Meredith's Husband: 0:24

So there's this really interesting phenomenon that I've seen over the course of my two decades in working at websites and SEO.

Meredith: 0:34

More people asking for the universe to help them.

Meredith's Husband: 0:37

How did you come up with that?

Meredith: 0:39

I don't know. That just seems to be over the past 20 years people have been like just let the universe take care of it, holy shit.

Meredith's Husband: 0:46

That's one of the things I'm going to talk about today.

Meredith: 0:47

No, it's not. Yes, it is no way. Yes, it is no way. Yes, it is. No, it's not, yes, it is. It's right in front of my face on my notes. No, show it to me.

Meredith's Husband: 0:55

I will Okay when I get home. It's right here. Don't believe it. Intro phenomenon universe. No, yeah, no hey let's get back to the episode.

Meredith's Husband: 1:08

So this interesting phenomenon is whenever you start or I don't want to say whenever, I feel like it's happened hundreds of times, probably not hundreds, it's probably dozens of times, but it feels like perhaps more than half the time. When you start a new project, there's stuff you do in the very beginning and then the client comes back, like within a month or a few weeks, and says, oh, we can see a change, it's already working. And sure enough, I go and I look at the metrics and yeah, there's an increase in whatever the traffic, the conversions. It usually means they're getting more leads or they're making more sales, and I can verify that by looking at the data.

Meredith's Husband: 1:42

The problem is, I know for a fact that what we have done did not result in that increase. There is absolutely no way. So it's just a fluke, that the timing seems to coincide with. We start some activity, some good results happen, but there is no cause and effect. Really, I guarantee you Now, I used to like not take credit, but when people would say that, it'd be like yeah, I'm good, I'm glad it's working, but nowadays I say, you know, there's nothing we've done that is causing that yet that's a fluke.

Meredith's Husband: 2:14

Because what happens is when there is that fluke and there is a spike, there's an increase in the leads, then it's going to come down. You know it's not the new norm. So then what happens? If I take credit for it, then I also have to take credit for the fact that it falls off. So I'm very yeah, I try to be very honest, just in all cases anyway. You do, but it's much better to manage expectations than it is to try to take credit for a win when you have it.

Meredith's Husband: 2:41

Anyway. So here we go. Yes, my husband One person has described this to me is oh, it's the universe. You just do something, you put something out there in the universe and it comes back to you and literally, that is in my notes.

Meredith: 2:56

I can't. You've never talked about this.

Meredith's Husband: 2:59

No, why would I? Because I don't really. I don't like that saying I agree.

Meredith: 3:04

I feel like we, of all the things that the universe has to deal with, me getting this client not important, Really not on the list.

Meredith's Husband: 3:15

Well, I think about it a little differently. Of course, the way I think about it makes sense. What? I'm not opposed to the concept of that sort of thing, but it's that phrasing. Because that phrasing it's to me it seems like a lot of pressure to the universe no to me, because it's I mean what?

Meredith's Husband: 3:35

what exactly is it to put something into the universe? Is it thinking about something? I, I think it is. If you think about something, you have essentially put it into the universe well, I think once there is such a thing like and accountability.

Meredith: 3:47

Once I remember in college I would say to a friend I'd like to travel to so-and-so, and they're like you should do it, and I said I'm going to, and then I actually do it.

Meredith's Husband: 4:00

That's actually a somewhat applicable story, hey come on now. I was ready to go completely off the rails. And doesn't it make sense? But back to my point about putting things out there, just putting thoughts out there. To me, if I'm thinking something, I'm putting it into, it's already in the universe. If it's occurring to you, it's already exactly, so that's very well thought out. I don't, I don't think about it in those terms, but what I do think about and this is gonna this goes back to my college, maybe even high school physics courses.

Meredith's Husband: 4:47

Newton's first law of motion.

Meredith: 4:49

Yes, yeah, yes, newton's first law of motion.

Meredith's Husband: 4:54

Do you want to remind all of?

Meredith: 4:56

us what Newton's. No, you know what I'm going to gift you. All right, I'm going to put it out to the universe that you should.

Meredith's Husband: 5:02

Newton's first law of motion says that an object at rest tends to stay at rest unless it's acted upon by an outside force and an object in Okay. So the way I think about that in terms of or in place of putting things into the universe, is you start to do something, you put your website marketing in motion. It has momentum. So to me that is kind of like yes, we are starting some marketing work on our website.

Meredith's Husband: 5:36

And then, lo and behold, they start getting more leads. But it wasn't that our marketing work yet created those leads. It's the object in motion tends to stay in motion. That's how I look at it. That's how I make sense of this, because I have no better explanation for this phenomenon Makes no sense to me. So what I thought is I would give you a few things that you can do that would be relatively easy to do and hopefully have some impact, but just to get you in motion If you're in any sort of stuck space or you're not sure what to do. If you want to create some of that momentum, do a little experiment.

Meredith's Husband: 7:10

See if Sir Isaac Newton's first law of motion applies to website marketing. I thought that was funny, not funny. Okay, things you can do, number one yes.

Meredith's Husband: 7:23

Your Google business profile. Yes, these things we've talked about before here on the podcast. I talk about them in workshops. Just spend up to an hour on any of these. It doesn't need to be an hour, it could take less. Just work to do something to improve your Google business profile. Your Google business profile. I can tell by the look on your face. You don't know what I'm talking about.

Meredith: 7:44

No, I do. It's the thing that has the reviews.

Meredith's Husband: 7:48

Yes, Come on now. It is the knowledge panel. It is the right-hand half of the page of Google. If you do a search for your business name, you should hopefully see some stuff over there. My advice when I say improve that, because that's pretty vague advice I was going to.

Meredith's Husband: 8:06

Just try to think of that like a little mini website of its own On that right-hand side. That's a little mini site that you can control. You can make sure all your business hours and address and phone number are listed. Make sure your products and your services are listed.

Meredith: 8:22

And updated.

Meredith's Husband: 8:24

If they need to be updated. Yeah, don't put old stuff on there. Add images. Just think of it like you would think of a website. You want to make it look good, Right? Okay, that's one thing.

Meredith: 8:33

Kind of dust it off.

Meredith's Husband: 8:34

Yeah, Dust off your resume, essentially kind of Just put it into the universe.

Meredith: 8:40

That's one thing you can do.

Meredith's Husband: 8:41

that is just. It's good for SEO, it's good, it's really good to do that and try to improve this. Also, it's not a difficult way to just oh, I'm going to spend a half an hour just devoting it yeah.

Meredith's Husband: 8:52

Just use common sense. What looks better? Yeah, something else you can do. Yes, same thing with your CTA, your call to action, your buttons, whatever you have on your website. Yes, test out some variants. So if you, if on your call to action button say you have, you know book, now try schedule a call, or try let's chat, or, you know, try whatever you feel is appropriate, yeah, test it out a little bit and make sure it's consistent. Don't do it just on one button.

Meredith's Husband: 9:23

Make sure those buttons are consistent. So try it out. Professional marketers do this all the time. There are people whose entire profession is optimizing your call to action and doing things like this, running little tests. So this is not an insignificant thing. Right and again, pretty easy to do? Yeah, I think so. Number three yes, blogging. If you're stuck with blogging, or you haven't blogged or you want to, you know your blogging needs like a little kick in the ass yeah.

Meredith's Husband: 9:51

Like maybe mine does sometimes. What I find is a good way to get that initial momentum go back and look at an old blog, pick an old blog that's preferably doing well and same thing, improve it. Just make it better, expand on it. Look at it as a user and just look at it and say what would make this more helpful to me if I were reading this. You know it could be something like adding business hours for a restaurant you recommended or giving an address of a park you talk about or anything. Just make it more helpful.

Meredith's Husband: 10:23

The best way if you want to get the most bang for your buck out of this approach go to Google Search Console and look to see what blogs are already doing well and pick one of those. Pick a blog that is getting more impressions than the others.

Meredith: 10:40

Here's an impression, yeah.

Meredith's Husband: 10:43

That means Google likes it, and if you make it better, Google's going to like it a little bit more. You're going to get more distance out of that than if you try to redo a blog that Google doesn't like. Say that is not getting any impressions, Okay. So those are the three things I think are all pretty easy, yeah.

Meredith: 10:59

Would you agree? Yes, I agree.

Meredith's Husband: 11:02

And I would say these are not things that are going to take a week.

Meredith: 11:06

No.

Meredith's Husband: 11:06

I don't spend more than an hour on any of these.

Meredith: 11:08

You end up to an hour?

Meredith's Husband: 11:09

not, but you could also spend 20, 30 minutes.

Meredith: 11:12

Sure, you can Do one of those.

Meredith's Husband: 11:14

And just see what happens over the next month, see if Sir Isaac Newton was right, these wonderful desserts. And if you want more guidance or suggestions on deeper suggestions on these or any others, follow the link below and you can ask a question. You can submit a question. You'll need to create an account. It's not just public on the web, but it's free.

Meredith: 11:35

Excellent.

Meredith's Husband: 11:37

I never know what you're talking about. Like, if I'm talking and you're whispering under my voice I'm always like what the fuck is she saying? I hope she's not telling people to do something stupid.

Meredith: 11:49

I would never say anything stupid.

Meredith's Husband: 11:52

I get to check it out when I edit these episodes and I turn my. I put my track on mute and Meredith is usually talking about ice cream.

Meredith: 12:03

That's exactly what I'm thinking about right now. Ice cream. I just made a faux ice cream with vegan yogurt and strawberry.

Meredith's Husband: 12:11

Oh, that sounds delicious. Is there any left? Can you leave it out for me?

Meredith: 12:16

That was my healthy substitution for Van Leeuwen's strawberry shortcake vegan. Okay.