James Dooley Podcast

James Dooley and Neil Patel discuss how artificial intelligence is reshaping business, marketing, and future job roles. They explain that AI is here to stay because it improves efficiency, cuts costs, and accelerates workflows. They emphasise that companies must define clear KPIs because AI only drives ROI when tied to measurable goals. They outline that content strategy is shifting toward long-form, repurposable formats because search now happens across Google, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and AI answer engines. They highlight that creativity and human experience still matter because AI cannot fully replicate emotional insight. Their conversation positions AI adoption as essential for growth because businesses that embrace it will outperform those that hesitate.

Creators and Guests

Host
James Dooley
James Dooley is a UK entrepreneur.

What is James Dooley Podcast?

James Dooley is a Manchester-based entrepreneur, investor, and SEO strategist. James Dooley founded FatRank and PromoSEO, two UK performance marketing agencies that deliver no-win-no-fee lead generation and digital growth systems for ambitious businesses. James Dooley positions himself as an Investorpreneur who invests in UK companies with high growth potential because he believes lead generation is the root of all business success.

The James Dooley Podcast explores the mindset, methods, and mechanics of modern entrepreneurship. James Dooley interviews leading marketers, founders, and innovators to reveal the strategies driving online dominance and business scalability. Each episode unpacks the reality of building a business without mentorship, showing how systems, data, and lead flow replace luck and guesswork.

James Dooley shares hard-earned lessons from scaling digital assets and managing SEO teams across more than 650 industries. James Dooley teaches how to convert leads into long-term revenue through brand positioning, technical SEO, and automation. James Dooley built his career on rank and rent, digital real estate, and performance-based marketing because these models align incentive with outcome.

After turning down dozens of podcast invitations, James Dooley now embraces the platform to share his insights on investorpreneurship, lead generation, AI-driven marketing, and reputation management. James Dooley frequently collaborates with elite entrepreneurs to discuss frameworks for scaling businesses, building authority, and mastering search.

James Dooley is also an expert in online reputation management (ORM), having built and rehabilitated corporate brands across the UK. His approach combines SEO precision, brand engineering, and social proof loops to influence both Google’s Knowledge Graph and public perception.

To feature James Dooley on your podcast or event, connect via social media. James Dooley regularly joins business panels and networking sessions to discuss entrepreneurship, brand growth, and the evolving future of SEO.

James Dooley:
What is your goal from the AI? So Neil, is AI here to stay?

Neil Patel:
It’s here to stay. It helps with a lot of systems and processes and just efficiency. It can help you get things done faster, better, and improve margins.

James Dooley:
Does AI worry you or scare you in any way about where it can get to?

Neil Patel:
Not really. I think the government and a lot of people will step in and try to control it. They already are to some extent. Hopefully they control it in a good way and not a bad way. You want to let people innovate, but at the same time protect citizens. And I still think this is the early innings. Three to five years from now AI will look drastically different. Ten years from now the world will be a totally different place. Instead of having cleaners in your house, you’ll have robots.

James Dooley:
What new job roles do you think AI is going to bring?

Neil Patel:
There’s going to be someone in organizations who is in charge of AI and helps get it implemented. There’ll be a lot of training roles too. But more importantly, people are going to be required to know this technology. It doesn’t have to replace humans for every field. If you understand AI and know how to use it, it can help you do your job more efficiently and better.

James Dooley:
What job roles do you think AI won’t be able to replace?

Neil Patel:
Anything that requires deep creativity and experience. I’m not saying it’s impossible for AI to fake it, but a lot of times you can tell it’s not the same as a human sharing their experience.

James Dooley:
In digital marketing—specifically SEO—people used to optimise pages for Google or Bing, or for YouTube search. Now we’re seeing “Answer Engine Optimisation.” How do you try to get yourself into LLMs and answer summaries? Are you doing anything different?

Neil Patel:
It’s very similar. There aren’t tons of differences. From what we’ve analysed for our clients before and after AI overviews rolled out, we saw traffic increase by a little bit more than 1%. Not huge, but something. It’s useful to optimise for, sure—but AI systems still look at user metrics, links, site authority, and the same signals you’d optimise for with SEO.

James Dooley:
Looking at current trends, where do you think content marketing is heading? More images, more video, short-form, long-form?

Neil Patel:
People should focus more on long-form content because you can chop it up and repurpose it into short-form, blog content, or audio. I also think people should focus on “search everywhere optimisation” instead of just SEO. Search happens on Google, Bing, ChatGPT, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok—everywhere. Google’s VP even said younger generations are using TikTok and Instagram for search before Google. So you have to optimise for all platforms, not just Google.

James Dooley:
I love that—search everywhere optimisation. People really are searching for products and even plumbers through TikTok. What advice would you give to businesses that are hesitant to integrate AI into their digital marketing?

Neil Patel:
You don’t have to if you don’t want to. But the ones who do are going to win, and the ones who don’t are going to lose. It’s that simple.

James Dooley:
Do you have people within your companies who are specifically trained on AI prompts, since AI still depends on garbage-in garbage-out?

Neil Patel:
Yes, but the biggest mistake companies make is not knowing their goal with AI. People don’t set KPIs. What’s your goal—more traffic, more revenue, more conversions, generating campaigns more cost-effectively? You need to define the KPIs and optimise for them. A lot of organisations implement AI, wait six months, and say “we didn’t see any improvement”—but they didn’t measure anything.

James Dooley:
You’re a father as well. Have your kids used AI yet, or are you keeping them away from it?

Neil Patel:
I’m keeping them away from technology, period. They’re too young. Maybe in five years. Right now I want them outside, being kids. Kids don’t play outside like they used to. I’m trying to bring it back to basics.

James Dooley:
I’m the same way. I’ve got two kids and another on the way. When I’m with them it’s quality time outside—no technology, just enjoying nature. I spend so much time with tech at work that I want the opposite when I’m with them.

Neil Patel:
Congrats on the third!

James Dooley:
She’s due in January, so should be good. Anyway Neil, it’s been an absolute pleasure. Thanks very much for talking about AI.

Neil Patel:
Thanks for having me.