September 1, 2025 • 36 mins
Learn the key strategies to boost your website’s visibility and attract more clients with expert SEO tips. In this episode, host Misty Lynch sits down with Julia Bocchese, founder of Julia Renee Consulting, to demystify search engine optimization for business owners.
Where to find Julia Bocchese
Website: juliareneeconsulting.com
Instagram: @juliareneeconsulting
Pinterest: pinterest.com/juliareneeconsulting
LinkedIn: @julia-bocchese
Where to find Misty
Websites:
- What SEO actually is, why it matters, and how search engines like Google rank your site
- Real-life examples of how improved search ranking can unlock client growth
- Common SEO misconceptions and outdated practices to avoid
- Tips for optimizing your website copy, keywords, and user experience—without sounding robotic
- Actionable advice for small businesses on measuring success, staying consistent with content, and low-budget marketing moves
Where to find Julia Bocchese
Website: juliareneeconsulting.com
Instagram: @juliareneeconsulting
Pinterest: pinterest.com/juliareneeconsulting
LinkedIn: @julia-bocchese
Where to find Misty
Websites:
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Demus Defying Money podcast, where each week
you will hear unforgettable conversations with expert guests about success, money, business,
and small steps you can take to elevate your life
and wealth. Now here's your host, Misty Lynch.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Hello, thank you so much for joining us for this
episode of the demist Defying Money Podcast. I'm your host,
Misty Lynch, and today I'm joined by Julia Bokaesi. She
is the founder of Julia Renee Consulting, where she empowers entrepreneurs,
especially business owners within entrepreneur organizations, to elevate their visibility,
attract more clients, and increase revenue through strategic SEO, purposeful copy,
(00:41):
and compelling user experience. I'm excited to talk about this
topic today because it's something that I don't really understand,
and I'll admit that as a business owner with a website,
SEO ranking on Google, all of these things that I
know are very important to attract your ideal client is
something that I really you know, the behind the scenes
(01:03):
end of it is something that I've never really quite
understood how it works. So I'm excited to talk with
Julia today about this and how all of us can
benefit and have more people see our businesses and hopefully
attract more clients and more money into our into our offices.
So thank you so much Julia for joining me today.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
This episode of Demystifying Money with Misty Lynch is proudly
sponsored by Soundview Financial Advisors. Visit www dot Soundview financial
Advisors dot com to learn more.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
Let my clients come to me, They're like, I don't
know what SU is, but I know I need it,
So I'm always happy to talk about SEO answer lots
of questions because I know it can.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Be Yeah, no, I think it first. It would be
wonderful if you could like, what is se O for
anybody listening that is, like, I know that I don't
even know what that stands for. What is se O?
And how how importan is that when it comes to
online business or you know, working with you know, with
websites and design.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
Yeah, so SEO stands for Search Engine optimization. This applies
to all search engines, Google and bing and Yahoo and everything.
Most people in the US focus on Google because you know,
they kind of like set the rules that people follow
by to you know, rank higher on Google. So the
SEO is basically just the practice of making sure Google
is able to crawl and understand what to rank your
(02:28):
website for so that way you can show up for
the right types of searches and then yeah, show up
for the types of searches that your clients are searching
for in order to get more leads, and yeah, make
more money with your business.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
That's it's important because I think all of us were familiar,
even if it's not using it on the business end,
but we all are going to Google or going to
the Internet to search for things before we even will
think about making a phone call or scheduling a meeting
or you know, I think that's usually our first step.
So I think it's it's super I know a lot
(03:00):
of people do spend a lot of money on their websites,
but if people aren't seeing it or finding it when
they're going looking for that thing that they need that
you offer. You can have the most beautiful website on
the planet and it won't necessarily do anything for you
because people aren't seeing it. So I think it's I
think it's really important for everybody. Like having a website
(03:20):
is good, but there are certain things about it that
need to be need to be optimized. So I think
that's kind of what I'd love to talk about next,
is well, first, kind of what inspired you to start
this business and focus so heavily on SEO and user
experience for business owners as a business itself.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
Yeah, so I started. I launched a travel photograph fee
blog over ten years ago and kind of just learned
you know, different marketing techniques for that SEO and Facebook
and Instagram and everything. And then I was, you know,
getting ready to quit my corporate job because I actually
wanted to go to grad school to study the history
with focus on the Viking Age, so I wanted a
(04:03):
flexible schedule. And so when I did quit my job,
I was doing a lot of freelance and like content
writing for small businesses. I was using the SEO practices
that I learned for my own website, and the businesses
start to see a lot more you know, growth on Google,
but weren't understanding like why all of a sudden they
were getting you know, more traffic from Google. So that's
when I kind of understand that, you know, people aren't
(04:25):
first for they're not interested in SEO, like learning about
it in themselves, and then they just don't have the
time to you know, kind of dedicate to it for
their own website. And I personally love SEO because it's
kind of a mix of both the analytical and creative
side because there is a lot of data. You know,
some like technical things was with SEO, but then there's
a lot of creativity with like copywriting and kind of
(04:47):
I kind of see it like as a puzzle, like
you know, trying to fit all the pieces together to
make sure everything you know works for the business and
every website is different, so kind of like you know,
trying to figure out what works best for the business,
what they need, and what they need to you know,
focus on to grow on Google. So that's quite why
I love it. I know a lot of people don't
like the data side, so that's you know why a
(05:09):
lot of people come to me for that.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
So I think you mentioned, you know, all the data
and the numbers, and I think that is something that
it does seem like I don't code, I'm not into
like that's not interesting to me, but I do think
that it is important to know, like if people are
finding you. So for many business owners, SEO is like
it's sort of overwhelming, like you said, with all of
that information, but why should ranking on Google be a
top priority for these business owners?
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah, because if you think about the way that you're
currently using Google, you may go there to search for,
you know, businesses or services or products or things like that,
and you may be in much more likely, you know,
more of a mindset to be able to purchase something
or hire someone, rather than if you go to Instagram
and you know, you might follow an account like, you know,
interior design Count, and you just really like, you know
(05:54):
the designs that they're doing, but they might be in
a totally different state, so you're not able to ever
hire them. But if you're like searching for interior designer
near me, then you know, any interior designers in your
location are much more likely to show up, and you're
much more in the mindset to be able, you know,
to hire them and work with them. So it's kind of,
you know, an easy way for people to come to
(06:16):
you rather than having to put out the energy on
social media for like having to find people yourself.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Do you have any examples of any success stories, whether
it's yours or someone else's, where having a better search
ranking actually did unlock growth for their small business.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Yeah, one client that I recently worked with, actually she
had one business a few years ago and then has
pivoted and you know, changed her business. She is a
dog trainer now in a different location, and she is
currently getting ninety percent of her bookings from Google because
people are searching for, you know, dog trainer near me,
or they're searching for you know, different topics related to
(06:53):
dog behavior that they're struggling with, and she has you know,
blog post content that's also answering those questions. So if
you're kind of able to rank for those you know,
types of keywords that your clients are searching for or
even types of keywords that are answering their questions, that's
a really good way to get people onto your website
and you know, turned into leads.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
And so I'm curious because I do think that there's
a lot of potential growth there. I feel like there's
a lot of times where we just wonder, like we're
you know, we're doing the right things, We're offering something great.
How come people aren't finding us? How come people aren't
like calling? But I do think there could be a
lot that has to do with do you show up?
So how would somebody know necessarily, I mean, I don't
(07:37):
think that a lot of people google themselves necessarily a lot.
But you help people with audits of their rankings and
things like that. What are some things that people if
they maybe feel like, oh wow, I don't show up
anywhere for like this basic search in my town or
things like that, how do you help people kind of
understand like where they're at right now and you know,
even that basic step in order to like then maybe
(08:00):
progress to starting to get on a on an earlier
page or anything like that when it comes to their
local business where people might be looking for them and
they're just not they're not showing up right.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
Yeah. So a lot of business owners may have heard
about Google Analytics, which tracks a lot of different types
of data for your business. But they also have another
tool called Google Search Console, which not as many people
are familiar with, but it's totally free and it's very
similar to Google Analytics, but it just tracks data specific
to how your site is performing on Google. So it's
going to show you the keywords that you're ranking for.
(08:32):
You know, where you're ranking for those keywords, how much
traffic you're getting for those keywords, so that way you
can see like what you're currently ranking for, if anything,
and you know kind of how you're ranking, and if
you're not ranking for the types of keywords that you
want to be the first step I recommend doing is
going to your website and making sure you're actually using
those keywords. I hear a lot of times that you know,
(08:53):
like a photographers, you know they want to be ranking
for like Philadelphia photographer or Philadelphia wedding photographers something like that,
they don't actually say Philadelphia anywhere on the page, or
they don't say like photographer until the footer of the page.
So making sure you're very clear with you know what
you do, the services that you offer, the types of
clients that you work with. Making sure that is you know,
(09:14):
incorporated within your website copy and then you know, I
typically recommend trying to incorporate it near the top of
the page for the first time, because Google does read,
you know, top to bottom just like a human does.
So if you're able to give the most important information first,
that is going to signal to Google that this is
the type of you know, information that you should be
ranking for. And this doesn't mean you have to like
(09:35):
write like a robot and just like keyword stuff like
Philadelphia wedding photographer, like twenty times on a page. Just
making sure that you're incorporating it, you know, naturally and
not yeah, sounding like AI wrote it, because you don't
want to turn people away as well. You want to
make sure that whatever you're doing on your website is
also speaking to your ideal clients and you're not just
ranking on Google for the sake of ranking.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
That's so that's very important because I do think a
lot of websites like maybe we don't make it. And
I've talked to other people about this, other business coaches
and stuff about the clarity and making it very easy
for people to understand what you do how you can
help them. And I do think a lot of times,
like you know, when you're looking you know, when you're
looking at a website or you're looking at a recipe
and it's like a life story and then it gets
(10:20):
down to like how to make the chicken farm, Like
we tend to do that maybe where we want to
like not look too salesy or too pushy, but it
might lead to it not being really clear like what
you do or how you help people. So I do
think that that mix of clever copy that's not robotic
or like clearly like if it just said like financial
(10:41):
player master is a financial play like that looks strange,
But trying to build that in so that it can
be found, I think is super important. And you're right.
A lot of times we're like, well, I want to
be known for like helping people with you know, executive
compensation or things like that, but if it's nowhere on there,
like it doesn't make sense that it would show up.
You would show up for that. But I do think
(11:01):
we sometimes assume, like, well, but that's what I do,
That's how I help people. So I think that's really
important to make sure the copy is good. And I
wanted to talk about a high because I know that
that's something that I mean, it's it's certainly something that
I'm looking at from as a financial as an investment advisor,
like that end of it, the money and the absolute
(11:22):
like the pace that it's growing at. But in your
in your business, how is it you know, how is
it helpful and how is it hurting? And how can
how can people stand out When things start to sound
a little bit more similar for people who are trying
to rank in these areas.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yeah, so I think focusing on AI has helped a
lot of people when they are ranking or not necessarily
ranking when chat GBT recommends them. Because the more website
copy that you're able to have, the more information you're
able to give people, the clearer that you are, the
more information you're also giving chat GPT, So when someone
is searching for like a lot of times, it'll be
(12:00):
a little bit more specific with searches with chatchipt rather
than on Google. So you might be searching like, you know,
financial planner near me or something like that on Google,
but on chatchept you might go into like, you know,
I'm looking for a financial planner who works primarily with
you know, uh, women owned businesses or you know something
like that, or you know, maybe has services within this
(12:21):
price range. If you have all the information on your website,
you know, it's both super clear to potential clients that
who you work with, what you do, what your you know,
maybe your price point is if that's relevant. But then
it also gives both Google and chatchept other AI tools
all that information to be able to recommend you more
when people have those more like specific searches, and then
(12:43):
On the other hand, people using AI tools to like
write their website copy and their you know, blog post
content things like that to rank higher on Google. Google
is focusing more on like quality content and not just
like you know, five hundred word blog posts from CHATTYPT
that you're putting on your website every single day. If
you're able to just like write one high quality blog
(13:04):
post a month, that's going to serve you a lot better.
Because yeah, people are kind of wising up to the
generic AI content. Google does also focus they want to
see like your personal experiences within you know, your content.
So like if you are a wedding planner and saying, like,
you know, I've worked at these five different venues. This
(13:24):
is what I love about each of them something like that,
rather than chat GPT just like regurgitating like these are
five grade wedding venues in your area. Showing that personal
experience is both gonna you know, better connect with potential
clients and then also Google likes to see that personal
experience and will rank that more likely than they will
the you know, generic AI content.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
You mentioned people searching on chat GBT, so not just
business owners using it to create the content, but as
far as the search engines. I know some people are
searching on chat, GBT, some people are searching you two now, Like,
is it changing a bit where people are going? I
know Google is still dominant, but are people looking for
answers in lots of different places now? And is the
(14:09):
something like keyword is it universal for all of them?
What are you seeing as far as those changes.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
Yeah, so there's definitely been an increase in people searching
on chat GPT for you know, different services. This is
a good way in Google Analytics you can check to
see like where you're getting traffic from. I've seen an
increase from Chat Gypt on my own website. I've also
started noticing in the last couple of months that bing
is bringing me more traffic than Google is. But that,
(14:38):
you know, kind of goes to show that, like, whatever
you're doing to optimize your website, it's going to help
you across all search engines, Like you don't need to
be separately optimizing for Google and Bang and any other
search engines. So, yeah, there are lots of you mentioned
keyword research. There's lots of keyword research tools that you
can use to kind of understand, you know, what the
competition level is for different keywords and how many people
(15:00):
are searching for those keywords each month. So that way,
you know, you know kind of like what keywords people
are searching for and what you can target on your
website that you can actually rank for. So something that's
not like too competitive that you're never going to have
a chance of ranking for. So that way you can
incorporate that within your website and that's going to help you. Yeah,
again across all the search engines and CHAPA, GPT, well
that one's hard to say so many times, and like
(15:23):
any other AI tools that people are using.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And so it's it's not so important to necessarily rank
in the most competitive category. It might be better to
stand out in something that's less you know, searched, but
also a little bit less saturated.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Is that you're saying, So something that would be less competitive,
But this can also help you kind of reach more
of you know, the specific type of clients that you're
searching or wanting to work with. So for like financial planner,
if you're just trying to rank for financial planner, that's
going to be really competitive. There are tons of different
you know, financial planners across the country who work with
different types of people. But if you say, like, you know,
(16:05):
financial planner in Philadelphia, or financial planner specializing in small
businesses or specializing in working with families, you know, something
like that, if you're able to get more specific like that,
and again use the keyword research tools to kind of
make sure you're not getting so specific that no one's
actually searching for that. But the more specific you are
able to get, you know, the better chance you're going
(16:27):
to have to rank and the better chance you're going
to have to reach people who are searching specifically for
what you have to offer.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
I think, and the more people I talk to in
business that are you know, that have gotten really really
focused on serving a particular you know, group of people
or particular like field, line of work, location. I know
it first with business, it's like, well I want everybody
to find me, and it's like, well, actually, maybe if
(16:55):
more people who are perfect for you find you, that
could have your website really be one of your you know,
one of your strongest people on your team, you know,
because it's working all the time and people can find it.
So I do think that that's something that a lot
of times is more of a mental thing to say.
But I want to rank as financial planner, but maybe
you want to rank you know, or you want to
rank as SEO expert for this type of business because
(17:18):
that's your that's your sweet spot. So I think that's
an interesting thing to think about and maybe to even
understand what people are searching for because we do what
we do. I'm not searching for a financial planner every day.
I'm not searching for investment advisors in my town. I
I just don't because I don't need one. But I
also don't know what people are typing in there when
(17:39):
they're looking. So I think that's a really interesting point
of getting that kind of research and really looking at
it and saying like, oh, they think about it this
way when they're changing jobs or any anything's happening where
they might need you whatever you you know, happen to practice.
So very very interesting. Are there any myths about SEO
(18:00):
that kind of frustrate business owners or you know, that
confuse them to the point where you kind of have
to demistify that piece of what you do.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
Yeah, so I would say, I mean SEO has changed
so much in the last twenty thirty years that there
are still a lot of old practices that are like
still being recommended, or you know maybe people read about
them ten years ago and they just haven't read any
updated information. So things like keyword stuffing I still see
sometimes where back in the day, the more often you
(18:30):
use the keyword, you know, Google will be like, oh,
this website is really important for that particular keyword. They
definitely need to be ranking number one. So people would
actually you know, take their keywords to like financial planner
and then they would paste it like thirty times at
the bottom of their website and change the text to
white so that humans couldn't read it. But search engines
could so things like that where people like try to
(18:52):
game the system or kind of like use these old
practices that may have worked twenty years ago, but you
know Google's kind of like why stuff that people are
trying to to you know, trick them. So I would
say there's a lot of that, or like yeah, when
AI was first introduced, everyone's like, oh, I can just
like you know, crank out one hundred blog posts in
a month and then be done with it. And Google
(19:13):
has again, you know, they wise up when people are
trying to like game the system, and they really try
to focus on you know, ranking the highest quality websites.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
So you're saying the the you know, Google's.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Getting smart Yeah anytime, all the.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
Time, which is kind of scary to me. But yes,
like your computers are onto us, Like are these tricks
do not work anymore? But I think that's good to know,
because I think you're right. Sometimes people might have said, Okay,
I learned about this, like I know what to do,
but maybe it's not necessarily the same. And it's kind
of evolving as you know, as we get more search engines,
more you know, you know, kind of more sophisticated technology
(19:53):
and things like that, so very important. So yeah, maybe
if your old practices aren't working, it might be time
to revisit them. And I wanted to ask about you know,
say you do rank and you're getting people in the door,
how do you then, you know, coach your clients to
help them convert that traffic or do something with it,
(20:14):
especially if say they are able to you know, rank quickly,
or something becomes a very popular topic and then all
of a sudden, now people are heading to their website.
How do you help them with that conversion piece of
it that actually will turn those searches into money.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Yeah, so we've talked a little bit on website copy,
but that is a really important piece of your website
is like speaking to your ideal clients to be again
very clear on what you do, who you help, you know,
and why people should work with you over you know,
your competition or something like that, and then you know
kind of again goes back to like incorporating keewers on
your website. If you're like making sure from the get
(20:49):
go that you're saying that you're a financial planner, rather
than something like I help people with money, which could
be very general, that can mean a lot of different things.
So making sure you're clear from the get go exactly
what you do how you can help people. Making sure
that you have things like a very you know, clear,
easy to navigate menu, both on desktop and on mobile,
(21:09):
so that way people can find what they're searching for.
Making sure things are very clear on you know, what
they're going to get when they land on a page.
So don't get like cute with naming your pages. Just
get you know, get straight to the point, like you
know services or like you can get more specific if
you have a few different services or like financial planning services,
(21:30):
accounting services things like that, but don't just say, like,
you know, get help with your money. Again, be very
clear because people you only have a few seconds to
get people to be interested enough to stay on your
website to learn more. So making sure everything is easy
for them to find. Making sure you have you know,
clearer calls to actions throughout the different pages that lead
(21:51):
to like your services page or to your contact page.
Making sure it's easy for them to you know, book
a call or you know, if they just can hire
you purchase a product directly from the website, make sure
it's easy to do that. Basically, make sure everything's easy
if you want to kind of like test things out
to see if other people are able to, you know,
navigate your website as easily as you are, because it
(22:13):
can be hard to analyze your own website when you're
kind of like in the weeds. You can like, you know,
give your website to you know, a family member or
a friend or something like that who isn't in your
business you know, industry, and say, like, you know, hey,
you know, how easy is it for you to find
the price of this particular service and give them a
(22:34):
little you know task and see if they're able to
find that quickly, or if it is a struggle for
them to find, or if your site takes a really
long time for them to load and it's kind of
like a frustrating user experience. So that we can kind
of get an outside perspective on you know, how people
are able to use your website.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
So important. And I know it's nerve wracking to tell
somebody to look at something that you've spent a lot
of time and money on develop and then be like
is this good enough? But I think it's so important
because we're, like you said, we're in the middle of it,
we're looking at it, we understand all the language, we
understand everything that's on there. But does somebody who actually
needs to hire you understand all that? And that's that's
(23:13):
really important. I'm curious when you when say you're somebody
who you know wants to build content and have like
an SEO strategy, what are some ways that you help
people build like a sustainable content because I've seen some
people that like maybe they start a blog and they stop,
or they start a podcast and they have one episode,
(23:34):
Like how do you with that piece of it? What
are some of your tips for building that consistent strategy
for people that they can maintain.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Yeah, so I would say start off small before you
kind of like jump in and say I'm gonna, you know,
blog every single week. Maybe start with one blog a month,
and if you're able to kind of like sustain that,
then increase it to two times a month, or you know,
saying with the podcast, don't try to have a podcast
episode twice a week if that's you know, that's going
to be too much great to keep up with. So
(24:01):
making sure you know what you can handle. Maybe set
aside time like in your calendar to you know block
or batch a few episodes or a few blog posts
so that way you kind of have things set it
for the next month so you're not kind of like
scrambling like, oh my gosh, what am I going to
blog bat this month? So kind of like planning ahead,
(24:22):
especially if there's anything seasonal with your industry, So like
you know, tax season, making sure that you have your
blog posts about tax season up and ready to go
in like December before people actually start searching for it,
because it does take Google a little bit a little
bit of time to start you know, crawling and ranking
new content. So like just because you put up a
(24:42):
blog post up tomorrow, it's not going to rank number
one immediately. It does take a little bit of time.
So do you need to kind of plan ahead with
those and think about when people are going to be
searching for that and then you know, post it two
months before.
Speaker 4 (24:55):
Then.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
That doesn't mean you have to be like, you know,
sharing it on Facebook if it doesn't make sense to
be sharing your text tips in October, but at least
having it on your website so that way Google can
crawl it and it can start ranking before people are
actually searching for it. So if there's anything seasonal or
you know, recurring every year that you need to be
planning for, kind of get that, you know, on your
(25:18):
calendar way before you think you need it.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
That's really smart because I think you're right. You can
post it, but you don't necessarily have to promote it
or start sharing it to everything right away. But having
that content there so it can be found is important.
But it's not something that I would necessarily think to
do because you write the blog and you're like sharing
it because it's kind of like it's got to go out,
everyone's got to see it. But I think That's a
very smart tip, especially for things that are seasonal or
(25:42):
maybe evergreen, that every year you can kind of refresh
that or you know, post those things to make sure
that you're you know, still you know, providing good content,
updating it and continuing to rank. When businesses start to
see more traffic, how do you recommend that they measure
their success beyond just looking at the number of visitors
when they go to that Google calm.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
Yeah, so, I mean the easiest thing you can do
is whenever you get someone who like fills out your
contact form or books a call with you, or you know,
however they get in touch with you, asking them where
they found you. So you do want to make sure
that you're tracking if they're coming from you know, Google
or you know, other platforms. This is also important for
you know, just marketing in general. If you're focusing all
of your time on Instagram, but then you're not getting
(26:24):
any clients from Instagram, then making sure you're focusing on
where you're actually getting your clients from. So that would
be the number one thing is just ask people where
they came from, where they found you, and then making
sure that you are also tracking, you know, if those
leads actually convert into clients, because you know, if you
get a bunch of leads from Google, but then they're
not actually converting, then you know, you might want to
(26:45):
analyze to see like why people are you know, finding you,
how people are finding you on Google, to make sure
you're actually targeting the right types of keywords that are
going to convert those leads into clients. You know, analyzing
things on your website to make sure it's clear you know,
what you do, who you help, things like that. But yeah,
just asking people how they find you is a really
good way to start with tracking that.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Yeah, I think that is a great way because it's
it's it's interesting once I started to do that, because
I would I was assuming that people were coming from
like websites, and it's actually surprisingly more Facebook and Facebook
groups for a certain period of time, which was kind
of cool because you might say, oh, but I'm spending
all my time on LinkedIn and I wasn't really seeing
(27:28):
much traffic from there. So it was interesting to see
that that where your clients are or where they're actually
looking for somebody who can help them and when that
happens to be So it's good information you're right for
marketing too, especially if you're spending money on certain things
with your marketing dollars and maybe they're limited, So I
think that that could be making sure that it's you know,
the most useful. Are there any any tips you have
(27:50):
for people who might be on a tight budget when
it comes to marketing with their business that you think
could be something that they could do right away that
can help.
Speaker 3 (27:58):
Yeah, So just with just making sure that you are
incorporating keywords, even if you don't have the time to
do keyword research or like you know, you don't want
to pay for a keyword research total with there are
lots of you know, free ones or you can get
free trials, but even just making sure that you're very
clear with you know, what you do from the get
go on your website, making sure that you have you know,
(28:19):
clear services and that you're describing your services. You can
if you have multiple services that are you know, maybe
ranking for different types of keywords, you can have different
services pages and so that way each page has a
good chance of ranking. This doesn't mean you have to
go out and create like fifty services pages, but like
if you have two main services that you offer, you
can have two different services pages, so kind of like
(28:42):
being able to capitalize on being able to rank for
different types of keywords and get more people on your
website in different ways.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Do you think it's important to list prices on the websites?
Speaker 3 (28:52):
I would say it depends on the business. I would
say most businesses that I've worked with, it is helpful
to list the prices or even like a starting at
price or this is what you know clients can expect
to spend on average. You know, there are different ways
of phrasing it if you don't want to like have
one set price on there, but that way, you know,
(29:12):
people know what to expect when they talk to you,
because that could be a reason why conversions could be
lower if people are expecting one price and it's you know,
double that. Like a few months ago, just to give
an example, I was like looking for a postpartum nutritionist
to help me with like my you know, postpartum meal
planning and things like that. And I contacted a few
(29:33):
different nutritionists. Most had their prices or like starting at
prices on their website, and then one didn't, but I
went ahead and contact her anyway, and it was like
five times the price of these other nutritionists, and it
wasn't really clear why it was so much more expensive,
Like if she had on her website like her service
included like five times more or she had more experienced
(29:54):
something like that, then that would have made sense. But
then we kind of like wasted time on a call
because she didn't tell me the price beforehand, and then
I felt like I was wasting her time. So yeah,
having some sort of pricing information it might not make
sense for every single business, but I would say the
majority it can help.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Yeah, I think that's definitely something I've seen as like,
you know, website like do it or no, get them
on the phone, make a conversation. I've seen that kind
of advice for people. But I do say I do
think that for the most part, most people want to
see or at least have an idea and self reject
or say okay, yeah, that's definitely like what I'm looking for,
not assuming that you know no one's gonna be able
(30:34):
to before that, which is rarely ever true, so very
very important things to think of it.
Speaker 3 (30:39):
I would say, don't make people sign up for your
email list to get your pricing sheet. I see that
sometimes and if I see that I'm definitely not signing up.
I'm immediately like moving on to yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
Yeah, yeah, you want something of value for that email address,
not just like information that yeah get is gate cap there?
All right? Yeah, definitely I understand like that a good thing.
But do you think it is important to have something
when when people sign up for your email lists? Are
there any things that you think have like converted well
or are good ideas for people who are looking to
(31:11):
then you know, grow their email lists and start to
nurture those leads.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
I don't have the biggest email lists, so I'm not
the biggest expert here, but i would say making sure
that whatever like freebe or lean magnet that you have
is something that your clients specifically would be interested in.
So not like the pricing sheet, but like, for example,
for a long time, I had like some like basic
checklist on you know, ten things to optimize your your website.
(31:38):
But that was for I was working with a business
coach and we kind of talked it through and she
was like explaining how that could attract a lot of
people who aren't ready to invest in SEO necessarily, They're
just kind of like getting the basic information for themselves.
So like kind of focusing my you know freeb on
being able to use SEO to convert more clients. That
has gotten a lot more sign ups and a lot
(31:59):
more people inverting from my email list. So kind of like,
instead of just doing the you know, a catchy freebie
that sounds really good, making sure it's actually aligned with
who you want to be working with.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
I think that's important because I think for a while,
I was, you know, when I first started blogging, and
I thought, you know, okay, like I want to provide
content for people who can't afford to work with me
yet and have that be free. But then I realized
I was only attracting people that couldn't afford to work
with me yet or didn't want to ever pay to
work with a financial planner, and so tweaking that to
make sure it was like, no, know, what's appealing to
(32:33):
that person that I want, And then they'd say like, Okay,
if I got this for free, imagine what I could
get if we work together, Like I could learn more.
So I think that that's kind of an important thing
to think about because it might be logically you might
be thinking, Okay, I'll do this for that person that's
at that step and then of course they'll think of
me next, but it's like, no, what are they going
to think of right now? And make sure that that's
that's what you're putting out there, so super important, and
(32:56):
before before we wrap up, I'm curious looking ahead. I
know we talked a little bit about AI SEO user experience.
What are some trends that you're seeing that you're either
the most excited about or the most interested in as
far as this year and this coming up with you
with your clients.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
Yeah, So one thing I'm seeing a lot with Google
like focusing on AI is I'm sure people have seen it.
If they go to Google and ask like a very
basic question, Google is supplying the answer right there rather
than like you needing to go to a website. So
kind of like getting a bit more strategic with clients
to making sure that they're focusing on that like long
form content that people need to go to the website
(33:32):
to get, you know, more information, so not just like
what's the date to you know, submit your taxes by,
but like something that's way more you know, detailed, that
people are interested in actually reading about rather than just
getting like a quick answer. Because I think Google is
going to be focusing more on keeping people on Google
rather than like, you know, pushing websites at first at
(33:56):
the beginning of Google. But then yeah, just making sure
that you have that high quality content that people are
actually interested in staying on your website to read more.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
About interesting All right, Julia. So if somebody has listened
and said, yes, yes, I know this is something I
need to focus on, but I still don't want to
do it myself, how can they find out more about
you and your services?
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah, so my website is Julia Renee Consulting dot com.
I do have my prices listed, so if you want
to get an idea of the different services that I
offer and the different price points, you can get all
that information there and you can call me at Julia
Renee Consulting on Instagram and Julia Renee Consulting on LinkedIn.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
Awesome, Well, thank you, Julia, thank you so much for
going on the show. I think this is an interesting
piece and I do think and I've talked to other
web designers before. I've talked to other people who are
our websites are very important. I think they are a
very important part of our business. Sometimes that's employee number
one or number two if we are the only employee
at our firm, and I think it is important to
constantly look at them. Nobody wants to see an outdated website.
(34:58):
You don't want to show up on page two on
you of a Google search because no one's going to
get there. So these are really important things to think
about and to kind of consider as you build out
your marketing strategy where you might be thinking of other
things like social media or going viral, this could be
the bread and butter to get clients actually converted in
in the door. So thank you Julia for sharing your expertise. Yes,
(35:18):
go follow her. She has very beautiful layouts and her
websites are very very nice looking, so I think that
she knows what she's doing when it comes to getting
people to want to actually stick around on the website
and learn more. So thanks again for joining, and thank
you everyone for listening. If you'd like to head over
to my website mister Lynch dot com, you can find
other episodes of the podcast or copy of the book,
(35:40):
or find some other information as far as working with
me as a financial advisor or planner. Thank you so
much for joining and we'll talk again next week. Thank
you for joining us on another insightful episode of Demist
Buying Money. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate
and leave a review. Stay tuned for more engaging conversation
on our next episode, and remember knowledge is the key
(36:03):
to financial empowerment.
Welcome to the Demus Defying Money podcast, where each week
you will hear unforgettable conversations with expert guests about success, money, business,
and small steps you can take to elevate your life
and wealth. Now here's your host, Misty Lynch.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Hello, thank you so much for joining us for this
episode of the demist Defying Money Podcast. I'm your host,
Misty Lynch, and today I'm joined by Julia Bokaesi. She
is the founder of Julia Renee Consulting, where she empowers entrepreneurs,
especially business owners within entrepreneur organizations, to elevate their visibility,
attract more clients, and increase revenue through strategic SEO, purposeful copy,
(00:41):
and compelling user experience. I'm excited to talk about this
topic today because it's something that I don't really understand,
and I'll admit that as a business owner with a website,
SEO ranking on Google, all of these things that I
know are very important to attract your ideal client is
something that I really you know, the behind the scenes
(01:03):
end of it is something that I've never really quite
understood how it works. So I'm excited to talk with
Julia today about this and how all of us can
benefit and have more people see our businesses and hopefully
attract more clients and more money into our into our offices.
So thank you so much Julia for joining me today.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
This episode of Demystifying Money with Misty Lynch is proudly
sponsored by Soundview Financial Advisors. Visit www dot Soundview financial
Advisors dot com to learn more.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
Let my clients come to me, They're like, I don't
know what SU is, but I know I need it,
So I'm always happy to talk about SEO answer lots
of questions because I know it can.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Be Yeah, no, I think it first. It would be
wonderful if you could like, what is se O for
anybody listening that is, like, I know that I don't
even know what that stands for. What is se O?
And how how importan is that when it comes to
online business or you know, working with you know, with
websites and design.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
Yeah, so SEO stands for Search Engine optimization. This applies
to all search engines, Google and bing and Yahoo and everything.
Most people in the US focus on Google because you know,
they kind of like set the rules that people follow
by to you know, rank higher on Google. So the
SEO is basically just the practice of making sure Google
is able to crawl and understand what to rank your
(02:28):
website for so that way you can show up for
the right types of searches and then yeah, show up
for the types of searches that your clients are searching
for in order to get more leads, and yeah, make
more money with your business.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
That's it's important because I think all of us were familiar,
even if it's not using it on the business end,
but we all are going to Google or going to
the Internet to search for things before we even will
think about making a phone call or scheduling a meeting
or you know, I think that's usually our first step.
So I think it's it's super I know a lot
(03:00):
of people do spend a lot of money on their websites,
but if people aren't seeing it or finding it when
they're going looking for that thing that they need that
you offer. You can have the most beautiful website on
the planet and it won't necessarily do anything for you
because people aren't seeing it. So I think it's I
think it's really important for everybody. Like having a website
(03:20):
is good, but there are certain things about it that
need to be need to be optimized. So I think
that's kind of what I'd love to talk about next,
is well, first, kind of what inspired you to start
this business and focus so heavily on SEO and user
experience for business owners as a business itself.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
Yeah, so I started. I launched a travel photograph fee
blog over ten years ago and kind of just learned
you know, different marketing techniques for that SEO and Facebook
and Instagram and everything. And then I was, you know,
getting ready to quit my corporate job because I actually
wanted to go to grad school to study the history
with focus on the Viking Age, so I wanted a
(04:03):
flexible schedule. And so when I did quit my job,
I was doing a lot of freelance and like content
writing for small businesses. I was using the SEO practices
that I learned for my own website, and the businesses
start to see a lot more you know, growth on Google,
but weren't understanding like why all of a sudden they
were getting you know, more traffic from Google. So that's
when I kind of understand that, you know, people aren't
(04:25):
first for they're not interested in SEO, like learning about
it in themselves, and then they just don't have the
time to you know, kind of dedicate to it for
their own website. And I personally love SEO because it's
kind of a mix of both the analytical and creative
side because there is a lot of data. You know,
some like technical things was with SEO, but then there's
a lot of creativity with like copywriting and kind of
(04:47):
I kind of see it like as a puzzle, like
you know, trying to fit all the pieces together to
make sure everything you know works for the business and
every website is different, so kind of like you know,
trying to figure out what works best for the business,
what they need, and what they need to you know,
focus on to grow on Google. So that's quite why
I love it. I know a lot of people don't
like the data side, so that's you know why a
(05:09):
lot of people come to me for that.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
So I think you mentioned, you know, all the data
and the numbers, and I think that is something that
it does seem like I don't code, I'm not into
like that's not interesting to me, but I do think
that it is important to know, like if people are
finding you. So for many business owners, SEO is like
it's sort of overwhelming, like you said, with all of
that information, but why should ranking on Google be a
top priority for these business owners?
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah, because if you think about the way that you're
currently using Google, you may go there to search for,
you know, businesses or services or products or things like that,
and you may be in much more likely, you know,
more of a mindset to be able to purchase something
or hire someone, rather than if you go to Instagram
and you know, you might follow an account like, you know,
interior design Count, and you just really like, you know
(05:54):
the designs that they're doing, but they might be in
a totally different state, so you're not able to ever
hire them. But if you're like searching for interior designer
near me, then you know, any interior designers in your
location are much more likely to show up, and you're
much more in the mindset to be able, you know,
to hire them and work with them. So it's kind of,
you know, an easy way for people to come to
(06:16):
you rather than having to put out the energy on
social media for like having to find people yourself.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Do you have any examples of any success stories, whether
it's yours or someone else's, where having a better search
ranking actually did unlock growth for their small business.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Yeah, one client that I recently worked with, actually she
had one business a few years ago and then has
pivoted and you know, changed her business. She is a
dog trainer now in a different location, and she is
currently getting ninety percent of her bookings from Google because
people are searching for, you know, dog trainer near me,
or they're searching for you know, different topics related to
(06:53):
dog behavior that they're struggling with, and she has you know,
blog post content that's also answering those questions. So if
you're kind of able to rank for those you know,
types of keywords that your clients are searching for or
even types of keywords that are answering their questions, that's
a really good way to get people onto your website
and you know, turned into leads.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
And so I'm curious because I do think that there's
a lot of potential growth there. I feel like there's
a lot of times where we just wonder, like we're
you know, we're doing the right things, We're offering something great.
How come people aren't finding us? How come people aren't
like calling? But I do think there could be a
lot that has to do with do you show up?
So how would somebody know necessarily, I mean, I don't
(07:37):
think that a lot of people google themselves necessarily a lot.
But you help people with audits of their rankings and
things like that. What are some things that people if
they maybe feel like, oh wow, I don't show up
anywhere for like this basic search in my town or
things like that, how do you help people kind of
understand like where they're at right now and you know,
even that basic step in order to like then maybe
(08:00):
progress to starting to get on a on an earlier
page or anything like that when it comes to their
local business where people might be looking for them and
they're just not they're not showing up right.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
Yeah. So a lot of business owners may have heard
about Google Analytics, which tracks a lot of different types
of data for your business. But they also have another
tool called Google Search Console, which not as many people
are familiar with, but it's totally free and it's very
similar to Google Analytics, but it just tracks data specific
to how your site is performing on Google. So it's
going to show you the keywords that you're ranking for.
(08:32):
You know, where you're ranking for those keywords, how much
traffic you're getting for those keywords, so that way you
can see like what you're currently ranking for, if anything,
and you know kind of how you're ranking, and if
you're not ranking for the types of keywords that you
want to be the first step I recommend doing is
going to your website and making sure you're actually using
those keywords. I hear a lot of times that you know,
(08:53):
like a photographers, you know they want to be ranking
for like Philadelphia photographer or Philadelphia wedding photographers something like that,
they don't actually say Philadelphia anywhere on the page, or
they don't say like photographer until the footer of the page.
So making sure you're very clear with you know what
you do, the services that you offer, the types of
clients that you work with. Making sure that is you know,
(09:14):
incorporated within your website copy and then you know, I
typically recommend trying to incorporate it near the top of
the page for the first time, because Google does read,
you know, top to bottom just like a human does.
So if you're able to give the most important information first,
that is going to signal to Google that this is
the type of you know, information that you should be
ranking for. And this doesn't mean you have to like
(09:35):
write like a robot and just like keyword stuff like
Philadelphia wedding photographer, like twenty times on a page. Just
making sure that you're incorporating it, you know, naturally and
not yeah, sounding like AI wrote it, because you don't
want to turn people away as well. You want to
make sure that whatever you're doing on your website is
also speaking to your ideal clients and you're not just
ranking on Google for the sake of ranking.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
That's so that's very important because I do think a
lot of websites like maybe we don't make it. And
I've talked to other people about this, other business coaches
and stuff about the clarity and making it very easy
for people to understand what you do how you can
help them. And I do think a lot of times,
like you know, when you're looking you know, when you're
looking at a website or you're looking at a recipe
and it's like a life story and then it gets
(10:20):
down to like how to make the chicken farm, Like
we tend to do that maybe where we want to
like not look too salesy or too pushy, but it
might lead to it not being really clear like what
you do or how you help people. So I do
think that that mix of clever copy that's not robotic
or like clearly like if it just said like financial
(10:41):
player master is a financial play like that looks strange,
But trying to build that in so that it can
be found, I think is super important. And you're right.
A lot of times we're like, well, I want to
be known for like helping people with you know, executive
compensation or things like that, but if it's nowhere on there,
like it doesn't make sense that it would show up.
You would show up for that. But I do think
(11:01):
we sometimes assume, like, well, but that's what I do,
That's how I help people. So I think that's really
important to make sure the copy is good. And I
wanted to talk about a high because I know that
that's something that I mean, it's it's certainly something that
I'm looking at from as a financial as an investment advisor,
like that end of it, the money and the absolute
(11:22):
like the pace that it's growing at. But in your
in your business, how is it you know, how is
it helpful and how is it hurting? And how can
how can people stand out When things start to sound
a little bit more similar for people who are trying
to rank in these areas.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yeah, so I think focusing on AI has helped a
lot of people when they are ranking or not necessarily
ranking when chat GBT recommends them. Because the more website
copy that you're able to have, the more information you're
able to give people, the clearer that you are, the
more information you're also giving chat GPT, So when someone
is searching for like a lot of times, it'll be
(12:00):
a little bit more specific with searches with chatchipt rather
than on Google. So you might be searching like, you know,
financial planner near me or something like that on Google,
but on chatchept you might go into like, you know,
I'm looking for a financial planner who works primarily with
you know, uh, women owned businesses or you know something
like that, or you know, maybe has services within this
(12:21):
price range. If you have all the information on your website,
you know, it's both super clear to potential clients that
who you work with, what you do, what your you know,
maybe your price point is if that's relevant. But then
it also gives both Google and chatchept other AI tools
all that information to be able to recommend you more
when people have those more like specific searches, and then
(12:43):
On the other hand, people using AI tools to like
write their website copy and their you know, blog post
content things like that to rank higher on Google. Google
is focusing more on like quality content and not just
like you know, five hundred word blog posts from CHATTYPT
that you're putting on your website every single day. If
you're able to just like write one high quality blog
(13:04):
post a month, that's going to serve you a lot better.
Because yeah, people are kind of wising up to the
generic AI content. Google does also focus they want to
see like your personal experiences within you know, your content.
So like if you are a wedding planner and saying, like,
you know, I've worked at these five different venues. This
(13:24):
is what I love about each of them something like that,
rather than chat GPT just like regurgitating like these are
five grade wedding venues in your area. Showing that personal
experience is both gonna you know, better connect with potential
clients and then also Google likes to see that personal
experience and will rank that more likely than they will
the you know, generic AI content.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
You mentioned people searching on chat GBT, so not just
business owners using it to create the content, but as
far as the search engines. I know some people are
searching on chat, GBT, some people are searching you two now, Like,
is it changing a bit where people are going? I
know Google is still dominant, but are people looking for
answers in lots of different places now? And is the
(14:09):
something like keyword is it universal for all of them?
What are you seeing as far as those changes.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
Yeah, so there's definitely been an increase in people searching
on chat GPT for you know, different services. This is
a good way in Google Analytics you can check to
see like where you're getting traffic from. I've seen an
increase from Chat Gypt on my own website. I've also
started noticing in the last couple of months that bing
is bringing me more traffic than Google is. But that,
(14:38):
you know, kind of goes to show that, like, whatever
you're doing to optimize your website, it's going to help
you across all search engines, Like you don't need to
be separately optimizing for Google and Bang and any other
search engines. So, yeah, there are lots of you mentioned
keyword research. There's lots of keyword research tools that you
can use to kind of understand, you know, what the
competition level is for different keywords and how many people
(15:00):
are searching for those keywords each month. So that way,
you know, you know kind of like what keywords people
are searching for and what you can target on your
website that you can actually rank for. So something that's
not like too competitive that you're never going to have
a chance of ranking for. So that way you can
incorporate that within your website and that's going to help you. Yeah,
again across all the search engines and CHAPA, GPT, well
that one's hard to say so many times, and like
(15:23):
any other AI tools that people are using.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And so it's it's not so important to necessarily rank
in the most competitive category. It might be better to
stand out in something that's less you know, searched, but
also a little bit less saturated.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Is that you're saying, So something that would be less competitive,
But this can also help you kind of reach more
of you know, the specific type of clients that you're
searching or wanting to work with. So for like financial planner,
if you're just trying to rank for financial planner, that's
going to be really competitive. There are tons of different
you know, financial planners across the country who work with
different types of people. But if you say, like, you know,
(16:05):
financial planner in Philadelphia, or financial planner specializing in small
businesses or specializing in working with families, you know, something
like that, if you're able to get more specific like that,
and again use the keyword research tools to kind of
make sure you're not getting so specific that no one's
actually searching for that. But the more specific you are
able to get, you know, the better chance you're going
(16:27):
to have to rank and the better chance you're going
to have to reach people who are searching specifically for
what you have to offer.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
I think, and the more people I talk to in
business that are you know, that have gotten really really
focused on serving a particular you know, group of people
or particular like field, line of work, location. I know
it first with business, it's like, well I want everybody
to find me, and it's like, well, actually, maybe if
(16:55):
more people who are perfect for you find you, that
could have your website really be one of your you know,
one of your strongest people on your team, you know,
because it's working all the time and people can find it.
So I do think that that's something that a lot
of times is more of a mental thing to say.
But I want to rank as financial planner, but maybe
you want to rank you know, or you want to
rank as SEO expert for this type of business because
(17:18):
that's your that's your sweet spot. So I think that's
an interesting thing to think about and maybe to even
understand what people are searching for because we do what
we do. I'm not searching for a financial planner every day.
I'm not searching for investment advisors in my town. I
I just don't because I don't need one. But I
also don't know what people are typing in there when
(17:39):
they're looking. So I think that's a really interesting point
of getting that kind of research and really looking at
it and saying like, oh, they think about it this
way when they're changing jobs or any anything's happening where
they might need you whatever you you know, happen to practice.
So very very interesting. Are there any myths about SEO
(18:00):
that kind of frustrate business owners or you know, that
confuse them to the point where you kind of have
to demistify that piece of what you do.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
Yeah, so I would say, I mean SEO has changed
so much in the last twenty thirty years that there
are still a lot of old practices that are like
still being recommended, or you know maybe people read about
them ten years ago and they just haven't read any
updated information. So things like keyword stuffing I still see
sometimes where back in the day, the more often you
(18:30):
use the keyword, you know, Google will be like, oh,
this website is really important for that particular keyword. They
definitely need to be ranking number one. So people would
actually you know, take their keywords to like financial planner
and then they would paste it like thirty times at
the bottom of their website and change the text to
white so that humans couldn't read it. But search engines
could so things like that where people like try to
(18:52):
game the system or kind of like use these old
practices that may have worked twenty years ago, but you
know Google's kind of like why stuff that people are
trying to to you know, trick them. So I would
say there's a lot of that, or like yeah, when
AI was first introduced, everyone's like, oh, I can just
like you know, crank out one hundred blog posts in
a month and then be done with it. And Google
(19:13):
has again, you know, they wise up when people are
trying to like game the system, and they really try
to focus on you know, ranking the highest quality websites.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
So you're saying the the you know, Google's.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Getting smart Yeah anytime, all the.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
Time, which is kind of scary to me. But yes,
like your computers are onto us, Like are these tricks
do not work anymore? But I think that's good to know,
because I think you're right. Sometimes people might have said, Okay,
I learned about this, like I know what to do,
but maybe it's not necessarily the same. And it's kind
of evolving as you know, as we get more search engines,
more you know, you know, kind of more sophisticated technology
(19:53):
and things like that, so very important. So yeah, maybe
if your old practices aren't working, it might be time
to revisit them. And I wanted to ask about you know,
say you do rank and you're getting people in the door,
how do you then, you know, coach your clients to
help them convert that traffic or do something with it,
(20:14):
especially if say they are able to you know, rank quickly,
or something becomes a very popular topic and then all
of a sudden, now people are heading to their website.
How do you help them with that conversion piece of
it that actually will turn those searches into money.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Yeah, so we've talked a little bit on website copy,
but that is a really important piece of your website
is like speaking to your ideal clients to be again
very clear on what you do, who you help, you know,
and why people should work with you over you know,
your competition or something like that, and then you know
kind of again goes back to like incorporating keewers on
your website. If you're like making sure from the get
(20:49):
go that you're saying that you're a financial planner, rather
than something like I help people with money, which could
be very general, that can mean a lot of different things.
So making sure you're clear from the get go exactly
what you do how you can help people. Making sure
that you have things like a very you know, clear,
easy to navigate menu, both on desktop and on mobile,
(21:09):
so that way people can find what they're searching for.
Making sure things are very clear on you know, what
they're going to get when they land on a page.
So don't get like cute with naming your pages. Just
get you know, get straight to the point, like you
know services or like you can get more specific if
you have a few different services or like financial planning services,
(21:30):
accounting services things like that, but don't just say, like,
you know, get help with your money. Again, be very
clear because people you only have a few seconds to
get people to be interested enough to stay on your
website to learn more. So making sure everything is easy
for them to find. Making sure you have you know,
clearer calls to actions throughout the different pages that lead
(21:51):
to like your services page or to your contact page.
Making sure it's easy for them to you know, book
a call or you know, if they just can hire
you purchase a product directly from the website, make sure
it's easy to do that. Basically, make sure everything's easy
if you want to kind of like test things out
to see if other people are able to, you know,
navigate your website as easily as you are, because it
(22:13):
can be hard to analyze your own website when you're
kind of like in the weeds. You can like, you know,
give your website to you know, a family member or
a friend or something like that who isn't in your
business you know, industry, and say, like, you know, hey,
you know, how easy is it for you to find
the price of this particular service and give them a
(22:34):
little you know task and see if they're able to
find that quickly, or if it is a struggle for
them to find, or if your site takes a really
long time for them to load and it's kind of
like a frustrating user experience. So that we can kind
of get an outside perspective on you know, how people
are able to use your website.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
So important. And I know it's nerve wracking to tell
somebody to look at something that you've spent a lot
of time and money on develop and then be like
is this good enough? But I think it's so important
because we're, like you said, we're in the middle of it,
we're looking at it, we understand all the language, we
understand everything that's on there. But does somebody who actually
needs to hire you understand all that? And that's that's
(23:13):
really important. I'm curious when you when say you're somebody
who you know wants to build content and have like
an SEO strategy, what are some ways that you help
people build like a sustainable content because I've seen some
people that like maybe they start a blog and they stop,
or they start a podcast and they have one episode,
(23:34):
Like how do you with that piece of it? What
are some of your tips for building that consistent strategy
for people that they can maintain.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Yeah, so I would say start off small before you
kind of like jump in and say I'm gonna, you know,
blog every single week. Maybe start with one blog a month,
and if you're able to kind of like sustain that,
then increase it to two times a month, or you know,
saying with the podcast, don't try to have a podcast
episode twice a week if that's you know, that's going
to be too much great to keep up with. So
(24:01):
making sure you know what you can handle. Maybe set
aside time like in your calendar to you know block
or batch a few episodes or a few blog posts
so that way you kind of have things set it
for the next month so you're not kind of like
scrambling like, oh my gosh, what am I going to
blog bat this month? So kind of like planning ahead,
(24:22):
especially if there's anything seasonal with your industry, So like
you know, tax season, making sure that you have your
blog posts about tax season up and ready to go
in like December before people actually start searching for it,
because it does take Google a little bit a little
bit of time to start you know, crawling and ranking
new content. So like just because you put up a
(24:42):
blog post up tomorrow, it's not going to rank number
one immediately. It does take a little bit of time.
So do you need to kind of plan ahead with
those and think about when people are going to be
searching for that and then you know, post it two
months before.
Speaker 4 (24:55):
Then.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
That doesn't mean you have to be like, you know,
sharing it on Facebook if it doesn't make sense to
be sharing your text tips in October, but at least
having it on your website so that way Google can
crawl it and it can start ranking before people are
actually searching for it. So if there's anything seasonal or
you know, recurring every year that you need to be
planning for, kind of get that, you know, on your
(25:18):
calendar way before you think you need it.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
That's really smart because I think you're right. You can
post it, but you don't necessarily have to promote it
or start sharing it to everything right away. But having
that content there so it can be found is important.
But it's not something that I would necessarily think to
do because you write the blog and you're like sharing
it because it's kind of like it's got to go out,
everyone's got to see it. But I think That's a
very smart tip, especially for things that are seasonal or
(25:42):
maybe evergreen, that every year you can kind of refresh
that or you know, post those things to make sure
that you're you know, still you know, providing good content,
updating it and continuing to rank. When businesses start to
see more traffic, how do you recommend that they measure
their success beyond just looking at the number of visitors
when they go to that Google calm.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
Yeah, so, I mean the easiest thing you can do
is whenever you get someone who like fills out your
contact form or books a call with you, or you know,
however they get in touch with you, asking them where
they found you. So you do want to make sure
that you're tracking if they're coming from you know, Google
or you know, other platforms. This is also important for
you know, just marketing in general. If you're focusing all
of your time on Instagram, but then you're not getting
(26:24):
any clients from Instagram, then making sure you're focusing on
where you're actually getting your clients from. So that would
be the number one thing is just ask people where
they came from, where they found you, and then making
sure that you are also tracking, you know, if those
leads actually convert into clients, because you know, if you
get a bunch of leads from Google, but then they're
not actually converting, then you know, you might want to
(26:45):
analyze to see like why people are you know, finding you,
how people are finding you on Google, to make sure
you're actually targeting the right types of keywords that are
going to convert those leads into clients. You know, analyzing
things on your website to make sure it's clear you know,
what you do, who you help, things like that. But yeah,
just asking people how they find you is a really
good way to start with tracking that.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Yeah, I think that is a great way because it's
it's it's interesting once I started to do that, because
I would I was assuming that people were coming from
like websites, and it's actually surprisingly more Facebook and Facebook
groups for a certain period of time, which was kind
of cool because you might say, oh, but I'm spending
all my time on LinkedIn and I wasn't really seeing
(27:28):
much traffic from there. So it was interesting to see
that that where your clients are or where they're actually
looking for somebody who can help them and when that
happens to be So it's good information you're right for
marketing too, especially if you're spending money on certain things
with your marketing dollars and maybe they're limited, So I
think that that could be making sure that it's you know,
the most useful. Are there any any tips you have
(27:50):
for people who might be on a tight budget when
it comes to marketing with their business that you think
could be something that they could do right away that
can help.
Speaker 3 (27:58):
Yeah, So just with just making sure that you are
incorporating keywords, even if you don't have the time to
do keyword research or like you know, you don't want
to pay for a keyword research total with there are
lots of you know, free ones or you can get
free trials, but even just making sure that you're very
clear with you know, what you do from the get
go on your website, making sure that you have you know,
(28:19):
clear services and that you're describing your services. You can
if you have multiple services that are you know, maybe
ranking for different types of keywords, you can have different
services pages and so that way each page has a
good chance of ranking. This doesn't mean you have to
go out and create like fifty services pages, but like
if you have two main services that you offer, you
can have two different services pages, so kind of like
(28:42):
being able to capitalize on being able to rank for
different types of keywords and get more people on your
website in different ways.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Do you think it's important to list prices on the websites?
Speaker 3 (28:52):
I would say it depends on the business. I would
say most businesses that I've worked with, it is helpful
to list the prices or even like a starting at
price or this is what you know clients can expect
to spend on average. You know, there are different ways
of phrasing it if you don't want to like have
one set price on there, but that way, you know,
(29:12):
people know what to expect when they talk to you,
because that could be a reason why conversions could be
lower if people are expecting one price and it's you know,
double that. Like a few months ago, just to give
an example, I was like looking for a postpartum nutritionist
to help me with like my you know, postpartum meal
planning and things like that. And I contacted a few
(29:33):
different nutritionists. Most had their prices or like starting at
prices on their website, and then one didn't, but I
went ahead and contact her anyway, and it was like
five times the price of these other nutritionists, and it
wasn't really clear why it was so much more expensive,
Like if she had on her website like her service
included like five times more or she had more experienced
(29:54):
something like that, then that would have made sense. But
then we kind of like wasted time on a call
because she didn't tell me the price beforehand, and then
I felt like I was wasting her time. So yeah,
having some sort of pricing information it might not make
sense for every single business, but I would say the
majority it can help.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Yeah, I think that's definitely something I've seen as like,
you know, website like do it or no, get them
on the phone, make a conversation. I've seen that kind
of advice for people. But I do say I do
think that for the most part, most people want to
see or at least have an idea and self reject
or say okay, yeah, that's definitely like what I'm looking for,
not assuming that you know no one's gonna be able
(30:34):
to before that, which is rarely ever true, so very
very important things to think of it.
Speaker 3 (30:39):
I would say, don't make people sign up for your
email list to get your pricing sheet. I see that
sometimes and if I see that I'm definitely not signing up.
I'm immediately like moving on to yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:50):
Yeah, yeah, you want something of value for that email address,
not just like information that yeah get is gate cap there?
All right? Yeah, definitely I understand like that a good thing.
But do you think it is important to have something
when when people sign up for your email lists? Are
there any things that you think have like converted well
or are good ideas for people who are looking to
(31:11):
then you know, grow their email lists and start to
nurture those leads.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
I don't have the biggest email lists, so I'm not
the biggest expert here, but i would say making sure
that whatever like freebe or lean magnet that you have
is something that your clients specifically would be interested in.
So not like the pricing sheet, but like, for example,
for a long time, I had like some like basic
checklist on you know, ten things to optimize your your website.
(31:38):
But that was for I was working with a business
coach and we kind of talked it through and she
was like explaining how that could attract a lot of
people who aren't ready to invest in SEO necessarily, They're
just kind of like getting the basic information for themselves.
So like kind of focusing my you know freeb on
being able to use SEO to convert more clients. That
has gotten a lot more sign ups and a lot
(31:59):
more people inverting from my email list. So kind of like,
instead of just doing the you know, a catchy freebie
that sounds really good, making sure it's actually aligned with
who you want to be working with.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
I think that's important because I think for a while,
I was, you know, when I first started blogging, and
I thought, you know, okay, like I want to provide
content for people who can't afford to work with me
yet and have that be free. But then I realized
I was only attracting people that couldn't afford to work
with me yet or didn't want to ever pay to
work with a financial planner, and so tweaking that to
make sure it was like, no, know, what's appealing to
(32:33):
that person that I want, And then they'd say like, Okay,
if I got this for free, imagine what I could
get if we work together, Like I could learn more.
So I think that that's kind of an important thing
to think about because it might be logically you might
be thinking, Okay, I'll do this for that person that's
at that step and then of course they'll think of
me next, but it's like, no, what are they going
to think of right now? And make sure that that's
that's what you're putting out there, so super important, and
(32:56):
before before we wrap up, I'm curious looking ahead. I
know we talked a little bit about AI SEO user experience.
What are some trends that you're seeing that you're either
the most excited about or the most interested in as
far as this year and this coming up with you
with your clients.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
Yeah, So one thing I'm seeing a lot with Google
like focusing on AI is I'm sure people have seen it.
If they go to Google and ask like a very
basic question, Google is supplying the answer right there rather
than like you needing to go to a website. So
kind of like getting a bit more strategic with clients
to making sure that they're focusing on that like long
form content that people need to go to the website
(33:32):
to get, you know, more information, so not just like
what's the date to you know, submit your taxes by,
but like something that's way more you know, detailed, that
people are interested in actually reading about rather than just
getting like a quick answer. Because I think Google is
going to be focusing more on keeping people on Google
rather than like, you know, pushing websites at first at
(33:56):
the beginning of Google. But then yeah, just making sure
that you have that high quality content that people are
actually interested in staying on your website to read more.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
About interesting All right, Julia. So if somebody has listened
and said, yes, yes, I know this is something I
need to focus on, but I still don't want to
do it myself, how can they find out more about
you and your services?
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah, so my website is Julia Renee Consulting dot com.
I do have my prices listed, so if you want
to get an idea of the different services that I
offer and the different price points, you can get all
that information there and you can call me at Julia
Renee Consulting on Instagram and Julia Renee Consulting on LinkedIn.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
Awesome, Well, thank you, Julia, thank you so much for
going on the show. I think this is an interesting
piece and I do think and I've talked to other
web designers before. I've talked to other people who are
our websites are very important. I think they are a
very important part of our business. Sometimes that's employee number
one or number two if we are the only employee
at our firm, and I think it is important to
constantly look at them. Nobody wants to see an outdated website.
(34:58):
You don't want to show up on page two on
you of a Google search because no one's going to
get there. So these are really important things to think
about and to kind of consider as you build out
your marketing strategy where you might be thinking of other
things like social media or going viral, this could be
the bread and butter to get clients actually converted in
in the door. So thank you Julia for sharing your expertise. Yes,
(35:18):
go follow her. She has very beautiful layouts and her
websites are very very nice looking, so I think that
she knows what she's doing when it comes to getting
people to want to actually stick around on the website
and learn more. So thanks again for joining, and thank
you everyone for listening. If you'd like to head over
to my website mister Lynch dot com, you can find
other episodes of the podcast or copy of the book,
(35:40):
or find some other information as far as working with
me as a financial advisor or planner. Thank you so
much for joining and we'll talk again next week. Thank
you for joining us on another insightful episode of Demist
Buying Money. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate
and leave a review. Stay tuned for more engaging conversation
on our next episode, and remember knowledge is the key
(36:03):
to financial empowerment.
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