Spoiler: SEO Success Is Trial and Error with Holly Homer

This week I'm interviewing Holly Homer, co-founder of PageWheel and the creative force behind KidsActivities.com.

Episode Highlights:

• Introduction to Holly Homer: Holly shares her remarkable journey from starting one of the first mom blogs to creating a sustainable business that supports her family.
• Streamlining Digital Product Creation: Discover how PageWheel can generate sales pages, thank you pages, delivery emails, and social media content, reducing the time and effort needed for digital marketing.
• SEO Strategies and Opt-in Benefits: Holly explains the critical role of structured content and opt-ins in building and controlling web traffic, enhancing user experience, and improving search engine rankings.
• Editorial Calendar Best Practices: Get practical tips on creating and managing an editorial calendar to ensure your content remains timely, relevant, and engaging.
• Maximizing Email Engagement: Learn Holly's effective strategies for maintaining a highly engaged email list, driving repeat traffic, and maximizing the value of your email subscribers.
• Internal Linking and Content Optimization: Understand the importance of internal linking to improve user navigation and boost SEO performance, along with tips on updating and optimizing old content.

Resources Mentioned:

• PageWheel: Visit PageWheel for a comprehensive tool that streamlines digital product creation.
• KidsActivities.com: Explore Holly’s blog for a plethora of fun and educational activities for kids.

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Chapters

• 0:00 this is all just trial and error.
• 0:52 Introduction to Holly Homer and Her Journey
• 1:40 The Birth of PageWheel
• 2:15 Streamlining Digital Product Creation
• 3:16 Challenges and Solutions in Funnel Building
• 3:45 SEO Strategies and Opt-in Benefits
• 16:13 Building and Utilizing an Editorial Calendar
• 19:06 Maximizing Email Engagement
• 19:29 Strategic Email Planning
• 19:53 Optimizing Old Content
• 20:31 Content Strategy for Seasonal Posts
• 21:48 Using Google and Pinterest for Insights
• 23:49 Internal Linking Strategies
• 28:06 Leveraging PageWheel for Opt-ins
• 28:49 Creating and Managing Digital Products
• 32:07 Evolution and Integration of AI in PageWheel
• 34:17 Simplifying Tech for Small Businesses
• 34:57 The Importance of Keeping It Simple
• 35:27 Customer Feedback and Product Improvement
• 36:45 Final Thoughts and Contact Information

Transcript

[00:00:00] Holly Homer: this is all just trial and error. And just doing something every day over many, many years. 

[00:00:06] I always laugh and say i'm like last vlogger standing. 

[00:00:08] Which I feel like they're gonna totally give me a trophy for at some point. 

[00:00:12] It really is just about being persistent in your business. Even though A lot of days we don't even know what that looks like.

[00:00:20] Like, ah! Okay, I'm going to do this because I don't know what else to do today. 

[00:00:23] And that opens doors that on the internet that is just like unbelievable. 

[00:00:29] It's crazy what you can build if you just, Put a Lego brick in every day. 

[00:00:33] Crystal Waddell: Welcome to the third season of the Simple and Smart SEO Show. The podcast dedicated to empathy driven, brand building SEO. I'm your host, Crystal Waddell. I leverage my obsession with user experience to help business owners just like you optimize your website with confidence. 

[00:00:48] Thank you so much for being here.

[00:00:50] Let's jump into another great episode.

Introduction to Holly Homer and Her Journey

[00:00:52] Crystal Waddell: Welcome back to the Simple and Smart SEO Show podcast. We are with a brainy business owner, Miss Holly Homer. 

[00:01:00] And she is going to tell us all about her new product and streamlining digital product production. But Holly is co founder of PageWheel. 

[00:01:11] And she has also been a blogger for a decade or more.

[00:01:14] So Holly, welcome to the show. I'm so excited to hear all about you and your business adventures. 

[00:01:21] Holly Homer: Thank you so much. And yes, it's actually longer than a decade. It's two decades. 

[00:01:26] 20 years ago, I accidentally started one of the first mom blogs. 

[00:01:30] So that over the years has turned into what now supports my family. Which is a blog, kidsactivities. com. 

[00:01:38] And and I run a few other sites. 

The Birth of PageWheel

[00:01:40] Holly Homer: And then in the last two years, co founded PageWheel. 

[00:01:43] Which is a digital product maker.

[00:01:44] Basically, make a product and because we know what you made in there. 

[00:01:49] It will write your sales page, thank you page, your delivery emails and all the social media you need to promote it. 

[00:01:55] It's all done with AI. In a way that AI actually does something, like, productive. Instead of just talks to you.

[00:02:02] And so I'm really excited about it cause it solved a problem that I had like significant problem that I 

[00:02:07] Crystal Waddell: had. 

[00:02:07] I do use my little AI assistants as, therapy . 

[00:02:12] But it is good to know that this business tool could be used for business. 

Streamlining Digital Product Creation

[00:02:15] Crystal Waddell: I'm super excited to hear about it.

[00:02:17] Over the last year, I've dove into some digital product conversations. 

[00:02:22] And I joined a launch with other digital product sellers. 

[00:02:26] I was speaking about SEO, but I realized, I really am interested in the digital product space. 

[00:02:32] Because that's so attractive to make something one time. 

[00:02:36] And then sell it over and over again.

[00:02:38] Is that what your product helps people do? 

[00:02:41] Holly Homer: Yes, absolutely. It can be from simple to more complex. But simplest, application that we see, and I use every day. 

[00:02:47] Is you can make let's say you need to opt in. And hey, I need an opt in for this podcast. 

[00:02:52] And like before, that was like super daunting. 

[00:02:54] Like you had to create something. 

[00:02:56] And then like the landing pages. And the funnels. And all these things. 

[00:02:59] And so now like you could go in make a simple checklist. And we know you made that checklist. 

[00:03:04] So it's going to automatically run those other pages. And you can go through and make edits if you want to. 

[00:03:09] Or if you Like the way that it looks you can just like Keep saying yes.

[00:03:12] That looks great. And so you could actually launch that in just a few minutes. 

Challenges and Solutions in Funnel Building

[00:03:16] Holly Homer: The other thing that, you know, what if you wanted to sell something?

[00:03:19] Or let's say you wanted to sell that one page checklist. 

[00:03:21] With maybe a video series on that supports it. So you could like, charge $50. 

[00:03:27] Just change the price. And then go add some videos to that thank you page. 

[00:03:31] Because no one's going to see that unless they've paid you or opted in.

[00:03:34] So there's so many different ways to go about this. 

[00:03:37] Whether it's about the digital product. 

[00:03:40] Or maybe the knowledge that you're going to share with the digital product as a kind of a sideline. 

SEO Strategies and Opt-in Benefits

[00:03:45] Crystal Waddell: So what's interesting to me is normally we're talking about optimization on the front end. To get people to our website. 

[00:03:53] And what we're talking about now is like the types of things that you do once people have arrived at your website, but you want them to now take another action.

[00:04:04] Holly Homer: Yeah. 

[00:04:05] And, I would say the the other thing is I actually started with the opt in situation because of SEO. 

[00:04:13] So think about this. Like we know Google loves to find the best resource. 

[00:04:19] Obviously a good title. A good context. A good, good description. 

[00:04:24] Alt text, captions, headers, all these things.

[00:04:27] And then, we found oh, Google really likes structure. 

[00:04:30] Oh, so let's add numbers. 

[00:04:32] And let's add, different elements that Google's oh, I know what that is. 

[00:04:35] Recipe cards, how to cards. Those kind of things. 

[00:04:38] I feel like, the game gets upleveled every few years. 

[00:04:41] Because oh, we all figure this out. And then we're all competing for that front page. 

[00:04:45] Jockeying for those coveted positions at the top.

[00:04:48] And so then you start saying, okay. Oh, make sure mine has a video. 

[00:04:52] Because that confirms to Google that yes. She's talking about what she said. 

[00:04:57] And oh, she has additional information. 

[00:04:59] And oh, she has a, not only is it in text and in a card. 

[00:05:01] But it's also in video. 

[00:05:03] And I started doing like PDFs type, files within those top ranked posts. As an additional resource. 

[00:05:11] So if they liked it in video and they liked it in text and they liked it here. 

[00:05:15] They might like it in printable form. 

[00:05:17] And so and what I found was the more and more You know assets that I was putting into those posts. The better the search results. 

[00:05:26] Which makes sense because google in the end Wants to send those people to the best on the internet. For whatever they're searching. 

[00:05:34] So if you can take them on that journey a lot of times, you know You Because it's been so labor intensive, people have been skipping that checklist. 

[00:05:42] It occurred to me one of my top posts several years ago was, like, a hundred things you should throw out today. Or donate to charity, let's be clear.

[00:05:51] But, the big catch was, like, you don't need these things.

[00:05:54] And then there's no checklist. 

[00:05:56] I mean like there's literally no checklist in that post. 

[00:05:58] It was a very popular post. It was like what a missed opportunity. 

[00:06:02] Because someone's all in saying Yeah, I need to get rid of these things.

[00:06:05] But what are they gonna do? Carry around my like my blog post? 

[00:06:08] And that was one of the first things. 

[00:06:09] I was like, okay. Let's make a pdf so that they can actually put it on the clipboard and check it off. 

[00:06:14] And so that mentality has been with me Like, literally, when I have something that's doing really well with Google, my next step is: what asset can I add to that? 

[00:06:25] That's going to keep me on that front page or elevate me to that front page?

[00:06:30] Crystal Waddell: Ooh, I just, I love that so much. 

[00:06:32] That's such a smart way to reflect upon it. And then you just keep going.

[00:06:37] I was just talking to somebody in my small group yesterday.

[00:06:40] I have a small group called the SEO squad. 

[00:06:43] Where I meet with business owners every week and we talk about their websites. 

[00:06:47] I troubleshoot everything. Like whether it's Wix, Shopify.

[00:06:50] WordPress, whatever. 

[00:06:51] And that's another place people get stuck because it's I don't know all of the whatever's. 

[00:06:56] And I'm like, look, I may not know it, but I will help you work through it. You know what I mean? 

[00:07:00] And sometimes that's just what somebody needs.

[00:07:01] They just need somebody to walk with them through it. 

[00:07:04] Being able to look back and say, okay. This is what my person needs, but then how to deliver it? 

[00:07:10] That gets really complicated. 

[00:07:11] So I'm assuming that this is a place where paid will can come in and help you deliver that.

[00:07:16] Is that part of the process? 

[00:07:18] Holly Homer: Absolutely. 

[00:07:19] I had started just adding opt ins to kids activities blog. 

[00:07:23] Partially because it was an asset to those posts that I needed google to find. And send me traffic. 

[00:07:29] Because I monetize through traffic only on kids activities blog for the most part. And so, I need that traffic. 

[00:07:35] So that so like the seo is important. 

[00:07:37] But then I realized, I gated all of my PDFs with an email opt in.

[00:07:42] And then I'm getting them on my list, and then I control the traffic. And that's what's so beautiful about an email list is when you have the email list you control the traffic. 

[00:07:53] So then You can think about this in the respects of like social proof to Google. 

[00:08:00] So let's say you have just published a post that you know is going to be like an ultra competitive market. 

[00:08:08] But you can send 3, 000 visits from your email list today.

[00:08:14] Like you can see how that's going to affect your Google ranking really, really quickly. 

[00:08:20] Cause it's not like you just launched that and said, Hey Google, come find it. You're like, Hey Google. 

[00:08:25] You need to find this because other people already like it. Like I have people coming from pinterest. 

[00:08:30] I have people coming from facebook.

[00:08:32] I have people coming from my email list. But quite honestly I can't always depend on the algorithms of the social media networks. 

[00:08:39] Like I can put the best pin in the world up and it doesn't deliver traffic until 18 months later. Or on facebook, They might just say yeah, we're not sending traffic today. 

[00:08:48] But your email list that you control. They're your people.

[00:08:52] Because they opted in to your list and they're on your list. They'll come. 

[00:08:57] Crystal Waddell: Wow. 

[00:08:57] That, that just kind of like made my mind explode because you always think about, yeah, you need to be sending people to your blog posts and your weekly content or dah, dah, dah, or whatever.

[00:09:07] But to actually have a reason that it shows Google that all of these people are going there. 

[00:09:12] I never thought about that as a signal to a search engine to say, this is really popular and dot, dot, dot.

[00:09:19] That's really interesting. I never thought about it that way. And I think one of the things I wanted to touch on earlier was that.

[00:09:25] SEO is only the tip of the iceberg. You know what I mean? It's like the initial thing to get people to your site. 

[00:09:31] And then it's okay, then what? Like the conversion, how do we do the nurturing? 

[00:09:36] And so I'm just curious, do you have just riffing off the top of your head, like client journey, mapping best practices that you do to make all of these things work together? 

[00:09:49] Holly Homer: Yeah. 

[00:09:49] I would love to tell you that it is drawn out in graphs and things, but no. I like, literally wing this on a daily basis. 

[00:09:56] And then I am a huge numbers girl. 

[00:09:59] So like, I will throw like all the spaghetti at the wall. And then I'm going to go look at my analytics and see what stuck and what didn't.

[00:10:07] And then my whole business is built on doing more of what works and doing less of what doesn't. 

[00:10:13] So for instance. When somebody comes into my email list, I am going to email the heck out of them. 

[00:10:20] They're going to get at least a daily email, if not two. Every day. Until they just unsubscribe from my list and why?

[00:10:27] Because I don't want them on my list if they have not bought into the whole kids activities thing. 

[00:10:33] And if they have bought into the kids activities, I solve a problem for that every day. 

[00:10:37] Because i'm sending them basically a social media feed of ideas. 

[00:10:42] In my email, I'm going to send them links to something for everyone on that list.

[00:10:46] You're going to have things to do with your preschooler. 

[00:10:48] You're going to have something to cook tonight. 

[00:10:50] You're going to have something, a way to organize your house. Basically, all things mom is going to arrive in your inbox at least once a day. 

[00:10:57] And so I'm solving the problem of if they didn't have time to go scroll endlessly through Facebook today. I just, I know who you are.

[00:11:07] I know like you have kids. I know that you're busy. Let me solve those problems for you. 

[00:11:13] So I monetize through traffic coming back from, from the email list and other places, of course.

[00:11:18] But then I'm also able to know, okay. 

[00:11:21] They really like, potty training. 

[00:11:24] Or a segment of them, might really like potty training. 

[00:11:27] I know, because i've been in this market for 20 years. I know the best potty training like potty train in a weekend by becky mansfield. Best on the market. 

[00:11:35] So i'm going to put that out to the people who are potty training and say hey! I know your pain point.

[00:11:42] I have three boys. Totally understand how your life is really hard right now. 

[00:11:46] Here, let this weekend product, which is very inexpensive. For the amount of relief it's going to cause you your house. 

[00:11:54] We'll solve it. 

[00:11:55] And so, it's a natural fit. Because they know me through my content. 

[00:12:00] They know that if I said it i'm not just going to throw something out there just to make a buck. 

[00:12:05] I'm going to be like no, this is a pain point for me. 

[00:12:07] And this solved it. So let me help you solve it too.

[00:12:09] Crystal Waddell: So essentially you have curated Resources and solutions for people. And so then you can recommend them consistently. 

[00:12:19] Even to the new people that come in. 

[00:12:22] Holly Homer: Exactly. And, and you think about something like potty training is a, is a really good example. They might come into my list because they like found my, activities to do with your babies.

[00:12:31] So they're not thinking potty training. 

[00:12:33] Like they don't even know what is ahead of them. And so they are on my list They're on my list. They're on my list. 

[00:12:38] And all of a sudden they have 18 month old and they're like, oh my goodness. I didn't know that this was going to be a challenge. 

[00:12:44] And so that's when so these things that are cyclical. And evergreen. 

[00:12:49] And then let's think about the holidays. 

[00:12:50] What can I make to give my teacher? You know for teacher appreciation?

[00:12:54] Like these are just elements in every single parent's life. Or caregivers, grandparents. Whoever's taking care of these kids has these pain points. 

[00:13:04] And so not only do we have free content that solves these issues. 

[00:13:08] But we also have like that second level, Affiliated products. 

[00:13:12] Our own products. Whatever it takes. 

[00:13:15] And i'm with you, we mentioned before we came on. 

[00:13:17] Is that you're like, hey if I find an affiliated product and I don't have my own. 

[00:13:21] Like I would like I don't want to reinvent the wheel if I could just make money from something that I really believe in. 

[00:13:27] And I know is better than what I could do myself. Or it would take me a million years to do it.

[00:13:31] So that, so a lot of times it's things that I used. 

[00:13:34] And my kids are like all in college now. So sometimes I have to go with recommendations of People of today. 

[00:13:39] But if you find something amazing. And you're solving that problem for someone. 

[00:13:43] And they have that problem. And you're like, hey this amazing thing solved that problem. 

[00:13:47] It's not even about sales at this point.

[00:13:49] It's about it's a really good match. And they're like, thank you! 

[00:13:53] Just like your best friend would be like, Why were you withholding the best potty training product that costs $21? 

[00:14:00] Crystal Waddell: And this is really interesting because when you were talking about, like you're sending these two emails a day. 

[00:14:05] How do you create that feed? That consistently pushes out that email?

[00:14:10] Holly Homer: Yeah. We do it by hand. We write those emails every day. 

[00:14:13] On kids activities blog, I really use the front page of my blog as a social media feed. So we're publishing eight to 10 times a day. 

[00:14:23] So it's like a coloring page. A fact sheet. Something organized. Something for parents. 

[00:14:27] It's basically what I think you're going to want today. 

[00:14:31] Or here's a holiday coming up or here's the eclipse. 

[00:14:34] Or here's the next thing that you need to think about. 

[00:14:36] Here's teacher appreciation day.

[00:14:38] Here's a hundred days of school. All these different things that I have on my editorial calendar. 

[00:14:43] Because I've been in this space since the dinosaurs roamed the internet. 

[00:14:47] Is that, they don't have to go out and search for it. Because I know that's what you need today.

[00:14:52] You know why I know that? Because you needed it last year at this time. 

[00:14:56] And you need the year before at this time. And so thinking about how you're serving your readers on an editorial calendar. 

[00:15:04] And then because it's on the editorial calendar, it's going out into the email. It's also going out to Pinterest.

[00:15:09] It's going out to Facebook. It's going out to all the things because we know In this time period, this is what you need. 

[00:15:16] Crystal Waddell: Wow. Okay. So we just jumped from SEO, bringing people to the site. 

[00:15:21] To, having a great opt in that gets them on your list. 

[00:15:25] To then having an editorial calendar that meets their needs and where they're at.

[00:15:30] You've had years and years of experience to build this. 

[00:15:32] And I want to say your site is beautiful. 

[00:15:34] Because when I think of affiliate websites. And you say you monetize through visitors. 

[00:15:39] I'm expecting to see like a bunch of ads everywhere from start to finish.

[00:15:43] And so like your homepage is beautiful. It doesn't feel congested with ads and that type of stuff. 

[00:15:48] So kudos to you. That's really awesome. 

Building and Utilizing an Editorial Calendar

[00:15:50] Crystal Waddell: But when you're just starting out, like, how do you make that editorial calendar? 

[00:15:54] Are there some big things that you should do first? And then fill things in?

[00:15:58] Or, is there a strategy there that might help us? 

[00:16:01] Holly Homer: Yeah. And here again, we don't want to overthink this. 

[00:16:04] So like what you're going to do probably the first year. 

[00:16:07] Or it might even be in the first couple of years. 

[00:16:09] Depending on how like aggressive you're like creating content. 

[00:16:13] Is like you go ahead and set up a Google sheet.

[00:16:17] And so you're just going to put, Hey, I wrote to make a paper plate koala today. 

[00:16:22] And so you're going to put the link. 

[00:16:24] And you're going to put your date that you published it. 

[00:16:26] Because when you write, you don't know this, but you're on an editorial calendar. 

[00:16:31] Because you're thinking, Oh, like the, okay teacher appreciation is coming up. 

[00:16:35] Let's write something for teacher appreciation. 

[00:16:37] Or end of school. Or, the next thing is mother's day and father's day. Let's do that content. 

[00:16:42] And you made that in April. Because it made sense for the internet, to publish in April. 

[00:16:48] So what you're going to do is put that on your April editorial calendar. 

[00:16:52] So you're just going to keep track of whatever content you make this year. 

[00:16:56] And then at the end of the year you're going to duplicate that sheet. And put the next year at the top.

[00:17:03] So when April comes around, again, you realize, oh. 

[00:17:08] I wrote these in April for a reason. 

[00:17:10] Let's go ahead, and make sure that they're updated for this April. 

[00:17:15] And if you're anything like me, that early content you write when you see it again, you're like cringing. 

[00:17:21] What was I thinking? When I wrote this? 

[00:17:24] And so Go ahead and update it! Make it better.

[00:17:27] You've learned since you wrote it! So so write it out push it out again to your email list. 

[00:17:33] To your social media, to your pinterest, all the things! 

[00:17:36] And then this year... 

[00:17:37] so you have all the stuff you made last year. This year, you're going to write new stuff. 

[00:17:41] So you can see how the first year, you might be publishing once or twice or three times a week. 

[00:17:46] The next year you might be in effect publishing every day. 

[00:17:51] Because. You have this other content that you are you already know is appropriate. And your people like it. 

[00:17:57] And then the next year you can see how you're just layering in. 

[00:18:01] So the first year is more about just doing it. The second year is more about filling in the gaps a little bit. 

[00:18:07] And then the third year you're gonna start thinking about, what am I missing?

[00:18:11] If I'm known for kids activities, what would a mom expect today from me? That I'm not delivering on? 

[00:18:19] And so that's where every year it just gets a little bit deeper. 

[00:18:23] Gone is the day that you write the blog post a really good blog post and then never look at it again. That's just waste of your time.

[00:18:32] Go in and optimize it. Go in and repin it. Go in and reshare it. Go put it in your email three times this month. If it was something really good that solves a problem, look at the data. 

Maximizing Email Engagement

[00:18:43] Holly Homer: Only 30 percent of those people are even opening that email at any given time, so make sure you put it in three times so at least you can hit hopefully close to 90 by the time you, like that month is over and that content is out of date.

[00:18:56] Crystal Waddell: Gosh, that's fantastic. And just recently someone reached out to me to help me with my email. 

[00:19:02] And I use Klaviyo for my email service provider. 

Strategic Email Planning

[00:19:06] Crystal Waddell: I actually have what you just described. 

[00:19:09] I never had a fancy name for it or whatever. 

[00:19:10] But it was like my strategic plan that I had broken down by weeks and every month or whatever.

[00:19:15] But, somewhere along the way, I just ran out of time to implement it. 

[00:19:19] This also answers the question of when to go back and optimize. 

[00:19:23] And just having this calendar in place. And this process in place to continually update that information. 

Optimizing Old Content

[00:19:30] Crystal Waddell: And just like you said, you might have a great blog post from two years ago, but guess what? 

[00:19:34] Now you can make it even better by having that PDF. 

[00:19:37] Or making a video. Or, including like user generated content or whatever might have happened in that time period.

[00:19:43] These are just such wonderful examples of okay, you get people to your website. Because you want to sell your thing or sell your service. 

[00:19:51] But you can make it even better by then showing the next group of people how other people have used your product or service. Or how you've made it better.

[00:19:59] And then you can send it out to your email. All of this is really just landing like in context of one another. So thank you so much for sharing that. 

[00:20:07] Holly Homer: Yeah. 

Content Strategy for Seasonal Posts

[00:20:08] Holly Homer: And It really. It is simplified. 

[00:20:09] Because the truth is, on Kids Activities. 

[00:20:12] At one point, I counted, we had 350 Halloween posts.

[00:20:16] Okay. No blog in the world needs 350 Halloween posts. 

[00:20:21] Maybe if you're a Halloween only site. 

[00:20:24] It's partially because we weren't cultivating the best. Updating. We were just making new. Every year. 

[00:20:31] Make new. And without strategy. 

[00:20:34] Kids activities blog has 13, 000 blog posts on it.

[00:20:37] So I'm dealing with a lot of content. 

[00:20:39] Depending on how much stuff you have, you're going to be dealing with different ideas. And like levels of prioritization. 

[00:20:45] So now what I do to say, okay. I have basically 30 days of Halloween content. 

[00:20:52] That I need to push out to my people to serve them the best.

[00:20:56] I need to come up with the best from that pool. And you know who usually tells me the best? Google. 

[00:21:03] Google knows which of those is good posts and which is bad. Now, I might disagree with them every once in a while. 

[00:21:09] And so I would go back. And maybe try to optimize something I think Google should like. And sometimes they'll totally fix it.

[00:21:16] Crystal Waddell: Yeah. So that was my question. When you say Google tells you, is it just by, page views? Or clicks? Or that type of thing? And how does Google tell you that? 

Using Google and Pinterest for Insights

[00:21:25] Holly Homer: You could do this through Google analytics. 

[00:21:27] Search console is a really good place to find a lot of this data.

[00:21:31] I might go to search console and type in Halloween as a keyword. 

[00:21:35] And see what are my top Google posts as far as Halloween. 

[00:21:39] I'd also maybe go to Pinterest and see what are my top Pinterest Halloween because that doesn't always correspond. 

[00:21:45] A lot of times it does. 

[00:21:47] You think about like, where is the data?

[00:21:50] So if if Google's Hey, here's your top 30 halloween content, I'm going to go through and make sure doubly make sure. 

[00:21:58] That those are in the best place for Google. 

[00:22:01] They're linked together. That they have the resources and stuff like that, that they need. 

[00:22:06] So each year I'm going to go in and look at those and say, Hey, did any of these fall out of that top 30?

[00:22:12] Do I have new ones in the top 30 I didn't have before? 

[00:22:15] The other thing I look at besides just the data. 

[00:22:18] My core mission to my website. 

[00:22:22] Is that someone can come find something to do with their kid. And not have to visit the store first. 

[00:22:28] So if I look at some of these crafts that maybe were published like 10 years ago. 

[00:22:34] That like they just they were a really good idea. But they weren't necessarily executed. 

[00:22:39] And if you look at your old content, it's so funny.

[00:22:41] It's like There's not even instructions on this. It's just like a picture and a, a story. 

[00:22:46] So like I might update that with a tutorial. And maybe make a video or update the photos. 

[00:22:51] Or make that idea like fresh again. And current. 

[00:22:56] And then you know what's really interesting about that? 

[00:22:58] Because that URL has been taking up real estate on the internet for so long. 

[00:23:03] A lot of times Google's like, Thank God! We've been trying to send people to that, but it's so bad.

[00:23:09] The funny thing is it's a lot of times those posts that you might update with your like logical brain today. 

[00:23:16] Versus what you just wrote, several years ago. It often will catch Google's attention in a way that you couldn't do even a new post. 

[00:23:24] Crystal Waddell: Wow. That's so interesting. 

Internal Linking Strategies

[00:23:26] Crystal Waddell: And then you mentioned like internal linking. 

[00:23:29] And, linking those posts together.

[00:23:32] How do you do that? 

[00:23:33] Do you do it by images? Do you do it by like the bottom of the page? Like just a bunch of different article links? Or how do you do that internal linking for the top 30 pages? 

[00:23:43] Holly Homer: So I'm an internal linking junkie. So I might need some sort of therapy for this.

[00:23:48] But this is my thought process. 

[00:23:50] Is I've been on the internet. My domain ranking is decent. 

[00:23:54] To the point where I get, 50 emails a day asking to buy links on my site. But the truth is they want links from any site. So no, even if you started your blog today. 

[00:24:04] The strategy is going to work for you. Because internal linking is something you control.

[00:24:09] I feel like if you write something and put it out there. And it's been out there for a while and you didn't even link to it. 

[00:24:17] Google's like, you didn't even like it. So it's a quality signal to Google. 

[00:24:23] So let's say we're doing a paper plate craft.

[00:24:26] I have I don't know, 150 paper plate crafts on the site. 

[00:24:30] Guess what? 

[00:24:31] If you come and arrive and you're thinking okay, I have a stack of paper plates. And I have some crayons, and I have some glue. 

[00:24:38] But that's all I got. You hit that first one, and you're like, Oh, that has a thing I don't have.

[00:24:43] I don't have googly eyes today. Or I don't have yarn. So you're like. 

[00:24:46] But at the bottom, if I'm like, Hey! Here's 15 other paper plate crafts that you might like. 

[00:24:52] You as a user is gonna like oh, thank goodness. 

[00:24:55] Because like I don't have this stuff, but this looked really fun. 

[00:24:58] And I have 15 minutes to do with this, preschooler. And who i'm about to You know tear my hair out if we don't have something to do together. 

[00:25:06] And so then they're like, oh we'll click through this, click through this. 

[00:25:08] And so Google sees that the user is clicking through those links in a organic way. Saying, okay. 

[00:25:16] That wasn't what I was looking for. But instead of going back to google. And googling more paper plate crafts. 

[00:25:21] I'm keeping them on my site. 

[00:25:23] Sending them then in through the other ones I think they might like. 

[00:25:26] So, like my simple, paper plate crafts might be linked to my other simple paper plate crafts. 

[00:25:32] Whereas, my more complex crafts might be linked to my more complex crafts. 

[00:25:36] Or let's say you're doing like a letter A lesson with your preschooler. 

[00:25:41] So that you're going to come to find our letter A activities.

[00:25:45] And then I'm going to link to letter A coloring pages, letter A worksheets, more letter A crafts. 

[00:25:51] Like you can think about someone coming to that. One thought in mind. 

[00:25:55] But then thinking, oh! 

[00:25:56] If I can just print this free coloring page that also goes along with this lesson that we were going to do at home, so that my kid knows the letter a. That's a no brainer.

[00:26:06] Like I'm totally staying on. I'm totally in for that journey. So you talk about like that customer or that reader journey. 

[00:26:13] And a lot of times it's as simple as presenting what they might want next. And a lot of times those people are going to be a little bit different. 

[00:26:22] And that's why internal linking makes so much sense because.

[00:26:25] Like on that, that apple paper plate craft, I might say at the bottom. 

[00:26:31] Are you looking for more a crafts? Here's more. Here's an alligator craft. 

[00:26:36] Here's an airplane craft. 

[00:26:37] And then I might say, are you looking for other apple things? 

[00:26:41] Here's an apple snack. Here's an apple coloring page. 

[00:26:44] So like you can see as as People arrive at that, they may have come for different reasons. 

[00:26:51] And then you can take them on that next journey with those internal links below.

[00:26:56] And if you go to any post on Kids Activities Blog, you'll see. 

[00:26:59] A lot of times I just have a long linked list, or I have multiple linked lists based on what I think they might want to do next. 

[00:27:05] Crystal Waddell: Okay, we'll definitely link to that so that people can see the examples. 

[00:27:09] And it makes me just want to go back and have little kids! 

[00:27:11] Because I'm like, Oh, man, that I could have did with my son. 

[00:27:15] But I was just trying to survive at that point.

[00:27:17] See, these are survival activities. 

[00:27:20] Yeah, that's so great. 

[00:27:22] So when you look at your website that is so thorough. 

[00:27:26] And all of those, links and activities and everything together. 

[00:27:31] Does your product still serve a website like yours? Or is it more for the person who's I don't have any of that?

[00:27:39] I just need to get started. 

[00:27:40] Or, how would you connect those two products together? 

Leveraging PageWheel for Opt-ins

[00:27:43] Holly Homer: Yeah I love it for both. I use it every day. 

[00:27:46] And we're talking about PageWheel. 

[00:27:48] But I might use it in a little bit different way. Than you, coming in. 

[00:27:53] Maybe getting started with your email list.

[00:27:56] For instance, because like on kids activities blog I have about 2,000 opt ins. 

[00:28:02] So yeah, I know. 

[00:28:03] I started with one opt in box. Actually I started with zero. 

[00:28:07] So this is something that as you figure out what you want to do, it gets easier and easier over time. 

[00:28:12] If you have under 50 opt ins, you can use like your ConvertKit tools, PageWheel tools.

[00:28:17] If you have over 50, I think you probably are going to try to figure out some way to manage it. 

[00:28:21] Because it does get a little unwieldy. That's where I was. 

[00:28:23] So now, we invented PageWheel. 

Creating and Managing Digital Products

[00:28:26] Holly Homer: And it's so easy to create an opt in. Super easy. 

[00:28:29] So what I do is I make an opt in in PageWheel. So that I can add them to my site. 

[00:28:34] i'm going to download that opt in I made in PageWheel. 

[00:28:37] But the secret sauce here: i'm going to go ahead and allow it to create a sales page and a delivery page for me. 

[00:28:44] Because it creates these mock ups. 

[00:28:47] That i'm then going to screenshot. 

[00:28:49] And put them into the blog post or whatever.

[00:28:52] And I'm also going to grab some of the language created around that product. 

[00:28:57] And put it into my normal system. 

[00:29:00] So I'm making these things. And then pulling all the things I want out of it. 

[00:29:04] And then I might go run like, okay, give me some Pinterest descriptions, or whatever I need to promote it.

[00:29:10] So I'm taking that and putting it into my established system. 

[00:29:13] If you don't have an established system, it's going to just be easier for you to let PageWheel create that system. 

[00:29:20] And then you're going to leverage that system until you outgrow it. 

[00:29:23] Crystal Waddell: Yeah. 

[00:29:24] And so if you already have the system, then PageWheel is an amazing optimization tool.

[00:29:29] Holly Homer: Yes, yes. It's just going to save me a lot of time. And instead of me having to go to Canva and create something from scratch. 

[00:29:36] I go to PageWheel. 

[00:29:38] And create a PDF in just seconds. Because we have all these templates. 

[00:29:42] And it will add a cover. It will add an about me page, whatever you want. 

[00:29:46] Or, I do this all the time, too. 

[00:29:47] Maybe I have like an "a" coloring page. 

[00:29:49] So I'm going to upload that. And then i'm going to add maybe, like an "a" activity craft page. 

[00:29:55] So I might make a whole "a" booklet. 

[00:29:57] That I pulled in for maybe one pdf of mine and then use the templates already in PageWheel to create. 

[00:30:03] Maybe a 10 page book about hey, let's have fun with the letter a today! 

[00:30:07] And so then, I can just download that. 

[00:30:09] Put it into my existing system. 

[00:30:11] Grab those mockups and pictures that come in automatically from your sales page. 

[00:30:17] And some of that language.

[00:30:18] And so it's a lot easier for me than if I would be like, Oh. 

[00:30:21] I have to go make something from scratch today. 

[00:30:24] I'll be really, really like honest here. I didn't make my PDFs. I hired that out until PageWheel came up. 

[00:30:30] Crystal Waddell: Yeah. And it's interesting because remember I asked you earlier if it generated an image. And you're like, Oh no. It doesn't do that yet.

[00:30:36] But technically, for digital products. 

[00:30:39] Holly Homer: For digital products, it says, yeah. 

[00:30:41] So it doesn't create like the AI images. 

[00:30:44] Cause I don't think we're quite there on AI images. And we will work with that when it is possible. But what it does do is it knows what it looks like. 

[00:30:51] 'cause you designed it there. And so it puts it onto different mockups. 

[00:30:55] And fans out all the pages that you made behind the cover. So yes, in effect it does make images. Thank you for that. I hadn't even thought about that. 

[00:31:03] Crystal Waddell: Yeah. I'm thinking of the fact that like getting digital product images is a little bit of a bear. 

[00:31:08] Because if you go into Canva, you gotta have the graphics to pull into the digital mockups to see that array. Or the fan out of all of the pages. 

[00:31:15] So that's a huge value add for it to already be there. And to be able to screenshot it.

[00:31:20] Holly Homer: For those who are going to experiment with it. 

[00:31:22] So the cool thing is the sales page has a vertical image where the pages go up. And so they make really nice portrait, like a Pinterest pin. 

[00:31:31] Or a blog post image or something like that. And then on the thank you page, it's like a horizontal image where the cover and then all the pages out to the side. So that's better for Facebook. Or like anything that needs to be wider.

Evolution and Integration of AI in PageWheel

[00:31:44] Crystal Waddell: So you mentioned that when you first created Pagewheel, it started as a product that's a little bit different than it is now. 

[00:31:51] Can you tell us, why Pagewheel even came into existence? And, walk us through its evolution? 

[00:31:57] Holly Homer: Yeah. It was about two and a half years ago.

[00:31:59] Rachel Miller and I have a site together called One Crazy House. 

[00:32:03] It's like fun hacks, house hacks. Tips and tricks and stuff like that. So we were creating basically a series of products. That were category based. 

[00:32:12] So if you're on our cleaning product, we wanted to offer you a cleaning guide for, seven bucks. 

[00:32:17] Or, if you were on the camping articles, we wanted to offer you a camping guide for $7 or whatever.

[00:32:23] Like we're talking low ticket products. But thinking that, Hey. 

[00:32:26] We have all this content that's top of funnel for this. And so let's do this. 

[00:32:30] So I'm notoriously bad at like all the tech. Let's be clear. So Rachel was like, no, I'll build. 

[00:32:37] Cause she's really good at the tech side of things and the funnel building.

[00:32:40] So she was building this funnel. Which like takes, six hours or so hooking it up. 

[00:32:45] And then cloning it for all the different products. 

[00:32:48] And then I was doing the customer service on the other end. 

[00:32:51] And as you can imagine, if you've ever built one funnel, if one thing goes wrong. 

[00:32:55] It literally is this wild goose chase to go back and find. 

[00:32:59] And I was just like Rachel, this is stupid hard.

[00:33:02] And by the way, the expensive equipment. That we're using. 

[00:33:07] So like, we are $200 in a month on this. 

[00:33:11] Then we had a series of opt ins. Which was the thing same thing. Like why is this so hard? 

[00:33:16] And Rachel and I have been off and on partners for the last 15 years. 

[00:33:20] She was like, I think I can solve this for you... and we might as well solve it for everyone. Do you want to create a software that will do this? 

[00:33:27] And I'm like, yes. Yeah. 

[00:33:29] But, of course. I had no idea. What I was getting into. 

[00:33:35] And neither did she. And so we bootstrapped this thing over the last couple of years.

[00:33:40] And in the middle of it, AI became a thing. So we integrated AI behind the scenes. To help us create these templates. 

[00:33:49] But it took a little longer. And a few more dollars than we were expecting. 

[00:33:52] Crystal Waddell: Yeah, it's always like that. 

Simplifying Tech for Small Businesses

[00:33:54] Crystal Waddell: But I think it's really cool. 

[00:33:55] I started as an e commerce seller. So what I'm used to dealing with is product pages.

[00:34:00] So as I started learning about how other online business owners set up their business, that's when I learned about opt in pages. 

[00:34:07] And landing pages. 

[00:34:09] And landing pages really threw me for a loop for a while. 

[00:34:11] Because I was like, isn't it like a product page? 

[00:34:14] Why would I want to create all this?

[00:34:15] If I just want somebody to check out? 

[00:34:17] Shouldn't I just send them to my page to buy the thing? 

[00:34:19] Like I really struggled with that. So I can appreciate what you guys are doing. 

[00:34:24] Even one of the clients I work with. 

[00:34:26] They moved from having, these landing pages to just opening a Shopify store. Because look, just buy the thing.

[00:34:33] Holly Homer: Yeah. 

The Importance of Keeping It Simple

[00:34:34] Holly Homer: And I think one of the things that's happened through this process, and quite honestly, this is a lesson I learned almost every day online. For over the last 20 years. 

[00:34:42] You'd think I'd learn it by now. 

[00:34:43] Is we tend to overcomplicate everything. Like keeping it simple is really the only way we can accomplish this. 

[00:34:50] Because we most of us do not have, unlimited resources or a huge team.

[00:34:54] A lot of times we're tackling this with ourselves, maybe with one or two other team members. 

[00:34:59] And so you can't be elaborate when you're like, duct taping your life together. 

Customer Feedback and Product Improvement

[00:35:04] Holly Homer: And so one of the other things that's happened, and I know that you alluded to this earlier. 

[00:35:08] Is that We launched this into beta about a year ago. And we had the most amazing customers come in.

[00:35:15] We were encouraging them to go in and break it. 

[00:35:17] And also tell us how they're using it. And then what they need to make that better. And so what we launched a year ago.

[00:35:26] In theory, is the same product. 

[00:35:28] But in practice is entirely different today. The nuts and bolts behind, behind it are still, our initial vision.

[00:35:35] But we get so excited to see all the use cases that our customers are using. 

[00:35:40] Just crazy amounts of people sharing information. Because. 

[00:35:44] All of a sudden we've taken that like tech obstacle off their plate. 

[00:35:49] Crystal Waddell: It's a tool that integrates other tools. 

[00:35:52] And that's what makes it more simple. Is because it's integrated into your tool. 

[00:35:56] Holly Homer: Yeah, so our tool provides everything from the product maker. Basically to the delivery page. 

[00:36:02] And the first delivery email. 

[00:36:04] And then you might take over at that point into your email list. 

[00:36:08] And then the other thing that we do is since we do know you made this. 

[00:36:11] We create social media calendars, blog posts, anything that basically AI can do. 

[00:36:17] We have templates and all these kind of things. Where you just, yeah, you tell us what you made. Or you could use it for other things, too. 

Final Thoughts and Contact Information

[00:36:22] Holly Homer: you tell us the product or what you want to talk about.

[00:36:25] Crystal Waddell: Want to go ahead and just give people where they can find PageWheel, where they can find you? 

[00:36:29] And yeah, just whatever else you might want to share.

[00:36:32] Holly Homer: Yeah. 

[00:36:32] Obviously Pagewheel.Com. 

[00:36:34] And then we have our blog at learn.pagewheel.com that has a lot of education. 

[00:36:40] But if you're on Facebook, join our Facebook group. 

[00:36:43] Because then you're going to also, I do live trainings twice a week in the PageWheel Facebook group where we talk through a lot of this stuff.

[00:36:50] And then through PageWheel, we'll also have a blogger group. 

[00:36:53] So if you want to talk SEO and that's, if you're a member of Pagewheel, it's free. All that kind of stuff. 

[00:36:58] So it's just a fun, like all things blogging for the PageWheel customers. 

[00:37:02] So there's an extension on that. 

[00:37:04] I used to do a lot of blogging coaching and we're moving that into PageWheel.

[00:37:08] So it's all under one umbrella. 

[00:37:10] And then if you have children or you want to just follow, follow along what Holly does on, on all the things is just look at kidsactivitiesblog. com. 

[00:37:18] And I think one of the things I just want to really emphasize is: like none of this is because I know what I'm doing. 

[00:37:27] This is all just trial and error. And just doing something every day over many, many years. 

[00:37:33] I always laugh and say i'm like last vlogger standing which I feel like they're gonna totally give me a trophy for at some point. 

[00:37:39] It really is just about being persistent in your business, even though A lot of days we don't even know what that looks like.

[00:37:47] So, just going in a direction that you're like, ah, okay, I'm going to do this because I don't know what else to do today. 

[00:37:53] And that opens doors that on the internet that is just like unbelievable. 

[00:37:58] And it's crazy what you can build if you just, Put a Lego brick in every day, 

[00:38:03] Crystal Waddell: Whoa, look at that.

[00:38:04] That monstrosity of beauty.

[00:38:06] That's awesome. Holly, thank you so much for coming on the symbols. My SEO show podcast. This has been fantastic. 

[00:38:14] I can't wait to listen to it again because I've already get, I was getting some ideas, but I'm like, try to stay focused. 

[00:38:18] So when I listen to it again, I'm going to write down like my ideas and I do an episode

[00:38:23] after your episode called follow through Fridays.

[00:38:26] Where I try to implement something that I learned from you. So yes, super excited about that. And -

[00:38:31] Holly Homer: oh my God, I can't wait. Yeah. No. Yeah. Let me know when that goes. I want to hear that one. 

[00:38:35] Crystal Waddell: Okay. For sure. Yeah. So I'll put all your links in the show notes and you know what, maybe one day we'll be able to have you back and just talk even more about whatever else has changed.

[00:38:45] Holly Homer: Thank you so much, Crystal. That's been so much fun. 

[00:38:48] Crystal Waddell: Bye guys. Catch you next time. 

[00:38:50] ​