October 14, 2025 • 37 mins
In this timely and insightful episode, Joe Fier sits down with SEO industry pioneer Jason Barnard, who brings 27 years of experience in search optimization to the table. As AI-driven platforms like Google, ChatGPT, and TikTok play an increasingly decisive role in how businesses are found online, the discussion dives deep into how to take real control of your digital identity, build trust with AI, and position yourself for the next era of search. Jason breaks down the importance of knowledge panels, the rise of walled gardens, and the urgent need for brands to become understandable and credible—before it's too late.
Topics Discussed
- The New Age of Search: Why traditional SEO tactics are no longer enough and how AI-powered engines now guide users down the decision funnel.
- AI’s Role in Brand Discovery: How platforms like Google, ChatGPT, and TikTok are shaping who gets found online—sometimes knowing more about your business than your own customers.
- Building a Walled Garden: Strategies to keep users engaged on your website and nurture them through your own content funnel, not just Google’s or TikTok’s.
- The Importance of Knowledge Panels: What they are, why they’re a KPI for algorithmic understanding, and how to structure your website and online presence to earn one.
- Content Creation for the Future: Why up-to-date information and unique data (“information gaps”) will be more valuable than ever as AI saturates standard topics.
- Bot Traffic and the Bot Economy: The surprising reality of how much bot traffic comes from TikTok, Meta, Amazon, and even mysterious newcomers (like Petalbot).
- Protecting & Optimizing Your Content: How to use tools like Cloudflare to control which bots can access your content—balancing visibility with site performance and business goals.
- Action Steps for Digital Understandability: How to create an effective “About” page and build an infinite loop of self-corroboration across the web to make your brand machine-readable.
Resources Mentioned
- Kalicube – https://kalicube.com/guides
- Jason Barnard - https://jasonbarnard.com/
- Google Search Results for Jason Barnard - https://www.google.com/search?q=jason+barnard
- Cloudflare – https://www.cloudflare.com/
- Scott Duffy – https://scottduffy.com/
- Gert Mellak - https://gertmellak.com/
Connect with Joe Fier
🤖 Chat with Joe's AI Clone: https://aibuildteam.ai/ask-joe/
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🎙️ Podcast: https://hustleandflowchart.com/
🔗 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joefier/
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If you found this episode insightful, don’t miss future conversations that can shape the way you grow your business in the digital world! Hit “Subscribe” on your favorite podcast platform, leave us a review, and share this episode with a friend or colleague who needs to stay ahead of the AI-powered search revolution. Your voice...
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
What if Google Chat, GBT, andTikTok already know more about your
business than your customers do, andthey're the ones that are actually
gonna decide who gets found andthe CE of everybody else out there?
Is it gonna be you?
So I chose to have Jason Barnardhere in the podcast today
because this is super timely.
He's gonna break down how to actuallytake control of your digital identity.
(00:21):
How to build trust with AIand how to position yourself
for the future of search.
Jason's been doing this for 27years, search optimization, so this
is extremely timely, very tactical.
Let's dive into it.
All right, Jason, we're finally hittingrecord because already the pre-chat, it's
(00:42):
always a good thing when we're, we're,we're relating to people that we know and
just getting excited for what's to come.
So thanks for hangingout with me today, Jason.
Brilliant.
Thank you Joe, and I love the pre-chat.
That's usually some of the beststuff and I just have to like cut
it off and be like, no, no, no.
Gotta hit record.
Gotta go.
So we were, we were, uh, yeah,going down memory lane a little bit.
(01:03):
You have 27 years of experience of workingwith, you know, maybe it wasn't always
called SEO at the time, but basicallysearch and how to optimize things.
It's evolving massively.
You said you're up at 3:00AM today with like fireworks.
Burst it in your mind oflike, there's new, new stuff.
So,
a hundred percent.
(01:23):
And uh, I started in the yearthat Google was incorporated 1998.
Mm-hmm.
And I was doing whitetext and white background.
I was doing submitting to thesedifferent engines, different pages
for each engine, for each variant.
And I've come all the way through now tothese machines are sufficiently smart to
(01:46):
understand who you are, what you do, whoyou serve, are you credible, and should
they actually recommend you as a solution.
And it's a huge evolution.
So I mean, like you've done this for,like I said, 27 years and so well over
20 years you've seen evolution happen.
I guess what.
We don't need to go like andstep through all of the evolution
'cause it's changed a ton.
(02:06):
But I guess what are the biggest changesthat maybe are happening right now and
what are to come that people aren'treally realizing what's happening?
No, I love that question becauseactually we can basically forget
everything that happened before
Okay.
That's good.
just checking in a bed.
Mm-hmm.
And we can look at, uh, AIassistive engines, which is
(02:26):
chat pt, Google AI mode copilot.
These engines are designed to help usas users go from top to bottom of funnel
to find the solution to our problem.
And it might be paid for, it mightbe just a conversion for you and
you're not optimizing for the visit.
You are optimizing for the click,and that's the perfect click,
(02:47):
which is the bottom of funnel.
This is the solution thatthe engine has recommended.
And that's true engagement whensomeone's clicking and taking an action.
I mean, those are the people you want.
You don't wanna
just be visible in thingsthat aren't relevant.
Right,
Yeah.
And I think as businesses we're,we're thinking, well, this middle
of funnel, top of funnel contentwe've created, I need visits.
(03:08):
And the answer is no, you don't.
right.
What you need is that the machine rebuildsthat funnel in its brain and leads the
person to you for the perfect click.
So clicks on your Midland top of funnelcontent are no longer a great KPI.
It's when do people come toyour website and simply buy.
(03:29):
So you're basically saying that nowwe're living in this age of with AI so
smart, and it's just getting smarter.
We'll talk about that with agentsand things that if we position
ourself correctly in the.
The, the AI platforms understand thatand us, and what we put out there.
It's basically gonna findus the best buyers or most
buyer intent people from, from the getgo, instead of us having to nurture
(03:52):
everybody and take a long time.
No, a hundred percent.
And so they nurture and theyrecommend, and that's brilliant.
Oh, and you can actually fightthese machines with exactly
what they're trying to do to us
Tell me more about that.
What do you, what do you.
while they're creating walledgardens where they take the
person entirely down the funnel.
Mm-hmm.
If they ever leak, IE, theysend somebody to your website
(04:15):
before the end of the funnel.
Create your own walled garden.
Don't let 'em out.
Yeah.
You beat them at their own game.
so, so what would you, how wouldyou recommend someone, what's a
basic structure of like a walledgarden from your perspective?
A
Well, what they're doing is saying, okay,we've got, um, an awareness question, and
we then take that down to considerationand we take it down to decision.
(04:38):
If ever you get a click from the awarenessmoment, you have to have that awareness
page pushing people down the funnel.
So they don't go back to theengine to ask for a recommendation,
which might not be you.
Mm-hmm.
So basically, it, it, it's kindof cute in the sense that they're
(04:59):
creating walled gardens that are notletting people out of their ecosystem.
If they ever send somebodyto you do the same thing.
Yeah.
Play their game,
but make sure you'realso playing their game.
Right?
Like it's kind
of, you have to, and Google'salways been that way too, right?
Like they've always kind of hadthese rules that don't, they,
they, they tell you or they hintto how to play by the rules.
(05:23):
But obviously the ruleschange all the time,
Exactly, and
if you can beat the rules at any pointin the funnel, take the opportunity
to not let the person go back,
Mm-hmm.
and then you've beatenthe machine at its own.
we mentioned SEO and that's whyI think when people immediately
think of, you know, oh, you workedwith Google for a long time.
(05:44):
You're an SEO guy, blah, blah, blah.
You know, and uh, we were alreadyconnecting on the previous,
um, a guy that I've had on theshow many times, Gert Mellak,
from, uh, out in Spain.
Yeah.
And you said, he's oneof the favorite people.
Your favorite people.
I'm like, that's super cool.
He's.
One of the smartest SEO marketersI've ever met, because he
(06:05):
builds things step by step.
Yeah.
He says, let's do this todaybecause it's gonna have a result
tomorrow and it's gonna be a smallresult, but at least it's a result.
And he builds things step bystep in a very intentional manner
that I immensely appreciate.
And when I talk to him,he always talks sense.
(06:28):
Yeah, that's true.
It's true.
It's very practical.
That's why I've had him on so manytimes because things change and we're
probably due for another one after, afteryou and, and of course Gert, if you're
listening, I'll make sure you hear this.
Uh, obviously Jason says,hi, I'd appreciate you, but
I mentioned that because.
It's been, um, you know, I've had 'emon a lot because people ask about SEO
(06:48):
all the time and because it changes and
so I'm curious from your perspective,Jason, like, when was SEO Like not really.
It's not enough anymore.
Like there had to be more behind just
It is never been enough.
ah,
Um, I built my company online.
It was a an ed tech tainment platform.
(07:11):
We competed with Disney with PBS.
We had a billion page views in2007 from 60 million visits.
Wow.
Holy moly.
So people were stickingaround on the site and
Yeah,
but only 20% came from Google.
Wow.
All of the rest came from themarketing, the branding that we were
(07:33):
doing across different platforms.
So I would suggest that Google is a bonus.
Chachi PT is a bonus, and that youshould be focusing on marketing to
the people that you can truly help.
In the places where they already hang out.
Mm hm.
In my case, it was kids entertainment.
(07:56):
It was schools, it wasuh, uh, cartoon websites.
It was parenting websites.
It was, um, grandparent grandparentingwebsites, and it was babysitting websites
that was 80% of our traffic.
So referral traffic,then more or less, right?
(08:16):
it was being in front of the rightpeople, in the right places at the right
time in the, uh, when you could actuallyoffer the solution and Google the 20% of
Google and search in general was a bonus.
So if you look at it that way, youchange your perspective and you
say, well, I don't rely on Google.
Google is simply an addition.
It's an additional amplifier.
(08:37):
And Chachi PD is exactly the same.
Yeah.
look at it as an amplifier ofwhat you should already be doing.
Do you see that being the same kind ofas time goes on in the future as well?
I would say it's even more the casenow with the clo, the closed walled
gardens is if you let them keepthe user, they will keep the user.
(08:59):
Mm-hmm.
can get the user be before the usereven gets to them, you've won the game.
True, true, true.
Do you feel like there's a, um.
Timeframe right now that we're kindof in like this window in time.
Two two years.
Why is this?
because in two years time, the AI willalready have all of the information it
(09:22):
needs to serve the basic fundamentalinformation funnel that we need as users.
So let's take an exampleof Napoleon Bonaparte.
I'm in France.
It doesn't need new information about him,
Right
so it doesn't go looking for information
about him.
So if
basically AI generated stuff ofthe knowledge that it already
(09:44):
has about Napoleon.
Yeah.
so if I write an article aboutNapoleon Bonaparte, I'm throwing my
time down the down, down the toiletin terms of Google and chat GPT.
And in two years time, that isgonna be true of every standard
basic topic in the world.
Meaning basically all theinformation has been mined from
(10:06):
what we know as humans or what hasbeen published, I guess, right?
Yeah, exactly.
And so your only in isUpToDate information, football
scores, great example, and
information gaps.
Anything you can teach itthat it didn't already know,
(10:28):
Mm,
that's what I was curious, like, yeah.
Information gaps.
Like defining, so it's, it'sinformation that what we hold
or maybe a, a perspective ofsomething kind of recent, I guess.
Define, yeah.
Information gaps and howthat's an opportunity for us.
Well, um, data numbers and,uh, are super important.
If I say I've got 9.4 billiondata points in Kali Q Pro,
(10:51):
and I can tell you that 30% oflawyers do not have a knowledge panel.
That's new information it didn't have,and it will be super enthusiastic.
Mm. Got it.
And then today, the three o'clock in themorning thing you were talking about,
and uh, it's difficult to explain, butI woke up and I thought, wow, okay,
we are looking at algorithmic harmony.
(11:13):
I like
How do we create algorithmic harmony?
We create a friction free situationfor bots on our website and
within our content generally.
We create tasty content foralgorithms that they want to use,
and we organize ourselves for theengines so that they can understand
(11:34):
how to put all the pieces together.
And it's, it's a bit geeky and I'msorry, I'm probably expect explaining
it very badly, but it was literallylast night that I thought of it.
This is new information.
This is a new perspective onsomething that everybody already knew.
Well expand.
I, I, I love for one, you gotme with algorithmic harmony.
I had to write that down.
'cause I'm like, that's,that's interesting.
(11:56):
And it is so algorithmic.
Harmony in your mind.
And this is what Yeah.
Kept you awake probably, or woke you up isso you're reducing, reducing friction for.
What all of the bots, so we're
talking what Google ai, all the, youknow, open ai, all the stuff that's
basically looking for information.
So you're making it easy forpeople, you're making it tasty
(12:17):
and interesting for the bots to,
you know,
like things
the algorithms,
Yeah.
For the algorithms.
so the Tasty Party's algorithmsis, does the algorithm think that
your content is tasty and helpful?
And that would be what,timely stuff, right?
The information gaps that you mentioned.
does it serve the purposeof the need of the user?
(12:40):
Mm-hmm.
you need to make sure the content you'recreating makes the algorithm algorithms
think, yes, I can serve this to myuser and it will be helpful to them.
That's tasty.
And then the organizing, please go ahead.
'cause I'm interested in your, your
Yeah, I thought you would be,
no, I mean this is like 18 hours old.
(13:00):
Right.
I know.
And just so everyone knows, thatwas 3:00 AM You're in France?
I'm in San Diego, California.
It's what, past 7:00 PM your time.
So almost seven 30.
So it's like you've been up fora while and you're still buzzing.
So, but yeah.
The third, so we talked aboutreducing friction, uh, for the bots.
Tasty.
Make it tasty for the algorithms.
And then organizing thisso the engines understand.
(13:24):
How to put all the pieces together, right?
Like so how it shows up when peopleare actually searching for that need
Yep, you've
is my take on it.
That's it.
Well, that's it.
So 18 hours old and it's all nailed now.
Thank you very much, Joe.
you're very much, well,I'm happy to introduce it.
I gotta publish this before you goand uh, no, I know you're already
writing something peachy to it.
(13:46):
I don't think I will, but No, this is,I think that's a great overview and.
I guess now this leads me to,because I wanna get to knowledge
panels and, and the, and how that'simportant and it's been around, it's
not like a new thing, but maybe we go backto that and kind of pause for a moment.
'cause I do wanna get your perspective ofwhat's happening right now in AI and how,
(14:09):
uh, yeah, just search is, it's similar butchanging how we position ourselves and,
Yeah.
but let's.
You know, I want to, I wantto tease that for a moment.
Go to knowledge panels, because that'ssomething that I know is very important.
I wanna underst, I want justquickly describe what they
are, they've been around, and
then how, how they're changing.
A knowledge panel is Google'sunderstanding of who you are.
(14:34):
So when it shows a knowledge panel, itsays, well, this is the person or the
company, and this is what I've understoodabout them, and I am super confident.
Hmm.
And it's a great KPI for algorithmicunderstanding, and that same
algorithmic understanding appliesto every single engine chat, GPT,
(14:54):
perplexity, Microsoft copilot, Claude.
If they understand who you are,they will represent you with that
factual representation that you needfor the bottom of funnel clients,
prospects that you're getting.
Yes.
So the knowledge panel right nowis a great KPI, because if Google
(15:16):
understands you, the other AIprobably understands you too.
Because they're all lookingat Google as that source of
information, at least for now.
But like you said, I mean, Google'sbeen at it since you said what, 97?
98?
I think they started in 96,but they incorporated in 98.
So I used that datebecause it makes me look.
Like I was there at the beginning,but they'd actually be going
(15:37):
two years before I started.
ah.
Okay.
I started SEO in the year Google wasincorporated is better than I started
SE O2 years after Google started.
I like it's all brandy and positioning,
Yep, exactly.
It's what we call it at KaliCube Claim frame and prove.
claim frame improve.
So I claim 27 years.
(15:59):
I frame it by saying sameyear Google was incorporated.
That makes me look impressive.
And then I prove it with links out toresources on the web that show that.
So the framing is super important becausethe difference between I started in
SEO the year Google was incorporated.
Brilliant.
Okay.
Google.
Jason, same date.
(16:20):
I started SE O2 years after Googlestarted actually with their search engine.
Jason was behind the time.
Right, right.
So you get immediate trust andyou could prove it and Yeah.
And, and.
Off.
You will.
That's great.
I mean, that's, that's alittle nugget right there.
Anyone could just take anduse for their own business or
Yeah, the frame, theframing is super important.
(16:42):
Whatever's true, whatever is true in yourlife is incredibly important, but how you
frame it to serve your current purpose
is fundamental to peopleand to algorithms.
I love that.
And so the knowledge panel thing,it's interesting because like,
so everybody's looking at, or youknow, everybody meaning these, what?
(17:04):
There's only like four or five big AIcompanies really, you know, if you think
about, and that's what's interesting.
They're all racing to getall the information and
beat each
other.
Go
Tell me which four orfive you're thinking of.
Oh, I mean, there'sprobably more, but yeah.
You have what Google, you have Microsoft,um, you have anthropic open ai.
And, uh, I mean, you have, shoot, Imean you have China and all these other,
(17:29):
but I'd say what Amazon is probably coming
Yeah.
No, I, I wasn't, I I didn'tmean to put you on the
No, it's
Um, but we actually had a situation whereright now people are saying 60 to 80%
of your traffic on your website is bots.
mm-hmm.
Right.
The dead internet theory or whatever, or,
(17:49):
Yeah.
And it's rubbish.
Of
oh, is it?
Oh God, we,
T tell me, tell me, tell me, because
I'm curious 'cause Yeah.
it struck me that that can't be true,
and the kind of subtlety there is,60% of the files on your website are
being taken by bots, but only 15%.
(18:11):
Of the web pages thatare digested are by bots
hmm.
because they're taking lots offiles that people never see.
CSS, JavaScript, robots, TXT, theXML site map, so on, so forth.
So if you remove all of that, thenumber of web pages that are being
digested is in our case at Kali Cube,15% because we are an incredibly
(18:33):
popular bot friendly website.
In your website, it mightbe 8%, it might be 6%.
But be careful about getting caughtout in this I or, or the, the, the,
the headline grabbing clickbait titles.
Right.
So bots are crawling yourwebsite and they are doing a lot.
(18:54):
And TikTok is a huge consumer.
Really
You said China, it's TikTok.
it's TikTok.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I dunno what they're doing.
I don't have an insight into why.
But they crawl as much as, ifnot more than Google and bing
TikTok does.
I did not know that.
Wow.
So is that just to beef up theirown internal search algorithm?
(19:17):
Right.
It's gotta be.
Maybe they're feeding Baidu.
Maybe they're, they havea plan for the future.
Maybe they're gonna take over the world.
I don't know.
But definitely there is.
They're huge consumers.
Got it.
I didn't know that.
Learned
And Amazon are a huge consumer.
Meta are a huge consumer.
(19:38):
I missed that.
So that might be thesixth or seventh then.
Yeah.
Meta.
That's true.
Good call.
Yeah.
we, we found a a, a bot called Petal Bot.
pedal bot.
I haven't heard of that.
No.
Now me neither.
I've got no idea what they do,but they're terribly enthusiastic.
And I mean, I'm curious of your thoughts,but like now with agents or bots,
(20:00):
everybody can vibe, code or do something.
I mean, the information isliterally out there to anyone in the
world.
You know, the power of ai, openai, it's literally so, um, who
knows what's getting developed?
I mean, yeah.
Right now we have these onesthat are really backed by
either a bunch of investors or
nations.
And both, but then you have allthese independent players who are
(20:22):
spinning up things that are alsocompeting in their own thing, right?
Yeah, and pedal bot are doing something.
TikTok are doing something,but I don't really know what,
hmm.
and we'll see.
Um, but it's super, super intriguing.
And I, I, I take it as it's probablyintriguing, at least to me, is like,
well, this is even more of a reasonto at least show up in the way that I
(20:43):
want to get showed up to, or shown tomy best potential customers or whoever,
subscriber viewers, whatever your KPIor your conversion point is, right.
Right, and, and a really importantpoint to make is that Google Bot
and Bing bot have been incrediblykind to us over the years.
(21:03):
Have They.
really though?
They render JavaScript.
They try to figure out what your websitelooks like when the JavaScript triggers,
they try not to overload your server.
They try to chunk down your content.
They make enormous efforts.
TikTok, open ai, uh, meta, Amazonliterally don't make any effort at all.
(21:27):
So they're literally like bogging downour own systems because they're trying to
Yeah.
And perplexity of being caught.
Not respecting, uh, instructionssaying, don't crawl this part.
Oh wow.
So it's now turned into the Wild Westand we've been spoiled by Google and
Bing, and we need to learn now thatperplexity will break the rules.
(21:48):
TikTok will crawl you massivelyand they don't care about the fact
that your server is about to crash.
And that your users are notgetting a great experience.
Amazon, the same method are the same.
So we we're in a situation nowwhere you're saying, well, we
actually need to think about this.
It's not so much am I sharingmy information, which you want
to do, if you want to be presentin these AI assistive engines.
(22:10):
It's do I have the resourcesand can I afford it?
Is there anything we can do to preventor optimize what we're doing so
they're not gonna take us down andruin the experience for everybody else?
Well, if you wanna takecontrol, go through CloudFlare.
Mm. Mm-hmm.
They have bot detectors andyou can actually exclude bots.
And so if you're saying,well, I don't want TikTok,
(22:30):
Yep.
exclude it.
Ah, okay.
So we have a
And that's a really neat trick.
So it's basically just settingyour your website up so that every
request comes through CloudFlare
Yep.
and then you can control it.
Yeah, it's cloud flare first, andthen it goes to your domain, right?
And then host and whatnot.
Exactly,
(22:50):
and so you, you take control and thatthen you just need to be careful, is
that, for example, USA today is sayingnobody can take our content because
we want people to come to our website.
We don't want Google open AI beingperplexity, clawed stealing our content.
That's fine, but then you have to acceptthat they're not gonna send you traffic.
(23:12):
Or you're probably not gonna showup in some of these, uh, AI search.
Yeah.
It's, it's an interesting thing.
Yeah.
It's a paradigm thatlike, you know, even with
TikTok or, or the other bots, you're like.
Maybe it's a good thing in the future.
I don't know.
Do I
exclude 'em, do I not,
Well, it's a huge betthat we're all taking.
mm-hmm.
If you're a publisher, you're saying,well, I make my money for my content,
(23:35):
therefore I can't give it to the bots.
But you are cutting off a source of.
Traffic and revenue.
Right.
If you're a business B2B, B2C, you wantthe bots to send the people to you, and
you need to understand that they willonly send them to you when the person has
made the decision at the perfect click.
(23:56):
Right, and you're showingup in the right way
Exactly, so you, you end up in it.
It's a debate in our own headsand it's a debate that we've
never had to have before, and Iwould advise every business owner.
To look at it from their own perspective.
What makes sense to me?
Well, it's a business model thing, right?
Like it's it, or maybe there's a shiftin the model that we get to take now
(24:18):
because of the, the shifts happening
with Kali Cube, we're a B2B service.
We help entrepreneurs and theircompanies turn up in Google and ai.
We want these bots to build the funnelin their brains and bring people to us.
And we're actively building that.
(24:38):
But if I were a publisher who waspublishing news, I would be struggling
with, do I want to share my contentwith them where they will give the
answer on their own walled garden?
Mm-hmm.
And if I do that.
(24:59):
Will I lose all the people who come to meand I make my money out of subscriptions
or adver uh, advertisements, but ifI don't, I lose all that traffic.
I have to find another source.
Right,
That's a huge, huge question,and I don't have the answer.
right.
I mean, I don't think anybody has aperfect answer right now, but we're
(25:19):
definitely, I think it's good thoughtexperiments, looking at what maybe is.
It happened in the past, eventhough this is kind of totally new.
I would advise anybody who is.
Implementing SEO strategies to sitdown and ask themselves the fundamental
questions of where do I get my money from
(25:41):
Mm
and talk to somebody smart like myself,for example, about how do I avoid leaking
and maximize the actual kind of income.
I think it's very smart and yeah, we, Imean, there's so many indicators that say,
yeah, two to three years in this kind of
(26:02):
time span.
I mean, who knows whatthe world's gonna be like.
There'll be, you know, it's,it's gonna change fast.
It's rapidly, you know, you have thingslike agents popping up that that will be
completely change.
now, and that's a hundred percent it is.
It's all gonna be brand.
Mm-hmm.
And you mentioned agents, and I literallyjust wrote an article about that
(26:23):
is AI assistive engines.
Today is a discussion, it's afunnel that I'm having with my,
uh, AI assistive engine, be it,uh, Google AI mode, actually PG
perplexity and so on and so forth.
Yeah.
But in the near future, it's gonnabe AI agents who do that funnel
multiple times for each task.
(26:44):
Yes.
Yeah.
they make the decisionand I don't know about it.
So we need to show up in theright way to those machines too.
Not only the, I mean right now it's thepeople primarily making the ch the choice
And it, and in a, in a few yearstime, it's gonna be the machine
makes the choice multiple times.
So your audience is the machine becausethe audience that you're actually trying
to reach are just gonna say, well, I gotthe plane ticket, I got the hotel booked.
(27:08):
I bought the microphone from Toman,which is something I did last week,
but I had nothing to do with theactual multiple decision processes
that the agent went through.
So AI agent optimization is gonna be a
Gotcha.
(27:30):
This is, this is fascinating.
Jason.
What?
Okay.
Knowledge panel.
I just wanna close the loop there
because I feel like I, I do, becauseI feel like, I think it's you and,
and also, you know, our mutual buddy,my business partner, Scott Duffy,
you know, um, I know he is, worked withyou for a, a long time now, you know,
building that up five years.
There you go.
So it obviously, and it's working for him.
(27:53):
Uh, where do people startfor the knowledge panel?
'cause it seems like that is kind
of, I don't know, it seemslike that's the core or the
most leveraged piece right now.
Obviously there's more to it,
Well, if, if you.
Look at the knowledge panel asthe KPI of Understandability,
Hmm.
then you're in a really good placebecause whether it's a knowledge panel
(28:14):
or it's chat GPT or it's perplexity,these algorithms need to understand who
you are, what you do, who you serve.
Yeah.
If they don't understandthat, they can't trust you,
so you are right.
That's the foundation.
The knowledge s the KPI of dothe machines understand you.
And the really simple approachto that is say, okay, right.
(28:36):
I have an about page on my websitethat describes who I say I am, who
I serve, and why I am credible.
Then from that page, I need tolink out to the resources that
confirm what I'm saying, and Ineed to get them to link back to
me confirming that it is indeed me.
(28:57):
And then you end up with what we callthe infinite loop of self corroboration.
Where the machine comes to yourwebsite says, okay, this is
what Joe Fier says about him.
This is what Medium says about him.
This is what this article says about him.
This is what Twitter says about him.
This is what LinkedIn saysabout him, and it all maps out.
(29:18):
I understand and I'm confidentI'll give him a knowledge panel.
That's the KPI, that's understandability.
So you're putting signals out there.
They're all kind of sayingthe same thing, so it gets a
picture of you, you are, yeah.
On the about page, like you said, you arealmost like creating this web or this,
this, um, journey for these bots to go on,
right.
That all kind of aresaying the same thing.
(29:39):
No, I love, I love that it's a journey,uh, and it's a very repetitive journey.
Mm-hmm.
the algorithm understands by repetition.
And repetition by trustworthy sources.
But you have to remember thatthe go-to source is always you.
(29:59):
Mm-hmm.
Hmm.
And if that's not the case, you've lostthe game because you have no control.
Yeah.
Well, speaking of control, I'm thinkingof websites now and, and you know, 'cause
you're talking about, well, about pagestructure of your own website, obviously.
Now you're talking about other platformsas well that your name shows up on.
What is one simple fix that someonecan make on their website today that
(30:24):
makes it easier for, uh, Google,but also AI to better understand
Well, the, the, the, uh, sorry, you saidthe about page and that's exactly it.
That might be it.
So, uh, the Kali Cube process, which isthe system we use, is understandability
credibility deliverability.
If it doesn't understand whoyou are, it can't trust you.
(30:47):
If it doesn't trust you,it will never deliver you.
Mm-hmm.
So you need to startwith understandability.
And understandability.
Is that about page on your website thatsays, this is who I am, this is who I
serve, and this is why I am credible.
Hmm,
So that's the first place to start.
that's it.
No, I love it.
Yeah, and there's more to it, but yeah.
That's great.
(31:07):
Thank you, Jason.
That's
But it, it, it, it's actually reallysimple and it, it's one of those moments
in life where you say, well, actually Ican explain it to the baker downstairs.
And she understands it in fiveminutes, create the single source
of source of truth, which is you
Yeah.
make sure that every single sourceabout you around the web corroborates
(31:28):
what you're saying, link out to it.
The machine goes backwards and forwards,and it keeps seeing, seeing the same
message, and you've won the game.
I like it.
I mean, logically it's all there,but like you said, it's a process.
I mean, Gert would, that's why, youknow, Gert Mellak, when he talks
about things, you know, he's got hisprocess and is, it's, um, and I know
you, so it's, I'm, I'm really excited.
(31:49):
'cause I know personally I'm goingto start the journey with Kali
Cube and with you and your team.
You know, Scott and my team are also,we're all working together, so it's
Yeah, and I think the importantthing is, is what you've focused on.
You keep talking about theknowledge panel and you know,
I've been doing this so long.
I'm a bit or knowledge panel bit though,but it is the foundation of everything.
(32:12):
If the machine doesn't understandwho you are, you have no hope.
You're not even in the game.
Yeah.
So if you don't have the knowledgepanel on Google, you're not gonna
be playing the game in Google,in Bing, in Claude, in chat, GPT.
And that's your foundation.
You need to start there.
And it starts with the entity home,which is the about page on your
(32:33):
website and the corroboration aroundthe web with links that make sure
that the machine goes through thatinfinite loop of self corroboration.
And when I say it likethat, it sounds very simple.
Managing it is quite difficult.
Yeah.
Because as human beings,we're a bit messy.
But that's where youstart and you can DIY it
That's great.
(32:53):
So, uh, if they don't wanna DDIY itor if they wanna learn more, where
do they go and find you, Jason.
well, if you want to DIY it, yougo here, Kali cube.com/guides.
And if you don't, um, reach out to me.
I'd be happy to help.
Awesome.
Yeah, we'll put everything in theshow notes, link it up and all that.
Make it easy.
So last question, Jason.
(33:13):
I'm always curious of, and we've kindof talked about it, but like the next
handful of years, like what's the, what'sthe thing you are most excited about?
I mean, you've been excited, you've been
on fire all day long today.
I know.
Um, I'm curious, like withyou, I mean, what you said, you
said there's two years of this.
Like, does that mean that you're out ofa job, Jason in two years or is like.
(33:35):
Now.
Ah, I love the question.
There are, there are a few things that aregonna remain in place is my life is gonna
change, and the algorithms know that, butif they don't recognize me before that
two year window, they won't come looking.
Yep.
have to make myself, you have tomake yourself sufficiently important
(33:58):
to the machines that they comelooking three years from now.
Yeah, that's the key focus, andanybody who's missed that boat
is gonna be really struggling.
So you need to, in the next two years,make sure that you become sufficiently
important within your niche forthe machines to proactively come
(34:22):
looking for information about you.
That's it.
Alright.
Y'all,
you know the, you know the procedure.
Go do it.
Go do some stuff.
Definitely go follow Jason.
What he is doing, I mean, thisis, it's very timely stuff.
That's why we we're talkingnow and um, yeah, I, next few
years is gonna be interesting.
Next, I mean, who, whoknows what the future's
like, but
(34:42):
isn't it?
I'm just happy we're here, we're aliveand we're experiencing it 'cause.
Absolutely.
knows, man.
All right, Jason, I appreciate you.
Was this a good like cap to the day?
I know it started very early for you, but
Yeah, it, it, it, it's absolutely theperfect end to a day where I started
the day just going, oh, wow, this is allbrilliant and wonderful and delightful,
(35:03):
and I'm thinking it all through.
But the foundation is always, does themachine understand who you are, what
you offer, and to whom does it believeyou to be credible as a solution to the
subset of its users who your audience.
And does it have the content to beable to deliver you to those people
(35:23):
for whom you have the perfect solution.
That's it.
Yeah.
Perfect.
All right, Jason, go get some rest.
You've been, you'vebeen at it all day long.
Thanks for hanging out late with me.
So till next time, we'll do it
again soon.
Bye.
What if Google Chat, GBT, andTikTok already know more about your
business than your customers do, andthey're the ones that are actually
gonna decide who gets found andthe CE of everybody else out there?
Is it gonna be you?
So I chose to have Jason Barnardhere in the podcast today
because this is super timely.
He's gonna break down how to actuallytake control of your digital identity.
(00:21):
How to build trust with AIand how to position yourself
for the future of search.
Jason's been doing this for 27years, search optimization, so this
is extremely timely, very tactical.
Let's dive into it.
All right, Jason, we're finally hittingrecord because already the pre-chat, it's
(00:42):
always a good thing when we're, we're,we're relating to people that we know and
just getting excited for what's to come.
So thanks for hangingout with me today, Jason.
Brilliant.
Thank you Joe, and I love the pre-chat.
That's usually some of the beststuff and I just have to like cut
it off and be like, no, no, no.
Gotta hit record.
Gotta go.
So we were, we were, uh, yeah,going down memory lane a little bit.
(01:03):
You have 27 years of experience of workingwith, you know, maybe it wasn't always
called SEO at the time, but basicallysearch and how to optimize things.
It's evolving massively.
You said you're up at 3:00AM today with like fireworks.
Burst it in your mind oflike, there's new, new stuff.
So,
a hundred percent.
(01:23):
And uh, I started in the yearthat Google was incorporated 1998.
Mm-hmm.
And I was doing whitetext and white background.
I was doing submitting to thesedifferent engines, different pages
for each engine, for each variant.
And I've come all the way through now tothese machines are sufficiently smart to
(01:46):
understand who you are, what you do, whoyou serve, are you credible, and should
they actually recommend you as a solution.
And it's a huge evolution.
So I mean, like you've done this for,like I said, 27 years and so well over
20 years you've seen evolution happen.
I guess what.
We don't need to go like andstep through all of the evolution
'cause it's changed a ton.
(02:06):
But I guess what are the biggest changesthat maybe are happening right now and
what are to come that people aren'treally realizing what's happening?
No, I love that question becauseactually we can basically forget
everything that happened before
Okay.
That's good.
just checking in a bed.
Mm-hmm.
And we can look at, uh, AIassistive engines, which is
(02:26):
chat pt, Google AI mode copilot.
These engines are designed to help usas users go from top to bottom of funnel
to find the solution to our problem.
And it might be paid for, it mightbe just a conversion for you and
you're not optimizing for the visit.
You are optimizing for the click,and that's the perfect click,
(02:47):
which is the bottom of funnel.
This is the solution thatthe engine has recommended.
And that's true engagement whensomeone's clicking and taking an action.
I mean, those are the people you want.
You don't wanna
just be visible in thingsthat aren't relevant.
Right,
Yeah.
And I think as businesses we're,we're thinking, well, this middle
of funnel, top of funnel contentwe've created, I need visits.
(03:08):
And the answer is no, you don't.
right.
What you need is that the machine rebuildsthat funnel in its brain and leads the
person to you for the perfect click.
So clicks on your Midland top of funnelcontent are no longer a great KPI.
It's when do people come toyour website and simply buy.
(03:29):
So you're basically saying that nowwe're living in this age of with AI so
smart, and it's just getting smarter.
We'll talk about that with agentsand things that if we position
ourself correctly in the.
The, the AI platforms understand thatand us, and what we put out there.
It's basically gonna findus the best buyers or most
buyer intent people from, from the getgo, instead of us having to nurture
(03:52):
everybody and take a long time.
No, a hundred percent.
And so they nurture and theyrecommend, and that's brilliant.
Oh, and you can actually fightthese machines with exactly
what they're trying to do to us
Tell me more about that.
What do you, what do you.
while they're creating walledgardens where they take the
person entirely down the funnel.
Mm-hmm.
If they ever leak, IE, theysend somebody to your website
(04:15):
before the end of the funnel.
Create your own walled garden.
Don't let 'em out.
Yeah.
You beat them at their own game.
so, so what would you, how wouldyou recommend someone, what's a
basic structure of like a walledgarden from your perspective?
A
Well, what they're doing is saying, okay,we've got, um, an awareness question, and
we then take that down to considerationand we take it down to decision.
(04:38):
If ever you get a click from the awarenessmoment, you have to have that awareness
page pushing people down the funnel.
So they don't go back to theengine to ask for a recommendation,
which might not be you.
Mm-hmm.
So basically, it, it, it's kindof cute in the sense that they're
(04:59):
creating walled gardens that are notletting people out of their ecosystem.
If they ever send somebodyto you do the same thing.
Yeah.
Play their game,
but make sure you'realso playing their game.
Right?
Like it's kind
of, you have to, and Google'salways been that way too, right?
Like they've always kind of hadthese rules that don't, they,
they, they tell you or they hintto how to play by the rules.
(05:23):
But obviously the ruleschange all the time,
Exactly, and
if you can beat the rules at any pointin the funnel, take the opportunity
to not let the person go back,
Mm-hmm.
and then you've beatenthe machine at its own.
we mentioned SEO and that's whyI think when people immediately
think of, you know, oh, you workedwith Google for a long time.
(05:44):
You're an SEO guy, blah, blah, blah.
You know, and uh, we were alreadyconnecting on the previous,
um, a guy that I've had on theshow many times, Gert Mellak,
from, uh, out in Spain.
Yeah.
And you said, he's oneof the favorite people.
Your favorite people.
I'm like, that's super cool.
He's.
One of the smartest SEO marketersI've ever met, because he
(06:05):
builds things step by step.
Yeah.
He says, let's do this todaybecause it's gonna have a result
tomorrow and it's gonna be a smallresult, but at least it's a result.
And he builds things step bystep in a very intentional manner
that I immensely appreciate.
And when I talk to him,he always talks sense.
(06:28):
Yeah, that's true.
It's true.
It's very practical.
That's why I've had him on so manytimes because things change and we're
probably due for another one after, afteryou and, and of course Gert, if you're
listening, I'll make sure you hear this.
Uh, obviously Jason says,hi, I'd appreciate you, but
I mentioned that because.
It's been, um, you know, I've had 'emon a lot because people ask about SEO
(06:48):
all the time and because it changes and
so I'm curious from your perspective,Jason, like, when was SEO Like not really.
It's not enough anymore.
Like there had to be more behind just
It is never been enough.
ah,
Um, I built my company online.
It was a an ed tech tainment platform.
(07:11):
We competed with Disney with PBS.
We had a billion page views in2007 from 60 million visits.
Wow.
Holy moly.
So people were stickingaround on the site and
Yeah,
but only 20% came from Google.
Wow.
All of the rest came from themarketing, the branding that we were
(07:33):
doing across different platforms.
So I would suggest that Google is a bonus.
Chachi PT is a bonus, and that youshould be focusing on marketing to
the people that you can truly help.
In the places where they already hang out.
Mm hm.
In my case, it was kids entertainment.
(07:56):
It was schools, it wasuh, uh, cartoon websites.
It was parenting websites.
It was, um, grandparent grandparentingwebsites, and it was babysitting websites
that was 80% of our traffic.
So referral traffic,then more or less, right?
(08:16):
it was being in front of the rightpeople, in the right places at the right
time in the, uh, when you could actuallyoffer the solution and Google the 20% of
Google and search in general was a bonus.
So if you look at it that way, youchange your perspective and you
say, well, I don't rely on Google.
Google is simply an addition.
It's an additional amplifier.
(08:37):
And Chachi PD is exactly the same.
Yeah.
look at it as an amplifier ofwhat you should already be doing.
Do you see that being the same kind ofas time goes on in the future as well?
I would say it's even more the casenow with the clo, the closed walled
gardens is if you let them keepthe user, they will keep the user.
(08:59):
Mm-hmm.
can get the user be before the usereven gets to them, you've won the game.
True, true, true.
Do you feel like there's a, um.
Timeframe right now that we're kindof in like this window in time.
Two two years.
Why is this?
because in two years time, the AI willalready have all of the information it
(09:22):
needs to serve the basic fundamentalinformation funnel that we need as users.
So let's take an exampleof Napoleon Bonaparte.
I'm in France.
It doesn't need new information about him,
Right
so it doesn't go looking for information
about him.
So if
basically AI generated stuff ofthe knowledge that it already
(09:44):
has about Napoleon.
Yeah.
so if I write an article aboutNapoleon Bonaparte, I'm throwing my
time down the down, down the toiletin terms of Google and chat GPT.
And in two years time, that isgonna be true of every standard
basic topic in the world.
Meaning basically all theinformation has been mined from
(10:06):
what we know as humans or what hasbeen published, I guess, right?
Yeah, exactly.
And so your only in isUpToDate information, football
scores, great example, and
information gaps.
Anything you can teach itthat it didn't already know,
(10:28):
Mm,
that's what I was curious, like, yeah.
Information gaps.
Like defining, so it's, it'sinformation that what we hold
or maybe a, a perspective ofsomething kind of recent, I guess.
Define, yeah.
Information gaps and howthat's an opportunity for us.
Well, um, data numbers and,uh, are super important.
If I say I've got 9.4 billiondata points in Kali Q Pro,
(10:51):
and I can tell you that 30% oflawyers do not have a knowledge panel.
That's new information it didn't have,and it will be super enthusiastic.
Mm. Got it.
And then today, the three o'clock in themorning thing you were talking about,
and uh, it's difficult to explain, butI woke up and I thought, wow, okay,
we are looking at algorithmic harmony.
(11:13):
I like
How do we create algorithmic harmony?
We create a friction free situationfor bots on our website and
within our content generally.
We create tasty content foralgorithms that they want to use,
and we organize ourselves for theengines so that they can understand
(11:34):
how to put all the pieces together.
And it's, it's a bit geeky and I'msorry, I'm probably expect explaining
it very badly, but it was literallylast night that I thought of it.
This is new information.
This is a new perspective onsomething that everybody already knew.
Well expand.
I, I, I love for one, you gotme with algorithmic harmony.
I had to write that down.
'cause I'm like, that's,that's interesting.
(11:56):
And it is so algorithmic.
Harmony in your mind.
And this is what Yeah.
Kept you awake probably, or woke you up isso you're reducing, reducing friction for.
What all of the bots, so we're
talking what Google ai, all the, youknow, open ai, all the stuff that's
basically looking for information.
So you're making it easy forpeople, you're making it tasty
(12:17):
and interesting for the bots to,
you know,
like things
the algorithms,
Yeah.
For the algorithms.
so the Tasty Party's algorithmsis, does the algorithm think that
your content is tasty and helpful?
And that would be what,timely stuff, right?
The information gaps that you mentioned.
does it serve the purposeof the need of the user?
(12:40):
Mm-hmm.
you need to make sure the content you'recreating makes the algorithm algorithms
think, yes, I can serve this to myuser and it will be helpful to them.
That's tasty.
And then the organizing, please go ahead.
'cause I'm interested in your, your
Yeah, I thought you would be,
no, I mean this is like 18 hours old.
(13:00):
Right.
I know.
And just so everyone knows, thatwas 3:00 AM You're in France?
I'm in San Diego, California.
It's what, past 7:00 PM your time.
So almost seven 30.
So it's like you've been up fora while and you're still buzzing.
So, but yeah.
The third, so we talked aboutreducing friction, uh, for the bots.
Tasty.
Make it tasty for the algorithms.
And then organizing thisso the engines understand.
(13:24):
How to put all the pieces together, right?
Like so how it shows up when peopleare actually searching for that need
Yep, you've
is my take on it.
That's it.
Well, that's it.
So 18 hours old and it's all nailed now.
Thank you very much, Joe.
you're very much, well,I'm happy to introduce it.
I gotta publish this before you goand uh, no, I know you're already
writing something peachy to it.
(13:46):
I don't think I will, but No, this is,I think that's a great overview and.
I guess now this leads me to,because I wanna get to knowledge
panels and, and the, and how that'simportant and it's been around, it's
not like a new thing, but maybe we go backto that and kind of pause for a moment.
'cause I do wanna get your perspective ofwhat's happening right now in AI and how,
(14:09):
uh, yeah, just search is, it's similar butchanging how we position ourselves and,
Yeah.
but let's.
You know, I want to, I wantto tease that for a moment.
Go to knowledge panels, because that'ssomething that I know is very important.
I wanna underst, I want justquickly describe what they
are, they've been around, and
then how, how they're changing.
A knowledge panel is Google'sunderstanding of who you are.
(14:34):
So when it shows a knowledge panel, itsays, well, this is the person or the
company, and this is what I've understoodabout them, and I am super confident.
Hmm.
And it's a great KPI for algorithmicunderstanding, and that same
algorithmic understanding appliesto every single engine chat, GPT,
(14:54):
perplexity, Microsoft copilot, Claude.
If they understand who you are,they will represent you with that
factual representation that you needfor the bottom of funnel clients,
prospects that you're getting.
Yes.
So the knowledge panel right nowis a great KPI, because if Google
(15:16):
understands you, the other AIprobably understands you too.
Because they're all lookingat Google as that source of
information, at least for now.
But like you said, I mean, Google'sbeen at it since you said what, 97?
98?
I think they started in 96,but they incorporated in 98.
So I used that datebecause it makes me look.
Like I was there at the beginning,but they'd actually be going
(15:37):
two years before I started.
ah.
Okay.
I started SEO in the year Google wasincorporated is better than I started
SE O2 years after Google started.
I like it's all brandy and positioning,
Yep, exactly.
It's what we call it at KaliCube Claim frame and prove.
claim frame improve.
So I claim 27 years.
(15:59):
I frame it by saying sameyear Google was incorporated.
That makes me look impressive.
And then I prove it with links out toresources on the web that show that.
So the framing is super important becausethe difference between I started in
SEO the year Google was incorporated.
Brilliant.
Okay.
Google.
Jason, same date.
(16:20):
I started SE O2 years after Googlestarted actually with their search engine.
Jason was behind the time.
Right, right.
So you get immediate trust andyou could prove it and Yeah.
And, and.
Off.
You will.
That's great.
I mean, that's, that's alittle nugget right there.
Anyone could just take anduse for their own business or
Yeah, the frame, theframing is super important.
(16:42):
Whatever's true, whatever is true in yourlife is incredibly important, but how you
frame it to serve your current purpose
is fundamental to peopleand to algorithms.
I love that.
And so the knowledge panel thing,it's interesting because like,
so everybody's looking at, or youknow, everybody meaning these, what?
(17:04):
There's only like four or five big AIcompanies really, you know, if you think
about, and that's what's interesting.
They're all racing to getall the information and
beat each
other.
Go
Tell me which four orfive you're thinking of.
Oh, I mean, there'sprobably more, but yeah.
You have what Google, you have Microsoft,um, you have anthropic open ai.
And, uh, I mean, you have, shoot, Imean you have China and all these other,
(17:29):
but I'd say what Amazon is probably coming
Yeah.
No, I, I wasn't, I I didn'tmean to put you on the
No, it's
Um, but we actually had a situation whereright now people are saying 60 to 80%
of your traffic on your website is bots.
mm-hmm.
Right.
The dead internet theory or whatever, or,
(17:49):
Yeah.
And it's rubbish.
Of
oh, is it?
Oh God, we,
T tell me, tell me, tell me, because
I'm curious 'cause Yeah.
it struck me that that can't be true,
and the kind of subtlety there is,60% of the files on your website are
being taken by bots, but only 15%.
(18:11):
Of the web pages thatare digested are by bots
hmm.
because they're taking lots offiles that people never see.
CSS, JavaScript, robots, TXT, theXML site map, so on, so forth.
So if you remove all of that, thenumber of web pages that are being
digested is in our case at Kali Cube,15% because we are an incredibly
(18:33):
popular bot friendly website.
In your website, it mightbe 8%, it might be 6%.
But be careful about getting caughtout in this I or, or the, the, the,
the headline grabbing clickbait titles.
Right.
So bots are crawling yourwebsite and they are doing a lot.
(18:54):
And TikTok is a huge consumer.
Really
You said China, it's TikTok.
it's TikTok.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I dunno what they're doing.
I don't have an insight into why.
But they crawl as much as, ifnot more than Google and bing
TikTok does.
I did not know that.
Wow.
So is that just to beef up theirown internal search algorithm?
(19:17):
Right.
It's gotta be.
Maybe they're feeding Baidu.
Maybe they're, they havea plan for the future.
Maybe they're gonna take over the world.
I don't know.
But definitely there is.
They're huge consumers.
Got it.
I didn't know that.
Learned
And Amazon are a huge consumer.
Meta are a huge consumer.
(19:38):
I missed that.
So that might be thesixth or seventh then.
Yeah.
Meta.
That's true.
Good call.
Yeah.
we, we found a a, a bot called Petal Bot.
pedal bot.
I haven't heard of that.
No.
Now me neither.
I've got no idea what they do,but they're terribly enthusiastic.
And I mean, I'm curious of your thoughts,but like now with agents or bots,
(20:00):
everybody can vibe, code or do something.
I mean, the information isliterally out there to anyone in the
world.
You know, the power of ai, openai, it's literally so, um, who
knows what's getting developed?
I mean, yeah.
Right now we have these onesthat are really backed by
either a bunch of investors or
nations.
And both, but then you have allthese independent players who are
(20:22):
spinning up things that are alsocompeting in their own thing, right?
Yeah, and pedal bot are doing something.
TikTok are doing something,but I don't really know what,
hmm.
and we'll see.
Um, but it's super, super intriguing.
And I, I, I take it as it's probablyintriguing, at least to me, is like,
well, this is even more of a reasonto at least show up in the way that I
(20:43):
want to get showed up to, or shown tomy best potential customers or whoever,
subscriber viewers, whatever your KPIor your conversion point is, right.
Right, and, and a really importantpoint to make is that Google Bot
and Bing bot have been incrediblykind to us over the years.
(21:03):
Have They.
really though?
They render JavaScript.
They try to figure out what your websitelooks like when the JavaScript triggers,
they try not to overload your server.
They try to chunk down your content.
They make enormous efforts.
TikTok, open ai, uh, meta, Amazonliterally don't make any effort at all.
(21:27):
So they're literally like bogging downour own systems because they're trying to
Yeah.
And perplexity of being caught.
Not respecting, uh, instructionssaying, don't crawl this part.
Oh wow.
So it's now turned into the Wild Westand we've been spoiled by Google and
Bing, and we need to learn now thatperplexity will break the rules.
(21:48):
TikTok will crawl you massivelyand they don't care about the fact
that your server is about to crash.
And that your users are notgetting a great experience.
Amazon, the same method are the same.
So we we're in a situation nowwhere you're saying, well, we
actually need to think about this.
It's not so much am I sharingmy information, which you want
to do, if you want to be presentin these AI assistive engines.
(22:10):
It's do I have the resourcesand can I afford it?
Is there anything we can do to preventor optimize what we're doing so
they're not gonna take us down andruin the experience for everybody else?
Well, if you wanna takecontrol, go through CloudFlare.
Mm. Mm-hmm.
They have bot detectors andyou can actually exclude bots.
And so if you're saying,well, I don't want TikTok,
(22:30):
Yep.
exclude it.
Ah, okay.
So we have a
And that's a really neat trick.
So it's basically just settingyour your website up so that every
request comes through CloudFlare
Yep.
and then you can control it.
Yeah, it's cloud flare first, andthen it goes to your domain, right?
And then host and whatnot.
Exactly,
(22:50):
and so you, you take control and thatthen you just need to be careful, is
that, for example, USA today is sayingnobody can take our content because
we want people to come to our website.
We don't want Google open AI beingperplexity, clawed stealing our content.
That's fine, but then you have to acceptthat they're not gonna send you traffic.
(23:12):
Or you're probably not gonna showup in some of these, uh, AI search.
Yeah.
It's, it's an interesting thing.
Yeah.
It's a paradigm thatlike, you know, even with
TikTok or, or the other bots, you're like.
Maybe it's a good thing in the future.
I don't know.
Do I
exclude 'em, do I not,
Well, it's a huge betthat we're all taking.
mm-hmm.
If you're a publisher, you're saying,well, I make my money for my content,
(23:35):
therefore I can't give it to the bots.
But you are cutting off a source of.
Traffic and revenue.
Right.
If you're a business B2B, B2C, you wantthe bots to send the people to you, and
you need to understand that they willonly send them to you when the person has
made the decision at the perfect click.
(23:56):
Right, and you're showingup in the right way
Exactly, so you, you end up in it.
It's a debate in our own headsand it's a debate that we've
never had to have before, and Iwould advise every business owner.
To look at it from their own perspective.
What makes sense to me?
Well, it's a business model thing, right?
Like it's it, or maybe there's a shiftin the model that we get to take now
(24:18):
because of the, the shifts happening
with Kali Cube, we're a B2B service.
We help entrepreneurs and theircompanies turn up in Google and ai.
We want these bots to build the funnelin their brains and bring people to us.
And we're actively building that.
(24:38):
But if I were a publisher who waspublishing news, I would be struggling
with, do I want to share my contentwith them where they will give the
answer on their own walled garden?
Mm-hmm.
And if I do that.
(24:59):
Will I lose all the people who come to meand I make my money out of subscriptions
or adver uh, advertisements, but ifI don't, I lose all that traffic.
I have to find another source.
Right,
That's a huge, huge question,and I don't have the answer.
right.
I mean, I don't think anybody has aperfect answer right now, but we're
(25:19):
definitely, I think it's good thoughtexperiments, looking at what maybe is.
It happened in the past, eventhough this is kind of totally new.
I would advise anybody who is.
Implementing SEO strategies to sitdown and ask themselves the fundamental
questions of where do I get my money from
(25:41):
Mm
and talk to somebody smart like myself,for example, about how do I avoid leaking
and maximize the actual kind of income.
I think it's very smart and yeah, we, Imean, there's so many indicators that say,
yeah, two to three years in this kind of
(26:02):
time span.
I mean, who knows whatthe world's gonna be like.
There'll be, you know, it's,it's gonna change fast.
It's rapidly, you know, you have thingslike agents popping up that that will be
completely change.
now, and that's a hundred percent it is.
It's all gonna be brand.
Mm-hmm.
And you mentioned agents, and I literallyjust wrote an article about that
(26:23):
is AI assistive engines.
Today is a discussion, it's afunnel that I'm having with my,
uh, AI assistive engine, be it,uh, Google AI mode, actually PG
perplexity and so on and so forth.
Yeah.
But in the near future, it's gonnabe AI agents who do that funnel
multiple times for each task.
(26:44):
Yes.
Yeah.
they make the decisionand I don't know about it.
So we need to show up in theright way to those machines too.
Not only the, I mean right now it's thepeople primarily making the ch the choice
And it, and in a, in a few yearstime, it's gonna be the machine
makes the choice multiple times.
So your audience is the machine becausethe audience that you're actually trying
to reach are just gonna say, well, I gotthe plane ticket, I got the hotel booked.
(27:08):
I bought the microphone from Toman,which is something I did last week,
but I had nothing to do with theactual multiple decision processes
that the agent went through.
So AI agent optimization is gonna be a
Gotcha.
(27:30):
This is, this is fascinating.
Jason.
What?
Okay.
Knowledge panel.
I just wanna close the loop there
because I feel like I, I do, becauseI feel like, I think it's you and,
and also, you know, our mutual buddy,my business partner, Scott Duffy,
you know, um, I know he is, worked withyou for a, a long time now, you know,
building that up five years.
There you go.
So it obviously, and it's working for him.
(27:53):
Uh, where do people startfor the knowledge panel?
'cause it seems like that is kind
of, I don't know, it seemslike that's the core or the
most leveraged piece right now.
Obviously there's more to it,
Well, if, if you.
Look at the knowledge panel asthe KPI of Understandability,
Hmm.
then you're in a really good placebecause whether it's a knowledge panel
(28:14):
or it's chat GPT or it's perplexity,these algorithms need to understand who
you are, what you do, who you serve.
Yeah.
If they don't understandthat, they can't trust you,
so you are right.
That's the foundation.
The knowledge s the KPI of dothe machines understand you.
And the really simple approachto that is say, okay, right.
(28:36):
I have an about page on my websitethat describes who I say I am, who
I serve, and why I am credible.
Then from that page, I need tolink out to the resources that
confirm what I'm saying, and Ineed to get them to link back to
me confirming that it is indeed me.
(28:57):
And then you end up with what we callthe infinite loop of self corroboration.
Where the machine comes to yourwebsite says, okay, this is
what Joe Fier says about him.
This is what Medium says about him.
This is what this article says about him.
This is what Twitter says about him.
This is what LinkedIn saysabout him, and it all maps out.
(29:18):
I understand and I'm confidentI'll give him a knowledge panel.
That's the KPI, that's understandability.
So you're putting signals out there.
They're all kind of sayingthe same thing, so it gets a
picture of you, you are, yeah.
On the about page, like you said, you arealmost like creating this web or this,
this, um, journey for these bots to go on,
right.
That all kind of aresaying the same thing.
(29:39):
No, I love, I love that it's a journey,uh, and it's a very repetitive journey.
Mm-hmm.
the algorithm understands by repetition.
And repetition by trustworthy sources.
But you have to remember thatthe go-to source is always you.
(29:59):
Mm-hmm.
Hmm.
And if that's not the case, you've lostthe game because you have no control.
Yeah.
Well, speaking of control, I'm thinkingof websites now and, and you know, 'cause
you're talking about, well, about pagestructure of your own website, obviously.
Now you're talking about other platformsas well that your name shows up on.
What is one simple fix that someonecan make on their website today that
(30:24):
makes it easier for, uh, Google,but also AI to better understand
Well, the, the, the, uh, sorry, you saidthe about page and that's exactly it.
That might be it.
So, uh, the Kali Cube process, which isthe system we use, is understandability
credibility deliverability.
If it doesn't understand whoyou are, it can't trust you.
(30:47):
If it doesn't trust you,it will never deliver you.
Mm-hmm.
So you need to startwith understandability.
And understandability.
Is that about page on your website thatsays, this is who I am, this is who I
serve, and this is why I am credible.
Hmm,
So that's the first place to start.
that's it.
No, I love it.
Yeah, and there's more to it, but yeah.
That's great.
(31:07):
Thank you, Jason.
That's
But it, it, it, it's actually reallysimple and it, it's one of those moments
in life where you say, well, actually Ican explain it to the baker downstairs.
And she understands it in fiveminutes, create the single source
of source of truth, which is you
Yeah.
make sure that every single sourceabout you around the web corroborates
(31:28):
what you're saying, link out to it.
The machine goes backwards and forwards,and it keeps seeing, seeing the same
message, and you've won the game.
I like it.
I mean, logically it's all there,but like you said, it's a process.
I mean, Gert would, that's why, youknow, Gert Mellak, when he talks
about things, you know, he's got hisprocess and is, it's, um, and I know
you, so it's, I'm, I'm really excited.
(31:49):
'cause I know personally I'm goingto start the journey with Kali
Cube and with you and your team.
You know, Scott and my team are also,we're all working together, so it's
Yeah, and I think the importantthing is, is what you've focused on.
You keep talking about theknowledge panel and you know,
I've been doing this so long.
I'm a bit or knowledge panel bit though,but it is the foundation of everything.
(32:12):
If the machine doesn't understandwho you are, you have no hope.
You're not even in the game.
Yeah.
So if you don't have the knowledgepanel on Google, you're not gonna
be playing the game in Google,in Bing, in Claude, in chat, GPT.
And that's your foundation.
You need to start there.
And it starts with the entity home,which is the about page on your
(32:33):
website and the corroboration aroundthe web with links that make sure
that the machine goes through thatinfinite loop of self corroboration.
And when I say it likethat, it sounds very simple.
Managing it is quite difficult.
Yeah.
Because as human beings,we're a bit messy.
But that's where youstart and you can DIY it
That's great.
(32:53):
So, uh, if they don't wanna DDIY itor if they wanna learn more, where
do they go and find you, Jason.
well, if you want to DIY it, yougo here, Kali cube.com/guides.
And if you don't, um, reach out to me.
I'd be happy to help.
Awesome.
Yeah, we'll put everything in theshow notes, link it up and all that.
Make it easy.
So last question, Jason.
(33:13):
I'm always curious of, and we've kindof talked about it, but like the next
handful of years, like what's the, what'sthe thing you are most excited about?
I mean, you've been excited, you've been
on fire all day long today.
I know.
Um, I'm curious, like withyou, I mean, what you said, you
said there's two years of this.
Like, does that mean that you're out ofa job, Jason in two years or is like.
(33:35):
Now.
Ah, I love the question.
There are, there are a few things that aregonna remain in place is my life is gonna
change, and the algorithms know that, butif they don't recognize me before that
two year window, they won't come looking.
Yep.
have to make myself, you have tomake yourself sufficiently important
(33:58):
to the machines that they comelooking three years from now.
Yeah, that's the key focus, andanybody who's missed that boat
is gonna be really struggling.
So you need to, in the next two years,make sure that you become sufficiently
important within your niche forthe machines to proactively come
(34:22):
looking for information about you.
That's it.
Alright.
Y'all,
you know the, you know the procedure.
Go do it.
Go do some stuff.
Definitely go follow Jason.
What he is doing, I mean, thisis, it's very timely stuff.
That's why we we're talkingnow and um, yeah, I, next few
years is gonna be interesting.
Next, I mean, who, whoknows what the future's
like, but
(34:42):
isn't it?
I'm just happy we're here, we're aliveand we're experiencing it 'cause.
Absolutely.
knows, man.
All right, Jason, I appreciate you.
Was this a good like cap to the day?
I know it started very early for you, but
Yeah, it, it, it, it's absolutely theperfect end to a day where I started
the day just going, oh, wow, this is allbrilliant and wonderful and delightful,
(35:03):
and I'm thinking it all through.
But the foundation is always, does themachine understand who you are, what
you offer, and to whom does it believeyou to be credible as a solution to the
subset of its users who your audience.
And does it have the content to beable to deliver you to those people
(35:23):
for whom you have the perfect solution.
That's it.
Yeah.
Perfect.
All right, Jason, go get some rest.
You've been, you'vebeen at it all day long.
Thanks for hanging out late with me.
So till next time, we'll do it
again soon.
Bye.
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