SEO Rockstars 2026: Day 1 - Ted Kubaitis

[00:04] Hello everyone. I'm uh not seeing what

[00:08] you see. So hopefully uh somebody let me

[00:12] know if you're seeing my camera view. Do

[00:14] you see a person?

[00:17] Yeah.

[00:18] Okay. Perfect. Perfect. All right. So I

[00:21] I want to start by talking about what

[00:25] Dan just shared. I I feel what he

[00:28] dropped there was uh so cool and so next

[00:33] level. I have an ecom background and let

[00:37] let me put the uh the actual scale of

[00:43] the nugget drop into perspective.

[00:46] Um,

[00:48] I had uh bought a house in Gig Harbor

[00:53] and it cost, you know, between four and

[00:56] $500,000

[00:58] and I rented it out for $3500

[01:03] a month and and months are, you know,

[01:08] uh, four or five weeks.

[01:11] So Dan in one to two weeks and I bet the

[01:16] first week uh it wasn't really running,

[01:19] you know, optimally. So he probably got

[01:22] that $800 in a week.

[01:26] So he basically got the rental income

[01:30] from a premium property

[01:34] without having to buy a house.

[01:37] All right. So that's that's the scale of

[01:41] what he showed you.

[01:43] Now once you build that,

[01:48] how hard is it to make five more?

[01:53] [clears throat] All right. So the first

[01:55] one's hard, but I bet I bet Dan could

[01:59] cookie cutter those. He could make one

[02:02] for cosmetics, one for trampolines, one

[02:06] for gaming computers.

[02:10] I mean, holy cow. Uh that that is

[02:15] potentially

[02:17] like a uh it's like a real estate bubble

[02:20] but without the upfront cost and

[02:22] lending.

[02:25] Um so yeah, kudos to Dan for sharing

[02:29] that. Man, my mind is blown.

[02:33] All right. So, I just wanted to say that

[02:36] because what he dropped there, normally

[02:39] people don't share methods like that.

[02:42] They sell them. All right.

[02:44] Oh, yeah.

[02:46] Uh, so yeah. Uh, def definitely uh right

[02:51] now best in show dance presentation. I

[02:54] haven't seen everybody else yet, but

[02:57] that's a tall order.

[03:00] All right. So,

[03:03] I also want to apologize. I really

[03:06] wanted to be there in person. Uh, but

[03:09] life happened. And so, I'm very sorry

[03:12] about that. If you came to network with

[03:15] me, just reach out to me later. We can,

[03:19] uh, book a session and and talk about

[03:22] what's going on with you. Uh my contact

[03:25] page at SEO Tool Lab has a schedule a

[03:28] meeting option and I'll I'll open that

[03:32] to all attendees. If you came there to

[03:35] talk to me about a problem, uh just book

[03:38] a meeting, we'll talk about it. Okay.

[03:41] Uh so I don't want to cheat you out of

[03:43] that.

[03:46] Thank you, Ted.

[03:48] All right. So, now I'm [clears throat]

[03:51] uh going to show a a slide deck here,

[03:55] and it's more wordy than my usual slide

[03:58] deck. Uh but just know uh the words on

[04:02] it don't matter. They're just notes for

[04:05] me. Uh what I really want to do is guide

[04:08] you through what I consider the most

[04:13] terrifying story in SEO.

[04:17] and it's happening right now. And I've

[04:21] never felt more alone. Like there's so

[04:24] much uh you know there there's just so

[04:29] many people that you know look at me

[04:31] with confusion.

[04:33] So I'm going to try to show you what I

[04:36] I'm seeing,

[04:38] but I'm also going to tell you what to

[04:40] do. And it's not the end of the world.

[04:43] So, as much as I scare you in the

[04:46] beginning, don't fall for it. It's not

[04:48] that bad.

[04:50] All right.

[04:52] So, let's see. I will

[04:56] share my presentation again.

[05:02] All right. So, let's tell a story.

[05:08] So January 15,

[05:12] 2025,

[05:14] Google requires JavaScript to view a

[05:18] search results.

[05:20] Uh this was the kickoff

[05:24] of Google's move to AI and the the

[05:30] changing of the game. Um, and this was

[05:35] just unsettling to me that they did

[05:38] this. And

[05:42] I started looking around in their source

[05:45] code

[05:47] uh and and I noticed they were also now

[05:51] uh tracking for headless Chrome.

[05:55] [snorts]

[05:55] So when Google required JavaScript to

[05:59] view uh the search results,

[06:02] every SEO tool that wasn't already

[06:07] rendering the page broke instantly. Uh

[06:12] that was largely rank trackers, but it

[06:14] was a number of other tools as well.

[06:18] And then all of these SEO tool

[06:21] providers,

[06:23] they all switch to APIs that use

[06:26] headless Chrome or they started directly

[06:29] embedding headless Chrome or they were

[06:32] already built to use headless Chrome.

[06:35] But it all came together on the exact

[06:39] same day. the entire industry

[06:43] without collaboration or communication.

[06:47] Everybody made this change on the same

[06:51] day.

[06:53] And I think Google knew.

[06:56] All right. And so this is from a uh

[07:00] desktop search. You don't have to

[07:02] understand the mumbo jumbo. just that

[07:05] they are flagging anybody using headless

[07:10] Chrome on the server. They know it's

[07:13] headless Chrome.

[07:16] All right. Wow.

[07:17] And thank thank goodness thank goodness

[07:22] that this isn't happening in local SEO,

[07:28] but it is.

[07:31] Uh so yeah it's happening on on normal

[07:35] search it's happening in maps.

[07:38] All right.

[07:40] So there are some implications to this

[07:46] in that uh

[07:49] [clears throat]

[07:50] we have to start thinking about the

[07:53] context that Google is trying to handle

[07:57] the context they like and the context

[08:00] they don't. And so as of early 2026,

[08:05] over 60% of all internet traffic comes

[08:11] from mobile. All right? And Google is

[08:15] capturing around 95%

[08:18] of that 60%.

[08:21] All right? That's that's a lot. That's

[08:24] why Google is big on mobile. All right.

[08:29] In 2016, their CEO

[08:34] told the world that in mobile, typically

[08:38] all users are logged in.

[08:43] All right.

[08:45] if you're starting to feel uneasy about

[08:48] the state of the world. Yeah. Like I was

[08:51] in the same place and and I was

[08:54] thinking, you know, I don't quite get it

[08:56] yet, but this does not feel good.

[09:00] All right.

[09:01] And so getting a little more nerdy here.

[09:05] Google's OOTH. So that's the login with

[09:08] Google. If you've ever gone to websites

[09:10] and apps and it said sign in with

[09:13] Google, that's what OOTH is.

[09:16] And 72%

[09:19] of all internet users worldwide as of

[09:25] 2019

[09:27] have a Google account, making OOTH one

[09:30] of the most compelling choices

[09:34] uh Google's offering.

[09:37] All right. And that's that's adoption

[09:39] rate has probably gone up since 2019.

[09:47] All right. So everybody's logging in.

[09:49] Let's let's think about how you and I

[09:53] operate. All right. So on behalf of our

[09:57] clients,

[09:58] let's kind of think about that. So I

[10:01] will open up an incognito window.

[10:06] All right. And I will search my client's

[10:11] keywords from an anonymous context.

[10:16] All right. Now, is is that what human

[10:19] beings do? No. Human beings are logged

[10:23] in Google users.

[10:25] They're not anonymous incognito.

[10:30] All right. Very, very different. Um,

[10:34] let's think about what we do when we go

[10:37] shopping. All right, we don't incognito.

[10:41] Uh, we owe off all over the place. We

[10:45] log in with Google everywhere and we're

[10:48] using our logged in user when we engage

[10:52] the internet.

[10:56] All right. So, there are these two

[10:58] paths. there's this, you know, let's

[11:01] pretend we're in the anonymous public,

[11:05] but the public isn't anonymous anymore.

[11:09] [clears throat]

[11:10] All right.

[11:12] So, September

[11:14] 2025,

[11:16] Google announced hiring for antiscraping

[11:21] engineers.

[11:23] They're coming after SEO tool developers

[11:28] and uh you know probably the reason

[11:31] isn't that they hate SEO and they want

[11:33] to kill us. They they probably don't

[11:35] give a crap about us except the fact

[11:38] that we incur a cost on them. And the

[11:42] cost that we incur by scraping the

[11:45] search results has gone sharply up since

[11:49] they've added very expensive AI features

[11:54] to those result pages.

[11:57] So Google is basically choking on the

[12:02] operating cost of what all of our tools

[12:05] are doing to them. And so that's

[12:07] probably why they're hiring these

[12:09] anti-scraping engineers is they're like,

[12:12] "We got to stop these guys. They're

[12:15] costing us too much." But it's not, "We

[12:18] got to stop these guys because we hate

[12:20] SEO." That might be the case, but it's

[12:23] more likely they just have operating

[12:25] costs they want to minimize, but it's

[12:28] happening. So we have

[12:31] uh roles at Google that are for the

[12:36] specific purpose stopping SEO tools.

[12:42] And you know that's that's amazing.

[12:45] That's not a friendly action towards our

[12:48] industry. So if you think Google uh

[12:51] likes you because you're a good person

[12:54] or something, this isn't Google saying

[12:57] they like you.

[12:59] Um, so just keep that in mind.

[13:01] Understand your relationship with Google

[13:05] if you're making tools because this

[13:07] right here is your actual relationship

[13:10] with Google.

[13:14] All right.

[13:16] Then uh in September 2025,

[13:20] Google took away the numbum equals 100

[13:25] support.

[13:27] You know, it seems like this is like

[13:28] this this plan that they devised and

[13:31] they're rolling it out in phases

[13:34] and it it was quietly disabled

[13:38] by them. They didn't announce it or or

[13:41] anything, but the world noticed in a

[13:44] heartbeat because rank trackers

[13:47] everywhere blew up. All the stats in

[13:51] search console were wrong. And so it

[13:55] hardly went unnoticed,

[13:58] but it was definitely not announced.

[14:02] And there are implications to to that.

[14:06] You know, it broke the tools everywhere.

[14:08] But now getting a hundred uh search

[14:11] results per [snorts] keyword

[14:15] takes 10 times of the request to Google

[14:18] because you have to pageionate.

[14:21] And because of that, you're using up

[14:24] more resources. You're using more API

[14:28] calls. Those API calls are expensive and

[14:31] it's all a lot slower.

[14:34] And so that's a huge hit to us.

[14:39] All right.

[14:43] But this should hurt Google, too, right?

[14:45] because Google made a change that

[14:48] requires us to 10x all of the requests

[14:52] we're making to Google. Isn't that like

[14:55] shooting yourself in the foot?

[14:59] You know, but here's the thing. Here's

[15:01] where we start to see how this could be

[15:05] working in their favor and not to their

[15:07] detriment.

[15:09] What if the headless Chrome requests the

[15:13] tools are making

[15:16] go to one place

[15:18] and all the Google logged in users that

[15:21] are human beings go to another

[15:27] they're cloaking.

[15:28] All right. Yeah, it's starting to sound

[15:31] black hat. [clears throat]

[15:33] Yep.

[15:34] All right.

[15:36] So this year's most important question

[15:40] is the headless Chrome SEO contest

[15:45] that rank trackers and SEO tools are are

[15:49] playing in. Is that the same contest as

[15:53] the logged in Google users?

[15:57] And I've I've been trying to figure this

[15:59] out and figure out the implications. And

[16:02] it's such a massive problem to unpack.

[16:06] So my analysis I I would describe as

[16:11] weak as hell right now. It's it's not

[16:15] enough.

[16:17] But everything I've seen in my weak as

[16:20] hell analysis says no, they're not the

[16:24] same contest.

[16:26] mobile users, human traffic are seeing

[16:31] different opportunities

[16:34] than what the SEO tools are presenting.

[16:39] And it's not it's not in all cases there

[16:43] there are definitely

[16:46] you know a noteworthy percentage where

[16:49] they're the same but it's definitely

[16:52] most cases there is a substantial

[16:56] difference between the two contexts and

[17:00] it tends to be the the higher the volume

[17:04] the higher the competition the higher

[17:06] the CPC the more likely

[17:10] uh the the two views are going to

[17:14] diverge

[17:16] but

[17:17] uh you know it's not all bad news in

[17:20] that case. So SEO is not dead you know

[17:24] that that's the that's the good news. Uh

[17:29] almost nothing has changed in the

[17:32] ranking algorithm.

[17:34] Everything that worked two, three years

[17:37] ago still works now. The same methods

[17:40] all work. Uh the rhinoplasty plano games

[17:45] still ranking number one. Nothing but

[17:48] schema from Clint and Terry Samuels

[17:51] still number one. Uh AI, as far as I can

[17:56] tell, made SEO easier for everyone.

[18:01] So, you know, that's the good news.

[18:06] But do your rankings impact traffic?

[18:12] Yeah, they still do. But does number one

[18:16] get the same traffic it used to get? No,

[18:20] not even close, except in a minority of

[18:23] cases.

[18:25] Will clients see the rankings I'm

[18:28] reporting?

[18:30] probably not.

[18:33] All right. And so there's problems with

[18:36] this in that we have to measure and

[18:40] operate differently

[18:42] as SEOs. You can't just report on

[18:46] rankings anymore. It's it's different.

[18:52] And so we have to understand where did

[18:55] all the traffic go. So number one isn't

[18:58] what it used to be. Where'd it go? And

[19:02] it didn't move. The traffic is still

[19:05] where it's always been. It's above the

[19:09] fold.

[19:13] All right. The problem is our rankings

[19:17] aren't all right. And so back in the

[19:21] day,

[19:23] back in the day, we used to view search

[19:27] as 10 blue links. So page one, page two.

[19:32] 10 blue links, page one. You'd

[19:34] pageionate 10 blue links, page two.

[19:39] All right? But that's not how it is

[19:42] anymore

[19:44] cuz now you go to page one. All right?

[19:48] and it's not 10 blue links, it's eight

[19:51] or or six or you know a different

[19:54] number. And then they have uh sponsored

[19:59] ads, they have business listings, they

[20:03] have the local pack, they have the AI

[20:06] overview,

[20:07] uh you know, they have all this stuff

[20:10] above the organic.

[20:13] So you might have to actually

[20:16] uh page down or scroll down multiple

[20:21] times

[20:23] to get those top three organic spots

[20:26] visible in the viewport.

[20:28] So what used to be page one page two

[20:33] pageionation events is now uh needing to

[20:37] be measured in user interactions. So

[20:41] page down or scroll down events and

[20:44] pageionation events.

[20:48] So if you're top of page two, that might

[20:52] be scroll, scroll, scroll, pageionate.

[20:57] That's equivalent to like four

[20:59] pageenations in the early day. That's

[21:02] effectively page four.

[21:06] So, they're burying us behind user

[21:09] interactions to be seen. And this is

[21:12] happening in AI mode, too, because

[21:15] you'll you'll note when you go to AI

[21:17] mode, they only show you three of the

[21:20] citations.

[21:23] You have to scroll to see everybody

[21:27] else. If you're below the fold in the

[21:30] citations, you might as well not even be

[21:33] cited there.

[21:36] I mean, almost nobody is ever going to

[21:38] do that.

[21:41] And all those people, Google's using

[21:43] your content and they're not even

[21:45] willing to show your link.

[21:49] That's bad.

[21:51] And so yeah, we have to stop thinking

[21:54] about pageionation events and start

[21:58] thinking about

[21:59] how many user interactions

[22:03] does it take to see my search result.

[22:06] And you need to measure those. And I

[22:09] like to use not not page events, page

[22:13] one, page two, but page down events. So,

[22:17] how many times do you have to hit page

[22:19] down to see it? And how many times do

[22:22] you have to pageionate?

[22:24] And and that's a more useful number.

[22:28] Um and because of this you have to find

[22:32] out what opportunities

[22:34] appear above the fold

[22:38] not for headless Chrome but for logged

[22:41] in human beings

[22:43] because those opportunities that are

[22:46] above the fold whether it's Google ads

[22:49] or YouTube videos or the local pack or

[22:52] the AI overview or the forums and

[22:55] discussions

[22:57] those are the things that will often be

[23:00] above the fold that you can get into

[23:04] and that's where the traffic is. So for

[23:07] your whole list of keywords, you need to

[23:09] know what opportunities

[23:12] you can go after to get in front of the

[23:15] traffic.

[23:18] Now most SEOs are out there and they are

[23:22] uh just running a list. They they got a

[23:24] list of keywords based on CPC and search

[23:28] volume and they're just SEOing the whole

[23:31] list, not realizing that probably half

[23:34] of that list, at least of the important

[23:37] keywords for logged in users are going

[23:40] to show four or five pay-per-click ads.

[23:44] There is no organic above the full page

[23:48] one experience.

[23:50] And so for those keywords, if you're

[23:53] SEOing those,

[23:55] you know, you you're probably gonna

[23:57] fight long and hard and deliver no

[24:00] value.

[24:02] But you could buy a pay-per-click

[24:04] campaign for that set of keywords,

[24:08] get immediate traffic for the customer.

[24:11] But then if you see forums and

[24:13] discussions above the fold, then you can

[24:16] go to Reddit and start sculpting how

[24:20] your brand and your brand's keywords are

[24:23] appearing in Reddit and that can get

[24:25] above the fold. You can get indirect

[24:29] representation.

[24:31] You might have to go to Merchant Center

[24:33] and tune the feed and get their products

[24:37] above the fold. And so this concept of

[24:40] SEO, you know, it's always been multi-

[24:43] channelannel, but now you kind of have

[24:46] to be multi- channelannel.

[24:49] So, you know, if if you're not taking on

[24:52] these opportunities that are above the

[24:55] fold, you're basically not delivering

[24:58] value.

[25:01] You can't just apply SEO to every

[25:04] keyword situation anymore. You have to

[25:07] actually triage these things.

[25:12] All right.

[25:14] So again, what to do? Some keywords only

[25:19] have ads above the fold. You know, maybe

[25:24] let the ad campaign handle those ones.

[25:27] So, we're putting keywords. We're

[25:29] looking at what opportunities are above

[25:32] the fold on page one and we're putting

[25:35] them into buckets. Now, you know, some

[25:38] keywords still are great SEO

[25:41] opportunities,

[25:43] but you have to find them. There are

[25:45] keywords where you get 10 blue links and

[25:49] five of them are above the full,

[25:52] but it's not your whole list. That whole

[25:55] list you've been working on all year is

[25:57] not that, but that's how we all kind of

[26:01] see them in our head because that's how

[26:02] it used to be 10 years ago.

[26:07] A lot of the keywords uh you might SEO

[26:11] might might never bring value even in

[26:14] the top three.

[26:17] And so you have to weigh, you know, how

[26:20] difficult it is to get top three. Where

[26:23] does top three actually show up on page

[26:27] one? Uh how much traffic does the

[26:30] keyword get? What is the uh value of a

[26:35] customer from that traffic for your

[26:38] customer? There there's a lot you have

[26:41] to look at to figure out if that keyword

[26:45] is actually an opportunity or a complete

[26:47] waste of time.

[26:50] And so SEOing the whole list, you know,

[26:54] for some people, half their list is

[26:56] going to be a waste of time if all

[26:58] they're doing is organic SEO.

[27:03] And that's that's dangerous. That's what

[27:05] gets you fired is you have an expensive

[27:09] service that delivers no value

[27:13] and it takes you a long time to do it.

[27:16] So, you know, you might want to start

[27:19] looking at your keywords because it's

[27:22] not that Google's changing the

[27:24] algorithm. The algorithm didn't change.

[27:28] The the greatest trick Google has ever

[27:31] pulled on the SEO industry is they

[27:35] changed the opportunity.

[27:38] All right, the opportunities are

[27:40] different. We're all thinking, "Damn,

[27:43] we're killing it. I'm ranking number

[27:45] three. I'm ranking number one." But what

[27:49] does that even mean now?

[27:53] You think you're killing it and Google

[27:56] just got very quiet about SEO. They

[28:00] dialed down their rhetoric about SEO.

[28:03] They've, you know, they talk about a lot

[28:05] of things they're doing, but they don't

[28:07] talk about SEO the same way they used to

[28:11] like two years ago

[28:14] because they know they already won

[28:17] [clears throat]

[28:19] this current round of the arms race and

[28:22] they're saying, "Hey, let's not draw

[28:23] attention to it. The SEOs think they're

[28:26] killing it with their top three rankings

[28:29] everywhere.

[28:31] let them think they're winning.

[28:36] All right. So, that's that's probably

[28:38] why they've gone so quiet and they're

[28:40] doubling down on hiring, you know,

[28:44] antiscraping engineers.

[28:48] And so, you really need to look at the

[28:50] opportunities because that's where the

[28:52] game is changing. triaging those

[28:55] keywords upfront and figuring out where

[28:58] the opportunities are and are they worth

[29:01] going after because if you deliver value

[29:05] to the clients they are going to love

[29:07] you but if you blindly deliver work that

[29:12] doesn't turn into money

[29:14] I mean that's a disaster waiting to

[29:16] happen

[29:18] and that's why that triage understanding

[29:22] the opportunity is almost more important

[29:26] than the FDO work itself, which frankly

[29:30] because of AI has gotten easier.

[29:37] All right,

[29:39] so new tools and new tests are coming.

[29:44] Can't tell you how often we've said it

[29:47] and it's never landed. Like people all

[29:49] nod and they're like, "Yeah, okay." You

[29:52] know, it pays to test. You know, let's

[29:54] let's wait for Lee to tell us what to

[29:57] do. [laughter]

[29:59] You know, we all need to be testing

[30:02] right now because it's all changing

[30:04] right now.

[30:06] All right. And there's never been a more

[30:09] important time to know what the hell is

[30:13] going on.

[30:19] All right. So, in that light, I want to

[30:22] show you a a few of the things I'm

[30:26] starting to dabble with and to test and

[30:29] things that I've seen.

[30:32] All right.

[30:35] So, this technical gobbledegook, don't

[30:39] worry if you can't read it, but this is

[30:42] from the headers, the response headers

[30:45] coming from Google. And there's this

[30:48] Xclient data one. And I will read uh the

[30:54] the uh statement that uh Chrome had to

[30:57] say about that one. It says uh active

[31:02] Google visible variation IDs on this

[31:06] client. These are reported for analysis

[31:11] but do not directly affect any server

[31:14] side behavior. And then they give a list

[31:17] of ID numbers.

[31:20] And then right below it, they have this

[31:23] trigger uh variation list.

[31:26] Active Google visible variation IDs on

[31:31] this client that trigger serverside

[31:35] behavior.

[31:36] These are reported for analysis and

[31:40] directly affecting serverside behavior.

[31:45] All right. So, that's really technical.

[31:47] We're all wondering, Ted, what the hell

[31:49] are you talking about?

[31:52] And chat GPT can actually explain a lot

[31:56] of these things. Uh, so that example

[32:00] explained,

[32:02] my browser session with Google is

[32:07] enrolled in 15 experiments.

[32:10] Three of them actively influence server

[32:14] side behavior.

[32:17] [ __ ]

[32:18] Yeah. Kind of crazy, right?

[32:22] All right. So, so why does Google do

[32:26] this? All right. They need to run

[32:28] thousands of experiments safely. They

[32:32] need to avoid exposing what those

[32:35] experiments are. They don't even want us

[32:37] to know the names. And that's why they

[32:39] hide them by those numbers

[32:42] and they change server behaviors but

[32:46] without having to roll out new API

[32:49] integrations with the client side. uh

[32:52] the uh attribute

[32:56] uh performance issues to specific

[32:58] experiments. That one

[33:01] uh

[33:03] uh uh the attribute performance issues.

[33:06] That one I'm you know I'm not so sure

[33:08] about. That's kind of a logging thing

[33:10] and it's like h well yeah okay I could

[33:13] kind of see that uh gradually rolling

[33:16] out new features.

[33:19] All right. So, a while ago we were

[33:23] talking, you know, years ago, we were

[33:26] talking about detecting Google updates.

[33:31] Now, we have a list of numbers of things

[33:35] Google is doing that are changes. When

[33:38] those numbers change,

[33:41] that's an update to what you're seeing.

[33:44] And now, let's think about our SEO

[33:46] tools, okay? How many experiments

[33:51] are our headless Chrome SEO tools

[33:54] enrolled in that modify the results?

[33:59] All right, so that's an apples and

[34:01] oranges thing cuz what if your clients

[34:04] aren't enrolled in the experiment?

[34:09] All right, so now you have differences

[34:11] of of what tools and clients see.

[34:16] All right, here's where it starts to get

[34:19] interesting. when you uh remove these

[34:24] numbers. So if you uh created a system

[34:28] where the server stripped that heading

[34:31] that had all these numbers in it, you

[34:34] will disable experiments which will

[34:38] change the responses and could possibly

[34:41] put you into fallback, you know, default

[34:44] behavior.

[34:46] Well, that's awesome because then you

[34:49] can create a system

[34:52] that will disable the numbers one at a

[34:54] time and you can get the diff of the

[34:59] before and after of the source code and

[35:04] theoretically whatever changes from

[35:07] removing that number should be what that

[35:11] number is testing.

[35:14] So you could potentially use HTML diffs

[35:18] to convert those numbers into what

[35:22] they're doing.

[35:26] [clears throat]

[35:26] Um and that that's amazing. And the

[35:30] other thing is you know we would we

[35:33] would want to know uh you know which

[35:36] things are being rolled out. So when you

[35:39] see that a number only appears in the US

[35:43] or a number only appears abroad that

[35:46] could be a roll out that you know

[35:49] especially if that number is growing.

[35:54] [clears throat and cough]

[35:55] All right.

[35:58] So [snorts] another thing I found in the

[36:00] data this is a new one.

[36:04] Uh, this one kind of blew my mind that

[36:08] it's in there

[36:10] because what Google typically doesn't

[36:12] want you to know

[36:15] is how well you're doing.

[36:18] All right? It's the reason they took

[36:21] away page rank uh from the Google

[36:24] toolbar. They don't want you to see how

[36:28] well you're killing it. Now, this is for

[36:32] local. This is in map search. Every

[36:36] single Google business profile, every

[36:40] business you're working with has this

[36:43] data in the JavaScript in uh map search.

[36:49] And what this is, this comes from

[36:51] Google. This doesn't come from my

[36:53] software or anything. This is Google's

[36:56] data. They are showing you these zones.

[37:00] So for the business I was looking at

[37:03] when I got this data, which was Jean

[37:06] Johnson Plumbing in Seattle,

[37:09] their strongest zone correlation is the

[37:13] Greenwood neighborhood.

[37:15] Their second strongest is the zone of

[37:19] Seattle. Their third strongest is the

[37:22] zone of King County. And they have all

[37:25] these applicable zones on where this

[37:29] business best fits.

[37:32] Wow.

[37:33] So if you want to expand

[37:37] uh your rankings at the county level,

[37:42] you need to impact that correlation

[37:45] number.

[37:48] All right. So now now you can actually

[37:52] go and change the website and change the

[37:56] profile and see if these various zone

[38:00] correlations changed.

[38:03] you can figure out how to tune for a

[38:06] county, how to tune for a city, how to

[38:08] break out of the Greenwood neighborhood,

[38:13] but odds are if uh you're locked into a

[38:17] neighborhood,

[38:19] you know, that

[38:21] that's something we got to figure out.

[38:23] We got to test more around this. And

[38:26] that's live. That's you can uh you can

[38:29] inspect the rendered DOM and find this

[38:32] in the JavaScript for each business

[38:35] today.

[38:41] All right.

[38:43] So, kind of kind of bringing it all to a

[38:47] close here uh before I take some

[38:50] questions. You know, I'm I'm only one

[38:53] person and I know a lot of people are

[38:56] mad at me that my my updates aren't as

[38:59] fast as they'd like. Uh but, you know,

[39:03] getting getting the answer right and

[39:06] finding the advantage, it's it's not

[39:09] easy. Um and so it's not just coding

[39:14] cool features, it's actually looking at

[39:18] how Google is changing crafting theories

[39:22] on why they're doing it and where it's

[39:25] going.

[39:27] And then it's trying to create solutions

[39:32] that that give you the advantage still

[39:35] in those scenarios

[39:38] and then you get to code it. And so

[39:42] everybody's, you know, watching the uh

[39:45] TED, why isn't the code coming out

[39:47] faster? Well, innovation

[39:51] doesn't really lend itself to a

[39:53] timetable. If it did, cancer would be

[39:56] cured by now and we'd all be living on

[39:58] Mars. If you could say, "Do it by next

[40:01] quarter," we would, you know, but that's

[40:04] that's not how innovation works. How

[40:07] innovation works is enough people care

[40:10] about a thing uh that together we'll all

[40:14] figure it out. And you know,

[40:16] [clears throat] kind of right now, you

[40:18] know, I'm I'm wondering where did all

[40:20] the testers go?

[40:23] You know, why why am I the only one

[40:26] that's raising the flag on this stuff?

[40:28] Why am I the only one that's digging

[40:31] deep into this stuff?

[40:34] And, you know, I'm happy to be wrong on

[40:36] all of it. Boy, that would be awesome.

[40:39] And so, yeah, prove me wrong, prove me

[40:42] right, find cool things I missed. Uh,

[40:45] but we got to do something cuz if it's

[40:48] just me, it's going to be really hard.

[40:53] It's going to take a lot of time.

[40:56] So, you know, my question to you, I've

[40:59] shown you some cool stuff here. What are

[41:02] you going to do? You can test the

[41:03] methods. You can test my advice. You

[41:06] could go looking for things I haven't

[41:08] found yet.

[41:10] And I know Ted, work faster, and I will.

[41:17] Um, but you know, that's not the best

[41:20] plan on the table.

[41:23] All right. Thank you. Does, uh, anyone

[41:27] have any questions for me while I'm

[41:29] online here?

[41:31] First, let's give a big round of

[41:33] applause. [applause]

[41:38] If you have a question, use this

[41:40] microphone here. You can hear it through

[41:41] here. So, anybody have a question? That

[41:45] was very heavy. Can

[41:46] you get him to tell us how to uh find

[41:48] the uh the uh neighborhood?

[41:52] How do you find the neighborhood zones?

[41:54] you uh do a search in Google Maps

[41:59] and you'll rightclick on the search

[42:02] results

[42:03] uh to uh see to uh see the DOM uh HTML.

[42:10] So you'll inspect

[42:13] and then you will do a uh a control F or

[42:18] a command F to find and you'll be able

[42:21] to keyword search the DOM and then you

[42:24] want to look for the city name in the

[42:27] JavaScript

[42:29] and then you'll find it in the

[42:32] JavaScript and there'll be one for each

[42:35] business. So you might want to search

[42:37] for the business name in the JavaScript

[42:40] and then search for the city name right

[42:42] after that. Um the other thing to do is

[42:46] to uh parse it out of the uh the data

[42:50] and then you can get every business in

[42:52] those zones and uh that's something I'm

[42:55] doing uh as well. It's one of the new

[42:57] adaptations I'm working on. Uh but yeah,

[43:01] it's it's there. You can see it for

[43:04] yourself. Any

[43:10] questions?

[43:10] Yeah, ask 10 questions. I will. [ __ ]

[43:13] that.

[43:14] Here. You got to have this so he can

[43:16] hear you.

[43:17] Hey, Big Ted.

[43:18] Hey, how's it going, Mike?

[43:20] Good. I said, man, if nobody got

[43:22] questions for Big Ted, I'mma ask him.

[43:24] Hey, I was curious. Have you seen the

[43:25] new mid link for Google Maps that shows

[43:28] up on the AI overview? Is it like a new

[43:31] GMBB URL that's been brought to the

[43:35] world since AI overview came out?

[43:38] Uh, I haven't had a chance to play with

[43:40] it, but yes, I've been seeing it. And I

[43:44] know in the past Google has tried to

[43:47] make it difficult to follow the ID

[43:50] chains. So, I I worry about that. Uh,

[43:54] but I I don't know what to worry about

[43:57] specifically yet.

[43:59] Okay. I know you got a lot on your

[44:01] testing table and I'm testing the [ __ ]

[44:03] out of it. But when you get a chance, if

[44:05] you could look deeply into that code and

[44:07] tell me if there's anything I should

[44:09] know. Uh cuz at first when when that

[44:12] link first came out, if you were to grab

[44:15] your machine ID and swap it out, it

[44:17] wouldn't load like exactly what you're

[44:19] saying. They didn't want you to be able

[44:21] to do that, especially not manipulate

[44:22] it. Uh then change and you can do it.

[44:26] And here's a little free nugget for

[44:27] y'all, right? uh reviews that come in

[44:29] from that link

[44:33] stick a lot more. Super nugget, right? I

[44:36] was not planning on sharing that.

[44:38] Anyway, Ted, thank you so much. That's

[44:39] what I wanted to ask you. If you

[44:43] Absolutely,

[44:44] Ted. Um I'll I'll show on my

[44:46] presentation. There's a new Google map

[44:48] link, the mid link that comes in from a

[44:51] AI overview suggestion. When you get to

[44:54] that map knowledge pan or whatever the

[44:57] [ __ ] it's called, if you get a review to

[44:59] come in from there, it seems to stick

[45:02] longer because I guess they trust it

[45:04] more. Why you laughing, Nester? Hey,

[45:07] listen. It's rockstars. Got to drop the

[45:08] nug. Oh, questions for Ted. Yeah. Yeah.

[45:10] Come on. You know, we got to get the

[45:12] nuggets from Ted.

[45:13] Yo. Yo, Ted. Um hello question for about

[45:17] I'm building a rank tracker still for

[45:21] one custom need and

[45:23] many challenges you know like um how

[45:25] you're scraping the data I I'm

[45:28] integrating like data for SEO other APIs

[45:31] but still the same blue links that

[45:33] there's not anymore it's about pixel but

[45:36] there are many other factors that are

[45:38] important like hle

[45:41] you know um the other stuff like where

[45:44] the the the provider this the provider

[45:48] of internet uh where you're tracking

[45:50] that might change. So in my still I'm

[45:54] building the tool but I'm pretty sure

[45:57] it's not uh trustworthy but I'm I'm just

[46:01] building because I need like the source

[46:02] of truth to for showing clients anyway.

[46:06] But uh what are your thoughts? I mean I

[46:08] was really surprised about this uh login

[46:12] accounts. So what I have in mind maybe

[46:15] uh connecting a bunch of Google

[46:17] accounts. I mean it's so hard you know

[46:19] but maybe that could give me a better

[46:23] approach but what what possibly

[46:26] the clients could see.

[46:29] Yeah. Yeah. So uh what I'm looking at

[46:32] you're exactly right. I think uh pixel

[46:35] height and knowing uh the pixel height

[46:38] of the fold uh is very important for any

[46:42] new modern rank trackers cuz I want a

[46:44] rank tracker to tell me what links are

[46:48] viewable.

[46:49] And so I need to know, you know, is it

[46:52] in the viewport? Is it one, two, or

[46:55] three user interactions below uh the

[47:00] initial viewport?

[47:02] uh because that that's more meaningful.

[47:04] If uh if somebody has to scroll twice

[47:08] then pageionate to find me that's my

[47:11] rank position.

[47:14] All right. It's not it's not number

[47:16] four. It's you know I am three user

[47:20] interactions away which pretty much

[47:23] means you know my result is dead.

[47:27] Um, and you know the problem is is you

[47:30] get impression count for things that

[47:33] might be four user interactions away. So

[47:36] even impression count doesn't mean what

[47:39] it used to mean.

[47:41] Um, so yeah, we need we need new metrics

[47:45] and kind of uh what you need to think

[47:48] about is either getting an embedded

[47:51] Chrome or piloting a Chrome instance.

[47:56] uh but the APIs they're using headless

[47:59] Chrome

[48:01] and so using the APIs doesn't

[48:04] necessarily solve your problem

[48:07] and so but if you if you pilot Chrome

[48:11] and connect to a debugging port that's

[48:13] pretty good if you use uh macro tools to

[48:18] open Chrome and put in the mouse buttons

[48:20] that'll that'll do the trick. Uh the

[48:23] other thing is there are uh for some of

[48:26] the languages out there that are popular

[48:29] there are embeddible versions of

[48:31] Chromium. They cost uh quite a bit of

[48:34] money. Uh but you know that's that

[48:37] avenue is out there and that's kind of

[48:38] the avenue that I'm going down. Um but

[48:43] yeah, you know, we we can solve this.

[48:46] This is a solvable problem. We just have

[48:49] to solve it with new techniques and new

[48:51] tools.

[48:53] And so your thinking is exactly right on

[48:55] that.

[48:57] Thanks, Ted.

[49:00] Ted, we have a question from Patrick

[49:03] online. In your opinion, what scenarios

[49:05] are worth putting the effort into

[49:07] ranking in AI overviews?

[49:12] Um, well, you know, getting getting

[49:15] above the fold is important. It's, you

[49:19] know, if if you're in the AI overview

[49:22] and your brand is refle uh reflected

[49:26] positively there,

[49:29] uh, you know, that's like having a good

[49:31] billboard on the highway. It should

[49:33] result in more brand search.

[49:36] So, even if they don't engage it, if

[49:38] they they see it and they remember you

[49:41] and they search your brand later, that's

[49:43] value. It's it's hard to attribute that

[49:47] value, but you want to be where the

[49:50] people are, right?

[49:53] And so if AI overviews are in front of

[49:55] the people,

[49:57] you probably want to be there. And I

[50:00] would I would try to get the the brand

[50:02] there. And you know, one of the things

[50:05] uh we've seen with that is right now

[50:08] it's it's kind of exploitable

[50:11] uh because

[50:13] the AI system is heavily weighting the

[50:17] occurrences of Roundup articles. Are you

[50:21] number one in a lot of Roundup articles

[50:24] for the thing you're doing? Are you top

[50:27] three?

[50:29] Uh do you appear in any of them?

[50:32] So,

[50:34] you know who who can think of a solution

[50:37] for that? Well, let's maybe write some

[50:39] roundup articles.

[50:43] Um, so yeah,

[50:45] Dory Dory asks, "What's a roundup

[50:47] article?"

[50:48] Um, all right. So, uh, you have a bar

[50:52] with a karaoke night.

[50:55] Uh, how many articles list you in the

[50:58] top 20 karaoke bars for Seattle? And if

[51:03] none of them list you, AI knows that.

[51:08] If half of them list you, AI knows that.

[51:11] If you often appear in the top three, AI

[51:15] knows that. That's what it trained on.

[51:19] So when you say to AI, you know, what

[51:22] are the best places for karaoke in

[51:25] Seattle, that's what AI is going to

[51:28] consider. And you can actually craft

[51:31] your prompts to tell you the ranking

[51:35] algorithm.

[51:36] Uh that is a huge thing right now that

[51:41] people aren't exploiting. You can craft

[51:43] your prompt in a way where you say,

[51:46] "Write a list of the top 20 karaoke bars

[51:51] in Seattle."

[51:53] And put them in a table along with the

[51:56] criteria

[51:58] you considered

[52:00] for ranking them in that position

[52:04] and site any applicable sources. It'll

[52:07] even tell you the roundup articles.

[52:11] Yeah. facts.

[52:12] Bro, give it up for Ted because if you

[52:14] don't understand what he's saying,

[52:15] [applause]

[52:16] he was in the VIP lounge last night. We

[52:18] was talking about this, Brad. One of the

[52:19] other speakers, Google Gemini, be

[52:21] dropping the T. If you don't know what T

[52:24] means, it means the gossip. Like, yo,

[52:26] how do I get my GMBB back? Ask Gemini.

[52:28] You'd be surprised that [ __ ]

[52:30] give you a checklist there at the end.

[52:32] That's what he's talking about. you go

[52:34] back and forth and chat with the [ __ ]

[52:36] with the right intention and prompting

[52:38] to reverse engineer what's getting not

[52:41] the rankings, the revenue, right? Where

[52:43] are the buyers at? Bro, it's just it's

[52:45] right there so easy for now. That was a

[52:47] huge nugget. Thank you, bro.

[52:49] Yeah,

[52:50] you're welcome.

[52:52] Keep going. Please. [laughter]

[52:57] He said keep going.

[52:58] Yeah. Ask him to touch on the so the

[53:00] listicles thing, right?

[53:01] What's the listical thing? round up

[53:03] listicles like listical articles like

[53:05] hey top 10 x in gio right a lot of

[53:08] people are scared to write an article a

[53:10] lot of people are scared

[53:12] a lot of people are scared to write an

[53:14] article right like on your client's site

[53:15] or your site like yo 10 best roofers in

[53:18] Texas because like why

[53:20] why are you gonna mention another brand

[53:22] on your website but if you've ever done

[53:24] that right you're ranking in the AI

[53:27] overview I guarantee it without any

[53:29] question of a doubt right now you'll be

[53:31] like

[53:31] go ahead

[53:32] It's important for the the rankings in

[53:36] uh map search, too. Google's looking for

[53:39] multip multiple forms of evidence that

[53:43] your claims are true. So, it's it's not

[53:45] just that your reviews talk about how

[53:48] great the karaoke event is at the bar.

[53:52] That helps. That's one dimension. But

[53:54] they are also collecting and storing and

[53:58] sometimes presenting those list

[54:01] articles. I have screenshots from past

[54:05] presentations at SEO Rockstars where I

[54:09] showed you the list articles being

[54:13] presented in map search.

[54:16] So if they're looking for them,

[54:19] if they're collecting them into these

[54:21] massive big data databases and they're

[54:25] sometimes even presenting them in the

[54:28] search results, what are the odds

[54:31] they're rank uh they're calculating the

[54:34] rank score with them as well?

[54:37] Yeah,

[54:38] absolutely. I I'll I'll piggyback a

[54:40] little nugget too, right? So, like don't

[54:42] do it on your client site what I had

[54:44] just said, you know, cuz be respectful,

[54:46] but you could go buy an exact match

[54:49] domain like best roofers texas.net.com.

[54:53] Make it a little [ __ ] directory

[54:54] site. You don't got to get crazy with

[54:56] it, right? And just reference the top 10

[54:57] people, right? And then,

[54:59] well, there's a better way.

[55:01] Go Ted. Go ahead, baby. Drop it. Give it

[55:03] to them.

[55:04] Yeah. uh you know I teach a a lot of

[55:07] local SEOs uh who are are are just

[55:11] getting started and one of the things

[55:13] I'm teaching now is that uh every local

[55:17] SEO needs to be three to five travel

[55:21] bloggers.

[55:22] So create your travel bloggers because

[55:26] you need to change topics and locations

[55:30] left and right. So you need websites

[55:33] where that's appropriate and expected.

[55:37] So if you are three to five travel

[55:41] blogging personas, you can be talking

[55:44] about the best dry cleaners in uh

[55:49] uh in Berlin and then you can switch to

[55:52] the best cajinjun restaurants in

[55:56] Alabama. then you can switch to the best

[56:00] uh karaoke bars in Seattle and you can

[56:03] do it all the time. And here's the

[56:05] thing, all of your local SEO

[56:08] competition,

[56:10] none of them are thinking this way. None

[56:13] of them are doing this. And so it when

[56:17] Google is looking in its database, are

[56:20] there any roundup articles uh for this

[56:24] keyword for these businesses?

[56:27] If you have three to five, even if

[56:30] they're not powerful, at least you have

[56:33] three to five entries where nearly

[56:36] everyone else has zero.

[56:40] Absolutely.

[56:42] Give it up for Ted. Any questions for

[56:45] Ted?

[56:47] Guys, I'mma finish that thought separate

[56:49] from what he's saying. Not compared,

[56:51] totally different exact match domain,

[56:53] right? List the top 10 or whatever the

[56:56] do the research like he said. Ask

[56:58] Gemini.

[57:00] That's what I'm saying. Yes, of course.

[57:01] And your link is the only one that's

[57:04] outbound, the only do follow link, the

[57:06] only map that's inbed. Everything else

[57:08] is an image that doesn't click out. So,

[57:10] it's not really it's a [ __ ] list of

[57:12] you control. do that for best geo, best

[57:16] service in geo, not just a category. So,

[57:18] not just best roofer if it's

[57:20] competitive, best metal roofer, best

[57:22] roof inspector, best and you'll [ __ ]

[57:24] smash and you'll get the AI overview in

[57:26] less than three, four, five days.

[57:29] Yeah. And in your roundup articles,

[57:33] don't list the obvious best competitors.

[57:37] Go find the the 19 worst ones and put

[57:41] yourself [laughter] at the top.

[57:43] Yeah, you can hold this question.

[57:46] Why don't you just create a couple lead

[57:50] genen sites and then list all those lead

[57:52] genen sites as your competitors many

[57:54] ways. So guys, real quick, just to say

[57:56] because you guys are having a lot of

[57:57] thought. There's literally so many ways

[57:59] to do this. That's why I started off

[58:01] with a directory [ __ ] directory. You

[58:02] can do a full-blown directory site and

[58:04] now that's it. You could do either

[58:06] either niche or just every city and

[58:08] state. And there you go. That one thing,

[58:10] subdomain or not, can do everything

[58:12] we're covering. I also have dyslexia.

[58:14] So, please let me ask a question. Is a

[58:16] roundup and a listical the same thing or

[58:18] am I mixing the two things up?

[58:21] Sometime I want to make sure I'm not

[58:22] bugging the [ __ ] out. All right. Cool.

[58:23] Cool. So, yeah, guys, it could be a lead

[58:25] genen site like you said, lead genen

[58:28] directory PDN

[58:31] like like Ted said, which is very smart.

[58:33] personas, bloggers, mommy blog. He had a

[58:36] question first, then we'll come to you.

[58:38] Okay,

[58:38] great.

[58:38] So Ted, I was gonna ask a more of a

[58:40] technical one. What if in a certain area

[58:44] you cannot you can get in big trouble if

[58:46] you were use the word best, right? So

[58:49] like from the law practice, we're

[58:52] restricted on that word, right? And I

[58:53] know people do it, but but it's a real

[58:56] red flag with the bar. What what would

[58:58] you suggest in building that?

[59:01] Yeah. in any regulated space you you

[59:05] really have to follow the letter of the

[59:08] law. Uh but there is nothing against

[59:12] emphasized numbers in the rankings.

[59:17] So if you say this is a list of DUI

[59:20] lawyers in Seattle, there's no reason

[59:23] you can't make the top three bold and

[59:26] larger font. [laughter]

[59:32] Go ahead. So Sean, you had a question.

[59:35] Okay, go ahead.

[59:37] I just have one question. Well, it

[59:39] doesn't matter.

[59:40] Can you hear that, Mike?

[59:41] Oh, is that mic?

[59:42] Yeah. Yeah, I can hear.

[59:44] Okay, great.

[59:44] Okay. All I wanted to is you need to

[59:48] give a plug for the the local SEO uh uh

[59:52] courses and helping that you can give

[59:54] some of of us out here. You said you

[59:57] said you're teaching some people. How

**[01:00:00]** can we get there?

**[01:00:02]** All right, here's here's the crazy

**[01:00:04]** thing. I actually don't charge for my

**[01:00:08]** training if you subscribe to my

**[01:00:10]** software.

**[01:00:12]** And even even if you end up not using my

**[01:00:16]** software, which would be insane, uh

**[01:00:19]** you're you're looking at $250

**[01:00:22]** for the training then.

**[01:00:25]** And everybody knows this software,

**[01:00:27]** right?

**[01:00:29]** Yeah. Yeah. It's a no pitch thing, but

**[01:00:31]** it was a question.

**[01:00:36]** Any other questions for Ted?

**[01:00:39]** No. Y'all sure? Go on once. All right.

**[01:00:40]** There you go. Smart man.

**[01:00:43]** Hold on. Hold on. Corora. C O R A.

**[01:00:47]** Any last questions for Ted?

**[01:00:49]** You sure y'all? All right. Hey, Ted. I

**[01:00:52]** got one. If you don't mind, I got a last

**[01:00:54]** I got. Yeah. Yeah. Bring it on.

**[01:00:56]** The last time you was breaking down the

**[01:00:58]** the schema zones to me, right, and the

**[01:01:01]** importance of certain zones and

**[01:01:02]** elements, right? Is that did you come up

**[01:01:05]** with anything

**[01:01:07]** uh any update on that that Merino might

**[01:01:09]** want to know?

**[01:01:11]** Uh

**[01:01:13]** yeah. Um you know, it's it's it's kind

**[01:01:17]** of

**[01:01:17]** private.

**[01:01:18]** No, no, it's not private. It's uh you

**[01:01:22]** know the the main thing we learned from

**[01:01:25]** Terry Samuels and Clint Butler's nothing

**[01:01:28]** but schema uh thing is that a schema is

**[01:01:33]** most definitely hardwired into the

**[01:01:36]** ranking system. So if you've been

**[01:01:39]** neglecting schema you really need to

**[01:01:42]** stop doing that. Uh the next thing is

**[01:01:45]** that I found that uh the most important

**[01:01:48]** fields in the schema are the description

**[01:01:51]** fields and that's where you can get

**[01:01:55]** really crazy value. You need to pull a

**[01:01:59]** uh a Kyle roof rhinoplasty plano thing

**[01:02:04]** in in your schema. You know, it doesn't

**[01:02:06]** have to be gibberish, but man, your

**[01:02:09]** topical relevancy, the entities need to

**[01:02:12]** be in there. All the keyword variations

**[01:02:15]** need to be in there. You need to be

**[01:02:17]** extremely verbose in those description

**[01:02:21]** fields. You don't put in a sevenword

**[01:02:24]** sentence. That's not going to cut it.

**[01:02:26]** And here's the thing, the words in your

**[01:02:30]** schema

**[01:02:32]** need to match the words on your page.

**[01:02:36]** All right? The visible words in the

**[01:02:38]** content. If you only put the words in

**[01:02:41]** the schema, they don't count. All right?

**[01:02:46]** So,

**[01:02:47]** so hold up, hold up, Ted, Ted, one

**[01:02:49]** second. Y'all heard that.

**[01:02:50]** No,

**[01:02:51]** Ted, say it again, please, because

**[01:02:53]** that's super huge. All right. If you

**[01:02:56]** only put the words in the schema, they

**[01:03:00]** won't count. The only words that count

**[01:03:03]** in schema are the words that match words

**[01:03:06]** in the content. When the words, the

**[01:03:09]** entities and the keywords in the schema

**[01:03:13]** match the entities and the keywords on

**[01:03:16]** the page and the headings and the title

**[01:03:18]** and the paragraphs,

**[01:03:21]** that's when the magic happens. when you

**[01:03:24]** uh go back to, you know, past videos and

**[01:03:28]** rock stars when Clint Butler showed his

**[01:03:31]** Fountain Hills example,

**[01:03:34]** he doesn't rank for Fountain Hills

**[01:03:37]** Clint.

**[01:03:39]** He doesn't rank for it. Google doesn't

**[01:03:42]** even think he has a page for it, even

**[01:03:45]** though his schema says Clint Butler 12

**[01:03:48]** times.

**[01:03:50]** he would have to put his name in the

**[01:03:53]** content of the page to rank for that.

**[01:03:56]** And if he did that, he'd rank number one

**[01:03:58]** for it.

**[01:04:00]** But it's in the schema only, so it

**[01:04:03]** doesn't work.

**[01:04:05]** But I'm sorry, Ted, because you know,

**[01:04:08]** you know I'm a learner. Are you saying,

**[01:04:10]** bro, that all the times, even me, bro,

**[01:04:12]** that I tried to be slick and and stuck

**[01:04:15]** for a whole bunch of [ __ ] in the schema

**[01:04:17]** that wasn't on a one page landing page,

**[01:04:19]** you know, like that? That's why it

**[01:04:20]** wasn't working or moving that much. And

**[01:04:22]** if it was moving, it wasn't because of

**[01:04:24]** that.

**[01:04:24]** Yeah, because I didn't know. Who here

**[01:04:26]** knew that? Time out, bro. You knew that,

**[01:04:29]** Sean. Okay. Who else knew that?

**[01:04:30]** Two people. Okay. I'm say I want I want

**[01:04:33]** to Is that Brian? Okay. Yeah, that one I

**[01:04:35]** could believe. Wait, you learned it from

**[01:04:36]** him,

**[01:04:36]** Sean?

**[01:04:38]** Okay, that's why. All right,

**[01:04:40]** that's uh Hey, Ted, that's a huge

**[01:04:42]** nugget. And real quick, this is like a

**[01:04:45]** no pitch event, but this is our event,

**[01:04:47]** right? And he just referenced past

**[01:04:49]** presentations, right? I don't know if

**[01:04:51]** you guys know cuz maybe it hasn't been

**[01:04:53]** advertised fully and properly, but the

**[01:04:56]** big rockstar package comes with access

**[01:04:59]** to all the videos and pre presentations

**[01:05:03]** from all 12 years. Then I created a

**[01:05:06]** custom rag chat. So you could talk with

**[01:05:08]** it. So you could literally go press or

**[01:05:11]** type, hey, what do Clint and Terry say

**[01:05:14]** about schema? And it'll give you an

**[01:05:16]** answer and it'll lead to their

**[01:05:17]** presentations. I'm also building SOPs

**[01:05:20]** based off though. Not a complete SOP as

**[01:05:23]** much as I can from a a presentation

**[01:05:26]** based off those because again, we here

**[01:05:28]** at Rockstars, we want you to have a good

**[01:05:31]** time, but we want you to implement kill

**[01:05:33]** it and go enjoy life with your family.

**[01:05:34]** Sorry. Go ahead. Keep going, Ted. Thank

**[01:05:36]** you so much for this, bro.

**[01:05:38]** Yeah. Yeah. That rag prompt, uh, what

**[01:05:41]** does rock stars have to say about

**[01:05:44]** Fountain Hills is probably the money

**[01:05:47]** prompt.

**[01:05:48]** Um and yeah, so how how that works is uh

**[01:05:55]** the decision to index or not index a

**[01:05:59]** page for a keyword is a different system

**[01:06:04]** than where should a page rank for a

**[01:06:07]** keyword. Those are two independent

**[01:06:10]** systems in Google.

**[01:06:13]** So uh what's happening is Google is

**[01:06:18]** saying uh if a keyword is uh only in the

**[01:06:24]** schema, well that's a no index zone.

**[01:06:27]** It's only going to index the the

**[01:06:30]** appropriate content. It's not going to

**[01:06:32]** index uh the schema by itself. So if you

**[01:06:36]** put a test keyword into schema and

**[01:06:40]** nowhere else that test keyword will

**[01:06:43]** never become findable in search.

**[01:06:46]** So to make it findable it needs to be in

**[01:06:49]** your title or heading or paragraphs.

**[01:06:53]** But

**[01:06:55]** when it is there uh the ranking system

**[01:06:59]** is going to look at that schema and say

**[01:07:01]** look at all this topical relevancy and

**[01:07:04]** keyword density and exact match and term

**[01:07:07]** frequency and boom it's going to apply

**[01:07:10]** all of that relevancy

**[01:07:13]** to your content where it matches.

**[01:07:17]** So by itself schema is a no index zone.

**[01:07:20]** It needs to be in your content to become

**[01:07:22]** findable, but once it's findable, that

**[01:07:26]** schema is going to boost the [ __ ] out of

**[01:07:28]** it.

**[01:07:32]** I got question master class.

**[01:07:35]** Here you go, sir. Jordan,

**[01:07:37]** this is Jordan. Hey, if we use about and

**[01:07:39]** mention schema, right? And like I do

**[01:07:42]** medical, so there's two procedures that

**[01:07:44]** have the same name. refractive lens

**[01:07:46]** exchange,

**[01:07:48]** lens replacement. On the page, we might

**[01:07:50]** have the word refractive lens exchange.

**[01:07:53]** The Wikipedia listing calls it custom

**[01:07:56]** lens replacement in that about and

**[01:07:59]** mention schema. Then you're saying we

**[01:08:01]** should use refractive lens exchange as

**[01:08:04]** the word and then link to the Wikipedia

**[01:08:07]** article that has a slightly different

**[01:08:09]** name.

**[01:08:11]** All right. So,

**[01:08:13]** the the aboutton mentions uh there's a

**[01:08:16]** bit more of an art to it. So, when when

**[01:08:19]** I uh redid Terry and Clint's experiment,

**[01:08:25]** I tried to get to minimum viable SEO.

**[01:08:28]** So, initially I I tried everything and

**[01:08:31]** all of it and and I couldn't get the

**[01:08:34]** about and mention stuff to create a

**[01:08:36]** measurable outcome. Not that it wasn't

**[01:08:39]** doing anything, it's just my test was

**[01:08:42]** inconclusive because I probably [ __ ]

**[01:08:44]** it up somehow. Um, but the thing you

**[01:08:48]** want to be careful with is when you

**[01:08:51]** start putting in those entity

**[01:08:53]** references, you need to make sure that

**[01:08:56]** all of them are topically relevant. So,

**[01:09:00]** for example,

**[01:09:02]** uh I'm going to go off topic on you. If

**[01:09:04]** the keyword is boat insurance

**[01:09:08]** and you start putting in a lot of

**[01:09:10]** boating terms into your entity

**[01:09:13]** references,

**[01:09:15]** all right, Google might start to think

**[01:09:17]** it's a page about boats,

**[01:09:20]** but what are you selling?

**[01:09:23]** Insurance.

**[01:09:24]** So, you need you need to remember that

**[01:09:27]** topical relevancy has a balance to it.

**[01:09:31]** We need we need it to be strongly

**[01:09:34]** insurance because that's what we're

**[01:09:36]** selling with a sprinkle of of boat and

**[01:09:41]** we definitely don't need, you know,

**[01:09:43]** masks and anchors and main sails and and

**[01:09:47]** all that stuff because we're not selling

**[01:09:50]** any of those things. So yeah, so be

**[01:09:55]** careful about the topical balance. So if

**[01:09:58]** you have a dedicated page for that, you

**[01:10:01]** know, you probably want all those

**[01:10:03]** important terms and incarnations of

**[01:10:06]** them, but there is going to be a

**[01:10:08]** canonical entity that you probably need

**[01:10:11]** to say same as and mentions and knows

**[01:10:14]** about and that's a disambiguation thing.

**[01:10:18]** So you're you're trying to corner

**[01:10:21]** yourself into a topical space. [snorts]

**[01:10:25]** Um and uh similarly like if you are

**[01:10:28]** trying to rank a page for apple pie

**[01:10:32]** and you put in you knows about blueberry

**[01:10:36]** pies, peacon pies, key lime pies, you

**[01:10:40]** know that's that's kind of going off

**[01:10:42]** topic when you start to make your page

**[01:10:44]** about all pies. How should a page about

**[01:10:48]** all pies rank compared to a page that's

**[01:10:51]** only about apple pie and is talking

**[01:10:54]** about making apple pies? 100% about

**[01:10:58]** apple pies when you're trying to rank

**[01:11:00]** for apple pies.

**[01:11:02]** So topical focus is important, but it's

**[01:11:06]** an art form. Nobody's uh cracked the

**[01:11:10]** equation on topical

**[01:11:14]** density, topical relevancy. We know it's

**[01:11:17]** a thing. There are people with methods,

**[01:11:20]** but it has not been totally figured out

**[01:11:24]** yet

**[01:11:27]** yet.

**[01:11:28]** So,

**[01:11:30]** hey Ted.

**[01:11:31]** Okay,

**[01:11:32]** we have one question.

**[01:11:33]** Okay, what's the question? Let's do the

**[01:11:35]** question first.

**[01:11:36]** Is there a way to find only the primary

**[01:11:39]** keywords that are above the fold using

**[01:11:42]** Kora?

**[01:11:43]** Ted, did you hear that? Is there a way

**[01:11:44]** to find only the primary keywords above

**[01:11:46]** the fold using Kora? Did I get it right?

**[01:11:49]** Uh, no. That's that's what I'm building.

**[01:11:53]** So switching uh to an above the fold uh

**[01:11:59]** type of mentality means that you have to

**[01:12:03]** work with JavaScript in a browser

**[01:12:06]** instance cuz you have to calculate the

**[01:12:09]** pixel heights of where the fold is and

**[01:12:13]** what content is visible above that fold.

**[01:12:16]** It is doable. I am coding it. other

**[01:12:20]** people are coding it when it was

**[01:12:22]** mentioned before a rank tracker with

**[01:12:24]** pixel height. That's what they're

**[01:12:27]** talking about. Those are the new tools

**[01:12:29]** that are coming but aren't out yet. And

**[01:12:33]** uh you know that's that's kind of where

**[01:12:35]** it's going to be for getting those KPIs.

**[01:12:38]** But all of that stuff is in the works

**[01:12:40]** from multiple businesses. I'm not the

**[01:12:43]** only one. Uh but yeah, your instincts

**[01:12:46]** are right. That's what we want. Another

**[01:12:50]** question is Google still not crawling

**[01:12:52]** JavaScript at certain times of the year?

**[01:12:56]** Yes. Uh when Google does a major uh

**[01:13:01]** update, usually the big core updates,

**[01:13:05]** they will pause rendered indexing.

**[01:13:09]** And so that means if you're using Edge

**[01:13:13]** SEO, these systems where JavaScript

**[01:13:17]** remotely manages SEO on the page, if

**[01:13:21]** you're using

**[01:13:23]** uh JavaScript frameworks that don't do

**[01:13:27]** server side rendering properly, all of

**[01:13:30]** your SEO vanishes because it was in the

**[01:13:34]** JavaScript and Google stopped doing it.

**[01:13:37]** And so what happens is whenever there's

**[01:13:40]** one of those big core updates, I

**[01:13:43]** inevitably get one or two people. The

**[01:13:46]** last time it happened to me, it was the

**[01:13:48]** SEO at Verizon. He was like, Ted, uh,

**[01:13:52]** the company wants to fire me because all

**[01:13:55]** of our rankings disappeared at the same

**[01:13:58]** time and all the engineers are saying

**[01:14:02]** that's an SEO problem.

**[01:14:04]** No, it's not.

**[01:14:07]** You can put a test keyword into those

**[01:14:11]** JavaScript content zones and demonstrate

**[01:14:15]** that they never become findable in

**[01:14:18]** search while a core updates rolling out.

**[01:14:22]** And it wasn't the SEO's decision to use

**[01:14:26]** those JavaScript architectures.

**[01:14:29]** That was an engineering choice. And so

**[01:14:32]** it's provable if you understand what's

**[01:14:36]** going on. But yeah, those things uh you

**[01:14:40]** can expect a JavaScript framework

**[01:14:43]** scenario or an edge SEO scenario to fail

**[01:14:48]** you about 25% of the time.

**[01:14:52]** And that's why when I was making mine, I

**[01:14:54]** scrapped it. That's not good enough.

**[01:14:57]** Thank you so much, Ted. We really

**[01:14:58]** appreciate it.

**[01:15:00]** Everybody give it up for Ted. [applause]

**[01:15:02]** Thank you so