Influencer Entrepreneurs: Marketing Tips to Make You More Visible
Surviving in the entrepreneur world is not an easy task. Jenny teaches you how to build a stronger business with blogging and social media tips that are up to date and proven. No more trading time for money! She teaches content and email marketing strategies that helped her build her audience and sell her lifestyle blog for over six figures in 2019. As a former inner city school district teacher she understands the importance of breaking strategies into bite size pieces of information all with the master plan of giving you homework so that you can implement the strategies in your business immediately. Get ready to be able to put her strategies into practice after just one listen!
Influencer Entrepreneurs: Marketing Tips to Make You More Visible
Proven SEO Tips to Improve Your Google Rankings in 2026
Google’s results are a scoreboard, and in 2026 the only way to win is to deliver what the current winners don’t. We sat down with Ty from Everything Digital Marketing to unpack the strategies that reliably drive rankings and revenue right now—no fluff, no recycled tips. From intent-first research to experience-rich content, we break down how to choose battles AI can’t win and how to turn your unique perspective into authority and clicks.
We start by mapping the biggest shift: if AI can answer it fast, don’t write it. Instead, chase queries that demand judgment, local nuance, or lived experience. Ty shares practical ways to evaluate a SERP before you draft, spot depth signals, and decide whether to publish, pivot, or pass. We dig into building trust with proof—expert bios, transparent methods, case studies—and why personality is not a nice-to-have but a differentiator that keeps readers engaged and coming back.
Then we tear down persistent myths. One-size-fits-all advice fails because SEO is like fitness: the right plan depends on where you are and what you need. Ty outlines a simple testing cadence you can run on clusters of similar pages, how to read leading indicators without overreacting, and why he follows what Google rewards instead of what Google says. For local and professional services, we highlight the outsized impact of a complete Google Business Profile and rich service pages. For creators and publishers, we offer frameworks for turning generic listicles into decision-making guides, comparisons, and itineraries grounded in real experience.
If you’re ready to stop chasing trends and start shipping content that ranks because it’s genuinely better, this conversation is your blueprint. Subscribe for more proven strategies, share this with a friend who needs a smarter SEO plan, and leave a review with the one tactic you’ll test first.
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If your website traffic has stumbled, you're about to learn the SEO strategies that are actually working in 2026. No fluff, no outdated information. Hi, Ty. How are you?
SPEAKER_01:Doing great. Doing great. So glad to be here and thankful that uh we have a chance to connect.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, me too. I am super excited about this conversation on proven SEO tips to improve your Google rankings in 2026. But before we actually jump into that, will you introduce yourself and your business to my audience? Um, you were on the podcast years and years and years ago, and both of our audiences have shifted a bit. So I'd love for you to reintroduce yourself.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I appreciate that. So yeah, I have a business called Everything Digital Marketing that I started about seven years ago. It's kind of crazy how time flies. Um, prior to that, I worked in the corporate world. So I kind of cut my teeth in the industry working at different digital marketing agencies throughout my time. Um, a couple of different agencies that dealt with national brands, uh, a couple of different agencies that dealt with local businesses, and then uh worked in in-house roles for about six years. So worked through um working on different e-commerce platforms and really kind of touched a lot of different areas and genres when it came to digital marketing and seeing how they all fit together. So uh for the past six, seven years, I started everything digital marketing, stepped away from the corporate life. Uh it's kind of morphed over the years, which has been fun, like you just said. Uh it originally started out as just a membership, uh, but now I offer done-for-you services. So uh I work with business owners, I work with uh people who are looking to increase their bottom line through getting more traffic, converting higher traffic and providing them with uh knowledge of how to do that. So uh I have a team of about seven people underneath me at this point, and so we are chugging along, working on clients and helping them in every aspect of their business. It's been fun.
SPEAKER_03:Excellent. Very bad. All right, so let's just jump right in. I also I don't know if you saw me giggle, but you said six, seven, and all I could do was would think of my middle schooler.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, I have a middle schooler too.
SPEAKER_03:Wondering if my audience caught it. I'm sure there were a couple of moms in the car that giggled. Um, but let's just kind of jump in. What's the biggest change you've seen in SEO's strategies over the past few years?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you know, it's interesting. As SEO has evolved, so has the content producer. So there's still some basics that are true where they were true 10 years ago, they're true today. But variety of changes that have happened clearly with AI, which I'm sure we'll get into, um, but also with the way people consume information. So in the past, it was very simple. You basically answered questions in a way that you felt like you would want it answered. And really what's changed now is Google is saying, well, you need to look to see how we're rewarding traffic and then provide a better answer than what's already currently available. So, for example, if you're a business owner and say you're a lawyer in New York City, right? Looking at the top results and seeing who is ranking and what kind of content they're producing to rank in order for you to try to compete with that. Whereas in the past, it was put your website up, get your information online, make sure it's full, fully uh filled out, and then do some tweaks here and there. Um, but really the the big change is intent behind the answers and answering them in a way that's better than what's currently available, um, and doing research prior to creating content. So just not just creating content because you're like, this is the answer, this is how it works, but really putting yourself back into the eyes of the consumer. What are they looking for? How are they wanting that content produced? And then providing it in the best and clearest way possible. So I think a lot of what AI has done is made people become better marketers. Um, most business owners wear thousands of hats. As an entrepreneur myself, I wear thousands of hats, and so you want to do it, but you don't want to become an expert in it because that's not what you started your business for, right? Like you started your business to do whatever it is that you wanted to do, and then you've learned how to do other things, and so I think becoming a better marketer just is overall better for your business. So, how do you sell your service, right? A lot of people aren't natural salesmen, and so when they are asked to pitch their services in an elevator pitch or on a website, it used to be you just kind of threw up the information, it was more brochure. Like this is what you're wanting. Now you actually have to appeal to an audience. Now you have to actually compete with other people, and so that has really also been the change is that your writing point of view has to be better than somebody else's or unique enough to make you stand out.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, it's that uniqueness. I think that it reminds me of 2009, 2010 when we weren't writing for SEO, right? We allowed our voice to be out there, we allowed to just kind of share in our personality, and I think it's bringing back that personality while still answering the question fully and to the best of our ability and beyond what others have done in the past when we search for a certain topic.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. I think people are doing themselves a disservice by not allowing their personality to shine, and that's what connects people, right? You when you talk to people face to face and they're robotic and quick with their answers, you move on. You don't spend any more time. It's you know, you know, small chat, right? Um, and if you do it in a way that connects people to you, then you build your brand, you build your business, you build relationships, which is what people are craving today, even with the technology we have at our fingertips.
SPEAKER_03:Absolutely. So now, how do you determine which keywords are worth targeting in 2026?
SPEAKER_00:So you can't ignore AI. And if people are going to Google a term and there's gonna be a very quick answer, there's not really a reason for you to create a blog post anymore for that. So, for example, there was a strategy back in like the 2012 to 2016 time frame where you would create an article around how many uh cups are in a liter or how many liters are in a gallon. And that type of information is too generically produced with AI that it's not worth creating content around. Uh, I work with a few travel bloggers, and one thing that I've explained to them if you are putting together a three-day itinerary for New York City, then AI can do that, they can hit the main spots. That has been done and over and over and over again. What you have to produce is information that people will actually want to read, not just highlights of skimmable information. So when you're choosing keywords, the biggest thing that you can do is Google the term and see if it is an informational query that is easily answered through AI, or if there's space in that search result that relates to people wanting more context, wanting more information. So your ability as a keyword researcher now determines what type of uh content you're producing and what type of content you set aside saying that's an AI post. That's information that AI is going to take. I'm not really going to need to compete with that, right? I mean, back in the day there used to be all these weather services. Well, now Google, AI, Apple, they've all created those. So it's all native now. So you don't need to have a post or a website talking about weather because you can get it information at your fingertips. Um, so depending on your business, depending on what you are, you have to make content that makes you stand out, that shows that you're an expert, that people can trust your brand, and that you can be seen as the expert that you are. Um, some people in this space, whatever they are, they like to hold back their best information. I feel like that's a strategy of the past. You have to give information and give information again and again and lead with your best stuff to really distinguish and separate yourself. So keyword research really boils down to can you create content that requires a unique POV that people want to know? So instead of how do I plan a three-day um travel vacation to New York City, the the content might be, you know, here is the four different itineraries for three days depending on your needs, right? Depending on what you like, right? So I've experienced all of these and I will give you my review, right? So if I go to you know Fort Lauderdale, Florida, I want to know how that person's experiences were, what their personal preferences were. That's the type of information that AI can't replicate. That's the type of data that will make you stand out, and that's what will help you gain more followers because people start to trust your opinion, not just your knowledge.
SPEAKER_03:It's about those authentic experiences, right? When you said the example of the travel barber, I have a client right now who I think of as a vacation advisor because everything is about the authentic experience in which she offers, and it's she's got pub experiences, and then she's got the castle experience, which is more kind of just what Ireland is known for. But it's authentic, it's the hidden gems, it's the off the beaten path. And I think that is why her business has continued to just explode ever since everything opened back up since COVID, because it is it's that authentic experience that people are looking for. They don't want to do the nomenclature kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_00:Right. I think that's been played out. I mean, at this point, most people can get the details on the big highlights, right? I mean, there's only so many tourist places in a built in a specific area, right? So then you're looking for, like you said, the information, like what would locals do? Like we travel quite a bit and we don't want to hit the same places that everyone else that is traveling with us wants to hit. Because yeah, we want to see it, but that's what we want to go where the locals go, right? We want to go eat where they eat. We don't want to eat where everyone else is eating. So yeah, I think everybody wants authentic experiences now, um, particularly the demographic that you're trying to reach compared to the demographic that AI is trying to reach. And I think that those are two different demographics.
SPEAKER_03:So we talked a little bit about AI and the importance of making sure that we've got an authentic quality content out there that goes above and beyond the surface level. Are there any other things that businesses should do to stay ahead of AI?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's a great question. I think the biggest thing you can do is make sure that when people come to you, they're not just getting the authenticity, is one thing, but the other thing would be for me is what information are you offering that like even if like I'll give you a perfect example. I can go and eat a taco here in Austin, Texas, and there's a place here called Torchies Tacos. And if you've ever eaten a place like that, they are five, six dollar tacos, but when you get the taco, you understand why. And I can go get a taco at Taco Bell for 99 cents and have very different experiences, right? So with your business, are you a 99 cent taco? Are you a five, six dollar taco? And are you charging and are you providing the experience to justify the charge? Right. And I think so many businesses, you know, when you look at it, you're like, how can I distinguish myself amongst my competition? Well, I I love it. I think that there's too many examples in businesses throughout history where price is a distinction, right? We're now buying like$120 t-shirts and a hundred and thirty dollar pair of pants, right? Whereas 20, 30 years ago, that's insane, right? Now we're buying$500 pairs of shoes where we would spend$60 to$80, and that was like the max. So obviously inflation, but there's also a level of quality that you come to expect with that higher price tag. And so I think the same can be true with staying ahead of AI. When you're producing something, what type of quality is it? Now, I always tell this to anybody I work with: I cannot get you to rank number one in Google if the information and the quality of information you're giving me is garbage, right? Like, there's no trick, there's no like special sauce that I can pour over that. Like, if it if the food stinks, people are gonna know, right? Like, like there's no way that you you have to have a quality product. So if you're going, and this isn't just because of AI, but this is just business in general. Like, if you're gonna provide an experience that's gonna be different from your competition, like I'll give you a great example. There used to be, you know, very different experiences. I've traveled a ton, and when I travel, there's absolutely experiences that are completely polar opposites, right? I I will fly one airliner and I will get interrupted three or four times, you know, watching a movie, reading a book, to ask me to fill out an application for their credit card, right? And it's almost like, oh my goodness, like again, and then here comes the stewardess or steward with the handout asking me to fill out a credit card app, and then I'll have another experience where it's completely worry-free, right? Everything's provided, you know, there's information like, oh, this is nice, right? Like, you want people to walking away from your business being like, wow, that was nice, wow, that was different, wow, that was unique. And that isn't I mean, that's just fundamental foundational advice for businesses, regardless of AI. So I think it's making you as a business owner be sharper, be more distinguished, and have a better offering, which really doesn't translate to AI, it's just mainly the fact that there's more people in the space.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, nope. I think so true. So are there any SEO myths you still hear that you want to debunk?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's a good question. Um yeah, I think uh particularly in the industry that I've been in for a while now, I think a lot of advice is given. And SEO advice is a lot like diet and health advice. And health and diet advice can be completely opposite for one person's body type and where they are in their health journey compared to another person, right? I always like to chair uh give SEO advice and compare it to fitness, right? So if I'm going to the gym and I'm an Olympic athlete and I'm a marathon runner, my workout is gonna look vastly different than someone who has never been to the gym before, who is overweight and trying to cut weight in order to be healthy, right? Two different experiences. And so the biggest myth that I like to give or debunk is really if you're given an SEO advice, know where the advice is coming from and know where the advice is meant for, right? So, for example, like there's people I work with who are on the highest tier of the ad networks, right? And so they're being getting one-on-one advice from those ad networks saying, do this, do that. And so that advice gets trickled down and the groups and in the masterminds, and then it lands at somebody and they're like, I heard this. Is this true? And you're like, Well, yes, it's true for that person, but it's not true for you, right? Like, if you're you shouldn't go out and run 13 miles day one. No, that's not a good idea. You haven't even ran a mile yet, and we have no idea how fast you can go. So, no, let's not do that. Tailor the specific SEO advice to the specific situation. Like, I'll give you an example. I work with some lawyers, and majority of lawyers don't have time for SEO, they don't do SEO, and the ones that do just want it checked off the box. So when I'm working with them, I'm like, I need you to fill out your Google Business profile. I need it to be completely filled out. Give me the information and I will fill it out for you. Give me 10 vote photos of your office, give me some headshots of give me access to all your media library. And within 30 minutes, I can get that profile in a place that immediately transforms their unique uh online inquiries coming from from that source. And it's just literally just the knowledge. So there's so many times where knowledge doesn't necessarily mean it's right for you, just like a doctor giving advice to somebody in their 70s is not going to relate to somebody in their 30s or in their 20s, right? So SEO is very similar. So when you hear of this advice, my caution to you would be what is the context the advice was given in, and who was the advice meant for? And if that person is similar to you, then particularly try it. And then the other thing I would recommend is you should absolutely be testing as much theories and as much things on your site as possible. But know that those tests do not mean that the theory is wrong, it just means it wasn't right for you, right? Um, you know, we I've gotten to a point with my health where I have a personalized uh vitamins that are based on my blood type and my urine because I've had those tested and now I know exactly what my body's deficient in. Well, my vitamin regimen is very different than my seven-year-old son's, right? And so the the advice from SEO and the myths that I hear, like I hear this all the time. Well, I heard the ad network said to do this. I heard that Google no longer wants this. Well, it's funny because I've heard those type of statements for almost 20 years doing this. And I'm like, okay, what's the statement? Great. Let me pull up a search result that shows you how that statement's incorrect. So I'm also a big proponent of I don't do what Google says, I do what Google shows me is ranking. And so there's a big difference because Google will always say from conferences, from tweets, from articles, do this. Like a good example is the SSL certificate. Back in 20, whenever 15 that came out, Google made a date that, like, I think it was in the middle of summer saying, by this date, if you do not have your SSL certificate, you will see decreased traffic. That was the verbiage that was used. So everybody panicked, got the SSL certificate loaded on their site. That date comes and everyone's like, okay, I did it, right? And then a month later, sites that devant hasn't even paid attention are still ranking in the top three, right? And then three months later, those sites are still there. Six months later, we're still seeing it. So I'm like, man, I'm sure glad we spent all that time, energy, and effort putting in the SSL certificate. And Google's like, oh yeah, by the way, it's something that we're rolling out, but we don't know when we're gonna roll it out, and we're not gonna tell you if we we did, right? So, yes, there are things that you should test. Yes, there's things that you should look at, but always base your assumptions off of what Google is rewarding, not after what somebody says.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. So my biggest thing that I will take away from this interview is that for 2026, my goal is to continue with SEO doing more research, really diving deeper into results and seeing how it actually works. Would you say that that's a good strategy based on our conversation?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So so my whole thing is data talks. Because so, so my journey into this SEO world started when I was in college. And one of the things that I had was a professor that challenged me to create a website and spend$20 in paid ads to the website. So that was our assignment in college. And one of the in the review of our sites as a class, he brought up a search result and specified that the paid ads were at the top. Underneath were the organic ads, and those were more of a black box. Nobody knew. That was the phrase that he used. And so I looked at that and I heard that, and like, well, clearly somebody knows because there's people there. So I led me on a journey to do what I do. And as I learned it, I was in my first SEO agency, and I had everything that the sales team could close come through the door. So I would be on the phone with a florist at one moment, and then the next call would be a software company, and the next call would be a lawyer, and the next call would be an app that was just getting started. I mean, and then it'd be an e-commerce site, so like all over the map. So what we would find is let's say something that would work with the the app or the software. So we would apply it to the florist or to the the e-commerce store. And what we found is that it wouldn't work. And it drove me, drove me nuts. I'm like, it works here, but it won't work here. Why? And so what I found is that you can't apply the same methodology from one business to the other, not in online marketing. Because, yes, there are some common things. Yes, you should have email, yes, you should have some some SEO done, but you have to understand how it works for you, right? And so specialization started to become a thing, right? And so we're like, okay, we specialize in lawyers, or we specialize in e-commerce, or we specialize in in content creators, or we specialize in in people who are getting their their courses started, right? The so the specialization, and what happened is that they found that there were things that worked, but they only worked in this order, like one through five, do it this way, and then it will work. You'll get the desired result. So I have taken that to the unth degree where now I'm like, okay, I'm going to do these six changes. I'm going to wait two weeks, I'm going to see the results, and I'm going to do it on these four URLs that have similar characteristics. And then if the results come back positive, I'm going to repeat that for the next four. But if it doesn't come back positive, I'm going to change, I'm going to change two things, tweak this, manipulate that, and then see what the results are. So I'm constantly testing what my theories are with results. And then when the data shows that it works, I replicate it more. And so what this has led me to belie do is that even with clients that I have, I'll get on the phone and say, here are the five things that work for your site. And we have seen this with, you know, 24 URLs we've tested, 80% of them respond positively. Here are the four things we do in this situation. And then get on a call with another client right after and say, okay, with you, here are 10 different things that we have to do to get your site to rank. And based on the data and the experiments we've seen, we've had to do them in this order, and then we get the same results. So the data is what drives decisions, not people's opinions and not people's thoughts of what they read on an article or what they heard on a podcast or what they read in a mastermind or whatever. I think when you find something that works for your business, it might not work for the next person on the mastermind call. And that can be okay. So either side of that argument or that conversation that you're on, know that all advice should be tested. And when advice is given, know that you should test it so that you're seeing the results for your own business and not just, well, you know, so and so's business is benefiting from this strategy. So I therefore must do the same thing. Right. And so, yes, there's principles. There's a difference between principles and certain strategy. And so, yes, the principles of being on social media, being having an email, doing social SEO, those are all valuable principles. But how you do it, particularly in 2026 and beyond, is absolutely specialized and absolutely driven by data.
SPEAKER_03:Yes. Yep. I love it. Ty, where is are the best places, where's the best place for people to be able to connect with you?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, just my website, everythingdigitalmarketing.com. It's really the best place. Um, my email, Ty at Everything Digital Marketing.com, is a good place as well. Um, I do offer a couple of uh things through my email with some courses, some free courses that I offer through emails and um some checklists and things, but I I have found the best way to connect with me is just to do something like this where I get on the phone, you tell me what you're dealing with, and I can kind of pick your brain and then tell you. Um, you know, I think as entrepreneurs, as business owners, it can be very lonely. And I think uh masterminds are fantastic. And uh coaching, the industry that has popped up has been fantastic. I I love that um because you need like-minded individuals, you need people who speak your language. Uh, most people that you interact with on a daily basis aren't in your spot, don't understand your circumstances, it's hard to relate. And so I find that just being able to offer free consultations has been huge. Um, just being able to outline, hey, this is where you should go next. This is what I've seen be successful. Here's the story of XYZ company, and I think it relates to you. And here's the owner of that company, love to connect you. So I think the the industry of entrepreneurship and the uh advent of social media to connect people has been massive. And um, I find that that connection is really where um I've thrived and really have seen growth and uh have helped others do the same.
SPEAKER_03:Yes. No, absolutely. We're gonna make sure that that is in the show notes. Ty, I appreciate you so much for taking the time to speak with me and share your knowledge with my audience.
SPEAKER_00:Of course. Well, thanks for having me. It's been great.
