September 24, 2025 • 48 mins
In this special Q&A episode of Over The Bull, Ken Carroll answers the internet’s most-asked questions about marketing — the ones real business owners are typing into Google every day. From “Does digital marketing really work?” to “How long does it take for Google Ads to pay off?”, Ken cuts through the jargon and hype with clear, experience-driven insights. You’ll hear honest takes on SEO, email marketing, content strategy, and web design — and why the real answers often go beyond what AI or quick-fix guides can tell you. If you’ve ever wondered what actually works in marketing, this episode is your no-fluff guide.
Over The Bull is brought to you by IntegrisDesign.com. All rights reserved.
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SPEAKER_00 (00:02):
You're listening to Over the Bull, where we cut
through marketing noise.
Here's your host, Ken Carroll.
SPEAKER_01 (00:09):
Questions and answers on this episode of Over
the Bull.
Welcome back.
I'm Ken and I'm your host, likeit or not.
So, anyway, diving in here thisweek, I wanted to uh share with
you a story from last week's uh,you know, just working around
the agency, and it really is notagency work because I was trying
to help somebody out, uh afriend of mine out in the
(00:31):
Midwest, and uh she got stucktrying to clean up a website
that was built on a really cheaphosting platform uh using
WordPress.
So it's one of those buy cheaphosting, click a button, start
WordPress.
And the problem was this websitewas in such disarray that her
changes and updates could not besalvaged.
(00:55):
Uh so if you're having someonebuild you with WordPress or
you're using WordPress, I wantto let you know that there's a
big difference.
Just like if uh you know I haveplumbing tools, I'm not a
plumber, I'm not going to dothings as well as uh another
plumber.
And I may create mold, I may, Imay completely damage my house
(01:19):
from what I'm doing.
In like manner, when you're whenyou're building in something
like WordPress, uh there arepeople who claim to be
professionals who are reallynot.
And they're going out andbuilding these sites, using
themes and just throwingtogether these sites and
launching them.
And unfortunately, businessesare buying these.
(01:40):
Now, the reason they're buyingthem is because they think
they're getting a deal, or thereason they're doing it
themselves.
They think they're they're kindof beating the system, so to
speak.
And in reality, remember thatyour website, if it's not doing
something effective for yourbusiness and not just sitting
out there drowning in a sea ofother websites, then it's really
(02:04):
ineffective and your money'swasted anyway.
Um the other thing that uh I didrun across this, this was
interesting.
I got through doing a proposalfor a uh a new prospect, and her
big question was, are you USbased?
And uh I thought that was areally good question because you
(02:25):
really shouldn't develop if youdon't live in the market.
Like if you outsource to anothercountry uh to try to get a deal,
one thing that they've learned,I think, the hard way is that
support, help, and making itrelate to the people they're
trying to market to simplydoesn't work.
Now, that company that builtthat site, they did some things
(02:48):
that were pretty good.
Even in the marketing, therewere some things that were good,
but there were some that wasjust incredibly uh off in that
particular situation.
So here's what I'm doing.
Let's jump straight into theseFAQs.
And if it seems like I've hadcoffee today, well, I I've had
coffee today, so buckle up.
And so basically, what I'm doinghere is uh jumping through
(03:13):
different tools, and basicallyin those tools, you can punch in
a topic, and then what it doesis it kind of spits out the most
common questions associated withthose topics.
So I thought it would beinteresting to find out what the
most common questions are thatare asked in regards to
different marketing questions,and then just try to answer them
(03:36):
off the cuff.
So literally before thissession, I went through, I
downloaded a series ofquestions, and I thought I would
just give you my answers withoutdoing a lot of homework and uh
overly preparing.
Let's see what happens.
The first subject is digitalmarketing.
(03:57):
So the first question, believeit or not, that's really popular
is what is digital marketing andhow does it work?
You know, this is an interestingquestion because when you're in
this business, you take forgranted that people understand
concepts like digital marketing,hosting, Google ads.
You just think these are verybasic things.
(04:20):
Just like if you were in aforeign uh country speaking
another language, to the nativesthere are certain words, it just
seem obvious, but to someonestepping into the country, uh
it's incredibly different.
And so the idea of digitalmarketing, digital marketing is
basically trying to promotesomething online, uh on the
(04:42):
internet.
And it works in the way thatwhat you're trying to do is
appeal to people that are mostlikely going to acquire your
services.
And then what you want to do isyou want to build a value
proposition based on yourstrategic advantages.
(05:03):
And so, in order to do that,you've got to understand your
strengths, your weaknesses, um,what we call a SWOT analysis,
opportunities and threats arethe other two.
And then what you try to do isyou you build the best possible
presentation that you couldbuild, and then you compete in
(05:23):
that job market.
Now, there are ways to marketonline that are more expensive,
and there's some that are lessexpensive.
Uh, but in essence, that's whatyou're trying to do.
Now, from there, it explodes.
There are all kinds of questionsthat you typically want to ask,
like, you know, for example, ifyou have a limited budget, uh,
(05:46):
which we all have a limitedbudget, it's just a matter of
how limited is that budget.
But if you have that limitedbudget, part of the question is
is how do you strategically usethat budget in a way that
positions you to gain customersfrom it in the most effective
(06:06):
ways?
And uh there's always a learningcurve.
Absolutely, there is a learningcurve with it.
And so what you want to do is uhyou need to work with somebody
who understands it, but you needto be able to bring your
expertise to the table.
And if you're a startup, you'regonna need to lean more on data.
Uh but things like competitiveresearch, understanding your
(06:29):
target audience, uh, making sureyou're running the right kind of
advertisements, making sure youunderstand what your objectives
are, and then building thatentire experience to generate
sales or generate whateveryou're trying to accomplish.
Now, I think one of the mostcommon things in digital
(06:52):
marketing that happen withbusinesses, and I see it a lot,
is where there is a focus onmetrics that are not as
important, but they're easier toachieve.
So, for example, the wordimpressions.
I can't tell you how many timesI've heard people talk about the
number of views something had orthe number of impressions
(07:15):
something had.
And basically those are vanitynumbers.
Now, they are an indicator, butyou should never use impressions
as like the ultimate goal whenyou're uh uh in business.
It's it's a it's an indicator ofof what's going on.
But the the more importantmetrics are how it's directly
(07:36):
meeting the goals that you setforth in your business, and then
modifying that.
And uh I guess the last thing Iwould say about digital
marketing is it it doesn't, younever just get it figured out.
So that's a myth that yousomehow run ads, figure it out,
and then stop it.
It never stops.
(07:56):
There's always the next step,and there's always the next
thing, and there's a trend, andyour competitors change, and so
you have to change too.
And if you don't change anddevelop, uh then you your
business will slowly start tolose momentum.
So uh digital marketing, it's uhreally complex, and uh to
(08:18):
encapsulate it.
I guess the the strangest partabout digital marketing is the
big companies, like super bigcompanies, uh, the biggest, that
they they make you think thatpossibly you can run your own ad
campaign.
And uh freelancers, you know,they anyway, it gets so muddy
(08:39):
because you wonder if you canrun your own campaign and then
you may hire someone and thenthey don't understand it.
And there's just all thesenuances that go into it.
Uh anyway, so so I thought it'sa little bit muddy, but there
you go.
It's uh right off the cuff.
Um let's go on down.
A lot of it's all about how doesit work.
(08:59):
By the way, this is aninteresting side note.
If you look at the questionsthat's asked when you look up
something like web design, whatyou find a lot of times is that
people are, you can tell thatthey're they're agencies or
they're freelancers.
Because the questions come uplike how do you make money at
(09:22):
web design?
How do you find customers forweb design?
How do you, you know, it's likethey are trying to sell web
design, but they they'restruggling to find people
that'll buy their services.
Now, granted, there is validityto the question because of
course we want to know whateveris current out there, but a lot
(09:43):
of this should really be anindicator that the world of web
design is saturated with peoplewho have bought into this idea
that somehow they're going toreplace their income building
websites when they're really notsolely dedicated to it.
And, you know, in a way it'slike more power to you, but in
(10:06):
another way, it's like it'sreally hurting businesses who
kind of get sold a bill ofgoods, or the people building
their website doesn't reallyunderstand everything that goes
into a website.
So you could imagine thatthere's this push and pull, but
at the end, I think it reallydoes show us that this market is
(10:27):
so saturated with people uhshortcutting it, fast tracking
it, learning it, and thenpromoting themselves in a way
that uh they really shouldn't bedoing it.
And and speaking of web design,I just caught this question.
Uh this is again one of the mostsearched questions is what makes
a good website design work?
(10:50):
That's a weird question becauseyou really don't start with a
web design and then make itwork.
So the way I'm reading this isthey have a good website and now
they're trying to make it dowhat they want it to do.
Well, this is the problem initself.
You never start with a webdesign and then back into making
(11:13):
it work.
That's the wrong method.
If you've started with a webdesign and then you go into
marketing after you've donethat, a lot of times you've got
to either rebuild it or you'regoing to suffer with really bad
results.
So the big thing to understandis you you don't go with that
(11:34):
kind of question.
The real question is, is how doI set goals so that my website
will be effective?
That that should be the realquestion.
But this is indicative of themarket that we live in today
because people are stillstarting, and these
do-it-yourself builders arehorrible for this.
They start with choosing adesign and then they sell you on
(11:56):
this design and they make youthink that it is a good website
design.
Not true.
What works in business?
Well, makes something good inbusiness when it contributes to
the business.
That's what you're trying to do.
There are no extra points ingood form and web design if it
doesn't accomplish goals.
So kind of uh going back to uhthe digital marketing lens, it's
(12:21):
the same thing.
Goals are the first step.
If you're not being asked whatgoals you're trying to
accomplish and everything gotoward reaching those goals,
then you don't have a goodwebsite.
So that's my tough answer tothat one.
Um here's an interesting one.
How long does it take for awebsite design to work?
(12:44):
How long does it take for awebsite design to work?
I guess what they think is thatthis used to be an old myth
where people used to think thatif they build a website, then
somehow it's going to pop up onthe top of Google or something
like that all by itself.
Um those days are long, longgone.
I I don't even think those daysever really existed.
(13:07):
It's just a myth and it's it'sreally an idea that's kind of, I
think, propagated not overtly,but it's implied through a lot
of companies that want to sellweb design.
And so it doesn't.
Okay, unless you put marketinglegs to it, unless you put real
(13:28):
effort into it and acontribution over a period of
time, it will not work byitself.
So the analogy that I've alwaysused is just imagine that you
have a boat, it has no cell andno motor, and it's sitting out
in the middle of the ocean, butit's a really nice boat.
Now, would you buy that boatknowing that it's sitting
(13:50):
somewhere in the ocean with nosail, no motor, but it's a
really beautiful boat and itreally does exist?
Probably not.
Well, a website's kind of thesame thing.
Uh, if you don't apply marketingand you don't set goals when you
first start it, it could beabsolutely the most beautiful
thing in the world, but no one'sever going to see that website.
(14:11):
So you really want to be becareful about this.
And this really circles backaround uh one of the most
frustrating things about thisbusiness.
Uh when I say that, I mean themarketing and design uh you know
uh agency is when you see thesesystems pop up, and you know,
(14:32):
you know that you know thatthey're building it because they
want to make money selling webdesigns and they don't really
care about the businesses theysell them to.
And so they sell this shinyobject that does absolutely
nothing.
And as you can see, when youlook at a question like how long
(14:52):
does it take for a websitedesign to work?
you can see the confusion.
And man, my heart goes out tobusinesses because I know what
goes into trying to make abusiness work.
And this just shows that youknow people are confused and
businesses are lost when itcomes to it.
(15:13):
Uh check out number seven.
Does custom website designreally make a difference?
Man, that that's a greatquestion.
Does custom website designreally make a difference?
Um if it's under the rightcircumstances, the answer is
yes.
It absolutely makes all thedifference.
Uh if you're building a customwebsite to build a custom
(15:34):
website, the answer is no.
If you make it to where youstart with the goals and the
planning initially, and thenthat custom website meets the
expectation of those goals andis designed in a way that speaks
to your target audience, then itcan make every bit of
(15:54):
difference.
It certainly will help not touse clip art and stock photos
and all that stuff.
People detect all that.
I mean, there's a place for uhstock imagery and things like
that, but uh really if you ifyou overlace it, it doesn't
work.
Now that's digressing a littlebit, but so the answer is yes
and no.
Some people sell custom webdesigns just to sell a custom
(16:17):
web design.
Um but uh all in all, if youdon't start with the goals and
you don't start with theplanning and you don't start
with the understanding phase,then uh no, it's it's no
different than anything else.
It could be an absolutely lousywebsite that doesn't do the job,
or it could be an incrediblewebsite that does.
(16:38):
Now, unfortunately, that doesn'twork the opposite.
You know, when you talk aboutusing uh like WordPress themes
and things like that, check outthe last episode.
But canned themes and cannedwhatever, the the world of the
web is so complicated and it'sso competitive right now, that
(17:00):
for someone to think that theycan somehow just pop in standard
stuff and have all the problemsassociated with uh even trying
to use those systems and thinkthey're going to be effective,
it's really not the way it is.
I mean, if you own a business,unless you want to get into the
(17:21):
web business and the marketingbusiness, like seriously get
into it, you need someone tohelp you out.
And you need someone who'scompetent.
You need someone who hascertifications and experience
and all that.
I mean, at Integris, I I justgot through, I'll give you an
idea, I just got through takingsome tests at Google and
legitimately going through alltheir material uh to get updated
(17:44):
like Google Ads information.
And one of them took three and ahalf, four hours for me to go
through just to kind of getcaught up on the modern trends
and everything with it.
And then I took a test tovalidate that I had had learned
what I learned.
And uh so so the idea is thatthis industry is extremely
complicated.
(18:05):
Uh, but there the problem is youcan do a really kind of slop,
sloppy, haphazard job at webdesign or Google Ads or
anything, and it could becompletely ineffective.
And so uh I really uh understandyour plight as a business owner
and trying to find the rightpeople to help you out to where
it's going to work.
(18:25):
There's some other questionshere, and um how does Canva
website design work?
I have no idea how Canva websitedesign works.
I I have my philosophy on that.
And um and so I we're as as ouragency that when I look at like
how that program works, uh, itwould probably fall into the
(18:46):
same bucket as how I feel aboutother solutions like that.
Um let's talk about Google Ads.
Here's something.
And believe it or not, okay, soseriously, I what I did was I
took the top questions that areasked, and then I ran an export
and then I run them through uhbasically Chad GPT in this case
and just asked it, really giveme the top questions with Google
(19:10):
Ads.
So let me read you the top fivequestions.
Uh, how does Google Ads work?
The second one is how do GoogleAds work?
So it's does and do, how GoogleAds work, question mark.
You get the point.
It's like people want to knowhow Google ads work.
Um and then number six is doGoogle Ads work for small
(19:33):
business?
So what I want to do is kind ofaddress both of these a little
bit.
So let's let's talk about GoogleAds.
So uh Google Ads is not assimple as putting in what you
think are like search terms andthen building ads to those
search terms.
Now, on a very rudimentarylevel, that's exactly what a lot
(19:57):
of people do, which is notcorrect.
At least not complete.
I'm not gonna say incorrect.
But typically what you want todo is in Google you have
something called a conversion.
So a conversion is basically ameaningful action that you want
to track.
So for example, uh have someonemake a phone call.
(20:20):
That's a meaningful action.
Uh have someone fill out a form,meaningful action, book an
event, a meaningful action.
And so what you do is you setthese up as conversions.
Now, when you set those up asconversions, and then you start
running ads with thoseconversions as your goal.
(20:42):
As you run those ads, what youdo is you're starting to work
with Google's machine learningto meet those objectives.
And so the system will learn,and then you massage that
information based on whathappens.
Now, when you look at GoogleAds, it's not just uh search
(21:07):
terms and and uh you know, you alot of people think, well, what
keywords do I plug in andthings?
All valuable.
But the idea is that Google ismuch more complicated and it has
a lot of different campaigntypes.
Like, for example, it's got atraditional search campaign,
which is kind of what I'mdescribing, but it also has
things like display campaigns,performance max campaigns.
(21:31):
It's even got some reallyoversimplified systems like uh
uh smart campaigns, which whichin my opinion I wouldn't I
wouldn't personally use those.
Um but then what you do is youyou set up those campaigns and
sometimes they handshake andthey work together.
Now, what's really fun aboutGoogle Ads is you can also uh
(21:54):
limit your the people that seethe ads to certain groups, like
audiences.
So if you have a certain uhpeople that are looking for
certain things or they havecertain attributes, you can also
limit the ads to be seen to thatgroup.
And part of the whole thing isweed eating the ads, so to
speak, where you eliminate thetraffic that doesn't help you,
(22:17):
you clean up the traffic thatdoes help you, you understand
what happens when people arevisiting your website, and then
what you do is you keep makinguh adjustments over a period of
time.
And you see that just running adcampaigns is not good.
Well, let me throw this at youtoo.
(22:37):
So we also track phone numbers.
And so we use different tools touse those where we can actually
see where the calls are comingin and actually optimize for
phone calls as well versus justpublishing the standard phone
number on a website and nottrack it.
Because when you do that, youcan understand a whole subset of
(23:01):
information.
So Google Ads is is effective.
I mean, it it's it is incrediblyeffective, but it does require
patience.
It's not instant.
Um you don't turn on ads one dayand then get results the next.
I mean, we've had those homeruns, but as a business owner,
you should never expect that.
(23:22):
You know, it's kind of like umwhen I had a friend go to uh uh
uh what is it?
Paris Silent.
And when he went, he expectedthe worst, and it wasn't as bad
as he had thought.
Like he had it like justpictured in his head as being
this just disaster he's gonnahave to go through.
(23:42):
And by by getting his mind thereand getting prepared, he made it
through easy.
Uh conversely, we had someonewho I knew someone who went to
Paris Island and he thought theopposite.
He thought he was in great shapeand he was gonna breeze through
it, and he washed out.
So kind of the same thing here.
But uh Google Ads isinteresting.
(24:02):
Oh, and it number seven, let'slook at this.
How long does it take for GoogleAds to work?
It varies.
I mean, if you think aboutGoogle Ads, it's like this.
The recipe is simple, but at thesame time, it's so nuanced.
Like, okay, here it is.
First of all, you got to bringthe the right people have to see
(24:25):
your advertisement.
That means you've got toproperly set up who sees those
ads to begin with.
And with each campaign type,there's a there's a subset of
ways that you can do that.
Okay, so that's number one.
Number two is the actual adcontent.
What do you put on that ad thatwill encourage people or offset
(24:47):
you from the competition wherepeople may click on that ad.
Then the next step is once theyclick on the ad and then they go
to your website, is your websiteset up in a way that is friendly
and meets the expectation ofwhat the ad is claiming?
Now, once all that's done andyou set everything up, those
(25:11):
three big buckets, I think itwas three, those three big
buckets, what they do is uh theywork together and harmonize.
Well, if you could imagine, whatif you're sending the wrong
people to your website?
Um what if the ad is setting thewrong expectation?
What if your landing page onyour website doesn't meet what
(25:35):
the ad is promoting?
And you may think, well, youknow, come on.
Uh, you know, if I'm selling uhelectrical, you know, I'm an
electrician and people arelooking for an electrician, and
then my ad says, need anelectrician, and it goes to an
electrician page, well, whatelse needs to be said?
(25:55):
And see, this is where thingsget kind of uh where it gets
nuanced because what makes your,what makes you different from
other electricians?
And what do you need to do tomake yourself stand out?
And it's not about price always.
Sometimes it's about maybe thesecurity of uh, you know, could
(26:19):
they trust you in their home ifyou're if you're working with an
older demographic or even ayounger demographic?
I mean, the world's gotten alittle bit crazy.
And so the idea is you've got tothink through all those nuanced
things, and then you have tofigure it out.
So there's a little bit ofdetective work that goes into
it.
And then once you figure piecesout, you run it.
(26:41):
And the thing is, is you don'trun it for a day, make a change,
run it for a day and make achange.
Um, what you do is you set it upto the best of your ability, try
to try to do everything rightthat you know to do, and then
you've got the pain of having towait and watch for results.
(27:02):
And then after a period of timewhere enough results come in,
you evaluate and then you makechanges.
Then you wait again.
And the thing is, is even thosechanges should not be dramatic
changes.
They, you know, you don't wantto do everything at once.
Um I usually equate this to likeuh back in the day, uh, you
(27:24):
know, my dad was in the NASCARand I'd watch it with him.
And part of what they would dois they would, when a car came
in uh to pit, one thing thatthey would do is they would make
a minor adjustment and then theysend the car back out.
Well, when they send the carback out and then it starts, you
know, then they see whathappens, and then they bring it
in, and they may, you know,reduce tire pressure or or do
(27:47):
certain things to make the carhopefully run better so that by
the end of the race they canmake a strong run to win the
race.
And so uh those fine-tuningprocesses apply definitely to
Google Ads.
And unfortunately, you canimagine that if you get it set
up and you make changes, thatyou can imagine that that could
(28:08):
be four weeks, six weeks, eightweeks, twelve weeks.
Uh three or four episodes ago, Ishared a story where uh we have
a client, uh Ryan, I threw ashout-out.
And uh Ryan, he uh stuck withit.
And it took some time to getresults, but once he did, it
started working, and it was alittle offbeat from people who
(28:30):
were doing it another way in hisfield.
Uh that's to his credit.
He stuck, you know, he stood inthere.
You know, he uh he's willing towait it out and let us make
minor changes and minoradjustments and keep fine-tuning
it until it worked.
So when you say how long does ittake for it to work, that's
(28:51):
really kind of uh it's almostlike they're asking, well, like
if I spin it up, like when's themagic going to happen?
Uh it's not magic, it's it'swork.
It's literally trying to buildan ATM machine and you know have
all pieces laid out and thentrying to put it together and uh
assuming that you can just youknow use some super glue or
(29:11):
whatever, but uh it's definitelynot that way.
Um let's move over here.
This is um a subject calledcontent marketing.
So let me look at some of thesequestions here.
Um so how does SEO and contentmarketing work together?
They do work together.
Uh content marketing is man.
(29:33):
So content marketing ismarketing content, meaning
creating stuff that people willsearch for, they look at.
Um there's also the idea of nowthe idea of conversational
language is really coming to theforefront because with uh
artificial intelligence likeChat GPT and things like that,
(29:57):
what you're finding is thatconversational.
And FAQs and answering questionswith real human content, not AI
writing you a blog article.
What you're finding is thatthat's becoming instrumental in
things like Gemini and thoseother AI systems from referring
(30:21):
to your content to help you gainvisibility and getting in front
of the customers you want to getin front of.
And so content marketing isreally complex.
People think that, you know, Ijust create a blog article based
on the flavor of the ice creamof the week.
And that's not how it worksthese days.
(30:43):
I mean, there are tools outthere that it'll vary from topic
to topic on how long the articleshould be, uh, what words should
go in the article, how muchthose words should go in the
article, how many headlinesshould be in the article, all
the way down.
And so uh content marketing isis not as easy as people think
(31:06):
that it is to be effective.
Um, freelancers and and somepeople, what they'll do is
they'll create articles andthey'll use AI and publish them
just to show that they're doingwork, but it's busy work, it's
not real work.
And uh so there's a real sciencebehind content marketing.
(31:27):
And the idea is the more contentthat you have that's really uh
human-touched, human-curatedcontent, and it's actually
topics people look for on theinternet, and it's structured
the right way, then what you dois you it's like just having
another door in your house thatpeople can come into.
(31:48):
Now, that content supports thelarger SEO effort, which uh
comprises a huge amount ofvariables.
Some of them are fine-tuning thewebsite, some of them are
building your reputation usingother locations on the internet,
and then pooling all thattogether to build your
(32:09):
credibility online in order tohelp you gain more visibility.
Uh, basically, from a five-mileview, just think of it as Google
and these search engines andartificial intelligence, they
want to pull up the mosteffective, correct answers that
are the most relevant to whatsomeone's looking for on the web
(32:31):
because that's what they sell.
And if you try to cheat thesystem, then what you know, that
doesn't make search engineshappy because you're coming up
and you're kind of showing up inthe worst places, or you're not
the most credible resource, andyou've kind of tried to game the
system to do it.
(32:52):
And that's why they adjust theiralgorithms, because every time
somebody finds a way to cheat,they make an adjustment.
Just like right now.
You're seeing like uh YouTube,uh, I believe they devalued a
lot of AI content because it wasreally messing up uh the value
of their platform.
And so that that's part of whatyou you kind of want to think
(33:14):
through a little bit is yeah,the both those things do go hand
in hand together.
They do work well together.
And if you're in a uh a fieldthat's an expertise, by the way,
if you own any business, you'rean expert in your business.
So when I say that it'svirtually any business, you
should have a solution wherecontent is kind of outlined and
(33:36):
created, but then it's given toyou to kind of modify it and
then give that back and thenpublish that content to make
sure that it's using the bestthat AI offers, but also uses
the best that humans offer.
And there is that hybrid, andthe hybrid does exist.
Um keep in mind that if allthat's on the web is AI content,
(34:00):
then the value of the internetis negligible because people,
you know, I forget the term.
There's something called likezombie, is a the website was
they were calling it a zombie orsomething, something like that,
because of the amount of likebot traffic versus real human
traffic versus whatever.
(34:20):
But you can imagine if if theinternet's going to become this
world of just AI junk contentthat's kind of just generic and
top level, uh, you're gonna seethat the Internet becomes less
valuable.
Well, what do search engineslike Google do when they see
that?
I mean, that's their bread andbutter.
(34:40):
They have to clean that thingup.
And so you can imagine the valueof human curated uh content
versus just uh spitballing it.
So at a five-mile view, thatthat's kind of like the way I
see it.
Uh does content marketing reallypay off?
This is another question.
(35:01):
Yeah, if it's done right, itdoes.
If it's done wrong, no, itdoesn't.
Um, if you uh but again, youknow, there's a price to pay.
How long does it take for you toask uh AI to create you an
article on a subject that you'venot researched?
You know, how much does it taketo properly research topics,
(35:21):
build a proper outline, createthe right tone, uh share it out,
then the client edits it andthen get it back and then put it
on a web page in a way that's uhgood for uh search engines and
uh large language models.
You can imagine one's gonna takeyou five minutes, one's gonna
(35:42):
take you hours of work, uh,one's gonna be more effective
than the other.
If you want an agency, you couldimagine it's pretty tempting to
build the five-minute versionand sell it as a two-hour
version versus doing thetwo-hour version.
So, this is what I see from theinside.
(36:04):
So let's move down the linehere.
So, search engine optimization.
This is gonna be probably atough one to try to answer some
questions, but let's give it ashot.
Um, let's just grab the top onehere.
How does search engineoptimization work?
Search engine optimization work.
(36:24):
So basically, what you do isyou're you're building, if you
five-mile view it, what you'redoing is building credibility
for a website in a way thatworks with search engines like
Google to give a properrepresentation of a business to
where they can properly rankthat business so that it shows
(36:49):
up in searches that's mosteffective for that business and
adding value to Google.
That's a mouthful, but that'sbasically what it is.
You're building the credibilityof a business.
Well, search engine optimizationis not, is trying to game the
system to artificially come upon the top of uh search engines.
(37:12):
And there's all kinds oftechniques.
If you go back through pastepisodes, you're going to see
all kinds of things.
Um do a little bit of homeworkon private blog networks, and
you'll find out that uh Googlefrowns upon these things, but uh
it's done behind the scenes.
Businesses don't even know thatSEO firms use this technique.
(37:33):
Uh that could mean real trouble.
Uh I did a press release earlythis year on it.
Um so what is the number two,what is the work of search
engine optimization?
What is the what do they mean bythat?
What is the work?
I guess what they mean what goesinto it, I guess is what they're
saying.
(37:53):
Um two big buckets, if that'swhat's being asked.
Uh there's on-site optimizationand off-site optimization.
Pretty self-explanatory.
On-site means you're working onthe site.
Off-site means you're buildingyour reputation within the
greater community of theinternet.
And so there's different thingsthat go into it, and there are a
(38:15):
ton of factors.
And typically what you do is youtry to look at what the
competition is doing, and Iforget who it was.
There was a real popular SEOguy, may still be around, but I
think he said your goal is notto have a perfect website, but
just be better than yourcompetition.
And so that's kind of uh whatyou try to do here.
(38:38):
And you do that by using a lotof advanced tools to find out
what the competition is doing,and then you just kind of mimic
that process over time.
Um let's see if there's anyother.
Oh, here's a good one.
Does SEO really work?
Oh, and then let's couple thatwith number seven.
How long does SEO take to work?
(39:00):
So this is really good.
So the short answer is does SEOreally work?
Yes, and believe it or not, it'smaking a huge comeback with uh
artificial intelligence.
Uh if you want to not risk goingdark as the new versions of
Gemini and uh Chat and GPTeclipsing traditional search
(39:22):
engines and things like that,yeah, uh it does work if it's
done correctly and consistently,and the business is patient.
I mean, this is a long timeeffort that you put into this.
It's not something that happensovernight.
Matter of fact, it's really badto try to do it overnight.
(39:43):
Uh how long does it take dependson um where you're trying to uh
gain positioning and thecompetition and a lot of other
factors.
Uh sometimes we've seen uh jumpsas early as three months,
sometimes two years.
Um it just shows that are youwilling to stay in the game?
(40:06):
And SEO work is not cheap.
I mean, it's it's really not.
We uh we do that, and a lot oftimes we don't even recommend it
to certain clients because it'snot something that um is
overnight and it's somethingpeople can grow tired of.
And if they see that invoicecoming in and out of a month and
they don't really understandwhat's going on, uh, or worse
(40:31):
yet, they're being takenadvantage of and there's nothing
going on, um, you know, then alot of money can be wasted uh
for nothing.
And so um the uh the shortanswer is is and you know what
the realistic answer is to that?
It could be, first of all,defining what work means.
(40:52):
Uh because to me, work isadvancement in gaining
visibility.
Uh but to some people work maybe, you know, when am I going to
be on you know number one onGoogle for a search result?
Uh which of course is um, youknow, a crazy gold ass with the
way everything works in the uhworld of SEO today.
(41:14):
So um in essence, those arethose questions.
All right, so I've been babblinghere for about 41 minutes, but
uh kind of having fun with this.
I don't know how you guys arefeeling.
Um check this out.
Let's move over to emailmarketing.
Does email marketing work?
Okay, so first of all, let'slet's get real about what
(41:36):
happens on the internet.
You know, one of the staggeringstatistics that Google Ads
people who sell services nevertell you is the average
conversion rate across industry,meaning people making meaningful
actions when they go to yourwebsite.
Across all industry, I looked itup earlier today.
That number is sitting somewherebetween 3 and 5 percent.
(41:59):
So just think 3 to 5% are goingto actually engage in your
business in a meaningful way.
So you can imagine theinvestment.
Well, what if there was a way tocapture a larger portion of that
market that may pop on yourwebsite, look around, and then
go look at competitors and seewhat they're doing.
(42:23):
So, by the way, we we do muchbetter than that percentage most
of the time.
Um But when you uh when you lookat it, the first thing is you
think of is if someone's goingto your website, you know, when
you look at a meaningful action,like really engaging with your
company, look at it kind of likea marriage proposal.
(42:47):
You know, yeah, somebody,somebody may jump in, jump in
and you know, hop right in,let's go to Vegas, and that's
probably what that number is, issomewhere in there.
People need it, they see it,they like it, they buy it.
That's great.
That's what we want.
But in a lot of cases, they'redoing their homework.
They're doing what I like tocall uh, I think it's popular, I
(43:08):
don't think it's me that came upwith this, but it's like uh the
whole uh what used to be thesales cycle is now a marketing
ecosystem where people arelooking, they're asking
questions, they go back, theylook.
And so you can imagine if you'reone step on the journey and
they're they're in that mode,you know, you've lost that
person because they're probablynot going to remember to come
(43:29):
back to you.
And so the idea with emailmarketing in part is to give
people a lower valueproposition.
So in the marriage analogy,email marketing is kind of like
going, you know, would you liketo go out for a cup of coffee?
The commitment level is much,much less.
But it doesn't mean you can getaway with something sloppy like
(43:53):
sign up for our newsletter.
I mean, that's like saying, Doyou want to eat some gruel for
dinner tonight?
Um what you want to do is youwant to make a real value
proposition to where peoplewould be inclined to say, yeah,
you know, I'll share my emailfor that.
Uh, because people areprotective of their email
addresses.
(44:14):
Uh no one likes to get spammed.
I mean, I I don't I can't tellyou how many of these spammy
emails I get.
I'm sure you know I'm talkingabout, ranging from everything
to getting a small business uhloan to we can grow your
business, whatever.
You know, they these things areridiculous and uh you should
(44:34):
never answer them.
I've said it a million times.
Don't answer the spammy emails.
You're causing problems when youdo because you make the bad guys
think that their marketingworks.
Um but anyway, getting back toit.
Uh what that does is if you ifyou can build a good value
proposition, you collect thoseemail addresses and then you can
reach back out to that group.
(44:56):
And so if you could capture asmall percentage of the people
that are leaving your site thatyou've already paid to have them
come to your site, and you canconvert them either short-term
or long term into customers,then you're you're you're making
the best.
It's kind of like you're you'reeating dinner, but you're
putting uh the leftovers in thefridge and Tupperware to eat the
(45:16):
next day.
It's kind of the same thing.
What you're trying to do isyou're trying to optimize your
marketing.
And email marketing is reallynot something that requires a
huge investment, but it issomething that is a profession.
And if you're serious about it,you need to really think through
it.
Everything from uh where it goeson your website to the offer
(45:38):
you're making to fulfilling whatyou're promising you're going to
do, the timeline at which yousend things out.
There's just a ton of factorsthat go into it.
And so email marketing doeswork.
Um, but it works in the rightsituations, and it works when
it's in conjunction witheverything else you're doing.
(46:02):
So, you know, my best analogy Ihave with digital marketing,
email marketing, website design,Google Ads is just think of one
of these old watches, you know,with all these little cogs and
gears.
If all of them are going in theright sequence and all of them
are working right, you got aworking watch.
If there's one or two gears out,odds are it's not going to keep
(46:24):
good time.
And it's the exact same thingwhen you do this.
If the plan is not comprehensiveand cohesive, it won't work.
This is why our agency has movedinto doing like more boutique
style work where we're trying toencompass every need of our
client, because if you have oneperson doing uh photography and
(46:48):
videography, and you haveanother person building a
website, another person workingon SEO, another person, you
know, get the point, uh, itbecomes disjointed and the
philosophy changes.
And each one of those people,they may have a core expertise
in one thing, but they theydon't get the big picture.
(47:09):
And so that's why things break,and that's why we believe that
one solution, one plan, one setof goals, and then use all these
things as tools.
And that's how everything works.
Okay, so I think I'm pretty muchdone with these questions.
The rest of them are just kindof redundant, and a lot of them
(47:31):
honestly are it looks likethey're marketing people trying
to figure it out.
I mean, is is what it lookslike, which should be a warning
sign to you as the owner of abusiness that if they're asking
questions, then they certainlydon't know how to do it for you.
Um and so uh the main ingredientat the end of the day, I would
(47:52):
say, is you require expertise,participation, patience, and
funding it like it's a businessand not a hobby.
Um and then make sure you, gosh,get the right people.
Uh with that being said, I thinkI'm going to close up for this
week of Over the Bull.
I do appreciate you tuning in,uh listening, and I hope these
(48:14):
questions help you out, at leastgive you some uh guideline and
direction as you move forward inyour business adventure.
As always, we wish you theabsolute best in your endeavors.
And until next time, thank youfor listening to Over the Bull.
SPEAKER_00 (48:30):
Thanks for tuning in to Over the Bull, brought to you
by Integris Design, a fullservice design and marketing
agency out of Asheville, NorthCarolina.
Until next time.
You're listening to Over the Bull, where we cut
through marketing noise.
Here's your host, Ken Carroll.
SPEAKER_01 (00:09):
Questions and answers on this episode of Over
the Bull.
Welcome back.
I'm Ken and I'm your host, likeit or not.
So, anyway, diving in here thisweek, I wanted to uh share with
you a story from last week's uh,you know, just working around
the agency, and it really is notagency work because I was trying
to help somebody out, uh afriend of mine out in the
(00:31):
Midwest, and uh she got stucktrying to clean up a website
that was built on a really cheaphosting platform uh using
WordPress.
So it's one of those buy cheaphosting, click a button, start
WordPress.
And the problem was this websitewas in such disarray that her
changes and updates could not besalvaged.
(00:55):
Uh so if you're having someonebuild you with WordPress or
you're using WordPress, I wantto let you know that there's a
big difference.
Just like if uh you know I haveplumbing tools, I'm not a
plumber, I'm not going to dothings as well as uh another
plumber.
And I may create mold, I may, Imay completely damage my house
(01:19):
from what I'm doing.
In like manner, when you're whenyou're building in something
like WordPress, uh there arepeople who claim to be
professionals who are reallynot.
And they're going out andbuilding these sites, using
themes and just throwingtogether these sites and
launching them.
And unfortunately, businessesare buying these.
(01:40):
Now, the reason they're buyingthem is because they think
they're getting a deal, or thereason they're doing it
themselves.
They think they're they're kindof beating the system, so to
speak.
And in reality, remember thatyour website, if it's not doing
something effective for yourbusiness and not just sitting
out there drowning in a sea ofother websites, then it's really
(02:04):
ineffective and your money'swasted anyway.
Um the other thing that uh I didrun across this, this was
interesting.
I got through doing a proposalfor a uh a new prospect, and her
big question was, are you USbased?
And uh I thought that was areally good question because you
(02:25):
really shouldn't develop if youdon't live in the market.
Like if you outsource to anothercountry uh to try to get a deal,
one thing that they've learned,I think, the hard way is that
support, help, and making itrelate to the people they're
trying to market to simplydoesn't work.
Now, that company that builtthat site, they did some things
(02:48):
that were pretty good.
Even in the marketing, therewere some things that were good,
but there were some that wasjust incredibly uh off in that
particular situation.
So here's what I'm doing.
Let's jump straight into theseFAQs.
And if it seems like I've hadcoffee today, well, I I've had
coffee today, so buckle up.
And so basically, what I'm doinghere is uh jumping through
(03:13):
different tools, and basicallyin those tools, you can punch in
a topic, and then what it doesis it kind of spits out the most
common questions associated withthose topics.
So I thought it would beinteresting to find out what the
most common questions are thatare asked in regards to
different marketing questions,and then just try to answer them
(03:36):
off the cuff.
So literally before thissession, I went through, I
downloaded a series ofquestions, and I thought I would
just give you my answers withoutdoing a lot of homework and uh
overly preparing.
Let's see what happens.
The first subject is digitalmarketing.
(03:57):
So the first question, believeit or not, that's really popular
is what is digital marketing andhow does it work?
You know, this is an interestingquestion because when you're in
this business, you take forgranted that people understand
concepts like digital marketing,hosting, Google ads.
You just think these are verybasic things.
(04:20):
Just like if you were in aforeign uh country speaking
another language, to the nativesthere are certain words, it just
seem obvious, but to someonestepping into the country, uh
it's incredibly different.
And so the idea of digitalmarketing, digital marketing is
basically trying to promotesomething online, uh on the
(04:42):
internet.
And it works in the way thatwhat you're trying to do is
appeal to people that are mostlikely going to acquire your
services.
And then what you want to do isyou want to build a value
proposition based on yourstrategic advantages.
(05:03):
And so, in order to do that,you've got to understand your
strengths, your weaknesses, um,what we call a SWOT analysis,
opportunities and threats arethe other two.
And then what you try to do isyou you build the best possible
presentation that you couldbuild, and then you compete in
(05:23):
that job market.
Now, there are ways to marketonline that are more expensive,
and there's some that are lessexpensive.
Uh, but in essence, that's whatyou're trying to do.
Now, from there, it explodes.
There are all kinds of questionsthat you typically want to ask,
like, you know, for example, ifyou have a limited budget, uh,
(05:46):
which we all have a limitedbudget, it's just a matter of
how limited is that budget.
But if you have that limitedbudget, part of the question is
is how do you strategically usethat budget in a way that
positions you to gain customersfrom it in the most effective
(06:06):
ways?
And uh there's always a learningcurve.
Absolutely, there is a learningcurve with it.
And so what you want to do is uhyou need to work with somebody
who understands it, but you needto be able to bring your
expertise to the table.
And if you're a startup, you'regonna need to lean more on data.
Uh but things like competitiveresearch, understanding your
(06:29):
target audience, uh, making sureyou're running the right kind of
advertisements, making sure youunderstand what your objectives
are, and then building thatentire experience to generate
sales or generate whateveryou're trying to accomplish.
Now, I think one of the mostcommon things in digital
(06:52):
marketing that happen withbusinesses, and I see it a lot,
is where there is a focus onmetrics that are not as
important, but they're easier toachieve.
So, for example, the wordimpressions.
I can't tell you how many timesI've heard people talk about the
number of views something had orthe number of impressions
(07:15):
something had.
And basically those are vanitynumbers.
Now, they are an indicator, butyou should never use impressions
as like the ultimate goal whenyou're uh uh in business.
It's it's a it's an indicator ofof what's going on.
But the the more importantmetrics are how it's directly
(07:36):
meeting the goals that you setforth in your business, and then
modifying that.
And uh I guess the last thing Iwould say about digital
marketing is it it doesn't, younever just get it figured out.
So that's a myth that yousomehow run ads, figure it out,
and then stop it.
It never stops.
(07:56):
There's always the next step,and there's always the next
thing, and there's a trend, andyour competitors change, and so
you have to change too.
And if you don't change anddevelop, uh then you your
business will slowly start tolose momentum.
So uh digital marketing, it's uhreally complex, and uh to
(08:18):
encapsulate it.
I guess the the strangest partabout digital marketing is the
big companies, like super bigcompanies, uh, the biggest, that
they they make you think thatpossibly you can run your own ad
campaign.
And uh freelancers, you know,they anyway, it gets so muddy
(08:39):
because you wonder if you canrun your own campaign and then
you may hire someone and thenthey don't understand it.
And there's just all thesenuances that go into it.
Uh anyway, so so I thought it'sa little bit muddy, but there
you go.
It's uh right off the cuff.
Um let's go on down.
A lot of it's all about how doesit work.
(08:59):
By the way, this is aninteresting side note.
If you look at the questionsthat's asked when you look up
something like web design, whatyou find a lot of times is that
people are, you can tell thatthey're they're agencies or
they're freelancers.
Because the questions come uplike how do you make money at
(09:22):
web design?
How do you find customers forweb design?
How do you, you know, it's likethey are trying to sell web
design, but they they'restruggling to find people
that'll buy their services.
Now, granted, there is validityto the question because of
course we want to know whateveris current out there, but a lot
(09:43):
of this should really be anindicator that the world of web
design is saturated with peoplewho have bought into this idea
that somehow they're going toreplace their income building
websites when they're really notsolely dedicated to it.
And, you know, in a way it'slike more power to you, but in
(10:06):
another way, it's like it'sreally hurting businesses who
kind of get sold a bill ofgoods, or the people building
their website doesn't reallyunderstand everything that goes
into a website.
So you could imagine thatthere's this push and pull, but
at the end, I think it reallydoes show us that this market is
(10:27):
so saturated with people uhshortcutting it, fast tracking
it, learning it, and thenpromoting themselves in a way
that uh they really shouldn't bedoing it.
And and speaking of web design,I just caught this question.
Uh this is again one of the mostsearched questions is what makes
a good website design work?
(10:50):
That's a weird question becauseyou really don't start with a
web design and then make itwork.
So the way I'm reading this isthey have a good website and now
they're trying to make it dowhat they want it to do.
Well, this is the problem initself.
You never start with a webdesign and then back into making
(11:13):
it work.
That's the wrong method.
If you've started with a webdesign and then you go into
marketing after you've donethat, a lot of times you've got
to either rebuild it or you'regoing to suffer with really bad
results.
So the big thing to understandis you you don't go with that
(11:34):
kind of question.
The real question is, is how doI set goals so that my website
will be effective?
That that should be the realquestion.
But this is indicative of themarket that we live in today
because people are stillstarting, and these
do-it-yourself builders arehorrible for this.
They start with choosing adesign and then they sell you on
(11:56):
this design and they make youthink that it is a good website
design.
Not true.
What works in business?
Well, makes something good inbusiness when it contributes to
the business.
That's what you're trying to do.
There are no extra points ingood form and web design if it
doesn't accomplish goals.
So kind of uh going back to uhthe digital marketing lens, it's
(12:21):
the same thing.
Goals are the first step.
If you're not being asked whatgoals you're trying to
accomplish and everything gotoward reaching those goals,
then you don't have a goodwebsite.
So that's my tough answer tothat one.
Um here's an interesting one.
How long does it take for awebsite design to work?
(12:44):
How long does it take for awebsite design to work?
I guess what they think is thatthis used to be an old myth
where people used to think thatif they build a website, then
somehow it's going to pop up onthe top of Google or something
like that all by itself.
Um those days are long, longgone.
I I don't even think those daysever really existed.
(13:07):
It's just a myth and it's it'sreally an idea that's kind of, I
think, propagated not overtly,but it's implied through a lot
of companies that want to sellweb design.
And so it doesn't.
Okay, unless you put marketinglegs to it, unless you put real
(13:28):
effort into it and acontribution over a period of
time, it will not work byitself.
So the analogy that I've alwaysused is just imagine that you
have a boat, it has no cell andno motor, and it's sitting out
in the middle of the ocean, butit's a really nice boat.
Now, would you buy that boatknowing that it's sitting
(13:50):
somewhere in the ocean with nosail, no motor, but it's a
really beautiful boat and itreally does exist?
Probably not.
Well, a website's kind of thesame thing.
Uh, if you don't apply marketingand you don't set goals when you
first start it, it could beabsolutely the most beautiful
thing in the world, but no one'sever going to see that website.
(14:11):
So you really want to be becareful about this.
And this really circles backaround uh one of the most
frustrating things about thisbusiness.
Uh when I say that, I mean themarketing and design uh you know
uh agency is when you see thesesystems pop up, and you know,
(14:32):
you know that you know thatthey're building it because they
want to make money selling webdesigns and they don't really
care about the businesses theysell them to.
And so they sell this shinyobject that does absolutely
nothing.
And as you can see, when youlook at a question like how long
(14:52):
does it take for a websitedesign to work?
you can see the confusion.
And man, my heart goes out tobusinesses because I know what
goes into trying to make abusiness work.
And this just shows that youknow people are confused and
businesses are lost when itcomes to it.
(15:13):
Uh check out number seven.
Does custom website designreally make a difference?
Man, that that's a greatquestion.
Does custom website designreally make a difference?
Um if it's under the rightcircumstances, the answer is
yes.
It absolutely makes all thedifference.
Uh if you're building a customwebsite to build a custom
(15:34):
website, the answer is no.
If you make it to where youstart with the goals and the
planning initially, and thenthat custom website meets the
expectation of those goals andis designed in a way that speaks
to your target audience, then itcan make every bit of
(15:54):
difference.
It certainly will help not touse clip art and stock photos
and all that stuff.
People detect all that.
I mean, there's a place for uhstock imagery and things like
that, but uh really if you ifyou overlace it, it doesn't
work.
Now that's digressing a littlebit, but so the answer is yes
and no.
Some people sell custom webdesigns just to sell a custom
(16:17):
web design.
Um but uh all in all, if youdon't start with the goals and
you don't start with theplanning and you don't start
with the understanding phase,then uh no, it's it's no
different than anything else.
It could be an absolutely lousywebsite that doesn't do the job,
or it could be an incrediblewebsite that does.
(16:38):
Now, unfortunately, that doesn'twork the opposite.
You know, when you talk aboutusing uh like WordPress themes
and things like that, check outthe last episode.
But canned themes and cannedwhatever, the the world of the
web is so complicated and it'sso competitive right now, that
(17:00):
for someone to think that theycan somehow just pop in standard
stuff and have all the problemsassociated with uh even trying
to use those systems and thinkthey're going to be effective,
it's really not the way it is.
I mean, if you own a business,unless you want to get into the
(17:21):
web business and the marketingbusiness, like seriously get
into it, you need someone tohelp you out.
And you need someone who'scompetent.
You need someone who hascertifications and experience
and all that.
I mean, at Integris, I I justgot through, I'll give you an
idea, I just got through takingsome tests at Google and
legitimately going through alltheir material uh to get updated
(17:44):
like Google Ads information.
And one of them took three and ahalf, four hours for me to go
through just to kind of getcaught up on the modern trends
and everything with it.
And then I took a test tovalidate that I had had learned
what I learned.
And uh so so the idea is thatthis industry is extremely
complicated.
(18:05):
Uh, but there the problem is youcan do a really kind of slop,
sloppy, haphazard job at webdesign or Google Ads or
anything, and it could becompletely ineffective.
And so uh I really uh understandyour plight as a business owner
and trying to find the rightpeople to help you out to where
it's going to work.
(18:25):
There's some other questionshere, and um how does Canva
website design work?
I have no idea how Canva websitedesign works.
I I have my philosophy on that.
And um and so I we're as as ouragency that when I look at like
how that program works, uh, itwould probably fall into the
(18:46):
same bucket as how I feel aboutother solutions like that.
Um let's talk about Google Ads.
Here's something.
And believe it or not, okay, soseriously, I what I did was I
took the top questions that areasked, and then I ran an export
and then I run them through uhbasically Chad GPT in this case
and just asked it, really giveme the top questions with Google
(19:10):
Ads.
So let me read you the top fivequestions.
Uh, how does Google Ads work?
The second one is how do GoogleAds work?
So it's does and do, how GoogleAds work, question mark.
You get the point.
It's like people want to knowhow Google ads work.
Um and then number six is doGoogle Ads work for small
(19:33):
business?
So what I want to do is kind ofaddress both of these a little
bit.
So let's let's talk about GoogleAds.
So uh Google Ads is not assimple as putting in what you
think are like search terms andthen building ads to those
search terms.
Now, on a very rudimentarylevel, that's exactly what a lot
(19:57):
of people do, which is notcorrect.
At least not complete.
I'm not gonna say incorrect.
But typically what you want todo is in Google you have
something called a conversion.
So a conversion is basically ameaningful action that you want
to track.
So for example, uh have someonemake a phone call.
(20:20):
That's a meaningful action.
Uh have someone fill out a form,meaningful action, book an
event, a meaningful action.
And so what you do is you setthese up as conversions.
Now, when you set those up asconversions, and then you start
running ads with thoseconversions as your goal.
(20:42):
As you run those ads, what youdo is you're starting to work
with Google's machine learningto meet those objectives.
And so the system will learn,and then you massage that
information based on whathappens.
Now, when you look at GoogleAds, it's not just uh search
(21:07):
terms and and uh you know, you alot of people think, well, what
keywords do I plug in andthings?
All valuable.
But the idea is that Google ismuch more complicated and it has
a lot of different campaigntypes.
Like, for example, it's got atraditional search campaign,
which is kind of what I'mdescribing, but it also has
things like display campaigns,performance max campaigns.
(21:31):
It's even got some reallyoversimplified systems like uh
uh smart campaigns, which whichin my opinion I wouldn't I
wouldn't personally use those.
Um but then what you do is youyou set up those campaigns and
sometimes they handshake andthey work together.
Now, what's really fun aboutGoogle Ads is you can also uh
(21:54):
limit your the people that seethe ads to certain groups, like
audiences.
So if you have a certain uhpeople that are looking for
certain things or they havecertain attributes, you can also
limit the ads to be seen to thatgroup.
And part of the whole thing isweed eating the ads, so to
speak, where you eliminate thetraffic that doesn't help you,
(22:17):
you clean up the traffic thatdoes help you, you understand
what happens when people arevisiting your website, and then
what you do is you keep makinguh adjustments over a period of
time.
And you see that just running adcampaigns is not good.
Well, let me throw this at youtoo.
(22:37):
So we also track phone numbers.
And so we use different tools touse those where we can actually
see where the calls are comingin and actually optimize for
phone calls as well versus justpublishing the standard phone
number on a website and nottrack it.
Because when you do that, youcan understand a whole subset of
(23:01):
information.
So Google Ads is is effective.
I mean, it it's it is incrediblyeffective, but it does require
patience.
It's not instant.
Um you don't turn on ads one dayand then get results the next.
I mean, we've had those homeruns, but as a business owner,
you should never expect that.
(23:22):
You know, it's kind of like umwhen I had a friend go to uh uh
uh what is it?
Paris Silent.
And when he went, he expectedthe worst, and it wasn't as bad
as he had thought.
Like he had it like justpictured in his head as being
this just disaster he's gonnahave to go through.
(23:42):
And by by getting his mind thereand getting prepared, he made it
through easy.
Uh conversely, we had someonewho I knew someone who went to
Paris Island and he thought theopposite.
He thought he was in great shapeand he was gonna breeze through
it, and he washed out.
So kind of the same thing here.
But uh Google Ads isinteresting.
(24:02):
Oh, and it number seven, let'slook at this.
How long does it take for GoogleAds to work?
It varies.
I mean, if you think aboutGoogle Ads, it's like this.
The recipe is simple, but at thesame time, it's so nuanced.
Like, okay, here it is.
First of all, you got to bringthe the right people have to see
(24:25):
your advertisement.
That means you've got toproperly set up who sees those
ads to begin with.
And with each campaign type,there's a there's a subset of
ways that you can do that.
Okay, so that's number one.
Number two is the actual adcontent.
What do you put on that ad thatwill encourage people or offset
(24:47):
you from the competition wherepeople may click on that ad.
Then the next step is once theyclick on the ad and then they go
to your website, is your websiteset up in a way that is friendly
and meets the expectation ofwhat the ad is claiming?
Now, once all that's done andyou set everything up, those
(25:11):
three big buckets, I think itwas three, those three big
buckets, what they do is uh theywork together and harmonize.
Well, if you could imagine, whatif you're sending the wrong
people to your website?
Um what if the ad is setting thewrong expectation?
What if your landing page onyour website doesn't meet what
(25:35):
the ad is promoting?
And you may think, well, youknow, come on.
Uh, you know, if I'm selling uhelectrical, you know, I'm an
electrician and people arelooking for an electrician, and
then my ad says, need anelectrician, and it goes to an
electrician page, well, whatelse needs to be said?
(25:55):
And see, this is where thingsget kind of uh where it gets
nuanced because what makes your,what makes you different from
other electricians?
And what do you need to do tomake yourself stand out?
And it's not about price always.
Sometimes it's about maybe thesecurity of uh, you know, could
(26:19):
they trust you in their home ifyou're if you're working with an
older demographic or even ayounger demographic?
I mean, the world's gotten alittle bit crazy.
And so the idea is you've got tothink through all those nuanced
things, and then you have tofigure it out.
So there's a little bit ofdetective work that goes into
it.
And then once you figure piecesout, you run it.
(26:41):
And the thing is, is you don'trun it for a day, make a change,
run it for a day and make achange.
Um, what you do is you set it upto the best of your ability, try
to try to do everything rightthat you know to do, and then
you've got the pain of having towait and watch for results.
(27:02):
And then after a period of timewhere enough results come in,
you evaluate and then you makechanges.
Then you wait again.
And the thing is, is even thosechanges should not be dramatic
changes.
They, you know, you don't wantto do everything at once.
Um I usually equate this to likeuh back in the day, uh, you
(27:24):
know, my dad was in the NASCARand I'd watch it with him.
And part of what they would dois they would, when a car came
in uh to pit, one thing thatthey would do is they would make
a minor adjustment and then theysend the car back out.
Well, when they send the carback out and then it starts, you
know, then they see whathappens, and then they bring it
in, and they may, you know,reduce tire pressure or or do
(27:47):
certain things to make the carhopefully run better so that by
the end of the race they canmake a strong run to win the
race.
And so uh those fine-tuningprocesses apply definitely to
Google Ads.
And unfortunately, you canimagine that if you get it set
up and you make changes, thatyou can imagine that that could
(28:08):
be four weeks, six weeks, eightweeks, twelve weeks.
Uh three or four episodes ago, Ishared a story where uh we have
a client, uh Ryan, I threw ashout-out.
And uh Ryan, he uh stuck withit.
And it took some time to getresults, but once he did, it
started working, and it was alittle offbeat from people who
(28:30):
were doing it another way in hisfield.
Uh that's to his credit.
He stuck, you know, he stood inthere.
You know, he uh he's willing towait it out and let us make
minor changes and minoradjustments and keep fine-tuning
it until it worked.
So when you say how long does ittake for it to work, that's
(28:51):
really kind of uh it's almostlike they're asking, well, like
if I spin it up, like when's themagic going to happen?
Uh it's not magic, it's it'swork.
It's literally trying to buildan ATM machine and you know have
all pieces laid out and thentrying to put it together and uh
assuming that you can just youknow use some super glue or
(29:11):
whatever, but uh it's definitelynot that way.
Um let's move over here.
This is um a subject calledcontent marketing.
So let me look at some of thesequestions here.
Um so how does SEO and contentmarketing work together?
They do work together.
Uh content marketing is man.
(29:33):
So content marketing ismarketing content, meaning
creating stuff that people willsearch for, they look at.
Um there's also the idea of nowthe idea of conversational
language is really coming to theforefront because with uh
artificial intelligence likeChat GPT and things like that,
(29:57):
what you're finding is thatconversational.
And FAQs and answering questionswith real human content, not AI
writing you a blog article.
What you're finding is thatthat's becoming instrumental in
things like Gemini and thoseother AI systems from referring
(30:21):
to your content to help you gainvisibility and getting in front
of the customers you want to getin front of.
And so content marketing isreally complex.
People think that, you know, Ijust create a blog article based
on the flavor of the ice creamof the week.
And that's not how it worksthese days.
(30:43):
I mean, there are tools outthere that it'll vary from topic
to topic on how long the articleshould be, uh, what words should
go in the article, how muchthose words should go in the
article, how many headlinesshould be in the article, all
the way down.
And so uh content marketing isis not as easy as people think
(31:06):
that it is to be effective.
Um, freelancers and and somepeople, what they'll do is
they'll create articles andthey'll use AI and publish them
just to show that they're doingwork, but it's busy work, it's
not real work.
And uh so there's a real sciencebehind content marketing.
(31:27):
And the idea is the more contentthat you have that's really uh
human-touched, human-curatedcontent, and it's actually
topics people look for on theinternet, and it's structured
the right way, then what you dois you it's like just having
another door in your house thatpeople can come into.
(31:48):
Now, that content supports thelarger SEO effort, which uh
comprises a huge amount ofvariables.
Some of them are fine-tuning thewebsite, some of them are
building your reputation usingother locations on the internet,
and then pooling all thattogether to build your
(32:09):
credibility online in order tohelp you gain more visibility.
Uh, basically, from a five-mileview, just think of it as Google
and these search engines andartificial intelligence, they
want to pull up the mosteffective, correct answers that
are the most relevant to whatsomeone's looking for on the web
(32:31):
because that's what they sell.
And if you try to cheat thesystem, then what you know, that
doesn't make search engineshappy because you're coming up
and you're kind of showing up inthe worst places, or you're not
the most credible resource, andyou've kind of tried to game the
system to do it.
(32:52):
And that's why they adjust theiralgorithms, because every time
somebody finds a way to cheat,they make an adjustment.
Just like right now.
You're seeing like uh YouTube,uh, I believe they devalued a
lot of AI content because it wasreally messing up uh the value
of their platform.
And so that that's part of whatyou you kind of want to think
(33:14):
through a little bit is yeah,the both those things do go hand
in hand together.
They do work well together.
And if you're in a uh a fieldthat's an expertise, by the way,
if you own any business, you'rean expert in your business.
So when I say that it'svirtually any business, you
should have a solution wherecontent is kind of outlined and
(33:36):
created, but then it's given toyou to kind of modify it and
then give that back and thenpublish that content to make
sure that it's using the bestthat AI offers, but also uses
the best that humans offer.
And there is that hybrid, andthe hybrid does exist.
Um keep in mind that if allthat's on the web is AI content,
(34:00):
then the value of the internetis negligible because people,
you know, I forget the term.
There's something called likezombie, is a the website was
they were calling it a zombie orsomething, something like that,
because of the amount of likebot traffic versus real human
traffic versus whatever.
(34:20):
But you can imagine if if theinternet's going to become this
world of just AI junk contentthat's kind of just generic and
top level, uh, you're gonna seethat the Internet becomes less
valuable.
Well, what do search engineslike Google do when they see
that?
I mean, that's their bread andbutter.
(34:40):
They have to clean that thingup.
And so you can imagine the valueof human curated uh content
versus just uh spitballing it.
So at a five-mile view, thatthat's kind of like the way I
see it.
Uh does content marketing reallypay off?
This is another question.
(35:01):
Yeah, if it's done right, itdoes.
If it's done wrong, no, itdoesn't.
Um, if you uh but again, youknow, there's a price to pay.
How long does it take for you toask uh AI to create you an
article on a subject that you'venot researched?
You know, how much does it taketo properly research topics,
(35:21):
build a proper outline, createthe right tone, uh share it out,
then the client edits it andthen get it back and then put it
on a web page in a way that's uhgood for uh search engines and
uh large language models.
You can imagine one's gonna takeyou five minutes, one's gonna
(35:42):
take you hours of work, uh,one's gonna be more effective
than the other.
If you want an agency, you couldimagine it's pretty tempting to
build the five-minute versionand sell it as a two-hour
version versus doing thetwo-hour version.
So, this is what I see from theinside.
(36:04):
So let's move down the linehere.
So, search engine optimization.
This is gonna be probably atough one to try to answer some
questions, but let's give it ashot.
Um, let's just grab the top onehere.
How does search engineoptimization work?
Search engine optimization work.
(36:24):
So basically, what you do isyou're you're building, if you
five-mile view it, what you'redoing is building credibility
for a website in a way thatworks with search engines like
Google to give a properrepresentation of a business to
where they can properly rankthat business so that it shows
(36:49):
up in searches that's mosteffective for that business and
adding value to Google.
That's a mouthful, but that'sbasically what it is.
You're building the credibilityof a business.
Well, search engine optimizationis not, is trying to game the
system to artificially come upon the top of uh search engines.
(37:12):
And there's all kinds oftechniques.
If you go back through pastepisodes, you're going to see
all kinds of things.
Um do a little bit of homeworkon private blog networks, and
you'll find out that uh Googlefrowns upon these things, but uh
it's done behind the scenes.
Businesses don't even know thatSEO firms use this technique.
(37:33):
Uh that could mean real trouble.
Uh I did a press release earlythis year on it.
Um so what is the number two,what is the work of search
engine optimization?
What is the what do they mean bythat?
What is the work?
I guess what they mean what goesinto it, I guess is what they're
saying.
(37:53):
Um two big buckets, if that'swhat's being asked.
Uh there's on-site optimizationand off-site optimization.
Pretty self-explanatory.
On-site means you're working onthe site.
Off-site means you're buildingyour reputation within the
greater community of theinternet.
And so there's different thingsthat go into it, and there are a
(38:15):
ton of factors.
And typically what you do is youtry to look at what the
competition is doing, and Iforget who it was.
There was a real popular SEOguy, may still be around, but I
think he said your goal is notto have a perfect website, but
just be better than yourcompetition.
And so that's kind of uh whatyou try to do here.
(38:38):
And you do that by using a lotof advanced tools to find out
what the competition is doing,and then you just kind of mimic
that process over time.
Um let's see if there's anyother.
Oh, here's a good one.
Does SEO really work?
Oh, and then let's couple thatwith number seven.
How long does SEO take to work?
(39:00):
So this is really good.
So the short answer is does SEOreally work?
Yes, and believe it or not, it'smaking a huge comeback with uh
artificial intelligence.
Uh if you want to not risk goingdark as the new versions of
Gemini and uh Chat and GPTeclipsing traditional search
(39:22):
engines and things like that,yeah, uh it does work if it's
done correctly and consistently,and the business is patient.
I mean, this is a long timeeffort that you put into this.
It's not something that happensovernight.
Matter of fact, it's really badto try to do it overnight.
(39:43):
Uh how long does it take dependson um where you're trying to uh
gain positioning and thecompetition and a lot of other
factors.
Uh sometimes we've seen uh jumpsas early as three months,
sometimes two years.
Um it just shows that are youwilling to stay in the game?
(40:06):
And SEO work is not cheap.
I mean, it's it's really not.
We uh we do that, and a lot oftimes we don't even recommend it
to certain clients because it'snot something that um is
overnight and it's somethingpeople can grow tired of.
And if they see that invoicecoming in and out of a month and
they don't really understandwhat's going on, uh, or worse
(40:31):
yet, they're being takenadvantage of and there's nothing
going on, um, you know, then alot of money can be wasted uh
for nothing.
And so um the uh the shortanswer is is and you know what
the realistic answer is to that?
It could be, first of all,defining what work means.
(40:52):
Uh because to me, work isadvancement in gaining
visibility.
Uh but to some people work maybe, you know, when am I going to
be on you know number one onGoogle for a search result?
Uh which of course is um, youknow, a crazy gold ass with the
way everything works in the uhworld of SEO today.
(41:14):
So um in essence, those arethose questions.
All right, so I've been babblinghere for about 41 minutes, but
uh kind of having fun with this.
I don't know how you guys arefeeling.
Um check this out.
Let's move over to emailmarketing.
Does email marketing work?
Okay, so first of all, let'slet's get real about what
(41:36):
happens on the internet.
You know, one of the staggeringstatistics that Google Ads
people who sell services nevertell you is the average
conversion rate across industry,meaning people making meaningful
actions when they go to yourwebsite.
Across all industry, I looked itup earlier today.
That number is sitting somewherebetween 3 and 5 percent.
(41:59):
So just think 3 to 5% are goingto actually engage in your
business in a meaningful way.
So you can imagine theinvestment.
Well, what if there was a way tocapture a larger portion of that
market that may pop on yourwebsite, look around, and then
go look at competitors and seewhat they're doing.
(42:23):
So, by the way, we we do muchbetter than that percentage most
of the time.
Um But when you uh when you lookat it, the first thing is you
think of is if someone's goingto your website, you know, when
you look at a meaningful action,like really engaging with your
company, look at it kind of likea marriage proposal.
(42:47):
You know, yeah, somebody,somebody may jump in, jump in
and you know, hop right in,let's go to Vegas, and that's
probably what that number is, issomewhere in there.
People need it, they see it,they like it, they buy it.
That's great.
That's what we want.
But in a lot of cases, they'redoing their homework.
They're doing what I like tocall uh, I think it's popular, I
(43:08):
don't think it's me that came upwith this, but it's like uh the
whole uh what used to be thesales cycle is now a marketing
ecosystem where people arelooking, they're asking
questions, they go back, theylook.
And so you can imagine if you'reone step on the journey and
they're they're in that mode,you know, you've lost that
person because they're probablynot going to remember to come
(43:29):
back to you.
And so the idea with emailmarketing in part is to give
people a lower valueproposition.
So in the marriage analogy,email marketing is kind of like
going, you know, would you liketo go out for a cup of coffee?
The commitment level is much,much less.
But it doesn't mean you can getaway with something sloppy like
(43:53):
sign up for our newsletter.
I mean, that's like saying, Doyou want to eat some gruel for
dinner tonight?
Um what you want to do is youwant to make a real value
proposition to where peoplewould be inclined to say, yeah,
you know, I'll share my emailfor that.
Uh, because people areprotective of their email
addresses.
(44:14):
Uh no one likes to get spammed.
I mean, I I don't I can't tellyou how many of these spammy
emails I get.
I'm sure you know I'm talkingabout, ranging from everything
to getting a small business uhloan to we can grow your
business, whatever.
You know, they these things areridiculous and uh you should
(44:34):
never answer them.
I've said it a million times.
Don't answer the spammy emails.
You're causing problems when youdo because you make the bad guys
think that their marketingworks.
Um but anyway, getting back toit.
Uh what that does is if you ifyou can build a good value
proposition, you collect thoseemail addresses and then you can
reach back out to that group.
(44:56):
And so if you could capture asmall percentage of the people
that are leaving your site thatyou've already paid to have them
come to your site, and you canconvert them either short-term
or long term into customers,then you're you're you're making
the best.
It's kind of like you're you'reeating dinner, but you're
putting uh the leftovers in thefridge and Tupperware to eat the
(45:16):
next day.
It's kind of the same thing.
What you're trying to do isyou're trying to optimize your
marketing.
And email marketing is reallynot something that requires a
huge investment, but it issomething that is a profession.
And if you're serious about it,you need to really think through
it.
Everything from uh where it goeson your website to the offer
(45:38):
you're making to fulfilling whatyou're promising you're going to
do, the timeline at which yousend things out.
There's just a ton of factorsthat go into it.
And so email marketing doeswork.
Um, but it works in the rightsituations, and it works when
it's in conjunction witheverything else you're doing.
(46:02):
So, you know, my best analogy Ihave with digital marketing,
email marketing, website design,Google Ads is just think of one
of these old watches, you know,with all these little cogs and
gears.
If all of them are going in theright sequence and all of them
are working right, you got aworking watch.
If there's one or two gears out,odds are it's not going to keep
(46:24):
good time.
And it's the exact same thingwhen you do this.
If the plan is not comprehensiveand cohesive, it won't work.
This is why our agency has movedinto doing like more boutique
style work where we're trying toencompass every need of our
client, because if you have oneperson doing uh photography and
(46:48):
videography, and you haveanother person building a
website, another person workingon SEO, another person, you
know, get the point, uh, itbecomes disjointed and the
philosophy changes.
And each one of those people,they may have a core expertise
in one thing, but they theydon't get the big picture.
(47:09):
And so that's why things break,and that's why we believe that
one solution, one plan, one setof goals, and then use all these
things as tools.
And that's how everything works.
Okay, so I think I'm pretty muchdone with these questions.
The rest of them are just kindof redundant, and a lot of them
(47:31):
honestly are it looks likethey're marketing people trying
to figure it out.
I mean, is is what it lookslike, which should be a warning
sign to you as the owner of abusiness that if they're asking
questions, then they certainlydon't know how to do it for you.
Um and so uh the main ingredientat the end of the day, I would
(47:52):
say, is you require expertise,participation, patience, and
funding it like it's a businessand not a hobby.
Um and then make sure you, gosh,get the right people.
Uh with that being said, I thinkI'm going to close up for this
week of Over the Bull.
I do appreciate you tuning in,uh listening, and I hope these
(48:14):
questions help you out, at leastgive you some uh guideline and
direction as you move forward inyour business adventure.
As always, we wish you theabsolute best in your endeavors.
And until next time, thank youfor listening to Over the Bull.
SPEAKER_00 (48:30):
Thanks for tuning in to Over the Bull, brought to you
by Integris Design, a fullservice design and marketing
agency out of Asheville, NorthCarolina.
Until next time.
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