What do Google, P2Ps, and Instagram all have in common? They are search engines! This week, Anne & Erikka talk tech. More specifically, SEO and how you can use keywords to improve your searchability & business. Our websites and online profiles are our digital storefronts. The words we put on them are the secret to getting found by clients, so specificity and consistency are essential. Listen up Bosses, we've got tips & tricks just for you!

Transcript

>> It's time to take your business to the next level, the BOSS level! These are the premiere Business Owner Strategies and Successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a BOSS, a VO BOSS! Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza.

Anne: Hey everyone. Welcome to the VO BOSS podcast. I'm your host Anne Ganguzza, and I am here back with special guest co-host Erikka J. Hey Erikka.

Erikka: Hey Anne, how are you today?

Anne: I'm doing good. What's going on with you?

Erikka: Oh, nothing, man. Just happy to be back and happy to have -- actually, I just had a job that walked in on my website, and I was so excited because I love getting those.

Anne: Ah, oh my God. I love that. You said that because walking in on your website, that's the best kind of job to get because you don't have to do all the work of auditioning. They've already come to your website. They've heard your demos. And they've liked what they've heard, and then they contact you and say how much?

Erikka: Yeah. They just walk in and wanna hand you money for you doing the talking. So I love that.

Anne: I love that. That is such an efficient way to work. Not that -- look, I'm not gonna blast anybody who auditions. I mean, I audition. I audition for my agents every day and thankfully I'm busy because I do a lot of things in my business that I don't really have a ton of time to audition outside of, for my agents. And so when it comes in on my website or however they find me online, I absolutely love the inquiry because they don't necessarily need an audition. They're just saying here's my job. How much will it cost?

Erikka: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, you know, talking about balance, yeah sure, we do auditions every day.

Anne: Yeah.

Erikka: And that's a great way to land work. And a lot of the work that we get from our agents where we have to audition are those big, you know, really great jobs, but having a balanced approach to your business and having a diverse set of leads that come in, having that walk-in money where you don't really have to do that audition work. And it's just like, hey, we want you to do this job. We saw your website and love your work. And when can we schedule a session and how much? Like, that's great. It's a good balance.

Anne: Love it, love it. And so I think so important to talk about is SEO, because that plays a large part in how people find you online, a large part in how people find me and my website, and then pretty much say, hey, I like your voice. How much will it cost? So let's talk a little bit about SEO, search engine optimization. I know a lot of people like get discombobulated when we start talking about technological things like that and SEO. And disclaimer here, I am not an SEO expert, but I have definitely employed certain things on my website that have allowed me to be found easier. And it has really contributed greatly to those people that walk in and ask for work from me, which I think is amazing. Erikka, what about your experiences?

Erikka: Absolutely. I mean, if you think about it, when it gets a little intimidating, you just think about SEO, as Anne said, stands for search engine optimization. What is Google? A search engine. What are all these social media sites essentially? A search engine. Even the P2Ps, a search engine, they're looking for things. So all you're doing is optimizing your website so that you are found more easily on that search engine when they're searching for things that are relevant to your website.

Anne: Yes, absolutely. Or your online presence. I know. I --

Erikka: Yeah, absolutely.

Anne: -- I bring it back to the website because I think the website is the core of who our businesses are. And the core website will allow anyone to come find me, listen to my demos and then pay me money. So it's like a full cycle. That's my online storefront. And so let's talk about how we can optimize our online presence for good SEO, Erikka.

Erikka: Yeah. Yeah.

Anne: What's the first thing?

Erikka: I think for me, I saw the jump when I went into -- 'cause currently my site is based on SquareSpace. I'm in the process of moving over to WordPress. But there is, if you dig into those sites, there are sections that are specifically for SEO. And if you go in there and you start putting in, I use keywords that I know when someone who is looking for me or my type of sound or what I bring to the table as a voice talent, I'm putting those keywords in my SEO box so that when they're searching for Black female voice talent, or authoritative, or sounds like Viola Davis or whatever, I'm coming up in those options. So I think that's number one is making sure that you have the right copy on your website and the right terms that are specifically driving SEO on your website listed there.

Anne: Let's talk a little bit more about keywords because I think keywords are what, you know, people are like, well, what keywords should I use? And I think keywords are very specific to everybody, every person. And I think everybody wants to be found for the keyword voiceover.

Erikka: Yeah.

Anne: You know?

Erikka: Everybody,

Anne: Everybody. And here's the deal. The sites that have a lot of people that have voiceover in their profile, that word, are going to be the ones that get found first because there's many occurrences. So keywords are, basically in Google, if you rank highly for a particular keyword, you will show up on the first page, which is desirable to show up on the first page. 'Cause many people, when they search myself included, I don't always go to the second or third pages. However, I will say, Erikka, I don't know if you've noticed recently, there's been an awful lot of ads on the first page of Google lately.

Erikka: There have.

Anne: A lot.

Erikka: Definitely. And not just Google, but like, you know, I went to like search for a restaurant on like Yelp or something, and it was like, it wasn't necessarily the best, but it was ranked first because it was sponsored, and you have to look for that word, and it's like, oh wait. . So yeah, lots of ads.

Anne: And so I think that by the way, Erikka, this is probably another podcast episode, but thinking about marketing and ads, adding ads into your daily practice could be something that would be worthwhile. And again, that's another investment, but I say that just because I'm noticing the increase on the first page of Google of ads showing up. And so you wanna make sure that the keyword that people search for will show up your entry on the first page, if possible, because not many people click to the second or third pages. However, I will say because of the amount of ads I have been going to the second page more often now.

Erikka: Yeah. I've seen that.

Anne: But what makes a good keyword? So of course you can put voiceover in your body of text that you put on your website or on your profile. But I also think you definitely need to target it more specifically to what you want to be found for. So for example, if somebody typed in voiceover coach or commercial voiceover coach, and I'd have to keep checking right now, but I have certain words that I wanna be found for. But if somebody types in commercial VO coach, that's a different set of words than commercial voiceover coach. So keep that in mind because people say, well, I didn't find you when I searched for you under commercial VO coach. And I'm like, well, that doesn't necessarily mean that you won't find me under commercial voiceover coach. So I think a lot of times in order to get yourself found on that first page, try to think specifically and narrow down that focus on your target.

So for example, if I say "commercial voiceover Orange County," I will show up on the first page exactly. Or "narration voiceover coach Orange County," that kind of thing. And if I don't, by the time this airs , I will, I will be working to make sure that that happens because I have a certain set of words that I wanna be found for. Now, it would be great if I could be found for voiceover coach, that in general, but there's a lot of voiceover coaches out there that use that as well as their a search term. So it really behooves you to think about what it is that you wanna be found for.

Erikka: Absolutely being specific is so key 'cause like you said, everyone is gonna have voiceover and not just that, but the first page, if you just have voiceover or even VO or just those sort of generic terms, you're gonna get eaten up by the sites that are corporations that have thousands of dollars into voiceover, some of the P2Ps.

Anne: Exactly.

Erikka: You know what I mean? So you're gonna get pushed down and, and maybe not even be in the first three pages. You'll get found for what you wanna get found for, for what really your niche is because we all have different areas of expertise.

Anne: Exactly.

Erikka: Not just in genre, but in like how our voice sounds like, how do you describe your voice?What adjectives do you use? What celebrity references would you compare your voice to?

Anne: I think celebrity references are great too.

Erikka: Oh yeah. Yeah.

Anne: So many people forget about that, their soundalike, and that really helps. And I think you should absolutely put that on your website. Because th...