This week's episode of Automation Unpluggedis an interview with a marketing expert at One Firefly, Jordan Littman.

About Jordan Littman:

Jordan is the SEO Lead, and manages our internal team of SEO experts here at One Firefly. He’s been a member of our team since 2017, and held a number of roles, including Content Writer and Account Manager. During his 7 years here, he’s worked directly with hundreds of integrators to help them grow their businesses.

We’re bringing him on AU to share his expertise and knowledge on the SEO landscape, and how integrators can use this strategy to grow their visibility and lead generation.

During this Q&A, we’ll cover:

• How SEO drives online visibility for custom integrators in their marketplace.
• The four pillars of SEO, and actionable examples of local, on-site, off-site, and technical tactics.
• Success stories of SEO in action that are driving measurable growth and new business opportunities for integrators.

SEE ALSO: Show #275: Smart Homes and Healthy Living: Exploring Tech Innovations with Johann Whitehouse

Transcript

Ron:

Hello. Hello there, Ron Callis with another episode of Automation Unplugged. And today is a special day because it's actually the first of our Marketing Experts series here on Automation Unplugged. So for those of you that have been tuning in, you know that back in late July, we announced our new format. And our new format consists of our industry expert interviews that many of you have come to love and appreciate. We've been doing those for many years, more than seven years now. In the new format, we're also going to be interviewing marketing experts from the team here at One Firefly. So today we actually have Jordan Littman and we'll be getting him fully introduced here in just a moment. And, we also have our education series where we're going to be reformatting some of our webinars and other educational formats. Our goal for all of you is to be dropping a new show every Wednesday. So today, is Wednesday, actually the day that we're recording and, and a show dropped. And we want for you to always be able to count on every single Wednesday, a new piece of content. From Automation Unplugged dropping, whether you like to watch the videos on your favorite platforms, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, or YouTube, or maybe you're like myself and you prefer to listen to your podcast, you can find us in Spotify and Apple Podcasts or wherever you prefer to listen to your content. So that's a little bit of the setup again. So today we have Jordan Littman and he is our SEO and Product Development Lead here at One Firefly. And, you just heard in the pre show intro, a little bit of Jordan's background, so you understand he's been at One Firefly for a while and he's actually been instrumental in the design and invention of the SEO services here at One Firefly over the years. And there's been a lot of invention in the last 18 months. And we're going to talk to Jordan about that today. Jordan, how are you, sir?

Jordan:

I am doing great. Honored to be the first guest on this new format of Automation Unplugged. You and I have done many webinars together in the past. This is actually my first time being on Automation Unplugged too. So very excited to be on.

Ron:

Well, and there's so much subject matter in this category of search engine optimization. It's a deep well of conversation and, there's so much change that's been happening in the world. Frankly, it could be considered pretty technical and even scary or intimidating. I know that you and I hope today to make it a little bit less intimidating, but also there's so much there to cover. You and I know we're not going to get to everything today. So I think we're going to have you back here in the coming weeks and months, so that we can really break this into bite sized morsels. But today, Jordan, we have, themed this conversation around the four pillars of SEO and maybe at a super high level macro level, maybe what is search engine optimization for those that are tuned in and you're like, man, I don't even know what they're talking about. Like, what is that?

Jordan:

Absolutely. So search engine optimization is the concept of getting your business found on Google or other search engines on the internet. So you might have a website, but what are you doing to get that website to show up in search results for the keywords that you want to be found for, the solutions that you want to be found for? That, in general, is the concept of search engine optimization. It's doing what you can to get your business to rank in search results just in general.

Ron:

How is it different than Google advertising?

Jordan:

Absolutely. So Google advertising, you pay to show up in Google search results, those spots that you see on, when you search for something and it shows up as sponsored at the top, that is what a Google ad is. You're paying to be at the top. The moment you stop paying for that Google ad, it goes away. Search engine optimization is much more different in that regard because it's permanent. It's part of your website that is naturally there forever unless you take it off your website for whatever reason. And so that's permanent real estate that your website can occupy in search results. Now that's to say that search results fluctuate all the time. And so search engine optimization isn't a one time set and forget thing. It's optimization, right? So it's constantly adjusting and paying attention to what's going on, the changes that are happening and making sure that you're always paying attention to what's happening in Google so that your business can stay relevant in the ever changing digital landscape.

Ron:

In your opinion, why should an integrator or a technology contracting business, whether they focus in residential or commercial, why should they care about search engine optimization or maybe even a higher level theme of showing up in Google? Why, why do you believe it matters?

Jordan:

I believe it's incredibly important. Thinking in the world that we live in, I know a lot of integrators I've heard in my seven years at One Firefly say the vast majority of my leads come through referrals and I would challenge them to think about how would then those referrals find you guys? How would they learn about your business? And the answer is that they would Google you. And so what are you doing to make sure that when that person that was referred to your business googles you, make sure that your business shows up. What if it doesn't? And then also not only are there the referrals that come to your business, but then there's also a growing segment of the population that is learning about this industry. And is interested in these types of solutions for their homes and have the money that would qualify as being a fantastic customer. And they don't know anything about your business. They don't know anything about any AV integrator out there on the market. All they know is that they want a home theater. All they know is that they want a home automation system in their house. And so they're going to search for "home automation system in my area," or, "home automation system, Atlanta," "home automation system, Dallas." And what will happen, what will happen is they'll show on the search result, other integration businesses out there. What are you doing to get your business to show up among those, those search results? And that's why I think SEO is so important is because you need to keep your business relevant, not just for those people that were referred to you and are searching for you online, that they need to find you, but then also for the people that don't know anything about this industry, but are, would be a very qualified customer otherwise.

Ron:

Okay. At a high level, I know that any business should have Google Analytics loaded on their website. Can you describe what that is and what the process at the simplest level, like how does one get that onto their website and why should it be there?

Jordan:

Yeah, absolutely. Google Analytics is a very important tool. The way it works, basically, is that it's a piece of code that you can add to your website. And what that code does is whenever someone visits your website, it tracks information about them and the way they navigate your website. So, not only does it track the way they navigate your website, it also tracks the way they came to your website too. And so Google Analytics data is incredibly important. Because it allows us to understand data about your website. It allows you to understand what pages are the most successful. What, when I say successful, pages that people are going to the most, how long they're staying on those pages, did they then go on to submit a contact form or call you guys? Those are all things that Google Analytics can track. It can also track, for example, Whether they came to you from organic search traffic, finding you through Google, or maybe they found you through a Facebook post, and you can evaluate the success of your campaigns that you're running to say, "Oh, this drove a lot of leads for me." We can then invest more in this channel to then have a more successful online presence. It really helps give context to everything that you're doing online. So that you can then grow your business more effectively.

Ron:

Let's say my business is in Los Angeles, California. How could Google Analytics give me visibility to whether I have visitors on my website from Los Angeles or whether they're from India or whether they're from Baltimore, Maryland, like, do I have that level of visibility? And does that require a lot of special configuration to know that?

Jordan:

It does not. And absolutely, Google Analytics does contain that information. So within Google Analytics, as long as you install that code on your website, Google is able to track, the country that that visitor came from, the state that they came from, even the city that they came from. And so there are absolutely views within Google Analytics that you can check out that will tell you what were the most popular cities that drove traffic to your website. And then you can even customize it further to say, based on users that came in from Los Angeles or Calabasas or Malibu. What pages did they go to? What was the conversion rate of them? And so you can really drill deeper, but at a high level...

Ron:

You said an important word there, you said conversion rate. What does conversion rate mean?

Jordan:

So conversion rate is now not a thing anymore. Actually, that was changed earlier this year in 2024. It's now called key event rate. And so what you can do, Google automatically configure some of these based on, known paths within your website. So for example, if someone submits a contact form, Google would know that counts as a contact form submission, but there are other key events that you could have that and configure within Google Analytics or Google Tag Manager, for example, and have Google recognize those things. So for example, clicks on a phone number, someone, maybe you have a live chat widget on your website as when someone starts a live chat, you can track that. And so you can configure these, quote, key events to say and find out when these major conversion events are happening so that you can then tell what pages are the most effective. Again, where people are finding you guys and then what channels are most likely to convert, what cities are maybe, converting a lot so you can maybe drive more strategy into those cities. All of that data is available within Google Analytics. It's a very powerful tool.

Ron:

Okay. Well, like I said, I'm going to have you back on multiple occasions, Jordan, we're going to go into lots of different detailed subject matter. And for folks that are, are watching, or not watching, but listening to this podcast in their audio, software you'll actually get announced, start to see new show art for our industry experts, our marketing experts, and our educational content. So as you're scanning through your podcast and you're trying to determine what do I want to listen to one of my fellow industry AV integration group owners, or do I want to listen to Jordan or Jordan's peers here at One Firefly talk about marketing topics, or do I want to listen to say the latest, Lutron webinar content, from One Firefly? You'll be able to get a visual cue. But Jordan, so I'm saying there's lots we're going to talk about in the future, but there's some very specific things I know we want to cover today. So what I'm going to. I'm going to bring up on screen and folks don't get too scared. We're not going to be super, webinary here. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But we're going to share some, some content here and I'm going to, I'm going to cue Jordan to kind of, give his thoughts and opinions on this. So the, this is actually a slide, Jordan, from some of the presentations we, One Firefly, and some of our different team members have done around the country over the last year. But the words on the screen say the digital landscape has forever changed. And there's a cool little rendered graphic. What, what are you, what, what does this bring to mind really in terms of the state of change with Google and search right now in 2024?

Jordan:

Yeah, absolutely. I think when looking back, when I started at One Firefly in 2017, what a Google search result page would look like compared to what it looks like in 2024. It's drastically different. And when I think about what it's going to look like in 2025, 2026, 2027, looking beyond, who knows what Google is going to do to its search result pages and how are you as a business going to respond to that? The fact is there have been a lot of changes in Google and SEO within the past five years. I think a lot about the rise in the local three pack and the importance of Google Maps and your Google Business Profile and SEO, the release of core web vitals and Google switching to mobile first indexing and making sure that you have a very robust, quick to load website. I think about so many things I think about the rise of AI. Right? And how does that...

Ron:

I'm gonna, I'm gonna ask, so I wanna understand about AI, sorry for interrupting, but I, I just had a quick topic. I've seen stats, I've come across them. They, they've probably been in a presentation or two from One Firefly to the marketplace. And it has to do with a bold headline around the theme that websites right now, and right now, we're in the Fall of 2024 websites in, in the United States are seeing around a 40 percent drop in traffic coming from Google Search. Like what is that? And is that because of, is that because of AI or what what's going on there?

Jordan:

Yeah, absolutely. AI has a lot to do with it, in my opinion. I think now more than ever, and I'm guilty of this myself too. Right? If I have a question, I'm not going to Google to ask that question sometimes, or I might still go to Google and what shows up at the top? It's a Google AI generated search result. I might also be going to ChatGPT and asking that question. There was an instance recently where I was dealing with some stomach issues and I didn't go to Google to find out what was going on with my stomach. I went to ChatGPT. And I had a conversation with the AI and...

Ron:

Was it helpful?

Jordan:

Oh, I found out what was going on and it was great. I mean the stomach issues weren't great, but certainly finding out about what was going on was really helpful. And so what's happening is people's search behaviors are changing. The way people consume information is changing. There's this concept called zero click searches. And what's happening is more than ever there, people are searching things into Google and then not clicking through to websites. As it relates back to our industry, that really counts in terms of maybe people having questions about home automation or AV and getting those answers directly from the AI search results and then not clicking through to your website. Or for example, maybe someone is looking for a home theater company in their area. And what shows up in the first results, it's the local three pack, the Google Business Profiles. And maybe the person, instead of going to a website, just sees that Google profile with five stars out of 500 reviews says, Oh, this company really seems reputable. I'm just going to call them right away instead of going to their website. And so AI and the way Google has changed has really led to more zero click searches where website traffic has dropped. Now, that being said, there still is a niche, in my opinion, for SEO within this industry, because the vast majority of integrators service a local market. And so SEO in that sense, while the Google Business Profile is now more important than ever, people still want to go to websites to make sure that when they're looking for a home theater company in Atlanta, or a commercial, you know, AV expert in Chicago, the Google Business Profile certainly helps, but they also want to go to your website and make sure that exactly what they're looking for, that messaging is on your website too. And so while absolutely, I think across the internet search traffic is down because of those things that I discussed, I still strongly believe that there is a real niche in this industry and a real purpose for SEO because of the fact that people searching behaviors and buying behaviors have not yet evolved in that regard.

Ron:

All right. I'm going to, jump to the next slide here, Jordan. Um, and I'll, I'll describe for what's on the screen just for our listeners. It says Google search quality rater guidelines. Google prioritizes the user experience. And there's, an acronym EEAT. Experience, expertise, authority, and trustworthiness. What, what is this and what, what does this have to do with search engine optimization?

Jordan:

Yeah, absolutely. So Google released these search quality rater guidelines back in 2014, originally as expertise, authority, and trust. And it was a way for SEO experts, or if you're just someone trying to practice SEO, a way that you can framework all of the SEO work that you're doing so that you're doing the best things in Google's eyes to have the best chance of showing up in search results. So for example, expertise includes making sure that you are writing copy on your website that shows that you know what you're talking about. Showing that if you have certifications or awards that you're highlighting those on your site. Authority, do other websites on the internet link back to yours? You know, do, you have industry specific awards and recognition that shows that you are, the authority on your subject? I know this is authority. I'm saying authority, but it's really the case that being the expert on something matters and showing that you are that dominant source. Google recognizes that and values that and would place your website higher in search results. And then trustworthiness. Do you have good reviews? Is your website secure, safe, easily navigable? Do you not have a lot of 404 errors where someone tries to click on a page from a search result and It leads to an error where that your website just doesn't show up. Those are historically, since 2014, for 10 years now, the guidelines that Google has established toward having a strong SEO presence. Now in December, 2022, Google also released this new E which is Experience and the reason why Google released this new E and EAT is actually in response to the rise of AI. So we all know what happened on November 30th, 2022, which was ChatGPT got released and it became so much easier for anyone to create a website and build content using AI and to get that ranking in search results. And so two weeks after the release of ChatGPT, actually, Google went ahead and updated their quality rater guidelines to include experience. And so it's now more important than ever to have originality, to show that you have done projects in your area. Highlight those, highlight the imagery of your project, the video of your projects, have a strong online review profile that shows that you have years of experience in your area, shows that you have customers that really value your business and say you are who you say you are. In a world where anyone can build a website and start a business from scratch, Google really values more than ever, a website that shows that you not only demonstrate expertise, authority, and trustworthiness, but also have that experience to back up everything that you're saying too.

Ron:

If a business follows these guidelines, what can they expect will happen with the way they show up on the internet?

Jordan:

Absolutely. Nothing is guaranteed. And so you have to always be paying attention to what's going on in your search results, think about what the key search terms that you want to rank for are. Say if you're an integrator in Chicago, you probably would want to rank for "AV company Chicago." Type that into the Google search, see what happens, see what shows up, pay attention to those things. If you practice all of these things, you know, practice building unique content on your website, practice getting strong Google reviews, practice technical SEO aspects, you can expect that you'll start showing up in search results. And ideally highly in search results, but it's always a good idea to keep track of those things and always make optimizations as you see them. SEO is not a set and forget thing, neither is it something that you just do one time and you see results forever. SEO is something very much that you have to be patient with. Because when you are patient and do this over a long sustained period, that's when you really see that growth.

Ron:

So I flipped a slide again. Thank you for providing these slides in advance, Jordan. On the screen right now, it says professional SEO in 2024 and there's four colored, sections. It says local SEO, on-site SEO, off-site SEO, and technical SEO. What are, what are we looking at here?

Jordan:

Yeah, so SEO is such a wide ranging concept, right? And so I think it's overwhelming to view SEO in such an expansive method. I think what we'd like to do here at One Firefly is really narrow it down into segments that help you easily understand the segments of SEO that will help you be successful if you practice all of them together. We always recommend an integrated SEO strategy at One Firefly. The reason being, if you only practice one of these things, for example, maybe you practice a local SEO and you have a really good Google Business Profile. You have a lot of pages on your website that have local keywords optimized for them, local service area pages, but then you're not paying attention to your technical SEO at all. And maybe you are ranking number one on Google for that search term, "home theater company Chicago," but your website's really slow to load. What do you think is going to happen? That person's going to click on that Google link to your site, realize your site's not loading, go back to Google and then click on your competitor. And so by practicing all of these pillars of SEO together, that leads to the best success.

Ron:

Got it. Now that makes sense. Now you've provided us some examples, and I think you've been kind enough to put these into the framework of these four pillars. So you've, I've got a slide up on, on screen right now. It says "Local Google Business Profile." And this is, this is for a customer of ours, Texadia Systems out of Dallas. Tell us what we're looking at.

Jordan:

Yeah, absolutely. So Texadia is a great example of an integrator that has a really strong Google Business Profile and having a strong Google Business Profile is especially important in 2024. So for example, having a ton of reviews. And not only having a lot of reviews, but also responding to those reviews, engaging with your customers to build that trust with a potential customer that might be looking at Texadia's reviews. Making sure that, you know, the products that they sell are listed. So that if someone is curious about whether they are interested in a Control4 system, does Texadia maybe sell Control4? They would look at that Google Business Profile and see, scroll through those products and see whether Texadia offers that. Some other optimizations you can make with the Google Business Profile, adding a business description that includes target keywords. That's something that is very important for a local SEO aspect. And then also, having service areas listed on your Google Business Profile. All ways that can help when someone is searching for that solution that you want to be found for in your local area. Your business profile shows up for that.

Ron:

Got it. Next topic on-site, new relevant content. And, I do see, it looks like there's a website page example, as well as some Google search results. Talk us through what we're seeing.

Jordan:

Yeah, absolutely. So it's one thing to have a keyword that you want to be found for, like for example, "boardroom audio video in Dallas." It's another thing then to get that content ranking on Google. And so, not only do you need to then create a webpage optimized for the keyword "boardroom audio video Dallas," you need to have messaging on that page that is very relevant to someone that is searching for boardroom AV solutions in Dallas. So on the left hand side of this, I'll describe this to someone that might be listening on a podcast, or this is a podcast. Someone that might be listening to Spotify or audio only. Exactly. We, for example, or it looks like this page has a meta description, and a page title that includes "boardroom audio video" in that page title, in that meta description. And additionally, not only does it include "boardroom audio video" in that page title and meta description, it includes the word "Dallas" too. And when we look at the on-page copy itself on the right. You can see that on the header tag, that main header tag on the site, "Dallas boardrooms" and "audio video" are included in that header tag as well. So what happens here and why this is so important is that when Google looks at this page to evaluate it in its spiders and the way it ranks content, when it sees that there's "boardroom, audio video, Dallas" in the page title meta description and in the on page copy and in the header tags, Google then knows, Oh, this page really is addressed to "boardroom audio video Dallas." And so by also then creating content on that page, that includes those words as well, "boardroom audio video Dallas" and any other relevant keywords around that. Those are called, um...

Ron:

Semantic keyphrases or cluster keywords.

Jordan:

Exactly. Google then understands what this page is about, and that's so important in the age of helpful content, where you can't just build a page and have a keyword on it and expect it to rank in search results. Google's AI and Google's algorithms have become so much more advanced that Google understands the context of a page and the messaging on that page, and so you need to have web pages that clearly describe what the solution is about in order to expect rankings growth. And so what you can see from Texadia's practice of this by including Dallas in the copy, by including Dallas in the page title meta descriptions across multiple pages on their site. They've actually seen more than a 70 percent growth in organic search impressions for the search term Dallas, or searches that include Dallas in the search term and almost a 20 percent jump in average position for search terms that include Dallas as well.

Ron:

Wow. There is a rabbit trail that will go down on a, a followup show, but I know there's conversation you and I have both had with folks out there that really want to carefully curate the words that show up on pages on their site. I'm going to call it main navigation pages. And there's like a conflict. There's like a good, there's an angel and the devil on, on either shoulder. Do you want the page to perform in SEO search and, or do you want the page to be perfectly in alignment with your brand voice and messaging? And sometimes they can conflict and I know that I'm just acknowledging that for everybody watching or watching and listening. And there are some different schools of thought around that. It's not that one's right or wrong, but you do gotta. Know that, and then you got to choose your strategy. And, and we will, we'll cover that in more depth in a, in a follow up discussion. Um, but for the sake of time, let's jump to offsite and it says offsite backlinks. And, you're showing an example, it looks like a reference to an integrator, Wipliance on, on some piece of, PR or publication that's been made on the internet.

Jordan:

Yep. And so actually on this webpage, this publication mentions Wipliance and it links back to the Wipliance website, and that's huge when it comes to SEO. So the concept of offsite SEO and backlinks is that there are all these different websites on the internet and all these different websites on the internet have the opportunity to link to other sites on the internet. Your own website can link to say other sites on the internet. Maybe it's your trade partners, maybe it's manufacturers that you offer to your customers. And the idea behind this concept of backlinks is almost that they're votes of confidence. So if there are other websites on the internet that link back to your website, it's a sign to Google that other businesses vouch for you. And so when Google tries to then pull up a search result for a certain term and sees that one webpage has a lot of other links pointing to it compared to say another website that has no other websites pointing to it. What do you think Google's going to rank higher in that search result? It's going to be that website that has a lot of other links from other sites on the internet pointing to it. And so yeah, you can have it on the screen here. Backlinks are one of the most important ranking factors, when it comes to how Google decides to rank websites in search results, because of the fact that they're so powerful and they’re votes of confidence across the internet, that your business is reputable, authoritative, and worthy of ranking higher in search results than a website that say has no backlinks.

Ron:

Great job explaining that. I think that you made that clear. Now let's get into the hairy subject of technical SEO. Now this is the, this is the really intimidating subject here, Jordan. So how can we make it not so scary? What, what is technical SEO? And here on the slide for those listening, it says core web vitals.

Jordan:

Yeah, I, I really understand the, the fear in some people when they say technical SEO and be like, I have no idea how to address this. I would say with technical SEO, the most important thing you need to know is how are you making your website easy to navigate, secure, and quick to load? You want the user experience for someone coming onto your website to be as flawless as possible. You want your website to be quick to load so that they don't leave and go to another website. You want to make sure that they aren't coming to your website and receiving an error that they can't access your content. They want to come to your website and be able to see all of your content on screen and not have to scroll left to right to view that content. And so all you need to know about technical SEO is that you need to be paying attention to how your website loads. Doing what you can to make your website as quick as possible, quick to load while loading all of the important videos and photos you might have on your site. Making sure you're paying attention to what pages might have errors right now. Maybe for example, you updated a URL on your site, but you never went back and updated the internal links that were previously pointing to that URL, making sure that you're paying attention to those things. Because Google pays attention to that too. And the more that you have technical SEO issues, whether it's page load speeds, broken links on your site, that not only lessens the confidence Google has in your site, it also lessens the confidence that the consumer has that potential referral that might be coming to your site for the first time and not being able to access the information that they want to read.

Ron:

Jordan, folks that have tuned in, they've watched you and I banter on SEO, or they they've listened in and they want to learn more and they can't wait for the next podcast. Where, where do you want to send them?

Jordan:

Yeah, absolutely. So we at One Firefly have produced a series of five minute videos, training about SEO. If you're watching this podcast, you can go ahead and scan that QR code. That is on the right. Or if you're listening, you can go to https://onefirefly.com/expertise/5-minute-marketing-workshops.

Ron:

Awesome. Jordan, it was a blast having you on our inaugural Marketing Experts show here on Automation Unplugged. How did it feel, man? What, what was your experience like?

Jordan:

Oh, it was so much fun. I love getting to talk with you, Ron. I love getting to share my passion about SEO with the CI industry. And I'm really excited, honestly, to be back on for more.

Ron:

Awesome. Well, we're going to have you on for more. Folks, stay tuned. Again, got content dropping every Wednesday. I hope y'all enjoyed it. We really reengineered our processes here at One Firefly to make this possible. As always, this show is brought to you and sponsored by One Firefly. Hope y'all have a great rest of your day and great week, and we will see you all soon.

Ron Callis is the CEO of One Firefly, LLC, a digital marketing agency based out of South Florida and creator of Automation Unplugged. Founded in 2007, One Firefly has quickly became the leading marketing firm specializing in the integrated technology and security space. The One Firefly team work hard to create innovative solutions to help Integrators boost their online presence, such as the elite website solution, Mercury Pro.

Resources and links from the interview:

• Jordan Littman LinkedIn Profile page
• 5-Minute Marketing: SEO Video Series
• One Firefly Professional SEO Services