Guy Kawasaki is a pretty big deal.
He’s written a dozen books, launched several successful companies, and has almost 400,000 followers on Twitter.
Which makes him the coolest Guy at most parties, the one that everyone wants to be associated with.
Not only that, but Guy really knows how to launch a book.
That’s why his latest book, Enchantment, has 200+ customer reviews on Amazon, and about 400 reviews posted on blogs all over the internet.
And I’ve beaten all of them to the top of Google.
That’s right – I’m ahead of the YouTube videos, ahead of the Amazon.com product page, and ahead of major reviewers like CNET and even Copyblogger.
This screenshot, which I took on March 15, shows me even beating Guy Kawasaki’s own blog!
(I’ve since dropped in the rankings to #1 after Guy Kawasaki’s site – oh well…)
So… do you want to know how I did it?
My Super-Secret SEO Recipe 😉
Okay, I’m going to put all my cards on the table, and reveal my super-secret recipe. Here are the ingredients that went into the mix:
- I picked a good search term. I knew that people would be looking for Guy Kawasaki and his new book, so that was a good phrase to go after.
- I was first on the scene. I made sure that my interview with Guy launched within days of his book launch. Quality deserves freshness, right?
- Lots of text for Google to spider. The interview was about half an hour long, and the whole transcript is available on the website, so that’s a lot of text for Google to spider.
- Lots of great backlinks. I’ve shared the story in guest posts on major blogs, and included links back to the Guy Kawasaki Enchantment interview. (See what I did there?)
- Lots of social media activity. I pulled out all the stops promoting the interview (I wanted to tell the world I had spoken on the phone with Guy!), so there was a lot of social media activity pointing back to the interview.
- Good title selection. I setup the title tag to match the search term, which is “guy kawasaki enchantment” (not “enchantment with guy kawasaki”, not “guy’s rules of enchantment”, etc.). Actually, I goofed here a bit, and only came close, with “Guy Kawasaki’s Enchantment” – I wonder if that apostrophe S cost me the #1 spot!
- Well-optimized content for the keyword. But honestly, it’s an interview with Guy Kawasaki about his book Enchantment – this would have been pretty hard to screw up. 😛
Pretty cool, right? Am I an SEO ninja superstar or what?
Except that it didn’t happen like that at all!
I’m no SEO rock star, and this wasn’t about SEO.
Telling the story retroactively makes it sound as though I did all this as part of a genius plan to get to the top of Google.
Everything that I described above is true, but none of it was done with the intention of improving search rankings.
The rest wasn’t about SEO at all, and the search ranking (that continues to deliver traffic to Firepole Marketing) is just a happy by-product.
So if it wasn’t about SEO, what was it about?
Here’s what it was really all about…
It was about marketing.
Not backlinks, not SEO, not professional landing page, not traffic, and not Alexa rankings.
Just marketing.
And what is marketing?
A lot of so-called gurus – whether because they’re trying to dazzle you with their latest product, or because they don’t really know what they’re talking about at all – try to make marketing a lot more complicated than it really is.
But the truth is that marketing, at its core, is very simple.
Marketing is about moving people through a very straight-forward process:
- Converting STRANGERS into LEADS (traffic),
- Converting LEADS into PROSPECTS (subscribers),
- Converting PROSPECTS into CUSTOMERS, and
- Converting CUSTOMERS into REPEAT CUSTOMERS.
This process is called the Chain of Conversion, and it’s what marketing is really about; getting strangers to pay attention to what you’re doing, making sure that it’s something that will hold their interest, and that will be valuable enough for them to pay for, on an ongoing basis.
Sounds easy enough, right?
So why do so many people get it wrong?
Marketing is Hard because Marketing is Real
I’ll tell you why marketing is so hard for so many people, even though it’s really not that complicated.
It’s because of two fundamental truths that I want to share with you:
The first fundamental truth is that everything is easy after you know how to do it.
The flip side is that everything is hard before you know how to do it. Whether it’s tying your shoelaces or understanding quantum mechanics, this statement holds true.
The second fundamental truth is that everything real takes time to learn.
Whether it’s medicine, or cooking, or law, or martial arts, or anything else, developing real expertise takes time.
That doesn’t mean you can’t develop competence quickly, but there’s a difference between competence and expertise.
Taking a cooking class doesn’t make you a chef, six months of karate doesn’t make you champion fighter, and getting sued once or twice doesn’t make you a lawyer. 😉
The same applies to marketing.
Reading a few blog posts or books, or having taken a class once… it takes more than that to turn you into a marketer.
But most people don’t have that expertise or training, and so they resort to tactics like trying to game the search engines in search of traffic… and you shouldn’t even care about traffic – you should be after profitable customers!
But I digress – I promised to share how to get to the top of Google, so let’s get back to that.
Forget Google and Focus on Marketing
The way to get to the top of Google is to forget about Google, and focus on smart marketing.
That’s where all of my “super-secret SEO ingredients” were really for:
- It wasn’t about a search term, it was about association with Guy Kawasaki. That meant credibility and interest from everyone I could reach. It also meant that the content would be good.
- The timing wasn’t about search algorithms. We planned for the review to go up when the book was launched because we wanted to show Guy that we were doing our part to help out, and we wanted the information to be out when it would be most relevant to our audience.
- The transcript was for readers, not bots. Not everyone likes to listen to an interview, and we wanted our content to be as accessible as it possibly could be.
- The backlinks were happy by-products. My guest blogging on major blogs were about building my brand and reaching more people, not about backlinks.
- Social media activity came from good promotion and good content. I spent 15+ hours preparing for the interview to make it as good as I possibly could, and then leveraged every channel, including Facebook marketing, at my disposal to spread the word. Social media was the results of all that.
Remember that Google’s job is to deliver the most relevant content to the people who want to see it.
Marketing is about moving people through the Chain of Conversion, which you can only do by aligning your offering with what people want to be seeing.
So focus on doing the best marketing that you can do, and let the search rankings take care of themselves.
Danny Iny
Danny Iny is the co-founder of Mirasee (formerly Firepole Marketing), the “Freddy Krueger of Blogging”, and the co-author (with Guy Kawasaki, Brian Clark, Ana Hoffman, and many others) of Engagement from Scratch! (available on Amazon, or as a free download). The latest and greatest thing you can get from him (for free, of course) is his Naked Marketing Manifesto, about marketing that really works!
Ana,
Great stuff. It continues to amaze me how SEO / Content Marketing done right can beat any corporate blog / webpage. This is small business capitalism at it’s best.
I bookmarked this article it is a wealth of knowledge. Thank you!
Ryan H.
Joseph says
This is so amazing, I learned a lot form this article. I really appreciate you taking your time to explain your techniques. That is really rare in this industry as most people try to keep their ways secret so they can try to get ahead.
When marketing your products on the web keep in mind that your customer is not the search engine but the people. So do your marketing the right way. Push your marketing efforts to influence people.
Andoidage says
Danny,
Your article explained two things that one is nothing is impossible as you have proved that you have achieved 1st position in SERP ranking of one of your blog post that is impossible if we do normal link building things we need to use some smart ways.
Also we don’t need to worry when we write good article with good title tag, so the thing is you have wisely added the title tag too.
Thanks to the wonderful post.
I really like this statement: “The way to get to the top of Google is to forget about Google, and focus on smart marketing.” Most people who are doing link building always please Google. Not minding if they are doing it in a positive or negative way. So long as they gain backlinks, reach the first position or get high Page rank, they care less to anything else.
Danny - thanks so much for sharing your story, I always learn the best by seeing what worked for others and putting my own spin on it, so I really appreciate you taking the time to outline all of this. Thanks!! 🙂
Also - cute picture!
You’re very welcome, Natasha, I’m glad you liked it! 🙂
Thanks for the tips. Congrats on your success!
I am still in the learning phase…learning the language of marketing and am pleased you can remain true to quality and your own integrity and not have to use “trickery” to make it up through the ranks. Sometimes, it can seem so complicated.
cheers,
Rajka
Ryan Critchett says
Well done. This reminds me of reading Napoleon Hill’s stuff in Think and Grow Rich, where he talked about focusing on “chief aims.” It also reminds me a lot of a marketer I know and follow called “Eben Pagan” that talks a lot about “setting up the conditions” to make something inevitable. It’s like you set up the conditions to make it inevitable for this to happen, consciously or un. Also, sending your friends emails asking them to tweet and promote that post didn’t hurt 😉
Well yeah, once you’ve done everything else, you’ve got to pull out all the stops to spread the word. 😀
Heres my favorite line out of your article……. “The way to get to the top of Google is to forget about Google, and focus on smart marketing.” It couldn’t be more true! At the end of the day its back to the basics of marketing and what brings people to your website and the retention for it. If you cut the Google string so to speak, where would your site be? So yes, it is important to get back to basics and provide smart marketing for the audience!
-Jean
Hi Danny,
Wow, that’s an interesting story. I feel that I know a thing or two about SEO, but I almost never get it right though. I just write, and publish when I think my post is ready to be published (it’s probably never actually ready, because I haven’t done anything when it comes to SEO and keyword research).
To me, writing a novel, has been the best lesson in marketing (and blogging). I used to be way too eager to publish something. I just wanted to get it out there so people could read my thoughts and ideas. Now, after I started writing a novel, I understood about being slow, and nurture my thoughts, and to relax and that it’s not that important to be the fastest writer in the blogosphere. It’s like you said, it takes time to do things right.
Thanks a lot for sharing your SEO “secrets”, the details are very helpful.
Jens
Hey Jens, you bet - writing for fun is a great way of training yourself to slow down and focus on creating quality, instead of just rushing to hit “publish”. What’s your novel about?
I agree. Marketing takes a long time to learn and is not any easy thing.
If anyone wants a free copy of my book that is a crash course on how to select the right Marketing for your business just send me an email. It has not went on sale yet but I would be willing to give away a limited number of free copies in exchange for feedback on the book.
You’re right, Chris. 🙂
I might be able to help you get some exposure for your book - could you email me a little more information about it to danny (at) firepolemarketing (dot) com?
Yup… he sure knows what he’s doing when it comes to marketing… 😉
Haha, no worries. 🙂
Thank you, Forrest, I really appreciate the compliment. Yeah, Google Trends is a great tool - I keep forgetting to use it as well! 😉
I like: “The second fundamental truth is that everything real takes time to learn.”
Something many business owners need educating on, online is not an over night success, but if you stick to it and are consistent, the rewards are surely there.
Thanks Danny
Yup, exactly, and just like everything else - real things take time. 🙂
I think all of these things (SEO, ranking in Google, backlinks, guest posting etc.) are all part of marketing your product. The only difference in each of them is the strategy on how to reach out to your target.
I’d go further, Carlos, and say that they’re mostly tactics - it’s the strategy that strings them all together that really matters. 🙂
Hey Danny! Truly AMAZING story! I LOVE your approach about it being about Marketing NOT Google!
Great stuff man and congrats on the rankings 8)
Joshua the ZamuraiBlogger
Thanks, Joshua, I appreciate it! 🙂
Great article, and an eye-opener by putting the focus on marketing rather than SEO link building, but I don’t think you can completely forget about Google and SEO practices. As you pointed out, you made the page title with keywords, and you made sure the links you placed in marketing content had the desired keywords as the anchor text. I’m sure you didn’t mean to come across as these things not being important, but I just wanted to draw attention to it.
Hey Lionel, that’s a really important thing for you to point out - thank you!
No, if you want to get rankings, then you have to at least keep those things in the back of your mind.
That being said, I guess my real point is that while the rankings are cool and impressive, they’re just happy side-benefits of everything else.
(I mean, compared with the relationship with Guy Kawasaki, the credibility by association, and so forth, the rankings don’t matter all that much…)
Rachael Slorach says
Spot on Danny! You are so right - our core business should be to reach out to PEOPLE, not traffic. To serve their interests and give them value. Additionally, we want quality traffic over quantity- people within your niche who are looking for what you have to offer.
Yes, that’s exactly right - after all, it’s not about the number of visitors, it’s about the number of customers! 😀
I agree Ana, SEO is not very effective if you don’t understand marketing.
That’s right - the trouble is that marketing is such a broad field, learning it can really take some time…
Interesting - who knew that the best SEO occurs when SEO isn’t even the focus of what you’re trying to do? This is a different perspective than I’m used to, but clearly it’s a great one since you got such fantastic results! Thanks for sharing your success story.
Thanks, Laurie. 🙂
The thing is that it’s not even about the rankings, it’s about everything else that comes with smart marketing. Rankings is just gravy. 🙂
I knew it was only a matter of time before I ran into Danny here. Does he ever sleep!??!
It’s funny, I always look back on posts that really worked and try to reverse-engineer what I did right and why the results were what they were. I think that’s the best way to learn. Experiment and see what works and what doesn’t.
Hey Eugene, for what it’s worth, I really didn’t sleep much last night - might have just been too much caffeine, though… 😉
I know exactly what you mean, and you’re right - it’s a great way to learn.
The risk is that we use that one case study of things that we did half by accident, that turned out well, and use them to portray us as geniuses. Often, much of what works well isn’t completely by design, and can’t be planned quite so easily.
The even bigger risk is that we look at what went right (e.g. lots of comments, or tweets, or whatever) and ignore the metrics that we were really after, and that really matter (sales, relationships, etc.).
Does that make sense?
Peter says
Hey Danny,
In the end, posts should be written for the readers and not for Google, exactly as you have advocated here. Have you seen some of those posts that were written to be “optimized” for search engines? They read like a robot with Tourette’s syndrome wrote them.
In fact, if we assume that the purpose behind Google’s iterative attempts at optimizing their search algorithms is to get GOOD and WORTHWHILE content in front of the right eyeballs, while filtering out all the sly attempts at hijacking them, then the only real long-term posting strategy is “writing for readers, not Google”.
Peter
Yup, that’s exactly right, Peter. We should focus on great content - let the great minds at Google figure out the rest. 🙂
I agree. It doesn’t take much of techno-tech seo to get ranked. The right choice of words, timing and backlinks will most of the time do the job. Thanks for putting out all your secrets 🙂
You bet, Jane. And if the content is good, and the timing is right, then the backlinks will usually take care of themselves. 🙂
My opinions are a bit different.
Converting STRANGERS into Visitors (traffic),
Converting Visitors into LEADS (subscribers),
Converting LEADS into PROSPECTS (Potential Customer) , and
Converting CUSTOMERS into REPEAT CUSTOMERS. (Loyalty or Brand Establishment)
Not all that different - just a little more “zoomed in” on the process of building interest. I’m on board with that. 🙂