Interview recorded at NFPA 2024 in Orlando, Florida, in which Paul Giannamore speaks with Mat Rogers, COO of Lizard Marketing, about digital marketing for fire protection businesses. Topics include SEO and content creation for the fire protection industry, paid versus organic search, obtaining reviews from commercial clients, contact (conversation) marketing for B2B lead generation, choosing a digital marketing partner, and the role of AI in marketing. Timestamps cover an introduction, Mat's marketing background, why digital marketing requires commitment, industry-specific challenges, content strategy for SEO, and how to start digital marketing from scratch. # Channel Identity Observations: Potomac TV (Video 01a168c8) ## Explicit Self-Description (Creator Claims) - **Channel name**: Host identifies himself as "Paul Giannamore" and the channel as "pic TV" / "patomic TV" (transcript rendering of Potomac TV): *"hi I'm Paul jamore… thanks for joining us here at patomic TV."* - **Stated historical focus**: *"historically pic TV has been focused on business and operational information and interviews for residential and Commercial Services business owners."* - **Stated scope expansion**: Following the "cide m&a master class" publication, Paul and "Dylan" plan *"more extensive m&a master classes both focusing on the sell side as well as the buy side,"* covering "choice of process," "m&a psychology," and "due diligence." - **Viewer-driven framing**: *"this channel is largely driven by you the viewer and what you want to see from us."* ## Intended Audience (Observable) - **Residential and commercial service business owners**, especially route-based service businesses: *"our Focus here at ponic is route based service businesses… anytime you put a technician in a truck send them to a business send them to a home."* - **Fire protection industry owners specifically** — recorded at the National Fire Protection Association conference: *"this is the first time you've been at the National Fire Protection Association conference."* - **Owners seeking growth or exit**: Guest frames his marketing goal as helping businesses *"get to a place where they can sell their company too."* ## Claimed Scope (Demonstrated by This Video) - Expert interviews with industry operators and service providers (guest: Mat Rogers, COO of "lizard marketing" / Lizard Marketing). - Practical education on digital marketing: SEO, paid search, reviews, content strategy, and vetting marketing partners. - Industry event coverage (booth floor references: vendors, VR training demos). ## Presentation Patterns Observed - **Interview/conversation format** with host-led questions: *"how should a business owner think about digital marketing and positioning online?"* - **Call-to-action structure**: subscribe prompt, email distribution list link in description, comment solicitation. - **Cross-promotion of prior content**: references to "the m&a master class," a "Google leak" discussion "last week," and *"we talked about this last week"* — indicating recurring episodic output. - **Named third-party anecdotes** used as teaching cases (e.g., "Ardam"/"Artem" of Chase Fire Protection in Queens: *"he's on page one of Google"*). ## Notes on Distinguishing Claims vs. Demonstration - The M&A master class expansion is a **stated intention**, not demonstrated in this transcript. - The demonstrated content here is marketing/operations education for service business owners, consistent with the claimed historical focus. # Delivery Observations: Paul Giannamore & Mat Rogers — Fire Protection Digital Marketing ## Overall Format - **Conversational interview structure**: Paul hosts and asks guiding questions; Mat answers at length. Paul frames topics and repeatedly hands off with prompts like: > "So how should a business owner think about digital marketing and positioning online?" > "So in closing today Matt… what do you guys do? Like how do you get going?" - **On-location framing**: The conversation occurs at the National Fire Protection Association conference, referenced repeatedly ("welcome to uh fire yes fire fire prevention here we are"). ## Tone - **Casual and warm**, with frequent interjections, laughter cues, and informal sign-offs: > "always buddy… sounds good brother cheres" - **Enthusiastic and emphatic** when discussing opportunity: > "demand for paid search for all the stuff that you see around us is high it's crazy high" ## Vocabulary & Recurring Phrases - **"Slow game" / "slow climb"** — Mat's repeated framing of SEO (appears at least four times): > "SEO uh which is a much slower game and a much slower climb" > "it's B2B uh and because it's heavily reliant on good SEO um it's a slower game" - **"Page one of Google"** — recurring success benchmark, used many times, e.g.: > "and he's on page one of Google… that's not easy to do" - **"It's an investment"** — core framing metaphor Mat returns to: > "it is an investment just like it's an investment to have an admin receive a call" - **"Hit me up"** — Mat's colloquial catchphrase, used twice: > "hit me up hit me up guys" > "give me some prompts for this particular industry uh and Bam hit me up" - **Recipe metaphor** for transferable marketing strategy: > "you can take this recipe or whatever you want to call it uh for one service industry you can tweak it modify it" ## Teaching Habits - **Concrete anecdote as anchor**: Both repeatedly return to a third party, "Artem/Artem" of Chase Fire Protection, as a worked example: > "it's 150 companies like his in a 15 M radius right that's insane and he's on page one of Google" - **Analogy-building**: Mat explains unfamiliar concepts via comparisons: > "it's the it's the equivalent of getting a text versus like getting a handwritten letter right it just feels different" > "he's made a very big net to catch a lot of fish on Google" - **Step-by-step process walkthrough** when asked how an engagement starts: evaluate → plan content → create video/backlinks → measure KPIs ("3 to six month plan"). - **Definitional teaching**: When Paul asks "contact Mar- what is that?", Mat defines it plainly with an example (LinkedIn inbox full of pitches). ## Communication Patterns - **Paul's funneling questions**: Paul uses short prompts to steer ("so how should you ask for reviews," "what percentage of clients Focus purely on SEO"), then lets Mat elaborate. - **Paul repeats/confirms key claims** for emphasis: > "it sounds like it's a part of his p&l and investment that he makes every time" - **Frequent filler and self-repair**: Both speakers show heavy "uh/um" usage and restarts, consistent with unscripted speech: > "you can uh um you can blast out and see what happen" - **Humor and pop-culture asides** from Mat: > "Sarah Connor is probably right skynet's going to blow us all up eventually but until it does…" ## Uncertainty Notes - Speaker attribution is occasionally ambiguous without video; "Artem/Artum/Arnam" spellings vary in the transcript and some lines' attribution (e.g., the AI/Google leak exchange) is inferred from turn-taking rather than explicit naming. - Emotional tone (laughter, gestures) is only weakly inferable from transcript cues; claims of enthusiasm rest on word choice and phrasing, not observed delivery. # Position Record: Digital Marketing for Fire Protection Businesses ## Source - **Video:** *Digital Marketing Strategies for Fire Protection Businesses with Mat Rogers and Paul Giannamore* (POTATOMIC TV / recorded at the National Fire Protection Association conference) - **Speakers:** - **Paul Giannamore** — host, founder-focused interviewer (Patomic; works with route-based service businesses) - **Mat Rogers** — COO of Lizard Marketing; previously ran marketing for his family's residential/commercial services business (sold in 2018, ~9 service lines, ~34,000 customers at sale) --- ## Background Positions (Mat Rogers) - **Transferable marketing "recipe":** Rogers states that residential and commercial service industries share "very similar underpinnings" for marketing; a strategy from one service industry can be tweaked and applied to another, working in both residential and commercial contexts. - **Career path:** Graphic design → family pest/services business (2012–2018) → now runs a digital marketing company serving residential/commercial services (HVAC, lawn, pest, fire protection). ## Digital Marketing as an Investment (Rogers) - Digital marketing should be treated like any other **P&L line item** (admin staff, salespeople, AP/AR): a commitment, not something to "sample and try and jump around." - **Case referenced — Ardam/Artum (Chase Fire Protection, Queens, NY):** - Started by knocking doors; no one opens doors now, especially post-pandemic, so he shifted heavily to digital. - ~150 competing companies in a 15-mile radius; he is on **page one of Google**. - Rogers attributes this not to a specific vendor or quick win but to **years of sustained monthly investment** in digital marketing. - **Paid search vs. SEO in fire protection:** - Demand for paid search *keywords* around vendor products is "crazy high," but actual paid search application in this service industry is low. - Fire protection is a **slower, SEO-reliant game**; there is "no shortcut" for it, unlike high-demand residential services (missed call = lost job). - Rogers: being on page one organically — with reviews, tutorial videos, content, regulation education — is where customers go when ready to choose. ## Reviews: Commercial vs. Residential (both speakers) - **Giannamore's position:** Commercial businesses are much harder to review-generate for than residential (fewer contracts). - **Rogers' agreement and reasoning:** - Residential can blast SMS requests via tools like Podium across thousands of customers; commercial requires **intentional, personal outreach** and network marketing. - Residential customers (his "aunt Susie with an iPad" example, voiced by Giannamore) review voluntarily; busy business people don't — unless there's a personal relationship. - Owner-operator involvement (Artum answering his own phones, name on the building) builds relationships that make customers "inclined to hook him up" when asked. - Recommended ask method: **personal, handcrafted requests** from actual customer interactions — "the equivalent of getting a text versus a handwritten letter." App blasts "see what happens"; Rogers qualifies: if your service isn't awesome, you won't get a heavy response, "and you got to be okay with that." ## Strategy Mix and Challenges for Fire Protection (Rogers) - **Mixed-bag strategy** needed, but the majority of the "pie" should be **SEO** for this industry. - Demand exists but is often tied to inspections or failed-inspection responses, so paid search need is lower. - Recommends **content marketing** (LinkedIn-based outbound, "making second and third contacts your first contact") for B2B, though Lizard doesn't offer it ("that's its own thing"). - SEO must be **responsive to regulation changes**, tethered to **Google Business Profile**. - **Biggest challenge:** it's a slow game; success is measured by month-over-month benchmark movement (traffic, number and quality of conversions, site authority). Wrong-direction metrics mean a different investment is needed. ## Getting Started (Rogers) - "Just start." Vet a marketing company via **referrals and KPI improvements**, look for long-term partner relationships, and accept the long-term timeline. - Notes contrast with pest control (offseason conversations start in October); fire protection has **no offseason**. ## AI and Trends (Rogers) - **AI compresses SEO timelines:** "the Advent of artificial intelligence diminishes the amount of time that it used to take for SEO to gain some traction" because large data loads can be dumped into AI to guide teams. - Cited the **Google leak (March)**; he fed the leaked content into ChatGPT to learn what to focus on as a marketer. (Note: he describes it as a leak revealing "what's behind the curtain of SEO.") - Also observed **VR training** by a vendor (Viking) at the conference as an example of technology covering ground quickly. - AI use for content: prompt generation ("give me 20 more"), though content must be **specific, educational, informative** — no "viral" screwing around in this regulated industry. - Joking aside preserved: "Sarah Connor is probably right, Skynet's going to blow us all up eventually, but until it does…" (Rogers). ## Content Tactics (Rogers) - Regulations (e.g., North Carolina fire prevention rules — "a quagmire," "like a wiki of data") are an abundant content source: informative videos, tutorials, how-tos, dos/don'ts, infographics. - Videos aren't for YouTube viewership per se but to **backlink with proper descriptions, alt tags, meta tags** — building "a big net to catch a lot of fish on Google." - Adjacent industries (commercial electricians, industrial) offer further regulation/content sources. ## Lizard Marketing's Onboarding Process (Rogers) 1. **Evaluate** the site: domain authority, organic traffic, errors, holes. 2. Partner with the owner on **unaddressed content areas**, especially regulation. 3. Forecast **3–6 months of blogs**; create matching **video content**, new YouTube channel, backlinks, white papers. 4. Track KPIs: site visitors, conversion count and quality ("are we spinning our wheels?"). ## SEO vs. Paid Search Adoption (Rogers) - Asked what percentage of clients focus purely on SEO: **"Not enough of them."** - Reasoning: many see page-one ranking as "a lost cause" and give up entirely, despite the industry's heavy reliance on SEO. - **Opportunity claim:** because so few focus on SEO, Google Business connection, and review building, there is market share available to companies willing to start. --- ## Qualifications and Contradictions Preserved - Rogers is both a practitioner and marketer; his claims about Artum's success are secondhand reports of a conversation ("he said," "one of the things he said to me"). - Rogers qualifies that app-based review blasts *can* work if service is excellent — he does not claim they never work. - He admits uncertainty about industry-wide adoption: "I don't know how many of them are, but not enough people focus on their SEO." - He recommends content marketing (LinkedIn outbound) that his own company does **not** provide. - The Google leak attribution is Rogers' characterization; specifics of the leak are not detailed in the transcript. # Speaker Attribution & Provenance Record **Video ID:** 01a168c8-3185-7acc-acba-1cd69c0586a6 **Title:** Digital Marketing Strategies for Fire Protection Businesses with Mat Rogers and Paul Giannamore ## Speakers & Roles ### Paul Giannamore — **Host / Creator** - Self-identifies: *"Hi I'm Paul jamore"* in the channel introduction. - Affiliated with **Potomac / "patomic TV"** (channel name rendered variably in transcript: "pic TV," "patomic TV"). - Conducts the interview, asks questions, provides channel welcome. ### Mat Rogers — **Guest** - **Chief Operating Officer of Lizard Marketing** (role stated by host, confirmed implicitly by guest). - Formerly of the family business **Killingsworth** (pest control / residential services), sold in **2018** with Paul's involvement; guest states family went from ~pest control to residential services, up to nine service lines, 34,000 customers at sale. - Background in **graphic design** prior to 2012. - Provides the digital marketing expertise content of the episode. ### Unverified speaker (opening line) - The transcript's first sentence (on AI and SEO) precedes Paul's introduction; attribution to Paul or Mat is not explicit. ## Referenced Third Parties (claims about, not participants) - **Ardam / Artum / arnam** (name rendered inconsistently in transcript) — owner of **Chase Fire Protection**, Queens / New York Metro. Claims relayed secondhand: started by door-knocking; ~18 years in business; ~150 competing companies in a 15-mile radius; on page one of Google via committed SEO. Met by Paul at the conference. - **Dylan** — mentioned by Paul as co-planner of future M&A master class content; not a speaker. - **Viking** (vendor at conference) — cited for VR-based training demonstrations. - **Podium** — review-solicitation app mentioned by Mat as suited to residential, not commercial. - **ChatGPT** — recommended as a content-ideation tool by Mat. - **Google** — referenced re: "Google My Business," page-one rankings, and an alleged March SEO document leak discussed "last week." ## Promotional Segments — Flagged - **Channel intro:** Paul solicits **subscriptions**, directs viewers to an **email distribution list link**, and invites comments. Refers to the prior "cide M&A master class" publication and announces upcoming sell-side/buy-side M&A master classes. - **Closing outro:** standard sign-off; no explicit promotion beyond series continuation intent (*"we're going to do some this year"*). - Mat's role inherently promotes **Lizard Marketing** services (describes onboarding/evaluation process); no explicit call-to-action for the firm beyond describing its practices. ## Provenance & Availability Notes - **Comment availability:** Paul explicitly invites viewer comments ("put a comment below"), implying comments are open; no metadata confirming actual availability supplied. - **Setting:** Recorded at the **National Fire Protection Association conference** (Mat's first time attending, per Paul). - **Sources of claims:** All third-party business metrics (150 competitors, page-one ranking, 34,000 customers, 18 years in business) are **uncorroborated anecdotes** relayed by the speakers; no cited documents or external sources. - **Timestamps:** None present in transcript. - **Uncertainty:** Guest's company name spelled only phonetically ("lizard marketing"); third-party owner's name appears in multiple spellings ("ardam," "artum," "artem," "arnam"); channel name appears as "pic TV" and "patomic TV" — all unresolved by supplied metadata. the Advent of artificial intelligence uh diminishes the amount of time that it used to take for SEO to gain some traction because you can dump incredible loads of data uh uh into uh Ai and it can uh guide you help guide your team in the right direction hi I'm Paul jamore I wanted to welcome our new subscribers to the channel you know historically pic TV has been focused on business and operational information and interviews for residential and Commercial Services business owners but after the publication of the cide m&a master class last month my LinkedIn inbox has been inundated with a variety of different requests so Dylan and I will be sitting down filming more extensive m&a master classes both focusing on the sell side as well as the buy side I intend to talk about the choice of process delving deep into m&a psychology uh as well as extensive buide practice approach and due diligence for those of you who have not subscribed you can click below and subscribe to the channel furthermore we've provided a link here in the description where you can get on our email distribution list and if you do that you'll receive an email right in your inbox with our latest Publications feel free to put a comment below on the types of things you want to see I mean this channel is largely driven by you the viewer and what you want to see from us again thanks for joining us here at patomic TV welcome to uh fire yes fire fire prevention here we are here we are how our journey began and where it's taken us so Matt y this is the first time you've been at the National Fire Protection Association conference so I want to start a little bit with some background okay um obviously I met you back in 2017 yep when you guys sold the family business but I want to talk a little bit about how you got into digital marketing so um the experience that I had before we met each other was in graphic design then the family business started out in pest control but ultimately became a servicing business for homes right so all these resi Services you start to uh um work on marketing strategies I think we were up to nine when we sold with you yeah and the thing that I learned actually in that time that was uh uh 2012 to 2018 uh the thing that I learned in that time is all these Services have uh very similar underpinings when it comes to marketing very similar strategies that you kind of have to use across the board and so you can take this recipe or whatever you want to call it uh for one service industry you can tweak it modify it and then you can apply it to another service industry uh uh and it works it it works uh and what's interesting is uh that works in at a residential capacity and then if you make some modifications it also works at a a commercial capacity too um and so you know fast forward we sold the company uh with you in 2018 um I fast forward a little bit more I am running a digital marketing company hopefully helping uh businesses that are looking to grow their market share in their respective markets for their respective circuits uh Services uh um get to a place where they can sell their company too so that's kind of that's kind of where I'm at so you now are the Chief Operating Officer of lizard marketing yeah I've got bigger aspirations in that too by the way you only imagine um your main focus is the resian Commercial Services space so you guys do everything from HVAC lawn pest fire protection and it's it's literally the same you and I are we do a lot together because we're very similar businesses our our Focus here at ponic is route based service businesses so anytime you put a technician in a truck send them to a business send them to a home that's what we focus on yep and so you know I was chatting with ardam whom you know uh just yesterday here on the stage he runs a business called Chase fire protection up in New York Metro in Queens he's he started his business literally knocking on doors um he said of course now no one wants to open the door so he's true especially post pandemic yes yeah he's moved very heavily to digital Y and so really one of the things that I want to talk to you about today is you know I want to stick to the basics um a lot of business owners struggle with having an online presence they it it it it's tough from an SEO perspective but it's also very tough to understand paid search um and so let's go right down to Basics today and how should a business owner think about digital marketing and positioning online yeah it is an investment just like it's an investment to have an admin receive a call just like it's an investment to have a salesperson closing a lead right uh just like having someone in accounts payable and accounts receivable you've got to have a digital marketing strategy now more than ever in the service industry in particular and it's got to be a commitment a part of your p&l that you are planning on right it's you cannot uh sample and try and jump around and all of this kind of stuff uh because one thing that that I I love that uh artum just dropped it you know we just recently met and so uh I love that he just put it right out there he's been in business for about 18 years now do you know what I mean and he's uh once he stopped knocking on doors he invested in digital marketing and digital marketing strategy indefinitely and one of the things he said to me when we were sitting in the back was uh uh in uh Queens where his Market is right it's 150 companies like his in a 15 M radius right that's insane and he's on page one of Google uh and he didn't say it like we got there last month or he didn't say it we got there with this digital marketing company he got here with a commitment to digital marketing uh uh and the longevity to realize that commitment month over month it sounds like it's a part of his p&l and investment that he makes every time so one thing I think for this Market in particular there are some services that uh we do business with that is more immediate gratification uh is uh much more high demand you miss that call it's over but then you have uh systems uh like what we're dealing with here that are a lot more slow to nurture and your strategy has to be different but artam has thought through the strategy he's found a team that he wants to work with and he's committed to working with that team and what do you know after years of making this investment in digital marketing he's on page one of Google and that's not easy to do there's not many there's not many spots on page one of Google I mean organically how much power is it to be from a organic perspective being on page one versus the guys who try to shortcut it and use paid search yeah there's no there for uh fire protection there's no shortcut right uh what one one thing I thought of when I was walking around through the aisles with my daughter all of these uh vendors that are here hit me up hit me up guys because demand for paid search for all the stuff that you see around us is high it's crazy high I was just doing brushing up on my homework before I flew out here to meet you uh with my paid search team and uh we were talking through you know uh what these vendors are offering and selling out here and it's it's out of control right but when it comes to the uh industry itself the service industry itself the application of these tools into the market it's much lower right for from a paid search perspective so the strategy is different artem strategy is different has invested in SEO uh which is a much slower game and a much slower climb and so how important is it to be on page one of Google it's crazy important when you are uh um a one of 150 companies uh in a 15 milei radius and you're on page one of Google and you have reviews out the and you've got uh tutorial videos and you've got uh content and you've got regulation and you're teaching the consumer and all this stuff uh uh you show up on page one and so where's the first place somebody's going to go when they're ready to pick somebody they're going to go to artum because he's right there you know you know one thing that I guess just popped into my mind when you were talking about the 150 players in New York Metro when I think about insane you know you've got your resi service businesses and your Commercial Services businesses the majority of the folks here are focused on the commercial market and you just talked about reviews it strikes me as it's much more difficult to get reviews oh yeah for a commercial focused business than a resi business right yep yep and so cuz you have fewer contracts right resi Services when when we sold our company with you in 2018 we had 34,000 customers you know easy and and before I jumped in in 2012 uh we had not made any investments in building reviews I know this ages me but it wasn't as big of a thing then as it is now right you just oppose that to uh commercial contracts which are fewer and farther in between you have to have a strategy and it becomes about network marketing right I uh have to rub elbows with people I have to nurture these leads and I have to with intention uh arnam is reaching out to people uh to get those reviews to stockpile up because it's a slower game and it's a it's much more of an investment as opposed to sending out an SMS to 10,000 customers looking for reviews like uh um an application like Podium or something like that which is awesome for the resi service space much harder to do with commercial and so it is definitely a feather in his cap uh that he has as many as he does I mean do you feel like commercial businesses are are less likely to on their own voluntarily do a review without asking them for it yeah I guess you know versus residential aunt Susie out in the suburb she's got nothing to do her daughter just got her an iPad she wants to use it oh yeah she she writes the review but business people are busy yes they're busy but you can tell one thing he was describing to me and I kind of relate to this cuz I feel like we were doing this at Killingsworth a lot one thing you said said was uh I don't have people answering the phone I answer the phone and I take care of my customers when you have uh a business owner like that who is doing a service like this especially that's focused on Commercial you've got a relationship with the owner you know the owner by name you know the owner is going to cover for you you know the owner is on top of his regulations uh you know the owner is not going to let you fail an inspection he's looking out for you all that kind of stuff you are happy you are inclined to hook him up if he asks you for something as simple as hey can you click on this link and follow up thisw you you can tell he he answered two phone calls while we were sitting there I like oh all right uh uh he's committed to it uh and it takes that to kind of build those reviews so yes people are busy but when you have a partner like that you will find uh over time that you're much more inclined to get them than when how most people treat commercial relationships which is distant you talking to an army of people over here which is talking to an army of people over here you don't know exactly who you're working with and it's okay if you fire this company go with the next one when you take it personal um it shows and I think people have your back right when it comes to uh uh giving somebody a shout out so how should you ask for reviews uh I think what what he did uh how he described it is the way that I would do it uh even at the size that he's at right um you know he's got plans he's moving and shaking uh in Queens which is fantastic but he he's never let it Escape him that it's his name uh on the building that's what Dad used to say it's my name on the building right uh it's his name on the building um and this is an objective that he's got to take personal and so uh what he does uh is he asks for it by the people who call him right um and that takes a lot of intention you can't really trust a mechanism necessarily I mean you can uh uh um a vehicle or an app like Podium or something like that you can blast out and see what happens and maybe you get something awesome maybe you don't hopefully your service is awesome uh but if it's not you're probably not going to get a heavy response and you got to be okay with that he takes it real personally kind of handcrafts him it's the it's the equivalent of getting a text versus like getting a handwritten letter right it just feels different you know it feels personal you know you know Matt in fire protection you know what sort of challenges are owners facing when it comes to digital marketing so you have to have a mixed bag strategy right but if you if it's a ratio if you're looking at a pie and you've got a paid search and you've got uh you're outbound and you've got social all this stuff most of their pie is going to be made up of SEO with residential Services uh uh it's a little bit different right um uh you you have this high demand you've got people that are trying to solve a problem right now but in this industry in particular uh what happens is people are trying to solve a problem with urgency but it's usually having to do with an inspection right or response to something that they have perhaps failed right and the demand from a paid search perspective doesn't need to be there so it is a slower game right and so one of the challenges they that I think that they have is they do have to invest in uh SEO one of the things that I would recommend anybody that's listening uh um who's coming from this space Also if you are not investing in contact marketing which we don't even do uh that's its own thing and contact contact Mar what is that contact marketing is like uh having a large I guess the best way to describe it is having a a large uh Salesforce strategy to utilize tools like LinkedIn right uh um to reach out to people who might start the right conversation to offer your services in a particular industry where you whereby you don't know them it's the process of making uh third a second and third contact your first Contact and then sending them messages to try to nurture a lead it's much slower it feels impessive when's the I mean the last time you logged into contact when you logged into your LinkedIn recently you see that your inbox is full of people who are trying to pit you on right that's contact marketing and so there there is an element of that that you need for a B2B space but these companies definitely need to focus on their SEO and their SEO has to be responsive to things like regulation changes uh and it has to be uh um uh responsive to the markets that they serve has to be tethered into their Google my business um that that's definitely what they need to be thinking about when they're thinking about digital marketing what other challenges um you it's a slower game I think that's the biggest one when you because uh it's B2B uh and because it's heavily reliant on good SEO um it's a slower game and so you're measuring uh to see that your benchmarks are moving in the right direction month over month so that is uh traffic to the site that is quality of conversions that's number of conversions right these things are moving in the right direction month over month that's how you know you've got the right digital marketing partner and that's how you know that ultimately you're going to get to the goal that you're trying to achieve if these things are going in the wrong direction your conversions are dropping the quality sucks uh uh your your uh you know we talked about this last week your uh site Authority uh is lousy right you're not on page one you're not on page two you're on page six or Worse right uh then you need to re make uh different kind of investment but their real challenge everybody that's here that's looking for uh information on products that are here to better their business or marketing companies they can work with to better their business they're playing a slow game when it comes to digital marketing and I think that's the biggest challenge so what are these guys you these business owners right now that are doing absolutely nothing but no they need to do it where's a how do they start just start yeah you just got start you're doing nothing you got a website nothing else what would you do you got to vet a company that you're going to work with right uh um you want to uh look at referrals right who have you worked with how have you improved these kpis that we're looking for especially when it comes to SEO you want to see that they've got partners that believe in them and back their playing have made long-term Investments here because SEO is a long-term investment right and then just start with the mindset that this is going to take some time you know we come from uh uh we've worked together in the pest control industry and you don't even start these conversations until October right uh because that's their off seon well there is no offseason here right and so the best thing that they can do is vet their company and start uh that's that's really how to do it and then just Benchmark over time make sure Trends are moving in the right direction you know what are you seeing now as far as trends go in this IND industry and how it'll actually impact the fire protection industry uh one of the bigger ones I think is actually um and everybody's been rattled about it in 2024 you know uh it started with self-driving cars and weird like that Sarah Connor is probably right skynet's going to blow us all up eventually but until it does uh AI has big implications on people's ability to cover a lot of ground quickly you know I will say you just asked me what's the the challenge SEO is a slow game uh um the Advent of artificial intelligence uh diminishes the amount of time that it used to take for SEO to gain some traction because you can dump incredible loads of data uh uh into uh Ai and it can uh guide you help guide your team in the right direction we talked last uh week about uh Google's big uh uh Gaff with uh their their leak into the uh the market telling everybody you know basically what's behind the curtain of SEO at least in March right and what did I do after I after I got that leak you put it in the chat I took all of that content I threw it into chat and I had chat start to teach me what's important to me as a digital marketing company what what do I need to be focusing on am I doing this right for my partner and so these guys uh they have an advantage uh through Ai and AI is only going to get better as it progresses but even these guys behind me actually uh Viking um uh it has uh application to how they do things like training I think over there me and my daughter were watching they're teaching people how to manipulate some type of Hardware through uh their uh goggles and their uh through um uh what do you call it uh virtual reality so they're doing trainings through virtual reality which is which is trippy you can cover a lot of ground uh um um when it comes to that kind of stuff so there's all kinds of technologies that are coming down the way that should make things easier when they're handled the right way and you definitely want to make sure your digital marketing company is uh up on it and not behind the curve right you know when you talk about SEO you're talking about content creation is that what you're talking about yeah large large amounts of content that are created for businesses that uh specialize in fire prevention and the content needs to be real specific right uh with some Industries some service Industries you can kind of screw around right you can uh make uh uh viral content and stuff like that with this industry in specific you are dealing with things like state regulations so you really want to focus on content that is educational and that's informative and you want to produce a lot of stuff like that even if you feel like uh it's a little bit of minutia like I uh before we came out here I looked at uh state regulations for fire prevention in the state of North Carolina with my general manager just to see what it might look like and it is like a it is like a quagmire of stuff right you could literally one strategy that I would totally Implement for any of these businesses that are listening to your podcast you could take uh uh this content these regulations and make uh uh informative videos not because people are going to be flying to your YouTube page uh to be like oh yes I need to watch this video about blah blah blah but to link it to your website with the proper descriptions alt tags meta tags all this kind of stuff and to create that big net that we talk about a lot uh on your website that's one thing that artem's done with his SE strategy right he's made a very big net to catch a lot of fish on Google right and creating content like that in high volume is one of the ways that you can do that but you can do other simple things too like you can jump uh hopefully your digital marketing company is helping you D all these eyes and cross all these te's but you can uh um create infographics to simplify things in the mind of the consumers or business that you're trying to work with give those the proper tags the descriptions all that kind of stuff and load it up to your site and kind of stretch out those those that net right load it up to your LinkedIn page you're just creating more things for Google to grab on to and become familiar with your site um and the good news for these businesses is because the uh the uh regulations is like a Wiki of data which just makes my uh head hurt just looking at it uh they they can just you know close their eyes point to a regulation and start creating some content you know that's great they've got plenty to work with so from an SEO perspective you're suggesting not only the written word but also video oh yeah video infographics informative videos tutorials right how- to uh uh the dos and don'ts of fire prevention right that's a great thing another great thing about AI uh jump over to chat gbt with your team uh and ask AI uh uh give me some prompts for this particular industry uh and Bam hit me up and it'll okay give me 20 more give me 20 more right um uh so it doesn't have to be so um check this box check this box right you can uh skim this cat a lot of different ways you can create tons of different content uh but definitely I would uh make information videos create tutorials and uh infographics and just load your s up so for a business that focuses on inspecting fire extinguishers yeah me there's a lot of companies here that's their sole business they're out there doing maintenance repair service inspection on fire extinguishers you you think doing a variety of tutorial videos behind the scenes of what they do how they do it the regulations involved who where uh uh all of that yes but then you've got implications uh things like electrical implications right one of the things that's fascinating to me about this particular industry is uh uh this industry is Tethered to a lot of uh separate Industries industrial Industries uh uh commercial electricians right uh um to to make it work right there are ations outside of just fire prevention outside of uh extinguishing uh outside of systems that are in uh infrastructure just like this one uh that can also you can also kind of draw from to create more content so there's definitely plenty to work with when it comes to SEO these guys have a trove of stuff they can work with they just got to get started I guess in closing today Matt I'm thinking about when when you guys work with clients so I own a fire protection company I come to you and say my website's sucks my I don't do any marketing my SEO sucks what do you how does it work what do you guys do like how do you get going yeah I mean if I sit down with a marketing company like lizard like what's the first step in this process the first thing that we've got to do is we've got to evaluate uh where they're at right we're going to scrub their site through the tools that we use to see uh how it lands what is the domain Authority how much organic traffic are they getting what kind of errors are we seeing right where are the holes right after we make that evaluation we're going to partner with uh the business owner to talk specifically about areas of content that they feel like they need to address that has not been addressed so far in particular when it comes to regulation right so that has implications when it comes to uh forecasting you know 3 to six months worth of blogs that we're going to create for them drop on their site and force Google to scrub their site but then I would even start to work with them and get creative with our uh videographer and be like okay you know let's come out there let's meet you uh and let's create some content that matches these blogs that can uh be used in video form that we can create a brand new YouTube channel for you and we're going to start backlinking into your site you're also starting to work with them to think about things like uh white papers that they can create uh to put on their site and backlinks that they can get into their site so you're going to look at kind of uh the State of the Union uh with their site when they're getting started with you and then you're going to work on a 3 to six month plan of the kind of content that you're going to create that they can expect in terms of deliverables and then hopefully forecasting with them what you should expect to see with those important kpis who's coming to your site what kind of conversions are you getting uh and what is the quality of those conversions are you closing down or are you still just kind of are we spinning our Wheels here right so that's what we would do we would meet with them evaluate uh and make like a 3 to six month plan of what we're going to try to do on this long game you know for SEO what percentage of clients Focus purely on SEO versus Grade search not enough of them not enough can I say that say that sure God not enough of them right it's because and artum had like a miracle he's on page one of Google right so many of them think that that's like a lost cause and then they just give up on it all together right this industry is heavily reliant on it so they've got to do it right uh hopefully they're all doing it I don't know you know I don't know how many of them are uh but uh not enough people focus on their SEO not enough people are connecting their SEO to their Google my business page not enough people are nurturing their leads and building out their reviews right not nearly enough which is great for a company that's getting started because there is an opportunity uh to get out there and take some market share because there are plenty of people who are not taking advantage of it so it is it's definitely an area of opportunity not enough people focus on it well good well list I appreciate you joining us down here at fire it's always great to chat with you Matt always buddy I'm going to follow you all around the country we're going to do some this year sounds good brother cheres yeah oh