James Dooley interviews Craig Campbell SEO | James Dooley Podcast

James: Craig, how we doing? Craig: All good, mate, all good. James: So, managed to get you on a podcast finally, mate. It’s been a long time coming – for a long time unfortunately… or fortunately. Let’s get straight into it: SEO myths in the industry – debunking SEO myths. Obviously, from speaking to you over the years, we’ve heard a lot of stories, we’ve tested a lot of things together. For anyone who's starting out, how do people know, with some of the training and info that’s out there, whether something’s an SEO myth or whether they should actually go down that route? How Newbies Can Spot SEO Myths Craig: For me, that’s a very, very difficult one. When you start out, you don’t know who to listen to. You could be saying one thing, someone over there could be saying something completely different. When I started, I was watching maybe 5–10 people. Someone would say “Do this” or “Do that,” and without actually testing it, you’re going to run into trouble. You can’t go around doing things that are just hearsay. We both know in SEO there’s a lot of hearsay. Even now, when you listen to people talking, you see folk still doing things that were working four or five years ago – which we know 100% don’t work now. We had a conversation last night – I’m not going to mention names – but there was a particular person who mentioned something in local SEO that hasn’t worked for years. It just clearly doesn’t work. There are people teaching stuff that maybe did work two or three years ago, or even six months ago, and newbies take that as gospel. It makes perfect sense to them because they’re new. But of course, Google is always changing. So for me, it’s not always about “myths” – it’s often about how up-to-date the information is. There are actual myths out there, sure, but a massive problem is out-of-date information, which there’s a hell of a lot of. Even with online courses – I used to do a lot of them – trying to keep them up to date is almost impossible. Something that works for me this week might not be relevant next week. Then people say: “Ah, you’re a bullshitter,” or “That’s a myth,” or “That didn’t work,” whatever. So I think the real challenge is differentiating between: A true myth (stuff that never really worked), and Stuff that just doesn’t work anymore because things have moved on. And that’s the hardest thing. Intent vs Malice With Bad Information James: I think what’s important here is that most of the misinformation being shared – I don’t think people are deliberately trying to send others down the wrong path. They’ve probably just heard it, thought it sounds good, and next minute they’ve got it in their own slides or their own course – with no testing. At that time, like we were talking about last night with Google Business Profiles and local SEO, there were some strategies working really well. But Google patched it about three years ago. Yet there are still people talking about those tactics on stage last week saying: “You just need to do this, this and this.” And we’re sitting there going: “No, mate. That got patched three years ago. We tested it – about 98% of the time it didn’t work. It was absolutely conclusive.” Yet people are still sharing that info. I think it’s sad because, like you said, how do you break through the noise and understand what works and what doesn’t when you’re just listening to random people? Good SEO vs Great SEO James: So from that, I’m going to jump onto the next question for you – a couple of quick-fire questions to start with. What’s the difference between a good SEO and a great SEO, in your opinion? Craig: I think the difference is the small details. A great SEO goes deep into the little details that most people ignore. I’ve spoken to many SEOs over the years – some considered “good,” some considered “great.” We both know we’re fans of Matthew Woodward. So what’s the difference between Matthew and another good SEO out there? It’s the small attention to detail. He’s a very technical guy, thinks about things differently, and he tests a hell of a lot. If you disagree, he can have a proper argument with you: “No, that’s bullshit, you should do this.” “Have you tried that?” “Have you thought about this angle?” That’s the difference between good and great. Anyone can be a good SEO if they follow what works. But a great SEO is: On top of everything, Doing tests, Trying things out, Levelling up constantly. Look at Cristiano Ronaldo – what’s the difference between him and another footballer? It’s small things: dedication, extra work, the extra 1%. Some SEOs are just obsessed with SEO – they think about it even on Sundays. You see it in group chats – people fighting at 6am on a Sunday about stuff (in a good way): “No mate, that’s bullshit.” “What about this?” “I tried that.” Those are healthy debates. I don’t think a lot of other SEOs are prepared to take that on board – and that’s what makes people great. No one in those circles is like: “I’ve got the biggest ego; I’m the best; I make the most money.” It’s more about pushing each other. James on Scaling vs Perfection James: You know what’s mad – I still see myself as an amateur SEO. I’ve leveraged SEO massively for business and done very well from it, but I still see myself as an amateur. Even last night I was asking you questions: “What would you do here?” “What would you do there?” The reason I love our private groups and mastermind chats is that we’ll just call someone out: “No, that doesn’t work.” “That hasn’t worked for two years.” You can’t really do that on stage at events, but in a private group I’ll throw you under the bus all day long: “Craig, you’ve not done this. You need to test that.” And you’ll do the same to me. Then it becomes: “Right, let’s have a competition. Let’s see who can rank this keyword and see what’s working in today’s algorithm.” That’s what I love about our group – nobody’s shy about debating or saying “I disagree.” Also, another difference between good and great SEOs, in my opinion, is: Once we get the minor details and dedication right, it’s about systemising and scaling. A lot of people suffer with the 3 Ps: Prioritisation Procrastination Perfectionism My SEO knowledge is probably not as good as 90% of the “good” SEOs out there – but I scale. I scale well, and I don’t procrastinate. That’s where our team has done very well: we’re good at scaling things with systems and processes. Craig on James’s Strength: Scaling Ideas Craig: That’s something I would always say you’re good at – the ability to take something and then it grows arms and legs. You’ll take a small piece of knowledge and blow it up, which is funny to watch – in a good way. Manual Actions & Algorithmic Penalties Craig: Question for you now. We’ve spoken about testing and changes with Google – their job is basically to stop us from manipulating the results. We’ve seen recent updates: Helpful Content, manual actions, algorithmic penalties. Thousands of people are talking online about this. I know you, in particular, deal with website recoveries. From here and now – to give people current information – what have you seen with websites getting algorithmic or manual penalties, and how have you been able to recover them? Any tips? James on Unnatural Links Penalties & Recovery James: There are a lot of different manual penalties you can get. One of the easiest to get out of – and we do very well with – is unnatural links penalties. Some people say: “Oh, I can’t remember the last time someone had an unnatural links penalty.” It happens every single week. Literally every single week there are people getting them. We’re in the know because people come to us for that service. What works well is: Extract every single backlink in the profile Use tools like Majestic, Ahrefs, Semrush, Google Search Console, Link Research Tools. Put them into a system and work out what you think is toxic. But before that, you actually need to show Google that you’ve tried to reach out to these domains to get the bad links removed – especially ones you don’t control. You’ve got to do that as part of the reconsideration request. That’s a very important part that most people don’t do. Then they come to us saying: “I’ve done five reconsideration requests and they’ve not even responded.” And we’re like: “You’ve not followed what they asked you to do.” So you’ve got to: Try manual outreach to remove links Document that effort Then be pretty aggressive with your disavow file Anything with any kind of toxicity – get it in the disavow. Then you submit the reconsideration request. Right now, it’s taking about 12 weeks on average for Google to come back. Previously, during Covid, it was nearly 12 months. We’ve got a very good success rate because: We follow exactly what they want We use specific wording in the reconsideration requests James on Pure Spam & Thin Content James: With regards to Pure Spam, that’s a very difficult one to get out of – almost to the point it’s not worth it. Even if you do recover, rankings usually don’t come back, so it’s almost worthless. In most cases, it’s better to just move on and build another site. For thin content: Go through pages that aren’t ranking Pages that aren’t getting impressions Pages that could be low quality Be really aggressive with content pruning – get rid of those pages. Then do the reconsideration request. You can get sites back from thin content manual actions. Algorithmic Penalties & the Helpful Content Update James: Those are the manual actions. For algorithmic penalties, the worst I’ve ever seen is the Helpful Content Update – specifically for display ad and affiliate sites. I’ve seen sites that: Halved in traffic Flatlined Halved again Flatlined again And some of these are really good sites in my opinion: Strong topical authority Good quality links Good quality, optimised content I think some good sites have been caught up alongside bad ones – some have wrongly been hit. Plus we’ve seen the rise of Reddit and user-generated content sites taking over. There’s been a big intent shift from Google – they don’t want to rank loads of similar-looking sites that all use Surfer SEO and correlation tools. Google’s trying not to show 10 clone sites.

People ask: “Is affiliate marketing dead?”

Go type in: “best TVs” “best [whatever]” There are still affiliate sites ranking. So it’s not dead – you just need to change your approach. Do I know the exact recovery approach yet? Not fully. We’re testing: Disavows (where needed) Content pruning Improving content that’s not getting clicks Making sure the entities are aligned with the core entity of the site Filling gaps for topical authority Basically doing what you always taught us years ago when you were training my team: Good quality content Strong topical authority Technically sound site Solid internal linking Good off-page (social signals, quality links) Same fundamentals – but quality thresholds have gone up. That’s what we’re trying for algorithmic recoveries. The Gambling Site Case Study & 301 Experiment James: One particular website – the gambling one (we both know which one, but I won’t name it) – took a big dive in traffic. You did a lot of testing. You did a 301 redirect and it recovered for two weeks… and then fell off a cliff again. Tell us a bit more about that and what your plans are next. Not everything can be successful – not everyone can sit here and say: “I did this, I did that, it all worked.” There are pain points in SEO – and that’s one of yours. A very successful website you’ve spent god knows how much money on. James Explains the 301 Recovery That Failed James: So, what we heard from some people was: “All you need to do is a 301” or “Do a cross-domain canonical.” Then we spoke to more technical people saying: “Cross-domain canonicals don’t work in that way; you need to do 301s.” We tried both on two different sites: One with a cross-site canonical – nothing happened, no recovery. The other with a domain change using 301 redirects. That one was getting about 10 clicks a day, but previously it was getting 10,000 clicks a day. We did the 301s and two days later – boom – everything jumped back: Position 1 for the main terms in casino, slots, bingo Looked like we’d cracked it We did page-by-page redirects to a new domain. It lasted 17 days, then nosedived again. Here’s what frustrates me with the industry: I could’ve taken that graph, cut it off on day 17 and gone: “I recovered this site. I’m the expert at recoveries.” And people do that – they post the “up” bit but not the crash afterwards. Same with CTR manipulation: They pump CTR, get jumps Overcook it or stop Then the site tanks or drops below where it started But they still show the screenshot: “Look, I went from #7 to #1 with my CTR technique.” What they don’t say is: They ran it for 48 hours It hit #1 for 24 hours Then dropped back worse than before That’s where a lot of myths come from. Back to the 301: Next steps – we’re going to try everything we know: Maybe do a press release / digital PR campaign to inject a lot of links and see if that sparks something We found 107 new pages we’re missing that could support topical authority Around 90 pages that aren’t good enough and should probably be pruned Some areas where we went too wide – topic dilution We’ll: Prune back Improve existing content Look at intent shifts using tools like Nightwatch / MarketMuse / POP (Kyle Roof’s stuff) Re-optimise pages based on current SERP intent Basically, we’ll try everything. But at some point, I might just park it, leave it, and focus on other sites that are working. There’s only so much money you can throw at it before you’re no longer getting ROI. So yes, it’s a big loss – we’ve spent a lot on that site – but we also have a lot of sites doing really well. We’re at both ends of the spectrum: Some sites flying Some big ones decimated I can’t sit here and pretend I know exactly what’s going on with that gambling site. Craig Confirms They Tried Everything Before 301 Craig: I’m assuming before you did the 301 redirect you did the disavows, content pruning and all that? James: Everything. We did everything everyone in the industry told us: Fixed crawl errors in Search Console Cleaned internal linking Ensured every page was within two clicks of the homepage Built a technically sound site – fast load times (~0.7s) Solid content, well structured Maybe we’re missing some pages, maybe some needed deleting – maybe it’s cost of information retrieval or something. But when I look at the sites that are ranking now: They’ve got more “bad” pages They’ve got more toxic links Some of my own other sites – that I don’t think are as good – are outranking it. So I’m being honest – for that particular site, I’m clueless. Other sites I own have flown and I’m like: “Why are THEY doing so well?” It’s bizarre – that’s the random ranking factor, the Google dance. That’s why diversification is important. Don’t throw all your eggs in one basket. Don’t just have one big affiliate site. Try to diversify. I probably diversify too much – you’re always calling me that guy who diversifies everything. If You Could Ask a Google Engineer One Question… Craig: Right, a question for you. If you could ask a Google engineer one question about a ranking factor – and he had to answer honestly – what would you ask? James: I have thought about this for the last couple of days because I saw this question beforehand. It’s a really difficult one. For me, the thing that interests me most is engagement signals. We understand: On-page Link building Even CTR to a certain extent But the engagement side – I don’t think anyone fully understands: How Google uses that data Whether it’s coming from social media Whether from paid ads CTR Email blasts We see massive jumps when we send traffic to pages. We all know “position 7 to position 2” can happen when you send traffic. But I’d love to nail a Google engineer on: How are they really using engagement data? How much weight is on it vs links/content? We know links work. We know content works. Engagement has worked for years as well, but the mechanics of it – that’s what I’d ask about. Engagement, Dwell Time, Pogo Sticking James: Because then you’ve got: Dwell time Pogo sticking Pages per session And there’s a big debate there. Example: If someone goes on my website, I present the exact info they want and a phone number. They call me. Then they go back to Google and click result #2 to get another quote; and maybe result #3 for a third quote. That doesn’t mean they didn’t like the number one result. If Google penalises me because they pogo back to SERPs to get more quotes, that’s not fair – that’s just normal user behaviour. Same with affiliate sites – people land on “best lawnmowers,” they click an affiliate link to Amazon and leave. They’ve only visited one page – but they’ve had a great user experience. So if Google is judging those sites badly because there’s only one page per session, that’s flawed. So yeah, it’d be an amazing question to ask a Google engineer. If You Were Google – What Would You Dial Up/Down? James: One more question for you on Google. If you owned Google – you’re majority shareholder – and you could turn the dial up or down on ranking factors: Would you turn Reddit and user-generated content down a bit? Would you promote links more? If you did, would it be relevance? traffic? sheer power? What would you dial up within Google’s search results to yield better results? Craig: That’s a really tough one. I get why Reddit and similar sites have had a boost – but people will always abuse whatever gets boosted. Same with links. If Google said tomorrow: “All you need is relevant links with traffic,” Everyone would pile in and systemise / manipulate that. We all know people do link building – guest posts, digital PR, etc. What’s a “good quality” link now? Does it need traffic? Does the page need to be relevant? Does the whole domain need to be relevant? Or is it just the content around the anchor? These are all things they could fine-tune. I don’t know if I’d actually turn links up – I think links are too easy to manipulate. On-page – I’m not sure how much more you could dial that up now. So for me it would be engagement, but it has to be refined engagement, like we said: They shouldn’t hammer an affiliate site for doing its job properly They shouldn’t hammer a lead gen site just because users want multiple quotes I’d like to tweak that part of the algorithm. I think a lot of sites have been hit that shouldn’t have – especially in helpful content / algorithmic updates. So I’d tweak the engagement + quality signals better, rather than cranking links or on-page. How James Decides What to Test (and Not Waste Millions) Craig: Going back to testing – you are the type of guy where someone says something to you on a night out, and next day your office whiteboard is wiped and your team are like: “What the hell? We’re doing this today, that, that, that.” Which is good – but like anything, you’ve only got so much staff and money. How do you decide what to test and what to ignore? There’s so much nonsense out there. James: Great question. I’ve wasted millions on testing because I used to listen to everyone. I eventually realised a lot of people are just rehashing Chinese whispers. Now I: Listen to the right people Go to people who are experts in their lane If I’m getting my roof done, I get a roofer, not a plumber. Same in SEO: For GMB, I’ll go to Slawar (Slawomir) – one of the best GMB guys in my opinion Instead of me testing everything he says, I just give him one of my GMBs and say “Go rank it.” If he ranks it, I know he knows what he’s doing. I’ll just subcontract to the expert. I don’t need to test his method – I just care that it delivers the outcome. For in-house testing, we focus on core basics: Technical Topical authority What is good quality content What is a good quality link and does it move the needle Power posts etc. Anything outside that, I’m like: “Prove it to me.” You say this tactic works? Fine – here’s a site or page: “Rank this from position 5 to position 1.” A lot of them don’t show me. That tells me everything. So that’s saved us a lot of money.

Also: cowork groups, masterminds.

I don’t need to test as much now because: The expert in their lane is testing every day They want to be the most innovative and best in their lane So I let: GMB experts test for GMB On-page experts test for on-page Link experts build/testing links And I just plug into their knowledge. Craig’s Mastermind & Why It’s Valuable James: I want to touch on something – your mastermind group. You don’t promote it enough. I know you don’t like pitching or selling; you prefer providing value. But people need to know about it. It’s an amazing mastermind that has people like Slaw and other experts in the group. It’s less than £100 a month to join, they get weekly calls, and loads of people are testing things live. I don’t need to test as much anymore because: Whoever is the expert in their lane is running tests every single day. That alone is worth the money. Craig: I’ve promoted it gently, just to see how it all worked out. Like you say, there’s a lot of value and a lot of different people with different skills: Guys in America Guys in India People doing GMBs, CTR, reviews, etc. We test a lot and we have fun competitions: Image ranking Video ranking GMB games CTR tests We also learn weird things from testing. For example, in an image ranking test: Magic PR was up against me He launched a press release at the last minute with Yahoo Finance etc. I had to think outside the box with time zones to beat him We also found weird stuff like: Someone buying an exact match domain Someone else setting up a GMB Google auto-assigning the GMB to the EMD owner We thought someone had “stolen” the GMB – turns out it was auto-assigned by Google. So we learned that through testing. We like doing those tests in a private environment, not in public where everything gets spammed. There’s about 100 people in the mastermind – good people, smart in their own areas. We’ve had a few bad eggs before, which is why I’m reluctant to scale it to 1,000 people and ruin the vibe. But, yeah – if anyone wants to join, that’s what it is. James’s Portfolio: Giger, Indexceptional, AutoBlogging, SearchHero, Local SEO Sharks & Lead Gen Craig: Couple of quick-fire questions about your stuff. You’ve been around a while and you’re into everything. You’ve invested loads of money, got websites in all sorts of niches, but also: Giger Indexceptional AutoBlogging.ai SearchHero Local SEO Sharks And obviously lead generation sites Let’s talk about lead gen first. Even talking to Slaw last night – he wants to do it for clients, whereas you’re like: “Nah, why do it for clients? Own the website, own the GMB, and sell the leads.” I love that model. A lot of people don’t have the confidence or cash flow to do that though. Then also, every time I do a live stream, people say they’re sick of clients and agency life, and they want a different way to make money. I think lead generation is perfect for that. So, talk about: Why you own the websites How you find people to buy the leads (before or after building sites) James: First off, why we own the websites: I don’t want clients telling me: “I prefer a red site” “Make the buttons brown” I want to build sites for conversion and for Google, not for a client’s “favourite colour.” So: I pick a theme and colour scheme that suits the niche I write content the way Google wants, not the way the client “likes” I focus on data and stats, not opinions It’s my site. You want leads for a product or service? I’ll get you leads. Forget how I’ll get there – that’s my job. I make sure we: Build out the site properly Control all the assets Generate leads consistently Then I go down the rabbit hole to find new niches, build more sites, generate more leads – and the businesses we partner with make a lot of money. It’s the best deal for UK businesses that fit our model because we guarantee them ROI. We pre-qualify heavily – they need to: Be able to handle volume Have sales teams Work in multiple areas ideally For the smaller businesses who can’t handle our lead gen model, that’s where Local SEO Sharks comes in: Overseas SEOs Lower budgets Local-only clients (like “plumber in London”) We charge cheaper rates because the work is done overseas, but we still keep quality high. James on His Tools & Investments James: Giger & Indexceptional – indexing tools Indexing became a massive problem, especially with mass AI content We want them to be the #1 and #2 indexing tools on the market It’s guaranteed indexation or you don’t pay Not just using Google API – multiple methods combined AutoBlogging.ai Produces a lot of our content Scott Ken has spent 12+ months improving prompts every day Founder Vibha is constantly innovating Focused on: No fluff Good sentence structure Right entities Content that ranks, not just “pretty AI text” SearchHero Link building agency

Difference vs others: Power Posts

We try to rank the guest post itself for the keyword you want your money page to rank for Like Reverse Sink or Swim 2.0 / on steroids

Aim: dominate the SERPs with both your money site & the guest posts

Local SEO Sharks Overseas SEO team for low-budget clients Great for local businesses who can’t fit into our lead gen model Mainly UK, some US All of these complement each other and support the lead gen ecosystem. The Carl Hudson Joke & Outro Craig: Right, last question that wasn’t written down – still about SEO. Has that tight bastard Carl Hudson ever bought you anything or paid you from SEO yet? He’s the most tight-fisted person I’ve ever met. Honestly, he could peel an orange in his pocket. He does well in business, and he’s the last one to go to the bar. I don’t think he’s ever bought a meal. I don’t think he’s ever once gone to the bar and bought a round. So if anyone ever sees Carl Hudson at an event – get him to the bar. If you do, I’ll give you £100 myself for doing it, because he’s very tight. Anyway, it’s been a pleasure, Craig. Always good to talk. See you again soon. Craig: No worries. Cheers, mate.