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The Recipe For SEO Success Show

Chart-topping SEO podcast. SEO is a giant pain in the bum right? Full of jargon, snail oil salesmen and dodgy tactics. No! Search Engine Optimisation is 100% doable by normal humans and in this podcast award-winning SEO Educator Kate Toon chat with her expert guests about all things Googley including - DIY Optimisation tips and techniques - The latest SEO news and updates - Real life SEO case studies - Other related marketing tactics Find out more by Googling 'The Recipe for SEO Success'
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Now displaying: 2023
Nov 21, 2023

Taking testing one step at a time

Do you ever wonder how effective your site’s SEO is? 

You’ve put all this time and effort into finding effective keywords, your images are slim, your page loading time is faster than a fast thing. 

 

But is it bringing in the clicks and sales?
Because at the end of the day, ranking is nice, but you know what’s nicer? Making money!

Today we’re going to look at some tests you can run on your SEO to make sure it’s all ticking along, and what needs some work.

Tune in to learn: 

  • What SEO testing is

  • Where to start - simple tests for small business owners

  • How to measure how successful your title tag is 

  • How long you should run a test before looking at the results

  • How you can test the effectiveness of a featured snippet

  • How to look at your highest conversion pages and see where the clicks are really going

  • What tools Logan recommends for SEO testing

  • Logan’s top tip to get started with testing

 

Useful resources: 

 

Head to episode notes 

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Nov 7, 2023

Today is a tip episode, no guest to interview, just little old me.

My tips, my advice.

These shorter, more succinct episodes are here to help with easy learning and quick wins and I promise they’re 100% jargon and gobbledegook free.

Today we’re going to be talking about the 4 most common website issues I see every day.

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Oct 24, 2023

Embracing techy SEO to get found online

Getting SEO advice is one thing, but how much of it is really doable for the average business human? 

In my reality SEO episodes, I talk to real humans and get the truth about how they use SEO and digital marketing to improve their businesses.

Today I’ll be talking to a former student of the Recipe For SEO Success Course, Elisha de Jonge.

We’ll chat about how Elisha got her start in SEO, the digital marketing highs and lows, and the challenges she’s faced along the way.

Useful resources:

SEO META in 1 CLICK

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Oct 10, 2023

Today is a tip episode, no guest to interview, just little old me.

My tips, my advice.

These shorter, more succinct episodes are here to help with easy learning and quick wins and I promise they’re 100% jargon and gobbledegook free.

Today we’re going to be talking about how much should SEO cost?

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Sep 19, 2023

Now here’s me thinking that being online means I’m pretty green.

My entire business is up in the cloud, with very few physical products, not much post, and a little shed in the back garden that uses minimal electricity.

 

And I never use my printer, not because I’m green but because I can’t hook it up to my computer properly.

 

But today’s guest is going to explain how even hosting your website has environmental consequences and some simple steps to minimising your environmental footprint.

Tune in to learn: 

  • What it means to be green online
  • How your digital footprint is connected to your carbon footprint
  • How climate change is being affected by websites, apps and email
  • Common practices online that are more harmful than helpful to the environment
  • What steps you can take to reduce your carbon footprint
  • Why hosting is a big issue when it comes to being green
  • How True Green® can help reduce energy output
  • What to focus on when choosing a hosting platform

 

Useful resources: 

 

Head to episode notes 

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Sep 5, 2023

So today is a tip episode, no guest to interview, just little old me. 

My tips, my advice.

These shorter more succinct episodes are here to help with easy learning and quick wins and I promise they’re 100% jargon and gobbledegook free. 

Today I’m answering questions about ecommerce SEO.

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Aug 22, 2023

Setting up a website is not a one-off process. 

In many ways, it’s like having a plant. 

Building your website and optimising it to be found is like setting up the nutrient-rich soil. 

Hitting publish for the first time is like planting a seed. 

Now you just sit back and see what happens right?

No, much like that little seed, if you ignore it, it will wither away, much like your website traffic. 

You have to monitor it, remove any bugs, and give it plenty of water and sunshine. I’ll leave the plant metaphor there.

So how do we keep it healthy and thriving? The answer? Well, one answer is Google Search Console. I often describe it as Google Analytics ugly cousin, but in fact, it’s a rich source of website nutrients, helping you diagnose, and understand your website, and if necessary bring it back to life.

Today we’ll look at the benefits of using Google’s Search Console as a tool in your SEO garden shed to keep traffic high and problems low.

Tune in to learn:

  • What Google Search Console is

  • Two metrics to focus on when you’re getting started

  • What Sodiq thinks of Search Console Insights

  • Where to start looking when your traffic is way down

  • More advanced ways to use Google Search Console

  • Sodiq’s tips for getting acquainted with Google Search Console

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Aug 8, 2023

Need a speedy SEO Fix? 

These micro SEO tip episodes are a fast way to digest a little SEO knowledge for easy learning and quick wins and I guarantee they’re 100% jargon and gobbledegook free. 

Today I’ll be giving you some top tips on Local SEO.

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Jul 11, 2023

Showing Google you've got the goods

Hey you, ecommerce store owner.
I know you got a sexy theme for your website that promised it was responsive, conversion-focused and all that jazz.
But is it?
So many ecommerce sites fall down on the basics of user experience.

Terrible navigation - check
Confusing home page - check
Bland category pages - check
Cut and paste product descriptions - check

And don’t get me started on that checkout experience.
Well, today we’re honing in on carts, shopping and making the sale.
Telling you how to turn casual browsers into eager buyers.

Tune in to learn

 

  • The three main differences between service-based business SEO and ecommerce SEO

  • How small businesses should build out the primary nav structure

  • Two ways to start driving more relevant traffic to your ecommerce site today

  • How to avoid the duplicate content issue with collection and product pages

  • How to do keyword research for collection pages and product pages

  • How to improve time on site and key information you should add to encourage customers through to the sale

  • How to stand out in the SERPS against the bigger brands

  • Optimising your product pages - where to start

  • Why generative AI isn’t going to doom ecommerce stores

  • The importance of your brand story, and taking consumers on a journey with your brand

Useful resources

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Jun 20, 2023

Okay, are you ready for a rant?
I know I share interviews and chats.
I’ve now started sharing tips and advice.

But today it’s rant time. This Toon is angry and I want to share why.

So today I’m getting stuck into shitty SEO agencies.
What they do.
Why they do it.
And how to see the red flags before you get screwed.

Ready? Let’s go.

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

 

Jun 6, 2023

Understanding how Google classifies context.

The Google beast has come a long way since 10 blue links, doorway pages and exact match domains.

But what’s changed the most is probably how we consider and use keywords. 

At beginner level we’re gathering keywords, grouping them by content and then using them on our pages, but as Google strives to improve the search results, it has started to dig deeper, and look at more than just the words on the page - now Google thinks about both context and the relationships between words.

And this, my friends, is what we mean when we talk about entity-based SEO.

Tune in to learn:

Today we’ll cover:

  • What entities are

  • What a knowledge graph is

  • What semantic search is

  • How semantic search helps users find relevant information

  • Keyword research: how relevant it is with entities in the mix

  • Nik’s top 5 tips for content writers with Natural Language Processing in mind

Head to episode notes

Useful resources:

Freebies:

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

May 16, 2023

I’ve started a new style of episode. 

I’ve had an amazing run of interviewing other humans but often you don’t hear that much from me. 

My tips, my advice.

So I thought I’d start sharing that with you. 

After a long 5 years, shorter more succinct episodes for easy learning and quick wins, 100% jargon and gobbledegook free. 

Today I’ll be covering Core Web Vitals: what are they, why do we care about them, and how we can make them better.

 

Useful Resources: 

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

May 2, 2023

Leaving your audience satisfied with every click

So you have your beautiful new website.
You’ve carefully written the copy and paid an arm and a leg for a fancy pants design, you’ve even done a little SEO, optimising your images, writing titles and metas and making an effort to speed up your site.


But you’ve noticed something odd when you look at Google Analytics.
Your time on site is low.
People are only viewing one or two pages.
And your conversions are lower than worm doing a limbo.

‘What went wrong?’ you cry, gnashing your teeth.
Well it could be your user experience.
How people enjoy and consume the content on your site, and travel from point a to point b.

Perhaps there are 15 steps before I can check out.
Perhaps the font is so small it needs a microscope to read.

Or the buttons have grey copy on a grey background.

User experience is crucial not just for … the users, but also to please the Google beast, so lets dig into this topic today.

Tune in to learn: 

  • User experience: what it is, and how it differs from accessibility

  • How to measure user satisfaction

  • Why engagement is so important to SEO

  • Which good engagement metrics to focus on

  • The pros and cons of heat mapping tools

  • Kevin’s best heat mapping tool recommendations

  • Which GA4 reports you should focus on

  • How marketers should approach SEO content in 2023, compared to 2013

  • Kevin’s number one tip to improve user experience

Useful resources: 

Head to episode notes

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

 

Apr 18, 2023

A complete history of algorithm updates (and why they matter)

Google appears to be fiddling with things all the time, which can feel overwhelming for your average site owner.


But the truth is most of the updates don’t impact small business website owners, and Google is pretty open about the big changes that you really need to take action on.

In this episode, I’ll run through a complete history of the algorithm updates since 2011 and explain what they mean and how they help.

 

Tune in to learn: 

  • What is an algorithm?

  • Why are all the updates named crazy things?

  • The biggest updates you need to know about

  • Why Google changes things all the time

  • Bonus: top tips on how to use pop-ups on your website.

 

Useful Resources: 

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Apr 4, 2023

Brendan Kelso and Kate Toon get back to basics

It’s time to get back to basics.

If you’re a regular listener to the podcast you’ll know we dive deep each episode into a different SEO challenge and adventure.

 

But today I though it would be useful to have a recap of common mistakes that we often see small business and professional services websites making.

 

Because the truth is it’s often not bleeding edge SEO that makes the difference in this market, but ensuring you’ve ticked off all the essentials. 

 

So today put your mind at rest as I chat with Brendan Kelso about the core things you need to fix up to ensure your website gets the Google love.

 

Tune in to learn: 

  • Easy site changes that make all the difference

  • SEO basics that most people forget

  • Why Google My Business should be a priority

  • Why it’s not the cutting-edge things that matter

And so much more.

 

Useful resources: 

 

 

Head to episode notes 

 

Freebies:

 

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

 

Mar 14, 2023

Building quality backlinks and promoting your content

I know, I know, backlinks are well-trodden ground, we’ve covered them before and we’ll likely cover them again.

Because still after all this time, debate rages about whether backlinks really do make a difference to you ability to rank.

Google encourages us to earn, not buy links.

SEOs tell us to focus on quality not quantity.

We dutifully keep our backlink profiles clean, disavowing on a regular basis.

But is any of this working?

And if the black hat tactics don’t work (PBNs, comment spam and the rest) why do so many SEO types still do them?

Today we’re getting back to basics on backlinks and it’s a refresher that’s definitely worth your ear time.

Tune in to learn: 

  • Do backlinks matter to Google? 

  • If backlinks from social media have any impact or authority

  • Where to start setting up your first 3 backlinks

  • How to recognise good backlinks

  • How to recognise the red flags

  • How content promotion ties in with link-building

  • Ranking locally - what effect local backlinks will have

  • Alan’s favourite tools to track backlinks

  • Dodgy backlinks - are disavows worth it?

  • Alan’s top backlink tip

 

Useful resources:

 

Head to episode notes

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Feb 28, 2023

I’ve started a new style of episode. 

 

I’ve had an amazing run of interviewing other humans but often you don’t hear that much from me. 

 

My tips, my advice.

So I thought I’d start sharing that with you. 

 

After a long 5 years, shorter more succinct episodes for easy learning and quick wins, 100% jargon and gobbledegook free. 

 

Today I’ll be answering the question that comes up a lot from my course students: Should I target zero-volume keywords?

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Feb 14, 2023

Taking your brand global

While many of us start small and want simply to be found locally, over time our desire to be found on the global stage increases.

And even if we’re not directly targeting other countries, of course it’s likely that a fair share of your website visitors come from different countries and speak different languages, so it might be time to consider making your site more international.

But if you’re looking to create an international website, what do you need to consider?

 

In this episode we’ll focus on the three big tasks:

1. International-friendly URLS - or country targeting

2. Language tags - language targeting

3. Ranking in the different countries.

As well as discussing a bundle of other tips and tactics.

So, if you’re ready to take your brand global, this is the episode for you.

Tune in to learn:

  • How to choose an internationally-friendly brand name

  • Which is best moving from local to global: Top level domains, sub domains or subdirectories

  • How to avoid duplicate content issues across multiple sites

  • Best practices for language targeting. 

  • What to consider across different cultures when writing content

  • Best ways to handle keyword research and backlinks for international variations of your site

  • Top tips for using Google Analytics and Google search console

  • How important it is to host your international sites on a local hosting site

Useful Resources:

Head to episode notes

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

Jan 31, 2023

Taking on AI as an asset, not a threat

Everyone is talking about ChatGPT.

My LinkedIn is stuffed with experts providing tips and examples of how to use this amazing tool.

(Everyone is an instant expert on LinkedIn).

To some it’s the best thing since sliced bread.

To others, it’s the end of the content marketing world as we know it.

I mean, haven’t these people watched The Terminator movies, don’t they know how it all ends?

 

So today I’m going to give you my low down.

​​What is ChatGPT?

What can it do?

Why all the fuss?

I’ll take you through the challenges, the positives, what’s coming, and also a bit of a reframe for those who are struggling or feeling scared about this new tool

 

It’s time to embrace the robots people. Let’s get stuck in.

 

Tune in to learn: 

  • What ChatGPT is
  • Why everyone is talking about ChatGPT
  • Why your job isn’t being taken by robots
  • How to use AI tools as an asset
  • The limitations in using ChatGPT
  • What’s coming down the line

 

Useful resources: 

 

Head to episode notes

 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

 

Jan 24, 2023

How to increase your site’s speed, performance, and quality

There’s one thing that never gets old when it comes to SEO.

And that’s speed.

I’d argue it’s one of the most important technical factors. 

A slow site isn’t going to please anyone, not least the Google beast.

So, in this episode we’re going to revisit the basics.

  • What’s the ideal load time
  • What makes sites slow
  • What tools can you use to test
  • What’s the impact of Core web vitals
  • And how the heck do you speed up your site?

It also features one of my all-time favourite guests, so I’m pretty darn excited.

Buckle your Google belts people, we’re about to get speedy!

 

Tune in to Learn:

  • Why site speed is so important
  • Factors that impact your site performance
  • How Google uses Core Web Vitals to look at your site
  • Why mobile is so much harder than desktop
  • How to improve the quality of your site
  • Jono’s top SEO tip

Useful Resources:

Head to episode notes 

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

 

Jan 10, 2023

Learning how the cogs turn behind the Google machine

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to actually talk to Google?

 

To ask them all the questions you’ve ever wanted to ask?

To find out why they do what they do.

Why they keep fiddling.

What they have coming up.

 

Imagine how great that would be.

Well, imagine no more, for today we have John Mueller, head of Google Search Relations, on the pod. 

 

We’ve spoken to John before in my first season on Episode 15: Ask Google: Q&A with John Mueller, Episode 29: Mobile First with John Mueller, and Episode 30: GOOGLE Q&A with John Mueller. 

 

And today, to kick off our pod in 2023 we have his ear again.

Hurrah.

Tune in to learn:

  • Biggest updates from 2022
  • What small businesses should focus on for SEO
  • What’s coming up in 2023
  • Where to find out the latest Google updates
  • Developments John is most excited for
  • John’s top 5 tips for ranking on Google
  • How important backlinks really are

Useful resources: 

Head to episode notes

Freebies:

  1. Free webinar: Increase your website traffic (and sales)

  2. The Ultimate SEO Checklist

  3. Free SEO Nibbles Course

 

Sign up for the Recipe for SEO Success Course

 

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