So today I have SEO Ninja Jason Acidre From Kaiserthesage who shares lot on link building and SEO strategies on his blog. I learned a lot from his blog when I started SEO and his case studies were so indepth that I used to make notes from his blog posts and implement those on my office projects. This guy is literally internet marketing Ninja. I am glad that he accepted my interview request.
Lets start with interview.
How did you get involved with online marketing? Introduce yourself to BloggersIdeas readers?
I believe it was by pure accident, or perhaps fate. Most of the things I did before (I started building a career in digital marketing) were really unrelated to marketing.
I took civil engineering back in college, I tried building a career as a pro-gamer (counterstrike) for 8 years, and then I became a full-time writer (eventually editor) back in 2007.
But now I realize how almost everything I've experienced from my previous endeavors has somehow collectively developed me into someone who can thrive in a very competitive space (digital).
Anyway, I came across SEO back in early 2010, when I tried applying for another writing job (for an Australian-based SEO agency). I didn't have any clue what SEO was back then, but the managers/recruiters processing my application thought that I'd be a better fit for an SEO position.
So I took the offer. They gave me a week to study (they provided tons of ebooks for me to read all week). Luckily, I got really addicted to it. While I was working for them as a newbie SEO (mostly doing grey hat), I was also doing a lot of research and testing on my free time.
A month after, I got nixed (not my fault though - the client I was working on fired the company, so they had to let me go). And fortunately enough, I was immediately hired by Simon Slade just a week after to work on their sites ( Salehoo, Affilorama and TrafficTravis). I believe that's the point where I was really able to take my SEO skills to the next level (major upgrade!).
That was also the time when I started my own blog - Kaiserthesage - to freely do tests on anything related to online marketing.
My career in digital progressed quickly (and unexpectedly) when I started blogging about SEO, as I started receiving service inquiries a couple of weeks after publishing my first 2-part case study. In a stretch of 3 months working in this field, I've experienced the 3 types of SEO:
- An agency guy (the first job I took)
- In-house SEO
- Freelance SEO consultant
A year later, with the influx of client inquiries, I decided to start our own agency ( Xight Interactive). Then the rest was history.
What do you do now apart from blogging? How many blogs you have?
Majority of my time (60 - 70%) is still spent on consulting work and in promoting our agency (through blogging and speaking gigs). Whereas the rest are spent on building our side projects.
I used to run several websites/blogs a few years back for purely testing purposes (particularly when I was closely working on Affilorama, where I had to test a lot of strategies for affiliate marketing). Though, now we're mostly focused on building high authority sites (we launched 2 sites earlier this year, and have 2 more on the works - and launched this one yesterday: Grit).
What makes you different than your competitors?
We're an all-Filipino team, working in the Philippines, helping global brands.
And there's a huge advantage in working with teams setup here in the Philippines:
- High literacy rate
- English is the second language
- Web-tech savvy (or mostly social - given that we're a Facebook country).
- Attractive rates - since cost-of-living is cheaper compared to US, AU and UK.
- Lastly, we have a solid SEO community here.
Basically, it's easy to build and scale teams here. But I think what really sets us apart is that we focused on improving our outreach and link building process, which is genuinely a lucrative part of digital marketing, plus the fact that the talent we need is somehow easy for us to acquire here.
Do you think blogging is dead? As Google is bringing a lot of Algo updates and many blogs are dying in 2017?
No! As long as the main objective of the content/ blogging campaign is to exemplify a brand's expertise/authority and to build a strong reputation in its space, it will always remain relevant.
As having a pool of information-rich and highly actionable blog posts will not just help you improve your search visibility, but it can also help attract/earn you more potential customers to your business.
What have you done that you are very proud of? How you take care of your personal life and professional life?
Not really sure at this point. As I've been just doing things that I want. It's just that I really enjoy a lot of things about digital marketing.
But I guess, the one thing I can probably be proud of is that I've somehow helped our SEO community here in the Philippines make a dent in the international scene.
As for work-life balance, honestly, I'm not really good at it. Because no matter where I am, I always seem to come up with intriguing/interesting ideas to try and test - I easily get inspired by the things I observe outside of work.
What is your biggest success in Making money online?
The majority are definitely from the consulting/service contracts we've landed through my blog.
And honestly, making money wasn't the biggest success. It's learning a ton of things I wouldn't learn elsewhere, through working with either small businesses or bigger brands, meeting other brilliant people in marketing, through failing and the overall experience of building something from ground-up. There's nothing more rewarding than those.
Also, read our other interviews:Yeah, (and again) for research and testing purposes. Since we've been working with several brands in the e-commerce-education space for the past couple of years.
I actually wrote a comprehensive case study on how to make your first sale on Shopify. You can check some of my tests/insights on that post.
What kind of opportunities are you seeking towards your business? Will you be a blogger forever or will leave blogging after making some handsome money.
I'm not really passionate about writing/blogging - and I don't really consider myself good at it as well (I think I just have a good feel on how to create uniquely valuable content and understand what sorts of content topics/formats that really work).
Despite that, I don't see myself quitting it. I enjoy sharing my ideas, especially when I think people will find value in it. Even if I stopped doing SEO (or any online marketing discipline), I think I'd still write.
With regards to opportunities, we're really focused on building and growing our own web properties now. That's where our business is headed. But we're still pretty much open to long-term strategic partnerships with businesses that share our same goal/vision (wherein we can offer our workforce in exchange for equity).
Which are the best affiliates you have tied up with so far?
As I've mentioned above, I only did affiliate marketing for tests. The networks that I've had the most success with in the past were from Amazon Associates and ClickBank.
How much money do you make through your blog every month? This is a crucial question that every curious on my blog wants to read.
From my blog alone we have above $60K/month worth of contracts for SEO/ link building services. But it's a stressful way to make money from a blog because it requires time, effort and workforce to scale and sustain.
Which are the countries you usually target through your content marketing efforts?
100% of our clients are businesses and brands from US, UK and Australia.
What plugins do you use on your blog?
How important is social media and SEO for someone's business to succeed in today's competitive world?
It's crucial, and it's obvious that a lot of businesses are already realizing the importance of getting their brands more visible over the web. Knowing that it's measurable, cheaper (than traditional channels), and can be specifically targeted. These disciplines are continuously evolving, and they definitely have more firepower now more than ever.
What are your plans for 2018? Are you leaving SEO please share something as SEO is now getting very difficult?
No plans of getting out of the game yet. I find it more exciting these days (I have a lot of tests lined up before the year ends).
I actually published an in-depth guide that features the most effective SEO strategies (with actual case studies) we've been using these past couples of years (that we're also continuously refining, to make sure we'll be on top of our game when 2018 comes). I highly encourage BloggersIdeas' readers to check that one out!
The best advice I can give when it comes to SEO is to aim to improve the overall quality and experience of the site, through optimizing on these areas:
- Architecture - Make it easy for Google to understand, crawl and index your website
- E-A-T (Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) through all their content and brand assets.
- Build a positive reputation for your brand (by building more content-based and relationship-driven links).
What will be your message to newbies all over the world who are starting out in make money online?
Never stop learning. The best way to really succeed in this line of business is to make sure you're well-equipped in terms of skills and experience. Invest more time in improving your knowledge in general internet marketing.
- Read more. Read every day.
- Don't just trust what you've read, test everything you're learning (that's the best way to know if they will really work). Doing is going to be the most important part of your journey.
- Analyze your tests. If they work, refine them.
What things you didn't like about internet marketing gurus? How do you see yourself as guru
I don't really have any negative comments towards other influencers in the industry. They're popular for a reason, and people follow them because they did something right.
Honestly, I don't see myself as a guru. We're all students of the game. Given that we have to be constantly updated with everything that's happening in our space. Especially when you're a consultant, you'll only be as good as your last reports.
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