Finder’s Zak Ali: Search Everywhere Optimization. How Finance SEO Wins in 2026

Welcome to Market Movers: Building Brands & Links with Linkifi! Your go-to podcast for transforming your business into an unforgettable brand where branding meets SEO and link-building. I’m Chris Panteli, Co-Founder and CEO of Linkifi, and I’m joined by my co-host and Co-Founder, Nick Biggs.

In this episode we welcome Zak Ali, US General Manager at Finder, the global financial comparison platform founded in Australia in 2011. Zak oversees marketing, PR, editorial, and growth across the US business, and breaks down what happens when a company built on SEO has to adapt to a world of zero-click search, AI answers, and shrinking SERP real estate.

We dig into why retention is becoming the real moat, how YouTube leads can be 10x more valuable than web leads, and why “SEO” is no longer a job title, it’s just one skill inside a broader “search everywhere” mindset.

 

Key Talking Points

✅ What Finder Does. Finder compares everything from credit cards to loans to insurance, pulling in providers and helping users find products they qualify for, plus educational content to support better financial decisions.
✅ The End of the “Simple” SEO Era. Traffic, clicks, and top-of-funnel growth were once the scoreboard. Now the top funnel is being eaten by AI answers and zero-click behaviour.
✅ Zero-Click Is the New Default. Users get what they need directly inside Google, ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, and other tools without clicking through.
✅ SERP Real Estate Got Crushed. Ads + AI answer + SERP features means fewer opportunities for 10 blue links, especially in competitive US finance SERPs.
✅ Bottom-of-Funnel Matters More Than Ever. When traffic is harder to earn, every visitor is worth more. Finder focuses on tighter conversion and higher lead quality.
✅ Retention Is the Moat. “Content is table stakes. Tech is table stakes.” The differentiator is keeping users, building owned audiences, and getting more value per customer over time.
✅ Search Everywhere Optimization. “Be where your customers are” now means YouTube, newsletters, social, community, and owned channels, not just Google.
✅ YouTube Reboot. Finder shifted YouTube from “support SEO content” to “win on YouTube” with consistency, thumbnails, and keyword-led topic selection.
✅ Owned Audience Insurance. Finder’s daily market newsletter is building recurring reach with strong engagement (40–50% open rates mentioned).
✅ Founder-Led vs Employee-Led Brand. It’s not only founders. Employees with real expertise can become the voice of the brand and drive trust and demand.
✅ Tools + Interactivity Increase Stickiness. Calculators, UX elements, videos, and interactive components help keep users on the page longer and improve engagement signals.
✅ Recency as an AI Citation Advantage. Finder is exploring a “Page Age” metric, aiming to keep content fresh to improve discoverability in AI systems that favour recent sources.
✅ AEO/GEO Is Still “Be Mentioned + Be Trusted”. Syndication, mentions, links, and a connected ecosystem across properties helps models understand entity authority.
✅ Affiliate Authority Can Be Repurposed. SEO authority can be sold beyond pure performance, as visibility inside AI answers becomes a new kind of branded demand.
✅ YMYL Requires Extra Caution. In finance, speed can’t replace accuracy. Trust takes years to build and seconds to lose.

 

Quotes from Zak Ali

📢 “Success is really more about optimizing the bottom of the funnel now.”
📢 “Retention is becoming the real moat.”
📢 “Content is table stakes now. And so is tech.”
📢 “If Google turns AI mode as the default tomorrow, how do we stand on our own?”
📢 “SEO is no longer a job title. We’re generalist marketers now.”

Actionable Insights

🧲 Turn Zero-Click Into a Conversion Game

• Treat each click as more valuable than ever.
• Tighten the leaky bucket: capture email, offer rewards, and build an owned ecosystem.

📺 Use YouTube for Higher-Intent Demand

• YouTube leads can be dramatically more qualified than web leads.
• Shift mindset from “video as SEO support” to “video as a channel you win.”

🔁 Build Retention Systems, Not Just Content

• Newsletters, community, and rewards programs create repeat usage.
• Don’t rely on Google alone as your only distribution source.

🧰 Make Pages “Sticky” With Tools + UX

• Add calculators, interactive elements, embedded video, and clearer structure.
• Engagement signals matter more when written content is commoditized.

🧠 Win AI Visibility With Recency + Entity Clarity

• Refresh content systematically.
• Connect your ecosystem: web → video → social → syndicated mentions so models understand who you are.

 

About Zak Ali

Zak Ali is the US General Manager at Finder, overseeing marketing, PR, and editorial in one of the most competitive search landscapes on the internet: personal finance. He’s focused on adapting affiliate-driven growth to the post-HCU era, with “search everywhere optimization” as the guiding strategy.
🌍 Finder: finder.com
🔎 Connect: Find Zak on https://www.linkedin.com/in/zak-ali44/

🚀 Build Your Brand with Real Links

At Linkifi, we help ambitious brands scale organic visibility through digital PR, brand storytelling, and SEO strategy. Book your FREE strategy session today:
🔗 https://book.linkifi.io/widget/bookings/pr-discovery-call

 

👋 Connect with your hosts:
👉 Chris Panteli on LinkedIn
👉 Nick Biggs on LinkedIn

 

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