Small businesses face the ongoing challenge of standing out in crowded marketplaces, both online and off.

One strategy that has gained significant traction in recent years is leveraging prominent, trusted local influencers to help boost online authority and visibility and grow the business.

This approach enables businesses to tap into established community voices, build trust, and reach specific local audiences through value-added partnerships.

Understanding Local Influencer Marketing

Local influencer marketing involves partnering with people who have significant followings and/or influence within a specific geographic area or community.

These influencers may not have millions of followers like national or global influencers, but their impact on local consumers’ searching and buying decisions can be substantial.

According to a 2023 study by Influencer Marketing Hub, 82% of marketers plan to dedicate a budget to influencer marketing. While this statistic covers influencer marketing in general, the trend is increasingly relevant for local businesses as well.

Why Local Influencers Matter For Your Local Businesses

Targeted Local Reach

Local influencers have an audience that is likely to be in the same area as your business.

This means your marketing efforts are focused on potential customers who can actually visit your physical location or use your local services.

It reduces wasted exposure to audiences outside your service area, making your marketing much more efficient and cost-effective.

Authenticity

Local influencers are often seen as more relatable and trustworthy by their followers. They’re part of the community and understand local challenges, needs, preferences, and culture.

This authenticity can lead to higher engagement rates and more genuine interest in your business.

Their recommendations often come across as personal endorsements rather than paid advertisements, though their support should be clearly indicated as paid/sponsored if this is the case.

Cost-Effectiveness

Partnering with local influencers is generally more affordable than working with larger, national-level influencers, who are used to charging a premium.

Most small businesses have limited marketing budgets, putting those larger influencers out of reach. You can often negotiate deals with locals involving product exchanges or experiences rather than large cash payments.

As noted, the ROI of these types of “paid” relationships can be higher due to the targeted nature of the audience and the influencer’s local credibility.

Increased Local Visibility

Local influencer partnerships can boost a business’s presence in local search results and social media.

When influencers provide backlinks to your content, tag your business on social media, or use location-based hashtags, it can improve your local SEO by transferring some of their established authority and “localness” to you.

This increased visibility can lead to more foot traffic, website or social media visits, and, ultimately, sales.

Timely Communications

Local influencers are often the first to know about and share local trends because part of their job includes being engaged and aware.

Partnering with them can help small businesses quickly adapt their offerings or marketing to new trends and customer needs.

Community Engagement

Local influencers can help businesses connect more deeply with the local community.

They can facilitate meaningful interactions, promote local events, and help your business become a more integral part of the community fabric.

This can lead to increased customer loyalty and word-of-mouth marketing, both online and off, beyond just the influencer’s followers.

Cross-Promotion Opportunities

A local influencer may already have existing relationships with like-minded businesses and be able to make valuable, trust-backed introductions for cross-promotion.

These types of relationships can be positioned as a win-win for all local parties and the community in general.

Further, local community engagement is another signal to Google of your business’s localness and can influence your online authority relative to your competitors, who may not be as engaged.

This trust factor is pronounced at the local level, where influencers are naturally viewed as neighbors and contributing members of the community.

Identifying The Right Local Influencers

Finding the right local influencers is crucial for the success of your campaign. Here are some best practices:

• Define your target audience: Understand who your ideal customers are (demographics and psychographics), what types of local influencers they’re likely to follow, and in which channels. Many influencers appeal to specific niches, so be sure to determine whether or not they will reach your target.
• Use social listening tools: Utilize social media listening tools or hire someone to identify local hashtags and active influencer voices in your community.
• Check engagement rates: Look beyond follower counts and pay attention to how active an influencer’s accounts are. An influencer with 500-1000 engaged local followers is likely more valuable than one with 50,000 passive followers. A Rock Content study quoted by TechJury.net found micro-influencers account for 91% of engagement posts. Much higher than their larger counterparts.
• Assess content quality: Ensure the influencer’s content style and values align with your business and brand. Be sure to research the influencer’s past activity and other local relationships they may have maintained.
• Verify local presence: Confirm the influencer is genuinely active and influential in your specific locale. Review the influencer’s follower list, looking for friends you may have in common. Ask a few of your customers if they are familiar with the influencer.

Approaching Local Influencers

Once you’ve identified potential local influencers, the next step is to approach them to propose a partnership:

• Engage authentically: You can start by following them on social media, liking/sharing their content, leaving thoughtful comments, and tagging them in your relevant posts. In other words, try to build a relationship before pitching a collaboration.
• Personalize your outreach: When you do reach out, make it clear why you chose them specifically. Reference specific content you feel would resonate with your audience, and be sure to highlight the importance of local involvement.
• Offer value: Clearly articulate what’s in the proposed relationship for them. This could be monetary compensation, free products/services, or exclusive experiences your business can offer.
• Be clear about expectations: Outline what you’re looking for in the collaboration, but also be open to their ideas; this should be a mutually beneficial relationship, after all.
• Start small: Consider starting with a small project to test the waters before committing to a larger campaign.
• Ask for references and/or results: Professional influencers should be able to provide references to other local businesses they’ve worked with. You can also ask them to provide details on results they’ve delivered to other businesses in terms of new followers, website traffic, or actual sales.
• Respect their audience: Remember, local influencers have likely taken significant time to build trust with their followers, which is why you should want to work with them. Be sure to respect this relationship and avoid pushing for them to endorse overly promotional content. They will likely let you know in any case, but it’s better not to start off a relationship on the wrong foot.

Case Studies: Local Influencer Success Stories

A Gardening Supply Company Partners With A Local Gardener

A local family-owned gardening store collaborates with a prominent local gardener with 5,000 followers across Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube for a series of DIY gardening tutorial videos featuring their products and services.

Results:

• Increase in website traffic from social media and organic search to key product and service pages.
• Growth in email newsletter sign-ups.
• Boost in sales of products featured in tutorials.

Key Takeaway: Educational content from a trusted local source drives both engagement and sales.

A Butcher Partners With A Local Foodie On A Charity BBQ

A new local butcher with three well-established competitors partners with a local food influencer with 15,000+ highly engaged followers on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok to promote and host a charity BBQ at his location.

The event is very well attended and the butcher receives positive feedback from several attendees, as well as charity organizers.

Results:

• Increase in website traffic and online purchases originating from social media and organic search.
• Significant growth of the butcher’s social media following.
• Single-day in-store sales record.
• A new partnership formed with the local charity, and a link to the butcher’s website from the charity’s site.

Key Takeaway: Community engagement via a known and trusted influencer boosts visibility, traffic, and sales.

Best Practices For Local Influencer Campaigns

Having identified influencers, here are some recommendations for running a successful campaign.

Set Clear Goals

Define what success looks like for your campaign. Is it increased foot traffic, online sales, or brand awareness? Setting specific, measurable goals is critical for evaluating the success of your campaign.

For example, a local bookstore might set a goal to increase website traffic by 20% and online sales by 5% during a three-month-long campaign with a local book reviewer. This can easily be tracked via Google Analytics.

Allow Creative Freedom

While it’s important to have guidelines, you should enable influencers to have some creative control. Their authentic, trusted voice and approach are what resonates with their audience. Overly scripted content can come across as contrived and may not perform as well.

Example: A local yoga studio partnering with a fitness influencer might provide key points about their classes and facilities but allow the influencer to create content in their own style, whether that’s a day-in-the-life TikTok video or a series of yoga and personal wellness stories on Instagram.

Tip: Consider providing a creative brief with your key messages and any mandatory elements, but encourage the influencer to present these in a way that feels natural to them.

Leverage Multiple Platforms

Don’t limit yourself or your influencer to just one social media platform. A multi-channel and content-type approach can maximize reach and cater to different audience preferences.

Tip: Consider each platform’s strengths and how they align with the goals you’ve defined. Instagram or TikTok might be great for entertaining/visual impact, while YouTube could be better for more detailed product demos and information.

Foster Long-Term Relationships

Instead of one-off posts, consider ongoing partnerships with influencers who truly align with your brand messaging. This can lead to more authentic content and stronger audience trust over time.

Example: A local pet store might partner with a popular dog trainer for a monthly “Ask the Trainer” Instagram series, creating an ongoing valuable resource for local pet owners.

Tip: Start with a smaller project and, if it’s successful, propose a longer-term and more involved campaign. This approach will enable both sides to ensure there’s a good fit before committing to a lengthy partnership.

Measure And Adjust

Use unique tracking links, promo codes, and analytics tools to measure the impact of your campaigns and adjust your strategy accordingly. Unique links and codes are particularly important if you start working with more than one influencer, as you’ll want to understand which is delivering the best results.

This data-driven approach will enable you to refine your campaigns over time. Set up regular check-ins to review campaign performance with your partner.

Be prepared to pivot your strategy if certain approaches aren’t yielding the desired results. Taking a data-driven approach will no doubt impress your partner and solidify your relationship.

Comply With Regulations

Ensure all sponsored content is clearly disclosed according to FTC or other regulatory guidelines. This maintains trust with the audience and avoids potential legal issues. Provide your influencer partners with clear guidelines on how to disclose partnerships within the context of campaigns.

The FTC recommends disclosures are clear, conspicuous, and not buried in a string of hashtags. Example: An influencer posting about a local fitness apparel store should include clear language like “#ad” or “Sponsored by [Store Name]” in a prominent place in their post.

Remember, the key is to balance authenticity while also achieving your desired marketing goals. Regular evaluation and adjustment of your strategy will help ensure long-term success in your local influencer marketing efforts.

Challenges And How To Overcome Them

All digital marketing campaigns come with some challenges and there are some which will be specific to local businesses.

These should not, however, deter business owners from testing this potentially powerful approach.

• Limited pool of influencers: In smaller locales, you might find a limited number of available or suitable influencers. If this is the case, expand your definition of influence to include local community leaders, business owners, or even enthusiastic customers. This may mean results will take a little longer to achieve.
• Measuring ROI: It can be challenging to directly attribute sales and revenue to influencer campaigns. As noted, use unique promo codes and tracked links, custom landing pages, or in-store surveys to track your partner’s impact. You may also ask them to share the stats they obtain from social media or their website.
• Maintaining authenticity: There’s a risk of the partnership feeling forced or inauthentic. Always focus on building genuine relationships with influencers and enable them, wherever possible, to speak in their own voice.
• Budget constraints: Small businesses often have limited marketing budgets. Many small influencers are well aware and will consider non-monetary compensation like product exchanges or exclusive experiences. For others, this is actually their preference and perhaps why they became an influencer in the first place; to get cool stuff for free.

The Future Of Local Influencer Marketing

Local influencer marketing is likely to grow as a potentially lucrative option for local business owners.

EMARKETER’s July 2023 forecast predicts influencer marketing spending will reach $5.89 billion in the US by 2024, with a significant portion of this growth happening at the local level.

As consumers increasingly seek authentic, trusted, community-based reviews and recommendations, local influencers are positioned to play an even more crucial role in small business marketing strategies.

Conclusion

Utilizing local influencers for digital marketing success offers small businesses a powerful way to connect with their community, build trust, and drive growth.

By carefully identifying the right influencers, approaching them thoughtfully, and creating authentic partnerships, businesses can tap into the power of local influence to achieve key marketing goals.

Remember, success lies in authenticity, mutually realized value, and a solid understanding of your local market/audience.

Start small, measure your results, and be prepared to adapt your strategy as you learn what works best for your unique business and community.

More resources: 

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Featured Image: Chay_Tee/Shutterstock

Search traffic isn’t just a metric — it’s a business model. Companies like HubSpot, Nerdwallet, and Zapier have built multimillion dollar empires on it. 

I’ve personally witnessed a gaming brand use search share of voice data to justify a $60M acquisition and market expansion.

The bottom line is: search rankings and revenue are intrinsically linked. That’s why SERP volatility, even down to the keyword level, can make a huge dent in business value.

Think about it: a law firm ranking for a high-value keyword ($75 CPC) would have to shell out $186K a month on ads if their organic visibility halved, just to keep revenue steady.

Now imagine that multiplied across tens, if not hundreds of equally valuable keywords.

That’s the cost of SERP volatility.

SERP volatility refers to the degree of fluctuation in Google’s search results. In volatile SERPs, different pages shift in and out of the top 10, while stable SERPs stay relatively steady over time.

SERP flux is an inevitability. You’ll experience it across all pages on your site to various extents, and, yes, even “stable” SERPs experience a level of volatility.

In the words of Google’s Senior Search Analyst, John Mueller

…there is no one-shot secret to long-lasting online success. Even if you find something that works now, the web, user desires, and how they engage with websites changes. It’s really hard to make good, popular, persistent things.

The reality is, Google is always testing and indexing to better meet searcher needs.

When the SERPs are volatile, it’s a sign Google is looking for opportunities to serve more relevant content.

What a “stable” SERP looks like

This chart may still look a little shaky, but it was just about the most stable SERP I could find after checking through what felt like hundreds of queries.

Only two sites (highlighted in yellow) dropped out of the top 10 over the course of the year, and the remaining eight pages saw relatively minor flux or position flipping.

In most other SERPs, sites flitted in and out on a near-constant basis.

It’s clear from this example that individual SERPs are intrinsically volatile. Tackling volatility at the keyword-group level is likely a more efficient way to improve your traffic and rankings.

What a “volatile” SERP looks like

Hopefully you can see the difference here.

In a volatile SERP, pages move in and out of the top 10, experiencing flips and tremors on an almost daily basis.

I’ve highlighted astrology.com because it’s the only result that, despite considerable flux, manages to maintain top 10 visibility all the way throughout the year.

There are two ways to think about SERP volatility

Multi-keyword flux

Multi-keyword flux is when the traffic and rankings of multiple keywords oscillate in the SERPs.

If you’re affected by this kind of volatility, you’ll feel an impact at the page, site, or industry level.

Multi-keyword flux can be triggered by search engine algorithm updates and shifting search intent, amongst other things.

Single keyword flux

Single keyword flux is when your content is experiencing traffic or ranking volatility for one keyword only.

This type of volatility impacts just a single page, but it’s worth investigating if the associated keyword holds significant value – whether that’s monetary value (e.g. CPC) or brand value (e.g. a branded keyword).

When your rankings fluctuate, it’s not by chance. Here’s a look at the main causes of SERP volatility  – also known as SEO volatility –  including algorithm updates, content issues, and changing search intent.

Algorithm updates

Search engines are always updating their algorithms to a greater or lesser extent, to improve results for users.

As a Google spokesperson told the BBC

“Our recent updates aim to connect people with content that is helpful, satisfying and original, from a diverse range of sites across the web,” 

These improvements can cause long-lasting Google volatility across entire industries.

Take the latest August core update, for example. Google made algorithmic adjustments to promote useful content by small and independent publishers, and issued a notice to say that it would take a full month to roll out.

Similarly, the March 2024 core update targeted hundreds of sites with manipulative content, and took 45 long days to complete.

Search engines usually announce major updates in advance, giving the SEO community a chance to address issues before they take root.

I say “usually”, because Google also has a habit of pushing smaller updates live without warning – like this one, where it deindexed a large number of URLs due to a “shift in perception” (in the words of Google Analyst, Gary Illyes).

Just like official updates, unconfirmed updates can lead to wide scale fluctuation.

Content needs refreshing

Search engines want to serve the freshest information possible to keep searchers coming back.

When the SERPs evolve but your content doesn’t, you’ll tend to see some SERP volatility.

If your page is littered with broken links or redundant information, pages delivering a better experience will inevitably outrank you.

Sites ranking for freshness related keywords are more susceptible to movement because searchers are on the lookout for new information. Google refers to these keywords as “Queries that deserve freshness”.

Examples of QDF keywords with volatile SERPs:

Crawling/indexing issues

If Google doesn’t crawl and index your pages properly, your content may appear only fleetingly in search results.

Equally, when resources like JavaScript or CSS are blocked from crawling, Google can misinterpret your page, which leads to peaks and troughs in ranking.

Cannibalization

Ever since the 2019 diversity update, Google has preferred to rank one site per SERP – making exceptions only for highly relevant content.

As a result, when you have two or more pieces of content fulfilling the same search intent, your rankings will flip and traffic can be inconsistent.

You’re essentially muddying the waters by giving search engines too many options; on top of competing with your rivals, you end up competing with yourself.

Irrelevant/low-quality content

There’s a goal behind every query, and it’s reflected in user search behavior; the keywords they choose, the results they click – even the time they spend on site.

Thanks to some leaked Google search documentation shared by SparkToro’s Rand Fishkin and iPullRank’s Mike King, we can now say with quiet confidence that Google processes all of this user activity when it ranks content.

If user behavior indicates that your content is underperforming, your page is more likely to drop in and out of Google.

Low quality content looks like:

• Thin content
• Misinformation
• A lack of E-E-A-T
• Slow load times
• Intrusive ads
• Keyword stuffing

Competitor content improvements

Competitors creating, updating, and ultimately improving their content can cause a certain level of volatility for your site – especially if they have greater brand authority.

Brand authority is the trust and credibility your brand commands in its industry. It’s shaped by factors like the quality of your content, the strength of your backlinks, and how much your brand gets talked about online.

Search intent is changing

Search intent is the thread connecting everything you’ve read so far. When intent is changing or ambiguous, the SERPs become volatile.

Google is ultimately trying to understand what the user is expecting to find when they search a keyword, so it tests and reshuffles results, causing rankings to flip.

Search volatility is even more pronounced when intent shifts and keywords take on a new meaning.

Here’s an example.

Before OpenAI announced ChatGPT, the dominant intent behind the keyword “LLM” was about “Understanding LLM Programs” – in other words, 79% of the top 10 search results catered to users interested in learning about “Master of Law” degrees.

Before

A year on, and by the time ChatGPT had become firmly embedded in our tech stack, the SERP had seen 16 changes in the top 10 and intent had shifted almost entirely to “Understanding Large Language Models” — the technology foundational to modern AI.

After

Sometimes, SERP volatility settles as the search engine better understands the intent. Other times, results stay in flux as a result of constantly changing intent (e.g. queries that deserve freshness).

But at what point does volatility turn into a full-on SERP switch? Can it be measured by the passing of time or the “SERP differential” – the degree to which the results change?

The only way to find out is to study the SERP.

Search results can change slowly

Search intent can shift gradually. Recently, while looking for content to update on the Ahrefs blog, I noticed a piece on “Website traffic” that had once driven impressive amounts of traffic.

But, when I did more digging into the SERPs (using the Identify Intents tool in Keywords Explorer), I noticed a slow shift in intent from informational guides in 2021, to free tools and tool compilation lists in 2024.

Looking at the SERP comparison metrics, I noticed the top 10 positions had changed 17 times, and both pages had received a SERP similarity score of just 10/100.

All signs pointed to slow-burning volatility and a near-total SERP switch.

Search intent can also change quickly

For queries deserving freshness, like the trending “Willy Wonka experience” example I mentioned earlier, the SERPs flipped within months as interest in the viral story waned.

This rapid shift was once again reflected in the SERP Similarity score, which came in at just 2/100.

If you want to better understand how the SERPs are evolving – whether they’re experiencing volatility or undergoing a complete transformation – it’s useful to analyze results in this way.

Volatility can manifest at the page, site, or industry level; to identify each type you’ll need to take a slightly different approach.

Below I run you through the tools you’ll need to spot SERP volatility in all its incarnations.

Check on an industry level

To anticipate when the SERPs are about to shift, many SEOs monitor top-level SERP volatility using algorithm “weather” tools like Algoroo.

This particular tool tracks macro-level SERP volatility by measuring both positive and negative ranking changes. The output is a simple, traffic-light-coded chart showing SERP flux over time.

If you want to analyze your own industry-wide volatility, head to Ahrefs Site Explorer and search your site or subfolder…

Then add your competitors in the organic search view.

In this example, I’m monitoring “Share of Voice” for a group of YMYL ( “Your Money or Your Life”) sites.

Hovering over the Ⓖ symbols in Site Explorer reveals detailed information about official, macro-level algorithm updates. This helps us tie the obvious SERP volatility we can see to the March 2023 core update.

Share of voice, being a percentage, offers a more accurate way to compare sites than total traffic figures. While traffic can vary widely between sites, share of voice allows you to look past those discrepancies and zero in on relative performance and shared volatility.

Check on a site level

You can easily check site volatility in Google Search Console, based on metrics like clicks and impressions.

And if you want to track site performance across a specific group of keywords, you can set up a Project in Ahrefs Rank Tracker.

Check on a page level

To analyze the fluctuation of a single keyword, you can search a keyword in Ahrefs Keywords Explorer and view SERP Position History Charts.

Focusing on the top 10 results will help you filter out the noise. You can also view Position History Charts whenever you see this chart icon next to a keyword…

You don’t have to just accept volatility. There are tons of things you can do to stabilize rankings – from improving your content’s E-E-A-T, to diversifying your traffic sources.

It’s beyond the scope of this article to go through every tactic, but I’ve included the most important ones below.

Regularly monitor intent

Search intent changes directly track to volatility. Use the Identifying Intents tool I mentioned earlier will help you assess how well your content hits the mark for the SERP’s dominant intents.

Keep content updated

Some topics crave freshness more than others. For these, regular updates aren’t just nice to have — they’re essential. Neglect them, and you risk dropping off the SERP entirely.

Here’s what to do:

1. Create a “freshness portfolio” of your key content using Ahrefs Portfolios
2. Prioritize your top-performing pages
3. Update regularly to maintain rankings and prevent traffic loss

Remember: stale content can cost you traffic and conversions. Stay on top of updates to keep your SERP positions (and your revenue) healthy.

Content you might want to include in your “freshness portfolio”:

• Date specific content/research (e.g. statistics blogs, headlines featuring years)
• News and trend content
• Pages that mention deals and offers
• Pages that mention pricing or plan details

Fix cannibalization

To avoid duplicating content and intent, make sure you’re creating new content in the context of your existing back catalog.

A simple Google site operator search will help you find all existing pages on your site related to a topic.

Ahrefs has approximately 19 pages that mention “SERP volatility” in passing, but zero that cover the topic in any real detail.

That means this article shouldn’t lead to any cannibalization (at least, I hope not!).

Toggling on the “Multiple URLs” filter in Ahrefs Organic Keywords report can also show you when you’re ranking more than once for a single keyword.

Use this workflow to spot pages that are at greater risk of cannibalization and SERP volatility.

Study competitor content

Assess rivals who rank consistently or often in volatile SERPs. What are they doing differently? How does their content satisfy intent? What topics are they covering that you’re missing?

Run your page through our Content Grader tool to spot content gaps and get actionable advice on how you can improve.

Audit and troubleshoot technical issues

If your site is experiencing SERP flux off the back of an algorithm update, it’s essential to run a thorough site audit.

When Google’s Site Reputation Abuse update specifically targeted sites with manipulative link practices, SEOs would have had to run an audit to clean up their external link profiles and earn back visibility.

Diagnosing and fixing technical issues can improve your site’s ability to get indexed consistently in the SERPs. Chris Haines has written a great 11 step site audit guide to get you started.

Final thoughts

SERP volatility can hit your traffic and revenue hard.

But stabilizing your rankings isn’t just about patching up a leaky bucket. It’s also about retaining a competitive edge and taking traffic away from your biggest competition.

To keep your site’s performance steady, you need to make a habit of monitoring search intent, regularly updating content, and troubleshooting any technical issues that could be dragging you down.

Do this right, and you might even be able to turn SERP volatility into an opportunity.

I asked 11 of SEO’s own headline acts to share their best advice for aspiring speakers.

Here’s their personal roadmap for speaking on the biggest stages, building your personal brand, and even getting flown around the world on someone else’s dollar.

Big dreams often start with small first steps—in this case, hosting webinars and running presentations within your company.

Start little by little with online shorter events first, to longer and then eventually in-person meetups, to later bigger conferences.

Start from in-house presentations where you can present something to your team. It doesn’t even have to be in person. You can just ask people to join a call where you will share your experience with some kind of topic. You will create slides, you will create a presentation, and that will be that. The other thing you can do is give a webinar, which is also public speaking, it’s just not in person—it’s online.

These virtual events allow you to collect social proof for your speaking abilities, making it easier for you to persuade event organizers that you’re a good fit:

Organizers are already going to be familiar with you or they are going to research you online. So, having a strong social media presence, along with articles you’ve written and videos you’ve recorded—including podcasts, webinars, and interviews—goes a long way. Video is key because organizers want to see how you speak and if you can engage an audience.

If you have recordings of yourself speaking, this helps a lot to pitch yourself to organizers because they understand that you did this before. You have experience creating slides, creating coherent presentations, you don’t have stage fright, so you’re not going to fail miserably.

Once you can run a webinar without breaking into too much of a sweat, local meetups are a great next step:

Speaking at local events is a good way to build up your profile in an easier environment. Having a event like SMX as your first speaking gig is more daunting. 

As Lily Ray explains, earning your first dose of live audience feedback can be a real confidence booster:

I started with a small meetup in NYC run by Botify, where I spoke on a panel with a few amazing SEOs. I was so nervous! But after hearing some feedback from the audience, that was the moment I realized that I could actually add value to the discussion and people in the room benefitted from hearing what I had to say.

Our CMO Tim views these local meetups as a great way to get reps in and prepare for big stages:

In many cities, there are meetups for 20, 30, or 40 people. Sometimes you can even organize a meetup, invite others, and speak there. It will take you a few years to get there, but once you’ve done some in-house speaking and smaller meetups, and you’ve developed a lot of interesting, unique ideas of your own—not just things you’ve learned from someone else—you can apply to speak at bigger conferences.

When you’re ready for the big time, there’s no real secret to success. You just need to pitch organizers:

Basically, to become a conference speaker, all you need to do is to apply.

I got more gigs by simply pitching event organizers and then sending the organizer a custom note on LinkedIn or via email if I’m connected with them. Don’t be afraid to pitch, get rejected, and then pitch again.

Apply to as many conferences as possible. Research the ones you’re interested in and find out if they have an application process or if they work on an invite-only basis.

Some events are more welcoming of newbie speakers than others, like our beloved brightonSEO:

Some conferences, like brightonSEO, intentionally recruit a certain percentage of new speakers. They have an application process on their website, which I took advantage of when I was starting out.

And speaking of brightonSEO, here’s conference founder Kelvin’s tips for pitching:

Be actionable. Our audience loves practical how-to information. Aim for takeaways like tasks, tools, and books.

Be specific. Specific topics are more likely to be chosen. Detailed titles and descriptions win us over.

Avoid the basics. Our audience is not new to digital marketing. Go beyond general tips and theories.

No self-promotion. Avoid pitches that focus on your tool or client results.

Use research. Relevant and timely data boosts your chances.

Be authoritative. Know your subject inside and out. Show your expertise.

Pitch a tight topic. Our talks are 20 minutes. Narrow topics allow for detailed, focused presentations.

Most of the speakers I asked find their talk topics in the same simple way: their own personal experience.

Speak on topics you know inside and out, where you have a lot of knowledge and opinions, as opposed to trying to speak about things that might be outside your wheelhouse but you feel are important to cover. The more you share things you actually know, the more natural and engaging the talk will come across to the audience.

I also recommend sticking to areas of SEO/ digital you are most comfortable with and have deep subject matter experience. Don’t try and speak about something you’re not an expert in.

And if you’re worried that you don’t have any useful experience—you’d be wrong.

My journey into speaking started with the simple thought that if I could teach people about what I knew surrounding digital marketing, companies and people would eventually pay me to do the things that I was talking about. 

Speaking is about sharing what you see to be useful from your own day to day, whatever your experience is! There will be always someone who will find it useful, since it will be another perspective from real experience.

Public speaking is a skill like any other, something that can be improved and developed. Many of SEO’s biggest names still make time to practice, via training, studying famous speakers, or just simply workshopping their presentations out loud:

I highly recommend doing speaker training. You can pick up some great tactics to make your speaking better. I paid for speaker training from my team with the organiser of Ted X, and it was extremely valuable. 

Limit the desire to study marketing speakers for inspiration. Instead, study the greatest orators and comedians of all time to better understand how to tell a story that captivates and hooks an audience. 

Practice your full talk out loud at least once before you present. This is probably the number one most important rule I’ve learned as a speaker – you need to formulate the sentences out loud a few times for the talk to become muscle memory.

There’s a Ryan Holiday quote about writing that I regularly share with my team, and it applies equally here: if you want to be a good speaker, “go do interesting things.”

You don’t have to be a world-class orator if you share an interesting idea and jump straight to the good stuff.

Having something interesting to say is critical, in my opinion. I go to lots of conferences where speakers talk about topics that have already been covered many times or that the audience could look up on the internet. But presenting something fresh and interesting is hard. That’s where the value is!

Typically, people want to hear unique information. This is not something you’ve heard before that you want to share on stage, but something you figured out yourself. So, years of experience definitely contribute to your ability to become a speaker.

Never waste time on an introduction. So many speakers waste 5 minutes at the start of their presentation explaining who they are and why they’re important. No one cares. Everyone can Google that information or read your bio in the pamphlet for the event. Get to the good stuff. Deliver value immediately or capture the audience’s attention with something bold. 

With a few talks under your belt, you want to think about “niching down”, and focusing your topics on a particular topic or style. As Cyrus explains:

Remember that organizers need to cover a diverse set of topics, so having a “niche” can work in your favor.

Lazarina Stoy has great ideas for finding a niche that feels right for you:

Choose a topic or even talk format that is unique to you. You could do this by doing an ‘audit’ of your processes and compare/contrasting to others.

You could do this by analysis, research, and insights from events (think Lily Ray’s Winners and Losers from Algorithm Updates series).

You could do this by giving an old process a revamp by incorporating new technology or new data to enhance the insights.

You could do this by showing how a process is different in your niche (e.g. on-page SEO for Healthcare).

The opportunities are endless!

The more people you connect with and talk to, the greater the odds that lucky, serendipitous opportunities will present themselves to you. As Andy Chadwick explains:

I landed my first conference speaking opportunity through effective networking at the conferences I attended. I made sure to let the right people know that I was interested in public speaking. When other conferences began seeking recommendations for speakers, those connections recommended me.

Bernard Huang is proactive about understanding and addressing the needs of everyone involved in speaking—organizers, other speakers, and your audience:

“If you do become a conference speaker… you now have 3 bosses to please:

1. The conference organizer—your ability to communicate and coordinate with them on deadlines, topics, reimbursements will be remembered.

2. The audience—what will lead to more potential presentations is your ability to deliver meaningful and relevant information to the audience. Present what you know and understand, but make sure you present in a relatable manner, depending on attendees.

3. Other speakers—a hidden benefit of becoming a speaker is the VIP events that you get to attend. You may initially feel imposter syndrome (I know I still do) at these networking events but make sure to play it cool and see how you can help your fellow speakers. This will go a long way since speakers oftentimes get asked to recommend other speakers for future events.

Final thoughts

This should provide a decent roadmap for working your way onto the biggest stages in the SEO industry. With the practical stuff out of the way, I’ll turn the inspirational final thoughts over to Lazarina:

Even if you just motivate someone else by stepping on the podium or by saying something they needed to hear, that’s a win! So, don’t be afraid to give it a go—we’re all rooting for you.