The discoverability hack for small entertainment sites

Jamie Broadnax: Here at Black Girl Nerds, I see us and the entertainment creators out there, the smaller entertainment sites, as the Avengers. And we're here trying to fight the good fight against the bigger tentpole sites. And I'm not going to call them Thanos, I'm not, but there's other forces out there that we're competing against and we're just trying to be seen out here in these online streets. Stephanie Woodin: Discoverability is a challenge facing every creator, but especially news and entertainment sites. There's so much to report on and the competition is steep. So it's really hard to know what content will rise to the top. This episode, Jamie Broadnax of Black Girl Nerds brings us a question about how to supercharge her site's discoverability and how she can think about evergreen content as an entertainment site. Eddie Mercado is VP of SEO at Raptive. He's here to break down what Jamie can do to give her site the main character energy it deserves. Eddie, welcome to Ctrl Alt Ask. Eddie Mercado: Hi, Steph. I'm so happy to be here. Stephanie Woodin: We're so happy to have you. Thanks for joining us today. This is a really fun and timely topic. But since we're talking about entertainment today, Eddie, and I know you are a consumer of all things good entertainment, we have talked about Broadway and movies and TV in our tenure as colleagues, I thought I would ask an icebreaker just to get the wheels turning. What's your favorite TV show or film you've seen lately? And give us a little reason why. Eddie Mercado: Yeah. I feel like Heated Rivalry is so topical right now. Stephanie Woodin: Yes. Eddie Mercado: And sure, it was steamy and fun, but also it had tremendous amount of heart. And I just love how a show with that much heart is transcending so many audiences and becomes so mainstream in pop culture right now. Stephanie Woodin: I know. It's an interesting thing when a show hits the zeitgeist. It has to be a perfect storm of internet chatter and content and the right timing, and it's a hit. And I cannot go anywhere, on my algorithms, it is everywhere. And everyone I follow is talking about it. So there you go. It's transcendent. Eddie Mercado: It's really good. Stephanie Woodin: It's a good one. Eddie Mercado: And I want a cottage. I want a cottage. For all the fans out there, I want a cottage. Stephanie Woodin: We need cottage core in Eddie's life this year. Okay. So now that we've talked about entertainment, let's get into Jamie's question because she runs an entertainment news site, Black Girl Nerds. So without further ado, let's get into Jamie's question. Jamie Broadnax: So my site is called Black Girl Nerds, for the intersection of gay culture and Black feminism. I started this site a little over 13 years ago. We have several verticals that include comics, gaming, TV, books. We just cover a lot of things within the pop culture space. And one of the challenges that I have right now is being an entertainment publisher that publishes content on a daily basis. I am competing with a lot of bigger publishers that really pretty much put out the same kind of content. So I really want to figure out how I can be discovered within a sea of other content creators that's putting out things like movie trailers, that's putting out interviews with celebrities and just putting out what's currently happening in the entertainment space. But also, I really want to be able to find ways to be more visible when it comes to that evergreen content. We do cover things like top 10 movies of the year and Christmas lists of films and TV shows and shopping lists and things of that nature. So I really want to be able to find ways I can be discovered a little bit better with my publication because I'm a smaller blogger in a very big entertainment space. I'm still unfamiliar about what Google Discover does for my site. I do see some analytics that show that there is some referral traffic that comes from Google Discover to my site, but traffic is fairly low. So just very curious about the algorithm of Google Discover and how all of that works. Stephanie Woodin: That was great. I have actually read Jamie's site and followed her for years. I used to work in entertainment PR. And she has carved out a great space in entertainment news, but I understand the concerns. I feel like Jamie has probably unique challenges in her vertical. What would some of those be when running a news and entertainment site when it comes to getting that content discovered? Eddie Mercado: Yeah. So I think right now one of the challenges that I see for entertainment and news sites is that this transition from organic search to really Discover as a primary source, it's been really nebulous because it's happened kind of slowly over the last two to three years. The metrics and the KPIs haven't really been as obvious. There's a new report in Google Search Console that you have to look at to understand your Google Discover traffic and you have to understand what that is. Some creators don't even use Google Discover, and so they don't know what the platform is in general. Stephanie Woodin: Actually, can you tell me just in a quick what Google Discover is for those creators who maybe have heard it but haven't adopted it yet? Eddie Mercado: Yeah. So Google Discover is basically Google's way of creating an Instagram or Facebook or TikTok sort of feed and experience for users based on the open web. And it's a very browsing experience and it's available in the Google Search app or Chrome app on iOS devices. It's embedded in Android devices as a separate feed on one of the screens. And so it's a very mobile first experience and every site across the internet is able to participate in it, but Google is using a separate algorithm to power it. Stephanie Woodin: Got it. So it really is algorithm based. So the more you see one piece of content, it's going to serve you things that it thinks you will like in that Discover feed. Eddie Mercado: Yeah. They do a lot of entity matching. So if you have a lot of interest in hair and makeup, you're going to get that sort of stuff in your feed. If you travel a lot, you're going to get that stuff in your feed. If you like comic books and you like movies and entertainment, you're going to get that stuff in your feed. And everyone's feed is personalized, just like the TikTok and Facebook and Instagram algorithms that are out there. If you react and respond by clicking on a topic or a site, you're going to get more of that. Stephanie Woodin: Right. So we were talking about Jamie's challenge being an entertainment news site. What are some of the content challenges that she faces in this vertical? Eddie Mercado: Yeah. I think with any site, there's always, of course, the challenges of what you're going to invest in and what you're not going to invest in. Understanding what's working for your current audience and identifying ways that you can maintain your brand and identity, but also go after new audiences. In the entertainment space, yeah, every entertainment site, there's thousands of them that will publish the same trailer and the same news story about the upcoming series or whatnot, and figuring out how to give that information to your loyal audience so that it's available to them on your site, but also figuring out how to add in your extra angle that maintains your brand identity and your voice and also makes you stand out in the pack, right? Stephanie Woodin: Yeah. Eddie Mercado: If you're going to have a thousand articles about the same show or movie, what's your take on that? How are you contributing to the conversation and pushing it forward? There's even mention specifically about that in Google's language in terms of recommendations for creators. Stephanie Woodin: Oh, interesting. So they're even saying you have to find your niche and super serve that to really stand out. Eddie Mercado: Exactly. Stephanie Woodin: Yeah. I mean, I think that's a through-line through other conversations we have around branding for creators. It's kind of a pervasive idea, but I think when it comes to this, it can be more tactical. And I'd love to maybe get into, when it comes to her content, what Jamie could do to improve that discoverability, and maybe we start with the timely content, right? What are some things she can actually do to really stand out and rise above some of those bigger [inaudible 00:09:23] sites? I think she mentioned Collider is one of them, which everyone knows Collider is a huge entertainment site, but what would your recommendation be? Eddie Mercado: Yeah, I would really encourage her and other sites like hers to not try to compete with as many of these giant sites. They are very successful because they're everywhere and they have this scale, they have tremendous resources. But really understanding and setting realistic expectations for where you are in the market. I think it's similar if you were to compare a boutique shop to one of these mega conglomerates like Nike or whatnot. The business model is just different. So to try to be everywhere and everything and publish every single trailer and a story about every single new TV series, all the streaming services and whatnot, you really are entering a rat race that is going to have a very complicated return on investment for all of that content. And so if you are able to talk about the specific movie and series that works for your audience, or if you're going to talk about every single thing out there, then making sure that you're writing about it from your perspective and adding to the conversation and moving it forward in a unique way, then that's great. And that's the way you would stand out compared to the bigger sites. Stephanie Woodin: Yeah. It sounds like prioritization is really important for this type of site, that you have to get really rigorous around what works for your specific audience and what they can do without and that they won't miss. I imagine that's very difficult in this age of literally ... I mean, the amount of alerts that I get from different entertainment, media, it's a lot of content coming out from these studios and these streamers. So I imagine that's hard, but it probably is maybe once you do it, you start to get an understanding of what your audience really is latching onto, I imagine, and what you can say, "This didn't perform well, we can get rid of this." Eddie Mercado: Yeah, totally. And these businesses, these sites are very high volume publishers. That's how they operate, and they're chasing trends and they're doing a tremendous amount of work to figure out how to keep their fingers on the pulse of pop culture. And you really have to understand what's going to super serve your audience and what's going to be meaningful to your brand and to your site and what's not. And the what's not part is almost just as important as identifying what you're going to write. Stephanie Woodin: Yeah. So for Jamie, I think obviously she has this kind of geek culture angle working for her, which does feel like something that's only increasing with the amount of comic book, Marvel series that continue to come out. She can lean into what's serving that type of audience. So it seems like she's on a good path. She just may need to cull her content a little more. Eddie Mercado: Absolutely. And I've taken a look at her site, and she's had some really wildly successful posts that have really leaned into that nerdy comic book audience. One in particular that I'm thinking about was a post that she did last December about the new Superman trailer that had just been released at that time. It was a teaser trailer, and one of her writers talked about how the inclusion of The Green Lantern, the specific Green Lantern in that movie really showed where James Gunn was going with the whole DC world and the Superman universe. And it was really well thought out and well written, and it was obviously very authoritative, someone who really knew what they were talking about, and had a lot of perspective. And that's the kind of thing that will really work. And on the flip side, there are sort of thinner posts where you just say like, "Yeah, Wicked's coming out on such and such date and it's starring Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande." And it's like, well, yeah, there's 150,000 probably other sites that are saying the same thing. And so if you don't add some interesting perspective about how relevant casting is to your audience or something interesting, I think you're just missing an opportunity. Stephanie Woodin: Yeah, that's a great way of talking about it and then for them to think about it. And it sounds like angle is the key, finding your angle. Do you find that opinion-based pieces do perform better than just straight news pieces? How does that breakdown work? And is there any differentiator there of performance? Eddie Mercado: Absolutely. Especially when you understand the difference in terms of the three different Google platforms, really, the channels, right? The traditional search part is going to really focus on just basic bits of information that everyone's always looking for. News is going to focus on something that's really, really timely and really sort of critical, and Discover is now this opportunity for everything in between. And so understanding that Discover is now really the bigger opportunity and figuring out how to lean into that, that's really, I think, essential. And I think that's what I was sort of alluding to before about this transition that's happened over the last three years that has confused a lot of entertainment and newsy type of sites because they were all told for many, many years, and it was right, that you had to write a certain way for Google. And that was really about writing it for Google organic search, a way of writing content that will have a very, very long shelf life. Google Discover is going to have a much shorter shelf life, but it's going to have a really, really high return. It's also going to give sites in the entertainment space and the tech space and sports an opportunity to really share interesting perspectives and commentary on what's going on in their vertical. Stephanie Woodin: I didn't realize that, that I'm learning a lot about how each of those tracks think about content or serve content. Just a note for the audience, we're going to do a really big deep dive on Google Discover in an upcoming episode, but I think this is a really good kind of appetizer for that to talk about how creators should think about the different ways of being discovered. And we didn't touch on this, but one thing I wanted to mention is we talk about timely content and obviously Google News liking that. And then there's evergreen content, which is kind of the more ... It could stand alone any time of year type of pieces. How should Jamie think about that? Because I think she alludes to that being a conundrum for her. Is there a different way she should think about evergreen versus timely and how that shows up? Eddie Mercado: Yeah, sure. So I think evergreen can mean a lot of different things, right? Stephanie Woodin: Yeah. Eddie Mercado: There's sort of the very, like I mentioned, the basic answers to questions. Who is in a certain movie? What's the rest of their filmography? What's their height? What's their age? We've all Googled people at some point or another in a conversation. Stephanie Woodin: As we're watching Heated Rivalry. Eddie Mercado: Exactly. Exactly. So those are very evergreen, very basic things. And honestly, that's not a space I would encourage any creator to lean into because there are so many big sites out there, Wikipedia being one of the most obvious, but there's so many sites out there with these mega databases and these resources that publish that sort of information. Google itself is kind of taking that information and serving it up in the interface itself. If you Google movies to watch or top movies or any of those sort of evergreen ideas in the entertainment space, you're going to get a module of like, it's called What to Watch at the top of the search results and it's very user-friendly. So the opportunity to compete against that is really, really low. On the flip side, there's of course always audiences looking for holiday movies to watch this year, right? Stephanie Woodin: Yeah. Eddie Mercado: But the way you're going to write about it really kind of qualifies it, qualifies the content in the trendy space, and that stuff is going to show up well in Discover, as opposed to organic search. Stephanie Woodin: That's a great point. And do you think the entertainment sites should be, and maybe this just goes for not just entertainment, really any vertical that has this type of content, should they be updating past posts with that or should they be creating new ones? Eddie Mercado: Yeah, yeah, totally. And this is the SEO response that everyone hates, but it also, it does depend on the site. And I would say every site owner, if you know that you have a specific post that always performs every holiday season because it has traction in the true organic space, then absolutely you have to update that in a timely manner well ahead of the holiday season. You really want to start updating that really probably by the middle of October so that you're well ahead of the holiday season. Everyone is looking for Christmas movies basically on Thanksgiving Day. Stephanie Woodin: Oh, yeah. Eddie Mercado: So you want to make sure that you're well ahead of Thanksgiving Day. So the update is indexed by Google and ranked and all that sort of stuff. On the other hand, if you don't have that sort of content, then what you want to do is you want to write that more trendy piece and make sure that you're angling it and optimizing it for platforms like Google Discover, where you're going to ... Writing that title in a specific way that draws the attention and pulls that reader in browsing mode, pulls their interest, is really, really important. Stephanie Woodin: So we're wrapping up, but I thought we could just come back to the idea of the trifecta, which is the idea of there's these three basic ways I've heard from you this episode of how to get in front of audiences, classic search, Discover, and then Google News. Anything else creators should take away on how they should think about those three elements? Eddie Mercado: Yeah. I think it's important also for everyone to understand that a single post isn't necessarily going to work in all three. At best, you're going to get like two of the three, but most often you're going to really get traffic from one of the three. And so if you understand that and you set the expectations, then you're going to be more successful and you're going to feel more rewarded. At the same time, it's also going to help you in terms of your content planning because you want to make sure that you understand your audience, the type of person that you're going after with that piece. So again, you can write the title in the right way, you can lean into your perspective and your own individual ideas that are going to set you apart from the pack. You can be a lot more opinionated for Discover, things like that. And then I think also it's important to understand that even as we say that all three of them are different, they also do sit on top of a sort of base level of trust and authority within Google system. So there is one layer that is relevant for all three, and then there's nuanced layers and optimizations that you have to do for each of the individuals. And then I'll just mention that news, there's just a super high barrier in terms of trust because Google needs to be able to pull that post from a site within seconds of it being published and surface it and know that it's from a trusted source and the information's going to be reliable without it having the real abilities to verify that information the way it would in more traditional organic search. Traditional organic search, it's not going to be as timely. There's going to be 150 other posts that are talking about something similar and Google has a minute to see where you fall in the pack. And then Discover I think sits in the middle where generally speaking, Discover is going to react to your posts within probably six to 12 hours of you publishing it. You're going to start seeing some traffic, whether or not the algorithm feels that you are a good match for different audiences. Stephanie Woodin: Oh, that's fascinating. It's like different reaction times. I would never have thought of that being a factor. But I think that's a great takeaway and hopefully some creators are learning something new today too. I've learned a lot, and I'm so grateful for you, Eddie, coming on to break it down. And I love talking about entertainment and entertainment gossip with you. So please come back and we can do another deep dive maybe about Wicked. I don't know. Eddie Mercado: Yes. Stephanie Woodin: We'll figure it out. But we will, like I said, have another episode about Google Discover. You gave us some really great tips on that too. So it was a pleasure to have you, Eddie. Eddie Mercado: Thank you for having me. This has been so much fun. Stephanie Woodin: Thanks to Eddie and Jamie for joining us, and we hope this helps more entertainment sites of all sizes find their audience. If you're a creator with a question, I would love to hear from you. Email me at ctrlaltask@raptive.com and tell me your story. For more information on everything we talked about today, check out the show notes or our website, raptive.com/ctrlaltask.