Welcome back to the Basic Bee podcast. I'm your host and favorite SEO coach, Brittany Herzberg. Today I'm joined by Nina Clapperton, a fellow SEO specialist and friend of mine. Yes, translation, we met on threads.
We're talking about AI, SEO, all the things. Because AI is going nowhere. We know that. That has been clearly established.
But if you're hearing or seeing aio, aeo, sge, and you, all these other acronyms and you're just like, really feeling confused and unsure that SEO even matters anymore, this episode is for you. So tune in, take notes, and save this episode for future reference. Before I bring on Nina, here is a quick little intro. Nina Clapperton is the founder of SheKnows SEO. We love a good name. She turned a passion for blogging into profit using what she calls her search powered business framework, scaling income without needing massive traffic. She's had a hundred thousand months with audiences under a thousand, all while working 10 to 20 hours a week due to chronic illness. And now she teaches thousands of bloggers and business owners how to do the same thing using SEO community and AI that actually works like a teammate, not a robot.
Hi, Nina. Hi, Brittany. I am so happy to be having this conversation with someone who knows what. They'Re talking about and someone who's not going to call it geo, because GEO is geography or geology.
It should have no place in AI. No, it doesn't. It's funny. It's always like a slip of the tongue and someone's like, CEO. And I'm like, sure, SEO, CEO. I can get behind that one. Oh my God.
I had like full interviews before. Someone just kept being like, she knows CEO. And I was like, sure, okay, love it. Yes, we're going to go with that one too. I love it. So anything AI, anything SEO, it's kind of fair game. We'll see where this goes. But let's start with AI on the scene. Are you finding that SEO still matters or is it like, not a thing? It a hundred percent still matters. It's just a little bit different. Like, this is the thing is, search engine optimization is for search engines, and while an AI is more of an answer engine, you still have to search to get that answer. So, like, you're still searching. It's slightly different for sure, but it's the same as like when you used to go to a library two decades ago to try and find something in an encyclopedia, you had to go searching. We just made searching even easier and more predictive now. And the cool thing is that the user can search something like how to blog. And it's already going to remember, oh, they have a travel blog. Oh, they have a pet blog. Oh, like you are looking for a blog to go on your legal site. It's going to know who you are, so it saves you the hassle. And then as the marketers for us, we get those more directed searches, which I love.
Yeah, I think it's been really helpful. It's funny. I'm sure you've seen the same stuff on threads and everywhere else where it's like, SEO doesn't matter anymore. It's this new thing and it's like, okay, but SEO working makes it so that this other thing works well. And even, like, someone at Google literally did a presentation that was like, it's just SEO to get into AI overviews, to get into AI mode. They were like, look, it's SEO. And so I think if basically the inventors of SEO and like, the reason that we all do SEO are coming out and saying that that says something like, let's be real. So I think that should stop all of the nonsense. But it's such good clickbait where it's like, SEO is dead. And, like, genuinely. A friend of mine, we went to this cemetery and recorded a funeral for SEO as a joke. And then we. This is a little bit too unhinged. So we decided not to post it. But one day I might, because I'm like, you know, please do. And genuinely. And then I had like, SEO, like, rise from the dead, because it's not dead. Like, people just love to say, like, blogging is dead. When I started blogging in, like, 2018, everyone was like, blogging's over. And I was like, okay, cool. Made 30k in a month. Sure. It's definitely dead, though. 100%, it's dead. I don't know any other dead thing that makes that much money, though. But fine, if you want to say that. It's so funny because just like what you said, people are like, blogging. Instead, this thing is dead.
That thing is dead. And it's like, no, it's. I know people have been talking about Instagram SEO and how, oh, you know, it's this magical thing that you can do now. The things were there. Anyone who was already taking advantage of them is just going to continue maximizing from that effort.
But it almost sends entrepreneurs into this brain glitch type of thing when things are so simple because we have been taught and we have learned by experience a lot of times that things are so complicated and so for anyone like me or you to be like, SEO's not that hard. If you do SEO correctly, AI will work really nicely for you. If we say that, it's like, nope, I can't comprehend that. I can't accept that. I'm not a social media girly at all.
Any success I've had on social media is so accidental. But like, I used to get high and then put my glasses on my dog and record him. Of course he went viral on TikTok and got 500,000 views. And I was like, oh, it actually is really easy to go viral now that I've like seen it happen. And I think it's with SEO and like with AI SEO as well. It's very much like once you do it, it's almost like learning two plus two. You're like, oh, now it makes sense. Okay, it is that easy. There's just a lot of competition is something to also keep in mind. So sometimes it's not like what you did was wrong, it was too challenging and you didn't have the authority yet. Or like with TikTok, I posted a lot of my dog in my glasses before he went viral. You just have to wait for your moment. And the great thing with SEO is that like, you have longer term traction. So even when you're doing those adjustments and figuring it out like it will have a longer lifespan and with AI, it's having an even longer lifespan.
Like you doing SEO now has tripled the impact because you're getting it for traditional SEO, you're getting it for AI overviews and you're getting it for like ChatGPT. Search for perplexity for every other one that I've never heard of and all the ones that I have heard of because there seem to be 20 new ones a day. And I'm like, I can't deal. We can't handle it.
I know. And I have a lot of clients who have been really successful with traditional, like website SEO optimization. And many of them have been like, is it not going to be effective? And I'm like, please, whatever you do, don't stop. I'm almost thinking of it like the stock market where it's like, if things start to get really rumbly, it's like, don't take your money out. Like, don't do anything panicky.
I have found that it's the same with AI on the scene and with SEO, it's like, I know I can confirm you're doing the right things. Your data is showing you you're doing the Right. Things. Sure, you might be having a little bit of a slip with traffic, but things are just, like, figuring out what this new playing field is. Don't stop doing the best practices.
Oh, a hundred percent. And, like, I've been to a number of blogging conferences this year and last year as well. People were like, oh, it's dead. We're done, we're done, we're done. And then everyone I spoke to who's been doing this, like, for 20 years, they were all like, no, this is the time when you go hard.
And same with literally my entire TikTok, that's about money. The very small part, that's not about dogs. They're all saying the same thing. Like, right now, invest in the stock market. Because, like, the last recession is when I became a millionaire or whatever. And I'm like, okay, sounds great. Love it. Let's go.
And I do think with a lot of, like, the changes with AI SEO and like, the changes to Google and the changes to all these algorithms, the main thing is, like, the people that we're going to be scared away have been scared away. The people that are going to stand the test of time are going to evolve with it. And I think we're in this really cool place. Almost like when, like, TikTok first came on the scene, or even when, like, Google traditional search came on the scene, we're able to be at the forefront. And how many times are businesses like, oh, I wish I had gotten on Instagram when it first launched. I wish I had, like, done that. Because, like, those are the people that go, like, massive. Immediately I'm like, we are at the forefront of something and that means we have to, like, bushwhack a little bit and, like, figure it out. But it also means that, like, you have the opportunity for so much growth and to be a leading expert so much faster, which I think is honestly so cool and, like, so fun. And also, as someone who loves puzzles and challenges, I love seeing the algorithmic changes to, like, see what we can do to improve and see what we can do to connect with people even more. And. And I honestly think that with SEO for AI engines, it's much more about, like, real people and not tricking an algorithm, which is so much better because, like, we all hated those recipe posts. Like, Google keeps saying they're like, you guys kept roasting us for that. We had to change. And then we're like, no, you didn't. And it's like, actually, they had to. They did.
They really did. And like you said we kept telling them that they needed to change. But you brought up a really good point. And this is part of what I've heard a lot from my clients, which is that, okay, I want to maximize on this moment. What can I do? And when I'm like, just keep following the best practices we've been doing, it feels like not enough. So on that note, are there any subtle shifts or even big shifts that you've seen where people can actually do more to make the most of this moment? I think there's a few different things.
The first thing is I would say really hone down on, like, who your audience is. So where before it was much more about, like, niching down to something that was keyword specific, I think it's much more about niching to your audience about who you you're talking to at whatever stages they're in. Then I think it's about really building topical authority.
That's the most important thing here. If we think of, like traditional SEO, it was much more domain authority focused. And domain authority is basically dead because the way that it was tracked isn't the way the algorithm's tracking things anymore. And so while backlinks are important and help in their own way, the, I don't know, just having a high DA for DA's sake means less than nothing anymore. It's much more about actual engagement. So that's gonna be really key. Is building topical authority where you show, like, look, I actually know this thing and I'm gonna keep talking about it. And it's so easy to do. It's just be that incessant, know it all, be the Hermione Granger, be that one who's just like, this is the thing that, like, if you get me into the corner at a party and put a drink in my hand, I will not stop talking about this. These are like the questions your audience will first ask you. This is what you do on your discovery calls, whatever.
Like, those are the pieces of content to get going with. Make sure you have at least 20 posts on a subject before you move on to a next subject. And then for backlinks, the main thing I'm finding is we're going back to traditional pr, so it's not about, like, all those, like, buy a link from, like, link farm things. Thank God they're dead. They're not a good idea. Test on them. And I destroyed a 300,000 page view a month site partially because I was like, I have issues. My therapist says there's problems and we need to deal with Them, apparently. I say it was an interesting case study. We differ on our opinions, but I bought 10, like spammy link Farm links to be like, look, it's going to kill this site. And it killed the site. The site has recovered a bit to the point of like 50,000 page views a month. But I also haven't touched it in two years. So to be fair, it's kind of dead in the water. But what's working now is going back to basics of, like, you want other people to recommend you because they like your content and that's easier to get. You don't have to pay$5,000 for five links for that or something. What you're going to do is get on podcasts like this one and talk about things that you just love talking about. You're going to get featured in someone else's Instagrams. Even nowadays, because it's not about link building, it's about reputation building. Essentially you just need them to tag you. You just need them to be like, hey, at Nina Clapperton, at whatever your site's or your business's name is. That's really key. I would also say with the multimodal element of search now and AI, because it can understand, like, if someone just mentions you. Like, I was mentioned on Semrush because I did this big case study post hcu, about travel blogging. They linked to the travel blog I talked about and not to me. And at the time I was like, I hate you. Like, this is such a waste for me. And now I'm like, no, it's not. Because it knows, even though they spelled she knows SEO wrong. Like, in terms of how do you do that?
Basically they just didn't put spaces. So it's all just one heat together.
Like when you get those like spammy backlink requests. And I was like, semrush, come on, come on, guys. Like, and I did email them and they never got back to me to fix it. So I'm like, rude.
But it still has that authority because just like these LLMs are like a human reading this thing and understanding context. So that's huge as well. I also think inside of any post you're publishing, any page, unique experience is the main thing is really make sure you're adding something new to the conversation. The old version of skyscraper content, which was like, just like such a buzzword of like skyscraper post, whatever, it was very much like a bit of a dick measuring contest of like, who has the tallest building. And it didn't matter if your building was Unstable and was going to topple over and kill everybody in the city of Toronto. It just needed to be tall. And that was bad. People didn't like that. It took them longer to get to their apartment on the penthouse floor. And they're just like, I want to get home nowadays, like, what matters? And I always give the example of an office building. I would rather go to an office that has 10 stories rather than a hundred. But it has a masseuse, it has a gym, it has like a really great smoothie bar in the lobby. I can bring my dog with me. Like, those are the things that matter. It's quality. So it's about leveling up in terms of the actual quality of your content. And that's going to be by doing things that help your user and showing that you actually know this stuff and that it's. Even if it's AI written, I'm fine with AI writers as long as it's AI written, not AI ideated, created, written, published. And there was no human involvement in it.
Because then what's the point? Because if you're doing that and you're like, I'm not ranking. I'm like, and you shouldn't be because you're part of the problem.
Could not agree more. That's one of the things I harp on pretty regularly, especially at this point of 2025, where you need your story in there.
And that could even mean including some quotes from clients, testimonial quotes from clients, creating a case study, linking to a case study, sharing parts about your framework. We really want to get, and I think you're hitting this perfectly, we really want to get to know you, why you, what have you done? What do you know, what's going on with your clients? And people want to know that. And it's going to be really challenging. And I'm seeing it's really challenging for the people who don't solicit or ask for even solicit, such a bad word. But like, kindly, nicely, appropriately, ethically ask for feedback about the experience of working with them and. Or they get it and they don't use it. And I was one of those people, like, hands up in the air. I was one of those people. And toward the end of 2024, early 2025, I was like, dang, I really gotta start talking about why me? Why my stuff? What am I doing? And I started looking at the data and then I got really confident because I was seeing that a lot of my stuff is working very quickly. Doesn't matter. The entrepreneur or the industry or any of the stuff. It's working quickly because my process works really great and it is really built on some solid stuff, including your audience, the who, who do you help? How do you help them? That kind of stuff. So it's really good to hear that. Another thing I know that I've heard a lot about is, and this would be great for anyone who hasn't really tapped into this, using the headlines in the hierarchy that they're intended to. So one H1 on every single page. Only one. We know that I say this and then H2s to support your H1 and H3s to support your H2s. That is really how we need to be using them.
Not. And I was guilty of this too. Not. This one's cute for this section and this one's cute for this section. We really do want to be going based on the hierarchy of information. So again, H1 is at the top, the H2 is supporting the H1, and the H3s are supporting the H2s. I have also heard, and I would love your take on this, I've heard that it's a really great idea to create just a giant massive FAQ blog post or page that you can continue adding to. And maybe it's not even linked anywhere on the footer or the nav bar, but it exists on your website and it's something that again, you can just add to. And it's not accordion style, it's just question, answer, question, answer. Have you heard anything about that? I have and I disagree with it. I'll be honest with you, because I think it's one of those things that is gaming the system and it's not actually helpful. Like, if we think of it as a resource center or an FAQ page that's going to help your user, then it has to be linked somewhere so they can find it. So to me, the idea of just doing it to, like, have an encyclopedia of content hidden in your site kind of feels the same as, like, when people and I. Oh, my God, I see this so often when people, like, hide keywords behind an image.
Yes. Keyword stuff. Or they turn the keywords like white so that you can't see them. And I'm like, I'm someone with ADHD and other disabilities, so I use a screen reader and I'm like, it reads those out to me.
And people are like, no, no, no. But it's hidden. And I'm like, yeah, but a lot of people over. I think it's like 1.3 billion people are disabled in some form. I might have that slightly wrong. It might be 1.7. I don't remember. But, like, it's. A lot of people are formally disabled in some way. And almost all of our accessibility functions are reading things the way an algorithmic bot is reading things. So even, like, you're talking about heading hierarchies, it's frustrating because, like, I will read something, and especially there was a trend like, two years ago where it would be like, you do an H6 and then you would do your H2, and the H6 was just like, the name of your site or a keyword in, like, light gray. And people were like, well, it's pretty. And I'm like, I don't care. It's hideous to me when my screen reader has to keep going. She knows SEO keywords are da, da, da. And I'm like, stop.
Just like, when people would keyword stuff alt text, and it, like, I would leave because I was getting so frustrated that, like, every other sentence basically was just, best beaches in Thailand. Best beaches in Thailand. I was like, get out of here. So I do think that with stuff like an FAQ page like that, I think what's better to do is in each post have FAQ schema for individual FAQs that matter to that post, and then they're also connected to whatever content that is. Now, if it's like, if you have a product or service on that service page, you can have the thing, but if your whole business is like, like ThriveCart or SEMrush or something, I get having, like, a help center of FAQ information. I think treat it like an FAQ page that people will see. I'm not a big fan of anything that's hidden behind the scenes or that you're just doing for SEO, like, tricks, basically. And I've definitely done stuff before that it was like, okay, here's something that'll scale your traffic 50,000 page views in a month, and you do it, and then it hurts your audience and it hurts their trust in you, and you get embarrassed. Like, I got to the point where I had a site that was getting 300,000 page views a month and making 30k a month. And I was embarrassed to show it to my family. I was embarrassed to have people read it because of how many, like, SEO tricks there were. And it stopped being authentic content. It stopped being something that represented me and my business as much. And I think that that's a really important thing to balance. Here is whatever's going to Work. The things that are going to last the most are not going to be the tricks, they're going to be the things that actually connect with your audience. So I would say if you're going to have an FAQ page, have it. I would link it somewhere. Somewhere just that way it shows that you're not like ashamed of it and like hiding it under the cupboard like Harry Potter or something. Like you want people to know you have this kid. We're not advocating for SEO child abuse here, so we want to make sure it's like very clear what you have.
And then I would say with those questions as well, like a lot of times people are making an FAQ page with questions that should be blog posts and things that they're like, I can answer it in one sentence. And I'm like, yeah, you definitely can. Your audience needs more than that to understand it.
And I actually got in trouble with a student, a couple students actually that got mad at me because I was sharing I have the zero volume keyword strategy I talk about. And they were like, well stop talking about it. Like stop telling people. It's like it's in your course. We don't want everyone knowing it. And I'm like, yeah, but you took a two hour lesson on it. I'm saying use zero volume keywords in a sentence. Like they don't know the next 20 steps. They don't have all the examples you have. Like it's different.
And I do think like with you have to match your audience's understanding of something. But I also think you have to give all that context and experience. And so think of it kind of like you're answering a question at a party versus having a discovery call. Do the discovery call instead. That's gonna convert so much better for you. Also, I am so lazy. Partially cause of chronic illness, partially cause I just love a nap. Like my dog at 2pm every day, even if he goes to daycare, he just drops and like he will not move. Cause he knows it's our two hour nap time and like we're done. That's what's happening where like the daycares have called me to be like, is he okay? And I'm like he is. It's just a thing. So with that I'm like, I don't wanna answer the same question a hundred times. And, and this is kind of the zero volume keyword strategy is whatever people are asking you, make a post around it, make like the ultimate guide to that question, connect it to your other content and they're going to be the easiest post to write. Like they're honestly they're so simple because you're like I know this, this is so easy for me. And then you're just verifying that keyword with key search semrush Ahrefs every other million of them. Just not ubersuggest. I'm not a fan of Ubersuggest, I will say because I've run tests and theirs is the most inaccurate search volume data which bothers me. Good to know. Yeah, it's much, much lower for no apparent reason and then much much higher for random stuff. Now I haven't used it in a year so maybe it's changed. But I will say I regularly run tests and I recommend everyone does this of like actually check your Google search console versus what they have every once in a while to see the percentage difference. That way you can like accurately predict volume for yourself to some extent and and then you can also start to track your click through data and your conversions to be like okay, it says 20,010 people are going to click through because actually what people wanted was a map. So like something to keep in mind. But yeah, you basically just need to actually think about people and answer the questions with content. And I wouldn't hide it on FAQ page. I like that.
Thank you for mentioning ubersuggest. One of the things I do talk about a lot is having that because it is a free option to a degree. Like I mean I know it caps people and I don't want to not give people some kind of tool. There's definitely a way that you can read like a Google search results page and not have the search volume. Is there another free tool that you know of for as far as keyword research goes?
Semrush I think you can do 10 a day, something like that.
KeySearch is also incredibly inexpensive. What I recommend doing to everybody, it's like what like 27amonth or something like that. Buy it for a month, batch your keyword research for three to six months and then just keep moving. And at a certain point too I would say like you can look at your Google search console data. That's going to be the best place because it's first party data which is so much more valuable than like secondary or third party data. Some people say Google AdWords. I think Google AdWords is horrible for user experience so I wouldn't recommend it. The best actual like free thing you can do for volume and data. Google Trends go into like the trend report and see what's trending right now. But also it's going to predict how it's done over a period of time. So you can go in there and see topical trends and topical volume. As for like the individual like keyword match.
KeySearch is just so inexpensive. I'm like, honestly it's worth it. Even if you're just going to like batch some stuff for a while. Otherwise Semrush, they do a seven day free trial. Ahrefs got rid of theirs for some reason and I think SE ranking has a free trial. Keywords everywhere used to have a free trial. I don't remember if they do anymore. Keyword Chef also has a free trial. Most of them will have some sort of free element.
Yeah. The main thing though is that like the free element is cap.
And ultimately with KeySearch, I'm like, look, if you buy it for one month and you plan out a hundred posts on it, you've made your money back a million times. Yeah. So I would say like just go for it to be honest. And I'm sure Britney has an affiliate link for you guys. Oh, she does. I have like a discount code called K S D I S C for anyone gets 20% off if you use that.
I don't know why they don't promote that more, but it's a thing. And they're really good as well if you get their stuff on like a Black Friday discount or something. Even if you got like a year today, whenever, like mid year. But if you ask them like they will prorate it, which is really nice and they're really good for customer service which I really appreciate.
So yeah, yeah, I would say that's probably the best one.
But ultimately as well, I don't think volume matters as much as intent and I don't think volume matters as much as the actual like conversion focus. So I use keyword research tools more so to check phrasing and like matching the marketing. So it's like is someone searching for how to grow their blog or how to have more page views or how to have more pages per session? Like what's the term that they're using? The example I always give is like I used to run a moving abroad blog and so I call myself a slow mad.
Cause I would spend like 3 to 6 months in the country before I moved on to the next one. I didn't get citizenship or anything. So I'm not really an expat and but I wasn't really a digital nomad because I would get jobs on the ground. But no one knows what a SLOMAT is because it's a term that like travel writer Rosie Bell came up with. So I was like she and I knew it and that was it. And so no one was searching it. So it's kind of like with SEO. If I started optimizing for geo, which also was dumb, as we said, people wouldn't know what to search for that people would know what to search for, like how to get ChatGPT to site my business or how to show up in ChatGPT search or something. We just want to translate ourselves so our audience understands us. And to some extent I care less about how many people are searching for it versus that the right people are going to find me and that I'm finding them in a way that they can understand. So yeah, I don't know. To me, key search is plenty.
I think like semrush and Ahrefs are great if you have more agency level or if you're publishing a lot of content.
I don't think most people and most businesses need that. And I think that that's another thing that makes SEO feel exclusionary. That doesn't need to happen.
Yeah, I really appreciate that take on that and it's especially because I love KeySearch. I am die hard KeySearch fan. But I love your idea of get it for a month, go ham, batch out your stuff, at least get the ideas, do whatever kind of researching you want to do and then you can close it up. And that is perfect. That is so, so great because you could optimize your website in that time. You could come up with some really dreamy blog post ideas and really get all the information that you need to go to town when you're ready to write those things. So I really love that idea and thank you for going through all those other free ones. That's all for part one, friend. Join us in the next episode for part two. And in the meantime, you can connect with Nina in her Facebook group, her Instagram dm's or sheknowseo Co before you go, grab her SEO content audit checklist. And of course you know all of the links will be below.