Enny 0:00

Hello dear listener. We had a little technical issue when we started recording this first episode, so we apologize that the audio in the first 20 minutes is a bit average, but we had such a good episode we didn't want to redo it. So we apologize for that and we try to make the next experience more seamless. Welcome to Making Digital Makes Sense, the podcast where we cut through the noise and talk about what really works in digital marketing. I'm Enny Benzonelli.

LJ 0:35

And I'm LJ Shannon. Together we explore websites, search, AI, paid advertising, and how they all work together to help businesses grow.

Enny 0:45

Real conversation, different perspective and practical advice you can actually use.

LJ 0:52

Let's make digital better.

Enny 0:57

So FJ, what are we gonna talk about? What are we gonna talk today? In our first episode.

LJ 1:04

It is our first episode, so I hope everyone is just um very generous with us. Yes. Forgiving.

Enny 1:11

Yes. We're trying uh to to merge two to uh to use two different platforms, video and um and audio. And uh you know, we're using what we have, and uh because we love technology, right? We love phone and uh and we are lucky enough to be here at the Central House, and we can use their podcast studio, which is fantastic.

LJ 1:37

Yes.

Enny 1:38

So thank you for having me in your uh office space.

LJ 1:41

You're always welcome, Enny, and you know it. And yeah, um, so Enny. A lot of business owners always ask me uh the same question, LJ, what should I start with first? Should I just go with organic or paid advertisement? And we always get those questions, don't we?

Enny 2:03

Yes.

LJ 2:03

So what is your take? What do you think?

Enny 2:06

Well, I usually and that's the difference that probably we have being humans compared to uh to AI. And we love using AI. We're not hiding it, but it's really going down to the nitty-gritty understanding the business we're working with. And if we understand what the business needs, then we can direct them to the right strategy. If it's something that is very urgent, then of course I would say probably paid ads is the best way to do it. If it's something that they want more of a steady growth, and I say organic, or if maybe they want to go all in and then it's a mix of the two. Um, and so it's it's very important to understand what the the um the client wants to achieve and the time frame.

LJ 2:54

100%, and I would add up to that as well their budget, because as we all know, with ads, depending on the industry, some industries are more expensive than others, and I always find myself talking that to clients because they would assume a thousand dollars, for example, for an electrician is a big budget, but I'll come and tell them that actually it's not because the way that Google ads work, and a lot of people don't know that, is like a bidding system. You and other businesses are bidding on the same keyword or you know, phrase or term. So, what actually happens if you have a business and I have a business and we're both bidding on the same keyword or phrase, but you're willing to pay $15 per click and I can only pay five, then your ad is gonna show up more than mine. Um, and then one click going to your website is really not gonna make a difference. So if your budget for a day is $25 and the click costs you ten dollars, you literally had two and a half clicks, and as a you know, rule of thumb, we always say you need a minimum of ten clicks to get to the website so you can have a chance of converting that person, which me which means that they land on the website and make a call or submit a form. So ten or twenty dollars is really nothing.

Enny 4:18

I know you're looking at me because I'm one of those big rich, but I don't spend.

LJ 4:24

No, no, it's it's a small businesses, it can be expensive, but that's why we tell people exactly what you said. Just let us know what is it that you're after and what is your timeline, because we can help you figure out the best way possible for you to move on with your marketing, whether it's paid or organic, because you kind of always have to, you know, invest in something, whether it's money, whether it's your time, or whether it's the time that you wait in order to start getting results.

Enny 4:53

Yeah, absolutely. And I think at the end is the return of investment. And I think we proud of ourselves to um, you know, we can tell clients, we we don't make huge promises to our clients. 100% because and especially now it's so hard to make promises. Uh, when I see those ads, we guarantee you 10 uh 10 uh qualified leads, yeah. And I'm like, really, can you? And if you don't, what do I get my money back? Probably not. So I think it's um at the beginning of our journey is always to come with we are working in this direction, this is what we're working on, and this is what we are trying to do. Yeah, um, with working, absolutely, we can say you're gonna have more visibility. But how far this visibility is gonna bring you, that's always uh a question of the right time uh and uh yeah, being in the right time at the right moment, you know. Um it's it's it's very, very um, and then depending on your competition.

LJ 6:00

Yes.

Enny 6:00

Because as soon as you start doing something and the competition start, oh, there is something moving here, then they start to jump in, and like you say, they start uh bidding for their click. Yeah, one dollar more, and then suddenly the budget is gone.

LJ 6:14

Exactly. And and I think let's start with baby steps because uh sometimes you know, us in the industry we talk uh technical terms, and then when I'm sometimes talking to clients or you know, business owners, they're confused. So can you tell us what are the organic channels? Like what does it mean when you say organic?

Enny 6:32

So organic is well, and I think it's like you as well. So it's having first of all a website that is healthy, yeah, um, that has that it's fast. Um, and these are the little things like uh a lot of people uh build their own website, but they don't realize that uh by adding an image that's uh 1.2 megabytes, it's gonna slow down. Or a video uh without using maybe, and sometimes you add a video, but you use a platform such as Vimeo or YouTube to make sure that the video is not clogging up the website. Images should be compressed. You can still have a nice compression and a great quality in photos, and those are the tricks of the trade that we learn because we have been doing it for so many years. How to resize an image, how to compress it properly. Uh, so speed, absolutely important, health, especially WordPress. Yes. Uh we heard the news every week.

LJ 7:33

AI hacking.

Enny 7:33

Yes, and not just AI hacking. Uh, there is a lot of break, uh plugins break, and now the PHP and this and that. Almost all, yes. And there's a business owner that you are not dealing with this every day. We're dealing with this every day, right? For us, it's our business. I always ask, are you really wanting to deal with this on a daily basis? Let us do it and focus on your business. And so having a healthy website is the first step. And then I always think um, for me, it's a Google Business profile.

LJ 8:04

Yes.

Enny 8:05

So having explain what it is. Yeah, the Google Business Profile is um a profile that you can open on Google, and then it's the one that it shows on the maps most of the time. That's the most common place that people can see. Or when you Google uh uh a company, it comes up on the right side. So, and there where you can collect reviews, uh, you can do a lot of things that a lot of business seems not to do because they don't know they can do that. And the most important thing is making sure that the Google Business Profile and your website, the information matches. And here I give you a C. Yeah, this information, uh the information that matches, it goes down to really the fine, fine things.

LJ 8:50

Oh, no ways.

Enny 8:51

Yes, like the street name. You know, Google sometimes write street name or street drive, for example, and drive is DR with a full stop. Yeah, you must do the same on your website. Exactly put the same name on Google Business Profile on your website. Oh and opening and closing times. If you are a uh a business has a uh a local or a or a or a or a building and you put the business times and make sure they are on the website.

LJ 9:24

Yes.

Enny 9:24

So these are two little tricks, two freebies I cloud, um where you can make a little difference. And organic is a slow burn.

LJ 9:34

Yes.

Enny 9:35

You know that. It's like don't go and and now start going into Google Business Profile and add two million things in one hour.

LJ 9:44

Yeah.

Enny 9:44

Because then you risk to be marked as a spam.

LJ 9:47

Yes.

Enny 9:48

So do it, and that's why we say organic is six months to 12 months. It's uh it's a slow burn, and a little here, a little there, a little here. Um, and so and that's why you know we talk about pay ads and organic. Organic doesn't mean that it's free. Yeah because well, you can do it yourself, absolutely, but if you want to have an expert that helps you, um you still have to to pay a little price to make sure that all of this is done. Yeah, but probably is less than uh than uh than than ads.

LJ 10:21

Yeah, no, a hundred percent. And because with the ads, you still have to pay the management fee to the business that is actually running the ads for you. And I think that's one thing that a lot of businesses don't understand. They'll be like, oh well, you set up the ads, and you know, now what are you doing? The problem is with the ads that once you set them up, you start with um getting more clicks and more traffic to the website, and you don't really want the Google Ads platform, for example, to just count conversions because you still haven't got enough traffic, and you're kind of shooting yourself in the foot when you do that. Um, so once you run it, and it takes two weeks actually to start collecting the data, the impressions, and we look at the keywords or the phrases that people are using to get to your website, and we analyze those words, and we want to make sure that they are the right words for you, and then we look at the conversions, and it's an ongoing thing because we don't just sit around, you know, fiddling with our thumbs and be like, Yeah, that's it. No, we actually look at the the words that are driving the traffic, and that's why communication is important. I've seen it with a lot of businesses, they don't even track their leaks. So I will come to them, present them with the numbers, or present them with the forms. I'm like, hey, last week you had five, and they'll be like, Oh, I don't know, I don't really check or or you know, register what calls I get. I get calls all the time, and I'm like, I'm here to help you, but I need you to help me as well. I need you to give me insights so I can make your campaign better. So that's why I feel it's like a a two-way street relationship.

Enny 12:01

It's like it's like did you have calls through Google? Yeah, actually, I had some calls um and then uh and then my husband, you know, he never remembers the phone number. He goes on my Google Business profile and calls me through that. Yes, that's the information we need to know. Your husband called you five times, good. Um, so those are not leads.

LJ 12:22

That is so true. And I think another way of um finding organic, and correct me if I'm wrong, is also now on the search when people are searching on Google. Now you have what is it, the Google um AI overview? Yes, which is an important space. Like I feel it's getting shorter and shorter and harder and harder.

Enny 12:43

Yes, so uh um before up to you would have you would be in the top 10, you will be still on the first page, right? Right. That's still that's still around. Um Google hasn't done yet, and today we are what end of October uh 2026. It hasn't done the complete switch over, but it's gonna become that um Google AI will suggest only three businesses. Yeah, and so competition even in organic is gonna get harder and harder. So um when we work with with clients, is especially who has um with local, and and and that's where organic works best, in my opinion. Um, so we start with let's look around you, because the first business is all around you, that's where we can control the best.

LJ 13:34

Yes.

Enny 13:34

And so we we check that it's a grid and we say you you should rank on the top three around you. So people when they are next to your business and they're looking for uh a cheese shop and they put cheese shop, you should pop up. Oh, I can go there. Um and then we can expand as as as it becomes green, like with we have uh uh red, amber, and green. As the green becomes green, then we can start keep building and adding all the suburbs.

LJ 14:03

Okay, yeah.

Enny 14:04

Um, but all of this takes time in a way that once you have reached, then we have to add as well content on the website.

LJ 14:12

Yeah.

Enny 14:13

Because uh that's how it matches. If you add a section like um, let's say I I am in Frankstone, and now I want to as well get clients in um um Geelong. Yeah, and so and this is for the people that listen us from uh around the world, we are in Melbourne, so those are suburbs or cities of Melbourne, around Melbourne. So then I will have to create content that relates to the the new location I want to point.

LJ 14:45

Correct.

Enny 14:46

So it is a lot of work um behind it, and it takes time.

LJ 14:52

Yeah, that's that's true. Also, one of the things that you know we help our clients is also like having, as you as you just mentioned, having enough content, but then I get the question all the time is how can I be recommended on AI? And and funnily enough, I had that question from someone yesterday, and I said exactly what you were saying when it comes to Google Business Profile. And I said, You really need to have your Google Business profile set up and you know, all the information are correct, you need to have the reviews, and then he said, Oh, but I can't compete with a five-star, you know, people around me because I'm a bigger business, so I might get less reviews. Um, and I said, It's it doesn't really like it plays a role. However, if you have enough information on your website and you're showing the questions that people are asking most of the times, um, how to find your business and how you know what are the niche things that you provide um to to your clients or potential customers, but your competitors are aren't doing that, you will still probably be recommended by AI, but it's very important to do what you just said.

Enny 16:01

Yes, and also reviews, um, it's again quality rather than quantity. You can have you can have a um a business with uh 500 um Google reviews, but they're just stars, there is no text in it. Yeah, people just go in and then put five star, three star, four stars, uh, and that's you know, that's okay. It's nice to show I have 500, I'm 4.9, great, with 500 reviews, fantastic. But now we are talking about writing those reviews in the proper way. Yeah, and writing the review is literally um I'm gonna give another secret source ingredients, but you need to make sure that they list what you have done for them, and that should be one of your services. So if you're the cheese shop, uh I found the best Swiss cheese.

LJ 16:51

Oh, a lot of Swiss cheese.

Enny 16:52

Yes, in Melbourne, yeah um at the store in blah blah blah. Um, and so that's important. So it's how you guide your customer to write the review. Yeah, it's very, very important because it's all part of the big new SEO. And and also keep in mind that everything changes every day, right? Every time we wake up in the morning, we start reading the news about where we're going. It's like, oh, like I was reading Quora is now back on AI likes to go to Quora and check this article out. Uh Reddit, I was like, okay. So then we're talking about citations, so building up citation is very important. Yellow pages. So having um having your entry into the yellow pages, back to the yellow pages, the online version, not the printed one. It's now it's kind of important because it's a reference. It's like, oh, this business is real, and there is plenty of those, there is hundreds of those, and that's what we do. We do, we have, we know exactly where to go, we build up all of these uh entries to keep building up, and this is how organic. Yeah, but I guess when you have all of this, LJ, how easy it makes in your life when you do paid ads, when you're everything is healthy. It helps you, right?

LJ 18:12

Oh, it definitely does. Um when when a business owner has the budget to to invest into organic and um Google ads, I think it's the best recipe because you're you're you know, at this time and age you need to be omnipresent everywhere, and and that's the reality of things. Like we're not saying that to make it impossible for people and you know just feel upset about the situation. But I think that's why it's important to talk to an expert that's gonna give you like a real advice and not just promise you empty promises. Because when you come to any marketing professional that is really you know keen to get you the best results, it's where this is where you stand. So you talk about the budget, you talk about um, you know, as you as you mentioned at the start, how fast do you want those leads to come? How much money can you invest? Because we always give you the best solution for that, and then obviously ads they help, they're faster, they they you know um fast track your inquiries. However, it's like renting a house, you don't own it, and you know, the minute you stop paying ads, you're off the grid. No one can see you anymore. Whereas organic, it's a long-term, yes, it takes longer, but it's a longer-term strategy. Ideally, you want to do both. We have clients that are doing both, which is awesome. Um, and you know, we have great referral partners like yourself that can help us with, you know, like all the things, Google business profile and making sure that it's working because that really definitely helps, and it helps people get more, you know, inquiries because a lot of us these days, I'm included, like I just go to Chat GPT and I ask, hey, I'm looking for a restaurant for lunch, and that's how much I want to pay. So what chat does it goes to the Google Business profile and it finds that information like yesterday? We wanted to go for like a steak dinner, and then um I literally just asked Chat GPT, and Chat GPT gave me like three or four options. All that information was from the Google Business profile. So that's what I mean with paid versus organic. Yes, paid is amazing, and it's great, it's a faster return on investment. Um, but also for sustainability, you need to have organic. So that's why come and talk to us. Don't just make a decision for the sake of it. Which brings us now to our favorite segment one thing to stop doing, one thing to start doing, and one thing to check this week. So stop, start, and check. So, what is the one thing to stop doing?

Enny 20:49

Well, um I think choosing marketing channels simply because um uh someone told you uh that you must be doing SEO or Google Ads.

LJ 21:01

Oh my god, this is amazing.

Enny 21:03

Right?

LJ 21:03

We get that all the time, don't we? Yes, like a friend, I saw a friend, a mate, and he said I should do this.

Enny 21:10

Yes. No, it's it's all just talk to uh talk to us, and then uh it's not because your friend uh or your colleague or or the other business works for them it works, it doesn't mean it will work for you as well.

LJ 21:26

100%.

Enny 21:26

So you need to you every single business, every single situation is different. So chat with us and then uh we will um we will guide you through.

LJ 21:36

Yeah.

Enny 21:36

And usually, you know, the first 15 minutes we don't charge.

LJ 21:40

Yeah, yeah, I I think both of us we're very generous with our time.

Enny 21:44

Yes.

LJ 21:44

And because we're I don't know, sometimes our coaches don't like it. Yes, yes. But we you know, it's sometimes you just need to help. And I would never lie to someone just to get a business, and I know you you're the same.

Enny 21:56

Yeah, and we are also two small businesses, and um we understand the we understand the pressure, you know, um, and so we want to support because uh we are both, we like to work with people and grow with them.

LJ 22:11

Correct.

Enny 22:11

And so and so sometimes, you know, you you understand that, and uh and that's the difference from us between the big agency which uh a client becomes a big number, that's all it is.

LJ 22:22

Correct.

Enny 22:22

Uh so and what do you suggest to start doing?

LJ 22:26

I think at this stage, for any business, and I know it it's hard, like it's a tough economy at the moment. What I would suggest is take a look at your business, think about your goals, think about what's missing. Take a look at what do you need, especially now we're we're getting into the holiday season and the silly season, and we probably as business owners we will have more time. So think about it. What what am I gonna do? Is my website you know enough uh for clients, um, for people that are looking for me? Um, do I want more leads? Am I ready to grow the business or do I don't have enough leads? So just start thinking about your goals as a business owner uh rather than just oh, I should be on social media. Just think of the big picture for the business and yeah, start talking to the right marketing experts.

Enny 23:17

That's right. And I want to know as well, what do you think they should check?

LJ 23:23

Oh, I think uh I think it's they they should check their online presence.

Enny 23:31

Yes.

LJ 23:31

And and you know, like websites, it's your domain. What do you think they should check?

Enny 23:35

Yes, make sure that for me the important thing on a website is the the customer journey or the or the visitor journey. Make sure that all your buttons work, the forms make sense, um the links are working, the links are working. So if you get that, because you know, you have now three seconds to really grab somebody's attention.

LJ 23:58

Uh-huh.

Enny 23:58

So so and if somebody comes in and they want to inquire or call you or whatever, make sure that it's easy to do. That uh they don't have to go and and find uh in the uh they need to have 17 clicks to go and find your contact details. Yeah, put them there in front on the homepage, make sure that you click copy. That's great. Yes, uh that's uh that could not have been updated 20 years ago.

LJ 24:27

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that's great.

Enny 24:29

I don't think this was out of the day. This is a lot of testing.

LJ 24:33

Thank you so much. I need to make it my screen. Um simple so people can understand really what is happening.