I Ignored My Own SEO—Here’s How I’m Fixing It

“I prioritized client work, and my SEO strategy paid the price.”

It's probably surprising that an SEO would ignore her own SEO, but here we are. 

And you know what? There's that saying about cobbler's kids, and I just keep seeing how true that is. 

You're really skilled in XYZ and you help your clients with that, but then 9 times out of 10, it happens to be a hot mess express on the back end of your own business.

The great news is that hope is NOT lost! There’s a way to fix it & I’m talking you through that 3-step process in this episode.

→ Follow along on the journey on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brittany_herzberg/

→ Get the full show notes here!

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Transcript

Brittany Herzberg:

Hello and welcome back to the Basic Bee Podcast. I'm your host and favorite SEO coach, Brittany Herzberg. And yes, as the title suggests, I have ignored my own SEO, but I am fixing it in 2026. 

It's probably surprising that an SEO would ignore her own SEO, but here we are. And you know what? There's that saying about cobbler's kids, and I just keep seeing how true that is. You're really skilled in XYZ and you help your clients with that, but then 9 times out of 10, it happens to be a hot mess express on the back end of your own business. 

What happened for me was just that… I prioritized client work, plain and simple. That's it. This very thing also factored into my decision I shared with you recently about pausing any new done-for-you SEO client work. I've got my monthly SEO clients that I'll be continuing to support. And I'm continuing to work with Jena on projects because we've got such a well-oiled process that makes it a very, very doable project. But as far as projects where people are coming to me for the full SEO website optimization service, that's what I'm pausing. And that is freeing up time for me to work on creating my own solid SEO foundations. 

This brings me perfectly into why I'm taking this task on now. There are a few reasons, but I do want to acknowledge that it's not the best time. Period. There's a lot going on in my world, and if I've learned anything, it's that the timing will always, always, always suck. I think Jena even shared in her own case study interview that basically there's time and what you do with it. 

So why do this now, B? Frankly, I'm sick and tired of feeling crappy about my own SEO. I'm ready to feel so good about it. I'm ready to experience more of these SEO wins that my clients are more traffic to their site, more rankings on page 1, better keyword associations, not to mention more inquiries, better leads, and more sales. I mean, what business owner doesn't want that? I want to share what I know in a way I also know people are looking for it, aka blogs. Podcasts, yes, obviously. Hello. But blogs too. Just regular old, I've got a question and I want to find a thing on Google. 

I also have so many resources from my clients that I've got just living in Google Docs that could easily be turned into blogs. So that others can find me through that, but also so that when I send my clients or students to those resources, it's simultaneously getting traffic to my site. Really clever. See how this whole thing works? And I want it to be even easier for the AI bots to pull me in as an answer over there. And following SEO basics still very freaking much works for that. People are out here scaring you with all these AEO, GEO terms, but time and time again, I'm seeing That's just a fancier label for doing the same quote unquote boring basics that work. 

All right, now for what I'm doing about this. There's 3 steps. So step 1 is this public declaration. Let's file it under accountability. I've said the thing that I've ignored my SEO and I'm doing something about it. And now I've got to do the thing, aka take action on my own SEO. Plus, how fun will it be to show you just how easy my approach is to start and keep up with? I mean, those who are in the SEO and Grow group coaching program know this, but you may not be in there or have graduated from that, so you may not be aware of this yet. This is exactly what I'm doing. 

Step 2 is doing website SEO first. Your site is your home base. It's the place that you ultimately want to send people to. So that's where my journey also begins. And for me, it's a bit of a twofer. One thing I'm doing is keyword research and fresh SEO strategies for my main website pages. Things like home, services, about, contact, all of that. And then I'm also doing a copy rewrite for the entire website, which is really important because like I said, that one offer is going away, but it's still on my site as of this recording. So I'm going in, possibly changing the structure of some of my pages, specifically my services pages. And I'm zhuzhing the copy so it actually reflects my messaging, my vibe, my process, my offerings for this season of business. So there's a lot of different pieces that I get to actually take action on. 

The website also encompasses my podcast and blog content. Unfortunately, you can't skip the need for content, especially now with all the AI filler that's clogging up the internet streets. More on AI in a little bit. But that doesn't mean content creation has to take over your life. Think about this: SEO marketing versus social media marketing is night and day. One asks you to hustle, grind, never take a break, lest you want people to forget about you. The other asks you for monthly content so it can see you're still active and make sure it's putting you in front of the best leads. That one is also very forgiving if life life’s and you, let's say, end up sick and can't post for a month, or have some family emergency that completely throws off anything marketing related with content or for your business. Or if you just want to take a break, even a fun one to go frolic on a beach somewhere. Two very different vibes. 

It's important to note though that content comes after the website SEO foundation is in place. So you can basically pour gas on the fire, but don't panic if you've started with content. It may not be ideal, but it is possible to start right now and get your website SEO foundations in place. Do not let that whole order of operations hold you back. Just know that the best order of operations, if you're starting from scratch or starting from a really baseline point, is that you do the website main pages first, and then you add in optimized content. 

Step 3 is monthly metrics tracking. This is the easy, sustainable part of SEO. I think the word metrics or data makes it feel complicated or time-consuming, but No, not at all. This is the easy breezy beautiful part of SEO. Once my website is optimized for SEO and my copy is rewritten and more aligned with this version of my business, and my content is optimized and going out on a regular basis, it'll be time to check in with the data so I can make marketing moves that make sense from a facts, not feelings standpoint. Data over drama, friend. Data over drama. 

I've actually already started this part of the process because I run my own monthly SEO report. With my favorite dashboard, which I'll make sure is linked below, inside my Maintain membership. I basically have my report as the example as we go through on that first call of the month, so everyone else knows what to do. They can follow along with me doing my report. 

And that's something that just added a little extra confirmation that this, all of the updates, all of the behind-the-scenes SEO work, is what I need to be doing right now. Because I'm seeing the keywords I'm ranking for. Most of them are okay, but it still feels like a mixed bag. And I want it to feel like, well, like I know what's inside the bag. I want the robots to feel like, oh, this is the peanut butter chocolate popcorn so-and-so was looking for. Boom. Add to cart. Weird analogy, but usually that means it'll stick. 

So if you, too, have either never made eye contact with SEO, it felt too scary, too unknown, maybe just not sexy enough of a strategy. Or you've fallen off the wagon for a month or 6 or possibly even 12. Follow along to see how everything unfolds. I'll be sharing updates with the podcast, but for the most up-to-date happenings, I'll be starting a video series on Instagram where I take you along in the process in real time. I want you to see the action steps as well as the results that they're yielding. 

Bonus, that's also the place where you'll be able to get ideas and inspiration for simple steps you can take to improve your own SEO along the way. But if you're like, um, I'm going to need some handholding, some guidance, a plan to follow, and maybe even some video tutorials and templates, there will be a link below that will take you to the SEO and Grow group coaching program, which I've just opened 5 spots for. 

They may already be gone by the time this airs, who knows. It's worth it to check out that link, and if the link is live, there's still time. I had such an aha moment on our very first coaching call just this week, like, you literally haven't missed anything. It just hit me that everyone in this group is dealing with the same challenge. They're so clear and confident within themselves about who they are. They're clear about their businesses and what they offer, but they are spinning out about what words to use. And this is absolutely not a unique situation. 

I was even having a little bit of this as I started to do keyword research for myself. And I do this for a living. So I know if there's 8 of them struggling with this, there's for sure a lot more business owners who are feeling the same way. And this is the perfect group for you to join if any of what I just shared resonates. If you have questions, of course, just ask. You can always, always send a text or voice note to me on Instagram or leave a comment if you're listening to this on the blog. You know the drill, friend. 

Thank you for joining me for this episode. I never take it lightly, and I so enjoy hearing updates and wins and even getting questions from you. So please find me and share. And remember, I'm over here cheering you on on your SEO journey.