This interview is with Aaron Winston, Content Strategy Director at Express Legal Funding.

 

Aaron Winston, Content Strategy Director, Express Legal Funding

Welcome, Aaron! Could you tell us a bit about yourself and your journey to becoming an expert in SEO and Content Creation?

My journey into SEO and content creation began in 2010, a few years before I entered the consumer finance sector, where I am now the Strategy Director of Express Legal Funding. Initially, I worked for a start-up app and video game company based in Plano, Texas. I learned a lot and became proficient in multiple programming languages, where I was first introduced to structured data concepts. My time there taught me a lot about the importance of being a self-starter and becoming an expert in any discipline or area of focus I seek to work in. Flash forward to 2018, the past CEO of that company brought me on to help create an online community platform. After just a few months on the project, I realized that my skill and understanding of SEO and working in Bootstrap quickly eclipsed his. Knowing the project was a lost cause, and I was being asked to be the workhorse for the project and bring on outside financing but would receive no equity, I decided to take my newly discovered knack for SEO and work for myself. That is when I pivoted my focus to helping Express Legal Funding grow through organic SEO, a low-cost yet effective brand-building strategy. Recognizing that having a robust online presence was crucial for any business to succeed, I was determined to understand and implement the mechanics behind it to the highest degree. I dove deep into SEO, learning everything I could about how search engines work and what drives organic traffic. It wasn’t long before I saw how crucial content is to SEO, so I began focusing on creating valuable, well-structured content that meets users’ needs while also being optimized for search. I created a brand voice and tone, which I still use today. Since then, I’ve honed my skills by running multiple SEO campaigns and crafting content strategies that help businesses—especially in legal funding—reach their target audiences more effectively. I am proud of the success we’ve seen through these techniques. We continue to boost our presence at Express Legal Funding and help our clients find the financial support they need during litigation. Presently, I primarily focus on content marketing on our company blog, including YouTube, where I create videos on topics like SEO for personal injury lawyers. My experience has shown me that success in this space requires balancing technical SEO knowledge with a deep understanding of what audiences are searching for and how to present it in the most engaging way possible.

 

 

What were some of the key milestones or turning points in your career that led you to specialize in this field?

A key milestone for me on the path to becoming an SEO and content creation expert was in 2018, when the former CEO of the start-up brought me on to help create an online community platform known as “Lace Nexus.” After a few months of working on that, I realized that my skills in SEO and working within frameworks like Bootstrap were far beyond what was expected for the project. I was the expert and primary developer on the two-person team. I made the easy decision to walk away from the project when the writing was on the wall: my efforts were being undervalued, and I believed the project had no future for long-term success or growth. That’s when I turned my focus toward SEO full-time and applied it to help Express Legal Funding grow organically. The shift to organic SEO for the pre-settlement funding company was a game-changer for Express Legal Funding and me. It allowed me to effectively build Express Legal Funding’s brand without relying on expensive advertising and become the nationally recognized and trusted company and brand it is today.

 

You mentioned reading Google Search Quality Evaluator guidelines has been critical to your SEO success. Can you share an instance where these guidelines helped you understand a ranking factor and avoid a potential SEO mistake?

Yes, reading the Google Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines has been instrumental to my SEO success. One instance that really stands out to me is when I first started diving into the concept of E-E-A-T: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. The guidelines made it clear that these elements are crucial for ranking well, especially in industries like legal funding, where people’s finances and the well-being of their claims are on the line. While I was focused on content creation, I hadn’t fully grasped how important it was to establish not just quality content but also to accompany it with trust signals around the brand and the authors who created the content, whether it be a new blog post or a video resource guide. So, I took immediate steps to add detailed author bios, including my own, showing our expertise in the legal funding space. While Google says E-E-A-T is not a direct ranking factor, I am confident these trust signals and authority-building methods directly contributed to our improved rankings and user engagement on our site. Without having access to these critical guidelines, I know I would have missed out on implementing many of these trust factors and adding value to our site experience and the quality of the bigger SEO picture we strive to improve day in and day out.

 

In your experience, how has the role of technical SEO, like prioritizing content load order, evolved alongside content creation strategies?

In my experience, the role of technical SEO has evolved significantly, and one of the biggest game-changers has been the focus on speeding up load times to improve key metrics like Largest Contentful Paint (LCP). This has become especially critical for getting featured snippets for my site’s content on Google. One technique I’ve leaned heavily into to accomplish this is lazy loading, which has done a great job of helping me prioritize what page elements to load first and what ones to defer.

 

Slower load times caused by the browser attempting to serve all of the images on a web page as soon as possible were negatively impacting our LCP score, a critical component of Google’s Core Web Vitals system. To solve this, I implemented Lazy Load, which allowed us to defer the loading of non-critical elements, like images and videos, until users actually scrolled down to them.

 

By prioritizing what’s called the “above the fold” content using Lazy Load, we sped up our LCP times, making it easier for Google to see that our pages delivered a fast, relevant experience. This not only improved rankings but also increased our chances of landing featured snippets, as we were delivering high-value information quickly and efficiently.

 

While great content is the backbone of SEO, combining it with technical strategies like Lazy Load to improve load times has really been a win for us at Express Legal Funding. It ensures our content is not only useful but also delivered in a way that meets Google’s Core Web Vitals standards for optimal user experience, helping us rank higher and capture those valuable featured snippets.

 

You’ve highlighted the impact of multimedia on SEO. What advice would you give to content creators who are just starting to incorporate images and videos into their work?

For content creators just starting to use images and videos, my main advice is to focus on enhancing user experience. I would tell them to make sure their multimedia is original and adds real value to the written content already on the page. Following technical SEO best practices should not be viewed as optional or something to eventually strive for. Content creators need to keep file sizes small to avoid slowing down their web pages and utilize tools like Lazy Load, available in WP-Rocket, to ensure key content loads quickly. Similarly, forgetting to add relevant descriptive alt text to images and using keyword-rich file names are lost opportunities for improving SEO. When it comes to videos, content creators should consider hosting them on platforms like YouTube, which make it easy to add transcripts or captions for accessibility and search engine indexing. If you do this right, multimedia will boost both engagement and search engine rankings.

 

You mentioned using templates to streamline your content creation process. How do you balance using templates for efficiency while ensuring each piece of content remains original and engaging for your audience?

Good point. I do use templates, but primarily for infographics created in Canva. They’re designed to make the process more efficient without sacrificing originality. The key factor to realize is that each template is flexible and allows me to easily swap in unique images and data that are relevant to the specific topic or audience. This way, while the structure might stay consistent, the content is always fresh and tailored to the subject at hand. It’s a great way to maintain efficiency, engagement, and brand consistency, while the visuals within the images remain highly relevant and unique to the topic.

 

Discovering unauthorized use of your copyrighted work can be disheartening.  Besides using tools like SEMRush, what proactive steps can content creators take to protect their intellectual property from the outset?

Besides using tools like SEMRush to help monitor for misuse of copyrights, one of the most proactive steps you can take is registering your original work with the U.S. Copyright Office. This is the number one thing you can do to protect your intellectual property, as it gives you legal standing to enforce your rights and pursue damages if necessary. Additionally, you should include clear copyright notices on your website pages. Another worthwhile method is setting up Google Alerts for your content, which can notify you when your work is being mentioned or duplicated online. Being proactive from the start helps deter unauthorized use and strengthens your case if you need to take legal action.

 

As someone who stays ahead of the curve in SEO, what are your thoughts on the evolving relationship between AI-generated content and search engine rankings?

AI-generated content is definitely changing the landscape of SEO, and I think it’s both an opportunity and a dangerous challenge. It’s still the tip of an iceberg-type situation with many pitfalls yet to be fully realized. Search engines like Google are getting better at recognizing valuable and engaging content for users versus content that feels mass-produced or lacks depth, issues AI-created content has yet to overcome. That said, I predict that in a few years, most of the new blog and article content posted on the Internet will be created primarily using generative AI tools. When the average quality of AI-generated written content surpasses the average produced by a human SEO content writer, the SEO job market will shrink, and the industry’s value will grow significantly, ushering in a time of huge growth and widespread unemployment.

 

Looking towards the future, what emerging trends in SEO and content creation are you most excited about, and how do you see them shaping the industry?

Looking ahead, I’m really excited about how important visual search and image recognition tools like Google will become as they get more advanced. I see it opening up a whole new avenue for reaching younger audiences, especially in e-commerce and industries that rely on strong visuals. It may take a little while to catch on, but I believe consumers will rely on reverse-searching images to perform searches for products instead of searching for generic product types.

 

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and expertise. Is there anything else you’d like to add?

I’d just like to take a final moment to emphasize that staying ahead in SEO and content creation is all about adapting to the evolving landscape while staying focused on delivering real value to users. Whether it’s optimizing for image search, improving Core Web Vitals, or leveraging ethical AI practices, the key is always ensuring that your content truly benefits the target audience.

 

At Express Legal Funding, we have and continue to apply these principles to create content that helps and alleviates the pain points of our main target audience, which primarily consists of people who seek to apply for pre-settlement funding as financial relief during lengthy legal battles. Our focus on creating helpful, optimized content does more than just educate people about legal funding and law firm topics. It helps us rank higher in search results and reach those who need our financial services the most.

 

For any content creator or business, I’d say the same is applicable to them. They should keep the user at the center of everything and make sure the content they offer is both informative and engaging. That is what helped us grow, and it’s what will help anyone looking to build a strong online presence.