to, to fix that quite quickly. Yeah, that's a nice catch, really. Yeah. Okay. So you, you also have a technical s e o, uh, s e o newsletter, right? I do, yes. Yeah.
[00:28:44] Um, yeah. Tell me more. It started, yeah, it started just on the back of, um, Tweeting, basically. And I, Uhhuh would do like a, I call it tech, s e o Tuesday, so I'd tweet one particular tip on a Tuesday and from, you know, that was, that was doing quite well on, on Twitter. And then I started to roll out onto LinkedIn and then it did even better.
[00:29:06] And people were just engaging with like the, the little snippets of advice. That I put out. Mm-hmm. So then I was like, well, how can I do this into something a little bit more detailed, which I kept finding that people were, were asking for. So then, yeah, I just created Tech SEO tips, which is, as I say, it's, it's the extension of, of the, the tweets uhhuh, I'll talk about.
[00:29:27] Any particular issue of the week? Sometimes it's the same one that I've tweeted, or it might be a weird issue that I've come across, like the, the chat bot on mobile or just some news, like big changes in the industry, like, like generative AI and things like that. I'll talk about them in like a, a small paragraph.
[00:29:45] Mm-hmm. And, and then towards the. Uh, the bottom ish. I'll include articles, like popular ones from the week. I know I've had a couple of yours in there as well as Yeah. Yeah. Thanks. As others in the industry, no, your articles are great. I, I always love it when, when I come across one of yours in feed or, or anywhere else.
[00:30:03] Um, but yeah, that, that goes in the newsletter and then that goes out once a week, Uhhuh. And can you share how many subscribers you are, um, you have with. Um, uh, was it, uh, five or 600? It's, it's not huge, but it's, it's, it's going well and there's, you know, yeah. En engaged visitors. It's certainly not huge, but we're, we're going slowly but surely.
[00:30:30] Yeah. Yeah, sure, sure. Uh, okay, so I guess technical, s e o is like your favorite part of seo, right? Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, do you also, like, do you also do like JavaScript seo, JavaScript audits? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, definitely. Okay. Can you share something about this? Is there something like, some interesting case you had with JavaScript, websites?
[00:30:58] Yeah, I mean, like a common one that I come across is just, um, and I've seen this on lots of different websites, but it's to do with like, um, JavaScript buttons on links hidden behind those buttons, and that are only accessible with, with JavaScript. And that happens a lot with products, but more often with, with blogs actually.
[00:31:16] So, mm-hmm. The search engine often struggles to find blogs beyond page one. Um, uh, sorry. Struggles to find articles beyond page one, I mean. Mm-hmm. Yeah. If they're linked to internally and they're included in the XML site map, they can, you know, still be, still be discovered that way, but that's not always the case.
[00:31:34] So, you know, Google is only able to see. The, the content that's on the first page of, of the blog and can't see anything on, um, page two and beyond. And that's because Google cannot and will not click on buttons. So if, if the link to that page two, or if that load more button doesn't actually contain a a H F link, then it's got nothing to follow and it, and it can't discover those, those other pieces of content.
[00:31:58] Yeah. So that's one I come across a lot. We saw that recently at, uh, at Journey further with a, uh, client who's in like the finance industry. They've got a lot of important information on there about, you know, money saving and mortgages and how to protect yourself from fraud and all of that stuff. Mm-hmm.
[00:32:15] A lot of it was, was just getting hidden unfortunately, or wasn't doing as well as, as what it should have been, and we were able to implement the. More typical pagination onto that, and we immediately saw, saw the results on the back of it, and it was, it works quite well. I mean, I'm, you know, JavaScript definitely has, its its place.
[00:32:34] I like JavaScript. I'm certainly not against it, but it's just making sure that you are using it in the right way and not Yeah. Using it, you know, on unbuttoned like that. I mean, we all love shiny features and things that make our websites look good and, and they're great, but just make sure that you are, you're setting up your, your links correctly.
[00:32:50] Yeah. Yeah, totally. And do you work remotely? Yeah, a bit of both. So, um, The agency, they, they do have an office, but they're, they're very much flexible in all respects that, you know, that they don't even work nine to five. You know, if you need to be flexible for whatever reasons you, you can be, um, I do go into the office, but not as often as I should.
[00:33:12] Um, but that's partly because I've got, Very, you can't see 'em cause of the way my, my camera's set up, but I've got about four screens set up here. Um Oh. So, okay. Obviously can't, I can't, I can't do that in, in an office, so I'm able to, to have all the screens and have my, all singing, all dancing little set up here.
[00:33:28] Um, but it is like, I, I do like going in the office and obviously socializing with people and just bouncing ideas off is, is always good. Um, but yeah, most of the time I'm, I'm here. Yeah. And do you also attend conferences, SEO conferences, or have you, have you spoken anywhere? I haven't seen you on Brighton SEO or I missed you.
[00:33:51] No, you haven't seen me. Um, yes, I do attend, um, as much as possible. Um, Brighton seo, uh, women in Tech SEO as well is, is brilliant. I'm, um, I'm part of that community and I've, um, attended the last three conferences that, that they've done as well. Um, Have, have I spoken? No. Um, I'm, I'm warming up to it. It's, um, anxiety is not fun.
[00:34:19] Um, But, um, so that's something that I'm, I'm battling with. But yeah, I've, um, starting to get a few, a few pitches out there, and hopefully you'll, you'll see me on a, on a stage near you soon, Uhhuh. Yeah. I, I, I think I also have the, have this issue, so you can say you are suffering from imposter syndrome as well.
[00:34:38] Mm, a hundred percent, yeah. Oh, okay. It looks like, like I interviewed a lot of women and so far, I, I can say that most of them. Said the same thing. Yeah, I think so. I think it's a common thing just for women in most injuries, most industries, but especially in industries like ours that are more tech. You know, it's, even though there's, there's plenty of us out there.
[00:35:03] I mean, you only have to have a look at women in tech SEO as a community. There's thousands of women on there, so there's plenty of us in the industry. But yeah, unfortunately I think a lot of us do come across as as that. But I think a lot of it as well is just, You know, I, I do talk like this all day long.
[00:35:20] Um, you know, I do presentations with, with clients and my own sort of stuff, but I feel like if I'm gonna speak at an event, that's when my imposter syndrome really kicks in. And it was like, well, I've got nothing to say that's not already been said, but I know that's not true. Yeah, I know. I've got, I know I've got plenty to say and sometimes have, it's, yeah.
[00:35:39] That's what I was gonna say. Yeah. Sometimes it's the different perspectives, but it's just, you know, say if I wanna talk about audits and I'm like, oh, well someone did an audit last year. And it's like, yeah, but it's not gonna be my audit. It's not gonna talk about it in the way that, that I do. And actually help people to prioritize them or come across whatever issues they may be facing.
[00:35:56] And it's just, it's just getting that to, to sink into my head cuz it, it just doesn't want to. And saying that to you now I know it makes sense and I know that, that that's true, but. Yeah. The minute I come, come to submit that submit pitch button, then it's just, it just kicked in. But yeah, like I said, I'm, I'm starting to get a, a few more out there.
[00:36:17] So, uh, I pitched, uh, to Brighton, I think two times last, last year, last time. And, uh, this time. And I was pitching for, for SEO audits, , different, different kind of, , angles of SEO audits. And, and then they didn't accept me, so this kind of made my mm. Imposter syndrome probably worse. But on the other hand, I'm thinking that maybe, maybe that's simply not, that's not the time yet.
[00:36:45] I'm still very busy doing my kind of podcast, YouTube newsletter, so I am busy enough, but that that was also something that I can say. Made it a bit worse. At least temporarily they don't know what they're missing. Like honestly. So have you on the stage would would be amazing and I'd definitely love to see that.
[00:37:07] So don't give up, but I know, I know I'm not taking my own advice either when I say that. So, um, I definitely need to. But I mean, it's, that's the other thing as well, like obviously by an SEO doesn't pay you at the minute, whereas I know like women in tech and some of the others do, and there's, there's a lot of time that goes into these things, but, oh, I would, I do definitely wanna, wanna Speaker Point at some point.
[00:37:27] But yeah, women in tech seo, they, they do pay you to, to speak at those conferences and Oh, we takes, yeah, check it out. Like Ish takes, uh, very good care of, of all of her speakers as well. I think they're still ex accepting for, for next year's one, but if not, there's, there's a couple of others that are coming up, so yeah, de definitely check it out.
[00:37:45] It's, it's an amazing event as well, you know, it's full of women that feel the same as ours and, yeah. Exactly. I, I'm, I'm trying to at least attend this next year, if not speak. Yeah. Because, yeah, I heard this is so, so, so wonderful to, to be there. Yeah, a hundred percent. Okay, so now maybe this question, uh, what do you think currently is, uh, the area of SEO we should be focusing on more than we do?
[00:38:14] What, what's, what are your thoughts on that? Underrated. It's weirdly not a tech answer. It's more content. Oh. And I think a lot of people are getting lazy with it, and that's because of chat, G p T and all of the other tools, and even some of my freelance clients recently. So I'd quit a, like a brief for them and then they come back with a, an article the next day that is very clearly generated in, in ai and, and they think that that's fine.
[00:38:38] Um, But is your wife using chat gpt? At least as an assistant. Yeah. But that's the difference. Using it as an assistant instead of writing the, the whole article. And that's, that's the point. I mean, I use chat, chat gpt and, and I think it's fine. It's, it's a great tool. I'm certainly not against it. I'm quite the opposite, but it's just, Using it as a tool as opposed to do the work for you because you know, we, you need unique content, you need content that's helpful, hence the helpful content update.
[00:39:07] And I think people are just getting lazy and they think that it's not gonna make a difference to use those sorts of tools to create articles. In, in 10 minutes and getting 'em all up online straight away, cuz we need content. I say, well, yeah, you do, but what's gonna make your content different from, from my content?
[00:39:24] You know, I could create a, I don't know if I've got a health client, I could create a health website tomorrow and throw up a bunch of articles, but that doesn't mean my content's correct because. You know, things like that need to be fact checked. But yeah, it's, it's certainly not gonna be, I'm just using tools like that.
[00:39:39] So it's getting the, the expert advice and the quality information, that's, that's gonna be the, the biggest challenge. So, Yeah. And so what's your, uh, take on like the entire revolution that's happening with ai generative, uh, generative search experience in Google? Like how do you see that, how do you see our future?
[00:40:00] Is there a future for SEOs? Yeah, it's, it's not going away. And like even John Mueller has said himself that, you know, SEO is, is always gonna be needed. It's, it's just gonna change. And that's what, what SEO does, and as, as SEOs, we're always adapting to the new things. So it's just the, the latest challenge.
[00:40:16] I mean, we've all panicked before when there's been other algorithm updates. So even when they said that they were switching to mobile first, everyone panicked then obviously this is like a bigger change that's coming, but. I'm just more interested to see what it happens. Obviously I'm listening to, to everyone's perspectives, but it's all educated guesses at the minute cuz Google is changing even how they're, they're doing it on, on search labs at the minute and trying out different things.
[00:40:42] So more interested to see what it looks like when it finally rolls out everywhere and, and goes live and how the general public engages in it. Cause I think like Summit, it must be the only people using generative AI at the minute must be SEOs. I don't think there's any action. I think actual customers using it, so how we use it is gonna be different from how they use it.
[00:41:00] So everything could, could change then. So yeah, totally. It'd be interesting to see. I think it's, um, it's gonna affect some industries more than others. I think. Um, e-commerce is hopefully gonna benefit from it, but I think affiliates are, are definitely gonna struggle in the more Yeah. Informational based sites are, are, are gonna.
[00:41:19] I'm gonna struggle, unfortunately, but that'll be our challenge as SEOs to work with on sites to see how we can, we can overcome that and help them be more visible in, in generative results. Yeah, totally. So now tell me, uh, how does your normal SEO day look like? Start with lots of coffee. That's, that's always the, the first one.
[00:41:42] Uhhuh, take the dog. Um, take the dog outside, sort him. Have lots of coffee. Um, I usually start with clicking through like my client websites and just seeing if, if anything changes. Cause I do have them set up on various monitoring tools. Um, so that does tell me if things change, but also something slip through the cracks or as much as most of my clients do, keep me up to date, there's ones that do just release things with without letting us know, or so the, the devs just tend to, to sneak things through sometimes as well with, without telling the client.
[00:42:13] So have a click around, see what's changed. Um, If anything, most of the time, not, thankfully, I've probably jinxed it now. I'll go on, on on Monday and things will change completely on all of my websites. Um, have a look in, in analytics and do all that. And then, um, uh, especially at at Journey further, there's probably usually a couple of like morning meetings.
[00:42:36] And so, we'll, we'll go through those. Let's send those present. Uh, whatever needs to be, uh, presented and. Yeah, just then crack on with, with various bits of, of client work. Finish work and then do more seo um, for, for my freelance stuff. And then that usually goes fairly late on into the night until my wife finally gets me to stop.
[00:42:59] Cause I'll just sit in front of the telly doing stuff as well. And then she's like, Nicki, pack it in. We need to go to bed on Nick. We need to go out and do this sort of thing. Yeah. But the same thing with me. Yeah. My husband is like at eight is is telling me like, maybe we can, maybe you can finish and go watch something with me.
[00:43:17] Yeah. Is he the same? Is he trying to take the laptop outta your hands and you're like, just one more minute and just lemme finish this one thing. He's, yeah, but he's an SEO too, so he understands it. But he's not that obsessed, I think. Not That's clever. Oh, it's just does, just as that obsessed. It's good that he works in the industry as well though.
[00:43:36] Yeah, it's, it's nice to have to have a support and when I have like some questions, I don't know, something, he's more experienced than me, so it's always like easier for me, a bit. At least I, I can better control my imposter syndrome this way. Nice. Yeah. And do you, do you work over weekends? I try not to, but yes.
[00:43:59] Um, same thing. Yeah. Especially again, obviously it's, it's freelance that, that I'm doing it at weekends, um, which is why my life, my wife likes us to do things on weekends and go out with the dog and go out with family, and then it. Gets me away from the screen, which obviously is, is a good thing and I want that too.
[00:44:16] But then I'm like, let me just do this one thing for the client before the end of the month. Well, let me just do this. But yeah, that, that's the thing as well. I do actually enjoy it. I, you know, I do enjoy seo, so I don't mind sitting there doing things and making a difference for the websites and just digging into to what's happened now and, and what we can do about it.
[00:44:34] So, you know, if I didn't like seo, that would be, that would be a, that would be difficult. An issue. Yeah. Yeah, totally. I can totally relate to that. And, uh, how do you learn new things? What are your, like favorites? Uh, do you have some favorite courses? You have taken? Books like the, the resources for you to, to learn more, to stay updated?
[00:44:56] Yeah, it's mainly like, um, websites, so like search engine journal and search engine on table and all those sort of things. But, but podcasts, so there's, there's various ones that, that I listen to on, on Spotify. Uh, there again, including Women in Tech. This is turning into an advert for women in tech. Um, but, but their podcast is, is.
[00:45:14] Great. And there's, there's various other ones, um, that I do listen to, but yeah, the reason why I like podcasts is because it's, it's, you get the two perspectives and, you know, get to bounce off each other rather than just stating a single perspective or a single finding within, within an article. Yeah.
[00:45:30] It's nice to be able to do that, and then it's able to, I'm able to generate more ideas on the back of that as well. Yeah, totally. Totally. And you can like do something else while listening, uh, or you can listen at a faster pace, which I like doing than you can consume more. Yeah. And what are your favorite SEO podcasts?
[00:45:47] Can you share? Um, yeah, that's, uh, surfs up I think is, is the Wix one? Um, mm-hmm. God, what else is there? Um, That's cool. Yeah. I'm umm gonna have to get Spotify to, to load the background. Yeah, sure, sure. It won't work now, but, um, you just have them on your list and you just listen. Yeah. Yeah. Literally. Um, but's, um, I mean, my Spotify is a mix of like murder and true crime podcasts and SEO podcasts.
[00:46:19] It's a very weird, very weird mix. If someone has a, ever has a look, they wonder what is going on with, with my life. But, um, which, which is a valid question to be about, but there's, um, yeah, I mean like search engine, journal show, um, go back to, to that one and, and a couple of others. Mm-hmm. Um, there was like a tech SEO podcast I used to listen to.
[00:46:40] Um, Was that one? Yeah, I think, yeah, I think it was by like salt or somebody like that. I don't think that's going anymore, but I, um, I used to listen to that. I think I know what you're talking about. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I was listening to that one as well. And yeah, it's, I, I think it stopped some, some time ago.
[00:46:59] Mm-hmm. Yeah, which is a shame. Um, I do listen to a little, a little podcast called SEO Sly as well. Of course. Nice, nice. Cool. Okay. And, uh, have you ever taken like any SEO courses that you like really enjoyed and you can recommend. Yeah. I dunno if you like sush ones, those are always mm-hmm. Are always handy.
[00:47:22] Um, I think most of the ones I've done are, are SUSH podcasts. Uh, courses. Really? Yeah. Courses. Yeah. Um, I can't think of any of any others off the top of my head. Uhhuh it, it's been a while since I've done any, uh, like Google certifications, uh, could be handy as well. That's good for like, especially Google Analytics and obviously they've recently got like a GFO one, which is g4.
[00:47:44] Yeah. Which is really handy. So I've, um, I've had a look at that. Uh huh. But yeah, it's, it's been a while since I've done one. I think the last time I did like a pop course was, was during lockdown, really? Uhhuh, which is a few years ago, um, planted. But yeah. And, and since then you have been busy just working, working and listening to a lot of the podcasts that, that we just mentioned.
[00:48:05] Yeah. And doing it that way. Yeah. Cool. And, uh, can you share some final tips for people who are just starting out in seo? Is it a good time to start and how to get started successfully? I think it's always a good time to start, as long as you know, you know that things are gonna change, um, and you like change cause that is the nature of, of, of seo.
[00:48:28] But I, I, it depends on how you learn best. And I know everyone learns in in different ways, but for me, honestly, having my own website was, was the best thing. And you can, it doesn't have to be, you know, my name.com website if, if you like. Dogs or you like, ah, just create a, a little website about that and figure out how to get it to rank.
[00:48:48] And the, the thing that you learn from the most is breaking things. Yes, totally. And if you, if you break your own website, It's annoying, but that doesn't matter. But if you break a client's website, then that's gonna cost them a few pounds and then you're gonna be in trouble. So that's, I mean, yeah, that, that's how I found out what Canonical is and what no index tag meant and why it matters and you know what not to do with them.
[00:49:14] So it's like a, a cheesy answer, but yeah, create your own website, try it. And then I do think that the best way to learn is, is agency side. Cuz you, you get to learn a lot of things really quickly and the idea of, and the, uh, ability to bounce ideas off, off of other people is it's invaluable and actually it can put you ahead of a lot of others in the industry by having that, that collaborative nature and able to, to work on lots of different things.
[00:49:42] Excuse me, at, at once makes, makes a massive difference. And then, you know, you can maybe look to go in-house after that if, if that's what you like to do or, and then start doing it at freelance. But I do think you, you learn a lot more. Yeah. Agencies I've done in-house Personally. Yeah, totally. Totally. I've been both and yeah, I can totally, I can only actually like, recommend agencies for most, of course people, some people will enjoy in-house.
[00:50:08] But agencies for that learning path I think are the best. Uh, who in the SEO industry do you think we should be following? And we may not be following, if there's such a person you would like to give a shout out to. Um, there's, there's two. So, uh, the first one is ish, uh, ish Abu from, uh, women in in tech seo.
[00:50:34] I just think she's amazing and, and she does a lot for, for. A lot of people, not just women, um, but a lot of, a lot of minorities as well. And I don't think she gets half as much credit as she does because she's just constantly on the go and, and trying to, trying to make a difference and, and build her community, which is amazing.
[00:50:54] And, uh, a leader. A leader, Ali, I think. You know, a lot of people in the industry know her and she's always sharing really useful insights and also tools on, on how to do things, and she's got lots of, uh, spreadsheets that are really useful. And also just her newsletter is, is amazing. She's got lots of a, lots of information in there.
[00:51:14] And it's a, it's a very large newsletter and it's, it's, yeah, it's, it's impressive. Yeah. You have just, I think, named my two favorite SEOs, so. Oh, nice. I'm giving a, giving a shout out to them as well. Yeah, would you agree? Yeah, yeah, totally. Uh, Nikki, so can you tell me now, where can people find you? What's the best place to connect with you?
[00:51:37] Anywhere and everywhere? Uh, Twitter is Nikki r halliwell, uh, LinkedIn, Nikki allwell, my website nick.com. My tech audit website is tech seo audits.com. Uhhuh. Um, What else did I say? Oh, uh, TikTok and, and Instagram and YouTube. I think they're all my name as well. And also check out journey further. There's, there's lots going on over there.
[00:52:02] Just journey further.com. Lots of, lots of exciting things happening. Um, I'm on Master Done as well. I dunno if anybody's still using that. There's a, there's a few people still around. Um, I feel like there's a, a lot of people that jumped over there at one point, but now it's, it's slowly died down a little bit.
[00:52:18] Yeah. But there's still think so a little, a little community going Uhhuh. Um, but yeah, I'm on there. So literally, I. Anywhere and everywhere you'll, you'll find me in some capacity, whether you want me or not. I'll, I'll pop up somewhere. Okay. Okay, cool. So Nikki, thank you so much for being my guest. I learned a ton from you.
[00:52:37] I think the audience started on too. And again, thanks so much. No, thank you for having me. I was, um, I was really excited when, when you reached out cause I've, I've been wanting to talk to you for a while, so I'm glad we finally got to properly connect. Yeah, that's, that's awesome. Okay, so thanks everyone and see you in the next episode.
[00:52:53] Bye-Bye.
