eCommerce Marketing Podcast: SEO Strategies for a Polarized Marketing World

Arlen [00:01]
Welcome to the Ecommerce Marketing Podcast everyone. My name is Arlen and I am your host. And today we’ve got a very special guest, Amanda Sherry, who is the Director of Marketing at a Microsoft Gold partner, Western Computer, with a passion for showcasing the transformative power of data in the dynamic world of Microsoft solutions and marketing. With over 15 years of marketing experience and a Master’s of Science in Public Communications, Amanda brings a unique blend of creativity and analytical prowess to the table. Welcome to the podcast, Amanda.

Amanda Sherry [00:18]
Thank you very much, I’m very happy to be here.

Arlen [00:20]
Yes. And thank you for joining me. You know, today we’ve got an interesting topic. We’re going to be talking about the polarizing beliefs in marketing and the power of SEO. Um, you know, we’re talking about polarizing. It’s, it’s these different beliefs where it’s kind of split where it’s totally even. There’s a certain, let’s say 50% of people feel this way about a subject. 50% of people feel that way. So it’s like, you know, drawing straws to decide which way you’re going to go.

So that’s kind of what we’re going to be talking about. And we’re definitely excited to see your take on that. And what are some of these different beliefs where people are kind of, um, you know, mixed upon. And then we’ll also be talking about SEO, the power of SEO, the future of SEO, and all of those good things. But before we do get into all of that, why don’t you tell us a little bit about your background and specifically how you got into what you’re doing today.

Amanda Sherry [01:11]
Sure. So I’m a B2B marketer with over 15 years of experience. As you mentioned, I’m the director of marketing at Western Computer, which is a Microsoft CSP partner, and that’s a cloud solution provider. We implement support and service, Microsoft ERP and customer engagement solutions, as well as power platform and business intelligence. So how I got into this, I’ve always had a passion for creativity and personal experiences. And I’ve,

really been intrigued with the way the mind works. So growing up, I originally wanted to study psychology in undergrad, but as that became a reality, it also became pretty overwhelming. And I selected advertising as my major instead to kind of play in that creative side while also still having a little of the psychology behind it. So outside of undergrad, I found an entry-level position in marketing, and I went back to school to pursue my Master of Science in Public Communications.

And that’s where I really fell in love with human communication with each other and how brands communicate with their audience. And I think that there’s a lot to be said with brand messaging and how that brand can make us feel even as individuals and also from a B2B aspect. So marketing has really allowed me to tap into my creative side. It’s allowed me to expand on my interest in communication and user experience all while tracking data.

and testing things, figuring out how and why it works, and using the data to support any future efforts.

Arlen [02:48]
Okay. Awesome. Yeah. Good, good stuff. And speaking about testing, actually, we just, the previous episode that was recorded, we talked about that data driven or test driven marketing campaigns, because that’s really what it’s all about. You know, when you’re talking about marketing, you really don’t know what’s going to work until you test it. You analyze the data and then see if you need to pivot one way or the other, or just totally cancel it. So there’s a variety of things that you can do based on the results that you get. So yeah.

Amanda Sherry [03:13]
Yes.

Arlen [03:16]
Definitely good stuff. And thank you for sharing that. So I figured we’ll just go ahead and dive right in to the topic. So I wanted to see what are some of the most polarizing beliefs in marketing that you see today and how does this really impact brands strategies and just overall customer engagement.

Amanda Sherry [03:17]
Exactly.

Amanda Sherry [03:36]
Yeah, so there’s a couple, a big one that I hear constantly is email marketing is dead. It’s you know, with data compliance, there’s been a shift away from you know, you’re allowing people to opt out more and you don’t want people to opt out, you want people to remain opted in and receive your communication. But why would you want to reach out to someone that has no interest in what you do or your communication? So

Arlen [03:42]
Right.

Amanda Sherry [04:02]
I actually feel like the data compliance and the option to give people the unsubscribe more often is actually self-cleansing your list and your potential outreach. So I find it to be more effective than it previously was. Another one I think of is that in the B2B space, everything has to be 100% professional and polished. And people want to connect with other humans.

companies should be personable and people buy from people. We hear that very often, is that they’ve selected us because we were more personable, we were more down to earth, or we just had overall expertise that we were willing to share. And that comes back to if we were polished with every, 100% polished with everything that we did, it would take out that personable touch, which I think is much needed today. But SEO related.

I think there’s a lot of polarizing beliefs. I think a big one is that SCM and SEO should be siloed, where I feel they very much need to work together. I’ve learned from previous experience here, early in my career, I blindly listened to a company and a CEO partner that wanted me to silo everything. And it was a huge lift in terms of content and forms and tracking.

and it did nothing for us. So it was a huge lesson learned and now I’m working with a company that fully believes that they should be brought together and that they both benefit each other, which is also what I believe and kind of what the SEO universe is showing that why would you have things siloed? Everything should be working together, especially in such a digital age. Also, SEO related is that

Content should be written for SEO. There’s, you know, you talk to different people and it’s like, well, no, all of your content should be SEO first and then written around that. And I really think content comes down to aligning with your business goals. You should understand what your business goals are and you should create content that supports that business goal and optimize it for SEO. SEO can uncover gaps that you can create content for,

Amanda Sherry [06:27]
Ultimately, that content in every direction should be backing all of your business goals and who you want to target and how you want to grow your business.

Arlen [06:37]
Yeah, yeah, definitely for sure. Um, I’ll go back to the first one that you mentioned, which is email is dead because that’s one that every few years it comes up and I’ve had this conversation before with some of the experts that have been on the podcast that have talked about email marketing and everybody that I’ve talked about this, that whole chatter about email is dead and every time I bring it up, everyone, um, kind of tends to say, at least on our end of this thing, you know, I guess we’re

Amanda Sherry [06:44]
Hehe

Arlen [07:04]
We’re on one side of the fence where we’re on the word marketers and we see the power of it. And like you said, you see how it gives you the ability to, you know, clean your list and to, to find the right people that are in the funnel. And so, you know, we can go on and on about the powers of it. And so I think you and I and people kind of in our community see the power of it. It hasn’t gone anywhere, but on the other side of it, um, where it’s kind of polarized is where people are saying, okay.

You know, I don’t really check my email. These are consumers possibly in there. They’re saying, okay, I don’t really check my emails that much. It’s all about text messaging. The best way to reach me is via text. Um, you know, it’s much more efficient. I can quickly respond. I’m not going through all of my emails. I get a ton of junk email anyway. And so that’s the other side of it. And, you know, there’s definitely something to say about that. Um, you know, with the rise of SMS and, uh, that type of, uh, text messaging communications. Yeah, it definitely is.

efficient for some things. You can reach people immediately. You get immediate response. You can do a lot of kind of flash promotions, flash sales where, you know, these days, you know, at least within the U S I don’t know what the percentage of people that have smartphones are, but it’s, it’s up there, you know, and people that do have smartphones.

Amanda Sherry [08:21]
Mm-hmm.

Arlen [08:23]
Typically, take it with them everywhere, whether it’s in bed, whether it’s into the bathroom, you name it, wherever they’re going, they’ve got that right there with them. So it gives them immediate access. So I understand that argument, but I think with email, it’s something where you can communicate a lot more, more effectively as opposed to other forms of communications like the SMS and the standard written communication.

Amanda Sherry [08:26]
Mm hmm.

Arlen [08:52]
And so it’s, I think it’s here to stay. And so I can definitely see that argument. And I question about one of the things that you mentioned, which is the polarizing fact of the glossy corporate messaging versus the more natural speaking messaging. Cause I think it’s, I’m kind of on both sides of this because as a marketer, I understand that these days,

Amanda Sherry [09:11]
Mm-hmm.

Arlen [09:21]
all types of, you know, the big thing these days is the user generated content, being more relatable to the end customers so that, you know, you, you come off being, you know, almost like a friend. Um, but at the same time on my end, when I’m sometimes when I’m trying to look for something, I’m trying to buy something. If I see something that’s too, uh, I guess you could say too plain, too simple, too, you know, friend next door, I get a little leery sometimes. What’s your thought on that?

Amanda Sherry [09:29]
Mm-hmm.

Amanda Sherry [09:52]
I definitely think you have to find the balance with what works for you, depending upon what your company and your brand is. I think in the B2B space, being too polished, it kind of can sway people against you because you’re taking away that relatability with them. Of course,

website overall branding should be professional but when it really comes down to every brand it’s the people behind that brand at least within my b2b space. So my company is very backed by a group I mean we are a group of amazing professionals that have a ton of personality and that are honest and trustworthy once you have one conversation with them you can relate to them and for us that’s what helps differentiate ourselves from.

those within the other Microsoft channel, the Microsoft spaces, we have that relatability. We have a professionalism, but we also are very personable. So I wouldn’t take away all professionalism, but I would say that in order to be entertaining and engaging and trustworthy, you have to show a bit of who you are because people buy from people that they trust.

Arlen [11:07]
Yeah, very true, very true. So it’s really, it’s really just all about striking that right balance. You don’t want to in your case, you guys are, you know, a little bit more relatable than some of your other competitors. You can attract more people that are looking for, you know, more of a, you know, a partner that they can count on. That’s something that, you know, they can easily deal with where they’re not just talking to some huge corporate entity where you can’t reach anybody. There’s no there’s no face on the other side of that. So yeah, I think it’s

Amanda Sherry [11:13]
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Arlen [11:37]
Right. It’s just about that right balance. You don’t want to go too far over because like you said, in my case, there’s certain cases where, you know, when I’m looking for things, if you’re too far over, you may lose someone like me. That’s like, all right, kind of leery about what’s on the other end. They have a, you know, a good enough infrastructure to be able to, you know, meet my needs. And if it’s too, you know, kind of mom and pop, so to speak, then I may, you know, I may bail and look for the other companies. So yeah, it’s just about that, that right balance.

Amanda Sherry [11:41]
second.

Amanda Sherry [12:04]
hank you.

Amanda Sherry [12:07]
Especially, I’m sorry, especially with video marketing, especially with video marketing. I think that’s a big one because if you come across too scripted, too polished, then you’re kind of robotic and then everything kind of is very sharp edge where people are not that. And that goes back to, again, that entertaining factor.

Arlen [12:09]
Um, now, right.

Arlen [12:17]
Yeah.

Arlen [12:24]
Mm.

Yes, exactly. I’m seeing that more and more with these bigger brands and looking at different social media platforms like the Instagram, I’ll see these Instagram reels. I recently came across one Instagram reel. It was a fairly big company. It’s a company that makes a solid form of cologne for men where it’s like a, it’s almost like a wax that you kind of, it comes in a little tin and you wipe it on yourself instead of the spray.

Amanda Sherry [12:53]
Hmm? Mm-hmm.

Arlen [12:53]
which I guess dissipates more quickly than this type of solid cologne. But anyway, they had an Instagram reel where it was just, I don’t know who the, the person was. I don’t know if he was an influencer, but it was just like, you know, just a gentleman talking about the power of it. He wasn’t in some glossy studio or anything like that. It was just like he was in his house and he was talking about the benefits of it. They kind of flew in there, the text and I’m like, okay, that’s interesting. And then when I did a little bit of research on it, I’m like, okay, this is, you know,

fairly large company, but they decided to kind of go that route and, um, you know, rather than create like a super glossy video, just do a 32nd little, uh, Instagram reel of, uh, you know, a person that was talking about the benefits of it. It could have been, um, you know, maybe one of their customers or somebody that was kind of coming off to be one of their customers. So I, I definitely understand. And I kind of see the trends of where things are going with it. And I see the power of, of trying, of being more relatable, even if you’re a large corporate.

Amanda Sherry [13:41]
Mm-hmm.

Arlen [13:51]
Now, shifting gears a little bit into the SEO world, as we’ve seen, SEO has really just evolved over the years. It’s always changing. And so from your perspective, what would you say are the most significant changes in SEO practices? And how do marketers need to, what do marketers need to do to kind of stay adapt of these changes and then the coming changes?

Amanda Sherry [14:19]
So I would, the most impactful, well there’s a couple I should say, but a huge one is more of intent-based search results as opposed to an intent-based content that is not keyword stuffed. You know, back very early in the career, my career when you were creating content, it was this keyword had to appear on the page five times and there was this.

version of the keyword that should also appear. And it just, it didn’t read for a human. It read for bots. And really search becoming intent based and writing for people, I think is again, people buy from people. So I think that is a huge shift that I’ve loved to see over the years. Another one is the importance of video marketing because that entertainment factor and

Arlen [14:48]
Mm-hmm.

Amanda Sherry [15:11]
YouTube, that’s a huge search engine and having suggested videos in there has been great. I think more people are implementing some type of video strategy than they could maybe give themselves credit for or that they fully know. Like on-demand webinars is a really great use case. Someone might say that they’re not doing, having a video strategy, but they have webinars and that’s just longer form video content. So the importance of video marketing.

I really like as well. And then, you know, in December of 2022, Google’s update changed to include just from EAT to EEAT. And that’s experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness. And I think that adding that E with that experience has been…

Arlen [16:01]
Mm-hmm.

Amanda Sherry [16:06]
coinciding with the intent based results. So I’ve liked kind of like all of those directions and how they are pulling together and with the ship denacio.

Arlen [16:15]
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah. Interesting. Speaking of that shift that Google made and you added, um, you mentioned that they added the experience part of it to it. I just wonder if doing that is with that experience part of it is, is that going to benefit more of the larger, more established corporate brands because they have a longer track record. They’ve been in business a lot longer as opposed to

Amanda Sherry [16:26]
Mm-hmm.

Arlen [16:46]
some of the newer startups, mom and pop shops. What do you think about that?

Amanda Sherry [16:52]
I think this comes down to understanding your audience, finding where they are and meeting them where they are. So if you are a startup and you sell that, maybe piggybacking off of your example of the perfume, if you’re a startup there, where could you find your audience that would sell to that? I actually had a perfume that was like that and it was fantastic for travel. So…

How can you use TikTok or Instagram and use these hashtags that people are looking at with this algorithm, use kind of that SEO and that backing to help drive your awareness, which is going to result in sales. I don’t think that the experience is fully taking away. I think it’s just providing additional transparency. Like one of the things they recommend is attributing your content to a specific author, saying who that author is.

how that author is a subject matter expert for the piece of content that is written, providing that transparency and kind of, you know, the about us page of a company website. So I think that just helps uncover a little bit and startups I think are more willing to kind of share who they are or what drives them or what motivates them than sometimes the larger companies. So I would be willing to say that it’s probably helping them if they’re using it in the right way,

Arlen [17:53]
see.

Amanda Sherry [18:18]
I would love the data to kind of back my theory.

Arlen [18:21]
Yeah, yeah, very interesting. Yeah. I would love to see that as well. Um, now in the whole world of SEO, it’s a broad subject. As you’ve mentioned, there’s a lot kind of under SEO. You mentioned the silos of SEO and SEM and how should you, you know, put it all under one or should they be separate? So, you know, it’s kind of a lot to it. Um, so with all of this, you know, there’s always been a lot of misconceptions about SEO in the marketing world. Um, could you shed maybe some light on, uh,

on a couple of these myths or misconceptions and, you know, explain really the reality behind an effective SEO strategy.

Amanda Sherry [18:59]
So for me and the ones that I’ve heard are that organic searches don’t convert or that they aren’t qualified conversions. My data and what I’m seeing shows the opposite. So I have a custom marketing measurement report that pulls in data from several different sources and allows me to understand how long it took from someone’s first anonymous touch on our site to when they converted and hit CRM, when they became an opportunity.

our average cost per lead across all of our marketing efforts. And it’s uncovered. I knew that SEO is always working. I didn’t realize it was one of our top drivers. So for anonymous traffic and for when people convert in both instances, it is our top performing initiative. It does take time to get there. So I will just have that as a little disclaimer that sometimes people start with SEM.

because it’s gonna get results a bit quicker, but they should absolutely continue to have SEO as the driver, and then once you have ample time, it’s really gonna be the leader. And I’m seeing that on my side with my metrics. Another misconception I hear is that SEO is kind of, you know, like, you make the updates and it’s like set it and forget it, right? Like I added my metadata, I added my meta title.

Arlen [20:13]
Yeah.

Amanda Sherry [20:25]
I have my keywords on the page, I’m done forever. And that’s not true. Google is making updates on a regular basis. You really need to kind of stay up to date with them, either you yourself or working with an SEO company that helps drive those changes. We do, on our side, we do regular technical audits that uncover if a broken link happened somewhere.

Arlen [20:28]
Mm-hmm.

Amanda Sherry [20:52]
It may be a backlink, it might not even be on your site. You may be backlinking somewhere or linking somewhere and that’s broken or it may be that an image has changed or is now broken. It could be, we recently went through a huge update to shorten our meta titles and our meta descriptions because those character counts changed. So it’s not at all set it and forget it. It’s something that you have to continuously work towards.

Arlen [21:18]
Right.

Amanda Sherry [21:22]
And having an SEO partner that’s super knowledgeable is really a great way to go.

Arlen [21:28]
Yeah, yeah, I agree. I mean, it’s kind of fortunately, and unfortunately, you mentioned having an SEO partner is these days is becoming actually more and more important because of all of that’s involved and being able to make these changes and being aware of these changes. You mentioned a couple of things like the character count, those things changing. You know, there’s a lot of things that are always changing and kind of, let’s say.

Let’s say playing devil’s advocate. Let’s say I’m a smaller e-commerce company, smaller e-commerce brand. And I’m, I’m hearing what you’re saying about your success with organic search and going the SEO route and it’s being successful for you, but let’s say I’m a smaller brand and I’m like, yeah, you know, I’ve got some other, uh, friends that have brands and they were focusing on SEO and then last year there was a huge, there was a big update.

dropped all of their top keywords down to like second and third pages of the results and you know, kind of wipe them out there. You know, they’re getting, you know, a very small fraction of the sales that they used to get. And you know, this is, you know, true stories that this has happened to a lot of brands and they’re struggling to try to recover because of this. So what do you say to the fact that, you know, nobody knows when these changes are going to come, what these changes are going to be about how they’re going to affect a brand?

branches saying, you know, I’m like, forget about all that. I’ll just deal with the SEM. You know, I’ll just do the paid marketing and focus on that. Don’t even worry about it. What’s your take on that argument?

Amanda Sherry [23:06]
My take would be that they have to focus on creating a website and creating content that is for a human. Google is moving away from bots more and more about the keywords and it’s really going towards that search intent. There was actually a…

a story that I heard when I was at a marketing conference, an SEO marketing conference. And one of the speakers who owned an SEO agency was talking about a website that she was working on and how they were number one in the rankings and they had all of these backlinks and everything was great from an SEO perspective. And then Google changed their algorithm and said, we no longer care about backlinks and we care about how you read for humans.

the company completely tanked. And they had to spend all of this time, and search results, they spent all this time redoing it and rewriting things that were human-based. And as a company, yes, those SEO items should be in the back of your head, but you really wanna be people-based and you wanna have content that is written for a human to understand and digest. A bot’s not gonna be the one that’s gonna buy your product. So.

I think the more you can get into the habit of people first and personality and highlighting your expertise and your experience, it’s going to be better because all of LinkedIn’s changes are slowly chipping away and going in that direction. So if you’re already there, it’s probably going to help you with one of their results or one of their updates.

Arlen [24:45]
Yeah. That’s, that’s very true. And I’ve heard that before it’s as long as you’re, you’re content is more people oriented or educational oriented and just focused on providing that in customer or that, that person that’s searching for your company or your content, provide them with that, you know, that information that’s really going to answer your questions is backed by, um, you know,

either research or different sources or information about your product line or service line, all of that, then that’s, it seems like you can, you almost can’t go wrong going that route. You know, I know of course there’s, there’s always caveats to that and nobody knows what the future of Google is going to, where the future of Google and some of these other search engines are going as far as how they rank different companies. But you know, the way things are now, I think you’re, you’re totally right about

Amanda Sherry [25:25]
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Arlen ([25:43].301)
just going that route of it. Now, Amanda, as we get ready to wrap things up, I wanted to see if you can highlight some emerging trends in SEO and digital marketing overall that you believe is gonna shape the future of how companies market their products and services, especially with the fact that there’s always these polarizing approaches to going different directions.

Amanda Sherry [25:45]
Mm-hmm.

Amanda Sherry [26:06]
Yeah. So a couple of trends I’m seeing, search, SERP snippets are actually being pulled from the website and not always the metadata. So as much as you want to tell Google or other browsers, hey, this is what you should serve, it’s really reading your content and trying to figure out that intent of what that searcher wants to see and populating based upon that.

Arlen [26:20]
Okay.

Arlen [26:34]
I see.

Amanda Sherry [26:37]
A really great example is, think prior to 2020, when someone were to search mask, do we think that the COVID masks were to come up? And all during it, intent shifted and Google is trying to predict what someone wants from those results. So I think just having content that…

Arlen [26:51]
right?

Arlen [26:54]
Yes.

Amanda Sherry [27:03]
goes along with that E A T is going to be helpful there. And that metadata and those metatitles are really the technical back end of it all. But they’re not always going to be populated and AI, that is ever the emerging trend. AI is everywhere. And now you’re seeing that, you know, Google wants to keep people on Google’s page. You know, they’re from an e-commerce standpoint, they’re trying to sell directly.

Arlen [27:12]
Mm.

Arlen [27:17]
All right. Sure.

Amanda Sherry [27:31]
from Google. So, you know, and AI driven SERPs are almost always at the, they are always at the top of the page, but they’re almost included in every search that I’ve conducted recently. So, it’s just showing, I guess, having enough content on your site to show who you are and then understand that AI is going to be a factor in search results. But I think also that goes back to

Arlen [27:43]
Yeah.

Arlen [27:54]
Yeah.

Amanda Sherry [27:58]
knowing where your audience is and meeting them where they are and have specific targeting, whether they’re on LinkedIn or whether they’re on Instagram or whether they’re on TikTok or whatever it may be, thinking beyond just website SEO and trying to expand your touch points.

Arlen [28:03]
Mm-hmm.

Arlen [28:18]
Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah, those are some great points. And then like you said, with AI it’s, it’s everywhere and it’s just exploded over the past couple of years. Um, what do you think of, cause I mean, we see the ship shifting so quickly and what’s your take on the possibility of Google the way we know it right now, kind of fully shifting to more of the chat.

Amanda Sherry [28:25]
Mm-hmm.

Arlen [28:47]
style, which is kind of how right now we interact with these AI bots, the chat GPTs, the Bing chat, all of those components where it’s like you’re talking to a person or you’re talking to an expert and then they’re giving you a specific response, not just a set of results. Do you see Google the way we know it with just spitting back the set of results? Do you see that ever going away? And if so, do you?

Would you anticipate any type of timeframe? Do you think that would happen?

Amanda Sherry [29:19]
I don’t see it completely going away because Google still needs to make their money with ads. So, I… There is gonna be a shift and there’s gonna be an evolution and of course it’s gonna depend on what others out there are doing and how that’s gonna affect Google. And what they do and they change, but I don’t see it fully going away right now. I wonder if I’m gonna listen back to this in five years. Like, what were you thinking?

Arlen [29:24]
True.

Arlen [29:47]
Thank you.

Amanda Sherry [29:49]
I think it’s gonna be a shift, but I don’t see it fully going away because Google does have to make money and paid ads are a huge driver there.

Arlen [29:53]
Yeah. Very true. That is that’s very true. I just wonder and I’m just kind of thinking on the fly here. I could see them just because we write ads is how they monetize so much of what they do. And so I like you said, I don’t think it’s going to be going away entirely too soon. But I do think then they’re probably already working on this. How do they integrate the ad model into the whole chat?

AI types of responses. I’m sure there’s a way they could do it, where you get a response via the chat, but then maybe a portion of that is some type of ad. I don’t know, I’m sure they’re working on it and I’m sure that they’re gonna kind of intermingle that at some point, but yeah, that’s a very valid point. I don’t think they’re gonna kind of can Google ads too quickly because yeah, it’s a huge.

Amanda Sherry [30:47]
No.

Arlen [30:50]
profit line for them. So yeah, I don’t think that’s gonna happen too soon. But you never know. We’ll look back and you know, we can both be amazed, but we’ll just have to wait and see.

Amanda Sherry [30:56]
Okay.

Amanda Sherry [31:01]
Exactly.

Arlen [31:03]
Well, Amanda, this has been an awesome conversation. We definitely loved having you on. I know I’ve learned a lot and hopefully our listeners and viewers have as well. And, um, you know, before we let you go, I always like to switch gears just so our audience can get to know you a little bit better. If you don’t mind sharing one closing fun fact about yourself that you think we’d be interested to know.

Amanda Sherry [31:17]
Okay.

Amanda Sherry [31:22]
Sure, so I think it’s fun that I am ambidextrous to a certain degree. I use both hands equally well in terms of throwing a ball or batting, bowling, carrying items. But when it comes to writing in print and cursive, I’m left-hand dominant. But right-hand dominant with scissors. I can’t cut with my left hand. It’s very strange. My husband is also a lefty.

Arlen [31:29]
Okay.

Arlen [31:36]
Okay.

Arlen [31:42]
Gotcha.

Amanda Sherry [31:51]
Two June babies, both lefties, so it’s interesting. But I think that’s really helped me in my career because I get to use both the left part of the brain, that’s the analytical numbers fact-based, and then the right part, that’s kind of the creativity and emotional drivers. So it’s helped me in my career. So I think fun fact, that’s also a bit career-driven or a career-based as well.

Arlen [32:16]
Yeah, that’s awesome. Yeah, thank you for sharing that. I don’t know if, you know, I’ve talked to other people that said they’re ambidextrous with certain things. I think like with me, there’s certain things where like, if I remember one of my school days, I was, when I played baseball with bat lefty, even though I’m right-handed, so small things like that. But in your case, it seems like you can do a lot of things, both sides, and then even, like you said, analytical and emotional, and that’s that, the kind of one of the main things that I’m sure has.

Amanda Sherry [32:18]
I’m sorry.

Amanda Sherry [32:35]
Mm-hmm.

Arlen [32:45]
uh, you know, helped your career. I know I see it all the time because of my background is computer engineering. And a lot of times when I was, you know, in college, you know, you can clearly see it, your classmates, the engineering, the mathematics, the science, um, their social skills were most of the time were lacking. And so a lot of times, you know, to be able to have a mix of both is, is really kind of the best of both worlds. So that’s a, that’s good to know. That’s definitely, um, I guess you can say kind of a superpower if you will.

Amanda Sherry [33:12]
Yeah, it was super power in fourth grade when our whole class was punished and our assignment was to write the entire science chapter. So I would just start with one hand and my hand would get tired and I’d write with the other hand and it just keeps switching back. So I was the first one done.

Arlen [33:21]
Okay. Wow. Okay. Well, that’s awesome. Very interesting. Well, thank you for sharing that Amanda. We appreciate that. Lastly, before we do let you go, if our listeners and viewers want to reach out to you and pick your brain anymore about these polarizing marketing strategies or SEO or anything under that sun, what’s the best way for them to reach you?

Amanda Sherry [33:50]
I would encourage anyone to reach out on LinkedIn. It’s Amanda Sherry and my headline is the Director of Marketing at Western Computer. I’m on there all the time. When I’m not on there, I get notifications on my phone, probably like majority of us do. So yeah, so feel free to reach out. I’d love to continue the conversation and talk analytics and SEO backed. It’s my wheelhouse. I like it.

Arlen [34:14]
Okay, awesome. Well, thank you for sharing that. We’ll definitely have the link to your company’s website, of course, in the show notes and your LinkedIn handle as well, so people can contact you that way. All right, Amanda, it was definitely been a pleasure. Once again, we really appreciate having you on the eCommerce marketing podcast.

Amanda Sherry [34:27]
minutes.

Amanda Sherry [34:33]
Thank you so much.