Branding, SEO, and Smart Business Growth [Follow Through Friday]

In this special solo episode of The Simple and Smart SEO Show, host Crystal Waddell reflects on her conversation with branding expert Mordy Oberstein. 

She shares key insights on defining your brand identity, optimizing SEO for conversions, and making smart business decisions that foster growth. 

Crystal also provides real-world examples of how she applied these lessons to her e-commerce business, proving that when branding and SEO work together, magic happens. 

If you’ve ever struggled with niching down, pricing your products right, or making your website more engaging, this episode is packed with actionable tips!

Key Takeaways:

✅ Know Your Brand Identity – If you're not something, you're nothing. Be clear about who you serve and who you don’t.
✅ Focus on Niche Markets – Trying to sell to everyone leads to confusion. Pick a market and dominate it.
✅ Pricing for Profit – Charging too little means working for free. Stand firm on prices that sustain your business.
✅ SEO + Branding = Conversions – Ranking high isn't enough; you must connect emotionally to turn visitors into buyers.
✅ Smart Business Growth – Expanding isn't about offering more—it’s about offering better and creating repeat customers.

Memorable Quotes:

 💡 “SEO isn’t just about being found; it’s about being remembered.” – Crystal Waddell
💡 “No risk it, no biscuit!” – Mordy Oberstein

Listener Action Items:

🚀 Reflect on your brand identity. Who are you truly serving?
 🚀 Review your website. Does it resonate with your audience, or is it just optimized for traffic?
 🚀 Re-evaluate your pricing strategy. Are you charging what you're worth?
 🚀 Consider business expansion wisely—does it align with your core audience?
 🚀 Take a step toward improving your branding and SEO integration today!

Resources & Links:

📌 Listen to the original episode with Mordy Oberstein –
 📌 Visit Crystal’s business, Collage and Wood
📌 Get in touch with Crystal – SimpleAndSmartSEO.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome back to the Simple and Smart SEO show podcast.
• 0:03 Have your host, crystal Waddell, and today I am solo doing a follow through episode.
• 0:09 That's not quite on Friday, but I thought, you know what?
• 0:12 Reflecting on the Year So Far
• 0:31 Implementing Insights from Mordy Oberstein
• 1:31 Focusing on a Niche Market
• 2:49 The Importance of Brand Identity
• 4:31 Pricing Strategies and Lessons Learned
• 6:01 SEO and Branding: The New Power Couple
• 6:55 Crafting Emotional Connections
• 9:06 Brand Expansion: Do's and Don'ts
• 12:14 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Transcript

[00:00:00] Crystal Waddell: Hey guys. Welcome back to the Simple and Smart SEO show podcast. Have your host, crystal Waddell, and today I am solo doing a follow through episode. That's not quite on Friday, but I thought, you know what? 

Reflecting on the Year So Far

[00:00:12] Crystal Waddell: We have been churning and burning since the beginning of this year. To me, 2025 seems like it is going by so quickly, and I thought, why not just take a moment and slow down and catch up? Make sure I'm implementing all of this amazing insight that I'm getting from our guests. So that's what I'm doing today. 

Implementing Insights from Mordy Oberstein

[00:00:31] Crystal Waddell: Today's follow through episode is from my conversation with Mordy Oberstein. So Mordy is the head of brand at Wix and also the head of his own consultancy called Unified Brand Marketing.

[00:00:43] He gave us several tips that I wanted to chat about, and I just also wanted to show you how I was implementing it in my business. 

[00:00:50] First of all, could we talk about these guns? I think a lot of you guys know that I've been going to Orange Theory and so I'm pretty proud that I no longer have just a "cep" in my arm. I actually have a bicep. Two muscles. So I was bragging to my husband about that.

[00:01:06] But yeah. So let's start first with Mordy's comment that many brands are like sand castles in the sky.

[00:01:13] And. Mordy is a guy who knows a thing or two about branding. And one of his truth bombs was that if you're not something then you're nothing. 

[00:01:22] And to go a little bit further, he's like, when you are something, you're for someone, which also means that you're not for a lot of other people. 

Focusing on a Niche Market

[00:01:31] Crystal Waddell: And I wanted to share a little bit about how I discovered this for myself.

[00:01:36] For those of you who don't know, I own an e-commerce company called collage and wood.com, where I sell giant wooden photo props and photo collages for athletes. 

[00:01:47] So when athletes reach their senior year of sports, either in high school or college, a lot of times their school will have something called a senior night or a senior day.

[00:01:57] And on that day, the coaches or parents might give the athletes some gifts. 

[00:02:02] And that's where I come in. So they'll come to me at collage and wood. Send me their pictures. I'll make 'em a really cool photo keepsake. 

[00:02:08] And that's my business. I also sell other things as well, though. A lot of people don't know that.

[00:02:13] Like I sell wooden signs like this one right here. I. And I also sell like baby nursery names. 

[00:02:20] And that type of stuff. Anything that I can cut out of wood with my giant CNC machine I can make. But I realized when I was talking on social media, one day to a new mom who needed a nursery wall letter for her baby's nursery. 

[00:02:38] And then the next day I was talking about senior photo props.

[00:02:42] There was a big disconnect there, right? Because those two people are not the same customer. At least not at the same time. 

The Importance of Brand Identity

[00:02:49] Crystal Waddell: And so what I decided to do was not stop making the nursery wall names. 

[00:02:54] But I did decide to focus my marketing specifically to senior parents. And senior athletes.

[00:03:02] And really just senior year in general. 

[00:03:05] When I first started, I wanted to serve everybody. I wanted to serve photographers, parents, event planners, sports teams, new moms. But when I tried to market to everybody, it just felt. Like a little off. 

[00:03:17] Crystal Waddell: So then I doubled down on senior night gifts. 

[00:03:20] And that really made all the difference in the world. 

[00:03:23] Because instead of people being confused when they came to my profiles, they were like, oh, this is the girl that makes those senior gifts.

[00:03:32] Cool. And then I expanded a little bit more and it was senior photo props. And so senior photographers come to my site and they're like, yeah, this is the girl that makes the senior photo props..

[00:03:42] So it really helped position my company as the company for senior gifts and senior photo props. 

[00:03:50] I really tried to focus specifically on the moms of athletes, and my business started to grow. So the lesson here is that I completely agree with Mordy. 

[00:04:00] Your brand needs to stand for something. So who are you for? Be strong in that. I think a lot of business owners are nervous..

[00:04:08] If I take away the nursery name signs, then I'm gonna lose a lot of business.

[00:04:12] I'm gonna lose all of the moms that were gonna come to my site. 

[00:04:16] That was never the majority of my business anyway. So even though I sell less nursery name signs now, I also sell way more photo props. 

[00:04:27] And for a lot more money. And then there's that part of, who are you not for?

Pricing Strategies and Lessons Learned

[00:04:31] Crystal Waddell: Another element of this was pricing. And there was a time where I, my prices were so low.

[00:04:38] I was essentially making things and sending them to people for free. Sometimes I was almost paying for it, and that is like really embarrassing to admit. 

[00:04:47] But it was a learning opportunity.. And I remember the day that I doubled my prices. 

[00:04:52] A couple weeks later after I'd gotten some sales and built some confidence that my pricing was okay. And I was gonna make it at a higher price.

[00:05:01] One of my former customers emailed me and said, Hey, what's the deal? 

[00:05:04] Your prices are twice as much as they were before. I explained to her, I said, Hey, I actually wasn't making any money at that price. 

[00:05:11] That was what it cost me to make and ship these numbers to you. And she didn't buy.

[00:05:16] . And for the first time in my life I was okay with that because if someone can't understand that I'm in business, to make money and to provide a service and a product, but at a profit. 

[00:05:27] Then they're not my customer.

[00:05:29] And that's okay. 

[00:05:30] So I hope that you find your brand's core identity as well, and that you lean into it. Without fear of rejection or judgment, and go out there and just make your brand the best that it can be.

[00:05:42] And that's a nice segue into another fun little quote that Mordy shared,. 

[00:05:46] Which is no risk, it no biscuit. And so I think it's it's something that will always make me smile. 

[00:05:53] And the next time I'm thinking about making a big change in my business, I'll definitely be thinking no risk it no biscuit.

[00:06:01] Okay. 

SEO and Branding: The New Power Couple

[00:06:01] Crystal Waddell: The second point I wanted to follow up on is SEO and branding and how it's the new power couple. So Mordy made it clear. SEO and branding are no longer separate things.

[00:06:13] Again, when I think about collage and wood, and I started with this SEO journey for my Shopify store. 

[00:06:20] I was focused 

[00:06:20] on three things, keywords, rankings, and traffic. But even when I hit the first page, people weren't buying.. 

[00:06:29] I was getting 20,000 visitors a month, and my sales stayed the same! So I thought.

[00:06:36] Maybe I missed something here in this search engine optimization thing. And the reason why this was happening was because my SEO was optimized for traffic, not for conversions. 

[00:06:49] And I had no thought to my customer's journey or how I could build a relationship along the way. 

Crafting Emotional Connections

[00:06:55] Crystal Waddell: And once I started crafting stories around senior night. 

[00:06:59] And really trying to appeal to that emotional buyer, you know that person who their child is leaving the nest.

[00:07:08] This is one of the final celebrations of their young adult life. And I started celebrating parents honoring their sacrifices and tapping into their emotions. 

[00:07:19] That's when the sales started rolling in. 

[00:07:22] And I also took it a step further. I used HoneyBook to create a workflow that reminded me to touch in with my clients. 

[00:07:31] So it's yeah, I have an email list where I'm trying to reach out to them and talk to them. 

[00:07:37] But I also created these workflows within the experience so that I could touch base with my clients and let them know Hey, I know this is important to you, is important to me too.

[00:07:48] Let me talk to you about that. And why it's important to me and how I wanna be here to support you, and also let me build that trust with you so you know what's gonna happen. 

[00:07:57] Like what this process is gonna look like, every step of the way from start to delivery.

[00:08:02] So the lesson for me here that I can tie back to what Mordy said about SEO and branding being interconnected.

[00:08:10] And not separate.

[00:08:12] Is that SEO isn't just about being found, it's about being remembered. And the question that I want to ask you, and what I would suggest for you as a follow up activity for yourself is take a look at your pages.

[00:08:26] Are they cold and transactional, or do they have some sort of personality to them? Are they talking to this customer that's visiting your site? And do they connect with that person? 

[00:08:37] One really great tip that I, I don't know where I heard it. 

[00:08:41] Somewhere along the way, but it's just to remember that someone is on the other side of that screen. So it's not a whole bunch of someones at the same time.

[00:08:50] It's one person. So you wanna write as if you are having a conversation with that one person. So pull up your website and ask yourself, does this page just rank? Or does it resonate? 

[00:09:04] And then let me know how that goes.

Brand Expansion: Do's and Don'ts

[00:09:06] Crystal Waddell: Okay, so number three is this idea about brand expansion done right or horribly wrong. And this kind of goes back to. This idea that I chose one product to focus on. 

[00:09:18] And then as I was developing relationship building around that product, then I built from there. 

[00:09:23] So let's take a giant number for senior photographers. 

[00:09:27] One thing that you always hear about in e-commerce is increasing cart size, right? Or lifetime value of a customer. But what do you do when your customer is usually buying for a one-time event? 

[00:09:41] That's when you have to think about how can I sell the most at one time? To this particular customer? 

[00:09:47] And a lot of people talk about upsells and adding different things in. 

[00:09:51] When I originally started, my numbers were connected. 

[00:09:54] Crystal Waddell: So it's like I had one photo prop that had the year, like 20, 25.

[00:09:59] Then I realized if I sell the props as individual numbers, I can sell giant props. 

[00:10:06] But then I can sell two to four at a time because sometimes people will want all four digits of that number.

[00:10:13] Or sometimes they'll just want two. But either way, now I have a bundle of a product in one order. Rather than just selling one single product. 

[00:10:25] The other great thing that's led to is repeat customers. So whereas I thought that was gonna be a one time sale. Those customers are senior photographers who come back next year when they need the six. 

[00:10:38] And the year after that when they need the seven.

[00:10:40] So it's allowed me to really build a relationship with my customers year over year. 

[00:10:46] And provide a product that they need and utilize in their studios. 

[00:10:50] Their clients come to their studio expecting to see my numbers. So I've become a part of their sales process. 

[00:10:58] Not just a vendor of a particular item.

[00:11:01] So my point is I've doubled down on what's worked. Senior night gifts, emotional storytelling. 

[00:11:08] And making those milestone moments unforgettable and really generating this desire in my clients to repeat that experience for their clients year after year.

[00:11:20] So while some people may think I wanna offer a whole bunch of products. And I wanna expand into a whole bunch of different services. 

[00:11:28] Especially if you're just one person. Sometimes bigger doesn't always mean better. Smarter and more focus can mean more sales, more revenue, and most importantly, more profit.

[00:11:40] So here's the takeaway. 

[00:11:42] Before you're thinking about expanding. 

[00:11:45] Think about if what you're trying to expand to aligns with what your audience already loves about you, your product or your service. 

[00:11:54] Is this gonna deepen or will it dilute my brand? 

[00:11:57] Because at the end of the day, you want to build brand loyalty and brand advocates.

[00:12:03] So whatever you can do, to either double down on what's working or expand it into something that's even more awesome, that's gonna create the type of clients that are gonna refer new clients your way. 

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

[00:12:14] Crystal Waddell: So. Thank you so much for listening to this follow through Friday episode. 

[00:12:18] I had a blast chatting with Mordy Stein. And in case you miss that episode, I will drop it in the show notes.

[00:12:26] And until next time, I hope you have a wonderful time building your business!

[00:12:31] If you're looking for a coach that is all about optimizing your business for your life. 

[00:12:37] I'd love for you to reach out to me. You can visit me at simple and smart seo.com. 

[00:12:42] Thanks for joining me and until next time, I hope you have a great day. And keep moving forward. 

[00:12:48] ​