627: Driving Business Growth through Effective SEO Strategies | Nic Padilla

Are you eager to elevate your online presence and achieve real success through search engine optimization?

Tune in to learn from Nic Padilla, Director of Business Development at Boostability and a seasoned SEO expert with over a decade of experience in the industry.

Since 2009, Nic has been at the forefront of the SEO world, selling thousands of accounts and training teams in 14 countries. His vast knowledge and expertise in the field have helped countless businesses achieve their goals through effective SEO strategies. With a passion for helping clients succeed, Nic has become a go-to resource for businesses looking to improve their online presence and drive results through search engine optimization.

Driving Business Growth through Effective SEO Strategies

Introduction

Welcome to the Conquer Local Podcast! Our show features successful sales leaders, marketers, thought leaders and entrepreneurs who will inspire you with their success stories. Each episode is packed with practical strategies, as our guests share their secrets to achieving their dreams. Listen in to learn the highlights of their remarkable accomplishments and get tips to revamp, rework, and reimagine your business. Whether you’re a small business owner, marketer, or aspiring entrepreneur, the Conquer Local Podcast is your ultimate guide to dominating your local market. Tune in now to take your business to the next level! 

I’m Jeff Tomlin and on this episode, we’re pleased to welcome Nic Padilla. Nic is the Director of Business Development at Boostability. He is a seasoned SEO expert with over a decade of experience in the industry. Since 2009, Nic has been at the forefront of the SEO world, selling thousands of accounts and training teams in 14 different countries. His vast knowledge and expertise in the field have helped countless businesses achieve their goals through effective SEO strategies. With a passion for helping clients succeed, Nic has become a go-to resource for businesses looking to improve their online presence and drive results through search engine optimization.

Get ready Conquerors for Nic Padilla coming up next on this week’s episode of the Conquer Local Podcast.

Long-time Partners, Conferences and Siinda in Berlin

Jeff: Nic Padilla, welcome to Conquer Local. How are you doing buddy?

Nic: I’m doing so well. Thank you so much for this opportunity. It’s always great to see you. And as always, you’re looking amazing, man.

Jeff: Well, I try it’s hard work looking this good.

Nic: I don’t know. I don’t know about it. You’re looking great, man.

Jeff: For listeners, known Nic for a long time, been a really good partner. We’ve, for years and years, gone to a lot of the same conferences. And there’s this collective of us that have been to the same conferences over so many years. And when you live out of suitcases and you see each other so much at these events, you start to feel like Carney’s. Sometimes we refer…

Nic: Absolutely.

Jeff: to ourselves as the local Carney’s.

Nic: It’s so true. And seeing your group everywhere, man, I’ve absolutely loved and adored seeing you guys. And recently I was at Siinda and seeing Brendan and the amazing booth that you ran, and the amazing speeches that you guys had as well. It’s always great to be with like-minded companies speaking about the digital world and how we can help small businesses and getting them on the first page and seen. And I absolutely love it, and it’s great to be at these amazing conferences with you guys as well. We love it.

Jeff: Yeah. So you were just coming back from Siinda. That was over in Berlin this year.

Nic: Yep.

Jeff: Jealous. Didn’t make it to that one, but some of the rest of our team was there. How was that? Kimberli puts on amazing events. This is a Siinda organization over in Europe. And Kimberli Lewis is absolutely amazing when she puts on incredible events. How was it this year?

Nic: Oh, I loved it. I think what I love about it is you’ve got some amazing speakers. You’ve got some amazing night events as well where you’re learning history at the same time. And I’m over there at the Berlin Wall learning about the different things that happened at Checkpoint Charlie. And at the same time, we’re talking about business and how the world is evolving, and AI to local businesses and what they’re doing to stay afloat. It’s a great experience.

Jeff: It’s a tough gig, Nic, having to go all the way over to Europe and enjoy. Tough gig, but somebody’s got to do it, right?

Nic: Exactly. Exactly. Somebody has to do it, but I’m very appreciative that I got to make the sacrifice.

Boostability: SEO Company, Adaptive, Thriving and Great Partner Reputation

Jeff: Well, we’re always appreciative too. And so Boostability and Nic have been partners of Vendasta for a long time. Hey, for the audience, talk a little bit about the organization. You guys have a tremendous reputation. And a great reputation is being a great company to actually work with. And so maybe talk a little bit about your recipe of success and a little bit about your stint there over the last decade.

Nic: Oh, a decade is true. I’ve hit 11 years at Boostability, started in 2012 and I have not looked back. It is amazing to work for a company that will be behind you when you need them. They give the support when you need it. They will also provide industry updates to their current platform that we’ve got to make sure that we’re speaking about things that are relevant today. I’ve seen it evolve from a group of 40 to… We’ve got over 350 employees in Utah, and we’re absolutely killing it and thriving and making sure that we’re relevant in the SEO world, and absolutely killing it and growing it. We love it.

Jeff: That’s amazing. So talk a little bit about what you guys do differently. Like I was saying you, you’ve got a great reputation of working with partners, and so you do partner with organizations sort of primarily. And so talk a little bit about your recipe for success there.

Nic: Absolutely. Well, in 2009 we started off as a DIY platform for small to medium businesses to do their own SEO. And this is when Boostability learned, rather quickly, the word pivot, not in the friend sense, but just in general. We realized that business owners don’t have a lot of time to work inside of a platform, let alone tie their shoes. They’re busy, right? So we started working inside of that platform ourselves. Boostability is the flexibility to adapt to the industry that is in the evolving world and what’s going on. When it comes to SEO, we provide an amazing experience from the beginning to the end to make that customer relevant and trusted so that they can get on the first page of Google. But really, Boostability has been flexible and adapts to the changing world to make sure that that relevancy and that trust that we’re creating for each customer stays. And that’s how Boostability has been able to thrive throughout this world.

Jeff: You just mentioned changing the world there, and my god, a lot’s changed. So I got into this space.

Nic: Absolutely.

Jeff: I think I was doing SEO back in 1995. The very first thing that I did in terms of marketing online was I built resume and cover letter templates on a website that was built on Microsoft Publisher. And boy, it was…

Nic: Wow.

SEO Changes: Hyper-Local Focus and Boostability’s 86% Page One Success

Jeff: That was a crappy-looking website, but I was pretty proud of it this time. And we were selling Microsoft Word documents just in a zip file. But back then, the search engines were Alta Vista, and then there was HotBot and Dogpile. So it’s changed obviously a lot from… I’m dating myself now, and so it seems to be the theme of the morning. But a lot’s changed. But just recently, there’s been a ton of changes in SEO. And so maybe talk a little bit about what you guys have seen and the big changes that people need to adapt to right now.

Nic: Absolutely. I think when it comes to SEO, there’s been a lot of changes. The processes might be very similar, but they’re becoming more granular. In the past, you might have said, “You know what? I need a pizza near me, right?” Now, google and other search engines are smart enough to look at the individual street that you’re on. So creating that trust and relevancy to the individual location is so much more important than it was 10 years ago where you would want to rank for a whole city, where now Google cares about where you’re specifically located, and you have to create that opportunity. Then don’t mix some of the tasks that you have to do have to change with how search engines are looking and what they’re doing, and you need to make sure that you’re aware of it. One thing I love about boost stability is we’re tracking 2.3 million keywords. I’m a nerd. That’s a lot of data. That’s a ton of information that we can utilize. And we then can break it down to individual verticals and what each vertical needs to make it relevant. We love it. But basically what it is you need to understand the new tools that are coming out, along with making sure that you’re getting hyper-local and hyper-specific with everything that you’re doing. That’s all that SEO is doing right now.

Jeff: So I want to get to some of the things that you guys are doing specifically, but I want to give you a chance first to brag a little bit more. So first off, I’m always skeptical of an organization that promotes or guarantees that they can get you on page one of the Google search results. But one thing I don’t mind, one little bit is hard data and facts. And I’m going to read this so that I’ve got it right. Now you guys did a study…

Nic: Absolutely.

Jeff: Looking at all that data that you have. And you determined that Boostability, you looked across all of your customers. And you found that 86% of your customers, after a six-month period, were ranking on page one for some sort of term. So that is a pretty awesome track record of success. Maybe talk a little bit about some of the things that you’re doing in order to get some of that consistency.

Nic: Absolutely. And thank you so much for this opportunity to speak to it. Number one, if a company guarantees you first-page results, it goes against Google’s guidelines. Run. Right? But if they have a track record that they can speak to saying 86% of their customers get on the first page, I work for them, you should absolutely partner with us. But it says something.

Jeff: It does.

Boostability’s Hyper-Specific SEO Process and Tailored Tasks for Clients’ Success

Nic: The process that we’ve got is hyper-specific to the individual website. Rather than saying, “Okay, you are now working with us. This is your website that you’ve got. You’re going to get five of these, two of these, five of these,” and then you do that for every website that comes in, you’re not going to get hyper-specific results. We customize individual tasks to the needs of the website. If the needs website needs copy, we’ll write copy. If we need to make changes to titles, descriptions, H1s and add service pages, we will do that. If we don’t need to do that, we will go off of the website and create relationships with third-party websites that are in the same industry, and hopefully get a link pointing back to your customer. And do that over, over, over, over.

And by doing that, we get our customers onto the first page of Google. But we make it hyper-specific to the needs of that individual customer, and that enables them to get on the first page.

Jeff: Well, a lot of consultants…

Nic: It’s simple.

Jeff: cut corners, right? Because it’s really hard to scale that type of work when you’re getting very specific for individual 

Nic: Absolutely.

Jeff: Customers and being able to do it cost-effectively. And you guys have come up with a formula and figured out how to scale doing that type of work at your organization.

Nic: You’re correct. What I was speaking to earlier with that DIY platform launchpad, it is the technology that we created that enables us to send specific tasks to Boostability-trained employees. Once they complete that task, they click a button, they get the next task that they’re trained on. That’s how we’re able to then customize individual tasks to individual customers. That helps them get on the first page. But the first thing that we got to do is make sure we understand the website, the needs of it, the needs of their backlink portfolio, and then distribute the task to the trained professionals to complete. And then put it all back together and make sure that we’re getting that customer ranking.

Boostability Focuses on On-Page Optimization and Relevant Off-Page Link Building

Jeff: Well, I like talking about that, because obviously, clearly I’m a big fan of the work that you guys do, and we’ve worked with you a long time. So get into some of the details about what you guys. Today, again, we talked about of there’s a lot of things that have been changing in SEO. Talk a little bit about specifically what you guys are doing today for on-page optimization and off-page optimization. I wanted to be specific because I know that the audience is…

Nic: Of course.

Jeff: I’ve got a mixed audience. We’ve got some people that are brand new small businesses. Some people are startups. They’re also some sophisticated agencies that know what they’re doing, they’re listening in as well. So maybe talk a little bit about both the on-page stuff that you’re doing, and some of the off-page stuff that you’re focusing on today, given all these changes.

Nic: Absolutely. Whenever we receive a website, the first thing that we’re going to do is we want to understand what Google sees. We’re going to utilize that data from the 2.3 million keywords, and we’re going to say we know exactly what Google looks at, so that’s where we’re going to start. We’re going to look at the robots.txt, the site map and see how people are coming onto the website, how Google will view the website, make sure that that is really easy for Google to understand because that’s literally. When you go to a zoo, there’s a map. If you want to see a rhino here, you go there. It’s the same thing with robots.txt And a site map. We want to make sure that that’s visible for Google and other bots to see when they land on the website. Then we’ll go into the individual pages that we’re targeting. We’re going to make changes to the title tags, the H1s, the copy, making sure that it supports what that customer wants to rank for and where they provide those services. If we need to add more pages with relevant copy, we will absolutely do that. It’s really simple to do, but you need experts to understand how Google will see the website and what changes need to be made in order for it to grow. Once we’ve done that, then it’s off-page. And we’ll go and create relationships with industry-related websites and get relevant links pointing back to your website. Relevant meaning, of course, from the same industry, of course from. If you’re a plumber, you want a DIY home-building type website pointing back to you. But at the same time, we want to get links that the customer deserves. If your customer is in a small town, why in the world are they going to have some crazy domain authority link? We want it to look correct. It’s not going to be a Lamborghini going back to a trailer park. That’s really awkward, and Google can recognize it. We want it to be relevant for what the customer specifically needs. And that’s what we do.

Link Importance, Build Industry-Specific Relationships and Emphasize Content Consistency in SEO

Jeff: So we’ve talked about links for a lot of years, and some people surmise that links aren’t necessarily as important as they used to be. But what I’m hearing from you is that links are absolutely still important and they’re critical to focus on to build authority.

Nic: You are a hundred percent correct. Getting links is valuable, but getting the right link is what you need. If you get the incorrect link, it can actually take your ranking down. It can look incredibly spammy. One of the things that we’re doing is we’re creating relationships with websites that are in the same industry. It is what Google wants. They want like-minded websites speaking to each other, saying, “Hey, I vouched for this website.” So when we’re going and creating these relationships, it is literally building. We’re building a relationship with this website and getting a link pointing back to your customer’s website. Some of the times, we will put forth effort and try and get links. And sometimes those websites say, no, we have to move on to the next one, the next one, next one. It’s hard work, but it’s literally a networking event. Similar to what you do when you’re at these conferences, you’re around networking. We have to do the same thing, but with websites.

Jeff: One of the things we’re seeing here with our older content that we’ve produced on our websites is sometimes that stuff is getting deprecated a little bit faster than it did before, and we’re seeing the increased need to keep content fresh, which also dovetails in another question I wanted to fire your way. So maybe a two-part question here. Maybe talk about the freshness of content, and are you seeing the same thing right now? And then secondly, one of the challenges of dealing with a client, so if you’re working for somebody else and you’re optimizing their presence for SEO, is to help them, help sort of breakthrough misunderstandings that they have about SEO. And one of the biggest ones that I find that’s challenging is the misconception that someone can come in and “do” SEO to their website or SEO their website, and then it’s done, and then they move on. And in this game, consistency is really important. So the second question then is, how do you work with customers to help them to understand that you have to maintain consistency and keep a program of SEO going?

Nic: You’re a hundred percent correct, right? The biggest thing with anything, with SEO, with content that’s going out is consistency, right? In the SEO world, things have a half-life. If you’re not updating your website consistently, if you’re not putting out new copy, there’s always going to be somebody else that’s there to replace you. Google knows that. If they’re looking at a website that has three new pieces of new content versus a website that hasn’t put out content in six months, which one is going to be more relevant? Well, it looks like this one’s actually doing more right now. So for that reason, we might give them a little bit more credit and their ranking may increase. It’s the exact same thing when it comes to SEO as well. It’s like going to the gym. I’m not a good example of it. You look like a great example of it, right? You go to the gym for six months. You can’t just quit and expect to look like you every day. You have to go and have that consistency.

Jeff: Tough work. It’s tough work.

Nic: It’s tough. I get it. I’m not good at it, but you are, right? But the thing is, if you go to the gym for six months, you should have some results, right? But if you expect to quit and have the same results in six months, you’re wrong. You need to make sure you’ve got that consistency and you’re keeping up with it. It’s the same thing with anything, with whether or not you’re putting out YouTube videos. Conquer Local is an amazing example of this. With the amount of valuable content that you’re regularly putting out, you’ve got something that people will see, and you’ll always be relevant because you’re always putting something out. The world may change, but as long as you’re continuing to put out content, you’re contributing to that changing world.

Encourage Businesses to Share Expertise and Document Instead of Creating

Jeff: I wanted to maybe dig into that a little bit about the putting-out content. So there’s a lot… Clearly, now putting out content and search engine optimization is much more well-known than it was in the past, and you see a lot of businesses doing a really good job of putting out content and sharing their expertise. You see others, it still feels like a really big stretch for them to produce content. But at the end of the day…

Nic: Of course.

Jeff: … it’s about sharing expertise. And some examples that I’ve seen of helping businesses get over the hurdle of that is to help people get other individuals in their organization to help them capture little pieces of content that exhibit their expertise. And so the business owner, for example, doesn’t need to be the one capturing and publishing and doing things that they don’t really understand how to do necessarily, but it’s really easy for someone to document their expertise and share little pieces of content here and there. And so maybe talk a little bit about how you get businesses to share their insights and expertise.

Nic: Of course. When you’re working with these smaller businesses, sometimes they don’t have that creative hat because they’re running around so in so many different directions trying to figure out what they’re doing. The most important thing is a piece of content could be a positive review that you had. A piece of content could be you saying, “Hey, I met this amazing customer. They did the following things here. What are you guys seeing?” It’s asking questions. It’s initiating that conversation that helps you maintain that relevancy that you’re searching for today, right? This conversation we’re having today is between two like-minded companies, right? It’s the exact same thing with everything else you’ve got. Whether or not it’s Instagram, TikTok, or LinkedIn, you’ve got more than enough opportunities for you to create unique content for your website or for your business. And you can create that conversation now easier than ever with a simple question, with an amazing review, with a, “How do you think I could do better?” What can I do better for you? But it’s creating that conversation, I believe, that helps create more content.

And then once you get used to it, you get into a flow and you can create more and more rather easily.

Jeff: And around here, we’ve tried to get in the habit for a long time now of documenting rather than creating. And it helps people in your organization think about, “Oh, well, we don’t necessarily have to be creators because creating sounds like work, right? But it’s more about documenting the things that you’re doing on a regular basis and just sharing that out. It makes the whole process a lot easier to think about.

Business Success: Honesty, Genuine Relationships and Show your Work

Nic: Exactly. And in today’s world, five or six years ago, everybody was like, “I’m going to vlog.” Right? On YouTube, everybody was caring about vlogging, and doing this, that and the other. Now, businesses are showing what they’re doing, their thoughts, what they’re participating in. Boostability is rather huge in participating in Pride Month right now. So it’s showing what we’re doing, whether or not we’re donating or we’re helping with individual employees. We want to help create a better community just as much as we want to help the small business.

Jeff: Nic, a big part of SEO clearly, and has been for a long time, is social. What are you seeing businesses doing today where they’re having a lot of success on social? And whether that’s LinkedIn or whether it’s Twitter or Facebook, or Instagram, what do you see in some of the things that are really working today?

Nic: Honesty. I think the most important thing that people are doing today is honesty. If you make a mistake and you say, “Hey, we did the following things, I apologize,” if you get a bad review and you notice that people aren’t responding and you don’t say, “Hey, I’m sorry for that experience. I’d love to make that up for you,” if you don’t have that honesty, you’re not going to grow. So I believe in showing your work, creating that honesty and saying, “This is my business. This is what we’re doing. This is how we’re able to grow.” There’s successful companies and organizations. You think about even TV shows like Shark Tank, it’s honesty. You’re actually knowing the cost of everything, and people are buying it now more than ever after the show. It’s because they’re seeing the honesty behind everything. So I think if you’re showing… What’s up?

Jeff: I love that tip, Nic. Sorry to interrupt you, but I love that tip because…

Nic: No.

Jeff: … we underestimate people’s bullshit metre. People are pretty…

Nic: Absolutely.

Jeff: We’re so used to consuming content now, and we’ve been doing it for years and years and years. Everybody’s got a bullshit metre now, and it’s pretty sensitive. And so honesty is so important. I never made mistakes, so it’s hard to be honest about some of the examples that you talked about there, but…

Nic: It’s so good. It’s true. You think about it, it’s like you can see a car salesman from a hundred yards away. You know, I’m going to avoid that guy, or I’m going to avoid that woman, right? But if you are honest about what you’re doing and you create an actual relationship, that’s the value of a local business, is an actual relationship. If you can create that actual relationship, through hard work, through honesty, showing everything that you’re doing. And that’s key to what Boostability does, is honesty. In everything that we do in our reporting dashboard, you can see every task that we’ve completed for the customer. In the SEO world, every SEO company is like, “Oh, that’s the shady one. They’ve got some snake oil they’re trying to sell. They’re trying to do something interesting.” If we make a mistake, we’re sorry. We’ll fix it. We’ll do what we can to make it right. But that honesty, if you can kind of spread that through everything that you’re doing, you’ve got a good company. And for that reason, we have grown so much is because we’re honest. And that bullshit metre that you’re talking about, it’s a hundred percent accurate, man. Creating a relationship is 10 times more valuable today than selling some product.

Support, Collaboration, Global Success and Tools for Growth

Jeff: Well, I was going to ask you specifically for any takeaways, but I think that’s one heck of a takeaway to leave people with. Anything else you wanted to add, some last words for the people that we have in the audience?

Nic: Absolutely. I think it’s great for… This podcast is absolutely amazing, and you guys have done some amazing things, spreading the good word, and helping small businesses around the world. I’ve literally seen Vendasta when I lived in Australia. I’ve seen it. I’ve been to Saskatoon now nine times. I’ve been to Spain, I’ve been to Italy, I’ve been to Germany, seeing the hard work that you guys are doing. And this podcast creates the best opportunity for small to medium businesses to think outside of the box, not think that everything is a huge money play, that they can do it themselves. And you guys have an amazing tool. We have amazing tools to help them become relevant. So thank you. I love it. I love working with you guys.

Jeff: Hey, well, one of the most rewarding parts of the journey that we’ve been on is working with people like you and getting to know you, and building relationships throughout the industry. Look forward to many more successful years. Look forward to having you back in the podcast. If people want to…

Nic: Absolutely.

Getting in Touch with Nic Padilla 

Jeff: get in touch with you, Nic, and the team Boostability, how do they reach you?

Nic: Absolutely. You can reach me at npadilla, P-A-D-I-L-L-A, @boostability.com. Send me an email. More than happy to hop on a Zoom call and get things set up. If not, you can call me at (385) 630-4498. You can text that. I’m here to answer any questions. I’m always here to support

Jeff: Nic Padilla, it’s good to see you, buddy. Happy to have you on the podcast. Looking forward to doing it again.

Nic: Absolutely.

Jeff: Until the next time, we’ll say peace out. And have a great week, man.

Nic: You too. Thank you so much.

Conclusion

Jeff Tomlin: It’s always great speaking to my good friend Nic Padilla, Director of Business Development at Boostability. Going all the way back to 2012, Boostability has demonstrated its adaptability and success in the digital world. Initially started as a DIY platform for local businesses, they then recognized the need to adapt and remain flexible in response to the ever-changing SEO landscape. By staying on top of industry changes, tools, and search engine algorithms, they also work to ensure their services remain relevant and effective in creating SEO strategies for their clients.

Consistency as highlighted by Nic is a really vital aspect of SEO. He stresses the importance of consistently producing content and maintaining a strong online presence. Nic also explained that SEO efforts have a “half-life,” meaning that without consistent content creation, businesses risk losing their search engine rankings to competitors who are actively generating fresh and relevant content. Additionally, establishing relationships with similar websites and fostering honest and transparent communications with customers are crucial for success. And by prioritizing genuine relationships and honesty, they have experienced tremendous growth and provided significant value to their clients.

If you’ve enjoyed Nic’s episode discussing Driving Business Growth through Effective SEO Strategies  Keep the conversation going and revisit some of our older episodes from the archives: Check out Episode 602: An Expert’s Guide To Digital Billboards with Gabriel Smith or Episode 541: SEO in the Legal Niche with Will Palmer.

Until next time I’m Jeff Tomlin. Get out there and be awesome!