How a Former Teacher Uses AI to Make Shopify SEO Simple and Smart

**Crystal Waddell** (0:00)
Of the future, search is more about what the customer wants versus what the company wants to say. It's like, what does the customer need? Because if you don't align that, it's called semantic alignment. And it's essentially a math problem that translates to English. And if you can't match those things, the LLMs won't even know to reference you or to help you show up.

**Brooke Gramer** (0:25)
Welcome to How I AI, the podcast featuring real people, real stories and real AI in action. I'm Brooke Gramer, your host and guide on this journey into the real world impact of artificial intelligence. For over 15 years, I've worked in creative marketing, events and business strategy, wearing all the hats. I know the struggle of trying to scale and manage all things without burning out. But here's the game changer, AI. This isn't just a podcast. How I AI is a community, a space where curious minds like you come together, share ideas, because AI isn't just a trend, it's a shift. And the sooner we embrace it, the more freedom, creativity and opportunities will unlock. Today's guest is Crystal Waddell. She's the founder of Simple and Smart SEO. Crystal didn't start out in tech. She was a teacher, a coach and a maker who built and sold physical products.
And that background matters, because she understands what most SEO experts don't. What it actually feels like to run a business, ship products, talk to customers and figure out traffic without relying on ads or guessing games. In this conversation, we get into how Crystal uses AI to turn SEO into calm, repeatable systems. We talk about custom GPTs, semantic search and why discovery today is less about ranking and more about understanding intent. She shares how AI has supported her as a solo preneur, boosted her confidence and helped her build systems that feel like having a team without burning out. If you're a founder, Shopify seller or creator who wants to get found online without chasing hacks, this episode is for you. Especially if you care about building a business that supports your life, not consumes it. All right, let's get into it. Thank you so much, Crystal, for being here. And remind me, where in the world are you joining from today?

**Crystal Waddell** (2:27)
Right outside of Fayetteville, North Carolina, it's Fort Bragg.

**Brooke Gramer** (2:31)
Well, I hope you're keeping warm. This is one of the only times I've ever worn a sweater on my podcast. It's actually chilly for Miami.

**Crystal Waddell** (2:39)
Yeah, we got this storm and we got ice and snow. And then my kid is out of school and my husband is home. And so everything just feels a little disjointed right now. But yeah, but it's fun. Snow days are fun.

**Brooke Gramer** (2:51)
Well, I'm so happy we got the opportunity to meet during PodFest in Orlando. And it was so wonderful to connect with other podcasters. I'm excited to dive in today, not only as you, as a consultant and how you're using AI, but also maybe we can swap podcast tips with AI as well, once we get into it.

**Crystal Waddell** (3:13)
Yeah, absolutely. And I was listening to the podcast that you had with the 14-year-old boy. Yeah. And I sent it to my son, and I told my husband and my son, I was like, I want you to listen to this while I'm recording the podcast. And so, you know, that's what they're doing while we're doing this.

**Brooke Gramer** (3:28)
Amazing. Well, I always like to just kind of start and open the floor. And if you could share a little bit about what it is that you do and how you find yourself at the intersection of really leveraging AI today in your work.

**Crystal Waddell** (3:43)
Wow. Well, I took a, it was kind of like a quiz based on like, what is your AI level? And it was through Seer. I don't know if you've ever heard of them, but they have a really cool tool where it says, you know, like, where do you fall with your adoption and application of AI? And so I scored pretty high. I scored like level three out of four. But one of the things that I've learned to do better now is to use multiple tools because I used to have like one tool that I felt really comfortable with, which was ChatGPT. But like as I was creating like my own custom GPTs, taking that quiz showed me that, hey, there's some opportunities if you try to recreate that tool in like Claude or Gemini or choose your LLM, you know, and then test them and see what are the different outputs. So that's kind of where I'm at right now. It's like I've created a lot of things, but now I'm recreating them in different AI tools to see how the results are better or worse.