E-Coffee with Experts

Digital Web Solutions
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Sip & Soar: Welcome to 'E-coffee with Experts' - Brewing Wisdom, One Expert Conversation at a Time. Grab Your Digital Mug, Let's Elevate Together!

  1. 8h ago

    Brian McLeod: The SEO Migration Strategy Behind a 150% Click Increase

    Brian McLeod, AI SEO Director of Level Agency, joins us to break down what’s working across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, and Perplexity. Brian shares his unexpected path from theater to enterprise SEO, along with lessons from major projects, including a migration that drove 150% click growth, a 40% search performance lift for TCS Education, and work that tripled a financial services client’s AI visibility against competitors. We get into what makes enterprise SEO migrations work, why client trust matters just as much as the strategy itself, and why consistency and specificity can matter more than simply chasing backlinks. Brian also explains why clicks and sessions no longer tell the full story. In AI search, the bigger question is whether your brand is actually becoming the answer. Plus, he shares how he’s using Claude to build automated SEO audit tools, and why AI can get you 70–90% of the way there, but still needs human judgment to finish the job. If you work in SEO, GEO, or enterprise marketing, there’s plenty to take away from this one. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 01:03: Introduction 01:03 - 02:29: Brian McLeod's Path Into SEO 02:29 - 04:16: Building Client Trust Beyond the Strategy Deck 04:16 - 06:41: Building SEO Credibility From Scratch at TCS Education 06:41 - 07:52: Why Measurement Matters More in the Age of GEO 07:52 - 10:04: The Operating Model for Enterprise SEO 10:04 - 10:42: The Coca-Cola Governance Framework Results 10:42 - 12:57: What Separates a Successful Enterprise Migration 12:57 - 15:19: Winning AI Visibility in Financial Services 15:19 - 17:04: Strategy for Multi-Category Brands 17:04 - 19:15: Off-Page Signals That Move the Needle in AI Search 19:15 - 21:31: How Social Media Shapes Brand Discoverability 21:31 - 23:49: Google AI vs ChatGPT and Perplexity Retrieval 23:49 - 25:57: When Technical SEO Isn't Enough 25:57 - 29:42: Building AI Workflows and Automations at Level Agency 29:42 - 31:51: Closing Thoughts  Connect with Brian McLeod  https://www.linkedin.com/in/briansmcleod/  https://www.level.agency/  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

  2. 1d ago

    Andrew Mazzonna: Why Backlinks Still Matter for SEO and AI Rankings

    Andrew Mazzonna, SEO Director of VEA Technologies, joins E-Coffee with Experts to share how he got into SEO in a pretty unexpected way, discovering Black Hat World during a rough freshman year of college. What started with teaching himself WordPress and experimenting through trial and error eventually turned into a career spanning self-storage, e-commerce, and enterprise agency work. In this episode, Andrew talks about how VEA Technologies is using AI to build a library of Claude skills for things like location page creation, sitemap monitoring, and content workflows. He also explains why self-storage is such a tough niche to stand out in organically, where proximity and reviews can matter more than keywords, and the difference between brand-level and facility-level visibility in AI search. We also get into entity clarity, topical authority, structured data, and what makes content more likely to get cited by AI platforms. And while AI search is changing the game, Andrew explains why he still sees backlinks as table stakes for both traditional SEO and AI visibility. To wrap things up, Andrew shares his take on learning SEO through trial and error, and one simple reminder: give yourself some grace. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 01:11: Introduction 01:11 - 02:40: Andrew's Journey Into SEO and VR Technologies 02:40 - 04:34: Lessons From Hands-On Learning and Staying Close to Execution 04:34 - 05:39: Scaling SEO With Claude Skills 05:39 - 06:42: Why Self-Storage SEO Is So Competitive 06:42 - 07:52: Brand-Level vs Facility-Level AI Visibility 07:52 - 08:42: Finding the Right Questions Behind Search Intent 08:42 - 09:13: The Biggest Shift in SEO and AI 09:13 - 10:15: How AI Is Making Long-Tail Search More Accessible 10:15 - 10:45: Andrew's Favorite AI Platforms 10:45 - 11:37: Entity Clarity and Topical Authority for LLMs vs Google 11:37 - 12:24: Are Backlinks Still Dead? Andrew's Take 12:24 - 13:38: What AI Citation-Ready Content Actually Looks Like 13:38 - 14:41: Advice to His Younger Self 14:41 - 16:55: Closing Thoughts  Connect with Andrew Mazzonna  https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-mazzonna-58b60b83/  veatechnologies.com  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

  3. 2d ago

    Ben Kalkman: How This CEO Built 10-Year Client Loyalty by Saying No

    Ben Kalkman, CEO of Rocket Media, started his agency as a side hustle while working as a handyman. 23 years later, it has become a leading home services marketing agency, and he has intentionally kept the team capped at 50 people. In this episode with our host Dawood Bukhari, Ben shares how one repeat customer taught him the difference between selling a quick fix and building real trust, why he narrowed Rocket Media’s focus from more than 100 home service categories down to just five: HVAC, plumbing, electrical, solar, and security, and why he believes going deep beats trying to do everything. We also talk about how AI and answer engines are changing home services marketing, from why Google Business Profile and solid SEO still matter to why customer conversations are one of the biggest untapped content sources. Ben also breaks down why PR and reviews are becoming increasingly important, and shares his “onion” framework for helping agencies actually adopt AI instead of simply handing everyone a ChatGPT license. Ben also gets into why his average client stays with Rocket Media for 10 to 12 years, how he decides which “shiny opportunities” to turn down, and why he believes every business has a “truth teller” niche worth owning. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 01:00: Introduction 01:00 - 01:54: The Moment Ben Realized He Was Selling Trust 01:55 - 03:52: How Rocket Media Started as a Side Hustle 03:53 - 04:51: Supporting Family Through the Early Days 04:52 - 06:28: How Word of Mouth Evolved With AI Search 06:29 - 07:22: Rocket Media and TikTok 07:23 - 08:39: Making Home Services Marketing Interesting 08:40 - 09:44: The Hardest Period in 23 Years 09:45 - 10:53: Why Systems Matter More Than Founders 10:54 - 14:43: The ToFixit Story and Narrowing to Five Trades 14:44 - 15:21: Becoming a Truth Teller in Your Industry 15:22 - 16:19: Consistency and How Answer Engines Perceive You 16:20 - 17:48: The 80/20 Rule for Saying No 17:49 - 19:37: Why the Office Was Designed for Exactly 50 People 19:38 - 21:17: Why Clients Stay 10 to 12 Years 21:18 - 23:17: Building In-House AI Tools and Teaching Transparently 23:18 - 24:25: Educational Content vs Selling an Offer 24:26 - 25:40: What Makes Content Citable by AI 25:41 - 27:40: Where to Invest Next After SEO Basics Are Done 27:41 - 32:06: The AI Adoption Onion Framework 32:07 - 33:40: Measuring Authority and Attribution in AI Search 33:41 - 35:22: What's Next for Ben and Rocket Media 35:23 - 37:08: Closing Thoughts  Connect with Ben Kalkman  https://www.linkedin.com/in/kalkman  https://rocketmedia.com/  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

  4. 3d ago

    Carl Poxon Explains Why Search Intent Beats Keyword Volume

    What happens when you stop looking at SEO through the lens of keywords and start looking at it through the lens of people? Carl Poxon, SEO Director Reflect Digital, joins E-Coffee with Experts to explore exactly that. Carl takes us through his unusual journey into SEO, from biomolecular science to hosting, media, and agency life, and shares how Google’s Panda and Penguin updates helped push the industry beyond the days of keyword stuffing and link spam. A big part of the conversation is about understanding what people actually mean when they search. Carl shares a fascinating example from a UK building society, where the team was targeting a valuable mortgage term but discovered that first-time buyers weren’t searching for it because they didn’t know the terminology. It’s a simple example, but it highlights a much bigger point: search data can tell you what people type, but it doesn’t always tell you why they’re searching. We also get into zero-click searches and why not every valuable search needs to result in a click. Carl explains how seemingly non-commercial searches can build familiarity and brand recall over time, using the “We Buy Any Car” campaign as a great example of how brand awareness can influence future search behavior. And, of course, we talk about AI. From AI Overviews to LLM visibility, Carl shares how the shift toward AI-powered search is making traditional attribution harder, why branded search share is becoming an increasingly useful metric, and how SEOs can prove their impact when clicks and rankings no longer tell the full story. If you’re trying to understand where SEO is heading, and how to build a strategy around real human behavior rather than just search volume, this episode is definitely worth a listen. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 00:51: Introduction 00:51 - 03:38: Carl's SEO Journey & Reflect Digital 03:38 - 06:07: Panda & Penguin: SEO Becomes a Proper Trade 06:07 - 08:41: Marketplace SEO: Lessons from Car Mats to Fit 08:41 - 13:10: Bringing Behavioral Insight into SEO Strategy 13:10 - 19:18: Understanding True Search Intent vs Keyword Volume 19:18 - 24:13: Zero-Click Search and Commercial Value 24:13 - 30:00: Favorite AI Platforms & Advice for New SEOs 30:00 - 31:15: Closing & Thank You  Connect with Carl Poxon  https://www.linkedin.com/in/carlpoxon/  https://www.reflectdigital.co.uk/  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

  5. 4d ago

    Alistair Knight: How AI Search Is Quietly Reshaping SEO Strategy

    SEO is changing fast. With AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and Perplexity becoming part of how people discover information, is traditional SEO still enough? In this episode of E-Coffee with Experts, Ranmay chats with Alistair Knight, Founder and CEO of Zionova, about what’s really changing in search, and how SEOs and agencies can adapt. Alistair shares the unconventional path that led him into SEO, from running an iPhone repair business in college to working with enterprise brands like IG Group and Brussels Investments, before eventually starting his own agency, Zionova. One of the biggest themes of the conversation is authority. Alistair explains why he believes technical and on-page SEO are no longer the whole game, and why things like link building, digital PR, brand mentions, and visibility on platforms such as Reddit, LinkedIn, and Medium are becoming increasingly important — especially when it comes to getting picked up and cited by AI. They also talk about the things that often get overlooked in SEO, from making reports actually useful for the business to the lessons Alistair learned from running his own affiliate site, Helping Principles. He shares some practical ways to create content that has a better chance of appearing in AI search, including schema, direct-answer content, and data-driven content that naturally earns links. And beyond SEO, Alistair gets into the personal side of building a business, including the mindset and daily habits that have helped shape his approach to entrepreneurship. If you’re working in SEO, trying to understand GEO and AEO, or thinking about building an agency of your own, this conversation offers a practical look at where search is going, and how you can stay ahead of it. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 02:28: Introduction 02:28 - 03:40: Alistair's Journey Into SEO 03:40 - 04:50: Why He Took The Entrepreneurial Leap 04:50 - 06:45: Biggest Lessons From His Career 06:45 - 09:10: Keeping SEO Focused On Revenue 09:10 - 11:25: What Running His Own Site Taught Him 11:25 - 13:00: SEO Tactics Losing Value With AI Overviews 13:00 - 14:20: Getting Content Referenced By AI Tools 14:20 - 17:25: How Link Building And Digital PR Have Changed 17:25 - 17:45: Favorite AI Platform 17:45 - 21:00: Rapid Fire Round 21:00 - 21:12: Closing Thoughts  Connect with Alistair Knight  https://www.linkedin.com/in/alistair-knight-859ba529b/  http://zionova.co.uk/  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

  6. Sep 11

    Dan Lauer: What Google's Latest Update Means for Your AI Visibility

    Dan Lauer, Director of SEO and GEO at Walker Sands, joins E-Coffee with Experts to talk about what it really takes to succeed in both traditional search and AI-driven search. Dan shares his unconventional journey from studying meteorology to building a career in SEO — and why he likes to say that “SEO chose me,” not the other way around. He also breaks down the strategy behind his award-winning Holland America Line campaign, which drove a 65% increase in organic leads and 136% year-over-year revenue growth. Along the way, he shares how he approaches technical SEO for large enterprise websites with thousands of pages, including how he decides what to fix first. The conversation also gets into Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) and what it actually means for brands trying to show up in tools like ChatGPT and Gemini. Dan explains why a strong technical SEO foundation still matters, how query fan-out is changing the way we think about search intent, and why “ghost citations” could become a bigger problem for brands. Beyond GEO, Dan shares his take on link building, explaining why five strong backlinks can be more valuable than a hundred low-quality ones. He also talks about why traditional attribution models struggle with today’s fragmented customer journeys — and why his advice to brands is simple: get your SEO foundation right first, then focus on AI visibility. If you work in SEO, digital marketing, or brand strategy and want a clearer picture of where search is headed, this episode is packed with practical insights and real-world examples. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 00:26: Introduction to Dan Lauer 00:26 - 02:10: The Story Behind SEO Content Goblin 02:10 - 04:42: From Meteorology to SEO 04:42 - 07:08: Holland America Campaign: 65% Organic Lift 07:08 - 09:31: Prioritizing Fixes in Enterprise Technical Audits 09:31 - 11:30: Why SEO Foundations Drive AI Visibility 11:30 - 14:13: How AI Overviews Combine Search Intents 14:13 - 17:24: Query Fan-Out and Defining Your Brand Entity 17:24 - 20:19: Quality vs Quantity in Backlinks and Mentions 20:19 - 22:48: Ghost Citations and Earning AI Trust 22:48 - 27:17: Attribution Challenges in a Fragmented Journey 27:17 - 29:11: Balancing SEO and AI Investment 29:11 - 31:21: Final Thoughts  Connect with Dan Lauer  https://www.linkedin.com/in/danlauer1/  https://www.walkersands.com/contact/  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

  7. Sep 9

    Samantha Torres: What It Takes to Migrate 200 Domains Without Losing Traffic

    What does technical SEO actually look like when you're dealing with millions of URLs, multiple languages, and a whole engineering team? Samantha Torres, Senior Manager of Technical SEO at Pipedrive, better known as the SEO Mermaid, joins the show to share what she’s learned from more than a decade in SEO, both agency-side and in-house. She’s worked on some seriously complex migrations, including a 64-million-URL, 200-language migration for a Fortune 50 company. We get into the practical side of technical SEO: how to write tickets engineers will actually prioritize, what needs to happen before a major domain migration, and where SEO workflows start to fall apart as your data grows beyond what a spreadsheet can handle. Sam also shares her take on the next wave of search, from AI visibility and LLM citations to GEO and AEO. We talk about why measuring AI visibility isn’t as straightforward as traditional search analytics, how to think about digital PR and brand mentions, and where platforms like G2, Reddit, and YouTube fit into the picture. If you're working in enterprise SEO, navigating the shift toward AI-powered search, or simply trying to build SEO processes that can scale, this episode is full of practical ideas, frameworks, and lessons you can take back to your team. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 01:21: Introduction 01:21 - 03:02: From Front-End Developer to SEO 03:02 - 05:08: Agency Side vs In-House SEO 05:08 - 06:32: Writing Tickets That Get Prioritized 06:32 - 09:33: The 180-Domain, 5.4M URL Migration 09:33 - 10:01: The Biggest Migration: 64M URLs, 200 Languages 10:01 - 11:58: When Spreadsheets Break: BigQuery & Looker 11:58 - 14:24: Measuring AI & LLM Visibility 14:24 - 16:17: Deciding Which AI Features Deserve Their Own SEO 16:17 - 18:23: Scaling Discoverability Across Platforms 18:23 - 19:31: Prioritizing Off-Page Signals & Digital PR 19:31 - 20:11: What's Next for Sam Torres 20:11 - 20:37: Rapid Fire Round 20:37 - 21:51: Closing Thoughts  Connect with Samantha Torres  https://www.linkedin.com/in/samantha-torres-seo/  pipedrive.com  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

  8. Sep 8

    Rafael Andrade: Why AI Makes Decisions Faster But Strategy Stays Human

    Rafael Andrade, Head of Business Development & Strategic Partnerships at illumin, joins E-Coffee with Experts to talk about what it really takes to scale programmatic advertising partnerships without compromising on quality. Drawing from his experience in affiliate marketing, ad exchanges, and now leading partnerships at illumin, Rafael shares why trust, transparency, and genuine relationships still matter so much in digital advertising, even as the industry becomes increasingly automated. We also dive into illumin’s Journey Advertising Platform and how visual journey mapping can give teams a much clearer picture of what’s actually happening across a campaign, beyond the usual line-item dashboards. Rafael breaks down why CTV has become one of the strongest-performing ad formats, how audience targeting is moving beyond basic demographics toward behavior and intent, and how AI is making segmentation more dynamic without taking humans completely out of the equation. Rafael also shares the metrics marketers should be looking at beyond last-touch attribution, from incremental performance and journey engagement to customer lifetime value. To wrap things up, he shares four principles for building stronger advertiser strategies in an AI-first world: stay customer-focused, build a solid data foundation, keep testing and learning, and take ownership of your AI strategy instead of relying on someone else to do it for you. If you work in programmatic advertising, partnerships, or marketing strategy, this episode is a practical look at where the industry is heading, and why the fundamentals of building trust and strong partner relationships still matter. Get Your Exclusive AIO Growth Plan - We’ll kick off with a Live AIO Audit to see how shoppers find you, followed by Competitor Research to steal their spotlight: https://lunacal.ai/team/dws/dws-meetings In this episode, we discuss: 00:00 - 02:06: Interests Outside Work & Industry Connections 02:06 - 05:06: The Power of In-Person Networking 05:06 - 07:22: Scaling Partnerships at illumin 07:22 - 09:05: What illumin Actually Does 09:05 - 11:37: Signals of a Strong Partnership 11:37 - 14:06: Trust, Guidance & Partner Relationships 14:06 - 17:38: Visual Journey Mapping Explained 17:38 - 21:23: Why CTV Leads in a Post-AI World 21:23 - 25:19: How Audience Segmentation Is Evolving 25:19 - 28:11: Metrics Beyond Last-Touch Attribution 28:11 - 30:20: 4 Principles for AI-First Durability 30:20 - 31:18: Closing & Where to Find Rafael  Connect with Rafael Andrade  https://www.linkedin.com/in/rafael-andrade-perez-cossio/  https://illumin.com  FOLLOW US Website: https://www.digitalwebsolutions.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digiwebsol Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dws_global LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-web-solutions./

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Sip & Soar: Welcome to 'E-coffee with Experts' - Brewing Wisdom, One Expert Conversation at a Time. Grab Your Digital Mug, Let's Elevate Together!

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  • Creator
    Digital Web Solutions
  • Years Active
    2024 - 2026
  • Episodes
    428
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Copyright 2023 Digital Web Solutions
  • Show Website
    E-Coffee with Experts