SEO ain’t dead

Hi again, this is Paige with the B2B Growth Newsletter, where we break down what one of the internet’s favorite creators is doing right so you can use their strategies to build raving fans for your company. 

Consider us the ‘content strategy espresso’ in your Friday morning coffee.

This week we’re looking at the #1 baby boomer living in the digital age — Steve Dotto.

After over a decade of hosting and producing Dotto Tech on Canadian TV, Steve Dotto didn’t turn to retirement — he began building his online empire. 

Now, with his main channel boasting 456K subscribers, Steve aims to help his community better understand and navigate modern technology with weekly webinars, podcast episodes and frequent How-to style videos on YouTube. 

With much debate on whether SEO is alive and kicking or deep in the graveyard, Steve has a strong argument for the former — 40% of his viewer traffic comes from non-subscriber searches. 

SEO plays a huge part in Dotto’s 30M views and counting. 

But, SEO is just the first step. It gets people in the door, but does nothing to keep them around and build the relationship that turns viewers into subscribers into paying customers. 

Steve’s big unlock for online creator success? His Patreon community. For $3, $10 or $20 a month, community members can unlock exclusive content and benefits and gain access to a vault of webinars and countless additional materials, courses and downloads. With over 36,000 current Patreons, a majority of Steve’s revenue comes from his community.

But creators must take a few vital steps to transform followers into community members. 

First: Understand the critical difference between subscribers and members of your community:

The subscriber relationship is like a customer relationship — they aren’t invested in your success. They are invested in the quality of your content and the value it brings them. 

Members of your private, paid community are different. They go a step further. Rather than a customer-inventor relationship, community members enter into a creator-supporter relationship. 

These individuals are highly invested in your content and success. And better — they want to play a part in the progress. 

Steve says he uses Patreon to involve his audience. They don’t just receive regular exclusive content — they gain access to live interactions with Steve and his community. They play a role in selecting the topics to be covered in the future. They ask questions and share insights that drive Steve’s content further in the right direction. 

This gives Steve direct access to understanding his audience better and ultimately gives them more of what they want. 

Second: Understand the fundamental role of community: Relationship-building at scale. 

Both the scale and application will look different based on your organization and audience base. Whether you’re jumping into Patreon or building an email subscriber list, it’s important to own your audience.

This requires stepping away from platforms that limit your data collection and personal connection. While YouTube and social media are incredible for top-of-tunnel audience building, you need to build a community you can keep and tap into outside of a platform. 

(Think TikTok — potentially disappearing from new US audiences. Without a secondary owned audience, TikTok creators may be SOL) 

What this all means for you and your content strategy: 

SEO is still great, even fantastic, for getting new eyes on your content. But without community, you’re missing a major opportunity for growth, monetization and improved content quality. 

Have an existing community? Now might be the time to start building an exclusive community. But it doesn’t have to be on Patreon. 

You can begin by building an email list to send regular newsletters, content or updates. 

Or, you can build a membership program off existing content channels (Steve also has a membership program for top fans of his podcast Grey Matters). 

Your community should have perks or benefits not available on free channels — this, too is completely customizable to your time and resource capability.

But with each of these community avenues comes one major necessity: Allow — encourage — your audience to play an active role in the process and progress of your (or your business’s) success. 

The takeaway: SEO may drive new viewers to your accounts, but community is what fuels long-term success. Identify your top fans and build an exclusive relationship with them to tap into better content, owned audience and business sustainability. 

That’s it, ya’ll. Happy creating!

Paige Peterson
Newsletter Aficionado, Sweet Fish

P.S. Your podcast creates a disjointed experience for your biggest fans. Ready to build an owned audience leveraging your podcast? We’d love to chat.

In case you missed it: 

🌯 Chipotle is getting DESTROYED for this…
📌 Your best B2B content marketing investment? Focus.
📽️ YouTube officially rolls out thumbnail testing