From Theory to Practice: Real SEO Tips for Your Website (FTF)

In this episode of Follow Through Fridays on the Simple and Smart SEO Show, I review actionable SEO and blogging strategies shared in the podcast with Steven Schneider of Trio SEO. 

I discuss my experiences applying these tips on my new Wix website and Shopify store to enhance user experience and optimization. 

My key takeaways are:

• simplifying navigation, 
• optimizing for search intent, 
• using professional photography, 
• and boosting user trust with reviews and detailed "about" sections. 

I also cover social SEO, optimizing owned assets, and creating bottom-of-funnel content.

Join my SEO Squad for weekly SEO implementation, accountability and feedback!

Transcript

[00:00:00] Crystal Waddell: Hello there. Welcome back to the simple and smart
SEO show podcast. My name is Crystal Waddell, and this is follow through Fridays. 

[00:00:06] Where I volunteer as tribute to implement some of this amazing advice that we've received from our guest experts. 

[00:00:13] If you can't tell I'm catching up from follow through Fridays from the summer because I was on vacation with my family and even though there were some things that I did to implement right away from the episodes.

[00:00:23] I didn't have time to record the actual episode. 

Recap of Steven Schneider's SEO Insights

[00:00:25] Crystal Waddell: So I'm doing it now. 

[00:00:26] This episode is following up with Steven Schneider, who came on to talk about blogging and SEO. 

[00:00:32] Crystal Waddell: Steven is an SEO for a company he co founded called Trio SEO. 

[00:00:37] We talked about a lot of different things. 

[00:00:38] I'm going to go through some of the notes that I had here. 

[00:00:41] And talk about how I implemented them on my website. 

[00:00:44] Which is so cool. 

Website Updates and New Features

[00:00:46] Crystal Waddell: A new website.

[00:00:46] I just migrated to Wix and I'm super excited about it. 

[00:00:49] So rather than just being hosted by Buzzsprout. The podcast now has an actual home. So I hope you will check that out. Let me know what you think. 

[00:00:58] And you can always, follow, subscribe on Apple, iTunes, and Spotify. 

[00:01:04] But if you like to go online and just look around. That's available for you now as well.

[00:01:08] So that's a simple and smart seo. com. 

[00:01:10] And let's jump into this episode. 

SEO Fundamentals and User Experience

[00:01:12] Crystal Waddell: a lot of what we talked about, it was SEO, it was blogging. And it was user experience. 

[00:01:17] The table stakes now for SEO. For your website. 

[00:01:19] It's that it is at minimum, fast loading, easy to navigate. 

[00:01:24] And, ideally, you want it to be visually appealing with photos and with a comprehensive FAQ section.

[00:01:32] Steven gave me some feedback for the Simple and Smart SEO website and gave me a couple of FAQs that I should include on my page. I'm really grateful for that. 

[00:01:40] And then also a straightforward checkout process. 

[00:01:43] I'm really glad that I moved to Wix for the podcast website. 

[00:01:47] Things have been a little bit janky between the podcast and my personal brand website.

[00:01:53] So it's, sometimes you're getting emails from helloandsimpleandsmartseo. com. 

[00:01:57] Sometimes you're getting them from crystal at crystalwaddell. com and sometimes you're getting from crystal at crystal@collageandwood.Com. 

[00:02:03] So this really helps streamline the process. 

[00:02:05] And so I'm trying to bring everything under one umbrella so that everything, is a little bit more seamless and straightforward.

[00:02:12] The other important thing that Steven touched on is that when we're optimizing our pages. 

[00:02:17] Our blog pages, our product pages, All of those things we need to optimize for search intent. 

[00:02:23] And particularly in a day of AI overviews with Google, it's no longer as important for that top of funnel to be a focus.

[00:02:32] The closer that you can get to answering people's questions as they're closer to actually buying your product, the better. 

[00:02:39] The more productive your time is going to be, especially as a solopreneur or very small business. 

[00:02:43] That's where I would recommend that you spend your time rather than informational type articles.

[00:02:49] And one thing I think you guys have heard me talk about the SEO squad probably several times. 

[00:02:53] But that's my weekly SEO kind of support group where small business owners, we get together for an hour on Wednesdays and discuss, all areas of content technical and link building for SEO.

[00:03:04] One thing that we've realized is optimizing our collection pages really has a great return for the time invested. 

[00:03:12] And so the great thing about that for e commerce is that you are optimizing for pages where people are very close to checking out and purchasing. 

[00:03:22] So I appreciated that feedback from Steven in that regard.

Importance of Professional Photography

[00:03:25] Crystal Waddell: Another thing regarding user experience is leveraging professional photography. 

[00:03:30] And I've told the story before, but my business changed almost overnight. The moment that I invested in brand photography and product photography. 

[00:03:39] When I got my very first set of brand photos back, I put them, all over my business social media. 

[00:03:45] And people that I knew personally started commenting on those photos. 

[00:03:49] And they were like, congratulations on all of the success. 

[00:03:51] And there wasn't much difference from the day before. 

[00:03:54] But all of a sudden those images presented my business as more of a legitimate business, right? 

[00:04:02] And the same thing with the product photos.

[00:04:04] It's so important with the product photos that people can visualize. The end result, because in my business, I sell two types of photo props. 

[00:04:13] One of them is like unfinished. You got to paint them, sand them a little bit, whatever. That's on you to make them look the way you want. 

[00:04:20] The other option is buying them painted by us.

[00:04:22] And I take a lot of pride in the painting process. The type of paint that we use. 

[00:04:26] It's, perfect for photographers

[00:04:27] because there's no issue with glare coming off the numbers. 

[00:04:30] But. If I had a picture of just a regular photo prop. 

[00:04:33] Like I have some right here, so I'll just I'll show you if you're watching a YouTube video, you can see it.

[00:04:38] Okay. But that photo prop, it's okay, cool. It was a 2027. But what do I do with it? 

[00:04:45] Just showing it was only part of the story. 

[00:04:48] People needed to see how It was going to look how it was going to make them feel and how it was going to help them show off this, major moment in their life.

[00:04:56] So I partnered with a photographer and I don't even remember how that partnership initially happened. It was just, an Instagram situation and I love their photography. And I said, Hey, can I send you some props? Do you think you could send me some pictures? They said, yeah, sure. And we've been working together since 2020.

[00:05:11] The day that I got those pictures back. 

[00:05:13] I think my business doubled. And it's just been increasing ever since. 

[00:05:18] So, brand photography. Product photography.

[00:05:21] Those are huge things that you can do for your business. 

[00:05:24] And they don't have to be expensive. 

[00:05:25] Especially initially. Number one with your branding photography, all you need is some pictures of you, That look professional that aren't selfies. 

[00:05:34] And ideally are not taken with your cell phone.

[00:05:36] But there's lots of photographers out there. And some who are just getting started. 

[00:05:40] I got to go on my soapbox for a minute about these brand photos. 

[00:05:44] Because when you're just a new entrepreneur or very small business owner, and you're looking to invest in brand photography for the first time. 

[00:05:50] Especially when you're not really established, maybe you've never had a marketing budget for something like that.

[00:05:55] It's not that you need the top of the line, everything. For your business. 

[00:05:59] Exquisite brand photos are amazing.

[00:06:01] And there's definitely a time and a place for that. But when you're first getting started, just consider doing like a product swap. Because. 

[00:06:08] Product photographers need their own portfolio to show people what they can do with products.

[00:06:13] So if you can find a new product photographer and do a swap with your products, that's a win for both of you guys, right? 

[00:06:18] That first group of images that I received from my photographer for my branding photo shoot were not edited. 

[00:06:26] It was literally hundreds of photos that they took. We took them at my house. We took them out in the neighborhood. We took them in my backyard, but they were just really nice professional photos of myself, my products, my family.

[00:06:40] And, had gotten some tips on wearing certain colors, whatever the colors were of my brand, that was what was in the photos. 

[00:06:46] Those things brought like a cohesive aesthetic to all of my social media feeds, but it wasn't like it was super expensive. 

[00:06:52] That's what I'm talking about. And I have a DSLR gosh, what do you call it? A Canon camera. And, some people might think, oh, that's really expensive.

[00:06:59] Cause it was like 500. Photographers are gonna listen to that and laugh, right? Because their cameras are thousands of dollars. 

[00:07:05] And even your cell phone cameras are so great now. If someone knows how to take a photo that could work too. 

[00:07:11] There's a way to do this on the less expensive side. 

[00:07:15] And even starting out 100 or 200 for a photo shoot is a big win for a brand new photographer. And it's a huge win for a business owner.

[00:07:23] And just grow from there. All right, off my soapbox there. 

Building Topical Authority with Surfer

[00:07:26] Crystal Waddell: So we also talked about like building, topical authority. 

[00:07:29] And I use surfer. I love surfer. I just told the SEO squad today. I was like, I'm such a blogging cheater because I use surfer. 

[00:07:37] Like surfer does all of the hard work for you. Like all the stuff about keyword research and search intent and analyzing the SERPs and all that type of stuff.

[00:07:44] I'm like, look, I love. I love all that. I really do. And I'm glad that I know what I know, so I can at least review it to make sure that it makes sense. 

[00:07:51] But I love the fact that Surfer does so much of the legwork for me. And so I depend on Surfer a lot for those types of things. 

[00:07:59] But there was a couple of articles that, you know, when I was, preparing for this episode that I'm not sure that Surfer had presented to me.

[00:08:07] And one of them was trends in senior photography.

[00:08:10] And I had done something like that a few years ago. And a spin on it would be trends In senior photography that included pictures of my props from photographers that I work with or that have purchased from me. 

[00:08:24] So I like that idea because that brings it more bottom of funnel versus just these are trends, I want it to be trends with photo props from collage and wood.

[00:08:32] That's what makes it a little bit more like a better use of time. 

[00:08:35] And, maybe even I could do that as a collection, like trending photo props for seniors, blah, blah, blah, that, that actually, I like that idea. I'm probably going to do that. 

[00:08:44] And then there was something else that was suggested, which I had thought about before, which was interviews with photographers.

[00:08:49] That would be a great way for me to, build relationships with the photographers that we work with and just find out like how they're using the props, what the seniors are saying about them. Some of the pros of using them inside versus outside and, just a real fun way to do it.

[00:09:04] Honest conversation about what it's like to use the props and what the experience is like for the senior and their families. 

[00:09:11] And you know what they think about the finished product. So I like that idea as well. That's another, bottom of funnel relationship building, brand building idea that is going to make, Super helpful content on my website. But also help me with those relationships.

[00:09:24] I thought those were some really great ideas. And I got those from chat GPT when I was, analyzing the transcript to do the follow through episode. 

Social SEO and Owned Asset Optimization

[00:09:32] Crystal Waddell: Oh, another thing that Steven talked about was social SEO. 

[00:09:36] And I love how so many of our guests, crisscross with each other because Jonas Stickler from Terakeet came on and presented the idea of owned asset optimization, which I have always believed in and the concept behind it is that you start with your website.

[00:09:52] First. You create assets, owned assets, and then you distribute them in a strategic way across the Internet. And when Steven was talking about social SEO, I thought, wow, isn't that amazing? Because it's yeah, we're If you know this month, my business goal is to sell more senior photo props, right?

[00:10:10] Social media is the fastest way to get what you sell in front of people at a particular time they're ready to buy. Okay. That's facts. Like I'm advertising also works. But if you're doing it organically, it makes sense to use social media for that. 

[00:10:24] But if you have a strong SEO strategy. 

[00:10:27] And you've created these owned assets- which, the product photos and the brand photos. Those are owned assets! 

[00:10:32] So obviously we can use those brand photos on our social media. 

[00:10:37] But when it's time for people to start taking senior photo prop or senior pictures, and they need a senior photo prop, that's the perfect time to just put those bad boys out there and let the world know that, Hey.

[00:10:48] I got your senior photo props! 

[00:10:50] So I do use Pinterest for this as well. But Pinterest is more like SEO in the fact that you've got to be more prepared, put it out in advance. And so I try to, unless it's absolutely trending and I can, hit it right then. I always try to Beat the trend by three months.

[00:11:06] And then if it's trending, then I'll try to do something right away. 

[00:11:10] But it all starts from having those owned assets already available to you. 

[00:11:14] So that you're more proactive in how you're marketing versus reacting to the trends that are in front of you. 

[00:11:20] Super excited about that. Loved how that intersected with the owned optimization concept.

[00:11:25] And then I guess the very last thing. 

Prioritizing User Trust Signals

[00:11:29] Crystal Waddell: Was this idea that Steven talked about with prioritizing user trust signals. 

[00:11:34] Think the words that he used was, implementing the E-E-A-T acronym from Google. 

[00:11:39] Which is experience expertise, authority, and trustworthiness, right? What does that mean though?

[00:11:45] You know what I mean? It's okay, we got to have EEAT. 

[00:11:47] Here are some very specific things that demonstrate EEAT. So you could create this as a checklist for yourself for each page. 

[00:11:54] And I did this, like I have an SEO checklist that I give to the SEO squad, and I updated it with these things.

[00:12:00] So first of all, customer reviews. Social proof. Okay, having that on the page is such an important indicator of trust and of expertise and experience. 

[00:12:14] You could highlight your commitment to quality and customer satisfaction. And then also having a detailed about page.

[00:12:19] I took this idea, I think, from Matt Diamante when he was on. 

[00:12:24] We were having a friendly discussion about pages. And he was making the case that he uses his social media more as an about page. 

[00:12:32] And, people already know about him from social media. 

[00:12:36] But In case they didn't. Or in case they need reassurance that they're in the right spot.

[00:12:41] He also had an about section on his homepage. And so I did that as well with collage and wood and with simple and smart seo. 

[00:12:49] So it just reassures people that if they're doing a brand search and they end up on your home page. Because they know who you are and they're trying to find you. 

[00:12:55] That they see a familiar face and they're like, yes. This is the person i'm looking for i'm in the right spot.

[00:13:00] So I love the fact that Steven gave us some specific action items where we can implement EEAT on our website. 

[00:13:06] So another SEO that I want to give a shout out to is Freddie Chatt. 

[00:13:09] He's always posting, e commerce SEO tips on LinkedIn. I just love it. But one of the best tips that he gave and I was able to share with the squad. 

[00:13:16] Is that people often search for your name plus reviews. 

[00:13:20] In my particular situation, that would be Collage and Wood reviews.

[00:13:24] And so rather than, hide those reviews on product pages or whatever. 

[00:13:29] I put reviews in my header menu. And so that way when people are looking for social proof and reassurance that they can trust this website to deliver on what they're looking for. They can easily find reviews right away.

[00:13:42] And there's a whole page of reviews that is populated by my review provider. 

[00:13:47] That's been really great. And it also ranks! 

[00:13:49] If people are looking up Collage and Wood reviews, I now have a page that ranks for that. 

[00:13:54] Those are just a couple of actual ways that you can, implement that E.E.A.T acronym on your website. So yeah, lots that we covered there. 

[00:14:03] Lots of fun stuff, I've just loved seeing all of it come together and understanding like why it works. 

[00:14:07] These different pieces have been implemented. But when you step back and see the whole picture, it's like, Oh, that's why it works.

[00:14:12] Yeah, I hope that helps a little bit. I hope that there's. At least one thing you can take away to do for your own site, because remember, that's the goal.

[00:14:19] If you did one thing this week. That means you would do four things this month that would improve your SEO and visibility online.

[00:14:27] And letting people know, that you exist. And that you're out there on the internet ready to serve them.

[00:14:32] So try to pick one thing from today. Implement it right away. And when you do, or if you have any questions about it, please send me a text message. 

[00:14:39] There's a link in the show notes. You can also send me an email at hello at simple and smart SEO. 

[00:14:45] And if you like this type of thing and you're like, enjoy like talking about it and thinking about how you could use it in your business. 

[00:14:51] But you want like some peer feedback and you like being a part of, Like a necessary mastermind, but just a group of people who are working on, similar goals together.

[00:15:00] I definitely want to invite you to join the SEO squad. It's open. It's 48 a month. And you essentially have an SEO in your pocket, which is me. 

[00:15:09] And we meet every Wednesday right now. It's at 10 a. m. Eastern. 

[00:15:12] And yeah it's just a great time for us to talk about our businesses. Talk about our websites, talk about our goals. 

[00:15:19] And really implement strategies that are going to help us reach those business goals.

[00:15:23] So we'd love to have you in the squad. And love to hear from you to see how you're implementing some of these ideas. 

[00:15:29] I'm Cheering for you and yeah, just remember, keep moving forward.