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The Future of Local SEO for Lawyers & AI Search Strategies with Phil Rozek · Legal Late Night

• Jared Correia (00:00): Hello everybody. We've got a show that promises to be at least mildly interesting for your listening and watching enjoyment. I'm your host, Jared Correia. I'm the CEO of Red Cave Law Firm Consulting. For the monologue, I'm reminiscing, well, what's new? But this time about a high concept network television series that you may have forgotten about. In the interview, it's Phil Rozek of Local Visibility System. He's the SEO guy's SEO guy. In the counter program, we're playing fill-ins, but for now, it's time to wake up or are we still asleep? Find out next. After you listen to my interview with Phil Rozek, I'm going to quiz Phil about some famous television sitcoms and the characters swapping that took place therein. It's a veritable switcheroo a Palooza. Phil doesn't know that's happening yet, but now you do, spoiler alert. But that got me thinking that there may be some listeners of the show who don't even know what a sitcom even is. (01:12): Add to that number of those who would know what a sitcom is, but have never actually watched one. Add to that number, those who know what a sitcom is, have watched one, but never watched an episode live only on streaming. And now I'm feeling like my skin is wrinkling as we speak. Time for some Botox injections, sparky. Okay, so back in the day, in case you're unaware, you couldn't just watch anything you wanted to at any time on a streaming service. You had to watch a television show when it aired live on a television. Otherwise, you just fucking missed it. I assure you, this was real. So people did things like actually rushing home to get back in time for the start of Simon & Simon or some shit. If you missed the episode when it aired live, you'd have to wait for months so it could appear in reruns, which are effectively rebroadcasts for syndication, oftentimes on different networks or on cable. (02:22): We'll get there. Some shows didn't get syndicated, but for those that did, they were pretty much guaranteed to make tons of money from the advertisements that you could rerun along with the episodes. The invention and promulgation of the VCR allowed you to tape a show so you could watch it whenever you wanted so that you weren't entirely fucked, which was nice. But video cassettes could be recorded over, would break, or degrade over time, and then you were right back where you started from. Plus, no one ever knew how to set the clock on a VCR. So when you were watching a television show that you had pre-recorded, it was always 12:00 AM. We were Philistines, basically. Of course, this created something of a monoculture, which really doesn't exist anymore and in which everyone would be gathered in front of the television watching the same episode of the same show at the same time. (03:22): Then we'd all talk about it the next day, potentially at the water cooler at work or in the back of the classroom at school. Now, these days, everyone's watching shows I ain't never fucking heard of on streaming platforms I don't want to pay for. Sitcoms, short for situation comedies, are probably the most popular television media of all time. For the most part, those sitcoms appeared on network television, specifically the three primary channels, ABC, CBS and NBC before Fox crashed the party in the late 80s as the edgy newcomer with the introduction of The Simpsons, trust me, had to be there. From early favorites like The Honeymooners, I Love Lucy and All in the Family to Cheers, Seinfeld and The Office, sitcoms own the 20th century. However, at the turn of the 21st century, the sitcoms started to fade in terms of cultural relevancy since streaming services meant you didn't need to be there anymore. (04:28): Sitcoms became less of a cultural experience, which significantly took the edge off. You could just catch it later, maybe never. There wasn't any urgency anymore. Just another cool thing the internet fucking destroyed. Add it to the list. I feel like the last sitcom that was part of a monoculture was probably Friends. I'm sorry, but only elderly people watched Modern Family or the Big Bang Theory on television. Go ahead, throw your tapioca pudding at me. To give you a sense of how popular television sitcoms used to be and what a stranglehold these shows had on the culture at large, of the 20 most watched television events in history that can be substantiated. Most people think the moon landing is number one, but it's not on this list because it can't be substantiated. 19 are Super Bowls, but coming in at number 13 is the MASH finale, Vietnam centric sitcom, which drew almost 106 million live viewers. (05:32): The Cheers finale drew over 80 million viewers and the Seinfeld finale got nearly 80 million. I think they finished like 74 million. This just isn't a thing anymore. People often refer to the final episode of Game of Thrones as one of the last monoculture moments for scripted television, but that episode aired on a paid platform. Network television was basically free for everybody and drew a paltry 17 million viewers or so, under 20 million, definitely. Might be 19.6. I can't remember off the top of my head. That may have had something to do with the fact that the last season of Game of Thrones blew goats as the showrunners ran out of books, but I digress. Now, as sitcoms began to fade in popularity, the era of prestige TV dawned. These shows were mostly on cable channels, so not the traditional networks, featured complicated, usually male protagonists and were largely dramas. (06:36): A series like The Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad, and Mad Men came to predominate. And yeah, I shifted my viewing habits as well over to AMC and Old Friend, the home box office. The last network sitcoms I watched regularly were Parks and Recreation and The Office, which both ran from 2009 to 2015, which were both tremendous, but which also had been off the air for over a decade. But at some point, the network started to fade sitcoms and tried their hand at the flawed protagonist dramas that worked over on their competitor sites. Generally, the malls seemed kind of forced for networks. Part of the problem was these programs were not gritty enough on network television where no one could swear or reveal a stray butt cheek if they so chose. But as I was mulling over the ungodly amount of television I've watched in my life as a grown ass latchkey kid, I remembered maybe the craziest network drama ever produced during the sunset period of the sitcom. (07:40): I for sure memory hold this motherfucker, but this show had the potential to be one of the greatest series ever produced. It was called Awake and it only aired on NBC for one season in 2012. Peep this concept. Jason Isaacs, crazy underrated actor who played Drake O'Malfoy's dad and Harry Potter and the insanely evil British general in the Mel Gibson movie, The Patriot, the most evil British general ever committed to cinema. He's a police detective who gets into a horrible car wreck with his son and his wife, but now he never sleeps. Every time he goes to bed, he actually wakes up in a different reality. In one reality with red coloration, his wife is alive and his son is dead. In the other reality, the green reality, his son is alive and his wife is dead. I mean, let's pause right there for a second. (08:31): What a phenomenal concept. Just a complete mind fuck. You had me at hello, Jason Isaacs. The Isaacs character has different therapists in each reality and interacts with different colleagues on the police force, depending on the reality he's in at that time. But is it reality? Not only is this motherfucker solving crimes, trying to figure out who caused the car wreck that injured or killed his wife and/or son, but he also needs to determine whether or not he's actually crazy or if his son or his wife is really the one who is alive and maybe neither of them are. (09:09): Now, I don't want to spoil the ending of the show because it does have an ending even though it's only one season long, but Awake represents the destruction of network television's influence in microcosm. Once sitcoms faded in popularity, networks were never able to transition to compete with challengers on the prestige side of the aisle. But damn, I'm left to wonder what could have been. What if Vince Gilligan had taken the awake concept and built an X-File style series around it? What if Christopher Nolan had utilized the proposition to create a movie like Inception? Or what if NBC had just renewed Awake and allowed them to lean into the sci-fi elements over the police procedural aspect that had already been done to death? The mind races. I need to sleep. Only I can't. Stay woke homies. (10:04): We're going to take a beat and stop talking about television for one motherfucking second so we can chit chat with Phil Rozek of Local Visibility System about everything you wanted to know about search, but we're afraid to ask. After that, we'll be back on our bullshit again for the one and only counter program. Well, I've effectively run out of things to say, which is awkward because this is a podcast, so I'm finally going to take the time to learn to tie my shoes. Hold on, I'll be right back. Now fuck it. That's what Velcro's for. Let's do the interview segment instead. Our guest today, here he is, Phil Rozek, who's the CEO of Local Visibility System, LLC. Phil, welcome to the show. We did it. Phil Rozek (10:55): Thank you. CEO and co-founder and coffee boy and janitor and chief marketing officer all in one. Jared Correia (11:02): So let's jump into it. Welcome. Thank you for coming on. Phil Rozek (11:05): Thank you for tolerating me. Jared Correia (11:07): Local visibility system, that implies some things. First, the local part. I think I told you I was sitting down in Austin last year with Friend of the Pod, Gisakalakis, who runs Attorney Sinc, and we were talking about you and Gi said, and I quote, "Phil is the OG of local search." Phil Rozek (11:29): I'm maybe the Mick Jagger of local search in that I'm just kind of crusty. I've been doing it since Moses wore short pants, but Guy is a smart guy. He's far too complimentary, so I cannot accept that compliment in full, but the spirit which it was intended is appreciated. Jared Correia (11:49): Partial acceptance. What is local search for those unaware? What does that mean? Phil Rozek (11:54): When somebody near you or who's headed your way typed something into Google or now the AI chatbots and it's something you offer or it's something you are, the type of business or the type of service, product, practice area of law, whatever, do you show up where that person is looking? And obviously people look in a variety of places. Historically, the 800 pound gorilla has been Google and in the AI era, I don't think Google is going away at least anytime soon, but now it's a little more balkanized and fractured. Jared Correia (12:30): We'll get to the AI stuff. Don't worry about that. Phil Rozek (12:33): Oh yeah. But Jared Correia (12:33): The local part is. I've always thought the local part, I don't know if you feel this way, but I know you work with several types of businesses, but I always felt the local part was really important for attorneys because they're jurisdictionally bound by wherever the lawyers are licensed. It's not like I can have a national law firm unless I have a certain type of practice. Phil Rozek (12:52): Yeah. Unless there is some fancy footwork or you're like a patent attorney where you're prosecuting patents with the feds basically, and you're in California, you can work with somebody in Peoria, Illinois. Yeah, in all other cases, it is very much a local search industry in the same way dentistry is or auto repair, pest control, you name it. And so it's a classic. I work with people in all kinds of industries, but the big three are the home improvement space that is contractors, medicine, typically doctors and attorneys. And obviously there are other animals on board Noah's Ark, but those are the big beasts. Jared Correia (13:43): It's funny because in theory, I live on the eastern seaboard of Massachusetts as everybody knows, so do you. I could work with an attorney in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. There's no reason I couldn't, Phil Rozek (13:56): But Jared Correia (13:57): I still feel like people think like, "Oh, I want the local..." When somebody will ask me, "Oh, who can build a website for me?" And I might be like, "Oh, use this firm out in Arizona or whatever." And they're Phil Rozek (14:08): Like, Jared Correia (14:08): "Arizona. Do you know anyone local?" It's crazy to me that people still think of localized services when a lot of them are web-based, including legal. Phil Rozek (14:17): It's changed a lot and it really depends on how much in-person contact is needed. Do you have to be breathing the same oxygen, sitting on the same couch, or are you just exchanging mind waves and expertise and there are questions and answers and then money is easily. It's not even handed from one party to another. It's just blips on a computer. And so yeah, I think the progress has been glacial, but yeah, people care less and less about, "Well, this person is two miles away versus 10 miles away versus three time zones away." Jared Correia (14:59): Important for a plumber, I think. Phil Rozek (15:01): It is. For certain businesses, this is where local search gets so interesting because certain search terms are inherently more location sensitive than others. And then certain parts of the search results are more location sensitive than others. Like the map, the Google map, very location sensitive. Organic results in Google, less so. AI results are an interesting blend. And then if you count Yelp, for example, as part of local search, which I do, that tends to be very location sensitive because it's not very sophisticated. You're like, "What are you looking for?" And then in the other field you have to type, "Where are you looking for it?" And so yeah, depending on what you offer, either you can. I mean, the general rule I think of is the higher the density of competition, the smaller the geographical area you can realistically rank in, whether it's on the map or off the map or both. (16:00): But if you're a taxidermist in North Dakota, you can own a lot of turf, even though they're probably more of a taxidermist in North Dakota than in New Jersey, you can still eat off a big swath of North Dakota because your competitors are few and far between. Jared Correia (16:22): I got to ship out my raccoon to North Dakota to get it stuffed. Phil Rozek (16:25): You're not going to make a hat? Jared Correia (16:27): Th's a shot of Phil Rozek (16:27): Jimmothy. I think you could replace the A's hat. Like the Davey Jared Correia (16:30): Crockett hat? Phil Rozek (16:31): Yeah, the Davey Crockett. Right. Jared Correia (16:34): That'd be dope. That's not a bad idea. All right. So you alluded to this too. Everybody's talking about this. So the visibility component of this is. It used to be like everybody was like, "SEO, I want to get on the first page of Google." Now the question is, does the first page of Google even matter? Who's moving through AI overviews at this point? Do you Phil Rozek (16:54): Feel Jared Correia (16:54): Like that's an existential crisis for your industry or are you like, "Nah, some of our shit still works and we're revising the rest of it?" Phil Rozek (17:01): The latter. Google's always changing. A few years ago, Google really changed. It hadn't changed a whole lot, but it added AI mode because there was a trouser darkening event at Mountain View and they're like, "Oh man, we better get on this AI thing or else we are going to become the new MySpace." I just Jared Correia (17:32): Want to say that's the first reference to trouser darkening on the show. Phil Rozek (17:35): It's not going to be the last. Well Jared Correia (17:37): Played. Phil Rozek (17:38): Yeah. But yeah, so Google adapts. They have the money. They've been around forever. They will adapt. So what was on page one of Google was pretty boring and vanilla when I started in local search 18 or so years ago. Now then they've gone through phases, of course. They threw in. There was authorship markup and then there was rich snippets out the wazoo. And then there was the zero click. There are all these changes and it's head spinning, but I mean the through line is that Google always evolves and there hasn't been a Google killer. And you've got Jared Correia (18:26): Along with them. Yeah. Phil Rozek (18:28): Yeah. Jared Correia (18:29): I guess the idea would be here that Google has kind of killed itself because now it has the AI overview that dominates everything. Right. So obviously I don't need you to give away the store, but if I'm an attorney and I'm like, "Okay, what do I do about this?" Everybody's coming through the AI overview. Am I ready for that? What do you need to be thinking of? Phil Rozek (18:56): Well, the short answer is don't do anything differently. Provided you had a smart strategy before. If you had a dumb strategy before - That's Jared Correia (19:04): Fair. Phil Rozek (19:07): Your audience I think is special, they're next level, they're more tech savvy than Jared Correia (19:14): Most. Well, Phil Rozek (19:14): Let's not get Jared Correia (19:14): Crazy. Phil Rozek (19:15): Yeah. Well, I'm laying it on because I'm setting myself up here. I mean, the average attorney. I'll knock my industry in a minute, but I' knock yours first. I mean, the average attorney is about as tech savvy as King Tut. It's Jared Correia (19:32): Not unfair. Phil Rozek (19:33): The average searcher is two. And old habits die hard, so people will still click around in the way they have for the past 25 years. Most people I know who are heavy on AI and use it for most of their searches, either because Google just voluntarily gives them an AI generated answer or they're like me and they love Claude and they use Claude for all kinds of things. Jared Correia (20:02): Claude's Phil Rozek (20:03): Great. Jared Correia (20:03): Yeah. Phil Rozek (20:04): They don't go cold turkey on Google, so they'll consider both. Now, I think it's in a trial phase, obviously. The whole AI thing is very new. And in the meantime, most people have not gone cold turkey on Google. And so they'll use Google's AI mode and be like, "Do I like this more than the 10 blue links? Do I like it more than the map? Do I like it more or less than Claude or Perplexity or whatever AI wingman of choice you employ?" So things just change slowly. I'm certain Google has shot itself in the foot in a variety of ways, and I'm certain there will be a Google killer at some point that just knocks the king off, but it's going to happen slowly and there will be a lot of iterations and adaptations on Google's part in the meantime. So the place, local search fundamentally hasn't changed because people are still searching for a thing or a expert locally to different degrees of location sensitivity. (21:13): So sometimes they're like, "This person has to be five minutes away versus I can work with somebody in Arizona." And so what exactly. It's like some of these bands that have been going since the '70s that have 41 members in them. And it's like there's one guy who's been there the whole time and the rest of them are evolving. The fourth lead singer. Jared Correia (21:36): Van Halen. Phil Rozek (21:37): Yeah. It's like spinal tap with the exploding drummer. They've had 11 exploding drummers. So local search is like that. I mean, there is a good amount of churn. Directories that were very prominent in Google kind of piggybacking off of the main search results are now fish feed. They come and go very quickly. Bing has had its ups and downs. Bing sort of made a resurgence a few years ago because they have a partnership with ChatGPT and I'm sure the pendulum will continue to swing. So the point is what constitutes local search changes slowly, but it's constantly changing. Your Jared Correia (22:20): Point about Google is good though. Google has been sort of unkillable, I think in part because they've made some really smart choices like acquiring YouTube was a good move. Phil Rozek (22:29): Yeah, I'm going to go out on limb and say that was a solid move. Yeah. The lobbyist - Jared Correia (22:36): Right. But you're right. I think there are people out there who are like, "Hey, I just got my computer and it's got Bing search on it and I don't necessarily know how to change my search engine on my computer. Phil Rozek (22:49): I'm Jared Correia (22:49): Just going to use this." Phil Rozek (22:50): Yeah, that's Bing's market share. The people who cannot figure out how to sit away from Bing, and plus Microsoft employees. That's about it. Jared Correia (22:58): All right. So the next thing I want to talk about is this notion of a system. So the way that you and other people I think talk about SEO is sort of like, okay, it's just changing game. You got to stay on top of it. Is it even possible to systematize this stuff? Okay. Phil Rozek (23:17): Yeah. There are some parts that are bolted down and others that are interchangeable. Doing SEO for an attorney is not fundamentally different from doing it for Louis the one truck plumber. If Louis the one truck plumber becomes the thousand truck plumber - He's great, by the way. (23:38): He's the man. You can call him day or night. If he scales up and he has a fleet of a thousand, or if the law firm becomes a white shoe firm that nobody likes, the SEO, it doesn't get that. The process doesn't change that much. Now, a mature SEO campaign, that is one somebody who's usually people have been chipping away at for five or 10 or 15 years involves different things from what. The action items are different for a mature SEO campaign than for one that just started five minutes ago. Yeah, that makes sense. I did a post about this a number of years ago about what are the one time steps versus the ongoing steps? And those are very different, but they're not very different. The evolution is the same for everybody. So early on, you're taking care of local listings, Google and friends. (24:39): You're trying to get a fewer - Just banging Jared Correia (24:40): Out like directory profiles is the Phil Rozek (24:42): Easiest Jared Correia (24:43): Thing to do. Phil Rozek (24:44): Right. You're doing some of that, but that's an asymptote. So after about 20 local citations, you hit the wall and you could build 300 of them until you're blue in the face and you would not see any boost. So that tapers off very quickly. You're building out basic forehead slap or obvious pages on the site that it's like, "We should have had these five years ago. We're fixing up the site in a hurry now." Over time, the action items move more toward, "Okay, the site is basically good. We're always going to grow it, but it's not growing fast and furious. (25:27): We're going to do whatever we can to rustle up a back link. We are going to study search console and see which pages are the squeaky wheels on the shopping cart and which pages are doing fine. Are we doing well for impressions, but not well for clicks? What are accidental terms where it's like we didn't even know we wanted to rank for that term, but we're ranking for it and it seems to be bringing people to the door. Let's see if we can whack more candy out of that pinata by intentionally going after terms that we didn't even know about until we popped open search console. Diversifying bringing out reviews. Good to have Jared Correia (26:10): Data, everybody. Remember Phil Rozek (26:12): That. Yeah. The sooner you start on it, the better. But the point is over time, the action items are more like the lamb chops play along song that never ends. It's like these processes that you will do until you're wearing a toe tag. You never stop them for as long as you care about your local SEO. Whereas the earlier stuff you're working on in the first year or two of your SEO campaign, there's more of an endpoint, or at least it just tapers off to nothing. Jared Correia (26:43): Yeah. We got SEO. We got analogies. What an episode. All right. Can we talk a little bit about SEO adjacent stuff? Phil Rozek (26:52): That sounds scary, but I'm game for it. Jared Correia (26:54): I mean, it could really be anything. Phil Rozek (26:56): Yeah. Jared Correia (26:58): I talked to other SEO guys, obviously, as I know you do. I feel like a lot of them take a dim view on social media, like, "It's bullshit. You don't need to do it." Do you feel the same way? Yes. Or do you feel like. Okay. Tell me why. Phil Rozek (27:14): I'll put some big fat asterisks in the Cooperstown Hall of Fame. YouTube. Well, first, just generally pick. YouTube is good for most businesses because even if you don't have a video that goes viral, which is not very helpful typically - I mean, law firms aren't Jared Correia (27:36): Producing viral videos, for Phil Rozek (27:39): The most Jared Correia (27:40): Part. Phil Rozek (27:40): It's a tough punt. It's tough to make. Yeah. It's tough to put lipstick on that pig. It can be done. But even if the YouTube channel is just a warm body where it's like the attorney or the attorneys do a case and yell into the camera for five minutes about who the client was, not naming names, but what was involved in bringing the case to a successful conclusion. So it's like a case study. And then they optimize the bejeebers out of that YouTube video. They embed it on the site. And it doesn't matter if nobody sees the video on YouTube or they find it in Google search results, which include YouTube results. If it's on the site and people find the site other ways, then the video has pulled the weight of its caboose because they're like, "Okay, I'm on this page. Okay, there's a video. (28:43): I don't want to read. I want the color commentary. I'm going to watch the video." So it's worth being on YouTube even if you're not serious. I would say beyond that though, for my business and for my clients - Is that Jared Correia (28:59): Mostly because the connection to Google? I mean, I think a lot of people forget this, but YouTube is Google property. Does that make it different from other social platforms? Phil Rozek (29:10): There is a dog fooding component here where it's just a little more likely to rank for something. I mean, yeah, theoretically, you can do the same thing with a Vimeo video. You can stick it on Vimeo and embed it, but nobody's going to find the damn thing. The other inherent difference, this is my take, albeit a hot take. Jared Correia (29:34): We like hot takes. Phil Rozek (29:36): YouTube is objectively more useful than other social platforms. It's a different medium. It's not like, "Well, here's the little shorty fortune cookie length version of a blog post and you can go read the rest of it." It's not a teaser the way Facebook posts tend to be. They tend to be just Miniature versions of whatever's on the site. And by the way, it's dumb not to have it be a miniature version of what's on the site. Because if you're just writing bespoke content for Facebook, what the hell? That's stupid. It should be on your site where potentially if it gets links, you get the links rather than Mark Zuckerberg gets the links. Same thing with X. As much as I like X, and I think that's unique also. Same thing with LinkedIn. It's not a real service. It's a different platform, but it's not like, okay, we are going to take your 110 megabyte video that slows your system to a crawl. (30:41): We'll take care of it. We will protect it like it's the Pope. And it will play instantly. And 99% of the time without problems when people click the button and people are trained to click the button, they have a Pavlovian relationship to YouTube at this point. So they see the button, they're going to click. Jared Correia (31:00): Definitely. And part of this is long form content as well, which YouTube sort of specializes in versus other platform. I mean, you could do it on Vimeo too, but people aren't putting half an hour videos on Facebook necessarily. Phil Rozek (31:15): No, they're like 15 second videos of somebody's feet and it's like, I want my 15 seconds back. I Jared Correia (31:21): Think Phil Rozek (31:22): You might Jared Correia (31:22): Be able to get some money for that, I hear. Phil Rozek (31:24): In certain corners of the world. Yeah, that's very lucrative. Keep your feet in your Jared Correia (31:27): Shoes. Phil Rozek (31:28): Right. Yeah. YouTube is most useful, as you say, for long form content, but they are pushing the shorts hard. The shorts can help get the engine started where you build a bit of a following on there for your long form content, but it's very easy to get the ball rolling with good shorts. Jared Correia (31:54): Let's do a little twist on the social media part of it. So we've been talking about posting on social media. What about social media ads? Do you see those as being valuable? I buy a LinkedIn ad or a Facebook ad. Phil Rozek (32:09): That's not really my side of the street. And I'm sure somebody. Anecdotally, I've heard a couple - I can assure you Jared Correia (32:16): People do it. Phil Rozek (32:17): People do it. Yeah. People do it. I've heard anecdotally people do it and they're like, "Yeah, nothing else seemed to..." I've had a couple of cases where people are like, "Nothing else has worked, but LinkedIn ads and then furious posting on LinkedIn, my home away from home," does seem to bring clients. Those seem to be outliers. So I don't know that Louis the one truck plumber would benefit much on LinkedIn or running LinkedIn ads. Now YouTube is an interesting example there, an outlier too, because YouTube ads can bring the ruckus. Just turning them on doesn't mean that you will make any money from them because you get charged per thousand impressions and then you get charged per click. And the clicks aren't actually that cheap depending on a lot of factors. But if you do a good job with your YouTube videos, even if it's just a bunch of shorts, you give yourself options and you can run a YouTube ads campaign that may work well, whereas Google Ads didn't work for you. (33:33): I've never won a social media ads campaign. So like Facebook, LinkedIn, X, I've never done that. So to the extent I do ads, I'm 100% Google Ads, and YouTube ads. And I've been doing actually Google Ads longer than I've been doing local SEO. I've been doing it since 06. Oh, Jared Correia (33:54): Interesting. Phil Rozek (33:55): Okay. I sort of veered into local SEO, but it was just a zygote, but Google Ads had been around for a few years at that point. Yeah. That's interesting. I'm a terrible person to ask about the efficacy of social media ads. Jared Correia (34:09): Optionality Phil Rozek (34:10): Though. Right. Jared Correia (34:12): Brad Stevens likes optionality. That's why he traded Jalen Brown. Maybe we shouldn't go there. I feel sore about that. All right. Let me ask you another angle here. So what about these sort of answer tools like Reddit, Quora? Is it important for lawyers to. Because the party line is, okay, we've got these places that are being picked up in chat bots, so I should be answering questions in these places. Is that something lawyers should be looking at? Is that even SEO or is that also SEO adjacent? Phil Rozek (34:49): It's SEO adjacent. And it's also another area where finally I get to knock my own industry, or at least some of the practitioners in it. I'm just trying to tee you up here. They're kind of like the antithesis of Goldfinger and James Bond where everything he touches turns to gold. They're like Brownfinger. Everything they touch turns to poop. And it's like that with. I'll give you an example. Better Business Bureau used to offer a really good backlink if you were accredited. If you got the free listing, you wouldn't typically get a link, but if you crossed their palm with silver for 300 or $800 a year or whatever it was for your local chapter BBB and you got accredited, they'd give you a very solid link. And guess what? Enough SEOs peed in that pool that the lifeguards drained it and kicked everybody out. And so now even if you have been accredited for 43 and a half years on BBB, you have the same no follow link that the lowly surf who has a free listing on there has. (36:03): Nobody gets a follow link anymore because my fellow SEOs ruined it. And I think it's going to be like that with Reddit. It's going to reach a point of diminishing return or (36:18): They'll have to get more moderators on there, more flat foots on just doing a daily patrol or maybe like, well, you have to pay now for an expedited review of your answer. Something's eventually Jared Correia (36:36): Going to get - This is less of a strategic consideration than a theoretical one. I don't know about you, but I feel like business marketing destroys everything good. It's like Phil Rozek (36:47): A hurricane. Jared Correia (36:47): I like unfiltered answers. Everybody on LinkedIn is fucking like, "Ah, I did another amazing thing today. How do I do it?" It's awful. It's awful. Phil Rozek (37:01): I don't remember who said this. It may have been the great Dale Carnegie, very underrated. He's like, "The most boring conversation is two people talking about themselves. LinkedIn is millions of people talking about themselves and each other. I can't do it. It's awful. It's terrible. Jared Correia (37:18): Oh my God. It's so bad. I can't even scroll it anymore. Okay. I got two questions for you remaining, one of which I think is a big question, which I think is probably of interest to you. AI overview. Right now it's pretty much all organic. Are we getting AI overview ads in Google and when? Phil Rozek (37:41): I've learned I'm very bad at predicting certain things. I won't hold you to it. Yeah. I don't see how Google could pass that up. I mean, that's like hanging the pork chop in front of a hungry dog. Right. But there always tends to be a free for all and then a freemium period where it's like, okay, Google introduces this new thing and they just want to. For two years, it's just habit formation. The first hit is free from the drug dealer. So they want to get people using this thing and leaning on it like a crutch. By the way, I suspect that's what it's going to be with our various AI buddies like my beloved Claude. They are going to jack the price up. Price is going Jared Correia (38:30): Way up. Phil Rozek (38:31): Yes. It's Jared Correia (38:31): Just a matter of time. Phil Rozek (38:33): Tell people Jared Correia (38:33): This all the time. This is the golden age of AI. Get in while you can. Phil Rozek (38:38): Right. I suspect they're not going to grandfather people in. I mean, they're just going to grab you where it feels really good or really bad and they're going to twist. Jared Correia (38:47): Right. Absolutely. Phil Rozek (38:48): It's just a question of plan. They got Jared Correia (38:50): Everybody by the short hairs when it comes to AI. Phil Rozek (38:52): They sure do. And Google does too. Google is in on the action and I think eventually AI overviews will be splattered with ads like their NASCAR. Jared Correia (39:06): Yes. Yes. Okay. Last question for you. If there's a lawyer out there now who is like, "Okay, this is interesting. I'm curious. I've never done SEO stuff before. Wasn't sure if it was a good time to get in with the AI stuff. It is." How would someone go about finding an SEO person and what kind of questions should they be asking that potential vendor? I'm sure you have these conversations all the time. Phil Rozek (39:35): Here's my softball interview. I was told there would be only softball questions and no tough questions like that. Man, where do I begin? Jared Correia (39:42): We don't do any softballs here. Phil Rozek (39:44): We're very Jared Correia (39:44): Bad at that. Phil Rozek (39:45): Yeah. I'm operating under false pretenses here. Just off the dome, completely spontaneously I'd say one, find somebody who's been doing it for a long time. Can you find. I mean, I started doing this when I was in my early 20s. Was I good for that at that stage? Yeah. As in I was honest and I had the curiosity chip up here. Jared Correia (40:16): Which is I think most of what it is when you're starting a Phil Rozek (40:19): Business, right? Jared Correia (40:20): Yes. Phil Rozek (40:20): Exactly. Did I have the same bag of tricks that I do now? Nope. So find somebody who has been doing it for a few years and who didn't go through puberty last week. Number two, this is going to be controversial. I think I might get lit up in the comments over this one. Think very hard about working with an industry specialist versus somebody who's omnivorous, an SEO who works with people in all kinds of weird industries. (41:02): In the words of the great Thomas Sowell, "There are no solutions, only trade-offs." The benefit of working with an industry specialist is that person has certain systems down pat and is plugged in and knows like, "Okay, here's the software you want. Here's all the crappy software you don't want. Here's a good developer who can build a good website for attorneys and who passes the vibe checks." There are other benefits of working with an industry specialist. You know them, I know them. They don't bear repeating. The downsides are not always, but sometimes the industry specialists do not have a deep repertoire of, "Okay, this worked for Louis the one truck plumber. I have not seen any other attorneys do it, but it's going to work for the. At least I'm going to give it a try because I have, based on educated guests, I think it'll work for the attorney. (42:03): I'm going to transplant that idea from over here and sew it into the patient over here." Because cross Jared Correia (42:08): Pollination. Phil Rozek (42:09): Exactly. That would've been a more succinct way of putting it. But yes, if you work with the plumbers and the pest control guys and the iPhone repair guys and Jeffrey the giraffe, may he rest in peace. Jared Correia (42:25): RIP, Jeffrey. Phil Rozek (42:27): Yeah, it was a good run. You get to grab ideas from all the different corners and sort of mix and match and then be like, "Okay, I think this will work for my PI attorney, but not for my immigration attorney and vice versa. You can take ideas from them and transplant them to your shady iPhone repair guy if you wanted to." The other inherent, this is a somewhat less controversial take, is you're less likely to run into the gray area non-compete areas where it's like, "Well, I was working with your competitor until two months ago and now I'm changing jerseys. This is kind of awkward." You just have a larger pool of people you can work with in which the relationships are not complicated. And so that's the second consideration. Just realize that it is not necessarily better to work with an industry specialist. It is a trade off, but they're great industry specialists and there are terrible omnivores and everyone in between. Jared Correia (43:33): I feel good stuff here. Speaking of a lack of softball questions, would you like to come back for our last segment in a moment? Phil Rozek (43:41): If you'll have one, I can't say no to that. I have no idea what's behind door number three. Jared Correia (43:47): We would love to. All right. We'll be right back with the Counter Program, everybody. Welcome back everybody. It's The Counter Program as promised. It's a podcast within a podcast. This is a conversational space where we can address usually unrelated topics that I want to explore at a greater depth with my guest. Expect no rhyme and very little reason. Phil, welcome back. Phil Rozek (44:13): Thank you, sir. Thanks for having me. I Jared Correia (44:15): Believe you are a Miami Vice fan, is that correct? Phil Rozek (44:19): It closeted. It's one of those shows that - Not Jared Correia (44:21): Anymore. Phil Rozek (44:22): Yeah. I like it. I'm about the same age as it and it's up there. It's not something I watch every day. People love Jared Correia (44:35): Miami Vice.You don't got to be ashamed of that. Phil Rozek (44:38): No, I love it. I will be a little more ambivalent about asking. If you ask me, "Phil, what's your relationship to Star Trek?" I'd be like, "Oh boy." I'll start sweating and be like, "I was kind of a Trekkie when I was a kid. I'm not sure that I'm not anymore. I don't go to the conventions. I'm not that cool. I'm not cool enough to go to a convention, but I have a very big soft spot for that. I like the Jared Correia (45:07): J.J. Abrams Star Trek movies, which real Star Trek people probably hate. You can Phil Rozek (45:11): Operate me for that. I've never seen them on purpose because I think they. I'm an open-minded guy. I'll try everything once. So maybe even though the movies have been out forever, I'll maybe watch one, but I'm like, "Eh, didn't sound great." Jared Correia (45:26): Well, we're going to stick to sitcoms here. I've got a new trivia game for you that I built just for you. It's called Fill-Ins. Get Phil Rozek (45:33): It? Oh, dad joke. The Dad Joke meter just started smoking. Jared Correia (45:38): It's going off. Yes. Every question I'm about to ask you involves a temporary or permanent sitcom recasting decision. This sounds Phil Rozek (45:48): Brutal. Jared Correia (45:49): I will ask you a question. Phil Rozek (45:51): Why did I agree to this? I'll Jared Correia (45:52): Give you multiple choice. Phil Rozek (45:55): Half the people I won't have part of because I'm like an 85-year-old guy and I like - Phil, you're in the right place. I listen to just music from the '70s. My eardrums are going to be fried in two years. Jared Correia (46:09): Oh, this is going to be good. This is perfect for you. Phil Rozek (46:11): Okay, good. As long as it's not too contemporary, I'm not in real trouble. Come Jared Correia (46:16): On. You're on the wrong show for that. I mean, it's funny to me because we're talking about sitcoms and no one watches sitcoms on live television anymore. It's Phil Rozek (46:25): A vestige of the Jared Correia (46:26): Past. Phil Rozek (46:27): I watch a lot of Kill Tony, and that's about it. Jared Correia (46:30): What is that? I don't even know what that is. Phil Rozek (46:31): Do I know what that is? It's a comedy. I don't know. It's probably Beakley. If you just type in Kill Tony, it's basically standup improv. It's not even improv because people have their minute, but it's like people have a minute to get a reaction out of the crowd and actually make them laugh. A quarter of the people are amazing. A quarter of the people are kind of journeymen and half of them just suck. You're even more Jared Correia (47:02): Contemporary than me. I guess Phil Rozek (47:05): Some questions I think might be in your Jared Correia (47:06): Wheelhouse. Phil Rozek (47:07): That's the only funny thing I watch these days. Jared Correia (47:09): Okay. I got some stuff that might actually be in your wheelhouse. Are you ready for question one? Phil Rozek (47:14): All right. Let's get it over with. Jared Correia (47:18): CBS Sitcom, one of my favorite shows of all time. The Dukes of Hazard replaced protagonist cousins Bo and Luke during season five with knock off actors Byron Sherry and Christopher Mayer. The ratings for the show immediately tanked and producers were forced to renegotiate and bring back original actors John Schneider and Tom Wopath. In the show, Bo and Luke did stints as NASCAR drivers. The show never recovered and only lasted two more seasons. But Phil, my question for you, what were the replacement cousins named in Dukes of Hazard? I know this off the top of my head, but I can give you multiple choice. Phil Rozek (48:00): I've never seen an episode, so I played the Jared Correia (48:02): Fifth. Dukes of Hazard is so Phil Rozek (48:04): Fucking Jared Correia (48:05): Great. Phil Rozek (48:05): I know. It is legendary. I just Jared Correia (48:07): Want to jump cars off. Phil Rozek (48:08): I clearly live under Jared Correia (48:10): Wrong. Phil Rozek (48:11): Yeah. You could offer me Elon Musk's fortune right now and I would draw one up. Jared Correia (48:19): This is why we have multiple choice. Is it cousins Roscoe and Enis? I'm going with real Southern names here. Cousins Coy and Vance, Tom and Tuck. Roscoe and Enis, Coy and Vance, Tom and Huck. You got a 33% chance to get it right. Phil Rozek (48:40): I'm going with B, Coy and Vance. Jared Correia (48:43): That is correct, sir. Phil Rozek (48:47): I just play Russian roulette here, just spinning the wheel and seeing what happens. Jared Correia (48:52): Now, I don't want to put any pressure on you, but we had a perfect score in our trivia game last week. And if it happens again, I'm just going to shut down the podcast. Anyway. Phil Rozek (49:01): Well, if I get it right, then you know it's just way too damn easy. Jared Correia (49:07): Question two, go back even further. Probably the most famous sitcom recasting in history was when the actor who played Darren on Bewitched, Samantha's husband was replaced after season five. Seeing a theme here. After experiencing such severe back pain that he collapsed on set and had to quit the show permanently to recover. Which two actors who both had the same first name played the two Darrens? Was it Roger Smith and Roger Perry, Tom Bosley and Tom Scarrett, or Dick York and Dick Sargent? Was it the Rogers, the Toms, or a couple of Dicks? Phil Rozek (49:51): We put it that way. I'm going to go with option three. Jared Correia (49:55): Dick York and Dick Sargent, correct? Yes. Did you know that? You knew that, Phil Rozek (49:59): Right? I don't know how I knew that, but a little voice in my head told me that. Jared Correia (50:04): I feel like it's burned into the public consciousness at this point, the Phil Rozek (50:08): Two Darrens. I think those names sounded more familiar than the others, so I'm like, "Okay." I watched a couple episodes of Bewitched a billion years ago. Of course, don't remember Jack about it. There's Jared Correia (50:22): A Samantha statue in Salem, Massachusetts. I don't know Phil Rozek (50:26): If you've seen that. Jared Correia (50:27): Yeah. It's outside the pizza place downtown. Phil Rozek (50:30): No way. It's pretty cool. I haven't been to Salem for, I don't know, since Jared Correia (50:33): 08. I'm not suggesting you go, just look it up online. Phil Rozek (50:35): Yeah. We went during Halloween time too. So it was like a new Harry Potter movie had been released or something. It's just crazy. Jared Correia (50:44): That's not when you want to go. Phil Rozek (50:46): No. Jared Correia (50:46): Phil, you're two for two. Here's question three. In the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, the Vivian Banks character, Aunt Viv, played by Janet Hubert, was replaced after season three due to friction with star Will Smith and an ongoing contract dispute, prompting DJ Jazzy Jeff himself to guest star on the show, break the fourth wall and say, "You know Mrs. Banks, there's something different about you since you had the baby." Phil Rozek (51:16): Then he got thrown out of the house at first. Yeah. Jared Correia (51:21): Jazzy Jeff, always getting tossed out of the house. Which actress was the new Aunt Viv? Was it Karen Parsons, Tatiana Ali, or Daphne Maxwell Reed? Aunt Viv number two. Karen Parsons. Karen Parsons. Tatiana Ali. Our streak is broken. Karen Parsons was Hillary Banks, the daughter. It was Daphne Maxwell Reed. All right Phil, you're still two for three though. Phil Rozek (51:49): Pretty good. Well, you still have a self-respecting trivia quiz though because if I got them all right, it's like. I Jared Correia (51:57): Would've had to hang Phil Rozek (51:58): It out. Yeah. Take it behind the barn and shoot Jared Correia (52:00): It. These are hard. All right. Question four. After season five again on the original Roseanne sitcom, the actress who played Roseanne's oldest daughter, Becky, was replaced. Then the original actress came back, but she had scheduling issues, so they just brought back the replacement actress to cover the original actress's absence. You following along here? So the sitcom used two actresses almost interchangeably for the remainder of the show's run. So there were basically two Becky's two oldest daughters on Roseanne and they played it off a joke. The second Becky was in another popular sitcom after Roseanne ended. Who was she and what was the show? Was she Laura Preppen and that '70s show, Sarah Chalky and Scrubs, or Krista Miller and the Drew Carey Show? Laura Prep in that 70s show, Sarah Chalkey and Scrubs or Krista Miller and the Drew Carey Show. What do you think? Phil Rozek (53:05): Again, I'm completely flying blind. I'm going to say Krista Miller and the Drew Kerry Show. Jared Correia (53:12): Oh, good guess. Good guess. It was Sarah Chalkey and Scrubs, but that's a good guess. Phil Rozek (53:16): Okay. Well, I'm glad. Again, if I'm getting them all right good guess. And I'm just guessing and I have no idea what the F I'm talking about. So I only care about your quiz. Jared Correia (53:30): Thank you. I appreciate that. Come back anytime. Becky and Roseanne used to have the craziest sweater. She was like the white teenage Bill Cosby. Actually, maybe we shouldn't talk about Bill Cosby. Question five. Phil Rozek (53:45): Yeah, he's fallen off just a touch. Jared Correia (53:49): Just a bit. He's had some Phil Rozek (53:50): Issues. Jared Correia (53:51): Here's a good one. On Happy Days, Richie Cunningham originally had an older brother. In season one, he was played by actor Gavin O'Hurley, and he was replaced by Randolph Roberts. Didn't have a great career in season two. In one episode of that season two season, Happy Days ended up running for 11 years. So basically Richie's brother, Chuck Cunningham, just disappears from the show after. They pretend like he never even had a brother. It's crazy. Phil Rozek (54:25): Didn't Richie disappear? Wasn't he not in later seasons also? Jared Correia (54:31): Maybe. I don't know. Phil Rozek (54:32): I've only seen a couple episodes of this in my life. Jared Correia (54:35): Yeah, me too. So the thing that's funny about this is it's giving rise to this phrase called the Chuck Cunningham Syndrome, which is used to describe when the sitcom character is written off without any explanation. So how did Chuck Cunningham actually exit Happy Days? I have three choices for you. Was his last line asking his dad if Fonzie could help fix a robotic Santa display? Was he talking to Richie about how to run a pick and roll correctly? Chucky Cunningham was always carrying a basketball. Or was he telling his mom about how his new girlfriend was studying to be an astronaut? What was his last line on happy days? Fonzie and the Santa display, Richie in the pick and roll, or his new girlfriend studying to be an astronaut? Phil Rozek (55:24): I'm just going with Fonzie and the Santa display because that's just colorful. It's probably the most plausible too. That is correct. Jared Correia (55:35): That is correct on the Phil Rozek (55:37): Christmas episode. It's way too specific. Jared Correia (55:40): When I was reading this, I was like, "What the fuck?" But that's actually what happened. No way. And then that's the last scene he has in the show. And every episode after that, they pretend like he didn't exist. It's crazy. Phil Rozek (55:50): All right. That's some good writing. So you're doing Jared Correia (55:52): Good. Three of five. Is it? Phil Rozek (55:55): Okay. I can still show my face around here. All Jared Correia (55:58): Right. We got question six. You're guaranteed a 500 record here, regardless of what happens on this question. On the original 1960s Batman television show, there were three actresses who played Catwoman. Which one of these actresses was not a Catwoman in the original Batman series? Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, Anne Francis. Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, and Francis. Only one was not a Catwoman on the original Batman. Which one was it? Phil Rozek (56:35): Lee Meriwether. Jared Correia (56:37): Good guess. Anne Francis is the correct answer. Eartha Kitt was the third. I Phil Rozek (56:43): Though you would be too obvious. I thought I put her in multiple choice. Obviously Julie Newmar is the 800 pound girl figuratively. Yeah. Jared Correia (56:50): Yes. Phil Rozek (56:51): Interesting. Jared Correia (56:52): Anne Francis, actual 1950s, 1960s actress who appeared in a number of tremendous Twilight Zone episodes. Phil, not bad. Thanks for coming on. You're a great sport. I appreciate it. Phil Rozek (57:04): Thank you. Thanks for having me. That was a lot of fun. Jared Correia (57:08): Thanks for our guest today. That was Phil Rozek, the CEO of Local Visibility System, LLC. To learn more about Phil and what he does, visit localvisibilitysystem.com. It's local, visibilitysystem, all one word. Com. Now, because I'll always be a '90s kid who just recorded the one about TV, but whose true passion is burning CDs for anyone who would listen, I'm now just doing the modern version of that, which is creating Spotify playlists for every podcast episode that I record where the songs are tangentially related to an episode topic. For this week's playlist, I'm throwing up some of my favorite sitcom theme songs. Yes, this was a thing too, and they were great. And I may even expand it to TV series theme songs because Mike Post would like to have a word, Kenny Loggins. And it's all brought to you by the television series Awake, only on NBC. (58:08): Oh, my bad. We have AI now and it's 2026. Things are going tremendously. Join us next time when I once again strive to put right what once went wrong.