The Jo Show · 16 December 2025
Is AI search killing SEO? Insights from zak ali, US GM at finder.com
If you’ve been quietly wondering whether everything you’ve built your marketing around—SEO, backlinks, keywords—is about to get blown up by AI… you’re not alone. And according to my guest on this episode of The Jo Show, that concern isn’t unfounded.
I sat down with Zak Ali, the US General Manager of Finder.com, where he leads a massive content and product ecosystem helping millions of people make better financial decisions. Zak didn’t take the typical corporate route. No university degree. No linear career ladder. Instead, he built his career by doing the work, learning fast, and staying curious—something that’s becoming more essential than ever in today’s AI-shaped landscape.
What followed was one of the most refreshing, practical conversations I’ve had about the future of search, career building, and what small business owners should actually be doing right now.
From teen tech jobs to GM of finder.com — without the traditional playbook
Zak first entered the workforce as a teenager, taking on a tech job while juggling community college. It didn’t take long before he realised that real-world learning was moving far faster than formal education. By 19, he was earning $60K—a “lot of money back in 2011,” as he joked—and seeing colleagues with four-year degrees doing the same jobs he already had.
Instead of following a prescribed route, he doubled down on experience:
→ Started a news business
→ Fell headfirst into SEO, content, and media
→ Used that knowledge to step into Finder in 2018
→ Became a leader by consistently showing up, solving problems, and learning relentlessly.
Zak’s journey is a reminder for every founder, freelancer, and marketer: expertise isn’t conferred—it’s earned. And right now, the people who can adapt quickly are the ones winning.
SEO has changed more in 3 years than in the previous 10
When I asked Zak what’s changed in SEO recently, he didn’t hesitate.
Three years ago, Google rolled out its Helpful Content Update—which marketers embraced… only to discover that following the guidance didn’t necessarily yield the results they were promised. That update was the first tremor. What’s happening now is the earthquake.
AI-powered search experiences—from Google’s SGE to LLM-driven answer engines—are rewriting the rules.
Zak put it plainly:
The old SEO playbook isn’t just outdated—it’s being replaced.
Search behaviour is shifting. Users expect direct answers. AI is summarising the internet. And brands that have relied on ranking for transactional keywords are starting to feel the squeeze.
But this also creates opportunity—if business owners know where to look.
So… what should small businesses do now?
I asked Zak the question on every founder’s mind:
“If you were building a small business today, what would you focus on?”
His answer wasn’t a tactic. It was a mindset shift.
1. Upskill ahead of the curve
Instead of clinging to what’s been working, focus on where tech and culture are heading. AI is moving at “light speed”—and those who adapt early unlock massive leverage.
2. Build real, recognisable value
AI makes generic content abundant. That means human perspectives, emotion, and lived experience are suddenly more valuable—not less. Zak’s own unconventional background helps him communicate in a way that resonates widely because he understands audiences on both sides of the fence.
3. Create genuine connection through video
Trust isn’t built through keywords anymore—it’s built through presence. People want to see who you are, hear your voice, feel your energy. Video accelerates this connection, especially when paired with multi-platform distribution (hello, 7-11-4 Rule).
4. Stop chasing volume. Start chasing clarity.
Your best customers leave clues. Look closely at the people buying from you now and ask:
Where can I find more people like this?
Simple. Effective. Timeless.
The reality check no one wants to hear: There is no guaranteed path
One of the most profound moments in the conversation was when Zak reflected on the illusion of the “life playbook”—study hard, get a degree, get the job, buy the house, follow the steps. Many people followed that script and are now wondering why it didn’t deliver the security or outcomes they expected.
Technology has disrupted the path. Economics has disrupted the path. AI is disrupting the path.
But Zak sees this not as a downfall—but as liberation. Once you realise the path was never guaranteed, you’re free to make your own.
If you want to stay relevant in 2026: Stay curious
Near the end of our conversation, Zak shared advice he’d give to anyone building a business in 2026.
It wasn’t complicated:
Stay curious. Stay adaptable. And lean into the skills that make you unmistakably you.
Your unique experience—your story, your perspective, your way of understanding people—isn’t something AI can replace.
And honestly? It’s the perfect reminder for any business owner feeling steamrolled by the pace of change.
Watch the full episode
This is an episode every founder, marketer, and entrepreneur should hear.
If you’ve been relying on SEO…
If you’re unsure how AI will impact your visibility…
If you’re ready to build something that can stand the test of the next decade…
Zak’s wisdom is exactly what you need.
Read the Transcript
TRANSCRIPT
Okay, hello, Zak Ali, General Manager of Finder.com in the USA. Thank you very much for making the time to record on The Jo Show today. It’s lovely to have you here.
Thanks for having me, Jo. It’s a pleasure.
So I get straight into it and I’ve heard that you have kind of risen through the corporate ranks to your current position without a traditional career path, without a degree. Can you tell me a little bit about that journey?
Yeah, definitely. So fresh out of high school, I was still planning to get my degree. Me and my best friend had moved a little further north in Northern Virginia. We’re originally from Prince William County. And we had both gotten tech jobs really early. And while we were still sort of doing the community college route, deciding what we wanted to be, we were talking to our colleagues and a lot of them were saying, hey, I went to school and got my four year degree for the job you have now.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (01:03.726)
And so to two 19 year olds making 60,000, which at the time was a lot of money back in 2011, it made the decision clear to sort of continue with the career that we had. And especially knowing that a lot of occupations, a lot of jobs require experience to get more jobs. We were like, we’re getting great experience right now. We’re learning a lot about the corporate world. We sort of have a leg up.
in life because of this. And so from there, we went off and started our own business. And eventually, through that process of starting a news company and learning a lot about media and content and SEO, that’s sort of how I ultimately landed at Finder back in 2018. was a news company and we were covering Trump and it was just too much. And I was like, I need to get out of there. And so.
I found a job online. I actually messaged the CEO, Jay on LinkedIn, and said, hey, I think I’d be perfect for this role you have opening up. I think it was for a life insurance or a lending role. And I wasn’t a super finance person at the time, but I knew a little bit about SEO from my experience as a news owner. And from there, I just went in, did my thing every day, and put my right foot forward. And I guess the founders recognized that.
sort of promoted me throughout the over the years, yeah.
I love it. didn’t go to university for different reasons, but sometimes I wish I had and actually now I’m glad I didn’t bother. So it’s a funny thing. You know, you sometimes want that credibility or something, but unless you’re probably resetting a bone or doing something, I don’t think it’s.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (02:51.766)
I agree. mean, especially with AI today, it’s like you have the entire collection of human intelligence in these LLMs. And again, unless you’re a surgeon or someone who or a lawyer, actually not even a lawyer these days, right? Because you’re seeing these LLMs pass the bar exam and do a better job. so basically, unless you’re a doctor or a physicist or something like that, it feels like, you know, the college experience is probably more for the social aspect.
It’s true. My partner and I actually own a racing yacht and for a while we were running day charters with it a few years ago and we had a guest on board one day who was a veterinarian and I remember them sitting on the rail sailing along and they said, oh, don’t tell anybody, but I YouTubed how to perform surgery on a rabbit once. I didn’t tell the owner. So that was well before AI, you
Yeah.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (03:41.196)
Yeah, definitely. I mean, always say my favorite university is YouTube University. There’s very little you can’t learn on YouTube.
It’s pretty good. Yes. It’s pretty good. the Finder.com, I think it’s a great company. think it’s always provided high quality information. I’ve seen that the company’s done that. I am a bit of a fan of the founder and the fact that he didn’t, stand for rubbish in a legal capacity in Australia at one point and pushed back, pushed back against him.
Ah, shy shall we say, am I allowed to say that on YouTube? And one. So, know, yeah, it’s big fan here. Um, but The quality of Finder I guess you’ve seen a lot of change in marketing and SEO. What would you say is changing in the last two years? If you put it in a nutshell.
So it was three years ago actually that they had the helpful content update that sort of put SEO on its head and Google gave out all of this guidance and little did we know at the time that by following that guidance it wasn’t going to change anything. You know, their mind was made up to…
Good lot of courses to be run.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (04:56.453)
Seriously, mean, consultants probably had a field day with the business that where they were getting in. But the but it was unfortunate. And I remember that time, I remember we tried doing everything we could to sort of recover from that being very people first, getting expert quotes, making sure our pages were as updated as they possibly can. All things that we were doing anyways, but wanted to take it to even the next level to see if we could get back the traffic we had during the 2011 to 2017, 2018 Golden Age.
but it, nothing was working quite plain and simple. Nothing was working. you know, there was a bit of recovery here and there bits of, hope and then despair. And it sort of goes in that cycle and, just out of the entire industry is experiencing sort of the same thing right now. and, and, and AI then comes in at a left field after during the helpful content sort of update madness. And essentially the AIOs come out and now users are able to get
their own, basically the articles that it’s training itself on is everyone else’s content, but they’re giving that to the user right there in search. And so it’s leading to more zero click searches, which means not clicking onto the websites that Show up. And businesses are having to adapt and finders know different and we’re finding really creative and new ways to appeal to our customers to try to bring them in.
I’m finding for clients that if they pay attention to what they put out on X that it helps with Grok. And I’m thinking eventually that will help with the new encyclopedia that’s been put out. So just feeding that ecosystem, I suppose, has been very helpful in particular for one of my clients that they cannot. When I was doing that work with them, they can’t advertise on Facebook because their clients are sort of
high net worth people who don’t use Facebook, you know, they’re building large scale hotels to sell to Hilton or something, but they do use Google and YouTube. So we flipped it to there, but also on X for them worked really well. So obviously each to their own for small businesses and where the audiences are, but SEO is very broad. And you say the models need to know that authority and quote, I’ve seen very small businesses pulling sales through chat GPT, which is
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (07:15.094)
I love seeing their face light up when that happens. It’s great. But do you think that small business owners are underestimating this change?
think it’s never been a more exciting time to be in small business, right? I think there are, it comes with its challenges, of course, with, know, especially if they had built up most of their traffic on one channel. But now, again, with these LLMs and with these resources available to them, they finally have the capability.
to play on YouTube, to play on X, to go on Google, and to be in sort of everywhere. They’re calling SEO search everywhere optimization these days because it really is a connection of all of the different platforms. so businesses, by managing their reputation, by going into these LLMs and asking what they know about them, what
know, ChatGPT or Claude knows about you, for example, and hearing what it spits back out, it sort of tells you the areas you need to work to improve your reputation so that you’re getting featured inside it even more in the answers when people are looking for something that you offer. But ultimately, again, with these algorithms like TikTok, which is just insanely addictive, and I’m sure there’s more than a few people listening who have lost months of their life to just scrolling on that feed, myself included.
the reach that’s accessible to everyone right now is if you just get in front of the camera and you sort of overcome it, to start posting is quite outstanding. You know, something that wasn’t available to us 10 years ago. And now, we have all of this at our disposal to sort of bring in new customers, bring in new clients. And I’ve been really, I think I get most of my inspiration in marketing from the small businesses who have learned how to be crafty without these massive marketing budgets.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (09:06.104)
to make themselves visible and known.
Yes. All I know I’ve had clients come to me from the weirdest source when I just showed up and did a module on email marketing for somebody’s course with a friend. And then suddenly I’m looking after a float spa in Washington or something. And it’s fun, you know, and I think as we’ve seen, it could go two ways. are some people who just, I’m not against it’s, it’s awful. We’d actually you’re listening to YouTube music out in the garden or something and you think, this is a cool track. And then you realize you’re listening to AI music.
We could go completely into that world, but then as we know, there are people who are going to want completely human, authentic interactions. And to differentiate yourself now, the easiest way to do that is to get comfortable, get out there, be seen. Yes, there are digital twins and all that stuff is happening, but I still think you’re going to have an edge when it’s actually you, you know, at least for a while, get in while we can.
Definitely. I always relate AI, pure AI content to that scene in Good Will Hunting where he’s sitting down with Matt Damon, know, Robin Williams character sitting down with Matt Damon and he’s saying, you know, I bet you could tell me all about the, you know, Sistine Chapel, but have you ever actually been there? And, know, sort of drives home that like,
There’s still a soul in the human created stuff, know, the AI stuff, AI content can be good and it can be very utilitarian, but there’s no soul and there’s no, there’s something about effort having gone into it that makes it what it is and makes it more trustworthy and authentic.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (10:37.582)
I that’s true. If we remember that even I was listening to Jensen from Nvidia yesterday talking about consciousness and really how it’s just prediction still, you know, if, if an AI wants to blackmail an executive when they put fake information about an affair and to test it, you know, it’s really just drawing like it would on a Shakespearean novel on how humans have behaved in the past because that’s out there. So it’s not what we would probably define as consciousness yet. I have had emails that I’ve
You you, you train the GPT on a client’s brand and it’s written stuff that was so nice. It brought tears to the client’s eyes who is an artist and hard to please, but describing something in a way that hasn’t been put on the internet yet from us exactly is our edge. And it’s definitely the vibe of who we are. I suppose they haven’t captured that yet. So we have that edge, which I think is very good. So if you are advising a small business owner today for.
search what would you tell them to stop doing and what would you tell them to start doing?
What I tell them to stop doing is creating content for search and just saying that like, don’t try to over-optimize your, don’t try to over-optimize the words on the page. Really just speak how you would, speak like a human. Really, that’s the advice I always give folks is write like a human, write in a way that’s going to make them understand and don’t feel like it all has to be words. Use graphics, use video, use any tool at your disposal that gets the message across in a way that’s going to be genuinely helpful for somebody because
at the end of the day, if everyone’s doing the same thing and everyone’s going off AI, you’re going to have 10 links of carbon copy content. no one’s going to get much value out of that, but they’re going to find your piece of content that has that quirky image or your backstory or your life put into it. And it’s going to resonate. I think that that’s going to give you the brand preference in the future over repeated visits of saying, every time I go to this site, there’s something unique. There’s something authentic about it.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (12:40.204)
I don’t care if it’s in P10, I’m going to skip right over the other ones and click that one because that’s the one that’s going to give me the most value and that’s the one that speaks to me.
think that’s, that’s really good. I actually, because I love reading and I’m not particularly like, if there’s a video on an instructional, I kind of get a bit annoyed. I just want to scan the text, you know, I’m that kind of person, but I’ve had to realize that video is something that small business can use so easily. Like it doesn’t cost anything. You pick up your phone and you hit record. And I forget the name of the theory, but there’s that somebody at Google espoused it. might know.
Where you build trust and their Brian can’t brain can’t tell whether it’s in real life or online, but something to do with seven hours of seeing spending time with somebody and you just trust them in four different locations. Do you know the word I can’t remember. I should have prepared that one. It’s a really good one, but something to do with the number of locations and the number of times spent. So obviously if people are investing their time to spend with you, even if it’s on video, it does build that trust in your brand.
and make it very easy for them to go, yeah, I want to do business with this person. So every business owner can do that. Even if they maybe feel that they don’t know how to deal with socials and want to farm it all out, still just pick up the phone, record something to give to the person who looks after your socials and that’s going to feed the machine if you like.
totally. You touched on something when you said when you read content, you just you’re looking to scan, right? And I think a lot of times, especially the wordsmiths out there, God love them, they don’t overwrite because again, this is a search audience as well. That’s that would be some practical advice is most people who are searching on Google are looking to scan. And if it’s about how you lay out your information in a way that’s very easy for folks to pick up again.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (14:02.871)
I think it’s
Zak Ali I Finder.com (14:30.09)
If it’s a how-to guide or something like that, make it very scannable. If it’s a blog, obviously, right, you’re attracting readers if it’s like a blog about your travel experiences or something like that. But everyone has experienced the annoyance of looking up a recipe and then having to get the entire backstory of their grandmother and all that whole thing.
while we all go, AI down, so just give me the damn recipe.
Exactly. But it’s it’s it’s one of those things where on the video front as well, like when you said it’s never been easier because of AI, AI stuff’s very polished. A lot of the times that and I’m sure you know, you’ve got Facebook ads, so you know, the ugly ad is a thing. It’s actually the less polished, the less polished it is. The more it looks like you just.
are driving in the car and just picked up your phone, the better those convert because the person on the other end of the screen is saying, my gosh, this is a real person giving me a recommendation.
I ran footage once actually, I have a client who sells fashion, just boho dresses and things like that. And they had some footage of the models, they’re just walking through the scrub, or bush, whatever you call it in America, and just chatting banter with the photographer. was just, you couldn’t even really hear what they were saying. She was just walking ahead and looking cute, you know? And it was about 12 minutes of it. And I just ran it. And I remember my client, texted me, said, you haven’t got any music on this video? I said, yes, but look at this, 12 times return on ad spend.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (15:58.734)
Right. Please can I keep it because it was different, you know, it was just like somebody was just hanging out there and it worked. So sometimes I call it sometimes the Tupperware party thing, you know, you the full thing and just let people play with it.
Exactly, exactly.
So yeah, something different and quirky can work. And as you would know, mistakes can work well and drive engagement because everybody likes to think they’re clever and pick up the mistakes. So they throw it in the comments.
Yep. yeah the engagement bait
Doesn’t hurt at all. So if we’re going to encourage small business owners to get on video to not write for the machine, but keep it human, but still get out there often and everywhere, I think is just a very simple way to think about it.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (16:49.602)
Have you seen any companies, small businesses that you think are doing a really good job of this right now?
I I’ll… So I wouldn’t be able to name the businesses. Again, it’s from the months I’ve lost on TikTok, but I do see a lot of restaurants on TikTok, restaurant recommendations that are finding really crafty ways and comedic ways to advertise their services. And again, there’s not that much production value. It’s very much just people having fun and that is resonating.
with folks and it’s almost getting a bit annoying because I’m seeing some of these places that show up on these TikTok and Instagram feeds now become super crowded and some of these were my spots before they went viral and now I can’t get in. But Facebook’s ad library is an amazing resource to spy on competitors. So there’s inspiration everywhere you look.
It’s very handy, the ad library and being able to see how long an ad has been running for in the ad library to me is key, not just something they threw up last week, but if it’s been running for a while, there’s a clue that it’s probably returning well for them. So that works well. I’m actually going to interview, I think it’s next week, lady called Alison who runs a law firm in the States. And one of the staff on her team said, we could make some TikToks and they serve underrepresented.
Exactly.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (18:19.682)
So I’m really looking forward to that one. They’ve done a good job.
I will say though, if you’re a SaaS business over and you need to look really legitimate and you need that higher profile clientele, your values will probably be the best form of marketing. so there’s like the Jeep, Chat GPT versus Claude versus Grok. And I really like Claude’s sort of thinking campaign they’re doing right now where they even had a pop-up in New York where they were selling hats that just said thinking on it and it did amazing wonders, but they’ve sort of positioned themselves as the, you know,
We’re not going to be the biggest for everyone. We’re for the professionals. And they’ve really narrowed down who they’re advertising to. Claude, and I’m sure they still want the Everyman customer, but they’ve said, no, we’re going to go up there. This is our base. These are our evangelists, the people who love us and want us. And then so they’ve positioned their entire branding around that sort of ethos. And I feel like that’s been really exciting to watch from the outside in because it almost feels a bit like watching Apple find its…
sort of personality in the 90s.
finding it’s, it’s that clue when you look at who your best customers are and then just follow that thread, isn’t it? You know, people make all sorts of slide decks with ideal customers and they’re bland. if you look at who spent the most money with you and just go and kind of check them out and then go, okay, let’s find more people like this. Where are they? Not too hard. I’m a simple kind of girl. Yeah. So as far as non-traditional career path.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (19:53.868)
Do you think that helps you look at things differently in what you do at Finder?
certainly, think by not having gone through sort of that, the playbook, right, the life playbook that everyone sort of follows where, you know, or is it privileged enough to follow where they get that, they go to school, then they go to college, and they get the spouse and then they have the, you know, not having followed the linear sort of traditional way of going about things has opened my mind to the sort of
I don’t know, diversity there is in schools of thought out there. You know, not everyone does follow that path and those people have unique experiences and they might know of, you know, they might be able to relate on an emotional level to an experience that no one else has had. And so therefore they’re able to embed that in their copy or they’re able to embed that in how they communicate. And all of a sudden they’re hitting, touching on these universal sort of emotions that everyone feels. But
They only know it because they know that the other side of the sort of coin exists, right? They know the other side, the grass, guess, the part that’s less green or the part that is too green. They know how to relate to both sets of people. And I think that’s definitely helped a lot. But I also feel like it’s made me more curious to understand the perspective of the folks who did follow that path and what their expectations are for life. And a lot of them are not
are watching it not pan out necessarily the way that they had planned and seeing how they react to that. And, know, I think with the economic sort of situation being so tumultuous and everyone’s sort of waiting to see if AI is going to be able to replace every entry level job or, or if it’s going to be, or if the economy is going to come crashing down because of all this tariffs and whatnot. there is this bit of, frustration around affordability and around other matters that is, leading
Zak Ali I Finder.com (21:51.438)
to it’s sort of breaking the illusion that there’s that there is a path. I sort of feel like I’m veering off of marketing and more into sort of a spiritual. I think.
It’s very valid though.
Yeah, but it’s all connected and marketing is very much a human science. And so that’s why you to have to understand it all.
Yes. There’s a cynical view of marketing, course, where it has, you know, marketers ruin everything. that’s true. but there’s also, for me, it’s just connecting people with things that they want or need, you know, if something’s useful or beautiful or both the old maxim, then I would like to get it out there. So to me, that’s, that’s just being helpful, but, I guess any way you look at it. Yeah. If, somebody was wanting to build a business right now, you know, what should they be focusing on?
I would probably focus on upskilling. That’s really where I would put most of my attention is instead of trying to do what’s working right now, predict where the culture’s headed, where technology is headed and focus there. Life is moving at light speed right now. Two years ago, Chat GPT barely existed and now it is.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (23:11.85)
everywhere. AIs and the conversation, you know, from not existing at all to Nvidia was a gaming company. I always knew Nvidia as the gaming chips company. Now it’s this whole thing. And so it’s like, you never know how quickly things can change and things are changing quickly. So adapt, learn. There’s so much good free advice out there for anyone, you know, to find there’s because of these sort of creator economy, incentivizing people to share what they learn. There’s templates out there you can steal for your business. There’s
gurus on YouTube who will teach you how to use N8n and all these workflow automation tools. There’s just so much available to you, so really pick that skill and just zone in on it.
That’s right. Um, and even things like N8N, you know, I can, I can use some of them. I’m not techie. So there is a lot you can build in with automation with AI agents. It’s great. Um, how do you balance? I mean, I, I am a big fan of, know, the moonshots podcast. And so my brain is always out there with.
What Dr. Alex Weissner-Gross is putting up on his updates, know, satellite data centers in space and the whole, he’s willing to dismantle a moon and, know, the whole extreme, I’m, like, my brain’s there. And it can be, it can be almost like the old religions where they think Jesus is coming back tomorrow and everyone would just stop what they were doing in down tools. You know, it can be kind of counterproductive in a way. How do you balance that? Because it is changing quickly. How do you keep it real?
You know, I wish I had the answer there really. It’s like it’s so it is overwhelming. There’s so much going on and I constantly feel behind and to the point where like, what’s the point of even trying to keep up? But that’s sort of the fun of it all. Like if you really view career and like that almost like a video game or like a yeah, like a video game, then what can you focus on? What can you upscale? Like what can you learn that day that’s just going to move the move you just a little bit closer to mastery?
Zak Ali I Finder.com (25:10.274)
but I think it’s just like, it’s the tools of the future and it would be, it’d be impossible to not learn them because you’re going to no matter what. So why not start today and position yourself? And one thing I did, I, I, I’ve, I’ve done a Finder to get buy-in is to say there’s no experts right now. Like there are very few, but there are really are no experts. So what’s going to make you an expert in this tool is just you using it because you’re going to be in that early adoption curve. Yeah, exactly.
Yes. Nobody’s got a hundred years of historical industry academia to draw on with this really, unless you’re in the very small hub of AI experts. Yeah. So I guess it’s those timeless principles just keep holding, don’t they? know, what can you do today to move the needle for your business with the tools that you’ve got at hand? And there are so many inexpensive tools. It’s nuts. Like I’m shocked that Google business owners.
Right.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (26:02.914)
don’t know more about Google search console and how it can Show you exactly how people found your site and what page they showed them and let’s go on and improve on that. little things like that. That’s free, free data. So I, I, I worry that business owners get caught with all of the shiny things in their feed, you know, buy this, buy that, buy this, and then just don’t use any of it effectively, you know.
To be honest, you only do need for the most part the free tools. Google Ads, for example, has Keyword Planner. So now you have your keyword research taken care of. If you right-click and use Chrome on any page, there’s something called Lighthouse that if you click, will give you an SEO. There’s so much you can do for free that will move the ball forward. I’ve actually done this experiment before because I usually have some niche site on the side that I’m always playing with.
There was one I had built, I remember, and I used no paid tools and I was able to grow it to a thousand sessions a month just using the free stuff.
Yep. It’s great. Isn’t it? Yep. Google analytics, Google search console lighthouse, as you say, to right click and work out the speeds and improve on that sort of thing. Okay. A $20 a month AI subscription to guide you through if you need it. Yeah. I mean, I do blend paid ads with organic for clients that need results kind of fast, you know, to keep feeding it. But, um, at the same time, organically there’s so much you can do. That’s right.
so much.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (27:35.01)
Yeah. Okay. so we’ve, guess, talked about the mindset that gives you the advantages to keep learning new tools. know, if you could tell yourself something from when you were 20 years old, is there anything you’d like to say to your 20 year old self?
invested in video.
Damn it, yes!
But beyond that, I would just say like, don’t be so afraid to just start. Because honestly, that is the most important part of business of growing of growth just generally is to just start because once you start, you get the feedback and then you get the feedback and then you get the growth and it’s just a never ending cycle. But if you’re always waiting for that perfect moment to
to feel like you’re qualified to do the thing that you just know and you need to do, it’s never gonna come, because there will always be one more thing you have to fix or figure out before you give yourself permission to fail. So that would be what I would say to my 20-year-old self who was very in his head about, am I to try and do this thing that, know, compete against the New York Times for news and whatnot. And it’s like, you know what?
Zak Ali I Finder.com (28:51.736)
just do it. You may not be qualified and we and I certainly wasn’t we certainly weren’t at that time. But eventually when we just did it and we just you know, ended up and got in the game, we started developing the skills that made it actual plausible for us to work in that field and work in that industry. And so that would be my that would definitely be my advice. Just start.
I love it. It’s a theme that’s coming out. And as I talk to people this week, you you talked about it being an exciting time to start a business. And just yesterday, I published a conversation with Margaret Bieler, who is an author. And she thought, what if you don’t want to the feel of your favorite book to end, you know, so she’s come up with Trope tails which is a book of cocktails based on literary tropes. And it’s just fun, you know, and she was taught she’s also come up with some cocktail powders and some mixer drinks and.
The story she was telling of the product development. she said, you know, if you want to do it, just start, get on Kickstarter. And she’s very good at that sort of thing, but just an exciting time. And I loved hearing it because, know, it’s just too easy to think, we’re all going to lose our jobs. We’re all going to die. I much prefer that get into it, have a good time and build something attitude. It’s a much nicer way to spend your days.
Right.
Yeah, so Thank you, Zak, for your time. Where are you most active online if people wanted to connect with you on socials?
Zak Ali I Finder.com (30:13.004)
So LinkedIn and I’m also on X and Blue Sky. So any of those.
Yes. Okay. So I’ll pop those links in the description, of course, and the link to your Forbes article as well that you wrote on SEO, because I think that’s very helpful for business owners. You know, I really, we used to think that bot traffic to our sites was bad and it’s actually flipped the script now. Bot traffic to your site is good if it’s the right kind of bot traffic. So helping business owners to start to think about it differently is hugely important right now. and as I said earlier, tiny clients.
are getting sales through GPT. if they can do it, anyone can, you know.
definitely. And the quality of those leads coming through AI is always higher.
That’s right. The Google clicks are way down, of course, because everybody’s reading the summary. But if you get someone to your site now, they are a high intent customer and you want to look after them as soon as they walk in that front door of your business on your website. So. Yes. Yeah. Really, really good. Thank you for your time today. Yeah. I’ll stay in touch online and put out any resources I can see to help business owners navigate this time, because as you say, it is an exciting time and there is loads you can do for free. So that’s great.
Zak Ali I Finder.com (31:28.238)
Thanks, Jo. It’s been a pleasure.
Thank you.
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