Rand Fishkin

So for me, this was a decision around where I was at at the time.

You know, I have been pretty public about this.

I had a pretty serious bout of depression and mental and emotional illness.

Don't.

don't make for a good match with the CEO role in a growing company.

They are not what the traits that inspire people to give their best.

And as such, you know, I talked with my investors, my board and with my executive team, and we made the call to replace me with with Sarah Bird, who'd been my chief operating officer for a long time and is one of my best friends in the world.

And I think that was the that was the right decision.

But it's it's painful and really hard.

And, you know, I think that that bout of depression didn't make it any easier.

So how are you?

Much, much better.

Self-aware, too.

So end of 2013 into beginning of 2014.

Okay.

Yeah, I don't know about that last part, but the other bits are true.

Yeah, so I run two of our products and engineering teams here, not as the people manager, but as the sort of product architect deciding on the roadmap and features and functionality and those kinds of things.

That's our big data team and our research tools team.

And then I also do a tremendous amount of speaking and promotion and content creation for the company.

you know, podcasts and interviews and, you know, hosting discussions and roundtables and generally trying to help people do better marketing all over the world.