Stop Chasing Conversions: Win More Customers with an Emotion-first CRO Strategy That Actually Works Featuring Talia Wolf

Garrett: Welcome back to The Next Chapter of Search produced by SEO Week and iPullRank. If you haven’t already gotten your tickets, you gotta come see Talia and me in New York, April 28th to May 2nd. You are going to see 35+ amazing speakers across marketing, content, SEO, AI, you name it. It’s going to be fantastic. Today, as I mentioned, I am joined by Talia Wolf. She is the founder and CEO of GetUplift. Thank you so much for joining me today. Talia, what is going on?

Talia: Thank you so much for having me. I’m so excited. I’m like, this is going to be incredible. I can’t wait for this conference.

Garrett: We’re just saying it’s like a family reunion because it’s like there’s so many people who have been in these industries so long, but everyone’s also learning on the fly. The fundamentals stay the same, but everything’s changing, which kind of brings me, let’s dive in. The whole world of SEO and search is evolving. From your perspective, especially in the context of CRO, what’s the current state of search?

Talia: Yeah, so, you know, as I said, like I’m a conversion optimization specialist. This is what I do. I think one of the most incredible things that I’m seeing right now, finally, so like 10 years ago, I got on stage at Search Love, which I think was like my first SEO conference that I ever spoke at. And I spoke about conversion optimization and emotion. And my feedback was the CRO and emotion isn’t relevant to SEO. That was my feedback. And so I’m psyched that fast forward to 2025 and people are starting to see the connection finally.

So what’s really incredible is as you think about SEO and search, if you really want to convert, you have to understand that all search intent is emotional. And I know it’s kind of hard to think that way because we think in like keywords and search terms, but really when you use tools like Also Asked, for example, you can really easily see that a single simple search for like an accounting software turns into very emotional search terms where people are trying to figure out their pains, their challenges, how are they going to solve this problem? So I really do think that one of the most important things that people can be thinking about right now is how do you understand real intent, the humans behind the screen, not the product and the solution that you’re selling. Why are people coming to you? What are they trying to achieve on an emotional level so that then you can serve them better content?

Garrett: I love that. And I mean, it really speaks to how audience research has never been more important. We always talk about this kind of overlap between the people and the search engine algorithms, but really understanding the humanity is so critical, which kind of leads right into what is the topic? Why should people come and see you speak at SEO week? What are you going to be educating us about?

Talia: Great question. So actually I’m going to be talking about the one thing that AI can’t touch right now. So in an AI obsessed world, technology changes, but people don’t. So what I’m going to be talking about during this talk is really about how your prospects are making decisions on an emotional level. I’m going to get into the psychological triggers and the most common emotions that really impact decision-making. And hopefully anyone watching will be able to immediately uncover how their customers are making decisions and then how to convert more of those people. So I’m really just going to dive into that human psychology and obviously tie it back to SEO and CRO.

Garrett: Oh my God, preach. I’m so excited for your talk ’cause that’s like one of my personal obsessions. So I will be front and center in the front row watching everything psychology, just soaking it in. But what can people do right now practically in their copy, in their marketing that you recommend to improve their visibility?

Talia: I think one of the most important things is to start thinking about intent, which is, you know, it sounds funny in search ’cause like, of course I’m thinking about search intent, but really uncovering that biggest pain, the one reason that led people to land on your website or your landing page or a blog post, what led them? What was that pivotal moment that made them search for a solution like yours and tie it to that pain? You can do that with all sorts of different ways, customer interviews, surveys to your customers or for your prospect on your website, but just trying to uncover that pain will help you tremendously in just auditing your website, looking at those pages and asking yourself, “Am I actually solving problems for people or am I just selling?” And there’s a distinct difference there between me saying, “Hey, this is the biggest pain that our prospects are feeling right now” and “Here’s me solving that on a page versus here’s my solution, please buy it.”

And that is the biggest thing I can tell you right now. Like if you are just looking for one thing, definitely try to dig into that main pain and I’ll teach you on stage exactly how to do that with the step-by-step process, but for now, I want you to start thinking about that. That’s more important than copy, design, everything.

Garrett: I love it. I mean, you’ve got so many great frameworks that you’ve really iterated and nailed over the years. So that’ll be some juicy stuff to get at this conference. And then finally, what comes next? What do you think is going to happen with search going forward? How are you thinking about it?

Talia: I don’t know. I’m not, I don’t like to do like predictions, but the one thing I will say is I think that as the world rushes to leverage AI, we’re going to be in a situation even more than today where everyone sounds the same. And you’re going to start competing with even more noise and even more competitors out there. So I think one of the most key things that people should start focusing on is that psychology and emotion part. And I think that that is where the future lies.

I think those that can remember and understand and be customer first, those are the ones that are going to win. Because obviously with AI, at least right now, what you put in is what you get out. And if you don’t want to sound like everyone else and you don’t want to be on this hamster wheel of just not knowing what to do to increase conversions, the human side is the key to everything.

Garrett: Do you think as someone who thinks about the way that humans interact with technology and with copying content, do you see us gravitating towards that more natural language sort of focus with search? Or do you think Google will continue to be like where people are so used to putting like specific keywords? Like, how do you think search behavior will change?

Talia: Well, I can even just speak to myself. I used to search on Google all the time. Now I’m in chat GPT, I’m in Perplexity. I’m just using that because it helps me brainstorm the way it’s just serving me in a much better way than Google does. And it’s not that it’s something that’s done differently. It’s just the way the content is served in a way that I can keep engaging it and keep asking questions and perfect it. So, I think ultimately, you know, it’s not about who’s using ChatGPT to write copy, who’s like using visuals. It’s about how you use it, what prompts are using, how well of an understanding do you have of your customers beyond age and geographical location and the browser that they’re using and more about those triggers. So yeah, it’s definitely changing. And I think companies that don’t adapt are going to be left behind.

Garrett: I love it. There you go. So many fascinating tidbits that you’ll be able to get from Talia’s presentation. So! If you haven’t already, get your ticket, April 28th to May 2nd in New York City for SEO Week. Thanks again. My name is Garrett and we’ll see you soon. Bye-bye.