Glen Allsopp

Here are three quotes that stood out to me from a big group of earnings calls yesterday.

The companies saw year-over-year revenue growth of 8.1%, 12.7% and 20.4% respectively. 📈

My gut instinct after reading & listening to hundreds of these is that Booking were solely talking about organic search traffic and not paid.

I've tried to clarify through a few sources but at the very least, I can't find anything contrary to that.

Just keep it in mind as I always try to be accurate, and it's also not always easy to know if they're talking about Booking or their network of sites as a whole.

On the AI SEO front, CFO Ewout Steenbergen added,

"The number of leads that we are receiving from large language models [is] relatively small, but it's growing."

These quotes are just one part of a bigger story, so never make investments based on them, but I hope you find them interesting too 🤝

As you've probably seen, "best" lists can dominate results in traditional and AI search.

Here are some uncommon (?) ways to get on more of them.

I've personally looked at ~750 of these lists in recent weeks (and very gratefully featured in some), but make sure you read until the end before taking action.

1. Find lists you or your competitors were on, but aren't anymore.

You can use Ahrefs' 'Link removed' filter, combined with the referring page title filter (pictured), for precisely this.

There's no guarantee you'll get your mention back, but it's a legitimate way to start the conversation.

Pro tip: Check out lost links to your profile pages on G2 (or other relevant platforms you find in the next tip).

2. Many "best" pages will only link to your listing on the likes of G2/Clutch/Feedspot/Amazon/etc.

I'm not saying you have to promote your offering on those platforms, but being on them can massively increase your chances of a mention in some cases.

3. Awards listicles rank well across countless industries.

I know this sounds obvious, but you aren't winning a legitimate beauty award unless the judge has had your product in their hands.

The same goes for people using your software or seeing your agency's results.

Make a note of the submission process for next year, or see if you can get a new fan in other ways.

4. Some lists only use affiliate links, and they might not be aware that you have an affiliate program.

5. Big brands are sponsoring a lot of them.

Proceed with caution and get advice from others if you want to follow suit, but plenty of pages accept sponsored listings.

You can use Ahrefs' 'Sponsored' filter to support your research, but a single brand receiving an external link is usually a strong hint as well.

At the very least, it's good to get an idea of what's happening in your space.

6. Check 'last updated' dates and Ahrefs' content changes filter to find pages actively updated.

You stand a better chance of featuring on a page that has changed in the past few months.

Adding "&tbs=qdr:m" to your Google search can help here, too.

7. Yes, you can create your own, and I have some recent data on this.

Across 250 "best X software"-style SERPs, 169 (67.6%) featured a list in which the company writing the article ranks itself number one.

I would highly recommend against going overboard here, but you've no doubt seen the same :)

**

Like some smart people in this space have commented recently (e.g. Lily Ray, Glenn Gabe, Patrick Stox), I think we're due for some listicles disruption.

They have their place, and can be used legitimately, but I would be very careful about scaling any tactics specifically focused on them. Especially for brands you care about. 

Please let me know if you find these kinds of graphics useful. I'll have a few more insights on this topic going live soon. 🙏