The Role Humanization & Empathy Play In SEO Strategy
episode
Voices of Search // A Search Engine Optimization (SEO) & Content Marketing Podcast
22 min
2 speakers
4 chapters
transcribed 29 days ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the purpose of this episode and who are the hosts and guest?
The Voices of Search Podcast is a proud member of the I Hear Everything Podcast Network. Looking to launch or scale your podcast? I Hear Everything delivers podcast production, growth, and monetization solutions that transform your words into profit. Ready to give your brand a voice? Then visit IHear Everything.com. Welcome to the Voices of Search Podcast, a member of the I Hear Everything Podcast Network. Ready to expedite your company's organic growth efforts? Sit back, relax, and get ready for your daily dose of search engine optimization wisdom. Here's today's host of the Voices of Search Podcast, Jordan Cooney. Hello SEOs and marketers. My name is Jordan Cooney from Previsible. Joining me today is Divya Hillier, who is the Director of SEO in strategic content at Coursera.
Coursera partners with leading universities and organizations to offer online courses, providing learners with access to high quality education around the world. Yesterday, Divi and I talked about leading SEO teams and programs during uncertain times. Today we're going to continue the conversation by discussing humanization and empathy in SEO strategy. Okay, here's my conversation with Divya Hillier, the director of SEO and Strategic Content at Coursera. Divya, welcome back to the Voice of Search Podcast.
Hello, glad to be here.
All right, so it's great to jump into day two. We had a phenomenal topic yesterday that if if you didn't get a chance to listen to, go back, probably listen to it more than once. But it was really diving into the concepts of how we get how we deal and how we lead as SEOs in uncertain times. Not a topic we get to discuss a lot on the pod. And I really encourage you all to to go back and listen if you didn't listen to that one. But today we're kind of taking a slightly more, maybe a more beneficial topic for some of us, which is the concept of humanization and empathy in SEO strategy. Divya, we both come from moments in the SEO history where it was a very tactical industry. It was an industry that derived from the need to identify a way to outsmart
Smart Google maybe is the right word, the nicest word, I guess, and to leverage that for every ounce of traffic it can possibly give you. Whether it be in backlinking strategies, you know, like the dot org plays that people would try to implement, whether it be hiding content, serving content in different ways. It's been an industry that's plagued by tactics. And when I think about the humanization and empathy in SEO strategy, I can't think of a topic that is more opposite than than where the industry in many ways in accounts started. What's your what's your perspective on that?
I could not agree more. You know, I I have this slide that I have in all of my all of my decks. Anytime there's an SEO deck, I firmly believe in educating whoever it is a little bit more about SEO and understanding where we are now and where we started and where we where it used to be. And one of the sections and I try to put some little like pithy reminder sections on uh the the eras and one of the eras is tricks is for kids which is we're doing tricks it's just doing all kinds of hokey stuff and then trying to get as much traffic as possible and not caring how long it lasts. It's just getting it and then getting more and then you throw that traffic away and then you get more and I think now In the last
Let's say four or five years, it's become more and more intent. Like as soon as Google said intent, I was like, Oh, it's my time.
Now I can play.
It's my time. Now I can play. I got it. Okay. Because intent is at the end of the day, think about it. Google just because they didn't have the ability To fully to the best of their ability police bad actors in this way, tactical actors, so to speak. Like the way the thing attracted me to SEO is the way I understood it, which was this is a platform, and the original makers of this platform did not want you to fill it full of trash because they thought the platform could help people find the thing they need and get the thing they want or do the thing they desired.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the purpose of this episode and who are the hosts and guest?
0:00–10:17
2
How did SEO evolve from pure tactics to a focus on intent and user needs?
10:17–14:39
3
Why is humanization and empathy now considered essential for SEO strategy?
14:39–19:39
4
How can SEOs create content that satisfies AI overviews and SERP intent?
19:39–22:01