Speaker 1: 0:52

Hello, welcome to Essie's.

Speaker 1: 0:54

Not that Hard Christmas Day special. This is Christmas special number two. It's me here, ed Dawson, as usual, and yeah, this just happens to be going out on Christmas Day. So, merry Christmas to you If you someone who celebrates Christmas. If not, I hope you're still enjoying the day. You're probably getting a lot less hassle off people around the world who do celebrate Christmas, so you're probably having some quieter time at work If you are working as normal, but if not, yeah, merry Christmas. I hope you're having a good day and, yeah, hopeful, full of cheer and all that.

Speaker 1: 1:27

So today I'm going to do a quick Christmas themed emergency question and then followed up by one of my favorite episodes from the past year or so. Today's SEO question emergency question is if your SEO strategy was a Christmas tree, what would be the star on top and for me, the star in the whole of SEO, the whole of web marketing, the whole of online has got to be content. I know some people are into links, some people are into Black Cat, some people are into digital PR, some people are into all Cat, some people are into digital PR, some people are into all sorts of different things, but for me, everything fundamentally, at the end of the day, relies on content, because you can have the greatest links in the world, you can have greatest digital PR in the world, have all these things, but you haven't got good content the people that you want to enjoy and consume. Then you know what's it all about. And consume, then you know what what's it all about. You know that's that's the ultimate aim is to get people to engage with your content and then use your content to take them to wherever you want them to go to next, whether that's to buy a product, whether it's to download a guide, whether that's to give you an email address, whether it's just to just follow the next piece of content, whatever it is that you're trying to do, it all boils down to that content, and that's why, to me, content is my star on the top of my seo christmas tree. So, um, that's probably not a surprise if you listen to the podcast for many years. Um, that content is my favorite thing, but that definitely is it. That's my, that's my star on the tree. So on to today's episode. This episode is one from quite a while ago and it's a story about how, when we were first launching Keywords, people Use, how we're trying to get a buzz, how we're trying to get our name out there, and how we did something slightly different and how it really worked out well for us. So yeah, without further ado, I hope you enjoyed today's episode and I hope you enjoyed your turkey, your Christmas meal, whatever you do with your Christmas traditions. Have a great day and I'll see you in the next episode.

Speaker 1: 3:20

Hello and welcome to. Seo is not that hard. I'm your host, ed Dawson, the founder of keywordspeopleusecom, the solution to find the questions people ask online. I'm an affiliate marketer, seo, and I've been building and monetizing websites for over 20 years. I've built sites from the ground up, bought sites and sold sites in large exits. I'm here to share with you the SEO knowledge, hints and tips I've built up over the years.

Speaker 1: 3:42

Today, I'm going to talk about how we went to Brighton SEO and came back with over a thousand new users without speaking to anyone. If you've never heard, then it's one of the UK's and possibly the world's biggest search engine optimization conferences, I think. Usually every time they run it, which is about twice a year in the UK, they get about 3,000 people come over a two or three day period and it's a really big conference. Now obviously we've not long launched keywords people use back at sort of this time last year and I was looking at ways of how we can sort of get our name known and out there. And I checked out with brighton seo what their sponsorship packages were available and we're working on a limited budget and they had a package we could just about afford and it allowed us to put a flyer inside their swag bags. So you know, when you go to a conference, quite often as you're going on the way in you'll get a free tote bag which is filled with some goodies like you might get stress balls, that kind of things in and a conference magazine and various bits and bobs that sponsors can put in. So we paid that kind of very minimal sponsorship deal to have a flyer in there.

Speaker 1: 4:59

Now, obviously our next thought was what are we going to put on this flyer to have the most impact? Because I mean, I've been to lots of conferences myself and you know you'll have a quick flick through all the flyers, um, but it's really hard to get engaged by them. Now we thought we've obviously got one chance at this. We've really got to think of something different and we used a principle called the curiosity gap. Now this principle is where you don't give everybody all the information they need to find out what something's about without taking another action. Clickbait is an example of this. You see it on the web a lot, where you're given some information but to find out the full details you've got to take another action. And we thought how can we get this? Just on a poster, on a little flyer, a little A5 flyer? So this is what we did.

Speaker 1: 5:57

What we decided to do was to run a free prize draw. So obviously this is going to attract people's attention because you know they'll just get this big flyer and it says on the front are you a winner? Turn over to find out. So it's got our branding on the top. But then just, are you a winner? So we're not trying to persuade them of anything about keywords people use at the moment, we're just trying to get their attention. It's like, are you a winner? Turn over to find out. And when they turn over, it says to them free prize draw, have you won? With an arrow that points down to a scratch card, you know, like a little scratch box, so they have to scratch off the foil to find out whether they're a winner. It's like the kind of, you know, lottery cards, those kind of things. Now when they scratch that off, it says winner. This is a little hint here. Every card was a winner of at least something. Now the prizes ranged from free Brighton SEO tickets for the next Brighton SEO, keywords people use, hoodies, and then lots of free subscriptions to keywords people use. So we were giving away unlimited subscriptions for one year, one year pro subscriptions. We also gave away all the different packages at different lengths of times and everybody got at least I think it was a month free of keywordspeopleusecom. So that's still at least a $15 prize. So it says you're a winner.

Speaker 1: 7:23

But the next point obviously was, if we just said what they'd won at that point, they might not choose to go any further with it. So we obviously wanted them to actually interact with us to then find out what they'd won. Wanted them to actually interact with us to then find out what they'd won. So what they had to do then was scan a QR code that was on the card to find out what they'd won. Now, when they scanned the QR code, it took them to qhpupilusecom, to a special landing page that knew where they'd come from, knew what card they'd come from and and then said, just invited them to create a free account, because that was part of the terms and conditions was to find out what you'd won. You'd create a free account. Obviously, people were free after that, if they wanted to, to delete their accounts. There was no obligation to keep the account once you'd done it. But you had to create an account to find out what you'd won. And that was dead easy to do because we could just sign in with their Gmail or they could put in their username, create a username and password if they wanted, but we made it frictionless by meaning that you can just sign in using your Google account. They then signed in, found out what they'd won and were given the details. So if it was a physical prize, they were told you know, we'll get in touch with you because we've now got their email address so we can get in touch with them for the physical. And if they'd won an account prize, then we just said you know, you've now won this, this account, and that was it. Basically, that was as simple as that.

Speaker 1: 8:42

Now, we had no idea how all this was going to work. I was actually quite worried to start with that this, that people just weren't going to engage with it. So I went down to Brighton SEO for the conference but didn't make a deal of going and speaking to people about this at all. I just sort of thought we'll go and watch and we'll see what happens. And I was thinking, you know, if we get 40 or 50 people actually go through and create an account, that would be a good success. So now it was a point where we're just waiting for the conference to open, for people to get their swag bags and then to see what happens.

Speaker 1: 9:22

Now at that time I didn't have remote access from my phone to be able to see how account summits were going up. To do that I'd have to go back to my hotel room, log into my laptop and log into the database to see how things were going. So I was just sat there in the conference hall sat on a chair, just waiting for the first talk to start, that I was going to watch. And then this other delegate came down and sat next to me that I was going to watch. And then this other delegate came down and sat next to me and she got her swag bag out and started flicking through the flies and stuff that were in there and you know, as I suspected, you know most of them were just a two-second look and then passed out two seconds and then on and she came to ours and they are, you a winner? And she stopped and she turned it over and I was sat there there, you know, trying not to to notice that I'm kind of sneakily peeking to see, to see what she's doing. And then she then scratches the uh, the foil off at the back to see if she's a winner, and it says she's a winner, scan the qr code. And she gets her phone out, scans the qr code. I'm just trying just to to keep it together and stay calm because someone's actually doing what we hoped they would do and then she scans, she creates an account and it says she's a winner.

Speaker 1: 10:38

I couldn't see what it was because you know, um, she was on a phone but I could see again, she went through the process and I was like, wow, it's working, it's actually worked, this is brilliant. So I watched the, the first talk, um, which I can't remember what it was, but whoever it was, it was good because I didn't think it was a bad talk. But I watched this first talk and I thought, right, I need to go back to the hotel, get on the laptop and see how well this is doing. And, like I said to start with, I thought if we've got 40 50 people go through the whole process and create a free account, um, then I would have thought that was that was brilliant with. So here we are.

Speaker 1: 11:14

Maybe it's about an hour or two after the first people getting the swag bags, I went back to the hotel room, looked and we'd already got hundreds it's probably two or three hundred people had already done this and I was like, wow, this is amazing, um, and it was hard to tear myself away from the computer and watching the um as the ticker climb as more and more people were creating accounts um off this, this one flyer, um, I was absolutely astounded by the response rate we got from it. Then, over the course of the next couple of days of the conference, we picked up just over a thousand people actually went through the process and then for the next few weeks and even a couple of months, we actually got another, about another two, 250 that came because some people, obviously taking these swag bags, stuffed them in the probably in their rucksack and then, you know, gone back to work a week or two later, decided to go through everything that was in there and then we're doing it. Then, um, but yeah, so it. It completely, completely blew away any expectations I had on how well it might do.

Speaker 1: 12:18

Um, now, obviously, because we were giving away, everybody got, everyone won something, everyone won at least a month for free light account. It wasn't, it wasn't sales that we're going for at this point, it was. It was reach. We were trying to get our name out there, we were trying to get in front of people in the industry and I think for saying that our only opportunity was to put a fly in a swag bag, I I would be astounded if anyone got close to that kind of response from just something in a swag bag. And I think that the real key thing here was that we used that curiosity gap so we didn't try and persuade anything about us as a product on the actual, on the actual flyer. It was all about have you won something? And then making them do that physical process, to start with, to scratch something off to see if they'd won. So we got them engaging with the flyer itself and then the qr code to find out what they'd actually won, because if you'd been told you'd won something, you would definitely want to know what it was. Um. So, yeah, it was a really, really successful campaign as far as we're concerned.

Speaker 1: 13:26

In terms of costs I think, with the cost of the sponsorship and the cost of getting the flyers printed, I think it was about two, two and a half thousand pounds, so about three thousand dollars, something like that. Um, which, for the amount of response we got, I was really pleased with. The people we got in front of I was really pleased with and also, as a side benefit, we actually picked up some backlinks. After doing Brighton SEO, we did see a little rise, a little natural rise in backlinks from people who I assume must have seen us from this promotion at Brighton SEO. So it worked as a side effect has also been a backlinking campaign, which it wasn't originally meant to be, but that's why if you create something good and get it in front of the right people, then you will build backlinks like that. At the end of the day, I think we were actually more successful with this promotion than if we'd taken a next package up where you have a booth and you stand there and you talk to people, taken like a next package up where you have a booth and you stand there and you talk to people. I don't think we would have possibly managed to speak to that many people and have that many people actually go through and sign up for a free account and get their email address so we can then have a, you know, carry on the conversation with them afterwards. So, yeah, I was really, really pleased and it's just a little tip here that to always look at what opportunities you've got and sometimes you can make something far greater than what it initially looks like you might be able to achieve with something If you just use that curiosity gap to keep people engaging with you.

Speaker 1: 15:01

Thanks for listening. I really appreciate it. Please subscribe and share. It really helps. Seo is not that hard. It's brought to you by KeywordsPeopleUsecom, the solution to finding the questions people ask online. See where thousands of people use us every day. Try it today for free at keywords people usecom. If you want to get in touch, have any questions, I'd love to hear from you. I'm at channel 5 on twitter or you can email me at podcast at keywords people usecom. Bye for now and see you in the next episode of SEO is not that hard.