Beyond Google: How Smart Agencies are Winning with Search Everywhere Optimization

Speaker A: Welcome to the Agency Growth series, the podcast dedicated to setting up, running and scaling your SEO agency. Hi everyone and welcome back to our first 2026 episode of the Agency Growth series. And today I have the pleasure of talking to Jules Davis, who is the founder of Scalars, an SEO agency that specialized in SaaS and focused on, uh, search Everywhere optimization. And today we'll be talking about that. We'll be talking about beyond Google, how smart agencies are winning with Search Everywhere optimization. Hi Jules, and welcome to the podcast.

Speaker B: Great to have me on. Thanks Ben, for inviting me.

Speaker A: Yeah, my pleasure. Uh, my first question to you is regarding search Everywhere optimization. How do you actually define search Everywhere optimization and what's the clearest way to explain it to a client who's never heard of that term before?

Speaker B: Definitely. So I think the first way to define it is to first of all have a think about why are we talking about this term in the first place. Okay, so um, if you want to motto, if you want to call it like that, basically is that if you look at Google today in terms of a landscape, let's take um, a very simple keyword. Let's take uh, how to do SEO. You search that keyword on Google today you will literally be saying Google results in terms of like traditional blog posts and guides showing you how to do SEO. So informational content, you'll also probably have a Reddit thread there ranking, you might even have the discussions and forums box on Google and you'll probably also have YouTube video carousels probably for that search term. And in B2B like literally you see these recurring types of content showing up. You've got like traditional SEO content, you've got like Reddit content, you got YouTube. And let's say you were uh, not in B2B, not in SaaS, let's say you're in travel for example, you might see short form videos popping up like Instagram, like TikTok, etc. So very simply said is like that search term search, every optimization comes from the perspective like Google are literally showing many more types of content in the serp and it isn't just basically Google content. So if you do a very simple just like math equation of like saying to yourself, before there was like maybe like 10 normal Google pages ranking, now there's maybe only 5 because actually there's Reddit results and YouTube, etc, you're literally missing out on like 50% less of clicks, not to mention all the different AI search boxes, etc taking up visibility. So that search term search ever optimization comes from the perspective of like literally on search there are multiple types of content showing and if you optimize for multiple of them, you're basically capturing more of that existing traffic going into those existing sources.

Speaker A: Very clear. And how did you start to position your agency in this way? Was it from market demand or something that you've seen happening from a while back? Was it always the case that you were specialized in search everywhere optimization across all these different channels?

Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question. So we weren't actually. And it was actually probably tying back to last year, last summer. So uh, I don't know if you remember, remember but like when AI search was starting to go crazy, a lot of customers were starting to go quite negative against the whole narrative of just um, doing SEO just in terms like just doing blogs, etc. They were like, no, this has got to change. The landscape's completely changing. AI search is pulling from different stuff. And the whole narrative of the market was like very against that basically. So I would say a lot of us included were very forced into thinking differently in terms of like customers had very different expectations, but we were already luckily leaning into that. So we were already doing initiatives for example on Reddit and we'd already suggested to customers to have a look into YouTube, for example because for us it was pretty simple. There was two rows to take either which a lot of our com, let's say like other fellow agencies which like in the same vertical as us have done like they've said to themselves like okay, our clients are losing clicks, we know we need to get AI search, sure. But like the PPC results are getting traffic. So like we're going to start offering PPC and we're going to do like combined blended search they've called it, right. Like PPC ads, etc. We said to ourselves like that's a very different skill set to organic in hindsight site like that's a paid ad skill. I wouldn't really know how to go about that. And I want to keep the organic DNA in terms of like what scalers was. So I was like okay, I don't want to go that route. I want to optimize for Google and I optimize for AI search. And literally it was very clear to like AI search is literally pulling from same sources of content which are like showing literally on Google. So we just said to ourselves like okay, let's make a soft pivot little by little. But we just knew that very simply said the more eyeballs we can soak up across Google, the more customers are going to get results. And uh, we started doing a few pilots with different customers. And I think like all agencies usually have like what we call like legacy customers, which usually trust them so much, but they'll trust every single direction and like new idea they have. So we started with our legacy customers saying like, hey, we believe we should focus on this. Are you open to it? Yes, they are. Cool. And then we just started doing it, we started getting results and we're like, cool. There's demand for this in a sense of like it's working and we're starting to see more of the market, kind of like want to do these new strategies. In that case we can offer that to more people basically. So that was kind of how we got started with a long winded story. But like that's how it initially got going.

Speaker A: In other words, how has your, how has your team evolved to cater to these needs and to new channels? Do you, did you have to upscale hire? Do you work with maybe like outsourced agencies and freelancers for this?

Speaker B: Well, uh, great question. So like 225 was a painful year for us because we had to change so much internally in terms of like how we're doing stuff. So both like on the SEO team, I was also very frank with them in terms of like, look, AI search, there's new skill sets, there's new stuff that you guys seem to be thinking about, whether that be tools, whether that be like what AI search is picking up on. So like AI search for example is picking up on doc folders, for example. It's even picking up on case studies you have on the website. It's picking up on sentiments that you have actually inside your content. Like those are new skill sets. Like I had to bring to the table in terms of like to the SEO team. Like, hey, we have to start thinking about this and we have to adapt. That's new for SEOs in general. So the SEO had to go for upskilling team. Um, then after we obviously read it was a whole new function and that actually we did a trial with freelancers to start with. Like, can we try and work around with this and see how it works? Turns out no, we had to straightaway go internal and we actually brought on someone full time who's in that field. And we've now got like four people actually just on the right team. So like that we had to build it Internally and then YouTube though, specifically that part. Um, we've actually managed to do that also internally, but it's a small part of our business basically. So one person who was on the SEO team has transitioned over to YouTube and I was just lucky that one person was actually super passionate about YouTube and literally was learning about that skill set on the weekend and like just really enjoyed that, that channel. So it was a good transition. So in other words, it's gone through internal. Everything that's been internalized. But we've had to go through a lot of upskilling basically to get the agency there. Um, but like those are a lot more different skill sets and I think also looking at our landscape in terms of like different, like other agencies which are in that field, I think they haven't gone that route because that was so painful to actually go through. So I think that's the reason being. But like, yeah, it asks a lot of changes internally for sure.

Speaker A: Why hasn't uh, hiring externally a freelancer worked for Reddit? What was the problem there?

Speaker B: I uh, think just like the nature of when you're working with freelancer, they have kind of like their own kind of schedules and how they planning stuff and like when you have high expectations of how you want to deliver for customers, like literally that's the way to. Well like you need to bring that internal to have people fully aligned, fully the way they want to do it. At the same time though, if you find the right freelancer, it can also be a cheat code because uh, the right freelancer usually wants to keep the business and keep you client happy as a client. So it can work. So for example, we actually, we have content, for example internal, but we also upscale basically as needed with like freelance demand. So that can work, but for these new services we just didn't find it worked. And also full transparency. But Reddit is one of those services that very few people actually know how to execute well because it's so experimental. So like right now in terms of like the markets, like demand's very high, but like the talent basically curve is very low basically in terms of supply. So I think also from that perspective, not lot of freelancers that truly understand what they're doing to the best possible degree I'd say as well as well.

Speaker A: Yeah, um, and I'm hearing a lot from the conversations I had with, with uh, previous agency owners. You know, they, when they come into uh, working with a client, there's already sometimes agencies that are specializing across all these channels that you're specializing in. When that happens and a client wants to work with you and you come in and you see they're already working maybe with an agency for, for Reddit. Or for YouTube, how do you comb with what you're focusing on, which is that all of your talent is actually in house? And how does that work, uh, in that particular situation?

Speaker B: Yeah, great question. Um, so first of all, I would say, luckily for Reddit, it's not the case that most brands have a Reddit agency, because very often they don't in the sense of it's not been a channel they've actually wanted to focus on. And I'll also be fully transparent, most, uh, companies that have picked up basically Reddit, they didn't pick it up from the perspective of like, oh, we want to build a community on Reddit. They picked it up because they're like, hey, we believe there are community conversations happening on Reddit which are fueling AI search. We want to be part of them in the bigger goal of AI search. So I would say, like, us having a DNA of like, AI search, that's obviously been like the first initial motivation to get a Reddit agency basically on board. So that's been the first reason motivation there. Reddit wasn't that tricky. We have had it with YouTube, actually. But to be very transparent, like, we're in it for the success of our customers. So if our customers are getting success with the agency they're working with, we've always been very happy to actually keep collaborating with that agency and saying, hey, well, if these guys have like, you know, planned their YouTube strategy perfect, well, we'll suggest certain ideas which from like an SEO coverage they could cover as well, whether that be to win a spot in the serps or whether that be to, um, just get more element coverage, whatever it is. But like, we're happy to collaborate, you know, at the end of the day. And I think, I think on the odd occasion where we've done a better job than the other agency, we've never pushed to try and like specifically kick out that other agency. I think just clients at the end of the day just, they just can't see that like, hey, this team here is proposing better options and like, hey, we're going to switch rounds and just go with that. So I just think it happens naturally, you know, usually by working together.

Speaker A: Yeah, this leads well into my, my next question, which is about vetting clients. So when you're working with clients and you have all these different agencies, as you said, and you have to collaborate or not collaborate, but, uh, what does the client actually need in place before this approach for search everywhere optimization becomes realistic?

Speaker B: Um, so go on. It's all about SaaS. If you want to, but at the end of the day, it's applicable to any other company. So the first thing to say myself is like, if you want to get into search, I think one of the biggest filters is like, is our TAM big enough to actually agree that search is going to be something we want to focus on? So when I mean tam, I mean like your products, your customer journey, does it make sense to actually go after it from a search perspective in terms of like, we have enough on the bottom of funnel, we have enough basically on the middle of funnel, etc. So let me take a very simple example. Let's say you're a, um, cool. Let's take an example everyone here can understand. Let's say your SEO software, right? There are so many different variations of like, SEO features which, like bottom of funnel are going to get coverage inside AI search. So, like, what's the best keyword rank tracking tool? What's the best technical SEO tool? What's the best local SEO tool? Like, there's so many different angles to go after. So like, that leaves a lot of room. Plus, if you think about all your competitor keywords, like, that's a lot of elements which are going to get coverage inside AI search. Okay, so like, the TAM there from a search perspective makes a lot of sense, but maybe some brands that just don't have that much, which means they can be limited in terms of how many content angles they can be able to produce because they're just limited just by nature. The next thing as well is just saying to yourself, like, uh, SEO, let's say, like, in terms of like, what's on your website. As long as you have the TAM and you have the capacity internally to like, I don't know, let's say, work the agency in terms of like, review the work they're doing. Like, you're pretty much good to go, right? Just a question of like, do you have the budget, et cetera. You're good to go for Reddit as well. Like, like jumping in and providing helpful answers and basically mentioning when your brand can actually help out. You're pretty much good to go as long as, once again, they're actually Reddit conversations happening on your vertical.

Speaker A: Cool.

Speaker B: You're good to go and target that channel. But like YouTube, I think this is like the one thing we've had like a ton of struggle with. And to be frank, that's why it's, it's a smaller part of our business. But like YouTube, like, look at my background, for example. Like, this would be good for YouTube. But like, not every SaaS company has this type of background, like a setup which they're able to start doing YouTube. And as well, not everyone has someone in the company who's organized and actually productive enough to probably like get on the channel and properly record a video, do a script, sit down. And this is just the biggest blocker, uh, to YouTube because it's just like so much internal organization. Like, you know, if you think about some clients, sometimes they're slow on just like reviewing some simple SEO pieces of content or like some Reddit comments etc, and like, if they're gonna be slow there, like producing a YouTube video is so much more harder. So I think like, like brands who want to embrace search over optimization, like, are basically our um, mindset internal is like we like every agency, like, usually you attract customers because you're well known for a certain thing. So we're very well known for AI search, we're well known for Reddit. Like, brands will come to us because that's the first thing they want to start doing with us. And then later on, if we see we're growing with them and they've got more capacity, we'll say, hey, you guys should potentially think about YouTube. Like, we'll, you know, we'll do them example script and just show them potentially like what's possible because we believe in it for them. And then they can have a little think and they can say to themselves, like, okay, cool, we should all go organize ourselves and we'll do YouTube. Uh, but like, yeah, I think like, you know, search everywhere. If you want to focus on Reddit, if you want to focus on what's on your website, if you want to do some other initiatives as well. Uh, but like YouTube, that's the one blocker where you've got to have some proper internal organization. Um, so, yeah, I'm probably, I'm sure you know where I'm coming from.

Speaker A: I mean, I do a lot of YouTube. I know how complicated it is. Uh, and, and Reddit as well. And that's the thing. There is a big level of investment that needs to go into it, even if you're working with an SEO agency. And so just to confirm, right, how do you, how do you communicate that to, to a client? Because, well, you know, for, for traditional SEO, you can take, you could do the content, you could do the backlinks. You know, all of that can be done by the agency, maybe with some communication with the client. But when it comes to YouTube or maybe even Reddit, I haven't cracked Reddit yet, but YouTube and we'll get back to Reddit as well after. But for YouTube, there's a big level of investment in there. How do you go about communicating that to clients who might be like, hey, we're paying you money. Why are you telling us to do this? Like you should be doing this.

Speaker B: Yeah, for sure. Well, I mean YouTube, the what usually is not too much of a blocker on at least like the creation. Because customers usually want to be the face of their own brand. They don't really want usually to um, they understand like they're the ones who are behind the brand. They should probably be the ones recording the videos. So that's, that's relatively fine. Like an internal blocker. They'll usually accept um, for, for these other parts though, like indeed like Reddit, etc, Like the, like the way we um, we organize at least like um, explain it to customers is true. Like if a potential customer comes to us today, we'll basically look at their budget and be like, hey, well if you've got this amount of budget to start moving the needle, um, maybe you should focus basically on only this channel. So like, let's take an example. Let's take, I don't know, let's take a SaaS company. They've got very little budget. Well, maybe instead of like focusing on their SEO channel, which they're very new to, where maybe they have to have like an SEO team, they'll start prod content. They also need to do backlinks because they've got like no authority. Like that content's still good for showing up on Google and also fueling AI search. But like that involves three teams. That involves an SEO team, a link building team and a content team. That's like free budgets in itself. But if you were uh, for example, just to say to yourself, okay, there are Reddit threads already ranking in Google for the target keywords we care about. Let's basically write thoughtful Reddit comments which actually we can, you know, say, hey, I'm from X amount X team on the product side, et cetera. I think you should check out this. We've seen it help out with this specific feature. Feature. Like you can come in and provide those helpful answers, those comments and directly benefit from that same visibility already existing. So the way we organize it for customers like who trying to understand like, okay, how do we tackle search over optimization? It's a question of saying yourself, like, okay, what budget am I working with? And like what channels make sense to activate more or less now or later? On. And um, but it's also a difficult conversation also, uh, Benjamin, because like at the same time I think like, like so many brands just don't realize right now, but the barrier to entry for organic and just kind of AI search is just like increasing further and further. And it's like, well, if you've got no coverage across your own website, your own blog, then after it's like your competitive blogs and after it's YouTube and after it's Reddit, it's like so many sources and it's like so much more coverage compared to before. It's like, well, the only thing for organic is just do blog content and product pages and links. You know, it's pretty simple. So that's how we structure internally. Is that helpful?

Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. I'm just curious to know. You talk about all these different channels. Uh, how do you orchestrate this without it just falling apart across all of these different channels and all of these different teams that are working across different points from different aspects of the business.

Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. Okay, so actually we have a process internally. We call it the golden keywords. But if you want to, it's a better way of calling it is like money keywords. If you want to. So every business is going to have like a small subset of like search terms which truly they pro, they produce the best leads. Okay, so if you're saying to yourself like there's two parts of the coin. If you're saying to yourself like, okay, we want to get more coverage in Google when someone searches that search term and at the same time as well, we want to get AI search to recommend us specifically for those search terms. Let's take your, let's take you an example company, like um, an SEO company. Okay. Who offers SEO software and you offer like keyword research software. Well, let's say when someone searches best keyword research, you def, uh, best keyword research tool, sorry, or software, you definitely want to appear on that keyword. Or maybe for example, someone searches a job to be done. How to do SEO keyword research. Same story, a very high value keyword. Uh, for you. So what we do basically is like we map out those keywords with our customers. Usually there's a batch of like 20 to 25 keywords. And then we say to ourself, we across like whoever teams involved. Okay, so it's separate teams in terms of like there's the SEO team, there's a Reddit team. If there's YouTube, there's YouTube. It's the different, it's like different teams, like different people. But very simply said, it's like they align the strategy all together around the core keywords. So that means that uh, if the SEO team, they focus on that keyword, they're going to create the product page, they're going to create after the blog post on best keyword research tools, etc. They're going to focus on that cluster, they'll be links to those pages. Okay, cool. That's the SEO side. And the Reddit team will basically spot which Reddit threads are actually ranking for that topic. Which ones should we basically um, target? Which ones are getting AI search coverage? They'll target those ones. And in the YouTube team you're like, okay, cool, I'm going to create also a YouTube video on how to do uh, keyword research. How to, well, what the best keyword research tools. So usually the way to align it in terms of at least like high level strategy is to say to yourself, okay, cool, are we not spreading our efforts across way too many content points? But versus instead of having common north stars in terms of search keywords and then just everyone basically aligns uh, across that. And one last little detail there as well. But that also makes AI search tracking a lot easier because AI search tracking is super expensive. Uh, which means that if you're trying to track your prompts and how you're being shown up, it's better to actually track basically the prompts across those key um, topics if you want to, which you care about. Because in hindsight all these actions across multiple teams are literally all fueling up basically that specific category term, if that makes sense. So that's how we organize it internally, at least in terms of like strategy, in other words.

Speaker A: And how do you report actually on the success of these different channels where reporting isn't as straightforward as say like a ranking, uh, in Google.

Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. Okay, so that's a great question. So there's a few different things. I'll definitely say it's been a bit messy across different times because there's so many different data points. Right. So, so SEO is pretty simple. I'm not going to dive into that one. Just like clicks, organic growth and keyword positions, et cetera. Okay, easy. Um, we definitely do have all customers to have self attribution, just like a top level perspective in terms of leads and give us that export every month. So we definitely have that usually in place for top level leads, but then after into the individual channels, usually for Reddit, for example, we tie that back to a few things. First thing is how much organic traffic are we in front of? Thanks to the comments which we thoughtfully placed into threads. And in that way that traffic traffic has uh, usually a, has a sum in terms of organic traffic combined and also like uh, traffic value. Because if you get in front of like a super high value thread ranking for like a juicy, I don't know, bottom of funnel term, that visibility might be worth a few thousand dollars like every single month in front of your brand, et cetera. So it has a dollar sign. So we do report on that and then we also report on basically the Reddit threads, how they're helping, the AI citations of the prompts we're tracking inside an AI search tool. So that's like the extra layer which we've added on top with that golden keyword, kind of like mindset in terms of like these are the keywords we're actually doubling down on. And then the next thing also which we've done uh, for like YouTube, that'll be mainly like the views in terms of like, okay, we're ranking inside the video carousel for this video and we basically track that inside our airtable and then just like the views which you get from channels to channel, uh, studio, etc. But like roughly speaking there's quite a few metrics so like top level self attribution for leads and then after like bottom level, the individual chow performances basically roughly.

Speaker A: And for Reddit, I think a lot of listeners, a lot of people, Reddit is just like the never ending conversation. Um, give me some uh, workflow, a bit of a process as to how do you onboard a new client into this new channel, what process goes on there?

Speaker B: Okay, awesome. So it's a really interesting process actually for Reddit. So the first thing is, is you got to say to yourself, why are you focusing on Reddit? Okay, so different customers have different goals. Some will say like oh, we mainly care about getting into those conversations which basically ranking on Google Other will be like we really care about AI search because we know it's a source of influence for lmm. So first of all identify the top level goal. Okay. The next thing is, is understand exactly how you can you actually benefit different users into different conversations because you're going to have to actually provide value to the, the conversation and actually provide something of uh, just a thoughtfulness which is going to actually be helpful to the community or is that conversation you're going to provide. Okay, so have like already in like your chest of jaws, a few USBs and angles which the community will actually find helpful. Okay. So that's the first thing. There's a few ways how to go about it. But like one way is to for example, say to yourself, okay, we've got a team internally, we've got different profiles and we're going to basically create a few accounts for different team members who are basically going to jump into conversations and provide value basically from different angles. Okay, so that could be someone from the product team, it could be someone from the dev team. But very simply it's like those people could basically benefit and provide value to different conversations. But there's a fine line to find basically between promotion and basically being helpful. Okay, so like if the conversation, at least the subreddits, let's say you are not well received by the community, I'd probably avoid those because as soon as you're going to want to come in, you might be badly received because maybe your brand, brand just doesn't have the right reputation for some reason. And that guess you have to tread lightly. For most brands it's not usually the case. Usually they're pretty well received. Okay, um, but just means that like if you are going to participate into a conversation, it needs to feel that like the sole purpose that actually you started to participate wasn't for the sole purpose of marketing. It needs to feel like this is just because, you know, Ben felt that he could participate in that conversation and that he was actually being helpful. And if you check the rest of your, you know, your account history, just a normal Reddit user. So the idea being is like Reddit's a very fine line to find there, but like if you can basically find the right conversations where it's not going to appear cheesy and basically you can actually build value, that's what you want to identify with. A brand basically is like, okay, which conversations are aligned with your SEO AI search goals and which ones are we actually going to be able to provide value without being kicked out? And that's the little angles you want to find basically. And then you want to draft out up very helpful comments but also not non biased. You know, they have, they have to be non biased, sorry, not biased. And uh, and generally just only participate if you actually think you can do something helpful and it's not going to be just badly received. So it's a very fine line to find. Um, that's roughly how to go about it. Is that helpful, Men?

Speaker A: Yeah. And how long does that whole process take? And well, you know, two questions that whole process taken. There's also, you know, there's a lot of Noise is about AI and SEO and how much do you use AI with that? Because it sounds like a lot of manual work and responding as a human. And I think in Reddit it's a fine line between, as you said, yourself, providing value and just being a spammy marketer, which Redditors hate and they hate that and they talk about that. And so how long does it take to build this trust? How much do you rely on tools to help you with this process? Sure thing.

Speaker B: So personally, the tools, I would not rely on that really for writing because it takes a ton of, uh, I mean AI is really gonna spit out a generic answer, I think unless you have really good at AI, it's gonna be probably tricky. Um, so write as a normal Reddit user would write. So just be helpful basically. Um, but if not for AI, yeah, definitely. How to use AI for Reddit, we use it mainly for thread research in terms of, um, we pull through Reddit threads as soon as they appear basically on a certain topic. That way we can get into that conversation soon. Or for example, if it's for finding threads, for ranking for our target keywords, we have also like an AI to pull those through. Um, but not really for the writing part or anything to do accounts account warm up or like looking after the accounts of our team members of the clients. Nothing on that end, unfortunately. Maybe I'm inefficient with how I use AI, but unfortunately I haven't found anything, uh, which works.

Speaker A: No, I mean, it's a whole debate. I think I agree with that. And you could get into a sticky situation, especially if you start using AI really poorly, where you could just get banned.

Speaker B: Um, yeah, that's not cool.

Speaker A: And yeah, it's very difficult to do. I mean, I think everyone's going to relate to this, finding a way in which you can get yourself in those conversations. What I've noticed, and this is maybe a bit of a tangent, is that even when you do get into some of those threads and those conversations for some reason on like ChatGPT or you know, these different LLMs, even if you're part of the response in the thread, they will choose to ignore the brand in the response. Have you noticed that as well? Just as a side note, and I don't understand how that happens. Is that something as well you've noticed whereby. Okay, yeah, we've, we've worked on your Reddit SEO and you're like, you're being shown now across, you know, all these different threads and people upvoting the comments and Everything but still hasn't translated over into visibility into ChatGPT. And then you have to say to yourself, okay, well what is going on here? Here?

Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. Well, I think that one's pretty simple.

Speaker A: Just.

Speaker B: But like, I think people overlook the fact that like Reddit is literally only one part of the puzzle. So it's not because you've got the Reddit, um, influence there, but have you got influence after across the blog post ranking across J2. If that's like uh, you know, if that's got lots of reviews. Is it YouTube also being pulled through? It's like I think just brands just overlook like Reddit's just one part of the puzzle and it's like it's cool if you mentioned there but like once again it's going to be like, like maybe today it's not being mentioned, maybe tomorrow will be mentioned but once again one part of the puzzle. So if you're not doing the rest of the parts of the puzzle, there's a good chance it might not have the full picture for the AI inclusion basically.

Speaker A: I think so just going into a Reddit thread and just commenting the brand name is not going to work then.

Speaker B: Not a silver bullet for sure. One part of it though, for sure.

Speaker A: Yeah, good to know. That's why we tried it first. It never worked. Anyway. Yeah, uh, I'll reach out to you with uh, maybe some of the successes of the blockers we see at Reddit a very difficult game. And actually talking last agency that specializes in AI SEO, they said themselves they don't even want to touch Reddit with a ten foot pole because of how complicated it is to work there and how time consuming it is to work there. So very courageous work to go into that, um, search everywhere optimization sounds great. Incorporates all of these different channels. Um, and it's so particular and unique to each client. How do you go about pricing this offering and how do you distinguish, you know, genuine service expansion from just doing more work across different channels for a client?

Speaker B: This is a great, great question actually. It's um, first of all this is the way to think about it. So if anybody here is like, uh, more of like a. Yeah, like first of all is like services in terms of like if you're adding Reddit, that's a whole nother team. Like that's literally like I'm employing Reddit strategists, I'm employing Reddit writers and heads up like these people aren't cheap. Like usually they've got a good skill and they know it's A good skill. Uh, so like that's a whole team altogether. So like if you're buying that service, you're buying a new service line. I'm not, I'm not putting that under our current scope because that's definitely like outside of what we're doing. That's something completely new. Same for YouTube. I mean literally YouTube, you're gonna hire you know, YouTube strategist to do scripts. You know how I offer a thumbnail designer that has a cost? Uh, who knows if you're doing editing, that's literally a video editor. Like this is literally like other service lines. So if ever someone wants to add that on, that is definitely like another service line. That's why like when people come initially we have a look at their budget and like, well, okay, given your search landscape, what you guys want to do, like I just recommend you guys start here and then we build up and then as we gain more trust we can add on different parts basically. So, um, definitely like in terms of like that first element there, like Reddit, YouTube, pretty clear there's different service lines. One where's a little bit right now of a bit of a fluff, a uh, gray area, sorry, which is a little bit um, it's a little bit blurry I would say is actually the SEO where we've added on a bunch of new responsibilities like AI search. And uh, we have for example added on the cost of like AI search tooling. It's quite expensive so like added that onto our customers who have been happy to pay. But at the same time actually we're doing more work trying to optimize for AI search versus doing for example just our traditional SEO on Google, which is um, a point for us which I think we're going to have to increase. Like roughly our uh, are our uh, time allocated like retainer on just like the SEO team. Because technically now instead of the SEO team just focusing on ranking blog posts and picking link building targets and doing on page and those optimizations they're also thinking about, okay, these prompts, where are they pulling from? Oh, they're missing data inside the doc folder. So I've got to spend time to analyze what's left in the doc folder which isn't being talked about. Or maybe for example there's integrations the prompts are actually using which those integrations aren't being talked about on the product page. I need to add those integrations here. Or maybe for example, um, we're not being well cited inside these prompts. This industry or for this business Type size. And that's because we don't have enough case studies on the website showing we're a good fit for these industries and a good fit for these types of customers. So like, there's a bunch of different like, scopes, in other words, like, which is involved for AI search. So I think that's an area where we right now are a little bit, in a bit of a scope creep in the sense of like we've had our traditional just normal SEO customers. We've said to them like, hey, SEO, the team is going to of course going to look after AI search. And we haven't really. I just said to them like, hey, we need to increase how much time. But I think for like new customers, there's something I've considered like, hey, we need to allocate more time and just communicate that there's more effort involved and uh, and also just communicate that to existing customers. So I think like, pretty clear, like all the rest is a different service line. You've got it, you've got to pay more. But like right now the one was a little bit blurry is the one with like the SEO and the AI search part, kind of like strategy part. But yeah, that's my perspective at least.

Speaker A: Well, we're still, uh, still navigating that whole transition over. And speaking of the transition, do you think that because some, some people, I mean, I feel like now it's kind of okay, this search everywhere optimization with, you know, the acronym is SEO, but there's a big, still a big gap between people who say well, it's just SEO and other people who say, well it is SEO, but there's more to it. And there's some agencies I still see on their websites, they refuse to really partake in this new type of. And people talk about it on LinkedIn as if, you know, this is, you know, it's all BS and it's just SEO. Do you think that these SEO agencies are going to get left behind in the future?

Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, to be, to be honest, it's uh, it's such a debate. I honestly don't understand why it's a debate. I think uh, probably the nature of SEO is going to be a bit too nerdy sometimes, to be frank. But anyway, separate debate that one. But like, uh, for me it's not a debate in terms of like, you know, know, um, I think we should all have a fundamental agreement for like SEOs until date. Like unless my knowledge is completely wrong. But like all the SEOs I know, they've Always focused on product pages, service pages, blog content, and that's it. They didn't focus on like, oh, we should look into our J2 presence. We should look into our presence, uh, on YouTube, unlike, um, our third party listicle mentions, like all this other stuff usually belong to other teams and SEOs. This, I didn't think one second about coordinating it. But like, if you agree that AI search engines in terms of like ChatGPT and Claude, whatever, are going to eat up market share, which is pretty clear. Just look at the numbers, like they're eating up market share. I think actually most of our customers literally like 20 to 30% of their pipeline literally comes from AI search today. So like enjoying that channel is a bit of a stupid mistake. But like, so it's pretty clear of like, okay, cool. If you believe inside these AI search engines, what do they pull from? Well, they pull from more than just SEO content. So. So like, if you're an SEO and your task is to get mentioned inside that new AI search engine, I think it's just pretty clear, like you have to be focusing on more stuff. And like, um, like I think last year there was a big wave of like agencies getting fired from companies because literally they were refusing to agree. But there's new things they should be thinking about. And I think like, um, if there's SEO agencies like right now who for example, don't want to add on Reddit because it's too complex, don't want to add on YouTube, YouTube, that's fine, but in that case you're at least going to have to be the SEO team who has the brains to at least say, well, we need to think about with you guys suggest the, the, the idea that you need to build a YouTube function to actually be able to maybe get more coverage or think about getting a Reddit team or a social team who can engage on Reddit for us, or for example, suggesting these ideas in terms like we're missing content on our doc folder on our case studies, whatever it is. But like, if you, if you still, still focused on just your traditional blog, just your product pages and you aren't really adding nothing new, like, I truly think, like, that's a real problem. Uh, and not to mention how I think also in the future, like the market is also going to change to a certain, like, there's a change right now for SEO agencies in terms of like the landscape of the service we're offering. But I think with AI, that's a whole different can of worms. But I think also the market is going to expect also, like, I don't know, different outputs of work. Ah. And different volumes and like different services altogether because the tooling would have evolved. Um, so that's another kind of worms. But like, at least in terms of positioning, I truly think it's just, I just really dumb. Um, you know, so, uh, yeah, I just think that's my, that's my percept.

Speaker A: At least you think a lot of it has to do with. And we're going a bit on a tangent here before we go on to the last question, which has to do with this repositioning, but does it. I think a lot of it has to do with the ideas that maybe, uh, SEOs don't want to unlearn what they know or come from a place of, you know, okay, maybe I need to relearn this technology and you know, kind of think of yourself as a big beginner in a new type of domain and they want to say, okay, well we've had 10 years of experience in this, so we're the, we're the reference in this and this is how it's going to work.

Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. Well, I mean, it's just how much,

Speaker A: how much learning do you do actually too, do you do. Last time I spoke with SMA Marketing, he said, well, I'm going to university courses for this, learning about large language models. He's reading all these different books. And I don't know if this is something now that, uh, as well, other SEO agencies that specialize in this new domain do as well. And do you also tell your team to work on this type of educating themselves?

Speaker B: Well, two things on the team side. I obviously can't sit down with everyone and say, hey, this is what you need to do. We have academy calls, which we do internally to level up everyone. But the people we hire, by nature, they're always trying to level up. So the people we have on scalers, I generally believe, are some of the most motivated SEOs you're going to find and even the Reddit people, uh, our core values. But people just truly want to go really deep in what they do. So, so like they upskill by themselves. They actually bring new ideas. We have like a Slack channel. Everyone pours in ideas and we level up processes, all of us together. But I, I do my own learning also, like LinkedIn, different sources on YouTube, etc. So like I do my own learning there. Uh, but I think you had another question you said was like, um, what was the question you said just before Ben, in terms of like that's like how I. But like.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah. How do you go about educating yourself in, in this topic? Basically the first question was, you know, is it a refusal to unlearn basically what they know?

Speaker B: Refusal? Because it's the uh, it's the path of least resistance in terms of. Most people want to take the easiest path. Right. Because if you think about the year we had, last year was tremendously difficult in terms of workload and I'm not going to sugarcoat it this year as well. It's still difficult. Like there's still processes. Because just think about it from this perspective, right? If you add on like two more services, let's say you add on Reddit and let's say you add in new stuff to do inside AI services, search and maybe even you add on YouTube, whatever it is. But like literally instead of our operations being focused on one or two free service lines like SEO content links, now it's focused on SEO content links, Reddit and also YouTube and then potentially like a few extra areas. So it means that like we've doubled a lot of like focuses and stuff to work on, even like reporting, etc. So yeah, it definitely means like that's super painful. But at the same time we've grown like uh, we grew 300% last year. So like I went from a struggling market market to actually growing 300. So it's like that was a very difficult decision. But also like literally like, like no offense to anybody, like other agencies, but like if you compare us for example to another agency, but like we're kind of like, it's not a one to one comparison because that other agency won't be doing the work we'll be doing. So it's pretty clear they'll be like, well you guys are offering something very different. So that's also. Which has helped us a lot. So definitely I think most SEOs and people in the market is because it's extremely difficult to do that. Change. Change. Uh, I think that, I mean I personally was nearly that mindset, the person you shared before. I don't even want to touch Reddix. It's so damn complex. And it was so damn complex, but it's because it's so damn complex that we decided to like crack it. And then after basically like that also helped us a lot basically. So yeah, it's the path of least resistance I think, you know.

Speaker A: Yeah. And some of them are starting to now finally change. So you know, uh, I, I do demos for keyword.com a lot we have lots of agencies that work with us. Um, that's, you know, our primary ISP are agencies and I get on calls with them and a lot more are interested in our AI visibility product. Uh, right. Which tracks your visibility across these LLMs. And recurring theme is I'm losing clients. They're asking me for this specific service and I wasn't offering and now I want to offer and I'm learning a lot about it. And I think a lot of SEO agencies are having this we need to reposition type of mentality right now. My question for you is if an agency owner is listening and wants to start repositioning around search everywhere optimization, what's the honest first move and what's the trap most of them will fall into?

Speaker B: For sure. I mean the first move is saying to yourself, what vertical are we actually in? And what makes the most sense? Because literally I'm talking about Reddit, but that makes the most sense for us in SaaS and B2B et cetera. But like let's say for example you focus on travel companies. Well, maybe actually you should think about um, how can your team, uh, incentive learn uh, the skills of social search in terms of like TikTok SEO and then after Instagram SEO etc. Because literally those platforms are becoming a search engine for where Gen Z is looking for like best places to go in Rome, etc. It's like it really depends in terms of like who, who are you as an agency and where are the channels which actually makes sense for your customer base. That's um, the first question I would say to have. And like the biggest trap to fall into is definitely though for sure, like full transparency. Like most businesses usually struggle because of, not usually lack of. It can be obviously lack of business. But also um, we say that businesses, uh, don't starve, starvation, they die because of um, congestion. In terms like there's too much stuff happening, they don't do it really well. So, so like that is the big problem, unfortunately. It's like if you add on too much and then you struggle and then your whole quality diminishes as a whole, then you're going to struggle. So it's like that fine line to say to yourself, like, you got to expand, you got to change, you got to grow, but at the same time don't do it too quick. And it's also pretty risky in hindsight. Uh, but it's also pretty risky not to do anything as well. So it's like, you know.

Speaker A: Exactly, yeah. More risk to inaction than action here. Well, that would was super insightful. Those are all of my questions. Thank you so much for joining me, uh, for this podcast. I learned a lot and I think our listeners will learn a lot as well. I will obviously attach your LinkedIn. So Jules Davis from Scalers with two Rs co. Uh, and if you have any parting words before we end this call now.

Speaker B: Awesome. I really appreciate you having me on Benjamin. And uh, yeah, now hopefully the listeners would have got some few ideas and hopefully I should shared some good ideas. And I think uh, anybody in SEO should be thinking about search everywhere. I think, uh, it makes also a new career development path in terms of new skill sets. So it's pretty cool.

Speaker A: Thank you so much.