We’re not supposed to pick favorites, but this may be our most beloved webinar so far. It’s no secret that Garrett loves prospecting in a way that can only be described as “devout and fanatical,” so he couldn’t wait to share his favorite tips during this session.
Below is the recording of the 8/27/15 webinar. Watch the whole thing (highly recommended) or click on one of the sections of our outline below.
1:17 Webinar Goals
- It’s not just about “do you know the advanced operators”; it’s “can you really use them?”
- We’re also going to talk about cocitation analysis
- The opportunity footprint library
3:15 WARNING
We’re proudly ad hoc for each campaign. You’re not going to walk away from this webinar with a precise formula, but you’ll be able to assemble your own process.
“Prospecting is a rich, rich place for a creative person to work.”
5:16 PART 1: SEARCH QUERY PROSPECTING
5:40 Why Advanced Operators are so important:
- You can isolate opportunity types.
- You can search by organization type.
- You can also use prospecting for finding business opportunities!
- They help you search topically.
8:32 Advanced Operators are ingredients – we usually use more than 1 at a time
9:11 Why there is such a difference between “on-page” and intitle:, and how it applies in prospecting.
Why is this significant?
Correct intitle: usage saves you bunches of time, and helps you find more specific types of audiences.
12:49 Patterns: why inurl: and intitle: and site: are so powerful.
“When you find word usage patterns on good prospect pages, you’ll be able to find more good pages.”
Learn about Garrett’s prospecting epiphany (thanks @ericward!)
Let’s get into specifics…
18:40 inurl:
(inurl: is the “nerdy” advanced operator)
use: to look for topic & opportunity type footprints that only occur in the url
example: inurl:links.html, file extensions, different keywords
don’t use: for tld exclusions
where to find: in the SERPS, in backlink analysis
16:33 intitle:
(inurl – you’re thinking more like the webmaster
intitle – you’re thinking more about how the webmaster is publishing for their users)
use: to look for topical guidance, less for opportunity type
example: intitle:”outer space”, intitle:”dating”, intitle:”[medical condition]”
don’t: get too over-specific
where to find: in the SERPS, on definite target pages, in the news
34:18 site:
use: to specify organization type – helps you think about types of people you’re looking for
example: site:.gov, site:.us, site:.edu, site:.org
don’t use: for already narrow queries (e.g. – blog prospecting)
where to find: there are only so many TLDs. (Wikipedia has a list!)
38:04 on page
use: primarily for topical guidance, looking for links page indicators
NOTE: “we usually use quotes like this”
example: common resource anchor text —> “nasa.gov”
or proper names of commonly linked entities —> “national aeronautics and space administration”
don’t use: exclusively!
where to find: on definite targets
43:43 PART 2: COCITATION
44:38 Defining cocitation
When we know two or more websites or web pages that we think are related, and we’re looking for pages that link to both/all of them.
46:46 When we use cocitation analysis
use cocitation: if site X is sharing content around “topic A,” and we’ve created “topic A” related content.
51:15 Seed: a website whose backlinks we use to launch a cocitation analysis
53:37 Garrett goes into the WILD, promoting an example resource on outer space
(Watch a Prospecting Master at work)
1:00:47 Your end goal as a prospector
Build out master lists & master patterns to use for opportunity prospecting.