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theawkwardterrier · 5 years ago

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things left behind and the things that are ahead, ch. 21

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Steve’s not in the general habit of warning his kids away from things. He doesn’t do it when Nate wants to build a five foot tall science fair volcano, nor when Drea tells them that she’s going to get herself into Harvard and is leaving herself no other option; he buys the baking soda and vinegar instead, flips through flashcards and drives to speech and debate tournaments. When Emma comes home for winter break during her sophomore year at Gallaudet and says that she’s not sure she’s going back, he asks why rather than telling her that of course she is. When she decides she will graduate after all, making plans to switch her major from Communications to Business and starting to put together a plan for her own café and bakery once she finishes, he doesn’t try to scare her off with talk of how difficult it will be. He is there first thing the day they open. And when, fifteen years later, she brings her husband and kids over for Sunday dinner and tells him and Peggy that she’s looking to run for town council, all he asks is, “How can I help?”

Apparently the main answer is babysitting. Eric is supportive of her campaign but he works and can’t always be there when she’s doing a midmorning question and answer session with the PTA at the local elementary school. The boys are both in school themselves at this point, but Julie is still only six months, and the idea of hiring someone to watch her at that age is what has left Emma on the fence about the whole thing in the first place. Steve, on his way to retirement after nearly twenty years, is a good alternative.

The boys’ teachers know him well by this point, waving and smiling as he pulls into the parking lot for pickup. ("They like you better," Emma had said to him, "than they ever liked me." "I don't remind them that they have to do better than math worksheets for homework," Steve said back.) When he goes to get Max, he actually gets out of the car to speak with Mrs. Jennings, who started teaching at MSD back when Emma was a student. Her hair is nearly all silver by now.

Finally the boys make enough faces against the window that he wraps up his conversation and returns to the car.

"Where are we going?" Will asks once they're on the way back to town. "Are we going home? Do we have popcorn?"

"We're not going home, we're going to watch your mom finish up her talk. She wants to see you and drive you home after," Steve tells him, watching in the rearview as Will relays the information to his younger brother. Max and Will spend half their time in little spats and the occasional punchup, but they are united in their sighing disdain for the plan. Steve tries to cover a smile. "We do have popcorn, though."

He doesn't remember having toted this much stuff around even in the midst of raising four kids, though that’s probably because all of Julie's accessories make up most of it - diapers and wipes, bottles, blankets, pacifiers, little stuffed toys - and he never had to deal much with baby gear. He's an expert at packing a bag now, filling the side pockets with books and handheld games, comics, coloring pages, and—of course—snacks.

Will and Max plunk themselves down on a bench, close to where Emma is speaking to a group of a few dozen in front of the local grocery store. "Popcorn, popcorn," Max starts chanting in ASL, his excited little finger flicks increasing in pace as he settles into the rhythm. Will joins him after a minute. Steve is holding Julie's carrier in one hand (she's still sleeping, thankfully; the campaign trail has really made her a trooper in that area) but he manages to rest the enormous bag on the pavement beside them.

He points to the right side pocket, and they fall on the bag, tearing open the snack as soon as they find it and digging their hands in. Knowing that they'll be satisfied for the moment, Steve turns to watch Emma.

"—help support local small businesses," Millie is interpreting, her voice as confident as Em's hands. "I believe that the citizens here should have a say in the sorts of stores and industry that comes to town, so I would take into consideration a preference for chain stores from my constituents. But I'm also a small business owner like some of you, and I know it's a shame to lose those institutions. A town can be well-served by family-owned stores like this, in more ways than one." Emma points over her shoulder at the doorway to the market, and Steve can see people nodding. It's taken the first several months of campaigning to get people past the questions of whether Emma could do the job, to get them to even believe she was saying anything when she signed rather than just having Millie make up translations. But now that they're listening, now that they trust her, he knows they like what they hear.

"I'm thirsty, Grandpa," Will signs, licking salt off of his fingers, while Max adds, "Where're the good crayons?"

Steve sets Julie's carrier gently on the ground, rooting around for the box. He finds them and hands them over to Max, who opens up his Disney coloring book to the next blank picture and starts filling it in, tongue poking from the corner of his mouth in concentration.

"Grandpa," Will repeats, "I'm really thirsty." He accompanies the trickling motion of the sign along his throat with an enormous eyed gaze of desperation, a desert waif sort of look that Steve has no idea where he learned.

Julie starts to stir, and Steve tries to lull her back to sleep by rocking the carrier a little with his foot. "We'll go into the store in a few minutes," he tells Will, but the boy shakes his head.

"They don't sell the good kind of juice there," he says, as if this is the most sensible thing in the world. "We should try the gas station." He points across the street; the station itself is closed for construction - Max had pointed out the heavy digging equipment on their way into the parking lot - but the attached convenience store is open.

This is what Steve has worked for all these years: a world where it would be unthinkable that growing up Grandpa didn't know good juice from bad because he never had any juice at all, a world where his kids and grandkids will never experience the same sorts of things he did growing up, where hopefully as few people will as possible. But Steve also knows that he isn't going to give in to this kind of attitude. It’s the sort of time where Peggy would have conveyed her firm disappointment with a look.

"We'll go look in the market," he repeats firmly. "Let me try to calm down your sister first."

But even Will, crossing his arms sullenly, can see that this is a lost cause. Julie is noticeably awake and crying now, not loudly enough for any of the potential voters to look over, but certainly enough for Steve to hear. He unbuckles her from the seat and picks her up, holding and rocking her in one arm.

"We'll go in a few min—" he starts to tell Will again, but before he can finish, the gas station across the street explodes.

Steve has Julie against his chest, his body curved over the boys before he can think. The explosion shakes the ground, and he can tell there's a fire even before he chances a look over his shoulder. The cloud of smoke and flame is even worse than he had anticipated from the drifting scent of burning: a towering enormity of color somehow made dark. For the first time in years, he wishes for the shield, the protective, nearly impenetrable shell of it.

"You, go inside and call 911. Tell them the exact location." It's Millie's voice, only a little shaky as it rises over the sudden noise. Steve looks over. The crowd is shifting, startled and confused edging into panicked, but Emma is standing firm. She directs people with quick calm, trusting Millie to relay her instructions and the people around her to listen: this woman to tell the manager what they've seen, a group to search between the parked cars to make sure no one fell or got injured.

"Grandpa, you're squashing me." Will says just what he is thinking, even now, but as Steve finally pulls back to give him a bit of room, he looks shell-shocked. It seems as if he might actually be close to crying. Julie certainly is, full-throated and frightened now in a way that will be difficult to comfort. As Steve watches, Will slips his hand into Max's.

"What was that?" Max asks, eyes wide and mouth open as he tries to glimpse over his grandfather's shoulder. His hand moves forcefully through the air. His coloring book has fallen to the ground, the bright cover facing upward, thin pages crumpling in on themselves beneath the weight.

"The gas station��there was an accident." It's the best he can do right now to balance the truthful version of what he knows without being terrifying.

"Dad!" Steve stands fully, keeping a hand on Max's shoulder. Julie is still giving cranky sorts of whimpers, even snugged against the softness of Steve's sweater. Will stands close to Steve's legs as Emma strides over. Millie, her job done for the moment now that Steve's attention has been caught, twists her hands. Her lips press tightly together, eyes wide behind her black-framed glasses. Steve catches her eye, trying to convey some sort of silent courage, but he isn't sure it's helped. He turns his attention to his daughter, whose words are coming fast.

"I don't think there are injuries on this side," she tells him. Her hands are so firm, precise, as she points to the ground they stand on. Her eyes can’t keep ahold of him, flashing back over to her children, to the hanging plants for sale which have not yet settled back into a leisurely swing.

"Good job," Steve says. He bends close, allowing Julie to nuzzle into her hold. His arm free, he wraps it around Em, kissing the top of her head. Hands held between them, where no one else can see, he repeats it. "Good job, brave girl."

She lets out a shaky breath, then straightens. "Bring the kids inside?"

His hand is already on Max's back, encouraging the boy toward his mother. Will is looking between the two of them with big eyes. "I'm going over—see what I can do."

"No." She closes her fingers with a snap, the way she would react to one of the boys asking for a cookie before dinner or someone at work wondering if they can skip out on the hourly restroom check just this once. "The firefighters—they're coming in a few minutes. The fire is their job."

Steve shakes his head. "A few minutes might be too long to try to save whoever is over there." He shifts Will forward too, despite his betrayed look, despite the wrench he feels. It is much easier to throw yourself into danger when there aren't people you care about to come back to, but he's always known that. He starts moving in the direction of the fire anyway.

"I don’t care. You’re not a superhero!" Emma looks anguished, but the anger is there too. He can see it in the tension of her arm supporting the baby. "You're my dad."

The smile he gives her is so sad, so small, it might not even count. "I'm a little of both," he says, and goes to try to do what he can.

But when he gets across the street to where a couple other men are considering the flames with horror, they turn him back too.

"We can't have you dropping and needing another ambulance," one of them shouts over the roar, and it’s only when he adds, “sir,” to the end of it that Steve understands. Because it’s not a military sort of respect that he is getting, it is the rote politeness due to the elderly. This man does not see any trace of Captain America in front of him, not expanded lung capacity or accelerated healing or increased speed. He does not see Grant Carter, who raised four amazing children, who strives to be a good husband, who declined the promotions offered to him over the years because he wanted to work with kids and families instead of numbers and higher-ups. Grant Carter, on whose effort, on whose word, the world changed to be what it is. He certainly cannot see Steve Rogers beneath that, who would have run into the fire before all of it - still and anyway and always.

This stranger can’t be blamed for what he assumes: an old man, kindly and graying, who should be sent safely back to his family rather than endangering himself in memory of some once-been youth. Steve reminds himself, as the fire trucks arrive with lights and sirens blaring, that such a thought is only natural. But he thinks of this, too: that perhaps it isn’t entirely wrong. Even if he had been training, even though he is still enhanced in some ways, how effective would he be now? His time for this sort of work has likely passed without his even realizing that the expiration date was upon him, without him having done all he could with it.

He shaped a life, shaped a world, with the choice he made, and he wouldn’t change it. But sometimes, these times, when the things he can no longer do, the sorts of things he has not done or not done enough over the years, present themselves to him, he cannot help but feel ashamed.

“You’re not a superhero,” Emma had said to him, and it’s true and it isn’t and somehow, forty years on, he is still sometimes reminded of how he lives in the overlap.

He returns to his family, helps Emma carry over the jugs of water she has wrangled out of the store owner to hand out to the fire crews and those living in the surrounding houses who come out to search for fresh air and answers as the smoke drifts into their homes. Will, his small face pale and serious, holds the cups in two hands while Steve fills them.

They stay as firefighters support the owner of the station, two customers, and a cashier out from around the back. The owner cannot stop staring at the column of flame, still raging. He twists his head toward it even as they guide him away.

They stay as the news stations arrive, a duo from the local paper, snapping pictures and asking questions. They stay as the mayor speaks to Emma, both of them intent and careful. They stay as water and time force the fire to grow smaller, turning the kids away from the revealed skeletal remains that once were machinery and the hidden remains of truer skeletons. Even Millie turns her back as the corner’s van arrives, although Julie, in her arms, is sleeping once again.

When they finally leave - all the kids and Millie in Emma’s car, and Steve in his - it is already dark. Eric, though trying to look calm cutting broccoli at the kitchen table, stands as soon as they all get into the kitchen, the knife still rocking on the cutting board. His questions are overrun by the boys' frantic hands, and just as things start to settle, Peggy arrives, having heard some vague details on the car radio on the way back from the speech she had been giving that afternoon, and they have to start all over again.

Dinner is a harried affair. Emma nurses Julie at the table, signing with one hand over her daughter's head, rather than going to sit in the living room rocker as usual. She won’t fully look at her father, and Steve knows that Peggy notices. The adults take turns reminding Will and Max to actually eat, which they do when prompted, eyes tracking the conversation the entire time and occasionally waving a hand to contribute.

Other than these admonishments, Steve stays mostly quiet. He watches as Max becomes more breathlessly hyperactive, overshadowing Will's growing quiet. Millie excuses herself at bedtime - stretching the bounds of professionalism by staying for dinner isn't unusual for her these days, but the intensity of the afternoon seems to be bearing down on her even as she tries to keep herself together. Steve hopes that Emma doesn't have anything overly pressing during the next few days.

Em goes to put Julie into her crib, and Eric joins her, still rubbing a hand over his forehead. Steve and Peggy exchange a glance - “my turn or yours?” with a side of "we'll talk about all the rest later" - and she goes to wrangle Max into a bath, while Steve presses Will to find his pajamas.

He can hear splashing on tile as he tucks Will in, but there's no complaint about little brothers getting to stay up too late, no insistence on three, no four, books tonight. Will just slides himself quietly under the covers. Without asking, Steve snaps on the nightlight that doesn't get much use anymore.

"I'm afraid that Max will have bad dreams from today," Will says, but there is a little waver to his attempt at being matter-of-fact. "I think he was really scared back there."

"Hmm," Steve says, settling himself on the side of the bed. "I don't blame him. Today was scary. It made me pretty worried. And if someone else other than Max was also worried or scared, even someone older, it would make a lot of sense to me. Just like it would make sense to tell people like your mom and dad, or Gran, or me if you—if someone was still feeling that way, so we could try to figure out how to help."

Will's hand somehow finds its way into his. "What kinds of things make you stop feeling scared?"

Steve's policy on comforting lies is not particularly well formulated; it's more of a gut instinct thing. Now he sighs. "Well, there's no way to stop being scared for always, and it's not a good thing to never be scared of anything. Only a robot would never be scared, and I like having human grandchildren instead of robots." Will laughs a little, head resting more completely back onto his pillow. "But the thing that helped me stop feeling so scared today was going over to help."

Will frowns. "Even though the firefighters did the big helping?"

"Even though." The words are out of his mouth before he realizes that they are not a lie. He remembers, from years away, giving a speech about prices he was willing to pay, even alone, and the way that he hadn't needed to stand alone at all. There were always people beside him who had none of the things he'd been gifted with, always people out there helping to right things with nothing but skill and wits - and sometimes not even that, only willingness to try. There is such honor in reminding himself of his place, now, in their number.

“And we helped the firefighters, didn’t we?” Will asks.

“We did.” Steve smooths back a piece of his dirty blond hair. “They were very thirsty, so we were doing important work, helping them.”

“Next time,” Will says around a yawn, “we should get them juice. The good kind.” He yawns again, flipping over onto his side seemingly without realizing it. His blinks are becoming farther and farther apart. “And maybe I’ll have some too.”

“We’ll see,” Steve says with a smile, and waits beside him for another few minutes before he stands to turn off the light and close the door. Will is going to be fine. They all are, today.

More chapters here

#Steggy fic #Steve Rogers #Peggy Carter #the Carter crew #things left behind fic #Steggy

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yasbxxgie · 5 years ago

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By the time I made the hike down the long pathway from the top of Kyoto’s Fushimi Inari to the houses below, I was thirsty. Which was convenient, since many local residents take advantage of foot traffic from the mountainside Shinto shrine by hosting small cafes in their homes. It was on that winding street that I first encountered amazake, an ancient, non-alcoholic, lightly fermented rice drink, which a helpful English sign noted could be served “hot or cold”.

I looked at the faintly sweet and creamy drink as a reward for my physical activity, one that, like kombucha, promised to replenish me after physical activity. But what my ¥400 (£3) bought me was actually a microcosm of Japanese culinary history.

First developed in the Kofun period (around 250 to 538AD), amazake was originally a food fermentation and preservation technique, created by boiling rice, water and koji, a filamentous fungus that is also used in the fermentation of miso, natto and soy sauce, for eight to 10 hours. The resulting drink, which is packed full of nutrients and gut-friendly bacteria, became so popular that it’s even mentioned in the Nihon Shoki, a text compiled in 720AD that comprises the oldest official history of Japan.

Since then, the drink has seen several rises and falls in popularity. Sales jumped 134.8% between 2016 and 2017, according to food and drink exhibition Foodex Japan, at the time that at-home fermentation became a trendy pastime. The drink then continued its popularity in 2019, thanks in no small part to boyband Kanjani Eight, who were hired to act as spokespeople for Hiyashi Amazake, a popular brand throughout Japan. Amazake also has a regular presence in cafes and convenience stores across the country, with locals sipping on it as a morning treat or afternoon pick-me-up.

Hiroshi Sugihara (杉原大), a fishmonger and fermentation enthusiast originally from Japan’s Aichi prefecture who relocated to Perth, Australia, has seen the rise of fermentation culture firsthand. His Facebook group THE BREW LIFE-発酵生活 has swelled to more than 5,900 members worldwide since its creation in 2014. Already a fan of fermenting miso and doburoku (a form of sake), he enjoyed introducing amazake, a drink from his childhood, to the group.

“It was very interesting and there were mixed reactions from Caucasian [members] but Asians were able to relate [it] to some of their traditional sweets,” he said.

Sugihara fondly recalls drinking hot amazake at temples on New Year’s Eve. Because the beverage is believed to have warming qualities (particularly due to ginger, which is often used to add flavour), it tends to be heavily consumed during the winter months, a period that includes several major holidays, including the Hinamatsuri “Doll Festival”. This has resulted in many Japanese people considering the drink as a tie to both their past and current national culture. As Shihoko Ura, author of food blog Chopstick Chronicles explains, her memories of amazake are laced with a fair amount of sentimentality, particularly now that she’s migrated to Australia.

“I used to be a Red Cross-trained RN in Ise City, Mie prefecture, where there is [the] famous Ise Shrine,” she recalled. “Ise shrine served free amazake for worshippers, and we first-aid employees were also offered the drink. I was always looking forward to the sweet treat when I had a little break in [my] eight-hour shift.”

Amazake is a sugary drink, as hinted at by its name, which translates to “sweet sake”, even though it only contains trace amounts of alcohol due to the fermentation process. Because of that translation, finding it in convenience stores can be tricky for non-Japanese speakers, who should consider asking for a brand name, such as Hiyashi Amazake or Marumi-koji-honten to avoid being served alcoholic sake instead.

As I sipped on my drink, I was surprised by the lumpy texture, similar to rice porridge, due to the small pieces of koji suspended in the liquid. At roughly 80 calories per 100g, it’s healthier than its creamy texture might initially imply, and fans of amazake claim it can positively impact seemingly every part of the body, including hair growth, weight loss, hangover recovery, sleep cycles and bowel movements.

Because of its nutrients, which include B6, folic acid, ferulic acid, dietary fibre and a notable amount of glucose, many claim it deserves a place in Japan’s stable of hangovers cures, which includes beverages made from turmeric or beef liver, ingredients meant to clean a specific organ. And amazake’s drinkable, easy-to-digest, gluten-free nutrients have also earned it the nickname “drinkable IV”, something that Sugihara confirms from experience.

“I usually have it when I have cold or fever and especially when I don’t have an appetite,” he said. “Amazake is something easier to swallow, yummy, and, thanks to the power of starch-breaking enzyme [found in the koji], it’s sort of pre-digested so kind to the digestive system, too.”

Its qualities are also thought to go beyond health benefits. As Misaki (文咲), a model and Spa LaQua ambassador in Tokyo explains, the drink is also loved by the beauty community. “Vitamin B group contained in amazake is related to metabolism of carbohydrates, lipids and proteins, skin and hair,” she told me via email. “Therefore, beauty effects are expected. Amazake also contains an ingredient called ergothioneine, an antioxidant that has the effect of suppressing skin aging.”

But with any food touted as an ancient cure-all, the big question remains. Does it actually work?

Adam Yee, an Austin-based food scientist and host of the podcast My Food Job Rocks, agrees that the minerals and vitamins contained in amazake will help the appearance of skin and hair – if consumed in large amounts. But he also says that the power of suggestion plays a large part in determining a food’s worth. He cited bone broth’s spike in popularity, a beverage that made many similar claims, as one example of good PR. However, he also made it clear that because amazake has an element that’s still very hard to scientifically account for, there may be some hidden, unaccounted truth to these claims.

“Fermentation is something that we really don’t know much about,” he explained. “It’s not like, give it one thing and [it] spits out another thing. Food is so complex, the koji that’s eating whatever it’s around, might actually create something different. You can say the same thing about yeast. Bread and wine are two different things, even though they use the same yeast strain.”

Currently, amazake is barely known outside of Asia. But that looks set to change. Like matcha, which has found its way into desserts both at home and abroad, amazake has become a ubiquitous part of Japanese cuisine, often extending past beverage status. Its continuing success outside of Japan was even predicted by America’s Test Kitchen, who named koji its number one food trend forecast for 2020.

John Sugimura (杉村), corporate executive chef and concept-brand director at PinKU Japanese Street Food in Minneapolis, has turned the drink into a signature part of his offerings, using it both as a creamy base and a way to add unexpected bursts of texture.

“I enjoy delicious baked goods including amazake for its nutrients,” he said. “For me growing up [with Japanese and German parents in the United States], I enjoyed amazake and banana smoothies. I have the most experience making pickles using amazake. And my greatest accomplishment has been incorporating amazake into my ‘sexy sesame dressing’ and salad.

This fusion of cultures may be what will eventually help amazake become a food trend outside of Japan, similar to the way kombucha and quinoa are now widely considered health foods outside their native regions of China/Russia and the Andean region of South America.

Atsushi Nakagawa (中川貴司), owner of Amazake Co in California, agrees, noting that by linking it to already-popular products, he only has to provide his consumers with a basic introduction to the drink and its potential benefits. After completing apprenticeships at miso and koji microbreweries in Japan over the last few years, he’s pleased at how his knowledge of amazake has sparked the interest of his Los Angeles-based clientele, and how he’s been inspired to play with traditional flavours.

“They get it,” he said. “Especially they love our amazake-mixed latte drinks. We offer Japanese ceremonial matcha, Golden Milk (turmeric, ginger and cinnamon) and horchata flavours. In the last few weeks, more and more people are becoming interested in our Pure Amazake, which is undiluted, so they can use it however they want.”

It might be easy to think of amazake as another trendy food. After all, bone broth, Brussels sprouts and açaí have all seen spikes and falls in popularity. However, those who grew up with amazake see its resurgence within Japan and its gradual introduction outside the country as an opportunity to take pride in their culture. As Sugimura explains, it’s that mindset that encourages him to experiment with the drink’s benefits – and has informed much of his career in food as a whole.

“When I was young, I resisted many Japanese traditions out of fear for the code of etiquette,” he said. “As a third-generation Japanese-American lacking mentoring, there were so many expectations on social behaviour, I became overwhelmed. Fast forward, [and now] every day is a celebration of my Japanese-American heritage.”

Amazake is a cup of Japanese history, but the natural energy the beverage delivers still feels very relevant today. I finished my drink, and returned the glass to the cafe owner, ready to continue exploring Kyoto. It might have just been the superfood at work, but not only did I feel nourished, I felt connected, too.

#amazake #drinkable iv #fermentation #koji #japan #japanese #beverage #beverages #bbc #bbc news

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snowfall-fanfictions · 5 years ago

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Beware the Frozen Heart Ch. 6- The Tailor Shop

Ao3 link

FF.net link

It’s time we got this romance thing rolling. Enjoy!

minor blood tw

“How… the HELL… can one woman run… THAT FAST?!”

Eryn gasped for air as he clutched the doorframe to the tailor shop. For the past five minutes, he had been chasing the princess as she dragged the queen through the entire town. The scene had caught the attention of the masses around the city, which Eryn despised. Now people knew the royals were out and about, which means that other potential assassins would be moving to strike against the queen. Eryn was somewhat glad they managed to get away from the public eye when they entered the tailor shop. It was a fairly large store, with mannequins dressed in various attire lined up around the brightly lit room. The air was thick with the smell of perfume and violet, which made Eryn gag slightly. The queen and princess were currently sitting a few feet away with an elderly woman near the counter discussing… something or other, Eryn was too exhausted to pay attention.

It may have been the exasperation that resonated in Eryn’s body, but some things weren’t adding up in his mind. The man who hired him described the queen as “a witch” and “a monster.” Eryn had a hard time seeing how exactly this woman was capable of such evil to be labeled as such. Everyone they passed through the town either ignored her or gave a pleasant hello. And for that matter, he wasn’t sure how someone (or anyone, for that matter) like her could have such magical prowess to encase the kingdom in an eternal winter. He hadn’t even seen her use her magic! Eryn started to think that those stories about the queen’s magic were nothing more than flights of fancy from fools who thought they were in some fairy tale. Or drunkards. Or both, for that matter. Eryn decided to seek some “expert advice” on the matter.

Oi, you can sense magic in others right? Eryn thought, projecting his thoughts to the dagger at his side.

Of course I can, boy… the dagger responded, slightly annoyed, What do you take me for?

Does the queen really possess magic then?

The dagger took a moment to respond. Yes. Most definitely. By the Old Ones, her power is quite impressive! I’m not even sure if she knows how much power she possesses.

Is that good or bad?

Mmmm… Hard to say. This will require much more attention, though it does make our job slightly harder.

Eryn fixated his eyes on the queen. No one has ever gotten that kind of reaction from the blade. It both fascinated and deeply terrified him.

“Now then,” the old hag said in a raspy yet upbeat voice, “if you can follow me, your highness, we can start with the measurements.”

The princess was radiating excitement through the entire room. It was as if she forgot that just a few days ago someone tried to kill her and the queen. The elderly woman slowly got up from her chair (Eryn was certain he heard something in the broad’s body squeak) and the princess followed suit.

“Should I go back with you?” The queen asked.

“That isn’t necessary, your majesty,” the old woman answered, “we won’t be long.”

“A-alright. I’ll be out here once your done.”

The old woman gave the queen a grin. “Why don’t you look around while we’re gone. I’m sure you will be in my store one of these days getting fitted for your wedding dress.”

The queen’s face turned bright pink at the old woman’s suggestion, who let out a small chuckle. The princess gave the queen a quick embrace before bolting away with the elderly woman behind a dark blue curtain. It was at that point Eryn perked up and felt his exhaustion dissipate as he came up with a daring yet stupid plan.

Don’t. You. Dare. The dagger scolded, reading his thoughts

C’mon, they’ll be in there for who knows how long, Eryn reassured, All I have to do is kill her and we’re off! Easy.

Since when has that ever worked? Do you remember London?

That whore knew more than she let on. Besides, there are no witnesses here. With a bit of magic we can make this as quick and painless as possible.

The dagger let out a defeated sigh. I have only a little bit left. Once I use it, you won’t have any more until she’s dead.

That shouldn’t take long, then. Let’s get moving.

Don’t blame me when you’re trapped in an ice block.

Eryn felt a surge of energy course through his body as he casually raised his hand towards where the princess and the tailor shop owner were. Small darts of darkness flew from his fingertips to the curtain they were behind. Should keep them from hearing any screams he thought. He then delicately shut the door as he unsheathed the blade from its holster, ready for the kill.

XXXXXX Elsa sighed at the events that had transpired. She was getting incredibly tired of the constant reminders of her marriage status. It was one thing to be asked by her advisors, but it was another thing to be asked by the common folk. Even if she wanted to seek a future husband, her duties as queen, along with the recent attempt on her life, had pushed that notion to the back of her mind. It felt like she had a thousand pound weight hanging on her shoulders

At least Anna was happy through all of this. Elsa remembered how estatic her sister was a few months ago when Kristoff proposed, how she teared up when he slipped the ring onto Anna’s finger. She was glad Anna was getting the happily ever after she always wanted. It also helped that she had some piece of mind with Derrik around. While not by any means a permanent solution, the extra security made Elsa feel better, if only by a little bit.

The queen rose from her chair and began perusing the store, noting the various fabrics and bolts of cloth. She could easily have the royal tailors fashion Anna’s dress, but the redhead insisted that it be done by Mrs. Rusgard, as she “put love in every stitch,” as Anna put it. Besides, Elsa liked getting out of the castle every now and then to visit the smaller shops and such. It made her feel like a part of Arendelle, rather than just the queen. Elsa picked up a spool of red yarn, twisting it around in her hand. She never tried knitting, but thought it wouldn’t hurt to try.

Before she had time to think about what to knit, however, she found herself forced onto the ground.

XXXXXX

Eryn wasn’t sure what just happened. He was silently striding towards the queen, dagger in hand and ready to strike, when he lost his footing and fell face forward into her. The two of them slammed onto the floor with a loud THUD. Eryn groaned in pain as he propped himself up onto his arms. Reorienting himself, he looked down and saw the queen looking up to him completely shocked, her blue eyes the size of dinner plates. Her hair was slightly messed up as well, with random strands falling out of place. Eryn felt his heart race as he stammered, “Um, so-sorry ma’am, must’ve uh- tripped on something.”

“O-Oh no it’s fine,” the queen responded as her face grew pink, “I’ve done that a couple of times.” Eryn quickly jumped to his feet as he helped the queen off the floor. As she put her hand in his, Eryn couldn’t help but notice how soft they were. As the queen fixed her hair, running her hand through her platinum locks, Eryn felt a surge of warmth across his face and his heartbeat grow rapidly. The assassin wasn’t sure what was going on. He didn’t have much time to ponder, as the princess and the old woman came out from the curtain.

“Okay, Elsa, we- oh!” the princess exclaimed as the old woman lightly chuckled.

“Well, well, well,” the woman chortled, “I see the queen of Arendelle has finally found a man.”

Eryn looked down and realized he still had the queen’s hand in his. He quickly snapped his hand back, clasping it behind his back, and directed his attention to the floor. Both his and the queen’s faces were bright red from embarrassment.

“O-oh no,” the queen sputtered awkwardly, “Derrik is just our bodyguard, he tripped and landed on me and-”

“Yes, yes,” Eryn chimed in, “I- uh, lost my balance on… something or other.” He quickly turned around and saw a basket of small spools spilt on the floor. “Ah! Here’s the culprit,” he announced, picking up the basket and replacing its contents.

“Ummmm, Elsa?” the princess said, “You might want to turn around.”

With that, both Eryn and the queen shifted their gaze to the direction the princess was referring to. He saw that one of the mannequins was completely coated with a sheet of jagged ice, the clothing it was wearing ripped to shreds. He heard the queen let out a horrified gasp.

“Oh my God!” she exclaimed, turning to the old woman, “I’m so sorry, I’ll happily pay for-”

The old woman raised her hand. “That won’t be necessary. Between you and me, that old thing was attracting more moths than customers.” The princess slightly giggled at the old woman’s joke as the queen snapped her fingers. The ice covering the mannequin slowly evaporated before Eryn’s eyes. Half of him was impressed at the queen’s abilities. The other half, however, was deeply disturbed at the scale of the woman’s power.

“I’m really sorry again, Mrs. Rusgard,” her majesty murmured sheepishly.

“Not to worry, dear,” the elderly woman reassured, “It was due to be replaced anyway.”

Eryn dropped his gaze to where he and the queen had fallen. There he saw the dagger resting a few inches away, the runes no longer glowing. Damn! He thought, I’m not going to hear the end of this…

“Alright, where to next?” The queen asked the princess.

“Follow me!” The princess grabbed the queen’s arm and bolted out of the store. Eryn quickly dashed over to grab his dagger.

“God damn it!” Eryn groaned, bolting after them with increased speed.

Later that night…

Eryn flopped onto his bed with a drawn out groan. He had been playing a game of keep-up with the royals for the past two hours as they traversed the city. His legs felt like jelly as his lungs cried out in pain. He was certain that the princess had some form of speed magic to not only be able to make such a mad dash around the city, but also while carrying another person in tow. Whatever it was, Eryn held a newfound respect for the young princess.

Despite his fatigue, Eryn began to mentally kick himself for what happened today. Never in the past twelve years has he fucked up as royally as he did in the tailor shop. He was supposed to be a master assassin, not some clumsy fool. This was even worse than the time in London, though luckily no one saw how awful he had messed up.

Eryn’s thoughts soon settled on the events after he stumbled into the queen, how his heart began beating loudly in his chest, how the image of her disheveled hair made his face turn bright red. He dashed these thoughts from his mind. It’s probably something I ate, he thought to himself. Imagine if the dagger read his thoughts at that minut-

SHIT, THE DAGGER!

Eryn shot up in his bed. He unsheathed the dagger and inspected it. As he suspected, the runes etched into the blade were no longer glowing. He mentally tried to grab the dagger’s attention, only to be met with silence. Eryn let out a frustrated sigh. He knew what had to be done if he wanted the dagger’s assistance.

Without thinking twice, Eryn held his right hand open and placed the blade in the middle of his palm. Pressing the blade into his skin, he dragged the dagger across his hand, slightly wincing at the pain. Blood began leaking from his palm, dripping onto the sheets of his bed. He quickly placed the top side of the dagger underneath his fresh wound, allowing the blood to drip onto the runes. As soon as blood met steel, the carvings began glowing bright crimson. The dagger’s voice soon followed, groaning as if awoken from a nap.

About time, Odrikson! I was wondering what took so long with- wait… This isn’t the blood of the queen! I thought you said killing her was ‘easy '.

A slight miscalculation on my part, luckily she still doesn’t suspect anything. Eryn reached over to his nightstand and pulled out a strand of cloth and wrapped it around his wound.

You need to exercise caution, boy. The goal is to kill the queen, not yourself.

Tell me something I don’t know. You were right about her having more power than she knows what to do with.

Is that the only thing I was right about?

Go fuck yourself…

Regardless, we should still plan out our next attack. Stumbling our way through this is damn near suicide.

Agreed. What do you propose?

We bide our time, use our position to uncover the weaknesses in the queen. Maybe through the princess or the snowman we can find some information that will be instrumental in her demise.

I’m vetoing the snowman. Stupid pile of piss would probably get lost in an empty room, not very reliable for information.

Very well… we shall pry at the princess then.

As long as I don’t have to chase after her, that’ll be fine.

With that, Eryn stabbed the dagger into the nightstand and flopped back onto his bed as he let his eyelids grow heavy with sleep.

#frozen fanfiction #disney frozen #OC #queen elsa #princess anna #olaf #kristoff #Eryn Odrikson #blood tw #gore tw #mature

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cathrynstreich · 5 years ago

Text

Zillbnb

[Editor’s note: Originally published on Not Boring, a weekly newsletter combining current events, strategy, finance and economics frameworks, and pop culture.]

Ancient Athens With Modern Amenities

Last year, my wife, Puja, and I decided to search for a house in Athens, New York, right across the river from the much trendier Hudson. We were ready to buy our first home, and the thought of spending the amount of money it would take to buy even a shoebox apartment in Brooklyn depressed us. So we decided to buy our second home first while continuing to rent in the city.

We went up for a day, met with our fantastic realtor, and set out to see three houses. It was like the house hunting version of Goldilocks: the first was too small, the second was too dilapidated, the third was justttt right. The house was built in 1885, but the previous owner had recently renovated the place and did a masterful job of updating the kitchens, bathrooms, and appliances, while retaining the wide wood panel floors and other touches that gave the house its charm.

We fell in love; it would make a perfect Airbnb.

We closed on the house last June, and for the past twelve months, we have been one small piece of supply for Airbnb’s aggregation machine. We get to observe a microslice of Airbnb from the inside, and mostly, we experience the things that we expected to:

People are willing to pay more for the weekend than they are for weekdays.

In upstate New York, spring, summer, and fall are more popular than winter.

Lower nightly rates mean more demand.

We also learned some things:

Older renters are more particular than younger ones.

Failing to realize that heating oil runs out makes for unhappy guests.

Adjusting your nightly rate in either direction creates a flurry of demand.

We have a great property manager who takes care of the place as if it’s her own, surprisingly strong demand even in the winter (seriously, if you want to feel the power of an Aggregator firsthand, list a small house in the middle of nowhere on Airbnb), and are able to cover our mortgage payments and taxes with the Airbnb revenue. We thought we were geniuses.

Then in late February, Coronavirus hit, and uncertainty with it. A few guests canceled their weekend bookings and the news confirmed what we were seeing: Airbnb bookings dropped 40-96% in major tourist destinations across the globe. Holed up in our Brooklyn apartment, we worried that our smart investment had become a disaster.

But within days, as the media continued to call Airbnb’s demise, something interesting happened: we started receiving a ton of inquiries.

Every couple of hours, another person or young family from New York City asked if they could rent our home for weeks or months at a time to escape the city and head for the fresh air upstate. Since the beginning of Coronavirus, we have had our best months as Airbnb hosts yet, with average revenue about 25% higher than in the first year.

I recognized something from my time at Breather: the easiest-to-book, shortest duration reservations respond more quickly to changes than heavier, longer duration reservations. At Breather, prices for our hourly reservations moved much more quickly than prices for the 5-year leases we signed. We could tell when a neighborhood’s office real estate was going to become more expensive before landlords could.

Similarly, Airbnb demand should be predictive of sublet demand, which should predict leasing demand, which, in turn, should predict home sale demand. Following that logic, I guessed that since more people were booking Airbnbs upstate, and fewer were booking in the city, home prices would soon rise upstate and fall in the city.

This week, I got a text from a friend who was looking to buy a house upstate. Turns out he wasn’t the only one. His realtor told him that homes in the area were trading at 20-30% above where they were just a few months ago. Bad news for him, but great news for us. We called our realtor and asked what we might be able to get for our house. He told us he’d do some research and call us back.

“Guys, I’ve done some digging, and I think we should try to list your place for 30% above where you bought it last year.”

Airbnb and Zillow Should Merge

On the micro level, Airbnb’s predictive power is great news for us. We were able to see that demand was increasing in the region before most other people, and are going to get our house on the market before others do.

On the macro level, this phenomenon points to an opportunity for a merger between two of residential real estate’s largest tech companies: Airbnb and Zillow.

Over the past year as home buyers, Airbnb hosts, Airbnb guests, and now sellers, Puja and I have noticed places where a combined Airbnb and Zillow would complement each other perfectly. Try before you buy, access to lending based on Airbnb cash flows, rent to own, more accurate Zestimates, and click to buy are just a few of the things on our wishlist that could be solved in an Airbnb / Zillow merger.

If you’re thinking, “This guy’s an idiot. The only thing worse than one unprofitable real estate company during a global pandemic is two,” I would say: Ouch, I might be, but this is Fantasy M&A and the merger is intriguing for a few main reasons.

Airbnb and Zillow are Yin and Yang: Airbnb is short-term, Zillow is long-term. Zillow is a scientist, Airbnb is a designer. Airbnb gives Zillow unmatched iBuying capabilities, and Zillow gives Airbnb SEO firepower.

Zippier Zestimates: Airbnb’s data would improve the accuracy of the Zestimate and make it more responsive and predictive.

Belong Anywhere, for Any Amount of Time: Instead of vertical or horizontal integration, this merger would represent Duration Integration. One place for consumers to book homes at every time interval – from one night to forever.

Liquid Real Estate: Together, Airbnb and Zillow can make real estate more tradable, like stocks.

Product Moonshots: The combined companies would be able to create more innovative products and experiences than either could alone.

The stakes are high. The total value of homes in the United States alone is $33.6 trillion, US hospitality is a $200+ billion industry, and the global hotel industry is a $525 billion market. Real estate and hospitality continue to blend, and Coronavirus changed the way that we think about where to live: our residence may no longer be one address in one city, but rather a series of cities and addresses that we sample or rotate through over our lives. Together, Airbnb and Zillow would be the leader in this new housing world.

Opposites Attract

For better or worse, Airbnb and Zillow are yin and yang.

Airbnb, led by RISD graduate Brian Chesky, has the soul of a designer. When Airbnb wanted to improve its customer experience, for example, it hired a Pixar illustrator to storyboard the customer journey.

Zillow, led by founder Rich Barton, who also founded Expedia and Glassdoor, has the soul of an engineer. In each of Barton’s companies, he uses data to grow scientifically. His companies follow the same playbook – expose previously hidden data (flight/hotel prices, home prices, employee reviews), attract users, create a unique page for each entity (homes, companies), and rank high in search results.

Airbnb’s brand color is pinkish, Zillow’s is blue. Airbnb is headquartered in San Francisco, Zillow calls Seattle home. Airbnb is an experience company, Zillow is a product company. Airbnb facilitates short-term rentals and calls anything over 30 days “long-term.” Zillow facilitates home sales and leases, and calls anything under 1-year “short-term.”

The merger has the potential to create one company that blends art and science, short-term and long-term, customer obsession and powerful data, the sharing economy and the economy economy. Read Barton’s interview with Ben Thompson; it’s one of the most insightful CEO interviews I’ve read, and I think he has what it takes to pull this off.

Airbnb and Zillow have taken nearly opposite paths to becoming two of the largest and most well-known real estate tech companies, and their merger would enable each to help solve the other’s challenges.

Airbnb Can Lower Zillow Offers’ Risk, Expand the Buyer Pool, and Boost Yields

Zillow, which began its life as a home listing platform, has expanded into iBuying through its Zillow Offers product – in which it takes principal risk by buying and selling homes – and mortgage lending. Zillow’s current market cap is $13.7 billion, and it’s trading just 5% off of its all-time highs after reporting stellar Q1 earnings, in which the company reported revenue more than twice as high as Q1 2019, buoyed by an increase in revenue from Zillow Offers from $128 million to $769 million.

But investors are still worried about Zillow’s ability to generate profit from Offers; the company itself estimates that it can generate returns of 4-5% from the product, much lower than the software margins investors originally bought into. The market is so uncertain about Offers that Zillow’s stock price rose 14% on March 23rd, the day that Zillow said it would temporarily suspend the program due to Coronavirus.

Zillow will be back in the market, though. It’s betting that 4-5% gross margins in a massive market – home buying – will ultimately prove more profitable than its historical 90% gross margins in a much smaller market – home listings. It’s a risky bet! Zillow now carries homes on its balance sheet until it’s able to flip them.

Plugging in Airbnb would lower Zillow’s risk and improve its yields. Instead of a binary outcome – buy the house for $x and only profit if Zillow can sell the house for $x+y – Zillow could turn on short-term rentals to generate income while looking for a buyer at the right price.

Zillow may even choose to continue to operate the homes it buys as short-term rentals on Airbnb instead of selling, based on predictive calculations of which offering will produce higher yields. Short-term rentals can generate 30% higher rates than long-term rentals. Airbnb has even shown a desire to own and manage its own supply with Backyard.

Zillbnb has the opportunity to build something more potent than Blackstone’s Invitation Homes, on which the private equity firm netted about $7 billion by buying up a portfolio of single-family homes in the US and managing them as rental properties. By using Zillbnb’s combined data, the company can make sharper offers based on both short-term and rental cashflow predictions. By offering Zillow Offers homes for one night, one month, one year, or forever, Zillbnb would be able to optimize yields based on where each duration prices in each market.

Joining forces with Airbnb might even increase the buyer pool for Zillow’s homes. Selling homes with Airbnb up and running turns a home into a turnkey small business, making it attractive to financial buyers looking for yield in a low interest rate environment.

Zillow Can Help Airbnb Lower Marketing Costs and Regain Profitability

Airbnb has some challenges of its own that Zillow would help solve.

Since its founding in 2008, Airbnb has been a darling of the tech industry – an early Y Combinator success story, trailblazer in the sharing economy, and one of the most anticipated IPOs of 2020. Due to Coronavirus, however, Airbnb has put its IPO on hold and laid off 25% of its employees. It raised $1 billion in debt from Silver Lake Partners at 10%, and warrants attached to the debt – which gives Silver Lake the option to convert its loan to shares in the company – valued Airbnb at $18 billion, down from $31 billion in its last round.

Even before Coronavirus hit, Airbnb faced some serious existential threats. In Long WeWork, Short Airbnb, my friend Dror Poleg pointed out that Airbnb faces serious competition from well-capitalized, profitable giants, namely Marriott, Expedia Group, and Booking Holdings. Those companies combined to generate about $10 billion in annual profits in 2018, while Airbnb lost $322 million in the first nine months of 2019. A big reason for the losses is that the whole travel industry – including Expedia and Booking – is paying more to acquire customers as Google has squeezed them out of search results with its own travel modules.

Spending to compete in that space is destructive, as Airbnb has discovered. Zillow, on the other hand, plays in a space that doesn’t face the same headwinds as the OTAs. For now, Google doesn’t have a home buying module, and Zillow is taking full advantage.

Barton built Zillow to be an SEO machine, and it works. Look what comes up when you search for “homes New York City.”

In Making Uncommon Knowledge Common, Kevin Kwok explains how Zillow takes advantage of data content loops to own the demand side of real estate. It pulled together disparate data to create the Zestimate, and exposed that data to the public, which drove people to Zillow. It also used the Zestimate to create a listing for every home, which drove more people to Zillow, which improved its SEO, which means even more people come to Zillow, and so on. Now, when you search for homes in nearly every city, Zillow is the top result. Zillow is the Aggregator for home sales and rentals.

Short-term, Zillbnb will need to take advantage of Zillow’s current SEO advantage before Google does the same thing to homes that it has done to hotels. One could imagine adding a “Book on Airbnb” to the millions of home listings pages that Zillow owns, giving Airbnb an instant leg up over its competitors, and backlinks from Airbnb to Zillow to learn more about the home and maybe even to see if it’s for sale.

Medium-term, Zillbnb’s goal will be to become the starting point for any home search, from an overnight stay to a purchase. If people go to Zillbnb.com before Google when they’re searching for a place to stay for any duration, the company becomes much less sensitive to Google pushing organic home search results further down the page.

There is precedent here – Amazon has become so synonymous with ecommerce that more shoppers start their search on Amazon (46.7%) than Google (34.6%), according to emarketer. Shoppers start on Amazon because they know they can find everything they’re looking for in one place. Zillbnb would offer the same thing in housing.

As our concepts of travel and living, of hospitality and home sales continue to blend, giving consumers one destination for all of the above provides an advantage – “a service so wonderful that people just come back to them directly.” In other words, Zillbnb would be the ultimate home Aggregator.

Zippier Zestimate

The Zestimate is the core of Zillow’s business. The ability to see the estimated price of any home by typing in an address is a customer magnet, and the company’s ability to algorithmically price a home is the engine that drives the Zillow Offers business. If Zillow believes that it can price a home better than anyone else, it should be the most sophisticated house flipper in the game, beating out competitors like Opendoor by leveraging its data advantage.

The company has poured its own engineering resources into making the Zestimate accurate, and even hosted a data science competition on Kaggle, awarding a $1 million prize to a team that made the Zestimate about $1,300 more accurate.

In stable markets, the Zestimate is a useful tool, accurate to within about 5%. But the Zestimate is slow to respond to change.

Before we called our realtor, I pulled up the Zestimate for our house. It was a modest 4% higher than our purchase price, and 20% lower than our realtor’s ultimate recommendation. If we had just looked at the Zestimate, we wouldn’t have given selling our house a second thought.

The challenge that the Zestimate faces is that home sales prices are the last to respond to changes in real estate demand.

Airbnb can fix that.

The graph above a) took me way too much time to create, and b) shows that prices are slower to respond the longer time commitment involved.

Sale prices are last to respond because they are irreversible and they happen once. Right now, across the country, many homeowners in cities most impacted by COVID are holding out for as long as they can to avoid selling into a down market. If they can make ends meet, they reason, they’ll be able to wait to sell their home when things recover and avoid losing money on what is likely their biggest investment to date.

Airbnb hosts, on the other hand, are willing to take what they can get for each booking (assuming the guest pays cleaning charges) because bookings happen every night, prices can adjust daily, and inventory expires. Tonight only happens once, and by tomorrow, it’s gone. If Airbnb hosts have to choose between renting their place for $50 or $0 tonight, they’ll take the $50. Hopefully, tomorrow is a little better and they can charge $60, maybe in a month or two, they’ll be back to their normal $200 per night. They’ll have been making money all along.

Because of that dynamic, Airbnb knows about the demand in a particular area, and for a particular home, before anyone else, including Zillow, does. Its pricing recommendations for hosts, while probably set too low in order to stimulate demand, are much more responsive and nuanced than the Zestimate.

By feeding Airbnb’s data into Zillow’s algorithm, the combined companies could create a zippier Zestimate, one that responds in real-time to changes in demand. There’s a chance that each company already incorporates the other’s data in a rough way, but they would benefit from a tighter integration and knowledge sharing.

Generally, “data moats” are bullshit, but in this case, improved data helps value homes better, which allows Zillow to front-run markets with its Zillow Offers product. Airbnb yields are already becoming a useful valuation metric, allowing investors to value a home based on its cashflows. When we asked to list our house, for example, our realtor asked us to send him our monthly Airbnb revenue, because potential buyers are now using that information to decide how much they can afford to pay.

An improved, real-time Zestimate also makes Zillbnb a more attractive destination for consumers. Zillow has built an unrivaled real estate demand engine by creating a pricing estimate tool that people check occasionally. Imagine if the estimated price of peoples’ largest investment changed every day in response to changing market conditions – people would check Zillbnb as much as they check Robinhood. Zillbnb would be the ultimate real estate destination site, giving the combined companies the ability to cross-sell homes for any amount of time (and, of course, Experiences) to the millions of people checking the site daily.

Accurate, real-time home prices would be a moat that would be nearly impossible for any competitors to overcome, just as the ability to find a home for any length of time would create a value proposition that customers would love.

Belong Anywhere, for Any Amount of Time

Together, Airbnb and Zillow would allow consumers to book any length of stay in one place, from one night to forever. They’re already bleeding into each others’ territory.

Launched to help people turn extra couch space into a little extra income, Airbnb has turned much of its attention to longer-term stays, bookings over one month long. One out of every seven nights booked on the platform is part of a longer-term stay, and Chesky has said that long-term stays are one of the company’s top three priorities.

We’ve seen that first-hand in Athens – our average booking increased from three nights to over two weeks, and one guest just booked all of September and October.

The natural next step is even longer stays, and that’s where Zillow comes in. In fact, looking for longer-term rentals to carry them through COVID, many Airbnb hosts are already turning to Zillow. Zillow is seeing increased demand for short-term (6 months or less) and furnished rentals. Furnished rental listings increased 42.8% between March 1 and May 21, and short-term rental listings rose 23% in the same period.

Hosts are increasingly listing their homes on both platforms, and guests are looking at both to find a place to stay. By combining forces, Zillow and Airbnb would give both sides of the marketplace – guests/buyers and hosts/sellers – one place to go for any duration. That might mean one night or one month. It might also mean forever.

This is a win from the consumer perspective, and a win for the company. Offering products at more durations allows the combined company to smooth out cashflows. For example, Airbnb generates the most revenue in the summer, when more people travel in the US and Europe. Since home sale timing has a low correlation with travel timing, combining the two would create overall more stable cash flows.

Beyond just smoothing out cash flows, allowing consumers to transact real estate at any time scale can expand the whole market by liquefying real estate.

Liquefying Real Estate

Public company ownership is liquid. People (and machines) trade ownership in companies every millisecond, facilitated by fractional ownership (a share in a public company is a tiny fraction of the overall company), real-time data, and a global market of financial buyers and sellers who don’t need to actually operate the companies whose shares they purchase. Markets allow people to diversify, to create a loosely correlated set of baskets in which to put their eggs.

Real estate, on the other hand, is relatively illiquid. The median duration of home ownership in the US is thirteen years, and for the vast majority of homeowners, the house represents the largest investment they will ever make. Home ownership is as “all your eggs in one basket” as it gets. Not only is your home where your money lives – home values represent about 20-30% of a person’s net worth – it’s where you live. People have insurance to protect against disasters that destroy the physical parts of their home, but nothing to protect them against declining home values in the city or neighborhood in which they’ve chosen to live. Plus, most homeowners go deeply in debt in order to afford the place.

The way we own and transact real estate is crazy, but historically, it’s been the only option.

Today, a host of new startups are working to provide alternatives. Point enables homeowners to sell equity in their homes instead of having to raise debt via a mortgage. Divvy operates a rent-to-own model, in which monthly rent payments accumulate and become your down payment when you’re ready to buy. Point and Divvy are good starts.

Zillbnb would bring real liquidity to the market, though. A more accurate, zippier Zestimate would provide the price transparency required to make shares in homes more tradable at scale. The short- or long-term stays that people are doing anyway could open up rent-to-own options to millions. One level above a 5-star review, the combined company might ask, “Love your stay? Click here to invest in the property.”

Instead of owning just one home, Zillbnb customers might be able to buy a portfolio of homes in different locations, representing a financial tie to the places they’ve traveled and the experiences they’ve loved, and diversifying their risk. It sounds like a crazy idea, but I think that in twenty-five years, we will look back and think that the way we do it today was insane.

Plus, I’ve got even crazier ones…

Product Moonshots

What’s the fun in doing fantasy M&A if you don’t let your imagination run a little wild? I’ve thought of a few product moonshots that only Zillbnb could create.

Zillbnb Offers. Currently, Zillow invests in the homes that it purchases for its Offers product via its balance sheet. What if, because of real-time price transparency, consumers were able to fund Offers by buying and selling shares in particular homes or baskets of homes. Roofstock does something similar today, without the benefit of Zillbnb’s reach, scale, and demand.

Experience Before You Buy. Imagine being able to live in a house for a month before you decide to buy it. You could get to know its quirks and its charms before committing. You might even be able to book Experiences in the neighborhood, like going to dinner with some of your future neighbors, taking in a play with locals, or taking your kids to a Little League game with team parents. That experience would enable you to determine whether you “Belong” before making the biggest financial decision of your life.

Click to Buy. Zillow already has price estimates and a mortgage lender. Airbnb already has people staying in someone else’s home millions of times per day. Why couldn’t Zillbnb offer a “Click to Buy” option after guests complete their stays? Now that we’re thinking about selling our house in Athens at the same time that more guests are staying there longer, I would love to be able to let them know that it’s for sale, increasing the demand for the property and potentially fetching us a higher price.

Zillbnb Subscription. With more people allowed to work remotely from anywhere, Zillbnb could offer a subscription product, a modern-day timeshare on steroids. For one price, I could live in the mountains during the winter, by the beach during the summer, in the city during the spring, and in the country during the fall. I would also be able to offer my home to others, making the whole thing cost neutral while increasing my flexibility. Because these stays would be longer than 30 days, they would get around many of the regulations blocking short-term stays in cities like New York.

Just thinking about these possibilities gets me excited. On a long enough time scale, they’re inevitable – the market adapts to what consumers want – but a Zillow/Airbnb merger would make them possible much sooner than any other entity could.

Make it Happen, Rich and Brian!

Any potential merger is fraught with complications, and this one is no different. Blending art and science might not take – what if the two companies’ cultures just don’t fit? What if Airbnb data isn’t actually a great predictor of home values? How to deal with Airbnb’s international presence and Zillow’s US focus? What will the regulators say? Isn’t packaging and selling slices of homes what led to the 2008 financial crisis?

Sure, but this is fantasy M&A, meant to make us think about the possibilities, of the upside potential if the companies are able to figure out all of the financial, operational, and regulatory complexity.

And the fantasy is compelling. A merger between Airbnb and Zillow would create an unmatched residential real estate aggregator, and build moats around two businesses that, while big by startup standards, are still actually pretty tiny compared to the markets in which they operate – housing and hospitality.

Most importantly, a combined Zillbnb has the potential to speed up the transition to the future in which we interact with and transact real estate in a much more fluid way. It would allow real estate to evolve in line with the shift to more flexible and remote work, and it could smooth the dichotomy between home ownership and diversification.

If you know Rich Barton or Brian Chesky, please forward this email to them. The Zillbnb future is the one I want to live in.

The post Zillbnb appeared first on GeekEstate Blog.

Zillbnb published first on https://thegardenresidences.tumblr.com/

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clarencevancleave · 5 years ago

Text

Zillbnb

[Editor’s note: Originally published on Not Boring, a weekly newsletter combining current events, strategy, finance and economics frameworks, and pop culture.]

Ancient Athens With Modern Amenities

We fell in love; it would make a perfect Airbnb.

People are willing to pay more for the weekend than they are for weekdays.

In upstate New York, spring, summer, and fall are more popular than winter.

Lower nightly rates mean more demand.

We also learned some things:

Older renters are more particular than younger ones.

Failing to realize that heating oil runs out makes for unhappy guests.

Adjusting your nightly rate in either direction creates a flurry of demand.

But within days, as the media continued to call Airbnb’s demise, something interesting happened: we started receiving a ton of inquiries.

“Guys, I’ve done some digging, and I think we should try to list your place for 30% above where you bought it last year.”

Airbnb and Zillow Should Merge

On the macro level, this phenomenon points to an opportunity for a merger between two of residential real estate’s largest tech companies: Airbnb and Zillow.

Zippier Zestimates: Airbnb’s data would improve the accuracy of the Zestimate and make it more responsive and predictive.

Liquid Real Estate: Together, Airbnb and Zillow can make real estate more tradable, like stocks.

Product Moonshots: The combined companies would be able to create more innovative products and experiences than either could alone.

Opposites Attract

For better or worse, Airbnb and Zillow are yin and yang.

Airbnb Can Lower Zillow Offers’ Risk, Expand the Buyer Pool, and Boost Yields

Zillow Can Help Airbnb Lower Marketing Costs and Regain Profitability

Airbnb has some challenges of its own that Zillow would help solve.

Barton built Zillow to be an SEO machine, and it works. Look what comes up when you search for “homes New York City.”

Zippier Zestimate

In stable markets, the Zestimate is a useful tool, accurate to within about 5%. But the Zestimate is slow to respond to change.

The challenge that the Zestimate faces is that home sales prices are the last to respond to changes in real estate demand.

Airbnb can fix that.

The graph above a) took me way too much time to create, and b) shows that prices are slower to respond the longer time commitment involved.

Belong Anywhere, for Any Amount of Time

Together, Airbnb and Zillow would allow consumers to book any length of stay in one place, from one night to forever. They’re already bleeding into each others’ territory.

We’ve seen that first-hand in Athens – our average booking increased from three nights to over two weeks, and one guest just booked all of September and October.

Beyond just smoothing out cash flows, allowing consumers to transact real estate at any time scale can expand the whole market by liquefying real estate.

Liquefying Real Estate

The way we own and transact real estate is crazy, but historically, it’s been the only option.

Plus, I’ve got even crazier ones…

Product Moonshots

What’s the fun in doing fantasy M&A if you don’t let your imagination run a little wild? I’ve thought of a few product moonshots that only Zillbnb could create.

Make it Happen, Rich and Brian!

If you know Rich Barton or Brian Chesky, please forward this email to them. The Zillbnb future is the one I want to live in.

The post Zillbnb appeared first on GeekEstate Blog.

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alarriefantasy · 8 years ago

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do you know any really long and hella angsty larry fics on aooo ?? sorry to bother you!

No bother at all! I LOVE getting asks!!! Also, I got a little ahead of myself here, so this is a long list! I’m doing this in numerical order starting at 100k and up! I will forewarn you, some of these fics may not be as angsty as you’re looking for, but I figured I’d add them still because you might like them! Hope you find what you wanted! :D

Angsty Fic Rec

take my hand (and my heart and soul) by bananasandboots

Words: 45k

Or, the one where Harry hasn’t spoken to his best friend in sixteen months and can’t remember why.

Even Angels Have Their Demons by AFangirlFantasy

Words: 53k

Louis is appointed the role of Guardian Angel, and his first mission is a boy named Zayn Malik. Unfortunately, it seems that a certain Demon has gotten to him first.

Or… an Angel/Demon AU where Angel Louis hates Demon Harry, but somewhere along the way that stops being so true.

No One Does It Better by nodibs

Words: 49k

Harry’s an alcoholic and Louis is a bartender. The first time they meet isn’t the first time they’ve met.

Tug-of-War by cherrystreet

Words: 63k

Louis’ husband dies suddenly and he is left with nothing. Well, not really nothing. He has Harry. And a St. Bernard puppy named Link, whom his late husband left behind for him. Louis takes care of Link and Harry takes care of Louis. Everything is okay until suddenly, it isn’t.

All Your Dreams Are On Their Way by1Diamondinthesun

Words: 73k

Or, Louis Tomlinson is a grieving author with a deadline. Harry Styles is afraid to realize his potential. The Caribbean is the perfect place to dream bigger. Featuring cocktails, imposter syndrome, and a race-against-the-clock rescue under a starry St. Lucia sky.

don’t tell the gods (we left a mess) by bottomlinsons

Words: 71k

After a misunderstanding with Liam’s mother, Louis agrees to accompany his best friend to a family wedding and pretend to be the world’s best boyfriend. But their simple plan goes awry when he learns that Harry, ex-boyfriend/ex-love of Louis’ life, will also be in attendance. (aka: fake!boyfriends with a twist ft. bromance, romance and cake.)

Truth Be Told (I Never Was Yours) by JustForTommo

Words: 76k

or the one where Louis and Harry have a complicated past, Louis is getting married to someone that’s not Harry, and the universe has decided to have a laugh and make Harry the wedding planner.

Baby, I think we might be too cold to float by forreveries

Words: 81k

AKA: Harry is a journalist that goes to Lake Tekapo, New Zealand, to look into a girl’s disappearance after a year of no movement from police. What he finds instead is his ex boyfriend Louis, who, six years earlier, ghosted him after five months of dating in university. A story of trauma, secrets, and the power of finally letting people in.

And down the long and silent street by whimsicule

Words: 86k

The year is 1881 and if you’re alone in this world you might as well be dead, because starving dogs have no mercy.

Or: Wherein Louis and Harry are on the opposite ends of the social ladder, but their paths still cross on the filthy streets Louis calls his home. The odds are staked against them from the beginning, and even more when Louis’ past finally catches up with him.

Here In The Afterglow by fondleeds

Words: 88k

1970’s AU. In a tiny town in Idaho, Louis’ life is changed forever by the arrival of a curious stranger.

Off The Record by Tomlinsontoes

Words: 90k

Louis is an out of control teen heartthrob, Harry is hired to get him back on track and they both hate each other while they secretly don’t.

Who Painted the Moon Black by throughthedark

Words: 95k

Hunger Games AU where Louis Tomlinson is district six’s victor from the 69th Hunger Games and Harry Styles is district seven’s victor from the 72nd Hunger Games.

Dance to the Distortion by Lis (domesticharry)

Words: 96k

Louis accidentally breaks Harry’s camera lens and in order to get it fixed, they decide to participate in a romantic couples study. The only issue is that they are not actually couple. Well that and the fact they cannot stand each other.

Untangle Me by suicxne

Words: 103k

Louis finds himself out of place in LA, unable to get at an itch that’s been bothering him for years. He supposes back in the early days, home hadn’t been a place. It’d been a person. He’d etched it permanently into his skin for fucks sake.It was always him and Harry. Stuck to each other like super glue. Pulled together by some magnetic force, existing in their own bubble. Everyone could see it, but that was half the problem, wasn’t it?

It’s not like Louis can pinpoint the exact moment in time when him and Harry fell out of sync. There wasn’t really one at all. It had been a gradual slip, like the tide wearing away at a sandstone cliff. Chipping the solid foundations until there was nothing left to stop the structure falling to the waves below. It’s not like he spends all of his time sitting around moping over a lost friendship, he’s good at distractions. But LA only seems to accentuate the distance between them. Two separate planets, not even in the same solar system.

Or the one where Harry and Louis finally get it right.

Take me down with you by harrystylesandstuff

Words: 107k

Louis is fine. He just happens to walk to the suicide bridge of Bristol at least once a week, just happens to be dealing with a lot of anxiety, and just happens to be done with life. But he’s fine.

Everything is just fine until a mysterious guy starts showing up every time he tries to kill himself, and he should be very scared, but he’s somehow very glad to have company. Until he’s not.

AU where Louis tries to kill himself multiple times but he’s not very good at it, Harry keeps showing up out of nowhere, and maybe life isn’t as bad as it looks sometimes.

Give Me Truths by iwillpaintasongforlou

Words: 110k

Louis is a psychology student with a tattoo count as high as his genius IQ. Harry is in a (sort-of) relationship with a homophobic man and hates himself a little more every day. Things fall apart and Louis puts him back together.

Or, the one in which Louis falls in love with a fragile boy and tells him every beautiful truth in the world, as long as it makes him happy.

Soft Hands, Fast Feet, Can’t Lose by dolce_piccante

Words: 112k

American Uni AU. Harry Styles is a frat boy football star from the wealthy Styles Family athletic dynasty. A celebrity among football fans, he knows how to play, he knows how to party, and he knows how to fuck (all of which is well known among his legion of admirers).

Louis Tomlinson is a student and an athlete, but his similarities to Harry end there. Intelligent, focused, independent, and completely uninterested in Harry’s charms, Louis is an anomaly in a world ruled by football.

A bet about the pair, who might be more similar than they originally thought, brings them together. Shakespeare, ballet, Disney, football, library chats, running, accidental spooning, Daredevil and Domino’s Pizza all blend into one big friendship Frappucino, but who will win in the end?

Tired Tired Sea by MediaWhore

Words: 113k

As a B&B owner on the most remote of all the British Isles, Louis Tomlinson is used to spending the coldest half of the year in complete isolation, with his dog and the sea as sole companions. Until, one day, a mysterious stranger on a quest to rebuild himself rents a room for the winter.

nobody shines the way you do by wildestdreams

Words: 115k

Louis pretends to be Harry’s boyfriend to help him win back his douchebag ex-boyfriend, but things don’t go according to plan.

The Dead of July by whimsicule

Words: 117k

or: Harry is Captain America, and Louis’ been dead for 70 years.

Never Be by cherrystreet

Words: 117k

The one where Harry Styles moves to Connecticut from England for nine months as a part of a study abroad program, and he just so happens to move in with Louis Tomlinson and family.

In Vogue by otpwhatever

Words: 121k

Fashion AU. Louis is the editor in chief of Vogue magazine, and Harry’s running British GQ. Featuring Zayn as the crazy creative director and Louis’ confidant, Liam as the sports writer that gets to sit front row at fashion week and DJ Neil as the only sane person in the whole story. (There are no skinny jeans in this fic)

more than just a dream by spit_on_me_larry

Words: 122k

Louis Tomlinson loves his life, he really does. It’s just that he’s constantly on the verge of everything completely going to shit. He’s disorganized and clumsy and hotheaded and just a little bit ridiculous.

And then he meets Harry Styles. Harry is the type of person Louis hates. It seems like everything comes easily to him. He’s rich and brilliant and everyone loves him and he has his life impossibly and perfectly together.

Louis detests Harry Styles. Except for the inconvenient fact that he can’t seem to get Harry out of his head.

Wild And Unruly by 100percentsassy, gloria_andrews

Words: 123k

Harry is a cowboy sitting on the biggest oil reservoir in Wyoming, and Louis is the paralegal assigned to pressure him into selling his land.

got the sunshine on my shoulders by hattalove

Words: 124k

(or, an au based on the movie sweet home alabama.)

Coeur d'Enfants by lavenderforluck

Words: 126k

As Marx said of the bourgeois class: all that is solid melts into air. St. Peter’s verse.

For As Long As I Can Remember (It’s Been December) by green_feelings

Words: 128k

After recovering from a severe accident that causes Harry to lose his memory of three years, he moves to London to start his life over as a star chef. Little does he know that when he falls in love with Louis at first sight, it’s not the first time they meet.

Featuring an unintentional game of hot and cold, Harry chasing memories that won’t come back, Louis burying himself in work to try and forget what he can’t forget, Liam being torn between two of his best friends, Zayn as a moral compass and Niall saving the day with good music and brutal honesty.

Empty Skies by green_feelings

Words: 134k

For three years, Harry has been running from his past. Now, he is moving to London and pledges to fulfil his only dream – making it big in the music industry. Not everyone has a place, though, and the competition is tough. As is his past catching up on him.

Louis is part of the biggest boy band of the world, and getting there had meant a lot of hard work, as well as sacrificing parts of his heart and soul. He’s still happy. Maybe not as happy as he could be, but who is he to complain?

Let’s Fall in Love in a Place You Want to Stay by embro

Words: 134k

A George of the Jungle / Tarzan AU where Louis is a model who meets Wild Man Harry in the Congo. He was raised by apes and barely speaks a word of English and turns Louis’ life upside down.

Love Is A Rebellious Bird by 100percentsassy, gloria_andrews

Words: 134k

AU in which the boys still make music. Louis is the concertmaster of the London Symphony Orchestra, Harry is the New! and Exciting! interim conductor/ex-cello prodigy who “has made Mozart cool again” according to Esquire Magazine (Louis hates him immediately, which is definitely why he internet stalked him in his dark bedroom late at night that one time), and Niall is the best. Zayn and Liam are around too.

Don’t hum Bolero.

Empty Skies by green_feelings

Words: 134k

Featuring Perrie as Harry’s adorable flatmate, Niall as his manager, and Liam and Zayn as Louis’ bandmates.

Lights Will Guide You Home by louisxharry1

Words: 137k

Louis Tomlinson is his school’s resident bad boy and easily the most liked person there. He’s loud and confident and popular. He spends most of his time abusing his parent’s money or partying or playing football. He also spends a good deal of it obsessing over the quiet curly boy in his English class, but no one really needs to know that.

Harry Styles is more or less invisible at the same school (unless he’s being harassed). He’s shy and painfully insecure and quiet. He spends most of his time crying on his bedroom floor with a razor pressed against his skin or trying (and failing) to think of reasons to stay alive.

So, of course, it’s inevitable that they fall for each other.

As You Are by zarah5

Words: 139k

AU. Five years after The X Factor launched his career as a radio host and songwriter, Louis Tomlinson returns as a judge. Falling for a contestant is the last thing he needs. It’s also against his contract.

Empty Gold by rainbow_kings

Words: 148k

AU where Louis Tomlinson attends the vigorous, demanding performing arts school: Guildhall in hopes to complete his theatre degree. He is a scholarship student, always having to work twice as hard to prove his worth which has caused him to feel resentment and anger towards his subordinate position.

Harry Styles is the wealthy, naturally gifted actor who effortlessly snatches all the main roles within the class. The complete contrast to everything Louis is.

Louis Tomlinson and Harry Styles have had bad blood and despised each other for the two years they attended Guildhall together, making each task a competition between each other.

In the final year, when Guildhall produces and performs an original play, Louis is heartbroken to learn the lead role has been been received to Harry and he’s the second role. He’s mostly terrified, however, when he realises he has to date Harry in the play as their characters. They come together through awkward stage kisses that transforms to hate sex, heated arguments, rehearsal times after lectures and baking carrot cake together.

Take My Breath Away by RealityBetterThanFiction

Words: 153k

There is a prestigious school in the British Royal Navy classified as Premier Delta - or as it is known by its flyers, 1D. These select pilots are an elite set of Naval lieutenants who are trained in the skill of aggressive aerial combat. They are instruments of war, trained in times of peace. They are dogfighters, relentless and fearless in their mission to protect their beloved country. From their lofty vantage, they are always watching, waiting, and ready to lay it all on the line.

Lt. Harry Styles, call sign Sparrow, is a prodigy when it comes to flying. The owner of an unrivaled Naval pedigree, being a pilot was always written in the stars for Harry. With his trusty RIO, Lt. Niall Horan, Harry has made an unprecedented ascension in the ranks of the Naval aerial combat elite, and has been recruited to the esteemed Premier Delta flight school, carrying on his family’s legacy. What he finds there are unexpected friendships, perilous challenges, and something beyond what he ever thought possible. Because as his father had always told him, before the great Captain Styles went tragically missing in combat, you don’t fall in love with the sky, you fall in love with what keeps you on the ground.

Nameless Night by green_feelings

Words: 155k

For their 18th birthday, every person receives a letter that reads a simple date. That is the date you’ll meet your soulmate.Harry and Louis have different beliefs, live in different worlds and have different dreams, hopes and fears. Yet, they’re not so different from each other when it comes to love. When their paths cross, there is no doubt they belong together. Except for that one, essential difference: they didn’t receive the same date.

Or, a fic about differences that make no difference at all: Harry and Louis are soulmates. In every way possible. Featuring Niall as a role model, and Liam and Zayn as a different kind of role models.

And Then a Bit by infinitelymint

Words: 158k

(aka Harry and Louis fake a relationship for publicity. Eventually it becomes a lot less fake and a lot more real.)

I Need A Fix Cause I’m Going Down by larryshares

Words: 158k

louis has been dealing with depression for as long as he can remember. he doesn’t expect green eyes and toothy grins and sweet petals in messy curls to save him, but they’re doing a hell of a lot more to help than regular therapy and prescribed pills ever have.

To Destroy a Dam by Evancalous

Words: 198k

AKA: Louis and Harry are best friends for six years. They lose touch, and sixteen years later, fate collides their paths into each other again.

Gods & Monsters by Velvetoscar

Words: 201k

The instructions were simple: seduce and destroy Harry Styles. Not once did they discuss the option of Louis actually falling in love. So, naturally, that’s exactly what he did.

Fading by tothemoonmydear

Words: 202k

Louis knows about beauty; the combination of qualities that pleases the aesthetic senses. He creates that combination every day in the garments he designs while studying fashion at uni. The cut of the design, the color of the fabric, the intricacy of the stitching; it all comes together to create something beautiful. When the science student with the long legs and dimpled smile agrees to model for him, Louis decides he’s found beauty personified. Harry just thinks Louis needs someone to show him how beautiful he is.

Shake Me Down by AGreatPerhaps12

Words: 208k

Harry’s new to college, fresh out of Catholic school and conversion therapy camp, and Louis runs the campus LGBTQIA organization.

Young & Beautiful by Velvetoscar

Words: 227k

Louis, to his horror, attends an elitist university in which the name Zayn Malik means something, Niall Horan doesn’t stop talking, there are pianos everywhere, and Harry Styles, only son of a drug-addled, clinically insane ex-rocker, has a perfect smile and empty eyes.

You are in love by wildestdreams

Words: 270k

The one where there’s late night coffee runs with deep conversations, lots of frat parties with cute frat boys, TV show references, numerous social network interactions, first kisses in the rain and a slow burn love story between two unlikely people.

You’ve got to see yourself from far and wide by Emm77

Words: 286k

(No summary so check tags)

He kissed my lips, I taste your mouth by MrsStylinson

Words: 290k

When Louis moves into the flat next to Harry’s, neither of them thinks it will change their lives. Louis is stuck in a relationship with his controlling and overly possessive boyfriend who he loves too much to break up with.. Harry is content, seeking refuge from the snobby world he grew up in and forging a new path for himself. He does happen to have a habit of wanting to fix people though and when he meets Louis, the gorgeous man with a prat of a boyfriend, he finds himself trying to do just that. While Harry tries to avoid getting tangled in a messy situation, Louis tries to deny that there’s a niggling voice in the back of his head that prefers Harry to his own boyfriend. While both studiously refuse to let change come, they fail to notice that exact force wrapping around them and pulling them tighter together until there just might be no escape from the feelings brewing within.

The Afterlife Fic (The Best I Ever Had in My Entire Life… Or Death) by LovingCup

Words: 491k

AU- After dying in an accident, Louis Tomlinson arrives in the Afterlife. Not Heaven and not Hell, Louis finds himself in Judgment City UK: a pristine city where the food and entertainment are divine and the newly departed must undergo a Review of their life on Earth to determine if they have lived a life worthy of advancement in the universe, or if they must be returned to Earth to be born again in a new body.On his first full day in the Afterlife, Louis meets Harry Styles, and the two have an instant connection. Over the course of their Reviews, they fall in love and begin to find that even though they didn’t know each other on Earth, they are nonetheless linked to one another in perfect ways. Both are hoping to move ahead in the universe together, but they are challenged with the threat of separation if one or both of them is sent back to Earth to be born again

credit to the owner of the manip

updated 08.17.19

#fic rec #angst #larry fics #ask

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brainsshit · 8 years ago

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been getting lots of flashes of lives i almost had lately.

I tried to put a bid on this house ( https://goo.gl/maps/xPEK15y79jC2 ) RIGHT after the papers were signed. it had 1 bedroom and a little loft. I was going to fix the floors and repaint and move in with the dogs. I had such a strong visualisation of sitting up in the loft at my desk next to the window, which the sun streaming me, skyping with my (now ex) boyfriend who would have been going to school at the time. we would be in the same time zone, at least, and part of the reason we thought the long distance thing had a chance at working was because he wanted to move down here eventually, anyway. Everyone who saw the house said it looked just like me. It was selling for 60k. I was heartbroken when i called my agent and she told me it was already gone.

I got a lot farther down buying another place- a condo. one of these: ( https://goo.gl/maps/V12QEyQFU3n ) I dont remember what it was selling for. It was on the second floor. it had high ceilings, 2 bedrooms. a big living room with a fireplace and a deck. the property had a bunch of pools and i was going to start swimming again. the dining space had these big windows and white tile floors, when the sun came in it was beautiful. i was going to put my art table in there. I was going to turn one of the bedrooms into a guest room/library. One of my friends was in the middle of thinking he needed to run away and start over- there was space for him here if he needed it. the offer i made was accepted and we hired an inspector. he found a couple things- relatively easy fixes, if potentially expensive ones, but nothing that made the place a money pit or unliveable. I remember having a long conversation with my brother that he would always be welcome here if he needed somewhere to go. I was going to live here for as long as i could and then rent it out if i ever moved. my loan agent asked for my updated documents so that we could finalise everything, and i started scrambling to find another 1-2k to put down. (i had 2 saved already.)

and then nobody would underwrite it. too many of the units in the complex were being rented out- the options were cash payment or nothing. i was a weird combination of wrecked and relieved.

I helped dom go apartment hunting. I did not let anyone go apartment hunting with me. when i saw the one i did eventually move into, i was less than impressed. i had been drawn to the building but the space itself was weird and narrow and cramped. i got back to the property managers office and they told me my first choice had been rented out while i was out looking. i applied for the one i didnt want.

they called me back a week later saying i had been approved.

the day after i picked up my keys, my mother tried to kill herself.

i moved out the following weekend, less than 6 days later.

it took almost an entire year for the new apartment to feel like home.

that december i made a mistake: i told dad i was ready to take over nelson’s. i was very wrong. It all just…. kind of spiraled from there. One time my ex boyfriend literally sent me 2 months of food. literally i showed up at my home one day to find 2 big amazon prime boxes of food, because he knew i didnt have any money to buy any for myself.

i did a lot of emotional growing, in terms of self care and worth and worldviews but i was (and am) very bad at time management, self motivation

dad is non confrontational until he isnt. he called me in march of 2015 and said something to the effect of “well maybe i should fire you then” and i said “maybe you should,” because i understood and accepted why he felt that way and i did not disagree. he gave me until the end of the month.

i managed to make it there until july

i am still extremely salty about it. not for me, exactly- i mean definitely for me, i fucking hate (hate hate hate, double hate, LOATHE ENTIRELY) not being able to support myself, but literally a life was lost in the process. a cat literally died because of this. dad drove me and kiki to the fucking county animal control building to have her put down, because mom didnt want that many animals in the house. i still dont know what happened to smalls. i fucking hope she found a home. she sure as hell deserves one.

one of my friends- bless them, the cat they do have found the best possible owners for the issues it has- SAW MY POST about trying to find smalls a home, and at this point her fiance finally said “yes okay” about them getting a cat- this happened ON MY POST about smalls- and they asked a couple of general questions and i said that i would be willing to help financially w/the first couple vet visits, i just hadn’t gotten to it yet- and then they adopted a different cat from the spca, who, it turned out, despite a clean bill of health, had like a fucking terrifying rib cage deformity/heart issue. they are, bless them, good people who handled it, but a little part of me was very much like “fucking take that goddamned karma, you assholes” (again cannot stress enough, these are lovely people and i love them both)

my brother drove me to the spca to drop smalls off because at that point i still did not have a personal vehicle, and also i was sobbing uncontrollably the entire time.

i got the job at the post office winter 2k15 and came this close 👌 to leaving school and doing that full time always I got an interview to be a city carrier. i decided i didnt want to, because fucking damnit hell i wasnt going to drop out AGAIN. I would have taken the carrier job in a heartbeat if it had come along before i lost my apartment. i wonder about where i would be if i had.

I don’t… want to be here. i hate living with people, i hate being supported, i hate not being able to keep food in the fridge and not even having independence to show for it. i hate that i fucking got there, i got so close and i fucked it up, and its just fucking gone now and i’m 25 goddamn years old and almost everyone i went to high school with has Real Jobs or families or they’re on they’re fucking postgrad education or fucking something, fucking anything to show for that time and i just

i work for goodwill you guys. this os the most dead-end a job can fucking get. i commute 20 miles to work 6 hours alone in a box and my managers cant even keep the fucking doorbell working. my car and insurance is almost exactly half of what i take home a month. i’m doing, objectively, very well- better emotionally and shit-handlingly than i literally ever have but for the first time i feel like i’m fucking floundering, like it’s not enough and i’m isolated as hell and i hate it, i dont have any time to see anybody and when i do i’m just tired. all my spare time is for sleeping now and i miss seeing everybody, and being able to afford the time or money to do to things- literally any things

#i'm just so tired and overwhelmed and i #i dont know #long post #parsing feels #venting

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dantelaw21 · 5 years ago

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Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 289 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts Episode 289 to one where Hernan looks continuously shocked for some reason.

Hi, how’s it going? Hernan Is everything okay. It’s great, man. I’m feeling like shit, but here we are. All right, good, good stuff. Well, keep going here. Like I said it’s Episode 289. Today’s the 27th of May 2020. I can see we got a lot of really good questions already today. But if you haven’t yet and you got a question, please put it on the page. First come first serve. And then I’m going to get into a few announcements. We’ve got some cool stuff that happened earlier this week. And then some last-minute announcements, things that we just found out about today that I want to touch on But first, let’s say hi to the guys real quick and see how everyone’s doing so

I’ll start to my top left here Bradley. How are you doing today?

Good. I’m good. I just edited the video description in YouTube because still had some stuff from the webinar we did yesterday. So anyway, but I’m good. Things are good. I’m back from taking a week off, and it sucked cuz I went away for a week camping and ATV riding, thinking that I was going to get away and get to enjoy it and it rained the entire week, all day every day and it was awful. It was fucking miserable. So I wish I would have stayed home and worked.

Yeah, man, speaking of weird weather that so I’m in the Bay Area. So we just hit 95 the last three days, which is like 34 Celsius. It’s just like, Okay, well guess I’ll go out in the morning, go for a walk and then come hunker in here, shut the blinds and turn the air just thinking. So that’s been my life for the past couple of days. So let’s head go with the happier weather report. Marco. How are you doing?

The sun’s out again. It’s the rainy season and he’s like the sun’s out. It’s rainy season man. Look, I live in paradise. All right, I can’t help that. Make some money. Right? First of all, go get the battle. You follow the Battle Plan.

make some money. Hire someone who will help you. Train, apply, and make money. lather, rinse, repeat. And then you can go find your own Fortress of Solitude where you can just watch the world go by and you don’t give up. Push your mouth but other than the outstanding weather

How are you doing marking things are going good. Things are good here man. Things are good. Yeah, I’m still like things are opening up a little bit here. Essential businesses and all that and all this other stuff, but I’m still self-parenting. I got three kids. They got to think about it and I’m not a spring chicken so that there’s another person that I had to think about right because I can go out or like one but I have to think about my family. Yeah. And what I might bring, bring home and closer to home to make somebody.

I knew personally died of this. It’s not as if it’s totally foreign to me like I don’t know anyone who is affected by this. I like what I do know. And so having it that cloth is not any longer six degrees of separation. it’s like I know and so no, it ain’t happening and we’re gonna see how this plays out and I’ll let everybody you guys can all go and enjoy yourselves you know to do whatever the hell you want and then let me know how that turns out and then I’ll decide after that second one what it is that we’re going to do but for now we’re cool we take it easy and that’s it, man. We did we just but my personal choice, right, my personal choice to do that. It’s not as if someone is forcing me to do it. I’m choosing that this is the best way for myself and my family. Enough. All right. Well, Hernan How about you man, things are like you’re moving into wintertime right? I always get

Yeah, it’s hot summer-like wait a second I was wearing a sweatshirt what hell’s going on? Yeah, actually actually all of you guys are well Marco Marco is like, you know, he’s in a good spot 20% but all of you guys are you know getting the nice season. I’m getting the shooting season. Yeah now so now but yeah man it’s good today was a good day.

Like warm-ish. But yeah, we’re getting into winter and all of that so see how that goes, could you? Oh, Chris How about yourself? Yeah, yeah can’t complain man sun’s out the sun is shining all day. I mean it’s dark right now and the best part of all Friday the gyms opening back up and stuff so things are really good standing. Well, I’m going to circle back around Bradley, you mentioned a webinar and I wanted to touch on that because we had Brian, a mastermind member, along with Bruno, and you all listening can get to know both of them better and see what Bradley has to say to about this go high-level system. And Bradley, you want to tell real quick, I’m gonna pop the link in where people can go and check out the replay. Do you want to tell them about the webinar a little bit?

Yeah, Brian, one of our mastermind members reached out and basically said that he was using a platform, an agency automation platform that consolidates a whole bunch of different services and such all under one roof. He reached out because he thought that it would fit really, really well with the 2xyoruagency training.

Because it does a lot of the stuff that I talked about in 2xyouragency about how to automate, delegate or eliminate because this platform consolidates a lot of services that you may have separate subscriptions for and I always call it duct taping them together using Zapier or some similar application. And basically these have integrated services that do all

All of the same things that many of these external services do that we put, you know, we connect via Zapier, and it’s all under one dashboard. And so it’s a lot more seamless. And there’s a lot of really cool features inside there, like one of the primary feature that was, is used to pitch this go high-level application or platform is what’s called database reactivation, which is a very easy way or a simple way for you to get your foot in the door as an agency owner with potential marketing clients because you can. So anyway, I can’t really go into depth right now about that, but it’s a really cool platform. I signed up my own agency on the agency level account level so that I can create a first of all, I’m gonna use it for my own agency, but second of all, so I could also create a case study for how I’m using it. I’ve got some really good ideas that I’m going to be sharing in that case study that I’m gonna be putting to the test and then sharing in the case study.

As well on how I’m using it and how to generate kind of exponential revenue growth from it, as opposed to just linear. And so anyway, I think it’s bad, it’s very valuable, I would encourage you guys to go check it out, it does come with a 14-day free trial. So once you see the webinar, you know, comes with some free or some, I think it’s free, or it’s like five bucks may be to pay for some of the training that Bruno had put together, what he calls the quick start training for that. And so you can get all of that. And your first 14 days determine if it’s for you or not, but I think once you see some of the potentials of this, it would be something if any of you are trying to grow. I think you should absolutely take a good hard look at it. Definitely. Yeah, no, I mean, I don’t do generally local stuff. But I check this out. And like I’ve been looking at it and I talked to Brian about all the details and like I was starting to be like maybe I could find a way to you just like no stop it. But like for anyone out there who’s dealing with especially local clients or can find the right use case

Yeah, just blew me away from the number of services and automation that’s packed into that suite of tools and how seamless that is, is pretty amazing. So definitely worth checking it out. Real quick to this one came up today. So we constantly get questions about GMB verifications, right? You know, hey, where can you guys do GMB verifications work in MGYB, when is it going to be available? I’m going to cut to the chase GMB verifications are available right now. As always, we cannot tell you how long that is going to be the case. So if you are doing lead gen if you’re needing a verification for some other reason, this would be a very good time to put your order in because not only can you order now what you couldn’t have yesterday, you can get a 15% discount today while we’ve got it opened up. Also, it comes with a 30-day guarantee. And it’s about I believe, 14 day turnaround time. So pretty quick. I’ll post all of that in the chatbox for those who are live. If you’re not just head to mgyb.co, and head to the store, you can look for GMB verifications there you can also get syndication networks, Rs drive stacks, SEO shield, link building all that sort of good stuff.

And circling back around. I wanted to touch on this real quick for those of you who are watching us for the first time, thank you very much whether you’re watching live or catching the replay on YouTube. If you want to go to the right place, head to semantic mastery comm slash HD questions every week, we asked you to limit your questions just to one. Unless you’re live, you can ask some more. You know, we get down there. We just want to make sure that everyone has a chance to ask their questions. So if you ask some questions, we may not get to all of them just before Warren. And then secondly, we encourage everyone to check out the battle plan and go to battle plan dot semantic mastery. If you want to get repeated repeatable SEO results that is for you. I’m not going to read the page to you you can go over there and check it out. But it is a fantastic tool that we recently just updated them released version four a month ago.

And then Bradley touched on this too if you’re an agency owner or a consultant that you want to get more clients, yes, you want to grow your revenue. Yes. And you want to scale your team, hopefully, yes. Then if you want to do that, head over 2xyouragency.com. There’s a ton of incredible training lets you crush it, whether you’re again, being a consultant, or if you want to build a true agency, and it doesn’t matter if that’s SEO, it’s other areas of digital marketing. It’s going to help you grow and make more money. That’s the bottom line.

All right, with that said, Guys, any other quick announcements before we dive into questions?

Good. All right. Let’s do it.

All right. Grab the screen.

You guys confirm when you see. See my screen.

Would You Recommend Ordering Another Drive Stack To A New Website Section Targeting Service Keywords In Different Locations?

So it looks like BB Now that might have been from last week. It looks like it was it will start with Bobby. Bobby says Hey guys, I got some questions. The first one was would you recommend ordering another drive stack to a completely new section of a website targeting a different service keyword in different locations on a large content site that would be perfect for the location sealed, am I right? Marco?

Yeah, that’s perfect for the extension. And it’s currently available and as a coupon sweep. So that’s what the drive stack expansion.

Yeah, we’re saying, Yeah, maybe if he already has the brand it because he’s saying another, right, a completely new section of the website. So we’re talking about the same website, money site. That’s how I’m seeing. I’m seeing something different.

He has a different service keyword, and a different location on a large content what so that’s, that’s just an inner page, I think what he’s describing the top of the silo. So you would aim the expansion on the current drive stack at that inner page, you’d get much more power going and extending that initial drive stack then you would be doing a completely different drive stack, g site. Sure, gotcha. Okay.

Would You Recommend RSS Masher To Drive Traffic To A Money Site And Lead Gen Assets?

The next question was GMB.Thanks again, I’ve not used them for lead gen assets but I have in the past I haven’t built since the updated the new version of RSS master which is even better. But to create the kind of like Kwazii PBNs and when I say PBNs, they’re not like what we would traditionally think of a treat PBN, these are real sites to generate real traffic and that’s the differentiator, right? having real sites generate real traffic. With automated content posting to them right through all the RSS feeds that you splice together and RSS masher and all the really cool shit you can do. You can take a look at the most recent webinar we did with Damon Nelson, about the most current version of RSS masher and see some of the examples of the sites that he builds are 100% honest.

Major content sites using RSS masher. And they’re freaking beautiful sites. And he’s generating affiliate income and, you know, like AdSense income. And so such using those sites because they do generate traffic, they look beautiful. But from an SEO standpoint, I looked at it as like, hey, this could be really good to generate, you know, in related content type sites that could feed traffic back to a money site or a lead gen site or whatever. So, I mean, I think it’s certainly possible to use it for that I haven’t done it myself just to be honest because it’s not the strategy that I’ve been pursuing. I’ve wanted to in fact, I even talked about it with my partners here. I would love to have some time to play with that and set up some sights but I haven’t done it yet. I think Marco. Weren’t you guys gonna try playing with that a bit. I know it probably hasn’t been done but wasn’t that on the to-do list?

It is being done. What we are currently testing it and we won’t like there is anything. I’m not personally doing it but I got my mini mastermind, which is where all the evil takes place where we can go after everything. And there’s a couple of people in there who have a license. And then one of them is using our license as I gave her our license to go and try it out. So they got together. Three of the people in my seven-person mini mastermind got together. And what they’re doing is they’re sharing information on how to make make it work in the best way possible. And then they’re going to come back and report it to me and we’re either going to make it available through MGYB as a service, or I’m not sure how we’re going to offer that but there’s definitely something in the works with that RSS masher. It’s just you guys if you go get it just be prepared because there’s a high learning curve is that simple software that you’re just going to go and plug and play

You have to be prepared to go through the training to go through the process, gathering up the feeds making everything look right. And then you know that that’s when the magic happens and I can’t wait to blast that. Now get it, give it a companion g site and drive stack, expand it, and then blast it with link building and some embeds and see what happened. I can’t wait.

Yeah, it looks good. As I said, I wish I had more time to mess with it. Because I think there’s a lot of potentials there as well. So, so maybe next Wednesday, or the following Wednesday, we can give people a preview. But again, the first ones that’ll get a preview, it will be my mini mastermind, and then the semantic mastery mastermind, the heavy hitter club, and then we’ll go public with whatever we have. It’s still a few weeks away, it takes time. That’s all

Is It Possible To Get An Iframe For A Drive Folder?

so Frank’s up. He says it is it possible to get an iframe for a drive folder tried adding a link into iframe generator and it came back saying the page was blocked from being displayed? also. Well, first of all,

The first part of that is Yeah, you can use to be able to do that. But no, I haven’t tried since the updates recently. Marco, can you? Yeah. Not through the iframe January? That’s why I tell people to code their own code. Yeah, because you can’t do it that way. You have to separate the, I can’t go through the process that you have to get the folder ID to be able to iframe it. And what you have to insert in an iframe generator is the entire URL, and you can’t do it that way.

Okay.

Publish to the web would be a file setting in the drive used to say publish to the web, it would give you an embed code for the file or for the folder, but I think that has been taken away correct recently. Uh, no. I can check that right now. I mean, go on and let me take a folder that has nothing in it. And we’ll just move on while you’re looking that up.

Do You Have Any Link Building Services In MGYB For T1 Money Site?

He says also with MGYB, do you have any link building services that could be used for tier-one money site or only g sites? Yeah, that while the SEO shield can point back to your money site, right, which includes the drive stack files and folders as well as the G site. Also, press releases could be used for tier-one money site, right where your money site tier-one money site is. It’s redundant. That’s like the Department of redundancy department. You know what I mean? So, yeah, your money site, again, press releases and the SEO shield? Those are the two things that I would recommend. Am I missing something?

No, no, no, I don’t think so. And I can’t find it. I can’t find published on the web by the way. That’s what I thought had been removed since the recent update. But it used to be able to do it that way. So hopefully that was helpful.

What MGYB Service You Should Use To Rank For A City That Is Three Hours Away From The Dealership Location?

Mohammed’s up, it’s up mom and he says, Hey, guys, a client is asking me if I can rank his Volkswagen dealership for VW related keywords in a city. Three hours away from where the dealership actually is.

Actually, how would I go about this? I know I can get a GMB from MGYB for the New City and add a new city page to the money site. What else would I do?

Well, the problem that I see with that Mohammed is it’s a dealership right? So if you’re getting a GMB for a dealership which is a storefront business, right with the customers come to the business location, and you’ve got a spammed GMB listing, that’s three hours away from where the dealership actually exists, then, how is that going to play with potential car buyers? When they’re looking to go to a dealership in their local area and they’ve come to find out it’s a spam listing and instead they’ve got to go three hours away to buy a Volkswagen. To me, I don’t think that would be advisable for the reasons I just mentioned. Maybe I’m misunderstanding the question. Anybody else interprets this another way?

No, that’s the way I’m I’m reading it unless the dealer is opening up a dealership in that city in which case, you would need spam. GMB. Right. Correct. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, I am not willing to drive three hours to go look at a car, like my dealer has to be closed by where I can just jump in the car. 1015 minutes, I’m there and look at the car and decide if I’m gonna buy it. Because I’ll be people. Yes. I mean, the idea behind it is correct. People are going to first look online to find a car that they liked, and they’re going to find the dealer, then they’re going to go visit the dealer to see the cart. Who’s going to drive? Did you talk that to this dealership owner, by the way, and ask him Who do you know that’s going to drive three hours to buy a car when they can buy one mic in the city? I don’t understand the thinking behind that. Not only that, but don’t you think it would piss a potential customer off if they were misled to believe that a dealership was in their local area just to come to find out that it’s three hours away? I mean, it’s not just that like if he was promoting like ranked a page organically for the city that is three hours away, and says, Hey, we sell cars. Were our dealerships over here and they’re honest about where it is. It’s very likely most people are going to drive three hours away anyways, but at least they weren’t being dishonest about it. Whereas having a GMB for a storefront business where a store doesn’t actually exist, that I think in my view would piss me off if I put driving directions and go show up at this place to find out that it’s it doesn’t exist, and then I got to drive three hours away to go where I intended. What about other car dealers dealerships? wouldn’t they be pissed if you’re faking? A GMB and I just totally am in the area. I don’t think VW corporate would be too happy with that with you faking GMB. I don’t know how much trouble I mean, you can get into a whole lot of trouble behind that. talk to this guy. talk some sense and then

yeah, just find out what his intent is really. And maybe you already know it, Mohammed and it just wasn’t conveyed in that message.

Yeah, but yeah, I mean like I said if I was going to do anything it would be to try to just rank organically for that and just be honest about where the dealership is and why they should drive three hours away to purchase a car at that particular dealership.

SEO Shield Question

Alright, moving on uh, next question is Hello everyone recently I purchased an SEO shield and since I got some discount for link building, I also bought that so I placed the order for SEO shield and link building altogether. What I found out that instead of building the links to my properties, they pointed all the direct all directly to your money site. Okay, you can edit the URLs to build links to an M GI Bill, Why be disregarded that and build all the links to your money site? No continue can find that hard to believe okay. When I inquired from support about it, they said since you had provided the URL file, we built all the links around that. But they also said that they don’t recommend it. I’m a new user purchasing SEO shield first time and also not aware of the internal tech now technicalities excuse me of SEO SEO. So I provide all the information including the URL file because I thought it might be required to build the SEO shield since I bought the SEO, SEO, and link building. So I believe that SM support will follow the best practice since I’ve gone blindly trust SM for SEO related stuff. So my question is Why were the links built directly in the money site even when it is not recommended? No one will pay for the money to I’m not sure what he says.

Now, he says that the links can’t be removed. This website is my six months old hard work. I don’t want to degrade my website by any means. So what should I do now? Should I disavow the links pointing in the Excel sheet? Please suggest, okay, um, the first part of that. I’m not sure if you came to us cold and you don’t know anything about our methodology, then then I could understand where that confusion may have come from.

Perhaps we need to have that clearly explicitly outlined on this on the order page or the order submit Details page. In other words, if it’s not already, but

As far as what you know, we didn’t build all the links to your money site URL. If your money site URL was listed in your submitted URLs list, then some links will have been built to your money site URL. But in all of our training, we always suggest we actually won’t build links to your money site URL if we know that it’s in there. So I don’t know what to tell you on that other than and as far as disavowing Marco doesn’t ever recommend that I’ve done it in the past haven’t done it for years.

I don’t think Have you seen anything negative happen? We don’t suggest it, but I don’t know that it is going to cause any problems. Marco, what do you say about this? I say I have a really big problem with this guy. Right? Because this was sent to support at mg y v.co. And I heard from Deadia and he said, hey, look, you know what, what can we do it with this? What can we do for this person? So we’re looking to do the right thing. Here. Look, I can remove all I think I can remove all the links

But it’s gonna take a while I so we aren’t talking about it, he doesn’t even give support a chance to respond and let him know what the answers are. He comes here to a public forum to air the laundry. And I understand that. I mean, in no way Is this a recommended practice. But I mean, he submitted the URLs for us to build links to if you give us a spreadsheet, how are we to know that there’s a money site included in the spreadsheet? I mean, he’s assuming that we’re supposed to assume and look these, the logic behind this evades me because I just don’t see it, how we’re supposed to know that he’s submitting his money site from now on. And so now we know that we need to make sure that we tell people explicitly on the order form do not submit your money site URL. So thank you for that. But I don’t appreciate

This being aired on a public forum, where we’re taking care of when we’re looking to do what’s best for you and for your website. Not that anything bad has happened. Not that anything bad will happen. We don’t know yet what would happen, but it’s still in the discussion stage and he doesn’t even give it an opportunity comes publicly as Hey, you guys, I thought you were supposed to follow best practice practices and whatever else he says. And I just don’t appreciate it. Give us at least a chance to do the right thing. And then if there’s a problem, if there’s no resolution, then you come here and you speak to us publicly. I thought about writing to you by the way. Because I saw this, I saw the way he called it the ticket, come through and I know I’m supposed to stay away from customer service. But I thought about writing to him because I don’t see the logic. If he submits the URLs to build links. That’s what we’re going to build links to because the customer as always, right? So if you want links built to your money site, in spite of the fact that we don’t recommend it, and then we say, Don’t ever do it, we don’t do it. If you submit the URL, and it’s by mistake, and I’m not saying that you did it on purpose, if by mistake you included in my site, or you didn’t know, it’s going to get links built to it. Now, yeah, we are going to try to do the right thing. That’s all I can say. We were trying to do the right thing before, even after having come on a public forum, and then like hitting on my last nerve, we’re still going to help you out.

Yeah and I don’t know that it’s going to cause any problem. We just, we don’t build links, the types of links that we sell at MGB directly the money site, we always in all of our training suggest not to do that because that’s the whole reason for the SEO shield right is because and that’s why it’s named the SEO shield because it shields your money site, from all the external threats.

SEO and link building that you can do because link building to your money site can, doesn’t always but can create a problem. So it’s not a guarantee that you’re going to have problems because that happened, it might not cause any problems at all, we just don’t recommend it, we suggest not to do it, because there’s no need to because we push all the power to the SEO shield and use the SEO shield to launder basically clean any potential negative juice through Google properties and through high authority assets, that and push relevancy essentially, eventually to the money site. So again, we don’t know that it’s gonna cause a negative impact at all, we just don’t, we don’t test it. Because we don’t do that we always recommend building them directly to the SEO shield. Again, that’s the whole point of the SEO shield. So we have learned, we have now decided or just came to the realization that that needs to be very explicit on the order form, submit page, and that makes sense and we’ll make sure that we make that change and Marco and Dadea, our link builder, are going to do what they can for you. So hopefully that will suffice.

How Do You Use Press Release To Achieve Better Rankings?

Next question, SMS insurances total newbie here, I just ordered the press release. Not sure where to start. I’m clueless on what to do, and the advice would be great. This is awesome that you asked this question because I’m actually working on a little mini-course for press releases for people that want to order and not for SEOs. But for business owners. I mean, anybody can have access to it that they want, but it’s I’m doing a little mini-course for press releases.

For MGYB, in other words, a little mini-course on trying to teach a layman right or a business owner, somebody that’s not an SEO, how to get the most use in the best use the most traction from press releases that you order from MGYB. And I’ll have that done by next Tuesday for sure. Maybe even possibly will be available on by next Wednesday for people to go download as a Lead Magnet or whatever, we’ll see, I don’t know if I’m gonna have it ready by Tuesday. I don’t know if it’ll be ready on Wednesday for public consumption. That said, I can give you a brief rundown on it. Because I was actually working on that presentation earlier today. In fact, it’s over here. So I can show you that I’m not kidding, do it yourself press releases, leveraged PR marketing for your business. So this will be both a presentation as well as some of that stuff hasn’t been added yet. But it will be a presentation that will be available, as well as some videos. So it’ll be like a little mini training course, on how to get the best uses of press releases, and then what to do next as well. So really a quick rundown on that is, first have an understanding of what your keywords are that you want to promote, right? So your primary products and services, products and or services, or an event if you’re promoting an event, whatever, whatever you’re trying to promote. You want to have a set of keywords that you’re looking to promote. And you want to submit that as the primary keyword for each one of the press releases.

So the press release writers, the writers that they’re really good about creating brand plus keyword association. So if you submit the keyword that you want to be used as the primary keyword, they’re going to create that they’re going to use the brand name and the keyword in the title. Okay, which is very, very important. And then they’re going to write about whatever it is that you instruct them to write about. And you can be as descriptive about how to like, you can tell them the tone that you want, that you want them to write it in, you can tell them certain things that you want them to highlight within the press release. Or you can be vague, you can just say, here’s the URL that I want you to promote. And they’ll go look at the URL, also look at the brand and they’ll create a news angle story, that they’ll write a press release about so it makes it easy for you guys if you have something specific you want written about. add that in the writing description. If you don’t and you don’t know how to create a newsworthy angle, don’t worry about it because that’s what the press release riders do. So you can just submit a URL and say this is the primary

URL I want promoting, write a story about it right. And though they’ll figure out a way, which is why I love using it, because it takes the responsibility right off of us to come up with the angle all the time. They’re really good about that once the press release is published, or you want to also link back to whatever you’re primarily trying to promote. So for example, I like to, by the way, if you’re new SM, s and s insurance, you can go to our YouTube channel youtube.com slash Semantic Mastery and use the channel search feature. And you can even go to Google and search for a press release or PR silo stalking or press release, SEO, semantic mastery, something like that, and you can find a webinar it’s actually still on mg y v. If you go to the webinars tab on the MG y v.co. website, you can take a look, I think that was the last webinar that we did was PR silo stalking, and that’ll give you a really good description. It was almost an hour You know, I don’t know 40-minute webinar or whatever specifically about how to get the

Most uses out are the best use out of sight, press releases. So again, you’re going to want to have at least one URL that you’re going to promote, you can have up to three, I usually recommend only two URLs per the press release, unless you’re siloing press releases, in which case you’ll have three, three target URLs that you’re promoting within the press release because you’re going to be linking back to the previous press release within that silo. if all of this sounds foreign to you, just go check out that webinar that I just described. And then it will tell you exactly what we do to get really, really good results with press releases. And just an aside to kind of a point to kind of reinforce this is I was just talking in the mastermind two weeks ago when I did my last mastermind webinar, about how I have a GMB asset as a lead gen asset that I hadn’t done anything with it was published about a year and a half, maybe two years ago, but I never optimized it never did anything to rank it. And I did three press releases in one week to push that GMB asset and all it has is it’s a GMB location. You know, profile and it’s got a GMB website. It’s not connected to a money site. The money site is the GMB website. And I did three press releases in a week. And the son of a bitch disappeared from maps all together for about three weeks. But then it popped after three weeks of it like not even showing I thought it got it was doing a Google dance. But I’ve not seen one this drastic, or this is significant of a Google dance to where it like literally, the listing disappeared, it disappeared entirely from Google Maps. And then all of a sudden bounce it when it popped, it popped into number three, the C position in the maps three pack from just three press releases in a week. Now that’s those results aren’t typical, but I’m just sharing that because it does show you that and all I did was PR silo stacking method, the same one that I’m suggesting you go watch that webinar to learn the strategy. And it works guys. It really does work. So that’s what I would recommend is

Just first go look at that webinar. And then after you have published the press release, it’s always better to do like one press release isn’t going to move the needle much, if at all, but when you start to do the silo stacking with press releases, you can do significant damage with that, and in a good way, right, yeah. And then from there, the next thing you can do is do link building gigs to the press releases or to the organization page that we provide. When you order a press release. That’s something else and embed gigs. You can do embed gigs as well, but don’t link directly to your money site. Anyway, you want to comment on that anybody?

From dance is real man. Right? We tell people 21 days actually, it’s 20 days. But I tell people 21 days just to be sure they’re clear of it. And then that’s when you go and take a look at everything. You decide what to do, but it’s very real. I don’t know why more people don’t talk about that. They just see rankings drop and then they go try to fix it and they make things worse instead of trying to instead of the result being better.

You just supposed to leave it alone until like you said, it just comes back and then you decide.

Unknown Speaker 35:06 Yeah, what’s interesting is, like you said, for about three weeks, I haven’t seen something that drastic of a dance in quite some time to be honest with you. And so I was a little bit nervous. I was thinking like, What the fuck is going on with this, this listing? And all I did was a handful of GMB posts to that listing over the course of those three weeks that was it, nothing else. And like I said, it popped and when it did, it’s, it’s in the number. In fact, I just got a lead from that today for sure, for Tree Removal in that particular city. So it’s producing and all it took was three press releases, which again, is very, very powerful. So it used the exact same method I just mentioned was PR silo stacking, so just go watch that webinar. It’s done in the MGYB, webinar archive, and it’s PR silo stacking, and it works really, really well.

Okay, next question. DC SEO says, Hey guys, I received the ROI as part of my shield back and your wise keywords are the ones that gave your team they’re in the same niche, but very different to what I handed in Is this right? Mine didn’t have any location or mine, I guess he means mine didn’t have any location as per instructions and what I received that keyword plus locations from around the world. I’m in the UK as well as a ton of keywords that are irrelevant to my services. I don’t know how that could happen. Any, any suggestion? No, that doesn’t sound right. But this isn’t the forum for that is it support at MGYB.co. What happened? Give us the order number. We’ll go track it down. And if we have to do it over, we’ll do it over we’ll talk to the VA who built it. I mean, we take care of everything guys. We always do we always try to do right, by everyone. You have to do things in the proper forum.

Last week, end of last week or whatever, I think it was Friday, I announced that we had cracked the code that we were able to now extend the drugs tax because we had automated it. And then someone posted in all of our groups, well, what if I have a VA? How do I train them?

And so now, no matter where I respond, it’s going to look like I didn’t respond and all of the other I would have to go and respond in all of the other groups, the very same thing that I responded in the one group and it’s gonna make it look in the other in the groups where I don’t respond like I don’t care or it doesn’t matter or I didn’t want to respond or whatever. I don’t like guys do things in the right place. And at the right time, this first goes to support. If support doesn’t take care of you, then come to us and let us know. And then like, I know, one of the owners in MGB and I’ll have a talk with him and see what we can do about rectifying the situation, but it’s in here in a public forum. I can’t do anything for you.

Yeah, Fidel. If it was indeed a mistake on our end, then absolutely. We just kill that drive, stack, and build and one for you. So and it won’t, it won’t hurt you at all. So it’s not an issue if it was indeed our problem. If you submitted the wrong keyword file, that’s one thing, but if it was, somehow it got built with keywords that you didn’t submit, which is unlikely, but people are human things happen. So if that was the case, just bring it to supports attention, we’ll take a look at it and if that was indeed the case, it would just kill that stack and then go to a new one, and it won’t it won’t cause any problems. So that’s the beautiful thing about those guys and that’s also why we talked about using the SEO shield for clients and stuff like that because you get the accounts back and you could protect your work right? Because if something happens and you get fired or the client stops paying you I’ve had that happen where they just ghost on you, you know what I mean? The business still exists but they just won’t answer phone calls or emails when they owe you money that kind I’ve had that happen several times over my career. You can go in and just kill the drive stack, delete it. I don’t even set it to not public which is it’s changed now anyways and because it can still push power, even when it’s not indexable. But you can go in and just kill the damn thing or rework it to point somewhere else, you know, to meet to their competitor, that you can go land as a client. So that’s one of the beautiful things about it. So it can be remedied. That’s not a problem.

Can You Create A Subdomain, Rank, And Redirect All The Pages To Another Site While Maintaining Its Ranking?

The next question was, can you create a subdomain website and rank it and then redirect all the pages to another site? And the subdomain maintain its rankings? No, because the redirect will point to the new location and new locate the new location is going to replace the subdomain at some point, right? You can’t redirect a URL and have both the URLs still appear in search, or they might temporarily, and I don’t even know that that’s true. But Google will whatever the redirect is eventually that’s what will rank and the other one will fall out of the index entirely. Am I right in that, or am I missing something? I’m not I think you’re absolutely right. I don’t see how you can’t since you’re telling the bot through the 301 that the page or everything in that sub-domain moved permanently somewhere else. Yeah. You could use I mean, that’s what it is. Yeah, you could use a canonical. And it can both pages can rank. I’ve seen that many times, you’re telling Google with a canonical, like, hey, this page is similar to this page over here, give the credit to this page, right? And then Google sometimes disregards that and well, you know, both pages will index and they’ll both rank. And that happens. So I would suggest a canonical instead of a 301 if that’s what you’re trying to accomplish, but remember that just because you canonicalize. It doesn’t, you know, doesn’t mean Google’s going to honor that. It also doesn’t mean that they won’t honor it. Right? It just kind of it’s kind of a crapshoot. So yeah, what, what that is canonical is when you have similar or the same, and it doesn’t have to be two. It could be two or more, however many copies of that document. There is there exists. You can tell Google which ones the master copy is and to rank that one, rather than all the other. Now, whether Google follows the directive, well, that’s up to Google. And they’re not telling what they’ll do is right.

Yeah, and just to, you know, kind of reinforce that I’m working on a tree care project. for it, you know, for new, a new lead gen service provider that I got. And it’s a case study that I’m doing in the mastermind, and I use tags, tags to create location silos anyways, a Google, it’s a new site, right? And my blogger just started blogging for the location posts on the site. And the way that we’re doing building it out with using tags to create the location silos. Google was ranking the tag pages, but not, but not the posts that I wanted to be ranked. And it indexed the tag pages first, right and the tag pages because some in some cases, they’re unique tags, which means that the tag page is a duplicate of post, that if you guys understand how tags work, that’s what happens if it’s a unique tag, it’s only in one post, then the tag page itself is essentially a duplicate of the post. And so for whatever reason, Google index the tag pages instead of the posts, and so the tag pages were ranking for the keywords, but not the post. And so and I even set the canonical in the tag setting with SEO ultimate Pro, you can do that because you can go to what’s called the Global canonical manager, or even the code inserter plus module, you can actually go in and add like a separate canonical for each tag and all that kind of stuff anyway. So I added the canonical URLs for the tag pages to canonicalize to the post, right, when it’s a unique tag, you can do that. And but Google wasn’t honoring it. And about two weeks went by and so finally I went just this week, I just went to search console, and forced Google to recrawl the posts or excuse me, the tag pages because they had the canonical URLs in the HTML header to point to the posts that I wanted to give the credit to. Right and that’s what I want to be ranked, and it only took about 24 hours, and lo and behold, now the tag pages aren’t indexed, but the posts are, which is what I wanted. So again, it, you know, that doesn’t mean that that’s always going to happen, because it could be that Google doesn’t honor the canonical or doesn’t, you know, doesn’t recognize it for whatever reason, they, By the way, you can also check that when you submit inspect URL in Search Console. And once it inspects the URL, it’s going to tell you whether it’s in Google or not. And there’s a drop-down setting that your menu that you can click on to expand, it shows you additional details, and it’ll tell you what the Google recognized canonical is for that page, or that post whatever URL it is that you’re inspecting. Right? And so you can clearly see what Google seeing. So you can force a canonical, and then go ask Google to request indexing. And then once it does, you know you can look at the code that it shows like the rendered page and it’ll tell you the details of that and it’ll show you if it if it saw the canonical or not. So anyway, hopefully, that was helpful. Do you see SEO

Is It Okay To Embed MyMap Via Tag Manager?

Is it? Is it okay to embed the mind map via Tag Manager? I’m not sure how you would do that.

I’m not sure how you would do that. Tag Manager creates container codes, right header code, and Body Code. And then you inject things into that like scripts and tracking codes and pixels and that kind of stuff. And I don’t know what embedding a my map would do, or if it would even read. Is that something you have any idea about? Marco?

Hello, sorry. Yeah, sorry about that. I was talking intimidated might not I think you can. You can use iframes with Tag Manager not not only that, you can track them. Hmm. Am I giving away too much? Oh, nevermind.

I’ll have to play with that DC. I’m not sure. I’ve never done it. Don’t listen, go play with it. And then and then look at all the nice stuff that happens in there.

Okay.

Cool, well there you go.

Is It A Good Deal To Have A 1500 Monthly Retainer Plus Sale Percentage?

Unknown Speaker 45:03 Alright, so moving on next one is Josh says I am changing locations from my current office to a shared workspace and apparently with Google, this isn’t a verifiable address so they won’t verify my GMB profile with this type of address. With the MG y b GMB service will this help with this issue?

Is it a storefront or a service area business that would be my question. Can you get a listing right now a GMB listing through MGYB? Yes.

As we talked about with Mohammed’s question earlier, if it’s a storefront business, I don’t recommend using a spam GMB listing for any type of storefront business because you mislead potential customers because they think it’s in one location and you are indeed in another location. So the only time I would ever recommend using a spammed GMB listing, let’s call it what it is. As for a service area business where the actual physical location in the GMB profile is hidden from the public, so it makes sense. So again, if it’s a service area business, then yes, that would help you. If it’s a storefront business, I wouldn’t recommend it.

Any comments, guys?

No, I think that’s absolutely right, man. It’s a myth. You got to know what you’re getting into. Especially if you’re, if you’re going to spam it, right?

Yeah.

I’ve gotten away from doing spam, GMB listings just because the how much volatility there’s been in the last, you know, many months. Um, so I’m working more heavily on the organic side. Now, again, which has been years since I really pushed that. So it’s interesting, and that’s what the tree care project that I’m working on is, in part is a case study for the mastermind, is working on mostly organic rankings. I do have some GMB locations that are going to be incorporated into the project most of the organic rankings. And I’m also doing a lot of call ads call-only ads for Google ads. They are

If you’re very specific with Google call-only ads with your what I call Bullseye keywords, then you can get some pretty good results with that. It’s a lot less expensive than actual clicks to like, you know, regular PPC pay per Click type ads, pay per call ads are a little bit less expensive if you have very, very targeted keywords with location modifiers and such. So that’s what I’m working on right now.

What MGYB Service Should You Use Get More SEO Clients?

Lonnie says I landed my first client concrete company 1500 dollars per month plus percentage of sales. This is a good deal fucking a man. Congratulations, Lonnie. That’s all that looks like it looks like a really good deal. Absolutely. That’s a cherry deal for sure. So congratulations, man. I’m gonna hop in real quick and say it’s all relative, right? One congrats on getting that. Especially the percentage of sales and revenue. That’s a big one that I think a lot of people miss out on. But keep in mind too, this is totally dependent on what he’s doing for that. 1500 That’s true. You’d be getting worked to the fucking ground for 1500 but you know

It’s up to you, you You are the person who can determine whether or not that’s worthwhile. Yeah, that’s a great point, Adam.

And just know this, if it’s your first client, you probably are going to be work to death anyways. Because it’s your first client and you will learn over time, how to set boundaries with clients. Just talk to Mohammed who’s always here asking questions every single week. Mohammed’s been following us for a long, long time, and we’ve watched him grow considerably over the last couple of years. And he’s experienced a lot of growing pains and come here and ask for advice. And that’s what this forum is for Lonnie. So feel free to come back and ask questions every week. concerning how to handle certain situations doesn’t always have to be SEO related either. It could just be about how to handle particular clients, business operations, management, outsourcing, all that kind of stuff. Guys, we’re here to help grow your business as much as possible. Yes, we talk a lot about SEO. But there’s a lot of other things that we’ve all learned with our experience over the years on how to, you know, help you to avoid some of the mistakes that we’ve all made.

But just know that it is your first client there, it’s likely you’re going to be work to death for that client. And that’s okay. Because you’re going to learn a lot from that. And you’ll begin to learn how to start to set boundaries. And remember, you know, one thing I want to recommend is, you do need to also set like communication boundaries, I don’t know that your new client is is somebody that might message you outside of business hours or over the weekend and that kind of stuff. But I’ve got a lot of clients that still to this day do, but I’ve trained them that I don’t reply to messages after hours or on weekends. Unless it’s an emergency like I have a preschool client that had a site go down on over a weekend and I had my daughter and I did actually help him because he’s a really good client and me, you know, I felt for him and I wanted to help him but very rarely do I ever reply to anything outside of ours, because once you set that precedent, people will take advantage of it. I don’t know that they mean to be malicious, but they just think that hey, I messaged him at night and he answered me, so, therefore, it’s okay for me to ask questions at any time, I would recommend that you know, as your first client, you need to start to learn how to set boundaries right upfront.

Anyways, let’s get back to the question. Sorry, I’m glad that Adam put that into perspective, because I immediately saw that percentage. And my mind went to the mat, my mind always goes to the numbers, where I normally get this company to 100-200k a month recurring for you know, out of if it’s like Costa Rica, where they work around, like, it’s killer money, it’s killer money, but even if it’s seasonal, right, you can’t work in the winter, if what if they’re doing driveways or whatever it is that they’re paving. If they’re laying a concrete slab, you’re talking about 100 k easy and if you charge 10 to 15% of that recurring, then I’m seeing that as a really good deal. If you’re going to be worked to the bone and the client can’t close. Then you got a problem. So thanks for putting that into perspective.

Yeah, not to downplay it. Yeah, definitely just wanted to tell because the way he phrased it that’s what gave me the hesitation. It’s like, Is this good? Like, man, there’s no way for us to know you’re the one who’s got to do that. But you know, congratulations on doing that. That’s good to see. Yeah. And I mean, like I said, Just remember, as your first client, you will make mistakes, there’s no question, you will work harder than you probably should. And that’s okay. Like I said, you’re going to learn from that. So, you know, just keep that in mind. Remember, come back here and ask questions often and we’ll try to provide you as much advice as we can. He says, also, I’m looking for simple services I can use to get me in on getting clients and suggestions. By the way, I love the video lead gen 2xyoruagency. Well, there, there you go. You have the video lead gen system and 2xyoruagency which is great for prospecting and generating prospects, right? Don’t build that pipeline first. Right? And that’s super, super important in through having a full pipeline of prospects and making presentations sending proposals, right so pitching prospects, you will get better, you’re gonna lose money upfront, and that’s okay. But you will get better you’ll be able to polish your presentation and your pitch and your message and all of that. And so just that’s why it’s so important guys to fill that pipeline full of prospects so that you can make those mistakes. And not every prospect that you talk to is going like you depend on them to be able to put food on your table. If because if that’s the case, desperation comes through and everything that you do, and they can smell that from a mile away. And so I think it’s better to have a pipeline full of prospects because then it’s okay, you don’t need anyone of them because you have more behind them. Right, that makes sense. As far as simple services, I recommend getting the most updated version of the battle plan if you don’t already have that. A lot of that was covered in 2xyoruagency anyways, but the battle plan is a very succinct version of what we recommend to get results and timelines for doing so and all of that and it’s very inexpensive. So I’d recommend you pick that up if you don’t have it already.

I’d also say mgyb.co, I mean everything there for you to offer your clients, whatever it is that they want. Everything is their press releases, liquidity and anything and everything that you need to do to produce results for your clients in MGYB.co. And if it doesn’t mean you have a good idea of a product that let us know.

What Is A Money Site?

This is a great question from Josh, he says, And see, guys, this is the thing you know, I think we often forget. Because we’ve been in this industry so long that not everybody understands the terminology. He says one more quick question, what exactly do you mean by money site that means your primary digital asset so like, whatever your primary domain is that you host your, your website for your business on? That’s what we call a money site. Why? Because it’s the site that generates you money, right? A lot of the other stuff that you know, we talked about is tier-one branded entity assets. Again, big terminology for basically meaning like social profiles and stuff that you can build a branded profile or presence on that you’re going to link back to your money site, your money site is your Epicenter, right? It’s your point of origin, it’s the golden frame, you always want to drive, all traffic all leads as much as possible back to your money site, because you have control over that’s an asset that you own and control, having ancillary profiles on social media properties and, you know, web to Dotto properties, and all that kind of stuff is great. And that’s what we do with the SEO shoot as we build all that stuff out. But ultimately, you don’t own those platforms. They could be taken away from you by Google, by YouTube, by Facebook, whatever, at any time. So they’re great to have. They’re great to use. But it’s best to try to use those to push people push traffic back to your money site because you do have control over that. And there’s so much more than you can do that. So your money site is again it’s your self hosted primary domain asset for your business, your company, your project, whatever it may be. Anybody else wants to take a stab at that? Yeah.

It could be your Google My Business website. It could be that it could be your your G site. It could be, you know, a free WordPress blog or blogger, Tumblr, or wherever it is that you choose to blog from, like, you don’t have to have something that’s self hosted. WordPress, are a self hosted domain for you to have a money site. This is like you said, it’s the place where you plan to send people to in order to make money and edit in order to sell your product service or whatever it is that you want people to see or buy. That’s your money site. Why? Because it makes you money. Not to say that there are other places that could make you money like social media, but it’s the primary source of what it is that you’re planning to do. Yeah, that’s a great point because as we talked about a lot of lead gen assets that I have don’t have a self-hosted money site. They are just GMB website.

In other words, the website, the Google My Business provides you which is free. And ultimately you don’t have full control over that Google does. Right. So I, you know, I’m glad Marco brought that up. Because I just mentioned self-hosted website, it doesn’t have to be that recommend that was possible. But there are times where it makes sense to not build a self-hosted website, for example, spammed GMB listings, it might not be wise to go through the trouble of building out a, you know, a self-hosted site because of all the work that goes into it. Whereas, you know, in case it was to get suspended, you lose all of them, the work that you did, essentially. So in that case, you know, the GMB website becomes the primary website for that location. Or another option would be like Marco said, you know, Google Site g site, right, so sites.google.com, that they, Marco and Rob have done several projects using those as the money site, and it works. It works really, really well. So the money site is exactly what Marco described, which is whatever it is that you’re using to make money.

If you’re going to build a brand, I think it’s important to build a self-hosted website with the brand name as the domain name, because you can really grow the authority of that brand and you benefit from that in so many ways. So, it’s a great question though. Alright, so the last question and we’ve only got three minutes left, we’re gonna wrap it up.

What SEO And Lead Gen Contract Do You Recommend?

He says, Lonnie says I’m having trouble with putting an SEO and lead with I’m sorry, with put an SEO and lead gen contract. Do you have any recommended contract forms? No, I don’t, you know, you could probably just go online and find some templates that you could use. I personally don’t like to use contracts I, I mean, I have in the past, but typically, it’s only for bigger companies that, you know, they want the contract. I like to do everything on a verbal agreement. So that and I always say this to potential prospects or customers look, you know, if I’m doing my job, you’re gonna want to continue paying me if I’m not, you’re not gonna want to continue paying me and that’s okay. I also want to be able to part ways from that client if we don’t dive well, we don’t agree on things if it’s just not a good fit, and I don’t want to be locked into a contract either. So I don’t expect my clients to want to be locked into a contract. And sometimes that burns me, for example, I had a home inspector client, that, you know, I very clearly stated what the timeline was going to be on results.

I typically asked for, hey, give me this much time. And before that time had passed before I reached that certain level of time that I mentioned, he canceled services. And I you know, And to me, that’s really unfair for both of us because he wasn’t able to get the results that he wanted, because it wasn’t, you know, fast enough for him even though I clearly stated all of that before we agreed to work together. But at the same time, I put a lot of work into that and it wasn’t able to fully realize the efforts you know, for him or for myself for my own satisfaction because he stopped paying me before all the work had been completed, if that makes sense. Sometimes I wish I did have a contract in place. But for the most part, I like the ability to be able to walk away from a client. And I also like them to know that they don’t, they’re not locked into a contract that kind of eases that.

That low and lowers the barrier to entry, so to speak. However, that said, there might be a difference of opinion here for some of the other guys. And you guys have a suggestion for him.

Now, you know me, I don’t do contracts. I hate him. I hate him. He locks me into everything. And what if I want to go out and maybe the client doesn’t want to go well, what if I want to go? What if I can’t stand the client? I want to go and then I’m bound by a contract for a year with this guy that I can’t stand that knows more or supposedly knows more than I do, which sometimes happens.

If you know how to produce results, then always go, “Look, I’ll give you results.” But record the quality I always record the call that that call. We talk

Bradley, what is going to take this long? I always have that recorded even though there’s no contract and I let the guy know Look, I’m gonna record the call. And then you can always refer revert back to that’s a contract, believe it or not, that’s a contract. Right? And it’ll hold up in most courts. I believe in the US. It’ll hold up, it’ll hold up in Costa Rica.

That’s a good idea. And yeah, if you disclose that right up front, and then get it on the recording, you do agree that this is being recorded, and that’s okay, right.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. I’m going to be recording this, I’m just gonna point this way. This way, we can refer back to the conversation, you know exactly what took place. I know exactly what to put in you walk them through, you know that this is going to take about 90 days for results. thereabouts. Because if you don’t, then you go into the process because I have to set everything up. And then we get everything going. I’m probably going to get two results before but I can’t guarantee any Google experience tells me that within 90 days, we should be able to see something, and then we can work from there but I need 90 days from you.

Are you okay with that? Yeah, yeah, sure, you’re gonna get that nine out of 10. So now you have a binding contract now, at the end of it you tell at the end of those 90 days when we meet again, then we’ll decide if we continue.

Now real quick, I know Adam is if you’re still paying attention, I know we’re a little bit over, but I think you have a little bit of a different methodology. Is there any way you can comment on this? Um, yeah, I just I’m trying to think like, I don’t have too much of a difference it’s kind of constantly evolving. But yeah, I mean, as far as contracts go like I stay out of that I’ve never done anything. Okay. Yeah. And then, if he’s looking for actual he may just mean, he’s looking for an outline for like a proposal or an engagement proposal. If that’s the case, just contact support at semantic mastery comm will point you in the right direction. I know Hernan put one out there we had as a free opt-in that you could get as an outline. And that can be really helpful. I mean, I’ve used other people’s as a starting point when I’m changing services.

Adding something in just so that I have a good starting point then you tailor it kind of to your specifics.

Very good. Thank you. Alright guys, thanks everybody for being here is Chris were you gonna says something? I’m sorry. I mean like he is like a lead gen contract. I mean, like why not sell on a per lead basis? I don’t see there’s an issue you can do like a contract that states the price of the elite.

Yeah. So you should be fine that way. It should be super easy.

Sweet. Well, thanks for your input, guys. And thanks, everybody for being here. We will see you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289 published first on your-t1-blog-url

0 notes

beyondvapepage · 5 years ago

Text

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 289 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts Episode 289 to one where Hernan looks continuously shocked for some reason.

I’ll start to my top left here Bradley. How are you doing today?

All right, with that said, Guys, any other quick announcements before we dive into questions?

Good. All right. Let’s do it.

All right. Grab the screen.

You guys confirm when you see. See my screen.

Would You Recommend Ordering Another Drive Stack To A New Website Section Targeting Service Keywords In Different Locations?

Yeah, that’s perfect for the extension. And it’s currently available and as a coupon sweep. So that’s what the drive stack expansion.

Would You Recommend RSS Masher To Drive Traffic To A Money Site And Lead Gen Assets?

Is It Possible To Get An Iframe For A Drive Folder?

Okay.

Do You Have Any Link Building Services In MGYB For T1 Money Site?

What MGYB Service You Should Use To Rank For A City That Is Three Hours Away From The Dealership Location?

Actually, how would I go about this? I know I can get a GMB from MGYB for the New City and add a new city page to the money site. What else would I do?

yeah, just find out what his intent is really. And maybe you already know it, Mohammed and it just wasn’t conveyed in that message.

SEO Shield Question

Perhaps we need to have that clearly explicitly outlined on this on the order page or the order submit Details page. In other words, if it’s not already, but

How Do You Use Press Release To Achieve Better Rankings?

You just supposed to leave it alone until like you said, it just comes back and then you decide.

Can You Create A Subdomain, Rank, And Redirect All The Pages To Another Site While Maintaining Its Ranking?

Is It Okay To Embed MyMap Via Tag Manager?

Is it? Is it okay to embed the mind map via Tag Manager? I’m not sure how you would do that.

I’ll have to play with that DC. I’m not sure. I’ve never done it. Don’t listen, go play with it. And then and then look at all the nice stuff that happens in there.

Okay.

Cool, well there you go.

Is It A Good Deal To Have A 1500 Monthly Retainer Plus Sale Percentage?

Is it a storefront or a service area business that would be my question. Can you get a listing right now a GMB listing through MGYB? Yes.

Any comments, guys?

No, I think that’s absolutely right, man. It’s a myth. You got to know what you’re getting into. Especially if you’re, if you’re going to spam it, right?

Yeah.

What MGYB Service Should You Use Get More SEO Clients?

It’s up to you, you You are the person who can determine whether or not that’s worthwhile. Yeah, that’s a great point, Adam.

What Is A Money Site?

What SEO And Lead Gen Contract Do You Recommend?

That low and lowers the barrier to entry, so to speak. However, that said, there might be a difference of opinion here for some of the other guys. And you guys have a suggestion for him.

If you know how to produce results, then always go, “Look, I’ll give you results.” But record the quality I always record the call that that call. We talk

That’s a good idea. And yeah, if you disclose that right up front, and then get it on the recording, you do agree that this is being recorded, and that’s okay, right.

Adding something in just so that I have a good starting point then you tailor it kind of to your specifics.

Yeah. So you should be fine that way. It should be super easy.

Sweet. Well, thanks for your input, guys. And thanks, everybody for being here. We will see you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289 posted first on http://beyondvapepage.blogspot.com

0 notes

daynamartinez22 · 5 years ago

Text

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 289 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts Episode 289 to one where Hernan looks continuously shocked for some reason.

I’ll start to my top left here Bradley. How are you doing today?

All right, with that said, Guys, any other quick announcements before we dive into questions?

Good. All right. Let’s do it.

All right. Grab the screen.

You guys confirm when you see. See my screen.

Would You Recommend Ordering Another Drive Stack To A New Website Section Targeting Service Keywords In Different Locations?

Yeah, that’s perfect for the extension. And it’s currently available and as a coupon sweep. So that’s what the drive stack expansion.

Would You Recommend RSS Masher To Drive Traffic To A Money Site And Lead Gen Assets?

Is It Possible To Get An Iframe For A Drive Folder?

Okay.

Do You Have Any Link Building Services In MGYB For T1 Money Site?

What MGYB Service You Should Use To Rank For A City That Is Three Hours Away From The Dealership Location?

Actually, how would I go about this? I know I can get a GMB from MGYB for the New City and add a new city page to the money site. What else would I do?

yeah, just find out what his intent is really. And maybe you already know it, Mohammed and it just wasn’t conveyed in that message.

SEO Shield Question

Perhaps we need to have that clearly explicitly outlined on this on the order page or the order submit Details page. In other words, if it’s not already, but

How Do You Use Press Release To Achieve Better Rankings?

You just supposed to leave it alone until like you said, it just comes back and then you decide.

Can You Create A Subdomain, Rank, And Redirect All The Pages To Another Site While Maintaining Its Ranking?

Is It Okay To Embed MyMap Via Tag Manager?

Is it? Is it okay to embed the mind map via Tag Manager? I’m not sure how you would do that.

I’ll have to play with that DC. I’m not sure. I’ve never done it. Don’t listen, go play with it. And then and then look at all the nice stuff that happens in there.

Okay.

Cool, well there you go.

Is It A Good Deal To Have A 1500 Monthly Retainer Plus Sale Percentage?

Is it a storefront or a service area business that would be my question. Can you get a listing right now a GMB listing through MGYB? Yes.

Any comments, guys?

No, I think that’s absolutely right, man. It’s a myth. You got to know what you’re getting into. Especially if you’re, if you’re going to spam it, right?

Yeah.

What MGYB Service Should You Use Get More SEO Clients?

It’s up to you, you You are the person who can determine whether or not that’s worthwhile. Yeah, that’s a great point, Adam.

What Is A Money Site?

What SEO And Lead Gen Contract Do You Recommend?

That low and lowers the barrier to entry, so to speak. However, that said, there might be a difference of opinion here for some of the other guys. And you guys have a suggestion for him.

If you know how to produce results, then always go, “Look, I’ll give you results.” But record the quality I always record the call that that call. We talk

That’s a good idea. And yeah, if you disclose that right up front, and then get it on the recording, you do agree that this is being recorded, and that’s okay, right.

Adding something in just so that I have a good starting point then you tailor it kind of to your specifics.

Yeah. So you should be fine that way. It should be super easy.

Sweet. Well, thanks for your input, guys. And thanks, everybody for being here. We will see you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289 published first on your-t1-blog-url

0 notes

pledje · 5 years ago

Text

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 289 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts Episode 289 to one where Hernan looks continuously shocked for some reason.

I’ll start to my top left here Bradley. How are you doing today?

All right, with that said, Guys, any other quick announcements before we dive into questions?

Good. All right. Let’s do it.

All right. Grab the screen.

You guys confirm when you see. See my screen.

Would You Recommend Ordering Another Drive Stack To A New Website Section Targeting Service Keywords In Different Locations?

Yeah, that’s perfect for the extension. And it’s currently available and as a coupon sweep. So that’s what the drive stack expansion.

Would You Recommend RSS Masher To Drive Traffic To A Money Site And Lead Gen Assets?

Is It Possible To Get An Iframe For A Drive Folder?

Okay.

Do You Have Any Link Building Services In MGYB For T1 Money Site?

What MGYB Service You Should Use To Rank For A City That Is Three Hours Away From The Dealership Location?

Actually, how would I go about this? I know I can get a GMB from MGYB for the New City and add a new city page to the money site. What else would I do?

yeah, just find out what his intent is really. And maybe you already know it, Mohammed and it just wasn’t conveyed in that message.

SEO Shield Question

Perhaps we need to have that clearly explicitly outlined on this on the order page or the order submit Details page. In other words, if it’s not already, but

How Do You Use Press Release To Achieve Better Rankings?

You just supposed to leave it alone until like you said, it just comes back and then you decide.

Can You Create A Subdomain, Rank, And Redirect All The Pages To Another Site While Maintaining Its Ranking?

Is It Okay To Embed MyMap Via Tag Manager?

Is it? Is it okay to embed the mind map via Tag Manager? I’m not sure how you would do that.

I’ll have to play with that DC. I’m not sure. I’ve never done it. Don’t listen, go play with it. And then and then look at all the nice stuff that happens in there.

Okay.

Cool, well there you go.

Is It A Good Deal To Have A 1500 Monthly Retainer Plus Sale Percentage?

Is it a storefront or a service area business that would be my question. Can you get a listing right now a GMB listing through MGYB? Yes.

Any comments, guys?

No, I think that’s absolutely right, man. It’s a myth. You got to know what you’re getting into. Especially if you’re, if you’re going to spam it, right?

Yeah.

What MGYB Service Should You Use Get More SEO Clients?

It’s up to you, you You are the person who can determine whether or not that’s worthwhile. Yeah, that’s a great point, Adam.

What Is A Money Site?

What SEO And Lead Gen Contract Do You Recommend?

That low and lowers the barrier to entry, so to speak. However, that said, there might be a difference of opinion here for some of the other guys. And you guys have a suggestion for him.

If you know how to produce results, then always go, “Look, I’ll give you results.” But record the quality I always record the call that that call. We talk

That’s a good idea. And yeah, if you disclose that right up front, and then get it on the recording, you do agree that this is being recorded, and that’s okay, right.

Adding something in just so that I have a good starting point then you tailor it kind of to your specifics.

Yeah. So you should be fine that way. It should be super easy.

Sweet. Well, thanks for your input, guys. And thanks, everybody for being here. We will see you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289 published first on your-t1-blog-url

0 notes

localwebmgmt · 5 years ago

Text

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 289 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts Episode 289 to one where Hernan looks continuously shocked for some reason.

I’ll start to my top left here Bradley. How are you doing today?

All right, with that said, Guys, any other quick announcements before we dive into questions?

Good. All right. Let’s do it.

All right. Grab the screen.

You guys confirm when you see. See my screen.

Would You Recommend Ordering Another Drive Stack To A New Website Section Targeting Service Keywords In Different Locations?

Yeah, that’s perfect for the extension. And it’s currently available and as a coupon sweep. So that’s what the drive stack expansion.

Would You Recommend RSS Masher To Drive Traffic To A Money Site And Lead Gen Assets?

Is It Possible To Get An Iframe For A Drive Folder?

Okay.

Do You Have Any Link Building Services In MGYB For T1 Money Site?

What MGYB Service You Should Use To Rank For A City That Is Three Hours Away From The Dealership Location?

Actually, how would I go about this? I know I can get a GMB from MGYB for the New City and add a new city page to the money site. What else would I do?

yeah, just find out what his intent is really. And maybe you already know it, Mohammed and it just wasn’t conveyed in that message.

SEO Shield Question

Perhaps we need to have that clearly explicitly outlined on this on the order page or the order submit Details page. In other words, if it’s not already, but

How Do You Use Press Release To Achieve Better Rankings?

You just supposed to leave it alone until like you said, it just comes back and then you decide.

Can You Create A Subdomain, Rank, And Redirect All The Pages To Another Site While Maintaining Its Ranking?

Is It Okay To Embed MyMap Via Tag Manager?

Is it? Is it okay to embed the mind map via Tag Manager? I’m not sure how you would do that.

I’ll have to play with that DC. I’m not sure. I’ve never done it. Don’t listen, go play with it. And then and then look at all the nice stuff that happens in there.

Okay.

Cool, well there you go.

Is It A Good Deal To Have A 1500 Monthly Retainer Plus Sale Percentage?

Is it a storefront or a service area business that would be my question. Can you get a listing right now a GMB listing through MGYB? Yes.

Any comments, guys?

No, I think that’s absolutely right, man. It’s a myth. You got to know what you’re getting into. Especially if you’re, if you’re going to spam it, right?

Yeah.

What MGYB Service Should You Use Get More SEO Clients?

It’s up to you, you You are the person who can determine whether or not that’s worthwhile. Yeah, that’s a great point, Adam.

What Is A Money Site?

What SEO And Lead Gen Contract Do You Recommend?

That low and lowers the barrier to entry, so to speak. However, that said, there might be a difference of opinion here for some of the other guys. And you guys have a suggestion for him.

If you know how to produce results, then always go, “Look, I’ll give you results.” But record the quality I always record the call that that call. We talk

That’s a good idea. And yeah, if you disclose that right up front, and then get it on the recording, you do agree that this is being recorded, and that’s okay, right.

Adding something in just so that I have a good starting point then you tailor it kind of to your specifics.

Yeah. So you should be fine that way. It should be super easy.

Sweet. Well, thanks for your input, guys. And thanks, everybody for being here. We will see you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289 published first on your-t1-blog-url

0 notes

angelagiles18 · 5 years ago

Text

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 289 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts Episode 289 to one where Hernan looks continuously shocked for some reason.

I’ll start to my top left here Bradley. How are you doing today?

All right, with that said, Guys, any other quick announcements before we dive into questions?

Good. All right. Let’s do it.

All right. Grab the screen.

You guys confirm when you see. See my screen.

Would You Recommend Ordering Another Drive Stack To A New Website Section Targeting Service Keywords In Different Locations?

Yeah, that’s perfect for the extension. And it’s currently available and as a coupon sweep. So that’s what the drive stack expansion.

Would You Recommend RSS Masher To Drive Traffic To A Money Site And Lead Gen Assets?

Is It Possible To Get An Iframe For A Drive Folder?

Okay.

Do You Have Any Link Building Services In MGYB For T1 Money Site?

What MGYB Service You Should Use To Rank For A City That Is Three Hours Away From The Dealership Location?

Actually, how would I go about this? I know I can get a GMB from MGYB for the New City and add a new city page to the money site. What else would I do?

yeah, just find out what his intent is really. And maybe you already know it, Mohammed and it just wasn’t conveyed in that message.

SEO Shield Question

Perhaps we need to have that clearly explicitly outlined on this on the order page or the order submit Details page. In other words, if it’s not already, but

How Do You Use Press Release To Achieve Better Rankings?

You just supposed to leave it alone until like you said, it just comes back and then you decide.

Can You Create A Subdomain, Rank, And Redirect All The Pages To Another Site While Maintaining Its Ranking?

Is It Okay To Embed MyMap Via Tag Manager?

Is it? Is it okay to embed the mind map via Tag Manager? I’m not sure how you would do that.

I’ll have to play with that DC. I’m not sure. I’ve never done it. Don’t listen, go play with it. And then and then look at all the nice stuff that happens in there.

Okay.

Cool, well there you go.

Is It A Good Deal To Have A 1500 Monthly Retainer Plus Sale Percentage?

Is it a storefront or a service area business that would be my question. Can you get a listing right now a GMB listing through MGYB? Yes.

Any comments, guys?

No, I think that’s absolutely right, man. It’s a myth. You got to know what you’re getting into. Especially if you’re, if you’re going to spam it, right?

Yeah.

What MGYB Service Should You Use Get More SEO Clients?

It’s up to you, you You are the person who can determine whether or not that’s worthwhile. Yeah, that’s a great point, Adam.

What Is A Money Site?

What SEO And Lead Gen Contract Do You Recommend?

That low and lowers the barrier to entry, so to speak. However, that said, there might be a difference of opinion here for some of the other guys. And you guys have a suggestion for him.

If you know how to produce results, then always go, “Look, I’ll give you results.” But record the quality I always record the call that that call. We talk

That’s a good idea. And yeah, if you disclose that right up front, and then get it on the recording, you do agree that this is being recorded, and that’s okay, right.

Adding something in just so that I have a good starting point then you tailor it kind of to your specifics.

Yeah. So you should be fine that way. It should be super easy.

Sweet. Well, thanks for your input, guys. And thanks, everybody for being here. We will see you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289 published first on your-t1-blog-url https://ift.tt/1WMpNvB May 29, 2020 at 02:42PM Semantic Mastery https://ift.tt/2YeHIxM

0 notes

semanticmastery · 5 years ago

Text

Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 289 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts Episode 289 to one where Hernan looks continuously shocked for some reason.

Hi, how's it going? Hernan Is everything okay. It's great, man. I'm feeling like shit, but here we are. All right, good, good stuff. Well, keep going here. Like I said it's Episode 289. Today's the 27th of May 2020. I can see we got a lot of really good questions already today. But if you haven't yet and you got a question, please put it on the page. First come first serve. And then I'm going to get into a few announcements. We've got some cool stuff that happened earlier this week. And then some last-minute announcements, things that we just found out about today that I want to touch on But first, let's say hi to the guys real quick and see how everyone's doing so

I'll start to my top left here Bradley. How are you doing today?

Good. I'm good. I just edited the video description in YouTube because still had some stuff from the webinar we did yesterday. So anyway, but I'm good. Things are good. I'm back from taking a week off, and it sucked cuz I went away for a week camping and ATV riding, thinking that I was going to get away and get to enjoy it and it rained the entire week, all day every day and it was awful. It was fucking miserable. So I wish I would have stayed home and worked.

Yeah, man, speaking of weird weather that so I'm in the Bay Area. So we just hit 95 the last three days, which is like 34 Celsius. It's just like, Okay, well guess I'll go out in the morning, go for a walk and then come hunker in here, shut the blinds and turn the air just thinking. So that's been my life for the past couple of days. So let's head go with the happier weather report. Marco. How are you doing?

The sun's out again. It's the rainy season and he's like the sun's out. It's rainy season man. Look, I live in paradise. All right, I can't help that. Make some money. Right? First of all, go get the battle. You follow the Battle Plan.

make some money. Hire someone who will help you. Train, apply, and make money. lather, rinse, repeat. And then you can go find your own Fortress of Solitude where you can just watch the world go by and you don't give up. Push your mouth but other than the outstanding weather

How are you doing marking things are going good. Things are good here man. Things are good. Yeah, I'm still like things are opening up a little bit here. Essential businesses and all that and all this other stuff, but I'm still self-parenting. I got three kids. They got to think about it and I'm not a spring chicken so that there's another person that I had to think about right because I can go out or like one but I have to think about my family. Yeah. And what I might bring, bring home and closer to home to make somebody.

I knew personally died of this. It's not as if it's totally foreign to me like I don't know anyone who is affected by this. I like what I do know. And so having it that cloth is not any longer six degrees of separation. it's like I know and so no, it ain't happening and we're gonna see how this plays out and I'll let everybody you guys can all go and enjoy yourselves you know to do whatever the hell you want and then let me know how that turns out and then I'll decide after that second one what it is that we're going to do but for now we're cool we take it easy and that's it, man. We did we just but my personal choice, right, my personal choice to do that. It's not as if someone is forcing me to do it. I'm choosing that this is the best way for myself and my family. Enough. All right. Well, Hernan How about you man, things are like you're moving into wintertime right? I always get

Yeah, it's hot summer-like wait a second I was wearing a sweatshirt what hell's going on? Yeah, actually actually all of you guys are well Marco Marco is like, you know, he's in a good spot 20% but all of you guys are you know getting the nice season. I'm getting the shooting season. Yeah now so now but yeah man it's good today was a good day.

Like warm-ish. But yeah, we're getting into winter and all of that so see how that goes, could you? Oh, Chris How about yourself? Yeah, yeah can't complain man sun's out the sun is shining all day. I mean it's dark right now and the best part of all Friday the gyms opening back up and stuff so things are really good standing. Well, I'm going to circle back around Bradley, you mentioned a webinar and I wanted to touch on that because we had Brian, a mastermind member, along with Bruno, and you all listening can get to know both of them better and see what Bradley has to say to about this go high-level system. And Bradley, you want to tell real quick, I'm gonna pop the link in where people can go and check out the replay. Do you want to tell them about the webinar a little bit?

All of the same things that many of these external services do that we put, you know, we connect via Zapier, and it's all under one dashboard. And so it's a lot more seamless. And there's a lot of really cool features inside there, like one of the primary feature that was, is used to pitch this go high-level application or platform is what's called database reactivation, which is a very easy way or a simple way for you to get your foot in the door as an agency owner with potential marketing clients because you can. So anyway, I can't really go into depth right now about that, but it's a really cool platform. I signed up my own agency on the agency level account level so that I can create a first of all, I'm gonna use it for my own agency, but second of all, so I could also create a case study for how I'm using it. I've got some really good ideas that I'm going to be sharing in that case study that I'm gonna be putting to the test and then sharing in the case study.

As well on how I'm using it and how to generate kind of exponential revenue growth from it, as opposed to just linear. And so anyway, I think it's bad, it's very valuable, I would encourage you guys to go check it out, it does come with a 14-day free trial. So once you see the webinar, you know, comes with some free or some, I think it's free, or it's like five bucks may be to pay for some of the training that Bruno had put together, what he calls the quick start training for that. And so you can get all of that. And your first 14 days determine if it's for you or not, but I think once you see some of the potentials of this, it would be something if any of you are trying to grow. I think you should absolutely take a good hard look at it. Definitely. Yeah, no, I mean, I don't do generally local stuff. But I check this out. And like I've been looking at it and I talked to Brian about all the details and like I was starting to be like maybe I could find a way to you just like no stop it. But like for anyone out there who's dealing with especially local clients or can find the right use case

Yeah, just blew me away from the number of services and automation that's packed into that suite of tools and how seamless that is, is pretty amazing. So definitely worth checking it out. Real quick to this one came up today. So we constantly get questions about GMB verifications, right? You know, hey, where can you guys do GMB verifications work in MGYB, when is it going to be available? I'm going to cut to the chase GMB verifications are available right now. As always, we cannot tell you how long that is going to be the case. So if you are doing lead gen if you're needing a verification for some other reason, this would be a very good time to put your order in because not only can you order now what you couldn't have yesterday, you can get a 15% discount today while we've got it opened up. Also, it comes with a 30-day guarantee. And it's about I believe, 14 day turnaround time. So pretty quick. I'll post all of that in the chatbox for those who are live. If you're not just head to mgyb.co, and head to the store, you can look for GMB verifications there you can also get syndication networks, Rs drive stacks, SEO shield, link building all that sort of good stuff.

And circling back around. I wanted to touch on this real quick for those of you who are watching us for the first time, thank you very much whether you're watching live or catching the replay on YouTube. If you want to go to the right place, head to semantic mastery comm slash HD questions every week, we asked you to limit your questions just to one. Unless you're live, you can ask some more. You know, we get down there. We just want to make sure that everyone has a chance to ask their questions. So if you ask some questions, we may not get to all of them just before Warren. And then secondly, we encourage everyone to check out the battle plan and go to battle plan dot semantic mastery. If you want to get repeated repeatable SEO results that is for you. I'm not going to read the page to you you can go over there and check it out. But it is a fantastic tool that we recently just updated them released version four a month ago.

And then Bradley touched on this too if you're an agency owner or a consultant that you want to get more clients, yes, you want to grow your revenue. Yes. And you want to scale your team, hopefully, yes. Then if you want to do that, head over 2xyouragency.com. There's a ton of incredible training lets you crush it, whether you're again, being a consultant, or if you want to build a true agency, and it doesn't matter if that's SEO, it's other areas of digital marketing. It's going to help you grow and make more money. That's the bottom line.

All right, with that said, Guys, any other quick announcements before we dive into questions?

Good. All right. Let's do it.

All right. Grab the screen.

You guys confirm when you see. See my screen.

Would You Recommend Ordering Another Drive Stack To A New Website Section Targeting Service Keywords In Different Locations?

Yeah, that's perfect for the extension. And it's currently available and as a coupon sweep. So that's what the drive stack expansion.

Yeah, we're saying, Yeah, maybe if he already has the brand it because he's saying another, right, a completely new section of the website. So we're talking about the same website, money site. That's how I'm seeing. I'm seeing something different.

He has a different service keyword, and a different location on a large content what so that's, that's just an inner page, I think what he's describing the top of the silo. So you would aim the expansion on the current drive stack at that inner page, you'd get much more power going and extending that initial drive stack then you would be doing a completely different drive stack, g site. Sure, gotcha. Okay.

Would You Recommend RSS Masher To Drive Traffic To A Money Site And Lead Gen Assets?

The next question was GMB.Thanks again, I've not used them for lead gen assets but I have in the past I haven't built since the updated the new version of RSS master which is even better. But to create the kind of like Kwazii PBNs and when I say PBNs, they're not like what we would traditionally think of a treat PBN, these are real sites to generate real traffic and that's the differentiator, right? having real sites generate real traffic. With automated content posting to them right through all the RSS feeds that you splice together and RSS masher and all the really cool shit you can do. You can take a look at the most recent webinar we did with Damon Nelson, about the most current version of RSS masher and see some of the examples of the sites that he builds are 100% honest.

Major content sites using RSS masher. And they're freaking beautiful sites. And he's generating affiliate income and, you know, like AdSense income. And so such using those sites because they do generate traffic, they look beautiful. But from an SEO standpoint, I looked at it as like, hey, this could be really good to generate, you know, in related content type sites that could feed traffic back to a money site or a lead gen site or whatever. So, I mean, I think it's certainly possible to use it for that I haven't done it myself just to be honest because it's not the strategy that I've been pursuing. I've wanted to in fact, I even talked about it with my partners here. I would love to have some time to play with that and set up some sights but I haven't done it yet. I think Marco. Weren't you guys gonna try playing with that a bit. I know it probably hasn't been done but wasn't that on the to-do list?

It is being done. What we are currently testing it and we won't like there is anything. I'm not personally doing it but I got my mini mastermind, which is where all the evil takes place where we can go after everything. And there's a couple of people in there who have a license. And then one of them is using our license as I gave her our license to go and try it out. So they got together. Three of the people in my seven-person mini mastermind got together. And what they're doing is they're sharing information on how to make make it work in the best way possible. And then they're going to come back and report it to me and we're either going to make it available through MGYB as a service, or I'm not sure how we're going to offer that but there's definitely something in the works with that RSS masher. It's just you guys if you go get it just be prepared because there's a high learning curve is that simple software that you're just going to go and plug and play

You have to be prepared to go through the training to go through the process, gathering up the feeds making everything look right. And then you know that that's when the magic happens and I can't wait to blast that. Now get it, give it a companion g site and drive stack, expand it, and then blast it with link building and some embeds and see what happened. I can't wait.

Yeah, it looks good. As I said, I wish I had more time to mess with it. Because I think there's a lot of potentials there as well. So, so maybe next Wednesday, or the following Wednesday, we can give people a preview. But again, the first ones that'll get a preview, it will be my mini mastermind, and then the semantic mastery mastermind, the heavy hitter club, and then we'll go public with whatever we have. It's still a few weeks away, it takes time. That's all

Is It Possible To Get An Iframe For A Drive Folder?

so Frank's up. He says it is it possible to get an iframe for a drive folder tried adding a link into iframe generator and it came back saying the page was blocked from being displayed? also. Well, first of all,

The first part of that is Yeah, you can use to be able to do that. But no, I haven't tried since the updates recently. Marco, can you? Yeah. Not through the iframe January? That's why I tell people to code their own code. Yeah, because you can't do it that way. You have to separate the, I can't go through the process that you have to get the folder ID to be able to iframe it. And what you have to insert in an iframe generator is the entire URL, and you can't do it that way.

Okay.

Do You Have Any Link Building Services In MGYB For T1 Money Site?

He says also with MGYB, do you have any link building services that could be used for tier-one money site or only g sites? Yeah, that while the SEO shield can point back to your money site, right, which includes the drive stack files and folders as well as the G site. Also, press releases could be used for tier-one money site, right where your money site tier-one money site is. It's redundant. That's like the Department of redundancy department. You know what I mean? So, yeah, your money site, again, press releases and the SEO shield? Those are the two things that I would recommend. Am I missing something?

No, no, no, I don't think so. And I can't find it. I can't find published on the web by the way. That's what I thought had been removed since the recent update. But it used to be able to do it that way. So hopefully that was helpful.

What MGYB Service You Should Use To Rank For A City That Is Three Hours Away From The Dealership Location?

Mohammed's up, it's up mom and he says, Hey, guys, a client is asking me if I can rank his Volkswagen dealership for VW related keywords in a city. Three hours away from where the dealership actually is.

Actually, how would I go about this? I know I can get a GMB from MGYB for the New City and add a new city page to the money site. What else would I do?

Well, the problem that I see with that Mohammed is it's a dealership right? So if you're getting a GMB for a dealership which is a storefront business, right with the customers come to the business location, and you've got a spammed GMB listing, that's three hours away from where the dealership actually exists, then, how is that going to play with potential car buyers? When they're looking to go to a dealership in their local area and they've come to find out it's a spam listing and instead they've got to go three hours away to buy a Volkswagen. To me, I don't think that would be advisable for the reasons I just mentioned. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the question. Anybody else interprets this another way?

No, that's the way I'm I'm reading it unless the dealer is opening up a dealership in that city in which case, you would need spam. GMB. Right. Correct. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, I am not willing to drive three hours to go look at a car, like my dealer has to be closed by where I can just jump in the car. 1015 minutes, I'm there and look at the car and decide if I'm gonna buy it. Because I'll be people. Yes. I mean, the idea behind it is correct. People are going to first look online to find a car that they liked, and they're going to find the dealer, then they're going to go visit the dealer to see the cart. Who's going to drive? Did you talk that to this dealership owner, by the way, and ask him Who do you know that's going to drive three hours to buy a car when they can buy one mic in the city? I don't understand the thinking behind that. Not only that, but don't you think it would piss a potential customer off if they were misled to believe that a dealership was in their local area just to come to find out that it's three hours away? I mean, it's not just that like if he was promoting like ranked a page organically for the city that is three hours away, and says, Hey, we sell cars. Were our dealerships over here and they're honest about where it is. It's very likely most people are going to drive three hours away anyways, but at least they weren't being dishonest about it. Whereas having a GMB for a storefront business where a store doesn't actually exist, that I think in my view would piss me off if I put driving directions and go show up at this place to find out that it's it doesn't exist, and then I got to drive three hours away to go where I intended. What about other car dealers dealerships? wouldn't they be pissed if you're faking? A GMB and I just totally am in the area. I don't think VW corporate would be too happy with that with you faking GMB. I don't know how much trouble I mean, you can get into a whole lot of trouble behind that. talk to this guy. talk some sense and then

yeah, just find out what his intent is really. And maybe you already know it, Mohammed and it just wasn't conveyed in that message.

SEO Shield Question

Alright, moving on uh, next question is Hello everyone recently I purchased an SEO shield and since I got some discount for link building, I also bought that so I placed the order for SEO shield and link building altogether. What I found out that instead of building the links to my properties, they pointed all the direct all directly to your money site. Okay, you can edit the URLs to build links to an M GI Bill, Why be disregarded that and build all the links to your money site? No continue can find that hard to believe okay. When I inquired from support about it, they said since you had provided the URL file, we built all the links around that. But they also said that they don't recommend it. I'm a new user purchasing SEO shield first time and also not aware of the internal tech now technicalities excuse me of SEO SEO. So I provide all the information including the URL file because I thought it might be required to build the SEO shield since I bought the SEO, SEO, and link building. So I believe that SM support will follow the best practice since I've gone blindly trust SM for SEO related stuff. So my question is Why were the links built directly in the money site even when it is not recommended? No one will pay for the money to I'm not sure what he says.

Now, he says that the links can't be removed. This website is my six months old hard work. I don't want to degrade my website by any means. So what should I do now? Should I disavow the links pointing in the Excel sheet? Please suggest, okay, um, the first part of that. I'm not sure if you came to us cold and you don't know anything about our methodology, then then I could understand where that confusion may have come from.

Perhaps we need to have that clearly explicitly outlined on this on the order page or the order submit Details page. In other words, if it's not already, but

As far as what you know, we didn't build all the links to your money site URL. If your money site URL was listed in your submitted URLs list, then some links will have been built to your money site URL. But in all of our training, we always suggest we actually won't build links to your money site URL if we know that it's in there. So I don't know what to tell you on that other than and as far as disavowing Marco doesn't ever recommend that I've done it in the past haven't done it for years.

I don't think Have you seen anything negative happen? We don't suggest it, but I don't know that it is going to cause any problems. Marco, what do you say about this? I say I have a really big problem with this guy. Right? Because this was sent to support at mg y v.co. And I heard from Deadia and he said, hey, look, you know what, what can we do it with this? What can we do for this person? So we're looking to do the right thing. Here. Look, I can remove all I think I can remove all the links

But it's gonna take a while I so we aren't talking about it, he doesn't even give support a chance to respond and let him know what the answers are. He comes here to a public forum to air the laundry. And I understand that. I mean, in no way Is this a recommended practice. But I mean, he submitted the URLs for us to build links to if you give us a spreadsheet, how are we to know that there's a money site included in the spreadsheet? I mean, he's assuming that we're supposed to assume and look these, the logic behind this evades me because I just don't see it, how we're supposed to know that he's submitting his money site from now on. And so now we know that we need to make sure that we tell people explicitly on the order form do not submit your money site URL. So thank you for that. But I don't appreciate

This being aired on a public forum, where we're taking care of when we're looking to do what's best for you and for your website. Not that anything bad has happened. Not that anything bad will happen. We don't know yet what would happen, but it's still in the discussion stage and he doesn't even give it an opportunity comes publicly as Hey, you guys, I thought you were supposed to follow best practice practices and whatever else he says. And I just don't appreciate it. Give us at least a chance to do the right thing. And then if there's a problem, if there's no resolution, then you come here and you speak to us publicly. I thought about writing to you by the way. Because I saw this, I saw the way he called it the ticket, come through and I know I'm supposed to stay away from customer service. But I thought about writing to him because I don't see the logic. If he submits the URLs to build links. That's what we're going to build links to because the customer as always, right? So if you want links built to your money site, in spite of the fact that we don't recommend it, and then we say, Don't ever do it, we don't do it. If you submit the URL, and it's by mistake, and I'm not saying that you did it on purpose, if by mistake you included in my site, or you didn't know, it's going to get links built to it. Now, yeah, we are going to try to do the right thing. That's all I can say. We were trying to do the right thing before, even after having come on a public forum, and then like hitting on my last nerve, we're still going to help you out.

Yeah and I don't know that it's going to cause any problem. We just, we don't build links, the types of links that we sell at MGB directly the money site, we always in all of our training suggest not to do that because that's the whole reason for the SEO shield right is because and that's why it's named the SEO shield because it shields your money site, from all the external threats.

SEO and link building that you can do because link building to your money site can, doesn't always but can create a problem. So it's not a guarantee that you're going to have problems because that happened, it might not cause any problems at all, we just don't recommend it, we suggest not to do it, because there's no need to because we push all the power to the SEO shield and use the SEO shield to launder basically clean any potential negative juice through Google properties and through high authority assets, that and push relevancy essentially, eventually to the money site. So again, we don't know that it's gonna cause a negative impact at all, we just don't, we don't test it. Because we don't do that we always recommend building them directly to the SEO shield. Again, that's the whole point of the SEO shield. So we have learned, we have now decided or just came to the realization that that needs to be very explicit on the order form, submit page, and that makes sense and we'll make sure that we make that change and Marco and Dadea, our link builder, are going to do what they can for you. So hopefully that will suffice.

How Do You Use Press Release To Achieve Better Rankings?

Next question, SMS insurances total newbie here, I just ordered the press release. Not sure where to start. I'm clueless on what to do, and the advice would be great. This is awesome that you asked this question because I'm actually working on a little mini-course for press releases for people that want to order and not for SEOs. But for business owners. I mean, anybody can have access to it that they want, but it's I'm doing a little mini-course for press releases.

For MGYB, in other words, a little mini-course on trying to teach a layman right or a business owner, somebody that's not an SEO, how to get the most use in the best use the most traction from press releases that you order from MGYB. And I'll have that done by next Tuesday for sure. Maybe even possibly will be available on by next Wednesday for people to go download as a Lead Magnet or whatever, we'll see, I don't know if I'm gonna have it ready by Tuesday. I don't know if it'll be ready on Wednesday for public consumption. That said, I can give you a brief rundown on it. Because I was actually working on that presentation earlier today. In fact, it's over here. So I can show you that I'm not kidding, do it yourself press releases, leveraged PR marketing for your business. So this will be both a presentation as well as some of that stuff hasn't been added yet. But it will be a presentation that will be available, as well as some videos. So it'll be like a little mini training course, on how to get the best uses of press releases, and then what to do next as well. So really a quick rundown on that is, first have an understanding of what your keywords are that you want to promote, right? So your primary products and services, products and or services, or an event if you're promoting an event, whatever, whatever you're trying to promote. You want to have a set of keywords that you're looking to promote. And you want to submit that as the primary keyword for each one of the press releases.

So the press release writers, the writers that they're really good about creating brand plus keyword association. So if you submit the keyword that you want to be used as the primary keyword, they're going to create that they're going to use the brand name and the keyword in the title. Okay, which is very, very important. And then they're going to write about whatever it is that you instruct them to write about. And you can be as descriptive about how to like, you can tell them the tone that you want, that you want them to write it in, you can tell them certain things that you want them to highlight within the press release. Or you can be vague, you can just say, here's the URL that I want you to promote. And they'll go look at the URL, also look at the brand and they'll create a news angle story, that they'll write a press release about so it makes it easy for you guys if you have something specific you want written about. add that in the writing description. If you don't and you don't know how to create a newsworthy angle, don't worry about it because that's what the press release riders do. So you can just submit a URL and say this is the primary

URL I want promoting, write a story about it right. And though they'll figure out a way, which is why I love using it, because it takes the responsibility right off of us to come up with the angle all the time. They're really good about that once the press release is published, or you want to also link back to whatever you're primarily trying to promote. So for example, I like to, by the way, if you're new SM, s and s insurance, you can go to our YouTube channel youtube.com slash Semantic Mastery and use the channel search feature. And you can even go to Google and search for a press release or PR silo stalking or press release, SEO, semantic mastery, something like that, and you can find a webinar it's actually still on mg y v. If you go to the webinars tab on the MG y v.co. website, you can take a look, I think that was the last webinar that we did was PR silo stalking, and that'll give you a really good description. It was almost an hour You know, I don't know 40-minute webinar or whatever specifically about how to get the

Most uses out are the best use out of sight, press releases. So again, you're going to want to have at least one URL that you're going to promote, you can have up to three, I usually recommend only two URLs per the press release, unless you're siloing press releases, in which case you'll have three, three target URLs that you're promoting within the press release because you're going to be linking back to the previous press release within that silo. if all of this sounds foreign to you, just go check out that webinar that I just described. And then it will tell you exactly what we do to get really, really good results with press releases. And just an aside to kind of a point to kind of reinforce this is I was just talking in the mastermind two weeks ago when I did my last mastermind webinar, about how I have a GMB asset as a lead gen asset that I hadn't done anything with it was published about a year and a half, maybe two years ago, but I never optimized it never did anything to rank it. And I did three press releases in one week to push that GMB asset and all it has is it's a GMB location. You know, profile and it's got a GMB website. It's not connected to a money site. The money site is the GMB website. And I did three press releases in a week. And the son of a bitch disappeared from maps all together for about three weeks. But then it popped after three weeks of it like not even showing I thought it got it was doing a Google dance. But I've not seen one this drastic, or this is significant of a Google dance to where it like literally, the listing disappeared, it disappeared entirely from Google Maps. And then all of a sudden bounce it when it popped, it popped into number three, the C position in the maps three pack from just three press releases in a week. Now that's those results aren't typical, but I'm just sharing that because it does show you that and all I did was PR silo stacking method, the same one that I'm suggesting you go watch that webinar to learn the strategy. And it works guys. It really does work. So that's what I would recommend is

Just first go look at that webinar. And then after you have published the press release, it's always better to do like one press release isn't going to move the needle much, if at all, but when you start to do the silo stacking with press releases, you can do significant damage with that, and in a good way, right, yeah. And then from there, the next thing you can do is do link building gigs to the press releases or to the organization page that we provide. When you order a press release. That's something else and embed gigs. You can do embed gigs as well, but don't link directly to your money site. Anyway, you want to comment on that anybody?

From dance is real man. Right? We tell people 21 days actually, it's 20 days. But I tell people 21 days just to be sure they're clear of it. And then that's when you go and take a look at everything. You decide what to do, but it's very real. I don't know why more people don't talk about that. They just see rankings drop and then they go try to fix it and they make things worse instead of trying to instead of the result being better.

You just supposed to leave it alone until like you said, it just comes back and then you decide.

Unknown Speaker 35:06 Yeah, what's interesting is, like you said, for about three weeks, I haven't seen something that drastic of a dance in quite some time to be honest with you. And so I was a little bit nervous. I was thinking like, What the fuck is going on with this, this listing? And all I did was a handful of GMB posts to that listing over the course of those three weeks that was it, nothing else. And like I said, it popped and when it did, it's, it's in the number. In fact, I just got a lead from that today for sure, for Tree Removal in that particular city. So it's producing and all it took was three press releases, which again, is very, very powerful. So it used the exact same method I just mentioned was PR silo stacking, so just go watch that webinar. It's done in the MGYB, webinar archive, and it's PR silo stacking, and it works really, really well.

Okay, next question. DC SEO says, Hey guys, I received the ROI as part of my shield back and your wise keywords are the ones that gave your team they're in the same niche, but very different to what I handed in Is this right? Mine didn't have any location or mine, I guess he means mine didn't have any location as per instructions and what I received that keyword plus locations from around the world. I'm in the UK as well as a ton of keywords that are irrelevant to my services. I don't know how that could happen. Any, any suggestion? No, that doesn't sound right. But this isn't the forum for that is it support at MGYB.co. What happened? Give us the order number. We'll go track it down. And if we have to do it over, we'll do it over we'll talk to the VA who built it. I mean, we take care of everything guys. We always do we always try to do right, by everyone. You have to do things in the proper forum.

And so now, no matter where I respond, it's going to look like I didn't respond and all of the other I would have to go and respond in all of the other groups, the very same thing that I responded in the one group and it's gonna make it look in the other in the groups where I don't respond like I don't care or it doesn't matter or I didn't want to respond or whatever. I don't like guys do things in the right place. And at the right time, this first goes to support. If support doesn't take care of you, then come to us and let us know. And then like, I know, one of the owners in MGB and I'll have a talk with him and see what we can do about rectifying the situation, but it's in here in a public forum. I can't do anything for you.

Yeah, Fidel. If it was indeed a mistake on our end, then absolutely. We just kill that drive, stack, and build and one for you. So and it won't, it won't hurt you at all. So it's not an issue if it was indeed our problem. If you submitted the wrong keyword file, that's one thing, but if it was, somehow it got built with keywords that you didn't submit, which is unlikely, but people are human things happen. So if that was the case, just bring it to supports attention, we'll take a look at it and if that was indeed the case, it would just kill that stack and then go to a new one, and it won't it won't cause any problems. So that's the beautiful thing about those guys and that's also why we talked about using the SEO shield for clients and stuff like that because you get the accounts back and you could protect your work right? Because if something happens and you get fired or the client stops paying you I've had that happen where they just ghost on you, you know what I mean? The business still exists but they just won't answer phone calls or emails when they owe you money that kind I've had that happen several times over my career. You can go in and just kill the drive stack, delete it. I don't even set it to not public which is it's changed now anyways and because it can still push power, even when it's not indexable. But you can go in and just kill the damn thing or rework it to point somewhere else, you know, to meet to their competitor, that you can go land as a client. So that's one of the beautiful things about it. So it can be remedied. That's not a problem.

Can You Create A Subdomain, Rank, And Redirect All The Pages To Another Site While Maintaining Its Ranking?

The next question was, can you create a subdomain website and rank it and then redirect all the pages to another site? And the subdomain maintain its rankings? No, because the redirect will point to the new location and new locate the new location is going to replace the subdomain at some point, right? You can't redirect a URL and have both the URLs still appear in search, or they might temporarily, and I don't even know that that's true. But Google will whatever the redirect is eventually that's what will rank and the other one will fall out of the index entirely. Am I right in that, or am I missing something? I'm not I think you're absolutely right. I don't see how you can't since you're telling the bot through the 301 that the page or everything in that sub-domain moved permanently somewhere else. Yeah. You could use I mean, that's what it is. Yeah, you could use a canonical. And it can both pages can rank. I've seen that many times, you're telling Google with a canonical, like, hey, this page is similar to this page over here, give the credit to this page, right? And then Google sometimes disregards that and well, you know, both pages will index and they'll both rank. And that happens. So I would suggest a canonical instead of a 301 if that's what you're trying to accomplish, but remember that just because you canonicalize. It doesn't, you know, doesn't mean Google's going to honor that. It also doesn't mean that they won't honor it. Right? It just kind of it's kind of a crapshoot. So yeah, what, what that is canonical is when you have similar or the same, and it doesn't have to be two. It could be two or more, however many copies of that document. There is there exists. You can tell Google which ones the master copy is and to rank that one, rather than all the other. Now, whether Google follows the directive, well, that's up to Google. And they're not telling what they'll do is right.

Yeah, and just to, you know, kind of reinforce that I'm working on a tree care project. for it, you know, for new, a new lead gen service provider that I got. And it's a case study that I'm doing in the mastermind, and I use tags, tags to create location silos anyways, a Google, it's a new site, right? And my blogger just started blogging for the location posts on the site. And the way that we're doing building it out with using tags to create the location silos. Google was ranking the tag pages, but not, but not the posts that I wanted to be ranked. And it indexed the tag pages first, right and the tag pages because some in some cases, they're unique tags, which means that the tag page is a duplicate of post, that if you guys understand how tags work, that's what happens if it's a unique tag, it's only in one post, then the tag page itself is essentially a duplicate of the post. And so for whatever reason, Google index the tag pages instead of the posts, and so the tag pages were ranking for the keywords, but not the post. And so and I even set the canonical in the tag setting with SEO ultimate Pro, you can do that because you can go to what's called the Global canonical manager, or even the code inserter plus module, you can actually go in and add like a separate canonical for each tag and all that kind of stuff anyway. So I added the canonical URLs for the tag pages to canonicalize to the post, right, when it's a unique tag, you can do that. And but Google wasn't honoring it. And about two weeks went by and so finally I went just this week, I just went to search console, and forced Google to recrawl the posts or excuse me, the tag pages because they had the canonical URLs in the HTML header to point to the posts that I wanted to give the credit to. Right and that's what I want to be ranked, and it only took about 24 hours, and lo and behold, now the tag pages aren't indexed, but the posts are, which is what I wanted. So again, it, you know, that doesn't mean that that's always going to happen, because it could be that Google doesn't honor the canonical or doesn't, you know, doesn't recognize it for whatever reason, they, By the way, you can also check that when you submit inspect URL in Search Console. And once it inspects the URL, it's going to tell you whether it's in Google or not. And there's a drop-down setting that your menu that you can click on to expand, it shows you additional details, and it'll tell you what the Google recognized canonical is for that page, or that post whatever URL it is that you're inspecting. Right? And so you can clearly see what Google seeing. So you can force a canonical, and then go ask Google to request indexing. And then once it does, you know you can look at the code that it shows like the rendered page and it'll tell you the details of that and it'll show you if it if it saw the canonical or not. So anyway, hopefully, that was helpful. Do you see SEO

Is It Okay To Embed MyMap Via Tag Manager?

Is it? Is it okay to embed the mind map via Tag Manager? I'm not sure how you would do that.

I'm not sure how you would do that. Tag Manager creates container codes, right header code, and Body Code. And then you inject things into that like scripts and tracking codes and pixels and that kind of stuff. And I don't know what embedding a my map would do, or if it would even read. Is that something you have any idea about? Marco?

I'll have to play with that DC. I'm not sure. I've never done it. Don't listen, go play with it. And then and then look at all the nice stuff that happens in there.

Okay.

Cool, well there you go.

Is It A Good Deal To Have A 1500 Monthly Retainer Plus Sale Percentage?

Unknown Speaker 45:03 Alright, so moving on next one is Josh says I am changing locations from my current office to a shared workspace and apparently with Google, this isn't a verifiable address so they won't verify my GMB profile with this type of address. With the MG y b GMB service will this help with this issue?

Is it a storefront or a service area business that would be my question. Can you get a listing right now a GMB listing through MGYB? Yes.

As we talked about with Mohammed's question earlier, if it's a storefront business, I don't recommend using a spam GMB listing for any type of storefront business because you mislead potential customers because they think it's in one location and you are indeed in another location. So the only time I would ever recommend using a spammed GMB listing, let's call it what it is. As for a service area business where the actual physical location in the GMB profile is hidden from the public, so it makes sense. So again, if it's a service area business, then yes, that would help you. If it's a storefront business, I wouldn't recommend it.

Any comments, guys?

No, I think that's absolutely right, man. It's a myth. You got to know what you're getting into. Especially if you're, if you're going to spam it, right?

Yeah.

I've gotten away from doing spam, GMB listings just because the how much volatility there's been in the last, you know, many months. Um, so I'm working more heavily on the organic side. Now, again, which has been years since I really pushed that. So it's interesting, and that's what the tree care project that I'm working on is, in part is a case study for the mastermind, is working on mostly organic rankings. I do have some GMB locations that are going to be incorporated into the project most of the organic rankings. And I'm also doing a lot of call ads call-only ads for Google ads. They are

If you're very specific with Google call-only ads with your what I call Bullseye keywords, then you can get some pretty good results with that. It's a lot less expensive than actual clicks to like, you know, regular PPC pay per Click type ads, pay per call ads are a little bit less expensive if you have very, very targeted keywords with location modifiers and such. So that's what I'm working on right now.

What MGYB Service Should You Use Get More SEO Clients?

Lonnie says I landed my first client concrete company 1500 dollars per month plus percentage of sales. This is a good deal fucking a man. Congratulations, Lonnie. That's all that looks like it looks like a really good deal. Absolutely. That's a cherry deal for sure. So congratulations, man. I'm gonna hop in real quick and say it's all relative, right? One congrats on getting that. Especially the percentage of sales and revenue. That's a big one that I think a lot of people miss out on. But keep in mind too, this is totally dependent on what he's doing for that. 1500 That's true. You'd be getting worked to the fucking ground for 1500 but you know

It's up to you, you You are the person who can determine whether or not that's worthwhile. Yeah, that's a great point, Adam.

And just know this, if it's your first client, you probably are going to be work to death anyways. Because it's your first client and you will learn over time, how to set boundaries with clients. Just talk to Mohammed who's always here asking questions every single week. Mohammed's been following us for a long, long time, and we've watched him grow considerably over the last couple of years. And he's experienced a lot of growing pains and come here and ask for advice. And that's what this forum is for Lonnie. So feel free to come back and ask questions every week. concerning how to handle certain situations doesn't always have to be SEO related either. It could just be about how to handle particular clients, business operations, management, outsourcing, all that kind of stuff. Guys, we're here to help grow your business as much as possible. Yes, we talk a lot about SEO. But there's a lot of other things that we've all learned with our experience over the years on how to, you know, help you to avoid some of the mistakes that we've all made.

But just know that it is your first client there, it's likely you're going to be work to death for that client. And that's okay. Because you're going to learn a lot from that. And you'll begin to learn how to start to set boundaries. And remember, you know, one thing I want to recommend is, you do need to also set like communication boundaries, I don't know that your new client is is somebody that might message you outside of business hours or over the weekend and that kind of stuff. But I've got a lot of clients that still to this day do, but I've trained them that I don't reply to messages after hours or on weekends. Unless it's an emergency like I have a preschool client that had a site go down on over a weekend and I had my daughter and I did actually help him because he's a really good client and me, you know, I felt for him and I wanted to help him but very rarely do I ever reply to anything outside of ours, because once you set that precedent, people will take advantage of it. I don't know that they mean to be malicious, but they just think that hey, I messaged him at night and he answered me, so, therefore, it's okay for me to ask questions at any time, I would recommend that you know, as your first client, you need to start to learn how to set boundaries right upfront.

Anyways, let's get back to the question. Sorry, I'm glad that Adam put that into perspective, because I immediately saw that percentage. And my mind went to the mat, my mind always goes to the numbers, where I normally get this company to 100-200k a month recurring for you know, out of if it's like Costa Rica, where they work around, like, it's killer money, it's killer money, but even if it's seasonal, right, you can't work in the winter, if what if they're doing driveways or whatever it is that they're paving. If they're laying a concrete slab, you're talking about 100 k easy and if you charge 10 to 15% of that recurring, then I'm seeing that as a really good deal. If you're going to be worked to the bone and the client can't close. Then you got a problem. So thanks for putting that into perspective.

Yeah, not to downplay it. Yeah, definitely just wanted to tell because the way he phrased it that's what gave me the hesitation. It's like, Is this good? Like, man, there's no way for us to know you're the one who's got to do that. But you know, congratulations on doing that. That's good to see. Yeah. And I mean, like I said, Just remember, as your first client, you will make mistakes, there's no question, you will work harder than you probably should. And that's okay. Like I said, you're going to learn from that. So, you know, just keep that in mind. Remember, come back here and ask questions often and we'll try to provide you as much advice as we can. He says, also, I'm looking for simple services I can use to get me in on getting clients and suggestions. By the way, I love the video lead gen 2xyoruagency. Well, there, there you go. You have the video lead gen system and 2xyoruagency which is great for prospecting and generating prospects, right? Don't build that pipeline first. Right? And that's super, super important in through having a full pipeline of prospects and making presentations sending proposals, right so pitching prospects, you will get better, you're gonna lose money upfront, and that's okay. But you will get better you'll be able to polish your presentation and your pitch and your message and all of that. And so just that's why it's so important guys to fill that pipeline full of prospects so that you can make those mistakes. And not every prospect that you talk to is going like you depend on them to be able to put food on your table. If because if that's the case, desperation comes through and everything that you do, and they can smell that from a mile away. And so I think it's better to have a pipeline full of prospects because then it's okay, you don't need anyone of them because you have more behind them. Right, that makes sense. As far as simple services, I recommend getting the most updated version of the battle plan if you don't already have that. A lot of that was covered in 2xyoruagency anyways, but the battle plan is a very succinct version of what we recommend to get results and timelines for doing so and all of that and it's very inexpensive. So I'd recommend you pick that up if you don't have it already.

I'd also say mgyb.co, I mean everything there for you to offer your clients, whatever it is that they want. Everything is their press releases, liquidity and anything and everything that you need to do to produce results for your clients in MGYB.co. And if it doesn't mean you have a good idea of a product that let us know.

What Is A Money Site?

This is a great question from Josh, he says, And see, guys, this is the thing you know, I think we often forget. Because we've been in this industry so long that not everybody understands the terminology. He says one more quick question, what exactly do you mean by money site that means your primary digital asset so like, whatever your primary domain is that you host your, your website for your business on? That's what we call a money site. Why? Because it's the site that generates you money, right? A lot of the other stuff that you know, we talked about is tier-one branded entity assets. Again, big terminology for basically meaning like social profiles and stuff that you can build a branded profile or presence on that you're going to link back to your money site, your money site is your Epicenter, right? It's your point of origin, it's the golden frame, you always want to drive, all traffic all leads as much as possible back to your money site, because you have control over that's an asset that you own and control, having ancillary profiles on social media properties and, you know, web to Dotto properties, and all that kind of stuff is great. And that's what we do with the SEO shoot as we build all that stuff out. But ultimately, you don't own those platforms. They could be taken away from you by Google, by YouTube, by Facebook, whatever, at any time. So they're great to have. They're great to use. But it's best to try to use those to push people push traffic back to your money site because you do have control over that. And there's so much more than you can do that. So your money site is again it's your self hosted primary domain asset for your business, your company, your project, whatever it may be. Anybody else wants to take a stab at that? Yeah.

It could be your Google My Business website. It could be that it could be your your G site. It could be, you know, a free WordPress blog or blogger, Tumblr, or wherever it is that you choose to blog from, like, you don't have to have something that's self hosted. WordPress, are a self hosted domain for you to have a money site. This is like you said, it's the place where you plan to send people to in order to make money and edit in order to sell your product service or whatever it is that you want people to see or buy. That's your money site. Why? Because it makes you money. Not to say that there are other places that could make you money like social media, but it's the primary source of what it is that you're planning to do. Yeah, that's a great point because as we talked about a lot of lead gen assets that I have don't have a self-hosted money site. They are just GMB website.

In other words, the website, the Google My Business provides you which is free. And ultimately you don't have full control over that Google does. Right. So I, you know, I'm glad Marco brought that up. Because I just mentioned self-hosted website, it doesn't have to be that recommend that was possible. But there are times where it makes sense to not build a self-hosted website, for example, spammed GMB listings, it might not be wise to go through the trouble of building out a, you know, a self-hosted site because of all the work that goes into it. Whereas, you know, in case it was to get suspended, you lose all of them, the work that you did, essentially. So in that case, you know, the GMB website becomes the primary website for that location. Or another option would be like Marco said, you know, Google Site g site, right, so sites.google.com, that they, Marco and Rob have done several projects using those as the money site, and it works. It works really, really well. So the money site is exactly what Marco described, which is whatever it is that you're using to make money.

If you're going to build a brand, I think it's important to build a self-hosted website with the brand name as the domain name, because you can really grow the authority of that brand and you benefit from that in so many ways. So, it's a great question though. Alright, so the last question and we've only got three minutes left, we're gonna wrap it up.

What SEO And Lead Gen Contract Do You Recommend?

He says, Lonnie says I'm having trouble with putting an SEO and lead with I'm sorry, with put an SEO and lead gen contract. Do you have any recommended contract forms? No, I don't, you know, you could probably just go online and find some templates that you could use. I personally don't like to use contracts I, I mean, I have in the past, but typically, it's only for bigger companies that, you know, they want the contract. I like to do everything on a verbal agreement. So that and I always say this to potential prospects or customers look, you know, if I'm doing my job, you're gonna want to continue paying me if I'm not, you're not gonna want to continue paying me and that's okay. I also want to be able to part ways from that client if we don't dive well, we don't agree on things if it's just not a good fit, and I don't want to be locked into a contract either. So I don't expect my clients to want to be locked into a contract. And sometimes that burns me, for example, I had a home inspector client, that, you know, I very clearly stated what the timeline was going to be on results.

I typically asked for, hey, give me this much time. And before that time had passed before I reached that certain level of time that I mentioned, he canceled services. And I you know, And to me, that's really unfair for both of us because he wasn't able to get the results that he wanted, because it wasn't, you know, fast enough for him even though I clearly stated all of that before we agreed to work together. But at the same time, I put a lot of work into that and it wasn't able to fully realize the efforts you know, for him or for myself for my own satisfaction because he stopped paying me before all the work had been completed, if that makes sense. Sometimes I wish I did have a contract in place. But for the most part, I like the ability to be able to walk away from a client. And I also like them to know that they don't, they're not locked into a contract that kind of eases that.

That low and lowers the barrier to entry, so to speak. However, that said, there might be a difference of opinion here for some of the other guys. And you guys have a suggestion for him.

Now, you know me, I don't do contracts. I hate him. I hate him. He locks me into everything. And what if I want to go out and maybe the client doesn't want to go well, what if I want to go? What if I can't stand the client? I want to go and then I'm bound by a contract for a year with this guy that I can't stand that knows more or supposedly knows more than I do, which sometimes happens.

If you know how to produce results, then always go, “Look, I'll give you results.” But record the quality I always record the call that that call. We talk

Bradley, what is going to take this long? I always have that recorded even though there's no contract and I let the guy know Look, I'm gonna record the call. And then you can always refer revert back to that's a contract, believe it or not, that's a contract. Right? And it'll hold up in most courts. I believe in the US. It'll hold up, it'll hold up in Costa Rica.

That's a good idea. And yeah, if you disclose that right up front, and then get it on the recording, you do agree that this is being recorded, and that's okay, right.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. I'm going to be recording this, I'm just gonna point this way. This way, we can refer back to the conversation, you know exactly what took place. I know exactly what to put in you walk them through, you know that this is going to take about 90 days for results. thereabouts. Because if you don't, then you go into the process because I have to set everything up. And then we get everything going. I'm probably going to get two results before but I can't guarantee any Google experience tells me that within 90 days, we should be able to see something, and then we can work from there but I need 90 days from you.

Are you okay with that? Yeah, yeah, sure, you're gonna get that nine out of 10. So now you have a binding contract now, at the end of it you tell at the end of those 90 days when we meet again, then we'll decide if we continue.

Now real quick, I know Adam is if you're still paying attention, I know we're a little bit over, but I think you have a little bit of a different methodology. Is there any way you can comment on this? Um, yeah, I just I'm trying to think like, I don't have too much of a difference it's kind of constantly evolving. But yeah, I mean, as far as contracts go like I stay out of that I've never done anything. Okay. Yeah. And then, if he's looking for actual he may just mean, he's looking for an outline for like a proposal or an engagement proposal. If that's the case, just contact support at semantic mastery comm will point you in the right direction. I know Hernan put one out there we had as a free opt-in that you could get as an outline. And that can be really helpful. I mean, I've used other people's as a starting point when I'm changing services.

Adding something in just so that I have a good starting point then you tailor it kind of to your specifics.

Very good. Thank you. Alright guys, thanks everybody for being here is Chris were you gonna says something? I'm sorry. I mean like he is like a lead gen contract. I mean, like why not sell on a per lead basis? I don't see there's an issue you can do like a contract that states the price of the elite.

Yeah. So you should be fine that way. It should be super easy.

Sweet. Well, thanks for your input, guys. And thanks, everybody for being here. We will see you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.

#Semantic Mastery #Weekly Digital Marketing Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 289

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