SparkToro Blog

Posts by Rand Fishkin:

5-Minute Whiteboards Analytics Marketing

In a Zero-Click World, Traffic is a Terrible Goal

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
60% of marketers say their top goal for the next 12 months is “increasing traffic.” And 59% say their primary KPI is… also traffic. To all those folks, I say: you’re about to have a terrible, horrible, no-good year. The Internet is sending less traffic. Period. That’s a provable fact, and it’s true for every source of referral traffic —…
5-Minute Whiteboards Data Product SparkToro Tactics

How to Use SparkToro + LLMs to Do Marketing Magic

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
Most folks who follow me know I’m a bit of a late adopter and skeptic of AI. Yes, it can do some impressive things that takes humans a long, painful amount of time to replicate. But, they’re also stereotype machines whose reasoning and capabilities, especially in the creative and novel needs that marketing demands, isn’t replacing even 1% of jobs…
Hiring Industry Predictions Startups

“AI will replace all the jobs!” Is Just Tech Execs Doing Marketing

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
Over the weekend, I went digging for evidence that AI can, will, or has replaced a large percent of jobs. It doesn’t exist. Worse than that, actually, there’s hundreds of years of evidence and sophisticated analyses from hundreds of sources showing the opposite is true: AI will almost certainly create more jobs than it displaces, just like thousands of remarkable…
Industry Marketing Psychology SEO Tactics

Seriously, please stop with the new acronyms. It’s still SEO: Search Everywhere Optimization.

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
It’s a day ending in Y, which means my social feeds are filled with people attempting to rebrand the acronym “SEO.” Look, I ain’t here to rain on your parade, so if you love calling it AIO or GEO or EIEIO, be my guest. I haven’t been an SEO for more than seven years, despite what all the “top SEO…
Events Seattle SparkToro

A Marketing Conference That Actually Changes Your Mindset

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
There are tons of marketing conferences. Most follow a familiar formula: slick slide decks, broad-strokes keynotes, case studies you’ve seen before, and maybe a tote bag to take home. But when you’re deciding where to spend your budget, time, and energy, the real question is: Which event will actually make an impact on me? That’s the question we asked ourselves…
5-Minute Whiteboards Marketing Product Tactics

Want better marketing output from your AI Tools? Give it real data about your customers.

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
An overwhelming number of marketers are using AI tools to bolster their campaigns, their tactical output, and even their strategic ideas. I don’t actually recommend all of those (AI can seriously mislead you on strategy, and using it to write anything you’re going to publish directly is a recipe for unsubscribes), but there are some clever, high-quality marketing use-cases out…
Data Product SparkToro

We’ve Launched a Brand New SparkToro Today with 10 (yes TEN) New Features

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
It’s time for a new, screenshot-worthy look. It’s time to deliver those key features you’ve been asking us for. It’s time for better data, graphed over time. It’s time for an all-new version of SparkToro. Today, we’re releasing a massively upgraded, fully-overhauled version of our audience research platform. <Slaps roof of car> This baby’s got so much audience research juice,…
5-Minute Whiteboards Advertising Marketing Psychology

Demand-Creation vs. Demand-Converting Marketing

Rand FishkinBy Rand Fishkin
One of the fundamental mistakes I see executives and marketing leaders make over and over is investing in the wrong part of the demand funnel. In this week’s 5-Minute Whiteboard, I’ll walk through an example of demand creation at the top vs. middle/bottom of the funnel, and explain why it’s critical to understand whether you have one of two problems:…

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