David Wilson: Findability Everywhere, and Why Cause Partnerships Are Defensible

David Wilson, executive vice president at Zozimus, has been doing this since AltaVista. His argument is that search engine optimisation has become search everywhere optimisation: being findable wherever a decision gets made, rather than ranking for its own sake.

The part worth a nonprofit's attention is his point about defensibility. His example is a tattoo shop working with veterans' groups, where the partnership creates something a competitor cannot copy by spending more money. For a cause organisation, that is the case for corporate partnership stated in the partner's own language.

What he covers

• Findability over rankings, because only one of those places has a rank tracker pointed at it
• Turning Search Console into a gap list by comparing expected against actual click-through
• Internal linking, still one of the most reliable tactics and the least fashionable
• Digital PR and brand carrying the load as unbranded search erodes
• Your About page as the thing an AI model reads to decide whether to trust you

Why we are running it here. Nonprofits compete for attention against organisations with far bigger budgets. Findability and genuine community partnership are two of the few levers that are not purely a spending contest.

Originally aired on The Unscripted SEO Interview Podcast. Cross-posted here for the nonprofit audience.