The New Era of Search: AI, SEO, and What You Need to Know | Kevin Roy

SPEAKER_1 (0:01)

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Justin Colby (0:30)

What is up, The Entrepreneur DNA family? This guest is something special. Most people are aware of SEO and you Google search terms, right? Search engine optimization. Well, this guy is the CEO of GreenBanana and not only has he built an incredible career over the last 15 years focusing on Google and search engine, but now AI is playing a main role in how people are looking things up. So the CEO of GreenBanana, Kevin Roy is here. How are you, dude?

Kevin Roy (1:01)

Great, great. And thanks for having me, Justin.

Justin Colby (1:03)

Yeah. Now your story is not linear. So I want to say that first, you're one of the, a great human that on our first conversation, right? We just both were very transparent, very vulnerable, very open.

You've done something incredible for 15 years. And we're going to get to what is currently happening, where you're kind of the board member in your company. You've quote unquote made it, but it wasn't always the case. Let's walk us through kind of your journey of entrepreneurship here.

Kevin Roy (1:29)

So I guess it would go all the way back to, I got a job right out of graduate school at a company called Eroom Technology. And there were a spinoff of Lotus Notes. And this was like right when the internet stuff was taken off. And I remember going to Internet World. I was there like trade show guy, for lack of better words. And I was like three and a half feet away from Bill Gates. It was back in the heyday when people were spending fortunes on these spinning trade show booths.

So that was super fun. But I didn't go to graduate school to fill out trade show forms and do those things. So I was cubby mates with the web guy back in Cambridge. And he said, hey, I need something for my team.

If I could pull you onto the team and I can send you to MIT to take coding classes, would you be interested in that? Absolutely.

So that's what it is. Long story short, he ends up leaving. I take over his position. The company gets bought up by, ends up getting bought up by EMC. My boss, like the VP gets let go and my team gets let go. I'm doing text updates at a director's salary and just going to the gym. Yeah. So I knew that there was a shelf left there. So they were handing out severance packages. I took one, bought a computer. I went to three local businesses back in my hometown and said, this is like pre like people didn't have good websites. I'm like, I'll build you a website and if you like it, tell your friends, just don't tell them it was free. Then I started to go to networking groups and then we grew to like, I grew to a point where I couldn't handle the work. I brought in the business partner, which I probably shouldn't have done. But I don't know, like things all, everything happens for a reason.

Justin Colby (3:26)

That's a learning lesson there.

Kevin Roy (3:28)

That's a learning.

Justin Colby (3:29)

I really want to pause for a quick second because your story is even better. Like, we're just getting to the tip. But you did the thing that most entrepreneurs don't even recognize today, right? Like, you went door to door, if you will, right? To say, hey, I'm going to give away my best product. Like Alex Ramozzi, everyone's familiar with him now.

He talks about the same thing. Now everything's digital, everything's YouTube, everything's whatever.

You are basically saying, I invented this principle, right? Like, this is 30 years ago, everyone ever was. I was going to door to door, giving away the best thing I knew to give, so people would talk about it, which would lean into more client acquisition for free, by the way, right? You're not out there spending a lot of money on these booths that you're talking about. You are literally getting client acquisition for free. I think there's a lot of people that might have missed that part of what you just said, that I immediately went, wait a minute, that's the game. Give your best shit away for free, have a loss leader, which is your best thing. So people talk about it and drive you traffic for free.