Rob Liu @RobAthenaVC

Tracking traffic is important, but not all traffic converts. But did you know that 70% of pages don’t get traffic? It's not just about getting indexed; it's about which pages bring results. In our experience, 70% of our programmatic SEO pages don’t bring in any traffic. So,…

Link building can skyrocket your SEO rankings quickly. But only if you're doing it the right way. We've built over 800 backlinks by consistently reaching out to websites that mention us and asking for a link back. It's not rocket science, but it requires dedication and…

Outsourcing your team can save you serious cash. But don’t assume lower cost means lower quality. We hired a 14-member team in the Philippines, each earning between $600 and $1,000/month. These talented people build 10 links per month per team member, personalized for each…

Link building is the no. 1 way to rank in Google. But not all backlinks are created equal. While link building is covered extensively online, I’ve found some strategies that have really worked for ContactOut. One is finding sites that link to your competitors and asking them…

Backlinks are key to getting indexed by Google. But they aren't the only factor that matters. We often focus on backlinks, but there are several factors Google considers for indexing—user visits via Chrome, links in Gmail, and even Google Ads campaigns. While these may sound…

Getting your pages indexed by Google is the easy part. But getting millions of pages indexed? That’s where it gets tricky. When we first started at ContactOut, we submitted pages in bulk—half a million to a million at a time—to Google Search Console. While we have about 7.8…

Most people think scraping content is just about gathering data. But it's actually the foundation for creating valuable insights. It's not enough to simply scrape and repost content—you need to add value. At ContactOut, we took this a step further by analyzing data to…

Most people think content creation is time-consuming and tedious. But what if you could automate it and still add value? Here’s a strategy my friend used to build a podcast search engine by scraping podcast episodes and transcripts. He created a site that highlights the most…

Most startups fail because they build before validating. But you don’t need to spend months building something nobody wants. The trick is to start by generating data and pages programmatically. Here's how we did it at ContactOut to create millions of pages that drive…

Ranking for high-competition keywords is overrated. You don’t need to target difficult keywords to win in SEO. When you’re targeting millions of keywords, like we do at ContactOut, keyword difficulty becomes irrelevant. We’re not focusing on a few highly competitive keywords.…

Finding high-traffic keywords isn’t enough to win SEO. Most people stop at finding high-volume search terms— but there’s so much more to it. At ContactOut, we didn’t just target generic keywords like “email” or “Yahoo email.” We got specific. We started with person name + email…

SEO drives millions of visitors, but here's the twist. Most people don't know how to scale SEO into a revenue-generating machine. At Contact Out, we drive over 1 million monthly visitors through programmatic SEO, contributing eight figures to our revenue. This strategy isn't…

Finding a mentor is easier than you think. But building a long-term relationship is the real challenge. When I first spoke to Doug Hall, the first sales hire at Glassdoor, I asked specific, actionable questions. - How did he create sales collateral? - What metrics did he…

"Who do you turn to for business mentorship?" Most people overlook this question, but it’s crucial. Whenever I start a new business, I break down my plan into key areas: product, hiring, marketing, and sales. Then, I find mentors who’ve succeeded in each of those areas…

Everyone thinks mentorship is out of reach unless you pay. But you can offer value without money. One of the best ways to get a mentor’s attention? Help them promote their personal brand. Here’s an example: I emailed the head of recruiting at McKinsey and offered her a…

Everyone thinks millionaire mentors are out of reach. But they’re more accessible than you think. When I was building ContactOut, I reached out to mentors like James Clear and Santosh Sharan—people who helped grow multi-billion-dollar companies. How? Simple: I offered money,…

Most people think startups should succeed in 2-3 years. But the truth is, success takes 10 years or more. Y Combinator advises aiming for 5-7% growth per week, but that’s not always realistic. At ContactOut, we didn’t grow for months, even years, and then suddenly grew 10x.…

Most startups think big tests take months to complete. But the truth is, the best tests can be done in a week. At ContactOut, we break everything down into weekly experiments. Every Monday, the team posts their previous week's goals, what they learned, and their plans for the…

Building a startup takes time—but you don’t have to build everything at once. In fact, you shouldn’t. Start with one product line, one feature, or even white-label an existing solution. Amazon only sold books before becoming the “everything store.” Zapier began with a single…