
SEO strategies to outrank big competitors, drive organic traffic, and boost revenue with smarter search optimization
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Marketing Expert
Let me ask you a few things. Do you feel like you know what differentiates your business from every other business out there? Can you confidently charge a premium for what you offer? Are you working from a plan, a marketing roadmap that allows you to know precisely what to do next? Look, don't worry if you can't answer yes to any or all of these questions. You're not alone. See, marketers today get so focused on the tactic of the week staring them right in the face that they forget to look at the big picture, the overarching strategy needed to consistently grow their business. Over the years, I've worked with thousands of businesses helping them do just that. Create the perfect marketing strategy and plan that gives total clarity about what to do next, confidence to charge ahead and charge more, and complete control of the marketing tactics they choose. I would love to help you and your team do the same. Look to find out if our Strategy first program is right for you. Visit DTM World Grow and request a free consultation. That's DTM World Grow.
Jon Jantz
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing podcast. This is Jon Jantz and my guest today is Sam Dunning. He is the founder at Breaking B2B, an SEO firm and the host of podcast by the Same name, breaking B2B. So, Sam, welcome to the show.
Sam Dunning
Hey John, thanks for having me on, man. Looking forward to the chat.
Jon Jantz
So I know that one of your promises, taglines, messages, whatever, we want to call it SEO for revenue, not vanity. So let's start there. How do you, how do you, how do you define that distinction? And how do you, how do you use that to sort of differentiate yourself from other SEO firms?
Sam Dunning
Yeah, great place to start. So in short, it's after going through the pain myself, it. So before I got into SEO as a profession or ran my own consultancy or agency, kind of working with past agencies, teams, contractors, and also potential clients, prospects and customers that come to us. So much of the time get frustrated as they've either tried to do SEO themselves, hired contractors, hired teams, or whoever it may be, but have focused on the wrong metrics or wrong outcomes. So they've fallen into what I call, John, the traffic trap, which is even more important in the world of AI. As AI search, LLMs take over slowly beat at Google's market share, they fall into something called the traffic traffic trap. What does the traffic trap means? Well, it means they go for informational based keywords on Google search. So think of things like simple searches, like what is a KPI? How to build a website what is a CRM? Stuff that's easily answerable nowadays with things like AI overviews in Google, which show up as really high juicy traffic terms, but are not likely to result in conversions, AKA inbound leads, demo requests, booked calls, or whatever that main call to action your B2B company wants. So they fall into that trap thinking we need to get traffic. It will cost, but it's not going to result in what's very unlikely to result in a book called demo or conversion. Now I thought, well that's a waste of time, especially running, running a business myself. And I'm sure you're the same John, like most marketing that we put, whether it's our own resource or agencies or contractors want to result in actual kind of qualified leads or revenue. So we flipped on its head. We thought how can we do the opposite of that and focus on what, what is a dream client actually searching for when they need our offer, when they have this very specific problem we solve, or they're comparing alternatives and how can we show up and start driving qualified inbound traffic for those terms?
Jon Jantz
Yeah, and I, and I think one of the things, you know, there are a lot of people that have enjoyed what looked like a lot of good organic traffic that are kind of freaking out because all of those information searches are going away or Google's like hoarding them.
Marketing Expert
Right.
Jon Jantz
And so a lot of people have seen real drops in traffic and they're freaking out. Right. But, but what you're saying is that was garbage traffic anyway, wasn't it?
Sam Dunning
Yeah. Now, now don't get me wrong, top of funnel or informational based SEO isn't completely dead, but if you're doing a very light version of it, stuff that can be simply answered by an AI or LLM, then that probably is a waste of your time and those prospects that are searching for that kind of stuff, like very simple what is or very simple how to terms.
Jon Jantz
Yeah.
Sam Dunning
Probably just going to land on your page, get the info and bounce off.
Jon Jantz
Yeah, yeah, I do. I, I do it dozens of times a day myself. Right. You know, because I just want to figure out like how do I make that thing work in this tool that I'm using? And I know I can find somebody who's written about it, but I, I can't even tell you what was or what it was about.
Sam Dunning
Yeah, yeah, that's it.
Jon Jantz
So, so SEO really with a lot of small business clients is so misunderstood that it gets a really bad rap, you know, because a lot of people hire SEO people they don't know what they're doing, they're getting some reports once a month that seem to say they're ranking for something and ultimately they get really frustrated. And, and so, you know, what is it that you think the, the, the true, like value based, let's put it that way, because there are a lot of scammers out there. The true sort of value based SEO firm is, is going to be telling their clients today that is kind of different. Different than smoke and mirrors, that I think a lot of SEO folks have used to, to describe what they're doing.
Sam Dunning
Yeah, yeah. So I'd say one of the first things is that SEO is not for every business. And what do I mean by that? Well, I mean, first and foremost you have to be in a sector that actually has demand to capture. So you have to be in a known category and have folks, AKA your dream clients or prospects actively searching for your offer. If you're trying to create some kind of new tool, new service, new offer, Google is. SEO is always best as a demand capture channel. So you need prospects in market searching for your offer. That's the first thing. The second thing is you actually have to have resource to make it worthwhile, whether that is your own cash. Like you mentioned, they're hiring a contractor agency, whoever it may be that you can invest to actually give it a good amount of time to see success. Or you need the resource in house marketers that actually know what makes a solid SEO campaign know how to actually build a revenue driving SEO program, whether that is creating, doing solid keyword research around what your dream clients search for when they need the offer, building content that matches that intent, that resonates with dream clients and is also following SEO best practices. Then the other elements of SEO, be it link building, technical SEO, et cetera. And you have to have the longevity to make it worthwhile. And you can, don't get me wrong, you can see results with SEO done right as quick as 90 days. But if you're looking at it as a quick hit and you're thinking, oh yeah, I'll do this for a month, then I might switch and do paid ads, then I might do some social ads, then I might try some outbound sales, then I might do some review sites, then it is a waste of your time. Do another channel that you can give a chance or stick to paid media.
Jon Jantz
Yeah. So what do you tell a client? When, I mean, because you, you just told me something a lot of clients don't want to hear. Right? It's like, no, I, you know, I, I See, my top three competitors are, you know, on top of Google. How come I'm not? So, you know, how do you kind of set the expectation for that fact that it's a long term game? Because let's face it, there have been SEO folks that, I sound like I'm really negative SEO, but I, I've just seen too many small businesses get kind of burned by just not understanding it.
Sam Dunning
Yeah, I get it.
Jon Jantz
Not knowing what they're even buying. So, so because a lot of SEO firms hide behind that. Oh, it's a long term game. It's a long term game. Which just means you're never going to get results.
Sam Dunning
Yeah, it's, it's that classic response, right? Like client says, or the potential customer says, how long does SEO take? Agency says, oh, six to 12 months. Sign our 12 month retainer and we'll be good. So what you said is correct in the sense that, let's face it, most of us, Whether we're a B2B service company, tech company, software company, we have giant competitors, right? We've got the top three, the top four, the top five that always come up in sales conversations to an annoying level. And they're probably, if we've not done SEO, ranking above us for some of those core terms that we want to start driving leads for now, usually for those juicy terms, there's quite often competitors owning those. So let me give you a tangible example. Let's pretend we sold proposal software as a tool. We might want to own terms like best proposal software or best shows or tools etc. But those are going to be extremely competitive. You've got massive software companies like Proposify, Quilla, PandaDOT, well funded companies have a ton of cash to spend on marketing and SEO. Now how can we beat these companies? Because we're probably not going to get ranked for that keyword for years, realistically. Well, that's when you need to do something called long tail SEO and you need to, instead of thinking like we're going to rank for best proposal software in this instance, we might go for things like we might pick niches that are maybe underserved or that we've historically sold well into. So you might think, all right, short term, like the next three months or so, we're going to go for like proposal software for fintech teams or for sales teams or for HR teams, or we're going to target competitors like we're going to go for proposal for alternatives or get accept alternatives or that kind of stuff. So there's always quick wins, you can grab with SEO, but it's naturally knowing first and foremost what niches you want to target, what your prospects might be searching for, and realizing that those really super competitive terms are going to be owned by the giants and then we have to chip away at the stuff they're underserving.
Jon Jantz
Yeah, and I love that idea. You know, I have people come to me all the time and they're starting a business and they're like, should I choose a niche? And I'm like, well, my take is, I mean, if you have a real reason, like you're an expert in that and you've worked in it all your life, otherwise, I think what happens is a lot of people choose niches they think are good and, but you know, then they're like six months later having to start their business over again. But I'm always telling people, you don't have to choose a niche, but you should niche your marketing. And that's really what you're talking about, is that, that you have campaigns that are like, let's say professional services is a category for you. Well, there's 10 subcategories in there, and you should be messaging to those 10 subcategories. And I, and I'm hearing you say that that's a, that's a solid foundation for approaching SEO today.
Sam Dunning
Exactly right. Exactly right. So I always say, like, going back to marketing fundamentals like SEO, let's ignore SEO for a second. The main marketing fundamentals are have an offer, but have an offer that serves a dream client that ideally has historically bought well into your service, is in a niche that can easily forward your offer, has the expensive problem you solve, is motivated to solve it, and has no issue spending cash on it. If you can get those lined up, that's good not just for SEO, but for marketing in general. So I have a very simple. I'm a simple guy. A lot of my strategies are straightforward when it comes to actually building out your SEO. Like what keywords we target, what type of content should we create? I recommend, folks, whether it's a founder, whether it's your marketing leader, whoever in your organization makes sense. The very simple strategy for finding what I call money keywords, which in simple terms are commercial keywords that your dream clients will search for. Needing your offer? Fire up a Google sheet. Fire up an Excel sheet, split it into four main columns. Column one is what you actually call your offer. Going back to proposal software, that might be proposal software, proposal tools, proposal platform. Column two, what are those money niches that you've historically Sold well that can have the problem you solve, are motivated to solve it and can easily afford the offer. Could be like you said, financial firms, accountancies, whatever those niches are. The third is what are those main competitors that always come up in sales calls. That's column three. And the fourth is this is probably a framework you've talked about on the podcast, I'm sure. Jobs to be done. What are your dream clients Jobs to be done? What are those struggling moments they face? Maybe they try to do something internally like they cobble together a solution on Google sheets or Excel or maybe in the sales proposal world like it would be like something like how to build a sales proposal within Google Docs or how to build out sales process that convert all that kind of stuff. Why do I build those four columns? Well, it helps me build out long tail keywords that my dream clients are actually going to search for needing the offer. And if I get, if I'm, if I have a team then I might involve my sales team so they can actually come with me to say look, these are competitors that come up. These are the niches that are doing well right now. These are the common frustrations or our clients jobs to be done or struggling moments. And then we can have well informed keyword research that's also going to fuel our content when we get to that stage that our target prospects are probably actually looking for when they need our offer.
Jon Jantz
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Jon Jantz
So one of the things that have, you know, we could do a quick search and find, you know, 10 blog posts on, you know, people saying, you know, SEO is dying and AI is going to, you know, eat all, you know, all SEO, you know, organic traffic. But what I'm one of the things I'M hearing you say is, or at least that I'm seeing is if you're really focused on high demand, AI is not really returning results for somebody who is looking to hire an accountant in their community right now, right? I mean it's somebody who's really doing.
Sam Dunning
That level of search.
Jon Jantz
They're not getting an AI overview for that, are they?
Sam Dunning
Not so much not to say there aren't. It's like right now, from what we're saying, a lot of the AI overviews are more for informational based searches, right? Not always, but quite a lot of the time. Now there's, there's obviously two sides to the coin with your typical Google result now there's sometimes an AI overview at the top, then you've got a couple sponsored listings, then you've got the organic results in between. But that aside, you've also got LLMs like ChatGPT, Search, Perplexity, ET cetera. Now a lot of folks are saying stuff like, when I say a lot of folks, I mean random marketers on LinkedIn, et cetera, I like to make a lot of noise saying stuff like Google search is dying and all this kind of stuff. And the truth is that LLMs, whether that is chat, chatgpt, perplexity, et cetera, they are gaining, chatgpt especially are gaining a bit more market share, but it's nothing in comparison to Google. Google's still growing and it still is by far the most searched engine.
Jon Jantz
So what do we, what are we just to put a number on that 2, 3% for the LLM.
Sam Dunning
I can't, I can't remember what it's lost valued at, but Brian Fishkin has just done a report. So one of the, one of the well known SEOs, he's just put out a report to show that, I mean Google's literally kind of 100x or so more compared to some of these LLMs. So what I'm saying is the thing to consider is if you have a more technical user, so if your end clients are more technical, they're probably using more AI search. If not, they're more of a layman. They're probably still using Google for now, but it's more to be aware that AI is on the rise. We can certainly dive into some ways that you can rank on LLMs and chat GPT and similar. Happy to dive into that. But I think that's one thing to bear in mind. Most folks are still using Google when they have intent to review.
Jon Jantz
Sometimes we forget about, you know, what our target market does like, do they read the newspaper? Do they, you know, it's like that's what we need to pay attention to. Right. So, so instead of ranking on the LLMs, I'd let's for a minute go into local search. So a lot of, let's say I'm a local home remodeler. I mean, in this day and age, search has really been, I mean, we can run ads and do things, but search has been a big driver of business for me, especially if I can get myself in that three pack. So how is local search going to be impacted?
Sam Dunning
Yeah, I mean, to be blunt, I don't do tons with local businesses.
Jon Jantz
Yeah, because it's more national, right?
Sam Dunning
Yeah, exactly, exactly. So a lot of my clients are kind of more national, not necessarily serving, serving small industries now. Yes, some of that, again, some of that certain searches will, will be appearing in, whether it's Google AI overviews, so we get the quick review and that sort of things. And I think more of it is understanding. The crux of SEO, in my opinion at least is yes, you follow simple guidelines with technical. So for example, if you were, let's say, I don't know, providing H Vac in a certain state of the U.S. so let's say in New Jersey, those kind of H Vac services in New Jersey, for example, if we actually want to typically what's going to rank for that is probably a landing page. And the usual framework I like to follow for a landing page is problem, are you facing this problem with whatever's going on your home? This is the impact of that problem. We'll agitate a bit and then this is the solution. This is how we're well equipped to solve these issues, these beadneck frustrations. And then you'll probably show some examples of your offer. You have some client testimonials and reviews, might have an FAQ like, what's your pricing? How long does it take? What's your refund policy? And you have a call to action to book a call. The crux of SEO is reviewing what's ranking right now in this case for our target search term, this offer in this location. And how can I completely blow that page out of the water? How can I make my page more helpful, more useful, more educational, trustworthy and convincing to this dream client. And a lot of that comes down to customer research, like knowing what your prospects actually care about, their jobs to be done and their end goals. Yes, you need basic technical SEO, so you need your focus keyword in the URL. You need it in the H1 in the meta title description. And you might want some internal links on that page to other blog articles or other useful pages. But if you can follow that framework with local SEO, in most cases you can actually outrank competitors without even worrying about backlinks. Because a lot of these local websites, they're not really doing a lot of SEO. They might have like a couple pages, like homepage, couple service pages, portfolio contact. If you can actually strategically build out what I call these money pages like offer plus industry, offer plus location and do that in a systematic way, that's customer research. Back then you can, you can probably start ranking quite nicely and putting in some leads.
Jon Jantz
So you said one of my favorite words that you Brits say, H Vac. I love that term. It's a little different than the way us Americans pronounce it.
Sam Dunning
But it's also niche, isn't it? When Brits say niche and us says niche, I always get those two mixes.
Jon Jantz
I've, I have learned niche too. I rather prefer niche.
Sam Dunning
So that's okay.
Jon Jantz
I have a lot of Canadians that are clients and a couple of their words of process is one that, as opposed to process that, that I love to harass them about. If you went into a business, they said, hey Sam, come help us. We're not ranking for anything. You know, they've got a decent business, they've got a decent product or offer. I mean that's not really the issue. Where do you start? I mean, what do you, how do you kind of start the process? And let's say they've bought into. It's going to be a six month process. Do you have a set? You know, here's what we do first, here's what we do next, here's how we expand that.
Sam Dunning
Yeah, yeah. So you start with what we briefly touched on earlier. So understanding the main offer.
Jon Jantz
Yep.
Sam Dunning
And problems they solve. Competitors, industries that they serve well, that have, that have that expensive problem, are motivated to fix it and have cash to easily invest in the offer. Sorry. So you build out that Google sheet, formulating those offers, industries, jobs to be done and competitors make those four main columns and then from there we're making our money. Long tail commercial keywords. So what, what service do you want to make it as John or what offer?
Jon Jantz
Oh, you know, let's do mine. Marketing strategy.
Sam Dunning
Okay. It's quite a nice broad one. And do we want to serve like specific niches?
Jon Jantz
Yeah, let's go with home service businesses where we're going to serve like remodeling contractors, roofers Yep. Lovely landscapers.
Sam Dunning
Yeah, yeah. So we could, if we wanted to drill down on those niches, some of our offerings might be some of our money keywords might be like marketing services for landscaping or best marketing agency for landscapers and hitting some of those, those home niches. And then once we've kind of worked out, once you've exhausted what I call these long tail keywords, and then if we go to kind of, that would be kind of some of the high commercial intent keywords. If we, if we want more jobs to be done, it might be how to rank higher as my home services business or why is my business not showing up on Google? Why is my landscape business not driving leads or why is my landscaping website not converting? Those might be some of the struggling moment searches.
Jon Jantz
So those were all, those were all questions, by the way, right?
Sam Dunning
Yeah, yeah. Those, those are things that probably come up on discovery calls.
Jon Jantz
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Sam Dunning
That's how you pull those. So make an exhaustive list of that. Like I say, if you're the founder, you'll know a lot of these. But if you, if you perhaps have a sales team, they can help you contribute to that, then simplest way to actually build content that ranks is to just google those keywords. So let's say marketing agency for landscapers or best marketing agency landscapers, something like that. Google the keyword, see what the top three organic pages are, what type of page they are. This is called addressing, assessing the intent. Is it a landing page, a blog article, how to a product list to a comparison, whatever. Probably going to be, I'd imagine a landing page for that type of keyword. It might be a top 10 comparison like we reviewed the top marketing agencies in 2025 for landscapers, probably one of the two. See what, what shows more in the organic search results? Let's pretend it's a landing page. I'd review the top three landing pages. So what's ranking now of my competitors? I look for gaps in those pages. Usually landing pages are quite thin. This is our offer. There's some testimonials. Here's a call to action. So I would do what we talked about earlier. Problem, agitation solution based on our knowledge of the industry or our sales team's knowledge. So start with hero area, the top banner. This is the offer. Here's a school to action. Here's a book of call to action. Are you facing these problems around your landscaping company? Like struggling to drive leads for your website, competitors above you in organic search results or spending loads of cash on ads and not returning pipeline. Here's exactly how we fix it. Here's three video testimonials of customers we sold it for. Here's our exact process from A to z. Here's some FAQs around our offer. Why are we more expensive than other marketing agencies? Do we have a proven process? Do we have a returns policy? How quickly can I see Results? All those FAQs from those really tight objections you get on sales calls and then yeah, follow the technical SEO basics. So the focus URL has the keywords. So yourdomain.com best landscapingmarketingagency Same for the H1. Same for the meta title and description. So that that's what I call the blow out the water strategy review. What's ranking make your page more helpful, useful, educational, trustworthy? Google rolled out a framework called E E A T Experience, Expertise, Authority, Trust a while back. I guess for less competitive terms that that alone, doing that at scale in a systematic way, like saying look, we're going to publish. We're going to build out and publish five to ten pages each month. Whatever's realistic for your company will steadily get you rankings. When you get to more competitive terms, I don't know, in the marketing agency world, like things like best marketing agency in the US or whatever it might be, you're gonna have tons of competitors. That's when you'll need the help of backlinks to build up your website's authority. And there's a bunch of ways to build links. Happy to dive into, but that's just a starting point that I'd recommend.
Jon Jantz
My favorite is guesting on podcasts, quite frankly, because we're gonna link back to your site, Sam, and we're gonna promote the heck out of this episode. And so that to me is one of the best backlinks that you can get is going on people's shows. Plus you get the exposure, you know, you might actually get a client because somebody listens to it. So that's my favorite.
Sam Dunning
Yeah, it's great. It is one of the best. I. I'd probably put that as number one or number two for sure. My other favorite is building partnerships, which again has more holistic business play. So this is finding partners that serve the same icp, the same idle client profile as you, but are not direct competitors.
Jon Jantz
Sure.
Sam Dunning
So as a real example, I partner with a LinkedIn ads agency. Impactable. They serve, just like me, B2B service and B2B SaaS clients. But they're not going after SEO clients because they don't offer it. So I approached their founder, a guy called Justin, a while back, and I'm a big fan, John, of weird, painfully short messages if I'm trying to get stuff done. So I probably sent you one. I find the founder or the marketing leader on LinkedIn, I'll say something like, hey, Justin had a weird idea to scale your organic traffic and inbounds you against a conversation. He'll probably connect with me on LinkedIn or whatever channel I outreach, email, whatever, and say, sam, what are you on about? But let's hear what you got to say. Then I'll shoot him like a loom video and just say, look, I've got an idea. In this case, partnership play. The small step initially I might offer is I'll write out a guest blog article for you that will be really useful to your audience, and in return I just want a link back. And then they might do that and that might grow into, okay, let's do a podcast together. Yeah, okay, let's do some more content together. All right. Let's start sending business each other's way. So it's gone from just a small SEO play to, like, reciprocal business. Just like your podcast is, kind of has so much more play to it than just SEO.
Jon Jantz
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, Sam, I appreciate you taking a few moments to drop by the Duct Tape Marketing podcast. Where would you invite people to connect with you, find out more about your work?
Sam Dunning
I really appreciate it. Three. Three main ways, really. One is LinkedIn. I post ramblings on SEO each and every day. The second is the Breaking B2B podcast, where we interview, just like this, marketing leaders as well as solo episodes on SEO and what's working on marketing today. Or the third is if you're tired of seeing competitors above you in organic search results, stealing traffic, inbound leads, and more, then we might be able to fix it with our unusual approach to SEO. It's breaking b2b.com. Happy to chat.
Jon Jantz
Awesome. Again, appreciate you stopping by and hopefully we'll run into you one of these days out there on the road.
Sam Dunning
Cheers, man. Thank you.
Marketing Expert
Let me ask you a few things. You feel like you know what differentiates your business from every other business out there? Can you confidently charge a premium for what you offer? Are you working from a plan, a marketing roadmap that allows you to know precisely what to do next? Look, don't worry if you can't answer yes to any or all of these questions. You're not alone. See, marketers today get so focused on the tactic of the week, staring them right in the face that they forget Forget to look at the big picture. The overarching strategy needed to consistently grow their business. Over the years, I've worked with thousands of businesses helping them do just that. Create the perfect marketing strategy and plan that gives total clarity about what to do next, confidence to charge ahead and charge more, and complete control of the marketing tactics they choose. I would love to help you and your team do the same. Look to find out if our Strategy first program is right for you, visit DTM World Grow and request a free consultation. That's DTM World Growing.
Podcast Summary: The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast – "How to Outrank Big Competitors in Search"
Release Date: March 19, 2025
Host: John Jantsch
Guest: Sam Dunning, Founder of Breaking B2B and Host of the "Breaking B2B" Podcast
In this insightful episode of The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, host John Jantsch welcomes Sam Dunning, a renowned SEO expert and founder of Breaking B2B. The conversation delves deep into effective strategies for small and medium-sized businesses to enhance their search engine rankings, particularly against larger competitors.
Timestamp: [01:38]
Sam Dunning introduces his unique approach to SEO with the tagline "SEO for revenue, not vanity." He emphasizes the importance of focusing on metrics that drive actual business growth rather than superficial traffic numbers.
Sam Dunning [02:00]: "We flipped on its head. We thought, how can we do the opposite of the traffic trap and focus on what a dream client is actually searching for when they need our offer."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [02:00] – [04:06]
Sam explains the "traffic trap," where businesses target high-volume informational keywords that attract visitors without conversion potential. He advocates for targeting commercial intent keywords that align with the specific needs of potential customers.
Sam Dunning [02:00]: "They fall into what I call the traffic trap... not likely to result in conversions, AKA inbound leads, demo requests, booked calls."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [05:07] – [07:31]
Jon Jantz discusses common frustrations clients face with SEO, such as misleading reports and unrealistic expectations. Sam emphasizes that SEO isn't a quick fix but a long-term strategy that requires commitment and proper execution.
Sam Dunning [05:51]: "SEO is not for every business. You have to be in a sector that actually has demand to capture."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [07:31] – [13:17]
Sam outlines strategies for small businesses to compete with larger entities in SEO. He advocates for long-tail SEO and targeting specific niches to find opportunities where larger competitors may be under-serving.
Sam Dunning [09:06]: "We might go for things like proposal software for fintech teams or for sales teams... targeting niches that are underserved."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [13:17] – [16:36]
The conversation shifts to the impact of AI and Language Learning Models (LLMs) on search behaviors. Sam clarifies that while AI is growing, Google still dominates the search landscape. He advises businesses to stay informed about AI developments but continue leveraging traditional SEO practices.
Sam Dunning [15:44]: "Google's still growing and it still is by far the most searched engine."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [16:36] – [19:29]
Jon and Sam discuss the nuances between local and national SEO. While Sam primarily focuses on national clients, he provides insights into optimizing for local search by enhancing landing pages and focusing on location-specific keywords.
Sam Dunning [17:07]: "Customer research... knowing what your prospects actually care about... is crucial for local SEO."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [20:00] – [24:51]
Sam introduces a systematic approach to keyword research and content creation using a structured Google Sheet. This method helps in identifying "money keywords" that align with business offerings and target niches.
Sam Dunning [20:55]: "It helps me build out long tail keywords that my dream clients are actually going to search for needing the offer."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [24:51] – [26:33]
The discussion covers effective backlink strategies, highlighting podcast guesting and forming strategic partnerships as top methods. These approaches not only enhance SEO through backlinks but also expand business networks and client bases.
Jon Jantz [24:51]: "Guesting on podcasts... is one of the best backlinks that you can get."
Key Points:
Timestamp: [26:33] – [27:20]
In wrapping up the episode, Sam shares ways for listeners to connect and learn more about his work, including LinkedIn, the Breaking B2B podcast, and his website.
Sam Dunning [26:41]: "If you're tired of seeing competitors above you in organic search results, steal traffic, inbound leads, and more, then we might be able to fix it with our unusual approach to SEO."
Key Points:
Sam Dunning is the founder of Breaking B2B, an SEO firm dedicated to helping businesses outrank their competitors through innovative and revenue-focused SEO strategies. He hosts the "Breaking B2B" podcast, where he interviews marketing leaders and shares actionable SEO insights. To learn more about Sam and his services, visit BreakingB2B.com or connect with him on LinkedIn.
This summary was crafted to encapsulate the key discussions, insights, and strategies shared in the episode "How to Outrank Big Competitors in Search" of The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. Whether you're a small business owner, marketing professional, or SEO enthusiast, the episode offers valuable advice to enhance your search engine rankings and drive business growth.