How to Get Ideal Clients Through the LIGHTHOUSE Strategy

Anton Shulke and I go way back. We’ve spent countless hours together, our journey started years ago, collaborating on webinars for SEMrush, where we covered everything from SEO tactics to Facebook ad strategies. Those sessions were more than just online seminars; they were the beginnings of a professional camaraderie that has grown stronger with time.

Fast forward to today, and Anton’s at Duda, a platform that’s tailor-made for digital agencies. But our mission remains the same: helping agencies grow. We both see beyond just using Duda’s powerful website tools. Our goal is to teach agencies how to leverage their client successes to build a solid reputation within a specific niche.

Many agencies excel at SEO but hit a wall when it comes to lead generation. To address this, We developed a training program. It’s a strategy we believe in deeply—the LIGHTHOUSE strategy.

What is a LIGHTHOUSE

A LIGHTHOUSE is someone who is the best-known expert in a niche. Take Roger Wakefield, for example. He’s a master plumber with over half a million YouTube subscribers. Many plumbers know him and trust him which makes Roger a LIGHTHOUSE for plumbers.

Roger Wakefield's YouTube channel tab.
Dennis Yu with Roger Wakefield after spraining his ankle.

YouTube tab

If you search “Roger wakefield dennis yu” you can see all of the videos that we made together.

3 months back, I did a livestream with Roger.

On that livestream, I talked about how marketing companies scam you. Many of his subscribers have seen this because we’re showing exactly how to take control of your SEO. This isn’t a sales pitch. Think of it like I’m a doctor showing you how to scan, perform an MRI, and collect the stats.

The plumbers came in on the livestream, and I audited each of their sites live. demonstrating it only takes a few seconds to audit a site and determine what’s wrong with it.

Imagine yourself as a consultant for a service provider agency that operates the only MRI-equipped emergency room in the city.

With countless people falling ill, getting into car accidents, and sustaining injuries, your hospital becomes the only destination for their medical needs.

You don’t need to sell your services; people come to you without you having to knock on doors. That’s what SEO is all about—making them come to you.

The impact of a single live stream with Roger: after the live stream, sixty home service businesses reached out to us. From these sixty, we conducted seven audits. Of those seven, four became clients. We turned down the other three because they didn’t meet our criteria. However, we provided them with some of our free training resources so they can qualify in the future.

Think about how that changes our mindset as agency owners. Instead of pushing sales pitches like, ‘Let’s hop on a 15-minute call,’ we’re more selective like Harvard.

If I were starting over as an unknown, I would first choose a local niche because it’s easier to dominate. Then, I would identify the LIGHTHOUSE of my niche and engage with their social media posts. For instance, if I were targeting A1 Garage, run by Josh Nelson, I would interact with his posts and find ways to add value to his community, such as repurposing videos into articles for free. Next, I would build connections with people who know the LIGHTHOUSE and demonstrate that I am actively involved with these individuals.

SEO Is About Googling

You can audit me, for example, to see if I actually do the things that I say that I do.

Dennis Yu's knowledge panel

How Liana Gets Clients Through The LIGHTHOUSE Strategy

If you search “Liana ling perry marshall” You can see Perry Marshal is promoting Liana through webinars and Rev share and he is coming from a DR 69 site.

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If you click on the link you can see this “Register NOW!” page.

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You might say this is an advertising play, not an SEO play. Many people disagree with me, If you do a good job on social media and lightweight advertising, then that’s the most white hat SEO you will ever do.

Why EEAT is Important For Your SEO

In the last day or two, I was in Pakistan, where we were collecting lots of content.

pakistan

In the last 48 hours, we were at a TV station where we interviewed a lot of people. This isn’t a one-time lucky invite it’s just one of many examples. We live and breathe this every day. You can see we have collected a lot of raw content behind the scenes. I will show you how this impacts our SEO.

Why Having Your Own Content is Important!

When I’m writing articles, I use actual photos instead of stock photos. It’s important to have your own content to include in your articles because Google highly values original content. This adheres to Google’s EEAT guidelines and demonstrates to Google that you are genuinely doing what you claim to do.

Google is very clear about this, yet people often get confused about how to rank in search results. It used to be EAT: Expertise, Authority, and Trust. But AI tools like ChatGPT have complicated things, so Google added an extra “E” for Experience. What does this mean? It means you actually do what you say you do with the people you say you do it with and achieve the results you claim. How does that relate to experience, expertise, authority, and trust?

This particular photo was taken on Sunday, January 28th, two days before the webinar, using an iPhone 15 Pro Max. It was taken in Lahore, Pakistan, at the Expo Center downtown, by a 14-year-old. Although the photo doesn’t show this, it does show I’m raising my hand, demonstrating real experience. If I want to show that I’m knowledgeable about Pakistan, I can share all my real experiences there. This is much more authentic than asking ChatGPT to write an article about why Pakistan is a great opportunity, citing statistics like 15,000 babies being born daily. Real information, like my experiences, truly demonstrates expertise.

taken by a 14 year old

Dan Ulin jokingly called me an expert in buffets. Just because I’m fat doesn’t mean I’m an expert in buffets.

I could ask ChatGPT to write an article about the 10 best buffets in Las Vegas. For example, even if I’ve never been to Las Vegas before (even though I have), it might list the top buffets. However, having real experience with authoritative people in that field is much better.

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We’re having lots of buffets here all sorts of all you can eat. This is Dan Ulin eating at a buffet in LA.

Dan Ulin

If I take my experience with Dan Ulin and run it through the 4 Stage Content Factory:

I process it using Descript and ChatGPT, those raw ingredients turn into blog posts, GMBs, YouTube videos, Facebook posts, Tweets, LinkedIn posts, TikToks, Quora answers, and Instagram posts. I don’t have to produce separate content for Instagram and TikTok, I just produce once because I’m living my life and doing things with the people I work with. If I’m serving plumbers, I better be around plumbers, demonstrating that I can generate results with them, like at the industry conference or with the person who is the LIGHTHOUSE that everyone respects.

Content stages of the factory

When you are doing the thing that you say you do, you don’t have to be traveling the world. You can do Zoom calls with your clients. One of my favorite things to do is have Zoom calls with our clients, showing how we conduct audits, optimize PPC campaigns, and fix broken websites. There’s tons of proof, and this is just us going about our day. This is not some extra thing that we’re doing. We have an army of VAs processing and repurposing this content into articles, blog posts, videos, and more.

My friend Brady Sticker,

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He runs ChurchCandy, a seven-figure agency serving churches. Basically, he runs Facebook ads to get more people to come in on Sunday. He has a whole program around that. When you look at him, he is hanging with pastors—he is a pastor’s son. He is out there with churches, teaching the gospel. You can tell he actually believes in it and not just some agency kind of thing.

Before Brady became our client, almost all of his content was on Facebook, which wasn’t indexed by Google because of a login wall. However, because we are running his content through the 4 Stages of the Content Factory, he now ranks on his name and has a knowledge panel when we search “ChurchCandy.”

churchcandy panel

What is the thing you do that should make you show up in Google searches? For example, do you create podcasts for chiropractors, do SEO for pest control companies, or are you the best plumber in Denver? What is the thing you do, and who do you do it for? Do you have proof in the first box? If you do, then you are 90% of the way there.

If you have WordPress and use Yoast All in One, or any other tool, you can then use ChatGPT to process your content. Think of these AI tools as robo VAs that get the job done for you, and then that content can live in multiple places.

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Dennis Yu
Dennis Yu
Dennis Yu is a former search engine engineer who has spent a billion dollars on Google and Facebook ads for Nike, Quiznos, Ashley Furniture, Red Bull, State Farm, and other organizations that have many locations. He has achieved 25% of his goal of creating a million digital marketing jobs because of his partnership with universities, professional organizations, and agencies. Companies like GoDaddy, Fiverr, onlinejobs.ph, 7 Figure Agency, and Vendasta partner with him to create training and certifications. Dennis created the Dollar a Day Strategy for local service businesses to enhance their existing local reputation and make the phone ring. He's coaching young adult agency owners who serve plumbers, AC technicians, landscapers, roofers, electricians in conjunction with leaders in these industries. Mr. Yu believes that there should be a standard in measuring local marketing efforts, much like doctors and plumbers need to be certified and licensed. His Content Factory training and dashboards are used by thousands of practitioners.