{"id":624,"date":"2025-04-11T22:26:30","date_gmt":"2025-04-11T22:26:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hudsonpcrepair.com\/?p=624"},"modified":"2025-04-12T16:49:06","modified_gmt":"2025-04-12T16:49:06","slug":"how-to-do-seo-right-in-2025-hint-most-companies-get-it-wrong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.hudsonpcrepair.com\/index.php\/2025\/04\/11\/how-to-do-seo-right-in-2025-hint-most-companies-get-it-wrong\/","title":{"rendered":"How to do SEO right in 2025 (hint: most companies get it wrong)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Hello and welcome to The GTM Newsletter by GTMnow <\/strong>\u2013 read by 50,000+ to scale their companies and careers. GTMnow shares insight around the go-to-market strategies responsible for explosive company growth. GTMnow highlights the strategies, along with the stories from the top 1% of GTM executives, VCs, and founders behind these strategies and companies.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Over the years we\u2019ve seen too many startups spin their wheels on SEO \u2013 hiring agencies, creating tons of content, building backlinks \u2013 only to see\u2026 nothing.<\/p>\n

So we brought in someone who\u2019s seen it all: Eli Schwartz<\/a>. He\u2019s helped scale SEO for companies like WordPress, Quora, and Coinbase. Plus, he literally wrote the book on it (check it out here<\/a>).<\/p>\n

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\"\u2705\" Recommendations<\/strong><\/h4>\n

ZoomInfo\u2019s GTM25 virtual conference on May 7th<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The future of GTM is AI-powered. <\/strong>Join us and thousands of revenue leaders at ZoomInfo\u2019s GTM25 virtual conference on May 7th to explore how high-performing teams are leveraging Go-to-Market Intelligence and AI to fuel their GTM strategies that help top teams crush their revenue goals. You\u2019ll hear from industry experts, connect with peers, and learn about the latest AI advancements. Beyond insights, you\u2019ll walk away with proven AI tactics that you can directly implement for your GTM team.<\/p>\n

Save Your Spot<\/a> \u2013 <\/strong>see you (virtually) there!<\/p>\n

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How to do SEO right in 2025 (hint: most companies get it wrong)<\/h2>\n

What high-performing teams do differently with SEO<\/h3>\n
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1. Start with the hardest question: Should we even be doing SEO?<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Not every company should invest in SEO. If people aren\u2019t actively searching for what you sell, you\u2019re shouting into the void.<\/p>\n

\u201cSEO isn\u2019t mandatory. Just like billboards or paid social, it\u2019s one tool, not the tool. You don\u2019t have to do SEO. You have to understand your users and find them where they are.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

One founder Eli worked with was spending $15K\/month on SEO for a QA tool, without realizing that every big customer had come through personal connections. Eli\u2019s advice? Take that same $15K and host more dinners.<\/p>\n

Another team building payroll software poured money into SEO. But when digging in, all the traffic came from employee-related searches, not the actual buyers. Right strategy, wrong audience.<\/p>\n

2. People are the moat.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

SEO isn\u2019t about hacks, it\u2019s about talent. The best outcomes come from teams who deeply understand their users and treat SEO like product development.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you don\u2019t understand how buyers evaluate your product, SEO won\u2019t just be ineffective, it might actively mislead you. If you don\u2019t know your buyer\u2019s journey, you don\u2019t have product-market fit. SEO won\u2019t help with that.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Some companies waste time with generic content and shady backlinks. Others win by embedding SEO into cross-functional teams. At SurveyMonkey, Eli moved from marketing into product and built an internal SEO \u201cteam\u201d made up of engineers, writers, and designers. It wasn\u2019t about more blog posts, it was about crafting user-first experiences. That\u2019s when growth took off.<\/p>\n

3. Measure SEO like you measure paid channels.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Traffic is a vanity metric. Rankings don\u2019t pay the bills. Great SEO shows up in CAC, leads, pipeline, and revenue.<\/p>\n

Everyone talks about SEO\u2019s excellent ROI compared to paid channels, but they rarely quantify their timing, investment, and returns assumptions<\/a>. When you put real numbers down, the picture becomes much more interesting.<\/p>\n

One company was spending $10K\/month on SEO\u2026 until they asked customers where they came from. Every deal? Referrals. Not a single one from search.<\/p>\n

SEO isn\u2019t \u201cfree.\u201d Hiring a top-tier SEO lead? ~$120K+. A full program with content, dev, and design? Potentially millions. It only makes sense if the ROI is there.<\/p>\n

Eli has a simple rule: if a startup isn\u2019t already running paid marketing, he won\u2019t take them on for SEO. Why? Because without benchmarks, there\u2019s no way to calculate ROI.<\/p>\n

4. AI is your copilot, not your enemy.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Google doesn\u2019t care if content is written by a human or a language model. It cares whether users find it helpful.<\/p>\n

\u201cGreat AI content beats bad human content every time.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Eli remembers when people tried gaming Google with auto-generated pages using RSS mashups. Didn\u2019t work then, doesn\u2019t work now. But when a client started pairing AI-generated drafts with human editors, and writing for intent not just keywords, results skyrocketed.<\/p>\n

5. Want to win? Target the middle of the funnel.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Top-of-funnel content is saturated (and now AI-generated!). Bottom-of-funnel is pay-to-play. But the middle? That\u2019s the goldmine.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an example:<\/p>\n

Eli helped a Latin American e-commerce company move away from fluffy posts like \u201cWhat is a sink?\u201d and into focused content like \u201cBest compact garage sinks with wide spouts.\u201d Traffic quality improved. So did conversions.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the same principle behind searches like \u201cdifference between South Beach and Miami Beach.\u201d<\/em> That\u2019s a middle-funnel query. It\u2019s not obvious, but it directly impacts a purchase decision, and it\u2019s where SEO still shines.<\/p>\n

6. Link building still matters, just not the way you think.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Forget blog comment spam and shady backlinks. The real value is in earned authority: PR, partnerships, and content people actually want to share.<\/p>\n

At SurveyMonkey, Eli discovered that the White House had linked to a now-dead page. They revived it, turned it into a landing page, and watched the traffic roll in. That\u2019s the kind of backlink Google respects.<\/p>\n

Compare that to a client who had backlinks from domains that used to be massage parlors, now repurposed as \u201ctech blogs.\u201d Yeah\u2026 Google sees right through that. And now, so does AI.<\/p>\n

7. SEO isn\u2019t dying, it\u2019s evolving.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Google\u2019s algorithm updates and the rise of AI aren\u2019t killing SEO. They\u2019re weeding out garbage and forcing companies to level up.<\/p>\n

Take Google\u2019s \u201csite reputation abuse\u201d update \u2013 it tanked traffic for publishers like CNN who were ranking for things like \u201cbest blender\u201d despite having no authority in kitchen appliances. You can\u2019t fake relevance anymore. You actually have to be useful.<\/p>\n

For Coinbase, the real SEO wins came not from more blog posts, but from scalable, search-driven pricing pages. Because that\u2019s what users were looking for.<\/p>\n

TL;DR key mental models for SEO:<\/strong><\/h3>\n

SEO isn\u2019t mandatory.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Just like billboards or paid search, it\u2019s one tool. Not the<\/em> tool.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t have to do SEO, just like you don\u2019t have to buy billboards. You have to understand your users and find them where they are.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

No buyer journey = no SEO opportunity.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

If you haven\u2019t nailed PMF or don\u2019t understand how users evaluate your product, SEO won\u2019t help. It\u2019ll just amplify confusion.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you don\u2019t know your buyer\u2019s journey, you don\u2019t have product-market fit. SEO won\u2019t help with that.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Quality > origin.<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Doesn\u2019t matter who\u2014or what\u2014wrote it. If it\u2019s helpful, it works.<\/p>\n

\u201cAI isn\u2019t the issue, it\u2019s whether the content is actually useful. Great AI content beats bad human content every time.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

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Share<\/a><\/p>\n

Tag GTMnow so we can see your takeaways and help amplify them.<\/em><\/h6>\n
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\"\ud83d\udc42\" More for your eardrums<\/strong><\/h4>\n

What does it take to scale revenue from $20M to $450M \u2013 and stay in the CRO seat for over 6 years while doing it? Jeff Perry<\/a> is a truly iconic revenue leader and the Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) at Carta where he scaled these revenue numbers, responsible for core software revenue across New Business, Upsell, Cross Sell, and Customer Success. Prior to Carta, Jeff led SMB Sales at DocuSign, and started his career at Oracle, where he rose from Strategic Account Manager to VP of Sales over a decade. Read some of the key takeaways from the conversation here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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GTM 141: Timeless Growth Tips From a $7.4B Oracle Exit and Scaling Carta to $450M in Revenue | Jeff Perry<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Listen on Apple<\/a>, Spotify<\/a>, YouTube<\/a>, or wherever you get your podcasts by searching \u201cThe GTM Podcast.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"\ud83d\ude80\" Startup to watch<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Writer<\/a><\/strong> \u2013 CEO May Habib is making bold moves, recently featured on the cover of <\/a>Forbes<\/a><\/em> for helping companies save millions in labor costs with AI<\/a>. The company has opened four new offices and plans to grow the team to 600. Investors call her \u201cthe time traveler\u201d and it\u2019s easy to see why.<\/p>\n

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\"\ud83d\udc40\" More for your eyeballs<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Customer Marketing Technology Landscape Report<\/a>. Maps the core subcategories of Customer Marketing and Advocacy platforms, as well as adjacent technology categories that customer marketing leaders must at least be conversant in. In this first-of-its-kind report, you\u2019ll get clear, unbiased data from 200+ real-world practitioners on exactly what these tools do best (and worst) \u2014so you can confidently build a tech stack that works.<\/p>\n

5 ways to build brand awareness by Sydney Sloan<\/a>. An exclusive fireside conversation with the CMO of G2 highlighting the new and evergreen strategies to build brand \u2014 including AI optimization, strategies for showing up in AI-generated answers, the rise of B2B influencers and the impact of referral programs.<\/p>\n

Udi Ledergor\u2019s new book, Courageous Marketing, is a marketing masterclass<\/a>. You\u2019ll learn how to grab attention, build loyal fans, and craft messaging that truly connects. A little hint on next week\u2019s podcast episode is that you\u2019ll get to hear directly from Udi himself.<\/p>\n

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\"\ud83d\udd25\" Hottest GTM jobs of the week<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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  1. Customer Success Manager<\/a> at Closinglock (Austin)<\/em><\/li>\n
  2. Account Executive<\/a> at Fastbreak AI (Charlotte)<\/em><\/li>\n
  3. Partner Customer Success Manager<\/a> at Vanta (Remote \u2013 US)<\/em><\/li>\n
  4. Sr. Customer Success Manager<\/a> at Northbeam (Remote \u2013 US)<\/em><\/li>\n
  5. ABM Manager<\/a> at Document Crunch (Hybrid \u2013 Atlanta)<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    See more top GTM jobs on the GTMfund Job Board<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    If you\u2019re looking to scale your sales and marketing teams with top talent, we couldn\u2019t recommend our partner Pursuit<\/a> more. We work closely together to be able to provide the top go-to-market talent for companies on a non-retainer basis.<\/em><\/p>\n

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    \"\ud83d\uddd3\" GTM industry events<\/strong><\/h4>\n

    Upcoming go-to-market events you won\u2019t want to miss:<\/em><\/p>\n