SEO is all about bringing customers to your site through organic search. SEO consultants help bring customers to a website by helping Google understand what a website is about, and who the company and the people in it are, through technical elements like schema, URLs, ALT text, meta data, etc. We make sure Google can find, crawl, and understand those pages. We help Google understand which pages are most important, and which pages are really just variations on other pages. We guide our customers on creating content that not only is helpful for users, but is seen by Google as more valuable than your competitors' content. Schema, crawlability, indexation, rendering, and user experience (partly measured by Core Web Vitals, partly measured by click behavior) are all key as well. Backlinks are still important--not just for PageRank, but also for context, as the content on pages linking to your site tells Google what you're known for.
Done right, SEO benefits your business by bringing new customers to your website month after month, without having to continue to pay money like you do for ads or social media promotions.
I offer SEO consulting services to clients ranging from small, family-owned businesses to international brands that are household names. My clients are from all over the world, including, most European countries, most southeast Asian countries, Australia, New Zealand, and even obscure places like Dubai, Peru, Trinidad, Iceland, and the Galapagos Islands. Click here to see a list of my past clients.
I've spoken at a number of conferences including MozCon, SearchFest, and Innotech. I've been a guest on many podcasts, webinars, and panels. I served on the board of SEMpdx for several years and am now on the SEMpdx Advisory Board, and helped put on their Engage conferences. See the full list of my past speaking engagements.
I've done Whiteboard Friday videos for Moz, and written about a dozen articles for the Moz main blog, plus articles for Raven Tools, 3Q Digital, Act-On, Outspoken Media, and AboutUs.org. See the full list of my articles here.
Current knowledge of the search engines, technical SEO issues, local SEO, SEO tools, and SEO best practices, plus a strong understanding of internet marketing, business, customers, and conversion to sales are key to growing your business and making your SEO investment pay.
I help our clients with the following:
- SEO strategy
- Answer Engine Optimization (ChatGPT, AI Overviews, Copilot, etc.)
- site architecture
- internal linking strategy
- keyword research and competitive analysis
- SEO best practices & site audits
- on-page content tuning, including images, video, and schema
- Google penalty recovery for both algorithmic and manual penalties
- local search optimization for ranking on Maps and in the 3-pack
- ecommerce SEO
- white-hat link-building strategies
- optimization of your social media strategy and processes for SEO
- duplicate content issues
- rich content tactics and strategies, including search-optimized photo galleries, Google Maps API, fast-loading video embeds, etc.
- XML sitemaps - one of the most misunderstood of SEO tools
- page speed analysis and recommendations for making your pages blazingly fast
- Yoast WordPress SEO plugin configuration
- semantic markup via schema.org
I don't do paid search advertising (PPC) for Google Ads nor for Facebook or other social media channels--while I am somewhat familiar with each of these, they are not areas I consider myself to be an expert in.
I'm an Associate at Moz, and you'll find me on the Moz list of recommended companies as well as on Cyrus Shepard's Zyppy List of recommended marketing companies.
Michael currently lives in Bend, in beautiful Central Oregon, with his wife and their three children.
You can find Michael on Facebook, Mastodon, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Tumblr, and SlideShare.
