September 4, 2025 • 25 mins
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From construction industry websites to photography businesses, the digital landscape is transforming at breakneck speed – and those who adapt will thrive while others fade away. When Wes Towers received a business valuation three years ago, identifying AI as an existential threat to his company, he faced a pivotal choice: resist or evolve. His decision led to his most profitable year ever.
"We're calling it search everywhere optimization," Towers explains, describing how customer search behavior has fundamentally changed. People no longer search with disconnected keywords but engage in full conversations with search tools. This shift toward natural language is actually humanizing digital interactions rather than making them more robotic. The key differentiator for businesses navigating this landscape? Authenticity.
Your content must sound uniquely like you – not the generic, faux-enthusiastic tone that permeates so much AI-generated content. Towers advocates using AI as your "first terrible draft" while ensuring the ideas and voice remain authentically yours. "You want to be the master of the AI, not the other way around," he advises, recommending businesses develop clear style guides before employing generative tools.
For smaller businesses competing with larger entities, Towers offers counterintuitive wisdom: embrace your size as an advantage. While larger companies might offer more services, small businesses provide direct access to passionate founders who truly care about outcomes. By niching down and becoming specialists in targeted areas, even tiny companies can attract significant clients searching for genuine expertise.
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Hosted and produced by Gary Pageau
Edited by Olivia Pageau
Announcer: Erin Manning
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Erin Manning (00:02):
Welcome to the Dead Pixels Society podcast, the
photo imaging industry'sleading news source.
Here's your host, Gary Pageau.
The Dead Pixels Society podcastis brought to you by Mediaclip,
Advertek Printing andIndependent Photo Imagers.
Gary Pageau (00:17):
Hello again, and welcome to the Dead Pixels
Society podcast.
I'm your host, Gary Pageau, andtoday we're joined by Wes
Towers, who's coming to us fromMelbourne, Australia.
Wes is the founder of Uplift360, where he's going to give us
practical business tips and SEOand getting your business found.
Hey, Wes, how are you today?
Wes Towers (00:40):
Really well, Gary.
Nice and early start.
For me, it's my start of theday and your end of the day, so
coming to you from the future,there you go.
Gary Pageau (00:50):
So you've got a very different background than
most of my audience and you camefrom the construction industry
and, as we were talking beforethe show, we're kind of saying
how do we make that relate?
But actually it directlyrelates, because you were
wrestling with AI a few yearsago and its impact on your
business.
Can you talk a little bit aboutthat?
Wes Towers (01:11):
Yeah, so we do websites and SEO for the
construction trades andconstruction.
We call them tradies here inAustralia.
But I got a business valuationthree years ago so it came back
a rude shock to me.
So it was far lower than Ianticipated and the in the, the
massive report that the evaluergave me, he said AI was a
(01:31):
massive threat to my entireindustry.
And it was three years ago, soit was pretty early days with
everyone just sort of realizinghey, this could transform a lot
of businesses and so the valuecame down.
So it was a real kick in theteeth really, to say my business
wasn't worth anywhere near whatI thought it was, but it was
the catalyst in a lot of ways tostart transforming my business
(01:53):
and introducing AI.
So what I did was took thetools and technologies and
implemented some of them into mybusiness and just had the most
profitable year ever, sotransforming the business in
that way.
So took the threat as anopportunity and things are going
really well now.
But things are changing all thetime.
So it's an exciting andterrifying time to be in
(02:15):
business.
Gary Pageau (02:17):
So I mean, I think my audience will be able to tell
you hey, I know how AI is goingto affect my business with
generative AI and things likethat, but how was AI going to
affect your business or in yourindustry?
Wes Towers (02:30):
Yeah, well, the valuer didn't put much detail on
precisely what he thought wasgoing to happen, only the point
that he didn't know what wasgoing to happen and I suppose
everyone was kind of talking thefirst sort of jobs that might
go, your programming tech jobs,because you know, AI can do that
really really well.
(02:51):
It can do content writing, Idon't.
It can do content writing.
I don't know whether it's goodor bad something.
It depends on how you prompt it.
Yeah, um, but the programmingit's doing really well and that
was foreseen a long time ago.
You know three years ago.
A was foreseen a long time ago,you know three years ago.
A lot that's a long time agoexactly, yeah he was right.
he was right in a lot of ways.
(03:11):
If I had stayed doing what Iwas doing the same way, probably
eventually I'd be maderedundant.
So some of the things like, asI said you mentioned before, we
do seos but we're calling itsearch everywhere, optimization,
because it's a different beastnow I think you had a SEO guy on
recently and touched on some AIbut people are just searching
(03:32):
in whole new ways.
That may mean for me, I jump onchat, gpt if I'm researching
something and I talk to my phoneand we're searching in full
sentences because we know thetools and technology understand
full sentences.
We're not just searchingplumber Melbourne, we're
searching for I want a plumberwho can fix a toilet that's
leaking.
This is the brand.
How do I do it?
(03:52):
If I can't do it, who's thebest person to come in and fix
it?
Those sorts of things.
So whole conversational, whichis exciting.
It's almost making us morehuman, humanizing us.
Exciting, it's almost making usmore human, humanizing us.
We've got to think aboutconversations rather than just
keyword phrases and shoving theminto your website, you know so
you know, that's interestingbecause I think I think people
(04:13):
were kind of trained to search,almost thinking about keywords.
Gary Pageau (04:17):
Right, I want to search for a photo book, the
hardcover, and they're searchingfor keywords as opposed to,
like you said, more of aconversational aspect of that
yeah, 100.
Wes Towers (04:31):
So back in the day you used to do a lot of research
to find the keywords thatpeople are most searching for.
And then you would, you wouldtarget those keywords and you
would track them and you wouldsay where you're going, where
you're ranking in Google andyou'd give a report to the
client and they'd be happy ifthe rankings were improving and
the traffic was improving andall that sort of stuff.
But everyone's traffic isdropping and you're not
(04:53):
necessarily getting clicks forthe phrases.
And the phrases are completelydifferent.
They're not just your keyword,your traditional keyword,
they're full sentences soincredibly hard to track and
measure.
I mean, I had a client two weeksago now.
He found out by accident.
Well, he found out because hehe spoke to the client and said,
hey, how did you find?
How did you find us?
(05:14):
And I said we, we found you onchat gbt.
We were searching for the verybest service offering.
Uh, in in australia.
This was a, this is a client.
Uh, a long, a long way.
It's about a two hour flight,two, two or three-hour flight,
so not even the local business,but they wanted the very best in
Australia.
And he came up in ChatGPTbecause you know the search
everywhere optimization strategy.
(05:36):
But for us we couldn't reallymeasure that, only that he spoke
to the client, so yeah, that'sinteresting.
Gary Pageau (05:44):
So when you mean by search everywhere, I mean, as
we've been talking to variouspeople about SEO we are finding
that Google is becoming lessrelevant and it's impacting what
they're doing.
Of course, they've got Geminiand they're trying different
things.
How do you optimize then for AIsearch?
Wes Towers (06:04):
Yeah, the good news is, the similar strategies work
for your traditional SEO, as dothe AI showing up in the large
language models.
You want quality content.
You want a website that's builtso it's fast loading and the
tech is all.
The foundational aspects arestrong, that's the obvious, but
the message is the key.
(06:25):
So, and there's a couple ofaspects to consider when you're
thinking about your message.
So it's your voice, so how yousay, say what you're saying, but
also your message, and both ofthese things have to be uniquely
yours.
And that's where a lot of peopleare going wrong.
They're just jumping on theirpreferred AI platform and they
realize that they've got topublish content to be found, so
(06:46):
they just go straight to thetool and they let the tool
dictate what the content is.
That the message and the voice,and it's just generic, it's
just the average of whateverybody else is saying.
But none of us want to beaverage.
We want to be exceptional inour field.
So you've really got to beddown your style guide of exactly
how you write your content ifyou are using these tools.
(07:07):
Right, your own voice, and butyou let your own language, the
particular phrases of how youtalk, um, but your unique
message and so whatever thatunique aspect is to your
business and that what humanizesyour business effectively, your
your unique thoughts andfeelings and those human
elements, what they mean asprompts.
(07:29):
Build a really strong, solidstyle guide.
Produce the content that way asa first draft, because you
still got to check it, becauseit might get even with those
really solid foundations youstill might get it wrong.
And you got to massage in yourcase studies and anything that
is information gain that you canadd value that no one else can.
So your unique case studies orexamples or stories Storytelling
(07:50):
is a fantastic thing,particularly when they're your
unique experiences.
Gary Pageau (07:55):
But when you come from a Outlook would say you're
more production orientated, likemany of my listeners are.
You know they run a photo lab,print shop, psp or whatever.
They may have trouble isolatingthe story right.
They just say I have thisequipment and it does these
things right and I print outthis kind of paper and I use
(08:17):
this kind of ink right, and sowhat would you suggest to
somebody in that position tolike humanize that story?
Wes Towers (08:26):
Yeah, so I mean the end client or the customer is
always interested in the outcome, so not necessarily the process
, or unless it's a DIY solution.
So then they're interested inthe step by step, but that the
outcome that people are tryingto achieve they're still
exciting.
I mean, I mentioned that it'sdifferent for a photographer
(08:47):
business, but I mentioned theplumber because we work for
construction clients mostly, buta plumber he might have a blog
post about how to.
I mentioned fixing a toilet.
He might have a blog post abouttoilets and how to fix them and
that sort of thing Incrediblyboring content unless you've got
a leaky toilet and it's causingyou massive problems then all
(09:07):
of a sudden, that content isreally valuable.
So it'll be the same in everyindustry, but photography is an
exciting field as well.
So you've got the distinctadvantage that you can show
examples, and some of theprocess might be helpful.
Some people are really they'llgeek out on process, um, and
others will just want to seewhat's the end product.
(09:29):
So by, yeah, producing massesof content within your blog or
your news or whatever the casemay be, is a great way to to
have all that, because they'llfind the piece that's
interesting to them.
Um, they're not going to readevery word on your website, for
that's for sure.
Gary Pageau (09:45):
Yeah, and probably shouldn't right.
So what are the?
I mean, I have found sort of anuptick in people like really
relying on AI generated contentfor their website because it is
so easy.
But, like you said, it's thatweird sort of phraseology.
It's that weird sort ofphraseology, sort of like a faux
(10:10):
enthusiasm.
That is just so insincere.
But if you're not a goodcopywriter and you don't have
someone handy like yourself tohelp, you know, do you say, use
that as a start and then edit itheavily, because I think that's
where a lot of people are.
Wes Towers (10:19):
Trouble is starting yeah, well, so I, I wrote a book
10 years ago now and so, um,and I'm not a writer, but I
wanted to write a book and sharesome of my thoughts and I
enjoyed it.
But everyone I spoke to in thefield so I sort of talked to a
lot of people how do youstructure a book?
How do you write a book?
I said you just got to get toyour first terrible draft, so
(10:44):
you just want to get your firstterrible draft done as quickly
as you can, all your thoughtsdumped into it, into the page.
Well, think about the AI contentas your first terrible draft.
So you've got something onpaper your thoughts and how you
get to that point.
You want to be the master ofthe AI, not the other way around
.
So what I mean by that is youwant it to be your ideas, right?
(11:06):
So even if you were to pick upyour phone, I use chativity and
speak to the phone my ideas andthey're kind of messy and not
really well articulated, butit'll start to articulate them
and put them in a sequence and astructure that just is a
refined version of my ideas, nottheir ideas, because it's just
(11:27):
generic if it's the AI being themaster and dictating what the
ideas are.
Gary Pageau (11:33):
So when you said you had a client who queried a
customer, right, how do yousuggest other people do that?
You know, talk, talk tocustomers, get feedback of
customers, because there's a lotof ways people get feedback
right now there's reviews andthings like that, but what are
some of the ways people can getmore realistic impressions from
(11:56):
their customers?
Wes Towers (11:59):
Yeah, well, this is the, I think, the exciting part
of AI forcing us to be morehuman and engage in
conversations.
It's not a linear path.
The way people find businessesI mean, even with my experience
talking to new people who makean inquiry, I always try and
find out how they found us Right.
They used to be really clear.
(12:19):
They'd say oh, we found you onGoogle, we found you on you know
, someone referred you found youon socials.
Whatever the case may be sure,now they kind of don't really
know because they've had touchpoints.
They've probably seen me onsocials, but they googled me and
they they probably chat.
You know we're talking to theirchat chpc there's.
They don't really know becausethere's just so many touch
(12:42):
points coming from all differentangles, and that's why I'm sort
of talking about searcheverywhere, optimization.
You kind of get a sense ofwhere they first found you, but
they don't really rememberbecause there have been a few
touch points in the meantime.
But I love the aspect of havingreal conversations with real
humans.
I'm a relational kind of guy.
(13:02):
So whilst I've introduced aimassively into the process of of
the business, um it's, it'sfreed up a lot of time so I can
engage with the clientele, sureto a greater level and just
build those solid umrelationships.
I think people like to buy frompeople and people that they
know like and trust, so trust.
So I think that's the real goalhumanizing your brand but
(13:26):
humanizing your business andkeeping it relational.
Gary Pageau (13:29):
I think that'll set Now you said you just came off
your best year doing this, whensome people would say that AI
was going to put you out ofbusiness.
Yeah, I know.
Is that because you took thefeedback from your evaluator
from three years ago, or whatwas the pivot point for that?
Wes Towers (13:50):
Yeah, 100%.
So he didn't tell me why hethought it was a threat or what,
but it was a real motivator tosay no, you're wrong, I'm going
to harness AI, I'm going to findout what he's talking about,
what that means, what I canintroduce without losing the
core values of the business andhow we do it.
(14:11):
So I can foresee that the way inwhich we get to the end result
may change, but the end resultwill remain the same, so the
outcome that clients are lookingfor when they come to us,
that'll remain consistent.
So we just have to stay alittle bit nimble in this time
of significant transition, whichwill I don't know how it'll
(14:33):
continue for the foreseeablefuture, but to remain solid on
the values and find thestreamlined approach with some
of this tech that's coming.
Gary Pageau (14:45):
How has your clientele changed?
Have you gotten different typesof clients since you made this
change?
How has that come about?
Wes Towers (14:53):
Yeah, I've always done websites and SEO.
I did it for a broad range ofclients.
We made the decision to nichemore closely to the construction
and trades businesses purelybecause most of our best clients
were in that field.
We still take on clientsoutside that field who were
referred to us because beenaround doing this a long time
and the similar principles applyacross industry.
(15:15):
Right, just that we've gained alot of knowledge in certain
niches.
It probably forced me to tothink about okay, what's an
ideal client look like?
How do we attract more of thatideal.
So I think if you go for the,the ideal, you'll get others by
accident anyway, and that keepslife exciting and fun and
(15:36):
different opportunities to workon different things is is
exciting to keep things fresh,and even for the team developed,
developers and and so on,keeping their lives exciting um
as well.
But yeah, if you, if you, focuson the very best, you get the
others, by accident, I think,and that's what we did.
Gary Pageau (15:54):
So, because I find that interesting?
Because, like in our industry,what you find is people are
always looking for.
You know, I want that newclientele, I want that new
market, I want the people whoaren't shopping for business.
I want to say they neglecttheir existing customers but
(16:14):
they don't optimize for them.
But I think what's going to behappening now with some of the
tools that are out there ispeople are going to be honing
more, should be honing moreclosely on their core clients
and, like you said, there'sniches within those niches,
within those areas that you canmaximize and then other people
(16:35):
will discover you.
Wes Towers (16:37):
Yeah, well, that's right.
And so the more niche you canget, the quicker you can do work
, because you know roughly whatthe end client is needing and
you've learned a few things thatare really suited to them.
But it can be boring.
So I think in creative fieldsand my field is creative too,
designing and so on, photographyis creative the people in these
(17:01):
creative industries areobviously creative people.
So, um, you got to get thatbalance right between keeping
people excited and doing freshthings and new things and so on,
but having um so that's that'sgood for the human.
Um, you know motivations right,but also the the business
aspect of systematizing things,so you get an outcome fast and
(17:22):
profitably.
You got.
There's always that tension.
Gary Pageau (17:25):
The truth in the tension, I think, is something
we we all hold in business solet's talk a little bit about,
like what people can do to growtheir business right.
So I imagine a lot of yourcompanies are fairly decent size
.
Your clients really does this,but how do you, what do you do
with a smaller company who wantsto look big, who wants to come
(17:47):
across as I wouldn't say morefull featured than they are, but
want need to tell a biggerstory?
Wes Towers (17:54):
Yeah, yeah, so we'll .
For those smaller clients,we'll sort of come alongside.
So as a big company, we'reprobably doing a lot of the
grunt work for them, using theirvoice, and tell them it's a
quick draft, but sometimes I'lljust record screen while I'm
(18:23):
doing it for them and show themexactly how I got to that point
and they use that as a tutorialto do some of it themselves and
just setting themselves up withthe tricks that streamline
things.
With the tricks that streamlinethings, there's always a risk.
There's always been the waythat tiny micro-businesses have
(18:44):
wanted to look bigger than theyare.
But I think there's a realadvantage and power in the small
micro-business because you'redealing with the founder.
So I would say use your genuinestrengths.
The client's dealing with theperson who really cares, because
it's their business.
They client's dealing with theperson who really cares because
it's their business.
They're not dealing withsomeone, some junior who's only
just come into the industry anddoesn't really want to be there.
(19:04):
So you know there's advantage,strengths and weaknesses.
Gary Pageau (19:08):
I would say zero in on what's uniquely you and
amplify that message, becauseyou'll attract the right people
that way because you'll attractthe right people that way,
because I think one of thethings businesses tend to do is
they tend to say you know, I amonly this, and they tend to be
not necessarily dismissive, butthey're almost envious of bigger
(19:30):
competitors who can do morethings right and it's like it's
okay to be just that if you'rethe best at whatever that is.
Wes Towers (19:39):
Yeah, and so niching is really powerful in that you
can be the expert in a smallniche when you're a small
company, but you can't be thebest in every field, and that's
the beauty of I mean, for my ownbusiness, we've won some
massive clients purely becausewe're really specific.
We've got a bunch of steelcompanies, yeah, like that sort
(20:01):
of in the construction field,but, um, steel companies all
around the world requesting thatwe do the website, purely
because they know we've done itbefore and we do an exceptional
job in that field.
And now we kind of understandthe industry right.
Um, if I was a generalist Iwould never have got those big
clients, because why would theychoose me?
That would be so difficult tocompete against the big guys in
(20:23):
that space.
Gary Pageau (20:24):
Right yeah, what are, like, the top three things
people should be looking forwhen they want to start a search
everywhere optimizationstrategy, like the first things
that they need to pinpoint asthe things they should
immediately fix.
Wes Towers (20:40):
Yeah, so search everywhere, optimization.
It's obviously overwhelmingbecause everywhere there's a lot
of places, right?
Gary Pageau (20:47):
Yeah, we got your YouTube, you got your social
media, you got your searchengines and all these things
yeah.
Wes Towers (20:52):
Yeah.
So you really want to focus onthe platforms that are the best
match for your industry andbrand, put most of your
attention on those importantthings.
So if it's a b2b business, thenyou probably want to be linked
in.
But if you, you know, if you'reb2c, you might be more facebook
or or the meta platforms.
(21:13):
So you put your most of yourattention on the platforms that
work best for your industry.
But you can use tools likepubbler or um lots of other
tools to to syndicate this samemessage out to multiple
platforms.
So you're streamlining processthat way.
So there's lots of platformsyou can post on, but your
website, I believe, should bethe foundation, so probably
(21:35):
number one.
You requested three.
Focus on your website becauseit's the one territory, it's
your space, you own that space.
You control all the messaging.
Everywhere else pretty much isnoisy because everyone else is
there and there's distractionand people will be looking.
Gary Pageau (21:49):
And they may even be paying more for keywords and
all these other things that canaffect search.
Wes Towers (21:54):
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
So I mean, there's so muchnoise out there online so
ideally you'll you'll attractthem out there, but but they'll
eventually come.
If some people are saying thewebsites won't be a thing
because you won't need themanymore, I don't believe that to
be true, because it's.
It's your digital shop frontstill.
(22:15):
So if people want to make atransaction or buy something,
they're going to go to aphysical.
So if people want to make atransaction or buy something,
they're going to go to aphysical shop, a physical
location, to make thetransaction, or they're going to
go to your digital shop front.
Gary Pageau (22:28):
People are really saying websites are going to go
away.
That's interesting.
Wes Towers (22:31):
Yeah, some people have said that yeah, so yeah, I
don't think so.
Gary Pageau (22:36):
I mean that seems to me like it's a little
detached from reality.
I think yeah that's right.
Wes Towers (22:42):
So I mean, there's only a lot of the younger crew
use tiktok and so on.
So you can be endlesslyscrolling and you might be
featuring on tiktok, but you'reonly there for a second, you
know.
So you've only got that uhmoment of engagement and you
can't even click through to findout more really.
Or in tiktok, some of the appand instagram, other platforms
(23:04):
you can click through but try toget your message out there as
much as you can uh in the coreareas.
So that would be so.
Number one would be website.
Number two would be gettingyour message to the platforms
that make best sense to you.
But number three would behaving a compelling message that
other people want to share.
That's the real goal.
If you're doing somethingexceptional, other people might
(23:25):
want to share it.
That's useful to to people.
So for you, you're doing apodcast that's massively
shareable because it's addingtrue value um to to lots of
people.
So people will share it becauseit's truly valuable and it's
getting your personal brand outthere and your business brand
and everything like that.
So making that content that'sshareable is a real would be the
(23:47):
third thing that I would say isreally important to be found
everywhere.
Gary Pageau (23:51):
Cool.
So where can people go for moreinformation, to learn about
what you do and to find out moregreat tips?
Wes Towers (24:00):
yes, well, the our website.
No, I just said website themost important website is a good
place, wouldn't it?
yeah, yeah, so, and from fromthe website uplift360.comau.
We're australian, so dot au isthe best place, and you can find
social media platforms as well,uh, in in the at the bottom of
the website.
So, and even my link, personallinkedin, is on the, the links
(24:22):
there, so I connect with anyoneif anyone reaches out.
Uh, so you can.
You can book a meeting with meif you want to, on the on the
website, uh, or you can connecton the social platforms.
That'd be great sounds goodlisten.
Gary Pageau (24:35):
It's great to uh talk with you.
Thanks for your time and yourexpertise.
I learned a couple things Ididn't realize.
Websites are going away, so Ibetter find something else.
Anyway.
Erin Manning (24:47):
I'll talk to you.
Gary Pageau (24:48):
Thank you very much .
Talk to you later.
Thanks, Gary.
Erin Manning (24:52):
Thank you for listening to the Dead Pixel
Society podcast.
Read more great stories andsign up for the newsletter at
wwwthedeadpixelssocietycom.
Welcome to the Dead Pixels Society podcast, the
photo imaging industry'sleading news source.
Here's your host, Gary Pageau.
The Dead Pixels Society podcastis brought to you by Mediaclip,
Advertek Printing andIndependent Photo Imagers.
Gary Pageau (00:17):
Hello again, and welcome to the Dead Pixels
Society podcast.
I'm your host, Gary Pageau, andtoday we're joined by Wes
Towers, who's coming to us fromMelbourne, Australia.
Wes is the founder of Uplift360, where he's going to give us
practical business tips and SEOand getting your business found.
Hey, Wes, how are you today?
Wes Towers (00:40):
Really well, Gary.
Nice and early start.
For me, it's my start of theday and your end of the day, so
coming to you from the future,there you go.
Gary Pageau (00:50):
So you've got a very different background than
most of my audience and you camefrom the construction industry
and, as we were talking beforethe show, we're kind of saying
how do we make that relate?
But actually it directlyrelates, because you were
wrestling with AI a few yearsago and its impact on your
business.
Can you talk a little bit aboutthat?
Wes Towers (01:11):
Yeah, so we do websites and SEO for the
construction trades andconstruction.
We call them tradies here inAustralia.
But I got a business valuationthree years ago so it came back
a rude shock to me.
So it was far lower than Ianticipated and the in the, the
massive report that the evaluergave me, he said AI was a
(01:31):
massive threat to my entireindustry.
And it was three years ago, soit was pretty early days with
everyone just sort of realizinghey, this could transform a lot
of businesses and so the valuecame down.
So it was a real kick in theteeth really, to say my business
wasn't worth anywhere near whatI thought it was, but it was
the catalyst in a lot of ways tostart transforming my business
(01:53):
and introducing AI.
So what I did was took thetools and technologies and
implemented some of them into mybusiness and just had the most
profitable year ever, sotransforming the business in
that way.
So took the threat as anopportunity and things are going
really well now.
But things are changing all thetime.
So it's an exciting andterrifying time to be in
(02:15):
business.
Gary Pageau (02:17):
So I mean, I think my audience will be able to tell
you hey, I know how AI is goingto affect my business with
generative AI and things likethat, but how was AI going to
affect your business or in yourindustry?
Wes Towers (02:30):
Yeah, well, the valuer didn't put much detail on
precisely what he thought wasgoing to happen, only the point
that he didn't know what wasgoing to happen and I suppose
everyone was kind of talking thefirst sort of jobs that might
go, your programming tech jobs,because you know, AI can do that
really really well.
(02:51):
It can do content writing, Idon't.
It can do content writing.
I don't know whether it's goodor bad something.
It depends on how you prompt it.
Yeah, um, but the programmingit's doing really well and that
was foreseen a long time ago.
You know three years ago.
A was foreseen a long time ago,you know three years ago.
A lot that's a long time agoexactly, yeah he was right.
he was right in a lot of ways.
(03:11):
If I had stayed doing what Iwas doing the same way, probably
eventually I'd be maderedundant.
So some of the things like, asI said you mentioned before, we
do seos but we're calling itsearch everywhere, optimization,
because it's a different beastnow I think you had a SEO guy on
recently and touched on some AIbut people are just searching
(03:32):
in whole new ways.
That may mean for me, I jump onchat, gpt if I'm researching
something and I talk to my phoneand we're searching in full
sentences because we know thetools and technology understand
full sentences.
We're not just searchingplumber Melbourne, we're
searching for I want a plumberwho can fix a toilet that's
leaking.
This is the brand.
How do I do it?
(03:52):
If I can't do it, who's thebest person to come in and fix
it?
Those sorts of things.
So whole conversational, whichis exciting.
It's almost making us morehuman, humanizing us.
Exciting, it's almost making usmore human, humanizing us.
We've got to think aboutconversations rather than just
keyword phrases and shoving theminto your website, you know so
you know, that's interestingbecause I think I think people
(04:13):
were kind of trained to search,almost thinking about keywords.
Gary Pageau (04:17):
Right, I want to search for a photo book, the
hardcover, and they're searchingfor keywords as opposed to,
like you said, more of aconversational aspect of that
yeah, 100.
Wes Towers (04:31):
So back in the day you used to do a lot of research
to find the keywords thatpeople are most searching for.
And then you would, you wouldtarget those keywords and you
would track them and you wouldsay where you're going, where
you're ranking in Google andyou'd give a report to the
client and they'd be happy ifthe rankings were improving and
the traffic was improving andall that sort of stuff.
But everyone's traffic isdropping and you're not
(04:53):
necessarily getting clicks forthe phrases.
And the phrases are completelydifferent.
They're not just your keyword,your traditional keyword,
they're full sentences soincredibly hard to track and
measure.
I mean, I had a client two weeksago now.
He found out by accident.
Well, he found out because hehe spoke to the client and said,
hey, how did you find?
How did you find us?
(05:14):
And I said we, we found you onchat gbt.
We were searching for the verybest service offering.
Uh, in in australia.
This was a, this is a client.
Uh, a long, a long way.
It's about a two hour flight,two, two or three-hour flight,
so not even the local business,but they wanted the very best in
Australia.
And he came up in ChatGPTbecause you know the search
everywhere optimization strategy.
(05:36):
But for us we couldn't reallymeasure that, only that he spoke
to the client, so yeah, that'sinteresting.
Gary Pageau (05:44):
So when you mean by search everywhere, I mean, as
we've been talking to variouspeople about SEO we are finding
that Google is becoming lessrelevant and it's impacting what
they're doing.
Of course, they've got Geminiand they're trying different
things.
How do you optimize then for AIsearch?
Wes Towers (06:04):
Yeah, the good news is, the similar strategies work
for your traditional SEO, as dothe AI showing up in the large
language models.
You want quality content.
You want a website that's builtso it's fast loading and the
tech is all.
The foundational aspects arestrong, that's the obvious, but
the message is the key.
(06:25):
So, and there's a couple ofaspects to consider when you're
thinking about your message.
So it's your voice, so how yousay, say what you're saying, but
also your message, and both ofthese things have to be uniquely
yours.
And that's where a lot of peopleare going wrong.
They're just jumping on theirpreferred AI platform and they
realize that they've got topublish content to be found, so
(06:46):
they just go straight to thetool and they let the tool
dictate what the content is.
That the message and the voice,and it's just generic, it's
just the average of whateverybody else is saying.
But none of us want to beaverage.
We want to be exceptional inour field.
So you've really got to beddown your style guide of exactly
how you write your content ifyou are using these tools.
(07:07):
Right, your own voice, and butyou let your own language, the
particular phrases of how youtalk, um, but your unique
message and so whatever thatunique aspect is to your
business and that what humanizesyour business effectively, your
your unique thoughts andfeelings and those human
elements, what they mean asprompts.
(07:29):
Build a really strong, solidstyle guide.
Produce the content that way asa first draft, because you
still got to check it, becauseit might get even with those
really solid foundations youstill might get it wrong.
And you got to massage in yourcase studies and anything that
is information gain that you canadd value that no one else can.
So your unique case studies orexamples or stories Storytelling
(07:50):
is a fantastic thing,particularly when they're your
unique experiences.
Gary Pageau (07:55):
But when you come from a Outlook would say you're
more production orientated, likemany of my listeners are.
You know they run a photo lab,print shop, psp or whatever.
They may have trouble isolatingthe story right.
They just say I have thisequipment and it does these
things right and I print outthis kind of paper and I use
(08:17):
this kind of ink right, and sowhat would you suggest to
somebody in that position tolike humanize that story?
Wes Towers (08:26):
Yeah, so I mean the end client or the customer is
always interested in the outcome, so not necessarily the process
, or unless it's a DIY solution.
So then they're interested inthe step by step, but that the
outcome that people are tryingto achieve they're still
exciting.
I mean, I mentioned that it'sdifferent for a photographer
(08:47):
business, but I mentioned theplumber because we work for
construction clients mostly, buta plumber he might have a blog
post about how to.
I mentioned fixing a toilet.
He might have a blog post abouttoilets and how to fix them and
that sort of thing Incrediblyboring content unless you've got
a leaky toilet and it's causingyou massive problems then all
(09:07):
of a sudden, that content isreally valuable.
So it'll be the same in everyindustry, but photography is an
exciting field as well.
So you've got the distinctadvantage that you can show
examples, and some of theprocess might be helpful.
Some people are really they'llgeek out on process, um, and
others will just want to seewhat's the end product.
(09:29):
So by, yeah, producing massesof content within your blog or
your news or whatever the casemay be, is a great way to to
have all that, because they'llfind the piece that's
interesting to them.
Um, they're not going to readevery word on your website, for
that's for sure.
Gary Pageau (09:45):
Yeah, and probably shouldn't right.
So what are the?
I mean, I have found sort of anuptick in people like really
relying on AI generated contentfor their website because it is
so easy.
But, like you said, it's thatweird sort of phraseology.
It's that weird sort ofphraseology, sort of like a faux
(10:10):
enthusiasm.
That is just so insincere.
But if you're not a goodcopywriter and you don't have
someone handy like yourself tohelp, you know, do you say, use
that as a start and then edit itheavily, because I think that's
where a lot of people are.
Wes Towers (10:19):
Trouble is starting yeah, well, so I, I wrote a book
10 years ago now and so, um,and I'm not a writer, but I
wanted to write a book and sharesome of my thoughts and I
enjoyed it.
But everyone I spoke to in thefield so I sort of talked to a
lot of people how do youstructure a book?
How do you write a book?
I said you just got to get toyour first terrible draft, so
(10:44):
you just want to get your firstterrible draft done as quickly
as you can, all your thoughtsdumped into it, into the page.
Well, think about the AI contentas your first terrible draft.
So you've got something onpaper your thoughts and how you
get to that point.
You want to be the master ofthe AI, not the other way around
.
So what I mean by that is youwant it to be your ideas, right?
(11:06):
So even if you were to pick upyour phone, I use chativity and
speak to the phone my ideas andthey're kind of messy and not
really well articulated, butit'll start to articulate them
and put them in a sequence and astructure that just is a
refined version of my ideas, nottheir ideas, because it's just
(11:27):
generic if it's the AI being themaster and dictating what the
ideas are.
Gary Pageau (11:33):
So when you said you had a client who queried a
customer, right, how do yousuggest other people do that?
You know, talk, talk tocustomers, get feedback of
customers, because there's a lotof ways people get feedback
right now there's reviews andthings like that, but what are
some of the ways people can getmore realistic impressions from
(11:56):
their customers?
Wes Towers (11:59):
Yeah, well, this is the, I think, the exciting part
of AI forcing us to be morehuman and engage in
conversations.
It's not a linear path.
The way people find businessesI mean, even with my experience
talking to new people who makean inquiry, I always try and
find out how they found us Right.
They used to be really clear.
(12:19):
They'd say oh, we found you onGoogle, we found you on you know
, someone referred you found youon socials.
Whatever the case may be sure,now they kind of don't really
know because they've had touchpoints.
They've probably seen me onsocials, but they googled me and
they they probably chat.
You know we're talking to theirchat chpc there's.
They don't really know becausethere's just so many touch
(12:42):
points coming from all differentangles, and that's why I'm sort
of talking about searcheverywhere, optimization.
You kind of get a sense ofwhere they first found you, but
they don't really rememberbecause there have been a few
touch points in the meantime.
But I love the aspect of havingreal conversations with real
humans.
I'm a relational kind of guy.
(13:02):
So whilst I've introduced aimassively into the process of of
the business, um it's, it'sfreed up a lot of time so I can
engage with the clientele, sureto a greater level and just
build those solid umrelationships.
I think people like to buy frompeople and people that they
know like and trust, so trust.
So I think that's the real goalhumanizing your brand but
(13:26):
humanizing your business andkeeping it relational.
Gary Pageau (13:29):
I think that'll set Now you said you just came off
your best year doing this, whensome people would say that AI
was going to put you out ofbusiness.
Yeah, I know.
Is that because you took thefeedback from your evaluator
from three years ago, or whatwas the pivot point for that?
Wes Towers (13:50):
Yeah, 100%.
So he didn't tell me why hethought it was a threat or what,
but it was a real motivator tosay no, you're wrong, I'm going
to harness AI, I'm going to findout what he's talking about,
what that means, what I canintroduce without losing the
core values of the business andhow we do it.
(14:11):
So I can foresee that the way inwhich we get to the end result
may change, but the end resultwill remain the same, so the
outcome that clients are lookingfor when they come to us,
that'll remain consistent.
So we just have to stay alittle bit nimble in this time
of significant transition, whichwill I don't know how it'll
(14:33):
continue for the foreseeablefuture, but to remain solid on
the values and find thestreamlined approach with some
of this tech that's coming.
Gary Pageau (14:45):
How has your clientele changed?
Have you gotten different typesof clients since you made this
change?
How has that come about?
Wes Towers (14:53):
Yeah, I've always done websites and SEO.
I did it for a broad range ofclients.
We made the decision to nichemore closely to the construction
and trades businesses purelybecause most of our best clients
were in that field.
We still take on clientsoutside that field who were
referred to us because beenaround doing this a long time
and the similar principles applyacross industry.
(15:15):
Right, just that we've gained alot of knowledge in certain
niches.
It probably forced me to tothink about okay, what's an
ideal client look like?
How do we attract more of thatideal.
So I think if you go for the,the ideal, you'll get others by
accident anyway, and that keepslife exciting and fun and
(15:36):
different opportunities to workon different things is is
exciting to keep things fresh,and even for the team developed,
developers and and so on,keeping their lives exciting um
as well.
But yeah, if you, if you, focuson the very best, you get the
others, by accident, I think,and that's what we did.
Gary Pageau (15:54):
So, because I find that interesting?
Because, like in our industry,what you find is people are
always looking for.
You know, I want that newclientele, I want that new
market, I want the people whoaren't shopping for business.
I want to say they neglecttheir existing customers but
(16:14):
they don't optimize for them.
But I think what's going to behappening now with some of the
tools that are out there ispeople are going to be honing
more, should be honing moreclosely on their core clients
and, like you said, there'sniches within those niches,
within those areas that you canmaximize and then other people
(16:35):
will discover you.
Wes Towers (16:37):
Yeah, well, that's right.
And so the more niche you canget, the quicker you can do work
, because you know roughly whatthe end client is needing and
you've learned a few things thatare really suited to them.
But it can be boring.
So I think in creative fieldsand my field is creative too,
designing and so on, photographyis creative the people in these
(17:01):
creative industries areobviously creative people.
So, um, you got to get thatbalance right between keeping
people excited and doing freshthings and new things and so on,
but having um so that's that'sgood for the human.
Um, you know motivations right,but also the the business
aspect of systematizing things,so you get an outcome fast and
(17:22):
profitably.
You got.
There's always that tension.
Gary Pageau (17:25):
The truth in the tension, I think, is something
we we all hold in business solet's talk a little bit about,
like what people can do to growtheir business right.
So I imagine a lot of yourcompanies are fairly decent size
.
Your clients really does this,but how do you, what do you do
with a smaller company who wantsto look big, who wants to come
(17:47):
across as I wouldn't say morefull featured than they are, but
want need to tell a biggerstory?
Wes Towers (17:54):
Yeah, yeah, so we'll .
For those smaller clients,we'll sort of come alongside.
So as a big company, we'reprobably doing a lot of the
grunt work for them, using theirvoice, and tell them it's a
quick draft, but sometimes I'lljust record screen while I'm
(18:23):
doing it for them and show themexactly how I got to that point
and they use that as a tutorialto do some of it themselves and
just setting themselves up withthe tricks that streamline
things.
With the tricks that streamlinethings, there's always a risk.
There's always been the waythat tiny micro-businesses have
(18:44):
wanted to look bigger than theyare.
But I think there's a realadvantage and power in the small
micro-business because you'redealing with the founder.
So I would say use your genuinestrengths.
The client's dealing with theperson who really cares, because
it's their business.
They client's dealing with theperson who really cares because
it's their business.
They're not dealing withsomeone, some junior who's only
just come into the industry anddoesn't really want to be there.
(19:04):
So you know there's advantage,strengths and weaknesses.
Gary Pageau (19:08):
I would say zero in on what's uniquely you and
amplify that message, becauseyou'll attract the right people
that way because you'll attractthe right people that way,
because I think one of thethings businesses tend to do is
they tend to say you know, I amonly this, and they tend to be
not necessarily dismissive, butthey're almost envious of bigger
(19:30):
competitors who can do morethings right and it's like it's
okay to be just that if you'rethe best at whatever that is.
Wes Towers (19:39):
Yeah, and so niching is really powerful in that you
can be the expert in a smallniche when you're a small
company, but you can't be thebest in every field, and that's
the beauty of I mean, for my ownbusiness, we've won some
massive clients purely becausewe're really specific.
We've got a bunch of steelcompanies, yeah, like that sort
(20:01):
of in the construction field,but, um, steel companies all
around the world requesting thatwe do the website, purely
because they know we've done itbefore and we do an exceptional
job in that field.
And now we kind of understandthe industry right.
Um, if I was a generalist Iwould never have got those big
clients, because why would theychoose me?
That would be so difficult tocompete against the big guys in
(20:23):
that space.
Gary Pageau (20:24):
Right yeah, what are, like, the top three things
people should be looking forwhen they want to start a search
everywhere optimizationstrategy, like the first things
that they need to pinpoint asthe things they should
immediately fix.
Wes Towers (20:40):
Yeah, so search everywhere, optimization.
It's obviously overwhelmingbecause everywhere there's a lot
of places, right?
Gary Pageau (20:47):
Yeah, we got your YouTube, you got your social
media, you got your searchengines and all these things
yeah.
Wes Towers (20:52):
Yeah.
So you really want to focus onthe platforms that are the best
match for your industry andbrand, put most of your
attention on those importantthings.
So if it's a b2b business, thenyou probably want to be linked
in.
But if you, you know, if you'reb2c, you might be more facebook
or or the meta platforms.
(21:13):
So you put your most of yourattention on the platforms that
work best for your industry.
But you can use tools likepubbler or um lots of other
tools to to syndicate this samemessage out to multiple
platforms.
So you're streamlining processthat way.
So there's lots of platformsyou can post on, but your
website, I believe, should bethe foundation, so probably
(21:35):
number one.
You requested three.
Focus on your website becauseit's the one territory, it's
your space, you own that space.
You control all the messaging.
Everywhere else pretty much isnoisy because everyone else is
there and there's distractionand people will be looking.
Gary Pageau (21:49):
And they may even be paying more for keywords and
all these other things that canaffect search.
Wes Towers (21:54):
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
So I mean, there's so muchnoise out there online so
ideally you'll you'll attractthem out there, but but they'll
eventually come.
If some people are saying thewebsites won't be a thing
because you won't need themanymore, I don't believe that to
be true, because it's.
It's your digital shop frontstill.
(22:15):
So if people want to make atransaction or buy something,
they're going to go to aphysical.
So if people want to make atransaction or buy something,
they're going to go to aphysical shop, a physical
location, to make thetransaction, or they're going to
go to your digital shop front.
Gary Pageau (22:28):
People are really saying websites are going to go
away.
That's interesting.
Wes Towers (22:31):
Yeah, some people have said that yeah, so yeah, I
don't think so.
Gary Pageau (22:36):
I mean that seems to me like it's a little
detached from reality.
I think yeah that's right.
Wes Towers (22:42):
So I mean, there's only a lot of the younger crew
use tiktok and so on.
So you can be endlesslyscrolling and you might be
featuring on tiktok, but you'reonly there for a second, you
know.
So you've only got that uhmoment of engagement and you
can't even click through to findout more really.
Or in tiktok, some of the appand instagram, other platforms
(23:04):
you can click through but try toget your message out there as
much as you can uh in the coreareas.
So that would be so.
Number one would be website.
Number two would be gettingyour message to the platforms
that make best sense to you.
But number three would behaving a compelling message that
other people want to share.
That's the real goal.
If you're doing somethingexceptional, other people might
(23:25):
want to share it.
That's useful to to people.
So for you, you're doing apodcast that's massively
shareable because it's addingtrue value um to to lots of
people.
So people will share it becauseit's truly valuable and it's
getting your personal brand outthere and your business brand
and everything like that.
So making that content that'sshareable is a real would be the
(23:47):
third thing that I would say isreally important to be found
everywhere.
Gary Pageau (23:51):
Cool.
So where can people go for moreinformation, to learn about
what you do and to find out moregreat tips?
Wes Towers (24:00):
yes, well, the our website.
No, I just said website themost important website is a good
place, wouldn't it?
yeah, yeah, so, and from fromthe website uplift360.comau.
We're australian, so dot au isthe best place, and you can find
social media platforms as well,uh, in in the at the bottom of
the website.
So, and even my link, personallinkedin, is on the, the links
(24:22):
there, so I connect with anyoneif anyone reaches out.
Uh, so you can.
You can book a meeting with meif you want to, on the on the
website, uh, or you can connecton the social platforms.
That'd be great sounds goodlisten.
Gary Pageau (24:35):
It's great to uh talk with you.
Thanks for your time and yourexpertise.
I learned a couple things Ididn't realize.
Websites are going away, so Ibetter find something else.
Anyway.
Erin Manning (24:47):
I'll talk to you.
Gary Pageau (24:48):
Thank you very much .
Talk to you later.
Thanks, Gary.
Erin Manning (24:52):
Thank you for listening to the Dead Pixel
Society podcast.
Read more great stories andsign up for the newsletter at
wwwthedeadpixelssocietycom.
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