First things first - User-first SEO

Mordy Oberstein:

It's the new wave of SEO podcasting. Welcome to SERP’s Up. Aloha, mahalo for joining the SERP’s Up podcast. We're pushing out groovy new insights around what's happening in SEO. I'm Mordy Oberstein, head of SEO branding at Wix. And I'm joined by the one, the only, the head of SEO communications at Wix, Crystal Carter. What's up, Crystal?

Crystal Carter:

Hello, good people of the internet. Hello. Many things are up. Things are up.

Mordy Oberstein:

Hopefully your rankings are up. Dad joke/SEO joke.

Crystal Carter:

We want all green arrows, every time.

Mordy Oberstein:

Someone was telling me that, because we're in the middle of, as we're recording this, some fluctuations on the SERP, and their boss was asking about, "Oh, why did our rankings on page two go down?" And they're like, "Why do we care?"

Crystal Carter:

Right.

Mordy Oberstein:

We went from page two to page three, whatever shall we do?

Crystal Carter:

How come no one's coming to my MySpace page? Because what?

Mordy Oberstein:

Oh boy.

Crystal Carter:

Don't worry. Pick your battles there.

Mordy Oberstein:

Bigger fish to fry. Or if you don't like frying fish, bigger fish to bake.

Crystal Carter:

This is true. You could bake it.

Mordy Oberstein:

I like fish baked more than I like it fried. Anyway, the SERP’s Up podcast is brought to you by Wix, where you can empower your [SEO] content strategy with the power of Semrush directly inside of the Wix platform. It's all part of Wix's SEO set up checklist, research keywords and topics, along with metrics such as search volume, keyword difficulty, and even user intent with our Semrush integration. It's like my two worlds combined with that one. So on today's show, geez, Crystal, we better make sure the bots are happy, happy, happy, right?

Crystal Carter:

S-bots must be very happy.

Mordy Oberstein:

But wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.

Crystal Carter:

Bots have happy.

Mordy Oberstein:

Do bots, or search engines, do they pay you money?

Crystal Carter:

No. No. I've asked.

Mordy Oberstein:

But I do not get a positive response, because guess what? People, people pay you money. But if I worry about the people, who will worry about the bots? Don't worry, Optimus Prime will. He's their father. Anyway. But if you're worrying about not worrying about the bots, fear not fair SEO for thou art in great luck, for the days of user first SEO are not just nigh, they are upon thee. That is correct. Today we are talking about why worrying about the user and not the bot, believe it or not, is actually good for the bots. That was circular. But who would've thunk.

From the research phase to how the Google algorithm is structured, we're diving into why user first SEO matters, with tips of the trade from SEO's own John Bonham, Little Zeppelin reference for you there. Michel Fortin will stop by and share some of his tips with you. We'll also sit down with Wix's own SEO product manager, Einat Hoobian-Seybold, to talk about her approach to putting users first and how that plays out in SEO product development. And of course, we have the snappiest of news for you and who you should be following. Actually a bonus, two people who you should be following on social for SEO awesomeness. Let's let the good times roll, as episode eight of the SERP’s Up podcast is on.

Crystal Carter:

It's on.

Mordy Oberstein:

It's on. I almost feel like breaking to song, let the good times roll.

Crystal Carter:

You bet. This is a very musical introduction there, Mordy, with the John Bonham there.

Mordy Oberstein:

Totally by accident. Totally by accident. Michel Fortin, by the way, plays the drums and he's awesome, and he's going to stop by.

Crystal Carter:

He's a really good drummer. He's got his drumming on his website and it's exceptional. He's a very funky drummer. He's a very good drummer.

Mordy Oberstein:

It's awesome. And he's an awesome SEO who talks a lot about user first SEO, so it's completely makes so much sense.

Crystal Carter:

I know.

Mordy Oberstein:

Speaking of user first SEO, Crystal, what are we talking about, user first SEO?

Crystal Carter:

Yeah, so the thing about user first SEO, one of the reasons why we're talking about this, one of the reasons why it's a little bit of a hot topic is because with their recent algorithm update, Google's announced that they are sort of encouraging or incentivizing people to be creating content. Specifically, they said, "Create content for people, not search engines." Who'd have thunk it?

Mordy Oberstein:

Who would've thunk that? That's crazy talk.

Crystal Carter:

Right. In their documentation, they say that the goal is to make sure that when users visit the site, they can find original, helpful content written by people for people, and that it has a satisfying user experience for site visitors. Now, the thing about this is that this is essentially user first content. This is content that is thinking about what the user wants, not necessarily thinking about what hacks, what gimmicks you can use to get to the top of the SERP, but rather thinking about something that's actually made for humans. And this follows on from some of the updates that Google updated in the past, like the Panda update, which really rocked this SEO landscape because it was talking about reducing black hat SEO techniques and reducing the prevalence of that information in the SERP. And when I say SERP, I mean search engine result pages.

And what that means is that when people go to Google, they can actually achieve their goals, because I think what people forget sometimes is we think that Google and SEO is about websites, and it pretty much is, but if you go to Google's page how Search works, they explained that their goal is to provide information. They don't say that their goal is to drive traffic to websites. They say their goal is to provide information. And so, this kind of algorithm update, like Panda before it, is the kind that makes sure that they're providing high quality information for people that visit Google. And in order to make it high quality, you need to put the user first. So content creators who do this, and you'll know these content creators when you find them, whether it's on a website or whether it's on YouTube or whether it's on any other platform, they're very clear to address their user's needs.

So they'll say, "A lot of people have asked me about this topic and I want to talk about it now." Or they'll share content that people that users have requested. So this is something that Google themselves do. They have a series called Ask Google Bot. And John Mueller will say, "Mordy Oberstein asked me this question on Twitter and I'm answering it here." And there's YouTube channels that I follow where they'll say, "What do you want me to cover next?" And the users will say that and they will cover that for them. They'll test content with their users before publishing it. So Instagram, good Instagramers will do a story and they'll see who replies to it and what kinds of things people are interested in, and then they'll do a longer post later on. There's lots of different techniques that you could do, but putting your user first is really important.

And it's something that Google's laid out in a lot of different documentation. The information about the helpful content update from Google is very, very clear with information around that. And also, if you want to do a really deep dive, you can have a look at something called the Quality Rater Guidelines, which is the documentation that Google gives to their team, to their humans and their team to help them determine what is a good quality website. Yeah, it's a really good idea. It gives you lots really good ideas of what makes good content that is made for users.

Mordy Oberstein:

And that's really the point. Back in the day with the algorithm, there was one way of running for humans and one way of running for bots, and even helpful content updates aside, what Google's been doing, I would say since circa 2018 with the new series of core algorithm updates... And if you look at their documentation around how should you respond to being hit by one of the core algorithm updates, it's very similar. It's all about writing really good content, really helpful content. And what they've been doing algorithmically is basically trying to think qualitatively the way a human could, and sort of mimicking that. And Danny Sullivan from Google's talking about, "Yeah, we look at quality," by the way, quality is for the entire site, a site wide metric, not a per page metric, "And we try to mimic through the algorithms how a person would qualitatively assess the quality of the webpage."

So now the algorithm and the user have been synced up in a lot of ways. Is it a hundred percent perfect? Is it a hundred percent there? No. Will it every be? Probably not. But directionally, and way, way, way more than it ever was before. And if you look at people like, I'll say Glenn Gabe and Lily Ray, Marie Haynes, maybe myself, Dr. Pete from over at Moz, when they write about their analysis of the updates, so basically showing you, "Yeah, Google's looking at things like tone and looking at things like the quality in this way and the quality in that way," and now when you put the user first, at the same time, and this is a key point, you're also putting Google first. It's not different anymore.

Crystal Carter:

Yeah. I think that what we're seeing is Google puts a lot of emphasis on EAT, which is expertise, authority, and trust. And that document that you mentioned, the one that they always put out whenever there's an algorithm, what SEO should know about or website owners should know about Google updates, talks about expertise, authority, and trust. And there's lots of different ways that you can demonstrate that on a website. And it's essentially like if you asked someone for advice and they gave you advice on something, you would want to know how they were qualified to give you that advice. So if you go and talk to a doctor and then they say, "Oh, I think it might be," I don't know, appendicitis or something like that, you assume that they know what they're talking about, because they're in a doctor's office, they've got their certificates up on the wall, you know who they are.

Similarly, if you go to a website and they're giving you advice or they're giving you information about one topic or another, it's very important that you know who they are, that they have an about page that talks about who they are. We recently did a webinar with Semrush around about pages, to talk about some of those elements. But it's also important that you have an address if it's a place of business. I saw recently someone, there was somebody who got in touch or somebody who was online saying, "Oh, I don't know why my webpage for a hotel isn't ranking," and it was a hotel that didn't have an address. And I was like, "That is red flags."

Mordy Oberstein:

Conceptual hotel.

Crystal Carter:

That's red flags.

Mordy Oberstein:

It's where my mind stays.

Crystal Carter:

It's, "Oh, book, book where, where is this?"

Mordy Oberstein:

In the ether. It's in the ether.

Crystal Carter:

Right. And if you think about some of the websites that do really well, if you think about something, so Airbnb, for instance, is something like that, that they have doubled down. They have multiple layers of verifying who is who and trying to make sure that it's very clear, that you're talking to an actual person that's actually in a place and these people are... Then there's agreements and there's all this sort of stuff. Similarly, Google's trying to make sure that when somebody comes to their website and tries to find out, I don't know, how far it is from the earth to the moon or any kind of information, that they're able to get it from a valid source. Because if people are not getting good quality information from Google, then people won't come to Google. And Google wants to make sure that they're keeping their users happy by giving them good quality information.

Mordy Oberstein:

You make a great point where you're talking about how people are looking at a website, "Can I trust this website? Are they authoritative? They have expertise?" And that's really, if you want to talk about how you create user first content, that's kind of how you do it. You look at it from the lens of the user. One way, I call it the brand sniff test. You go to a webpage and you immediately, because you're a brand, they're going to realize it's, "Oh, machines and AI and Google's so smart and machines are so smart." Your brain is AI on steroids. It takes a look at something, and in three seconds or 0.3 seconds, it takes a million different signals. And without you consciously being aware of it, it's like, "Yeah, I've completely judged this already." You go to a webpage and it's an HTML table from 1999, you go, "I'm not trusting this thing."

Even might have great content. If you think, "Okay, how do I know I've created user first content, outside the fact that you know where your heart is? Leaving that aside for a second, if you look at the page and you think, "Okay," from a branding point of view, "What are the latent signals that this page sends? Is the tone right, is the layout friendly? Is it digestible? Is it well structured? Does it give off a sense that this page is well intentioned, trustworthy, and has my best interest in mind?" And if you feel like you know it does, then you've probably created user first content.

Crystal Carter:

And I think, also, if you're getting good feedback from your users, then that will also tell you this. For instance, if you've got people coming to your Google business profile and they're asking the same questions over and over again, they probably can't find that information on your website. If you're having people calling you and asking you for the same information over and over again, they probably can't find that information on your website. You should probably make some information, that kind of information on your website. If you've got people who, "Oh, yeah. I saw this on your page and I thought it was great," or "This was really...", then that's information that you're providing that's clearly good for users.

So there's lots of different signals that you can get around that. I know some people put reviews on their blog, just regular blogs, not necessarily a recipe blog, but just a regular blog, "Did you find this content helpful? What do you think of this content?" Three stars, five stars, whatever it is. And you can sort of understand, you can get actual direct feedback from people about whether or not it's helpful, whether or not it's useful. And there's lots of different elements and different factors that can help you to demonstrate that and help you to understand that.

Mordy Oberstein:

For sure. And it really all starts with your mindset. I know you have a whole article about this, I think, where if you're looking at it, I'm was going to go to a keyword research tool and I'm going to plug it in and whatever, and pull out the data and I'm going to... that's probably not the place to start, in my mind. When you're trying to start writing content for the web, for both bots and users, it starts with empathy and understanding your audience, and being able to tap into their mindset. Because now you're going to create content that actually helps them because you actually feel bad for them. Like, "Oh, you have a pain point here? I would love to help you with that."

Crystal Carter:

Right. I've sometimes written articles, so I remember writing a piece that was around different sources for structured data or something like that. And I use it myself. It was basically, it was a bookmark thing that I put together. And the reason why I put it together was because I couldn't find one. So I think that's one of the things, if you're trying to think about user first, try to be mindful of your experience as a user and the things that irritate you as a user, the content that you don't like as a user. It says something in the description and you get to the page and it's completely different. That can be annoying. Or Google in their helpful content notes talks about the kinds of things where they're saying, "Are you trying to give an answer to a question that doesn't have an answer?" Like when is this show coming out and they haven't announced it and you're just trying to get on the SERP or something, that sort of thing.

If you find that irritating, don't make that content. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Remember that. When I was looking at this, a lot of the people that... I spoke to lots of different SEOs about how they create content for users, and they talk to users. And sometimes this can be interviews or sometimes this can be going through CRM information. So if you are using something like Salesforce or that sort of thing where people are raising tickets regularly or raising customer service queries, you can go through that information and see the ones that come up regularly, and you can help your customer service team by giving them the information that they need and help users at the same time. And with regards to the keywords, not to say that keywords and using keywords tools, not to say you shouldn't use them, but think of the user first and then use the keyword tools just to make sure that you're actually hitting some of the actual terms.

Mordy Oberstein:

Yeah, you're refining and gaps you haven't missed, those sort of things, because I've done this before myself. The questions you get from, actually, users are completely different.

Crystal Carter:

Right, completely. And especially if you're looking into a new space where you think about keyword tools, a lot of times they're using historical data. And it's fantastic. It's amazing to have that kind of data there. But Google said, I think, 15% of queries are new queries. So if you're going into a new space, you're launching a new product, then you're going to need to get new content for that and you're going to need to get that to users. And if you're not somebody who wants to do lots and lots of interviews and stuff, that's okay. There's lots of different things you can look-

Mordy Oberstein:

Forums and social.

Crystal Carter:

Forums. Yeah. Reviews. You can do a poll. I sometimes go through Slack channels, Slack messages. You can talk to juniors if you're trying to... Training juniors is incredibly useful because juniors will go, "What is a acronym? I don't know what that means." And they want to know. They want to know. So you can create something that's good for the juniors in your team and also is useful for users who are in the same place, where they want to know desperately, so they need it to be-

Mordy Oberstein:

Exactly.

Crystal Carter:

... accessible.

Mordy Oberstein:

And if you're still doubting, well, doing all of this and putting the user first and, I want to say abandoning, slightly abandoning traditional, what you might think is traditional SEO, is that's not going to help me rank, think about what's coming down the pike. MUM is coming down the pike, it's Google's new AI 1000, machine learning rather, 1000 times more powerful than Byrd, it's previous most powerful machine learning property, blah blah blah. One of the things that MUM is doing, it's Google's own example, and they gave an example of something like, "I hiked Mount Adams, now I want to hike Mount Fiji in the fall. What do I need to do to prepare differently?" Something like that.

Crystal Carter:

That's so many words. That's got too many words, by the way.

Mordy Oberstein:

But the coolest part is that they show you how they parse the word prepare. Does it mean to equipment, I need to know what equipment I need, or training? Is that what you mean to prepare? And Google's like, "Now we're going to show results about both." And you could probably parse it a million times over. So if Google's going to be parsing topics into smaller subtopics like, "Oh, preparing for a hike." It means equipment. It could mean tips, it could mean food, it could mean trading.

The only way that you are going to be able to parse a topic down the same way so that you have the opportunities to rank, that are afforded to you on what's going to be the new search results page is by identifying and empathizing with your audience. Like oh, if someone's going on a hike and they have to prepare, what do they really need? Well, they might need this, they might need that, they might need that. Let me create content about that. So we will most definitely help you rank to put the user first, because that's the only way you're going to be able to create the right content.

Crystal Carter:

Right. And I think that if you're thinking about actually answering the question... Again talking to children is another good one. I have a kid and he asks me questions all the time and he's very capable of understanding if I explain it to him the way that he wants, but he wants a full answer. Kids will just keep asking why, so make sure that you give a full answer for whatever the question, and genuinely get involved.

Mordy Oberstein:

Like a real substance targeted, nuanced content. Now speaking of questions, we have a question for Michel Fortin, the director of search marketing over at seoplus+. Hey Michel, how do you check yourself to ensure you always keep the user first, not bots? Take it away.

Michel Fortin:

In SEO and in business, in general, many people tend to think the other way around. They think that we should focus on our product, it's the best things since sliced bread, and then we focus on our marketing because we think that people just need our product. The thing is, is actually the other way around, we should be solving a problem, we should be helping out our market. SEO is no different. We have to keep the user first in mind. Yes, we should be leading with our product, but we also are creating a solution to a problem. So it makes sense that we should focus on the problems that our users are experiencing and we help to solve them, in that case when they're making a search. So to keep the user first, you need to at least start with the user first. To borrow a quote from Steven Covey, "First things first is to put first things first."

And it really does mean that in the case of SEO, as in any other form of marketing, because SEO is just a channel for marketing, it's really about putting the user first and thinking about their pain points. I always say this, that to really rank well, to be visible actually is a better way to say it, to really be visible in search engines, you need to do what Google really wants you to do. It's the same thing, we share the same goal, which is to create quality content and a quality user experience. So appeal to your market and optimize those things for their sake and you will naturally appeal to search engines too. In marketing, I think the single biggest challenge is to think like our audience. And I say it's a challenge because we tend to always think that our audience are like us or that we know what our audience wants or what they're thinking about or what their needs are.

And there's a famous quote from a mentor of mine from many, many years ago who said, "You are never your own market." And in my previous life, I was a copywriter, we always focused on trying to tell our clients that they are never their own market. Well, SEO is the same. Either we think we know or we expect they know. And that's true also for research engines as it is for the audiences that we are trying to go after. And both are wrong. Both of those notions are wrong. We have to think of our market, we have to think like our market. Think about it this way, Google is always doing split tests all the time. It's always testing and changing and adding new search features. And if things don't work out, I mean how many products have we seen Google put out and it basically didn't last too too long because it just flopped or it didn't really do well or it wasn't... The man wasn't there.

Remember Google+? But the thing is, with SEO is that we have to think like our market. We have to think for a market. We have to provide the solution that our market wants. I want to end with this, there's a book on marketing in general, but it's called Scientific Advertising. It was written in 1923 by Claude C. Hopkins. And he said something that was really interesting, "The product itself should be its own best salesman." But here's what he said next in his book that is the most important part, "Almost any question can be answered by a test campaign. The court of last resort is the buyers of your product. No one knows people's desires enough to get an average viewpoint. If you want to know whether your product will work, do a test campaign." Now, the reason why I mentioned this in the context of SEO is when we try to optimize something before we put it up, we are thinking about how Google will see it, but we are ignoring the users of our product.

Don't think of the ranking factor or factors first and then create content and the user experience to match that. Think of the user first. Create great content, great experience for them. Then think how you can match that to the ranking factors. I think in SEO we tend to forget that there's a word in there called optimization. And optimization applies that it has to be done after something already exists. We optimize something like content or user experience. We optimize what we provide our users so that they're seen by or ranked by or indexed by search engines. Too often we create content and user experience that focuses on search engines, or we will focus on the user but the search engines are dictating the development, so that's why it's not really optimizing after the fact. We're doing it as we go along. Yes, there's always going to be a place for technical SEO. There's always going to be a place for things that we can apply and optimize that will be appealing to the search engines. But put the user first, then optimize.

Mordy Oberstein:

You know what? He's so right. And it really, as we spoke about, comes out to mindset. The way I put it is started thinking like a marketer almost, because marketers have been doing this for a long time. I know in SCL, "This is so new, think about the user," but marketer doing this forever. It's time to start thinking more like a traditional marketer in a lot of ways as part of your SEO process.

Crystal Carter:

Yeah, I think so. And I think that when you do that it makes it more than just ranking. It actually means that you're actually connecting with the audience. So some of the YouTubers, for instance, that I really like, do this a lot. The last audience are together, and then it feels like it's a conversation. When you're literally user first, when a user says to you, "Oh, I don't understand this thing, can you help me?" And you write them a blog or you do the thing, and then you come back to them and you're like, "Hey, remember that thing you asked me about? Here it is."

Do you know, they will go to you first the next time they need something that's in your niche, they will go to you first because they'll say, "Well, I trust this person. And if I get stuck, I trust that they'll help me in some way." So it's more than just ranking. It's also about building literal trust, building relationships with your audience. And I think that Google talks a lot about audiences. He was talking a lot about audiences there as well, and about making sure that you are thinking about something that is actually of value to the people that you're connecting with.

Mordy Oberstein:

Do you know who thinks of value with the people that they're connecting with and who always puts users first and not?

Crystal Carter:

Oh, yes, [inaudible 00:24:18] she absolutely does.

Mordy Oberstein:

Einat is a master at this. And she's a master of getting into the minds of the people that she's trying to help. Einat is also the product manager here at Wix for SEO tool set and development. So who would've thunk? What better person then to sit down and chat about how to put users first within an SEO context other than Einat? So join us now as we reach for the stars and go across the Wixverse with our own SEO product manager Einat Hoobian-Seybold.

Audio:

Three, two, one, ignition, lift off. Lift off.

Mordy Oberstein:

So we're here with Einat.

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

Hi.

Mordy Oberstein:

We've cornered you. We finally got you on the podcast.

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

I'm happy to be here.

Mordy Oberstein:

That's great. We're really happy to have you because when we were sitting down, we were talking about doing an episode on user first SEO and how important that is. The person who immediately came to both of our minds was Einat, because your job is literally to put users first. And so many different kinds of users and it's so complicated. So we just wanted to pick your brain about how you put Wix's users first when developing our SEO product.

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

Well, that's an interesting questions because, first of all, what is Wix users, because we have a variety of users? We have the DIYs, the self-creators, the moms and pops, if you would like, which are just building their small business and they don't know much about SEO. And we have the professionals ones that are SEO professional, that are marketers. They need a lot more things and we need to dance in between. And every time I build a product, I don't build it for one of them, I build it for all of them. And that's the tricky part, because I need to take into consideration all their needs. I need to give the DIY users everything they need in order to have the best SEO without them understanding or without them knowing a lot. So that's why I will create lots of defaults and things that will be created for them with minimum effort or knowledge for their side.

But in the same time, I will want to create full customization for the professional users. I want to allow them to have workflows. I want to allow them to have automation to save their time, that they will be able to do anything they want in the platform. I don't want the platform to minimize them in any way. Every time I build a product, I need to cater both of them. So I need to protect the DIYs and I need to give the full customization for our users. And it varies, so a lot of time I will give the basic information in the first view and then I will allow users, advanced users, to find what they can do more. Like I said, I will build a lot of defaults for the users, which is also beneficial for the professional one. For example, in Wix we create a lot of default structure data.

I can recognize the page of the user, I know what it is. And for example, if you have a product page, I can already build you the structure data with all the information that you need. So it's, of course, extremely valuable for our DIYs, so they don't know structured data, they for sure don't know how to write it, so I already did it for them. And it's also extremely beneficial for the professional because I saved their time. It's automatically built to work in scale and, of course, they can customize it. If the default that I build is not enough for them, they want to change, they want to edit, they can do it as well.

Crystal Carter:

And I think this is a great example because one of the things I really like about the structure data customization options is that you have the default, which is great out of the box but, for instance, if you wanted to edit it, it also has a validator, so it tells you if you've misplaced your syntax and won't let you submit incorrect schema markup. The other thing I think is great about Wix is structured data customization options is there are variables, so variables already exist within the platform. I've previously had to build these myself and it can be very time consuming and sometimes inconsistent. So I think that's a great example of something that works for lots of different users. One of the things I also think is great, from observing you and the way that you roll out these products, is how you test them. Can you talk to us a little bit more about your testing process, about how you test to make sure that what you're building is good for your users?

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

It's true that almost everything that we do in Wix, we test, because we don't know everything. Even if I know SEO and I know product and I know my users, still, reality is different and we really need to see how users behave and if users understand what they see and what they need to do, so we test everything. Every time I will make a major product or a major change, I will run an A/B test. I will start with 50% of the population. I will start with one market, because in Wix we have over 20 market. I will start with one dedicated one in order to really understand the effect of this new feature or this new tool. And I really will, I will run it 50% A/B test and I will see the effect, first of all, on the existing reality that we live in. We live in Wix in SEO, specifically in a very complex environment.

We have lots of tools, again, we have lots of users, so I want to make sure that I didn't harm anything else, that by creating this new feature or by creating this new tool that everything else that our users are known and used to, stays the same and I didn't shake the boat too much. So I will test this and I will test also regarding the feature that I just launched. I will test the specific APIs that I want to reach with this tool, whether if there's usage in the tool, I will understand really how users behave in the tool. And I think one thing that is important to note, we don't only look on the quantitative data, we also look on the quality of data. I will see sometimes numbers and this is working well and this is not, but I want to understand why.

For example, right now we ran a test, we added, we have the SEO wiz, we just added a new section GBP, the Google Business Profile to it, and it worked amazingly for Google Business Profile users, created extremely well, more locations as success verification. Was amazing. But it did affect the SEO with the checklist that we have. The KPIs of this affected it. I know that those KPIs, if you complete the checklist, if you move forward, it's improve your SEO, so I don't want to do that. I don't want to create any new feature, I will kind of sabotage the user success because this is really what lead us; user success, how we guide them to success. So what we did is we look at the data and we try to understand what's going on. And we understand that a lot of users, in order to create a Google Business Profile, they need to go out to Google Business Profile, which is in another place.

And we participated this. We already added some CTAs to go back to the SEO wiz, to the checklist, but they weren't permanent enough and we saw that users are not seeing this. They are being sent out by me, but they don't come back. So what we did is, first of all, I looked at the full story, which is a tool that we use a lot to understand how user interact with our tools because sometimes just the data of the CTA is not enough. We need to know what he did before and if did he get lost or not. And we understand that they don't see the way to go back to where they were. So now we are improving it in terms of UI and in terms of content. And I will be glad to update you once the test will be done.

Mordy Oberstein:

We would love to be updated. So let me ask you real quick, because I know we're reaching the end of our allotted time together. Let's take it back a step. When you have so many things to develop, let's say, or multiple things you could be developing, how do you decide which one to do first? What goes through your thought process and how does the user factor into that and how do you really know which makes the most sense?

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

Yeah, that's true. I think the most painful part of being a product manager that you have to prioritize is you have to decide what you do now and you won't do everything that you want. Because I have tons of plans, but I need to prioritize and I need to scale them down a lot of times. So I have lots of, I will say information sources that I use in order to decide what I do now. The bottom line is impact, is how do I help my users? What I do now is for my users. Will it, like I said, drive them towards success or not? So I have lots of information. I have, first of all, data. I look a lot of data of users and what they do and what they are missing and where they get stuck. And we have an SEO in Wix.

We have a team, a dedicated team of SEO domain experts, data, the guys that are connected the most of the industry and they know what is needed, what are we lacking of, what do we need to do next. And so, I rely a lot of their recommendation. I do a lot of research and I really, really look at support information, support tickets, what our users are struggling with, what are coming to support. I talk a lot with the users and I really call our users and we talk about them. And all of this is driving me towards decision of what I need to do. That's the first step, what is missing. And then how do I prioritize this? It will be mainly on a impact. What will close a gap that I missing the most that will help our users? Or what will bring more value to my users? And this is what guides me when I prioritize the products.

Crystal Carter:

And I love these conversations because whenever we're like, "Oh, what about this?" you're like, "What about the users? How is this going to help the users?"

Mordy Oberstein:

Yep, so true.

Crystal Carter:

"How is this going to help the users? This is very interesting, Crystal, how are we going to help the users with this?"

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

Exactly.

Mordy Oberstein:

Exactly. Einat, thank you so much for stopping by. It's really been a first class look into the mindset of putting a user first and what that looks take from a product point of view. And it really applies to anytime you put a user first, whether it be for a product or service or for a website itself.

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

Exactly. Thank you. I really enjoyed being with you.

Crystal Carter:

Thank you so much.

Mordy Oberstein:

Well, we'll have to have you back again. Talk to you later.

Einat Hoobian-Seybold:

Bye.

Audio:

Three, two, one, ignition, lift off. Lift off.

Mordy Oberstein:

She is so lovely. Always. Every time I speak with her, I always enjoy... Super calm under pressure too. Always pleasant. Everyone's like, "Oh no, what do we do?" She's always so calm.

Crystal Carter:

I am always in awe whenever I hear... Einat will give us presentations on all the different stuff that we do and she just. Yeah, exactly, always super calm, super organized, very committed to the project of making Wix SEO stack as best as it can possibly be for our users. It's phenomenal to work alongside Einat.

Mordy Oberstein:

Yeah. And it's great talking to her and being able to talk to her with our audience, because now you actually know one of the key people who has made our SEO product so evolved. And it's really, was a great pleasure to talk to Einat.

Crystal Carter:

And user first, just user first stuff, she constantly Slack messages, she's constantly, "Yeah, I'm just responding to questions that our users have about various different things." She's very much involved with making sure that things are user first.

Mordy Oberstein:

1000%. Let's snap to it, because now it's time for the Snappy News. Snappy news, snappy news, snappy news. Well, I guess the pandemic is behind us. I mean, Google did just announce that Google Business Profile health and safety attributes are being kicked to the curb. That's right. Per Barry Schwartz on Search Engine Roundtable, "Google Business Profile removes health and safety attributes." Google business profile attributes, by the way, are little tidbits of info that help users better understand services and structure of a business, for example, that are attributes that let you know of an establishment is wheelchair accessible or there are attributes that let you know that a business is owned by a woman, it's woman led or it's veteran led or so forth.

During COVID, Google introduced the option to display health and safety attributes like a mask being required or staff gets temperature checks, et cetera. These are now gone. Why is that important? Well, less so for SEO or there's no ranking that's involved in it if it's gone from all business profiles and users won't expect it to be there at all, so if you don't have it, it's not like your competitors have it. This is more, in my mind, a general marketing point, as it's a strong statement of where the world is and where your potential customers might be currently at. And with that, this is the snappiest of Snappy News. Another wonderful week of SEO news.

Crystal Carter:

So newsy.

Mordy Oberstein:

So newsy. It's always newsy in the SEO world. All right, before we have to duly depart, it's really important that we share with you who we think you should be following for more SEO knowledge. And when it comes to being user first and user first friendly, we have two people for you, because it's such an important topic, we thought what person wasn't enough. And we couldn't decide on which person to showcase. So we're like, "Let's do both. Why not do both?"

Crystal Carter:

Yeah, yeah.

Mordy Oberstein:

Two is better than one. When you have pie, they're like, "Oh, do you want the cherry pie and the blueberry pie?" Then they have a combination of it too. Oh, my god, I'll take that.

Crystal Carter:

Which pie do you want? Yes.

Mordy Oberstein:

All. Yes. I love pie, by the way.

Crystal Carter:

Pie's good.

Mordy Oberstein:

Here, by the way, is the cherry on your pie in the SEO industry when you're trying to think of being user first. I did it on the fly, I'm so proud of myself.

What do we have? Who's your follow of the week or our follow week, but who are you going to showcase, Crystal?

Crystal Carter:

I would love to give a shoutout to Adriana Stein. She is a writer, she's in SEO and does some incredible user first content. One of the things that she does really often is she regularly speaks directly to people about how they approach content, how they approach different technical tactics, so she'll get on her Twitter account and she'll ask questions. She'll say, "How do you do this? What do you think of that?" And people respond to her and she uses that to help shape her content and how she makes content. And I think it's a great approach and I think she's really good at it. I think her content's really great. So she's someone who's really worth following. She does a lot of stuff with some of the industry's best publications, so it's really good to follow her for that advice and for just seeing how she works.

Mordy Oberstein:

And her Twitter account is so conversational and so engaging, so it's absolutely worth the follow. It's @adrianakstein, A-D-R-I-A-N-A-K-S-T-E-I-N. Of course, we'll link to her profile in the show notes. And bonus follow of the week-

Crystal Carter:

Bonus.

Mordy Oberstein:

... the man who I will say is so dedicated and passionate to making sure the web actually has good content on there. He's Google's own John Mueller.

Crystal Carter:

John Mueller.

Mordy Oberstein:

Is a saint by the way, an absolute saint. I love John. He's hilarious as well. So it's a great follow for many reasons. But I remember when the product review update was first rolling out, maybe it was the second iteration of it, I can't remember which one it was. And people were saying, "Oh, why do we need this? Why is it there?" And John was just calling it as he saw it. No, because there's a lot of really not great content out there around product reviews. And it's so true. And John will literally just tell you like, "No, this is how it really is and this is why we needed improvement." I always say John Mueller is an advocate for Google, but he is also an advocate for a better web and a better web starter, I think, with better content. I think John is a prime example of someone who speaks of that. And I really do appreciate that.

Crystal Carter:

I think he's great. I think also the other thing that's great about John is that SEO, everyone's coming to SEO from different spaces. You might be an expert in one field and a beginner in another, and he speaks to everyone in the same way. So in his Webmaster Office Hours would very regularly speak to users from all different backgrounds, whatever questions they had. And he always did his best to answer every single question in those spaces. And it is something that is incredibly user first because that gives you a very clear finger on the pulse of the kinds of questions that people have. And he uses that to shape the content that he shares. I think that he's a pillar in that community.

Mordy Oberstein:

He's just simply wonderful. He's simply wonderful and-

Crystal Carter:

He's great.

Mordy Oberstein:

... honestly, he brings joy to my day sometimes when you're on Twitter and is like things are not going great. John is wonderful. Anyway, it's @john, J-O-H-N-M-U, as in Mueller, John Mueller. And we'll link, of course, to John's profile in the show notes. And that's going to do it for us. Thank you for joining us on The SERP's Up podcast. Are you going to miss us? Not to worry. We're back next week with an all new episode as we dive into the controversy that is AI writers. AaaaaaaaaI writers, if you're Fonzie.

Crystal Carter:

Can we just call it AI the whole time?

Mordy Oberstein:

AI writers. Wherever you consume your podcast or on our SEO Learning Hub at wix.com/seo/learn. Looking to learn more about SEO? Check out all of the great content and webinars that we have on the Wix SEO Learning, I bet you guessed it, wix.com/seo/learn. Don't forget to give us a review on iTunes or a rating on Spotify. Until next time, peace, love, and SEO.