The RAW Spotlight: Co-founder’s Dialogue

PodCast | Mar 10, 2025

Co-Founder's Talk with Emily Au & Victor Huynh from Ready Artwork, a web design marketing agency in Monrovia, California

Victor Huynh is the CEO and Head of Digital Strategy at Ready Artwork, a digital marketing agency dedicated to B2B services. Born in San Diego, California, to an immigrant family, Victor embodies the entrepreneurial spirit instilled in him from a young age. He holds a background in graphic design, which propelled him into a marketing manager role early in his career and ultimately led to the creation of Ready Artwork over two decades ago. Throughout his professional journey, Victor has proven to be a versatile leader, serving as the Monrovia Chamber of Commerce President during the pandemic and advocating for local businesses.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

[4:30] Victor Huynh talks about how digital marketing evolved from simple websites to strategic tools
[9:27] Why UX and data-driven decisions now matter more than ever
[15:57] Why businesses must treat websites as ongoing investments, not one-time projects
[22:22] How SEO is changing with AI and what businesses must do to stay visible
[31:13] The rise of AI and automation in web development
[35:30] Learning from top experts to stay ahead of digital trends
[38:32] The best mindset and tools to thrive in a fast-changing digital world

In this episode…

The digital landscape is evolving faster than ever. What started as simple websites has transformed into sophisticated digital marketing strategies that businesses can’t afford to ignore. But how did we get here, and what does it take to stay ahead in today’s competitive online space?

According to Victor Huynh, a digital strategist and co-founder with years of experience in website marketing, businesses must shift from seeing websites as static assets to treating them as evolving tools for growth. He highlights how the user experience, SEO, and AI-driven strategies are now crucial in web design. The industry has moved past basic website creation — success today depends on strategy, adaptability, and data-driven decisions. With rapid advancements in AI and automation, companies that fail to integrate these changes risk falling behind.

In this episode of the RAW Spotlight, Emily Au and Victor Huynh, CEO and Head of Digital Strategy at Ready Artwork, discuss the evolution of digital marketing and what businesses must do to stay ahead. They talk about how AI is reshaping web design, why SEO strategies must adapt to Google’s AI-driven changes, and the shift from traditional website builds to ongoing digital optimization. Victor also shares insights on the upcoming Vietnam SEO Conference and what trends define the future of digital marketing.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Quotable Moments

“The technical part of web design is easier now, but the strategy has become a lot more sophisticated.”
“Websites used to be a ‘set and forget’ thing. Now, they need constant updates like a storefront.”
“SEO is going through a big revolution with AI, and businesses need to adapt fast to stay visible.”
“Google favors mobile-first design, yet many businesses still think of desktop as their primary experience.”
“AI is changing everything. We need to embrace it, learn it, and figure out how to leverage it.”

Action Steps

Continuously update and optimize your website: Treat your website like a storefront. Regular updates ensure it remains competitive, functional, and aligned with business goals.
Adopt a mobile-first approach: Google favors mobile-friendly websites, and most users browse on their phones. Prioritizing mobile design improves the user experience and rankings.
Leverage AI for content and SEO strategies: AI is reshaping digital marketing. Using it for research, automation, and optimization helps businesses stay ahead of the curve.
Monitor and adapt to SEO changes: Google’s AI-driven search is evolving. Staying informed on ranking factors ensures your business remains visible and competitive.
Invest in first-party data collection: With increasing privacy regulations, relying on owned data like email lists protects your marketing efforts from external policy shifts.

Sponsor for this episode…

This episode is brought to you by Ready Artwork, where we deliver uniquely tailored B2B digital marketing services to facilitate the long-term growth of your business.

At Ready Artwork, we combine data-driven insights with innovative design to help your business thrive in the digital age. From SEO and digital advertising to web development and email marketing, we have experts who help companies uncover growth in unexplored and extraordinary ways.

To learn more, visit readyartwork.com or get a free proposal. Let Ready Artwork discover your full potential.

Video Transcript:

Emily Au – 00:16
Welcome to the RAW Spotlight, where we dive deep into the world of leadership, entrepreneurship, and digital marketing.
I’m your host, Emily Au, co-founder of Ready Artwork.
I am thrilled to kick off this new series of conversations with my business partner and fellow co-founder, Victor Huynh.
In this series, Victor and I will be having open and candid discussions about the evolution of digital marketing, the biggest lessons we’ve learned in building and scaling a business, and the strategies that are shaping the future brands in today’s digital-first world.
Today’s episode is all about change and growth.
We’ll be diving into how website marketing services have evolved over the last 10-15 years, the impact of custom website design and brand success, the role of SEO, automation, and AI in web design, what businesses need to do to stay competitive in this digital marketing space.
But that’s not all.

Emily Au – 01:12
We have an exciting special feature coming up.
Victor and I are heading to Vietnam for our SEO conference.
It is one of the biggest international conferences in the industry.
Over the next couple of episodes, we hope to bring you daily recaps from the event, sharing latest SEO trends, expert strategies, and actionable insights that can help your business boost your online presence.
So whether you’re a business owner, marketing professional, or just someone looking to grow and innovate, this episode and the series might just be for you.
Before we start, I have a sponsor message.
This episode is brought to you by Ready Artwork, where we deliver uniquely tailored digital marketing services to facilitate long-term growth for your business.

Emily Au – 01:59
At Ready Artwork, we combine data-driven insights with innovative design to help your organization succeed in the digital age.
Our team of experts specializes in custom website design and marketing.
We’re here to help you amplify your traditional marketing in innovative and unexpected strategies and ways.
To learn more, visit ReadyArtwork.com.
Let Ready Artwork discover your organization’s full potential.
Today, I’m joined by someone who has played an integral part of ready artwork from the very beginning, my business partner and fellow co-founder Victor Huynh.
Victor is a visionary, entrepreneur, strategist, and digital marketing expert with years of experience helping businesses scale through innovative website marketing services, branding, and technology.

Emily Au – 02:49
As the co-founder of Ready At Work, a leading website design company in Los Angeles, he has played a crucial role in transforming our agency from a small garage startup into a full-service digital powerhouse, specializing in custom Shopify and custom WordPress websites, and online growth strategies
for B2B businesses, niche markets, and major brands.
Victor’s expertise has helped our clients navigate the ever-changing digital landscape and achieve real measurable results.
Beyond marketing, Victor is passionate about mentorship, leadership, and helping businesses refine their digital strategies.
His ability to merge creativity and data-driven insights has been a game changer for ready artwork and the clients we serve.
Today, we’ll be diving into our journey as co-founders, the evolution of digital marketing, and the biggest lessons we’ve learned about building and scaling a business in today’s competitive digital space.
Let’s dive in.

Emily Au – 03:50
Victor, welcome to the show.

Victor Huynh – 03:53
Thanks for having me, Emily.
I know the roles are a little bit different today, or at least not for you, but for me, I’m usually the one interviewing clients.
So thanks for having me.
I look forward to today’s conversation.

Emily Au – 04:06
Yeah, and I am excited to share our experiences with listeners.
OK, so let’s dive in.
Evolution of digital marketing.
When we started ReadyAtWork as a web design company, digital marketing looked very different.
How would you describe the industry back then?

Victor Huynh – 04:30
How would I describe the industry back then?
I think it was a lot younger 10 to 15 years ago as we were.
Things were not as sophisticated as we are today.
The term digital marketing wasn’t even a thing yet, like 15 years ago, right?
People were just looking for tactics, looking for, I need a website because everyone has it.
It’s kind of like AI today, right?
No one knows exactly how it’s going to be used five, 10 years from now, or even two, three years from now.

Victor Huynh – 05:09
But everyone wants it.
So this whole industry is very trend driven.
And by the time the word digital marketing came around and became more established, I think a lot of businesses, their competitors were already kind of far ahead.
So we were kind of figuring out as it was evolving, right?
Because if you think about it, 10 years before that was when the internet started, 10, 15 years before that.

Emily Au – 05:46
10, 15 years before the 10, 15 years?

Victor Huynh – 05:48
Yeah.
Okay.

Emily Au – 05:49
I see.

Victor Huynh – 05:50
So the internet just was born.
People were figuring how to use it.
And then fast forward 10 years later, you know, like SEO was becoming a thing.
People were starting to, you know, I remember a lot of the conversations was, what is SEO?
So we always had to clarify every time we mentioned SEO, it’s search engine optimization.
It’s how search engines find you.
Today, if you speak to most business owners, they already know what SEO is.

Victor Huynh – 06:20
At least you don’t have to explain the acronym.
They don’t fully, I guess, understand all the stuff that goes into it, but at least the idea of SEO is not foreign to them.
So 10, 15 years ago, we were doing a lot of education on what SEO is.
And you know, I think there’s another term in the industry, SEM.
So some people that haven’t been exposed to it know what it is, but some people don’t, you know, search engine marketing.
So it’s, you know, jargon, industry jargon for like PPC or any paid media.
Right.

Victor Huynh – 06:55
So I would say.
It was less mainstream back then.
Now it’s almost like, you know, companies have to kind of think about digital marketing and kind of line item it just like they were doing their traditional print media or traditional advertising or it, you know, you knew that you had to be on the phone book back then today.
That doesn’t exist anymore.

Emily Au – 07:24
Yeah.
And I also feel like maybe, you know, 15 plus years ago, businesses probably didn’t think of their website as a integrated part to their business.
It felt like it’s a separate thing that lives outside of the business.
And because everyone’s trying to jump into having a website, they kind of need, okay, I just have to have a website.
But nowadays that looks A little bit different.
You know, how do we integrate it into the whole funnel, the sales funnel, right, the marketing funnel?
And you know, how do you attract?

Emily Au – 08:00
And it’s really using a website to assist your in-person or in-person digital outreach and whatnot.
So I think to me that mindset has shifted.
And I think a lot of our clients are slowly understanding that a little bit more.

Victor Huynh – 08:20
Well, not only just 10, 15 years ago, I think pre-COVID, post-COVID, that whole dynamic changed in how we, our relationship with digital, our relationship with our websites, you know, with remote work and, you know, unfortunately for, you know, people doing in-person, what we saw was Other trade
shows and live events shut down.
So there was a mass adoption, right?
People were slowly adopting it, but I think it got really sped up by COVID.

Emily Au – 08:54
Right, exponentially, right?

Victor Huynh – 08:56
Mass adoption of digital as everything got shut down, in-person events got shut down.
We saw that big transformation just within those few years.
Yeah.

Emily Au – 09:10
So you kind of touched on some of the changes, you know, the last decade or so, but Is there one that is massive or the biggest change to you in web design and website digital marketing?

Victor Huynh – 09:24
Changes.
If it’s one change, I would say things have gotten easier to produce, but The strategy has gotten a lot more sophisticated.
So back then, just creating HTML websites was a big feat on its own and you had to find talent to code and everything like that.
As a technology leapfrog forward, Anyone can now talk to AI and say, hey, build me a web page, right?
So the technical part of it has come down quite a bit.
So the barrier to entry is a lot easier, but because there’s so much people adopting it now, it’s become a lot more competitive, right?
If you’re talking about the industry as a whole and in website design, So the technical part is no longer what you can claim to be your differentiator.

Victor Huynh – 10:35
It’s almost become commoditized, right?
So you have to really stay ahead of the curve and really understand user experience, right?
And then not only that, it was just generic user experience.
I mean, AI can do a fairly decent job at that, but you have to be able to understand Each individual business’s goals and strategies and their customers and how to merge that and have that deeper conversation.
I would say previously the conversations were very shallow and it was really based on Productizing, like I need a website, I need this many pages, I need a blog, I need a forum, I need an image gallery, and then you would be able to say, okay, this is going to take me this much time to put together,
right?
Versus today, it’s more like those things are given.

Victor Huynh – 11:35
It’s expected that you’re going to be able to do those things.
The difference is now like, why?
Why do I need a blog and how does it integrate with my strategy?
Whether it’s SEO, whether it’s paid media, whether it’s email marketing, how do I gather customers like leads?
But no one’s going to really just give you their information right off the bat, right?
So how do I nurture through the funnel?
So I think that’s the piece that’s really shifted.

Victor Huynh – 12:11
Those conversations didn’t happen 10-15 years ago.
They were really focused on just getting the product up, getting the website up.
Nowadays it’s more like people want to know, at least our clients, they want to know why do I need these things and how can you help me kind of connect those dots, right?
So I would say that’s the biggest difference.

Emily Au – 12:33
Right.
And maybe to add, I think on the back end of things too, right, as a website operator or as a marketing agency like us now, we have better tools to have better insight to measure and collect that data.
15 years ago, heat map tools are not as sophisticated as what we have today.
So we have a lot more clarity into what users are technically doing on the site.
As marketers, we can make better recommendations on, hey, users are doing this and This information should in theory help businesses understand and make better decisions on what they need to do next.

Victor Huynh – 13:23
Yeah, but there’s also the flip side to that challenge is that privacy laws are getting tighter and tighter every year.
So there was a time when you can literally legally Monitor every keystroke of what your customers are doing, your end users are doing.
Not too different from what a hacker would be looking at.
And obviously that’s very alarming.
Consumer protection and all these other things.
So how do you do it properly?
A list of keywords relevant

Victor Huynh – 14:14
Design to protect the consumer and we have to understand those things to help navigate and then gather the data properly to then go to our clients and go look this is what your customers are telling you right so that tells a full story um to then make those ongoing um decisions you know
this triggered another thing i just remembered is You know, the traditional model 10 years ago, and some people are still stuck in it, is I would build a website, I would hire someone to build a website, whether it’s a freelancer or an agency, right?
And I would spend a couple of months or even up to a year fine tuning this, getting it up and running.
And then I would just let it slowly die.

Emily Au – 15:02
Yeah, set and forget it.

Victor Huynh – 15:04
Set and forget it.
And if I was more active of a business, I would post some updates, I would post some blogs, and I would let it slowly deteriorate over time.
And then, oh, three years, five years later, all my sites looking a little dated.
Let me go out, either I go back to my original person, you know, and if they’re not available, or if I didn’t like enjoy working with them, I would go and shop around.
And then I would then spend another chunk of money.
And I would do it all over again, right?
And we’re talking, this is common in the small to medium sized business, right?

Emily Au – 15:39
Right.

Victor Huynh – 15:39
If you look at the big, you know, giant Fortune 500 companies, they obviously have a lot of resources.
So they have a team that constantly upgrades their website, right?
Looks at the data, makes small tweaks over time to improve that.

Emily Au – 15:56
Right.
It could be a section at a time or a page at a time.

Victor Huynh – 16:00
Correct, correct.
And they’re looking at trends, they’re looking at data, they’re trying to understand all these things.
And this is what now is trickling down to the mid-market where companies are now hiring people like us or other agencies or even some very talented freelancers to start thinking about these kinds of things.
And really shift in how we think of a website as part of the brick and mortar part of our business.
Like we would not have a building and a front lobby without having a maintenance crew of some sort.

Emily Au – 16:38
Right.
Yeah.

Victor Huynh – 16:40
You wouldn’t just let trash pile up on the front lobby.
So the website has become part of that.
And that’s how you really have to think of it now.
That’s the big shift.
Yeah, I just kind of want to share that.

Emily Au – 16:52
No, that’s a good point.
Yeah.
It used to be, you know, like I mentioned in the very beginning, like it’s silo to the business.
It just sits outside of the organization.
But, you know, versus today, it’s more integrated or people are realizing that it needs to be more integrated to their day to day business.
So we spoke about shifts, but how about How has the shift towards mobile-first or user experience UXed influenced custom website design trends?

Victor Huynh – 17:23
Yeah, we had a lot of pushback when we were designing back then to try to get the customers to think mobile-first, right?
And that’s because their own personal behaviors It doesn’t make sense to me
Land, I want to see a website.
I’m used to Yahoo, I’m used to Lycos.
So they were trained to think about everything in a very busy desktop way.
And when you think mobile first, you really have to think about that user experience in a very small real estate.
And back then phones were smaller as well.

Victor Huynh – 18:14
So, clients wanted more.
They felt like, I’m not getting my money’s worth, I’m not cramming everything into this website.
So, we struggled.
We were maybe a little too early at the time, but we saw the trend.
Mobile was gaining traction and we tried to push this out and had to backtrack a few times because clients just were not having it.
They were just used to seeing desktop first.
Right.

Victor Huynh – 18:43
Maybe you can share.
I think you have some stories about that.

Emily Au – 18:46
Yeah, I mean, especially when, you know, as a B2B service, right, we’re emailing or displaying our work and as we’re talking about the design, we’re viewing it on a desktop or a laptop, right?
So they’re like, well, okay, what about the regular website?
Right, they don’t see it as one, the same website, they see the desktop as quote unquote the website and the mobile is just, should be a second, you know, thought.
But then it’s, you know, the shift has been, or a lot of our clients, when we look at their GA4 data, 80 plus, 90 plus percent of the traffic is coming from mobile.
It doesn’t make sense for you to only focus on your desktop.
If anything, it should be flipped the other way around where we need to look at the mobile experience first because that’s where your audience is converting from.
If we’re not looking in how that’s laid out, how people are interacting on a smaller viewpoint, you’re really missing out on optimizing that Mobile First

Victor Huynh – 20:09
Yeah, and I mean, we deal with a lot of B2B, very traditional like manufacturing and, you know, brand owners.
A very common thing I hear is like, my customers are on desktop, and on Microsoft, they’re using Outlook, they’re not going to pull up their phone and pull up our website.
That’s just not a use case.
And You know, and there’s some truth to that, that when we look at their data on GA4, that their customer base is really, or where the people that are converting are on desktop.
But the other flip side is that Google is going to favor people that are mobile-friendly, right?
So they look at all the metrics, your desktop speed, your mobile speed, and the people that come to your mobile already having a good experience.
They’re all ranking factors, right?

Victor Huynh – 21:07
They’re telling Google, hey, I like this mobile site, I’m staying on there longer, I’m interacting more, right?
So even if your business is primarily and your customers are primarily on desktop, right?
You still need to be mobile first.
That doesn’t mean being mobile first has a horrible desktop experience.
So a good UI UX designer will be able to balance the two and deliver something that is a great experience for both mobile and desktop.
And that’s what’s important, right?
That’s where we spend a lot of time convincing and educating The more traditional industries where they have to end, they’re coming around, right?

Victor Huynh – 21:47
It was really, really hard at the beginning where they didn’t see any benefit whatsoever.
And there were times back then where everyone had to do custom coding to remove things on desktop versus mobile.
I mean, it can be done from a technical standpoint, but is it a good practice?
And the answer is no, right?

Emily Au – 22:07
Okay, so we touched a little bit on SEO.
So what role does SEO play in today’s web design strategies, you know, especially maybe for businesses in a competitive market in like, let’s just say, you know, Los Angeles?

Victor Huynh – 22:22
Yeah, so SEO is going through a big revolution right now.
And as soon as I bring this up, those of you that weren’t aware of it will probably go, aha, right?
So the last time you checked Google for something, there was an AI response.
Most likely you’ve come across that, giving you an answer to whatever you typed in on the Google search bar.
And we all kind of knew that for a while now like you know people go to google to ask questions we call that queries so when you type in a query what you’re looking for as a user is an answer and the better the answer the better quality of the search result The better Google’s score is going to
be, or whichever search engine, right?
The reason why Google wins that preference is because they’re good at what they do.

Victor Huynh – 23:13
They give you what you’re looking for.
So it only makes sense for them to lean into AI as AI is starting to grab all these things.
So the short answer is I don’t know exactly what SEO is going to look like in the next couple of months, couple of years.
But what I can say is that we’ve been kind of on top of that because that’s what we live and breathe every day.
We’re currently winning.
Being part of the aggregate of when the AI goes and tries to find the right answer so you can find some of our clients list under you know if you see if you watch if you look at the AI answer and you go view all and it opens up and on the bottom on the side it says these answers were aggregated from
these top three websites we’re trying to win those currently as the position zero But then the traditional stuff is still very valuable, like your local search, your Google Maps search, your search on YouTube, those are all part of the SEO ecosystem, right?

Victor Huynh – 24:23
So we have to understand The search, the user’s intent, right, wherever they are in terms of searching.
So not just looking at the Google search bar as SEO, but where else are they looking and what’s relevant to you?
Is it Yelp?
Is it YouTube?
Is it even social media?
You know, TikTok shows up on Google search results on their videos.
So video search is big, right?

Victor Huynh – 24:54
So, I mean, the role that it plays in web design strategies, we really have to think about all these different things that I mentioned when you’re putting together a website.
How am I labeling things?
Am I strategizing my keywords based on my design?
Is this integrated well with YouTube?
Is this answering queries that are going to be favorable to AI?
So all these things need to be taken into consideration as you’re designing and building a website and then thinking about how we’re going to handle the SEO as it comes in.
It’s kind of evolving really quickly but at the same time staying on top of it and really thinking about where the search behavior is changing because it’s changing really quickly these days and then kind of pivoting as we’re moving forward.

Emily Au – 25:53
Yeah, I mean, there’s a lot more positions for you to rank and optimize in compared to years ago.
Like you mentioned, when you’re on top, you might be on the feature snippet area, right?
Position zero if you’re not placing an ad.
You could also be like the knowledge panel.
Right, of the Google search results page or even, you know, some of the depending on the query, like you said, the search there could be people also ask and there could it’s a long list if you keep clicking on more.
So those are great areas where you know, you can insert into your SEO strategies.

Victor Huynh – 26:38
Yes, a lot of these SERP features are still there, right?
It’s just that AI panel It takes up a lot of real estate so it’s something we have to really think about.
A couple years back before this whole AI rush was voice search.
So you talked about the position zero, the feature snippet, right?
Couple years back it was how do we win that featured snippet that Alexa will use as a reference or Siri will use as a reference to answer a query and that’s this is what we’re seeing it’s just a next evolution version of that now it’s becoming more user centric so Google and these other search
engines like Yahoo right their goal is to provide as Good of a search result to a query as possible.
That’s how they stay in business and that’s how they’re going to be selling ads.

Victor Huynh – 27:33
And even the ad side is starting to evolve because of AI.
So staying on top of that is really important.
And you know, some people, they think, well, I’m a national or a statewide or regional, right?
Why do I care about, you know, my Google, my business, right?
GMB.
That’s going to be relevant no matter where you are and who your customer is.
So a lot of people say, I’m not a local business, why do I care about that?

Victor Huynh – 28:04
But that is a ranking factor too.
That tells your audience, that tells Google that you’re a real business and that you exist.
Staying active on those are super important, obviously a lot more important for local businesses or even B2B businesses like our clients.
It’s just as important.
It’s one component of SEO that managing your Google My Business, managing those reviews, no matter how hard they are, getting some activity going and having constant posts and activities.
It’s going to have more of a ranking factor than being active on meta, for example, right?
Right.

Victor Huynh – 28:45
That’s a different thing.

Emily Au – 28:46
Yeah, even for us as an agency, we work with clients like nationwide and at times international as well.
But it is important still for us to rank for a keyword like website design company in Los Angeles.
A lot of users will still search for something like that and we want to make sure as an agency we pop up when it’s Website Design Company Los Angeles because it’s important and we want to make sure we do rank on that local pack as well.

Victor Huynh – 29:21
Right, right, right.
I mean, if you think about it, you know, the agency, especially digital agency world, has evolved and fast tracked during COVID as well as everyone else, right?
Most of the people are surprised to find that we still have an actual office location, a studio.

Emily Au – 29:40
Right.

Victor Huynh – 29:41
Right?
You know, in my different mastermind groups with other agency buddies, most of them, I would say 80%, easily 80%, and that’s low balling, do not have an actual location anymore.

Emily Au – 29:57
They’re fully remote, right?

Victor Huynh – 29:58
It doesn’t make sense for them to maintain the building and have people come in and everything.
You know, we were a little bit more old school, but we found a happy medium in terms of having a hybrid model.
Right.
And the thing is that we work with a lot of traditional businesses as well that are kind of a bridge.
They want to move forward, but they’re also very old school.
So they’re more comfortable knowing, you know, I’ve had clients sign on and worked with us, sign the contract and start working with us without ever meeting in person.
And that’s become really common during COVID versus before COVID.

Victor Huynh – 30:35
It was like they had to come in, they got a knock on the door, they got to sit down with you, look you in the eye, shake you in the hand, right?
Before they’ll sign anything.
But they still like the idea that you have a location, that you’re close to me, you understand my needs because you’re local, right?
So that’s just how we do it.
It’s not the right way, but having that Google My Business and how it ties into SEO is really important.

Emily Au – 31:01
Yeah.
Okay, next topic.
So with the rise of AI and automation, how do you see website development and digital marketing evolving in I think we touched a little bit on that earlier.

Victor Huynh – 31:15
So the technical aspect is going to get easier, right?
I was just having a conversation with our senior dev Michael.
He does a lot of stuff for like our Adobe client and AI integration to help with writing code is now common.
On the mid-market and entry-level market, it’s also going to get easy because everyone is using AI to develop SaaS products.
That’s the biggest craze.
It’s been the biggest craze for the last decade.
So tools keep rolling out to make things easier and easier and easier.

Victor Huynh – 32:04
So as where we stand, how do we kind of Take advantage of AI, not ignore it, not shy away from it because we definitely don’t want to get left behind.
We don’t want our clients to get left behind as well.
So we’re bridging that gap between the clients that are not comfortable with AI.
And we’re integrating that and then making those connections.
So the technical build part of it is getting less important.
The strategy piece and the human connection piece is becoming much more important.
So how do I hold the hands of my clients and walk them through the process and help them understand who their target audience is and how to use these tools?

Victor Huynh – 32:57
I think that’s the big shift in terms of how to produce a good website.
It’s not so much I have to hard code everything anymore.
That part is becoming easier, but it’s more of what are new technologies?
So more of the time is spent on R&D and discovery and educating my cost, right?
It’s really focused on that versus hiring more and more people to type code from scratch.
So you have to hire higher end people with more critical thinking ability to identify how AI is going to help the clients.
So it’s not necessarily, yes, you’re saving costs on the manual part of what used to be building websites.

Victor Huynh – 33:43
But you’re shifting to a workforce that is higher experienced, higher educated, and be able to connect the dots between and leveraging AI and how to drive and deliver results for the clients.

Emily Au – 33:57
So it’s doing a little bit more efficiently than the whole industry has ever done it, but really focusing on the strategy.
That’s where the value is for our clients.

Victor Huynh – 34:11
You need to be able to navigate the quick changes that are happening in the market.
So that requires a different type of talent, a different type of brain than 10 years ago, 15 years ago, right?
The ones that don’t evolve and just kind of stick their head in the sand are gonna kind of left behind that’s exactly what happened when the website you know internet.com you know happened right there are people that just refuse to change yeah and unfortunately we’ve seen it firsthand you know these
people that stay stuck to the fax machine they are no longer around You know, and they got replaced by people that were thinking forward at the time.
So here’s another big shift from .com to AI and who’s going to embrace it and figure out how to leverage it and who’s going to be stubborn and go, you know, they’re going to convince themselves that whatever they’re doing is not broken.
So they don’t want to change it.
And it’s like a slow death by like a thousand knives, right?

Emily Au – 35:13
Yep.
So during the introduction, I did mention that both you and I are heading to the conference that’s happening in Vietnam.
What are we most excited to learn and how will it benefit our clients and listeners in your opinion?

Victor Huynh – 35:30
I’m most excited to see collectively as a industry, as a community, how different people are handling AI and AI changes.
When it comes to SEO and search, what are people doing?
Because there are a lot of smart people in the industry, a lot smarter than us, right?
And the only way we can really Help our clients is embrace one of our one of our core values is be humble, right?
I don’t know everything because how fast things are going.
How do I humble myself and be part of a community and ask those questions without, you know, coming in like I know everything, right?
That’s the only time you really learn.

Victor Huynh – 36:19
And that’s how you evolve.
And that’s where you can bring maximum value to the clients when you constantly put yourself in these type of situations.
Yeah so that’s for me that’s the that’s the thing I’m most excited to learn about is how others in our industry are leveraging AI and how they’re handling challenges and how and what are their wins yeah I’m excited to learn about tools and where we’re headed You know, and then merging,

Emily Au – 36:47
you know, both AI and automation, you know, because that can help save us as a marketing agency a lot of time as we’re executing a lot of these tactics for our clients.
But also, you know, in turn, it can save on a lot of costs to our clients as well.
We’re able to leverage a lot of that.
We’ll be able to do more with, you know, in a faster way for our clients to see results.

Victor Huynh – 37:12
Yeah.
One of the biggest things that, you know, Some clients don’t understand why I should outsource versus, you know, I should just do it myself.
SEO, I can check online.
But even if you hire someone, right, you’re not going to be able to say, hey, I’m going to send this person out halfway across the world for a week to learn the latest things that are happening.
It just doesn’t make sense financially.
But as an agency, as an expert in this field, it makes total sense for us because we can then take what we’re learning and we can sell it to all our clients.
So from a numbers perspective, it makes a lot of sense.

Victor Huynh – 37:54
And there’s no way, you know, small to mid-market companies, it makes sense for them to kind of have that investment because it will probably end up costing them more To do that and build a team and nurture a team than to just go, hey, you guys handle it and do your part in terms of your expertise
because you can send your team out there.
It doesn’t mean that they’re going to stay with you forever.

Emily Au – 38:18
Yeah, that’s true.
Okay, two last questions from me.
For listeners who wants to stay ahead in the digital marketing space, what are the key takeaways they should focus on?

Victor Huynh – 38:32
What are the key takeaways they should focus on?
They should always work under the pretense that things will change.
There’s a quote out there, change is the only constant in life.
So don’t get complacent with what you’re doing today, especially if it’s working.
How do I continue to look forward?
The other thing is that understand that AI is here.
At least short term, the first one was long term, short term is how do I learn more about this?

Victor Huynh – 39:09
The more you learn, the more you realize you don’t know, right?
That’s a starting point.
And then from there kind of branch out and understand how things are changing with the rapid change of AI.

Emily Au – 39:21
Okay, that’s a good one.
Alright, my last question and I typically ask this to my other series.
She’s got hustle to all my guests, but I’m going to ask you the same question, Victor.
What is your favorite tool or software that you find essential to your day-to-day work?

Victor Huynh – 39:41
My favorite?

Emily Au – 39:42
Yeah.

Victor Huynh – 39:44
I think this is probably a lot of people’s favorite is ChatGPT and it helps
It kind of helps move things a lot more efficiently for me, right?
If I’m stuck on a question or, you know, or if I’m trying to generate ideas, I would just go and ask chat and I think it’s becoming more and more common.
And that’s also what’s going to impact, you know, that used to be Google.
People used to go to Google for everything.
Now people are going to chat for questions and queries and That’s become a lot of people’s favorite.

Emily Au – 40:29
That’s a wrap for today’s episode.
We covered how digital marketing has evolved, why custom website design and website marketing services are essential for business growth.
And the learning doesn’t stop here.
So again, Victor and I are heading to Vietnam for an SEO conference where we’ll be bringing you recaps of latest SEO trends and insights.
So be sure to subscribe to the RAW Spotlight so you don’t miss out on our insights.
Victor, if guests are interested in connecting with you, where can they find you?

Victor Huynh – 41:02
LinkedIn.
I’m actually becoming more and more active on LinkedIn.
So Please add me, just say you watched the podcast and, you know, there are spammers on there, so just make sure you let them know that, you know, hey, you watched this whole podcast and Victor invited you to connect.

Emily Au – 41:23
Okay, great.
We’ll include a link to your LinkedIn as well.
For expert website marketing services and custom website design, visit readyoutwork.com and we’d love to help you grow.
Thanks for listening and we’ll see you in the next episode.
Thank you.

Victor Huynh – 41:38
Thank you.