It was announced back in July that Rand FIshkin would be stepping down from a day to day role at Moz, although he will continue to provide advice as a Moz Associate. He will be attending, and speaking at, SEO conferences, writing blog posts and producing some Whiteboard Friday Videos.
I have always found Rand to be a very engaging, honest, funny and enlightened member of the SEO community and it will be sad to see him depart from a front-line role.
I thought it would be fun to collate five of my favourite Rand Whiteboard Fridays. I haven’t dug too deep into the archive as some the of advice in the earlier videos has been surpassed by changes to the Google search algorithm.
The videos are around topics in SEO that I love, and I hope you find them as useful and entertaining as I do.
Keyword Research – Niche Keyword Discovery- July 2015
As I have preached in the past, solid keyword research is vital to a successful SEO campaign. Get your keywords wrong at the start and you are going to waste precious time and energy on obtaining rankings for keywords that aren’t going to meet the needs of a client.
This video from June 2015 outlines the thought process, tools and analysis you should cover when looking at niche keywords. It looks at why you should be wary of the top-level search volumes in the Google Keyword tool, why you need to consider the longtail keywords, the SERPS for a given keyword, Google trend data, using Adwords to gather data and the ROI you are going to get on a keyword.
The complete video and transcript is here
https://moz.com/blog/estimate-total-volume-value-of-keywords-in-niche-whiteboard-friday
On Page – Topics and Semantics – March 2016
On page SEO has become much more complex over time as the Google search algorithm has evolved. Google Hummingbird and Rank Brain have changed how Google reads, indexes and understands content when deciding on which pages to rank for a given keyword search.
This video covers key ideas about semantic links between keyword terms and how this can feed into broad and niche concepts. These concepts can then be used to draw up content for your website and indicate how your current content can be improved.
The complete video and transcript is here
https://moz.com/blog/related-topics-in-seo-whiteboard-friday
Local SEO – Ranking Issues for Locations – September 2017
I have a real passion for local SEO; if I had to choose one area of SEO that I enjoy the most, then it is local. The positive impact you can have on a client’s business when you can get them to rank well in their location for the right keywords is massive. It is always a joy to help a quality local business grow online.
This video examines issues around why a site or page might rank in one location and not rank in another, although they might be very close in terms of geography. The video outlines how you can work out which pages are ranking and those that aren’t ranking, discover if those searches are “local”, and how you can then get these pages to rank. This one is new so I can’t embed it in this post.
The complete video and transcript is here:
https://moz.com/blog/pages-rank-in-one-geography
Link Building – Using Viral Content to Build Links – July 2015
Viral content is great for driving traffic and links to a website. The video covers how a link flywheel works if the content is great; it can lead to more social shares, social sign ups, brand awareness and personalisation bias. The video covers what type of content can go viral, what type of content is shared by your target audience, why uniqueness works and what content is best for your users.
The complete video and transcript is here:
https://moz.com/blog/linkbait-bump-viral-content-lifts-organic-traffic-whiteboard-friday
Small Business SEO – How to Make the Case for SEO – April 2016
I really believe in SEO and have seen the value it can add to a small business when it is done correctly. It is one of the many reasons why I love my job. This video makes some great points on how you can use keyword research, rankings, competitor rankings, how to outline your process and examples of your SEO results to showcase the value of SEO.
https://moz.com/blog/make-seo-case-small-businesses-whiteboard-friday
There are many more great Whiteboard Friday videos that are worth watching and I hope that Rand will continue to make them long into the future.
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