Carlos started Agillian in 2007 to offer consulting on how the web can be used to connect with customers. He has 10-years of experience designing and analyzing web strategy and implementation for a variety of companies ranging from small businesses to world-leading companies like Otis Spunkmeyer and Viz Media. He believes that proper use of traffic analysis and breaking down barriers between web-involved departments is fundamental for businesses to succeed in a web driven economy. Carlos has spoken at both regional and national conferences, including SMX Advanced, SMX West, and SMX East.
Please introduce yourself and where you work.
I’ve been working in web marketing since 2005, I have co-authored two books on analytics for web marketing. Agillian started in 2007 and has focused on the technical side of web marketing.
How do you think SEO has changed over the last 10 years?
SEO has become more competitive in terms of people doing the work and sites fighting for rank. It was definitely complicated by the rise of social media. Ten years ago I think a larger percentage of people doing SEO could correctly identify a search engine. Today I meet more people that are aware of SEO tasks, but they don’t understand where or why those tasks matter.
How did you get introduced to digital marketing, more specifically SEO?
In 2005-2006 I was working for a company that ran the websites and did fulfillment for entertainment merchandise, things like Viz Media and HBO, I started working with the affiliate network. One of my tasks was deconstructing how the top 20 ranked in Google and Yahoo to create documentation to help other affiliates drive more traffic, I was pretty motivated because part of my pay was based on that channel.
What are the services you provide to your clients?
These days we focus on Conversion Optimization. Because there are overlaps with technical SEO we make those callouts in our audits.
What strategy according to you will prevail in 2017 for SEO?
The best strategy is to start five years ago. Since that isn’t possible I would say focus on the technical, and never mistake your competitors’mistakes as your accomplishments.
What would your advice be to people who are looking to take up digital marketing as a career choice?
Learn how to do your own analytics. If you don’t know how to analyze your campaign you are going to fail. Small companies don’t have data teams and even at a large company,you need to be responsible for understanding what data is needed and what it means.