u/GrowthbyAkanksha

I've used Powerpoint since forever, but I'm realizing that I spend way more time putting together the slides than thinking about the presentation.

I don't need pixel-level control / perfection.

I mostly want to turn ideas into structure, then turn it into a good looking ppt for daily or weekly reports.

Using gamma for quick informal doc to deck creation which works well but wanted to see what else is out there.

Has anyone actually switched away from Powerpoint for this kind of workflow?

Would love to hear what you use and what you gained/lost by switching, rather than just a list of AI tools.

working on an e-commerce SEO project where we're looking at how bigger shopping sites structure their categories and keywords, then trying to apply the same thinking to a smaller brand.

instead of just collecting hundreds of keywords, we're grouping them by actual product categories and using search volume + KD to decide which ones are worth Targeting.

it makes sense on paper. but now i'm wondering if i'm overcomplicating something that experienced SEOs already have a simpler process for.

*has anyone done this before? what results did you get, and which tool did you rely on most — Semrush, Ahrefs, GSC, or something else?*

working on an e-commerce SEO project where we're looking at how bigger shopping sites structure their categories and keywords, then trying to apply the same thinking to a smaller brand.

instead of just collecting hundreds of keywords, we're grouping them by actual product categories and using search volume + KD to decide which ones are worth Targeting.

it makes sense on paper. but now i'm wondering if i'm overcomplicating something that experienced SEOs already have a simpler process for.

has anyone done this before? what results did you get, and which tool did you rely on most — Semrush, Ahrefs, GSC, or something else?

built it, it's good, it's live, it's accurate, it updates itself, and the four people it was built for have collectively opened it eleven times since Feb.

What they do instead is ask me, in a meeting, what the number say.

so now I have a second job, which is turning a live dashboard into a Static summary once a month, and the static summary is a huge decision aid. The dashboard is decoration.

I've made the monthly summary faster - i put it together in gamma now rather than screenshotting charts into slides one at a time - so it costs me an hour instead of half a day but I've also just made it more sustainable to keep doing the things i think is principally wrong, feed the team's anti adoption.

is this everyone?

At my org. everything lives on notion - our research, notes, the argument and by the time the doc is done, the thinking is done and the structure is right there in the headings.

then a client wants a deck version and I lose an afternoon.

Things i have tried: export to pdf, which is a pdf of a doc and everyone can tell. presentation mode, which i think is built for a different job than the one i have. Pasting into gamma ,which gets me closest - it'll take the whole doc and give something back - but it treats the doc as a prompt rather than as the source of truth, so what comes out is its interpretation of my argument. usually a decent interpretation but may not match what i m trying to say.

has anyone got a route from a finished notion doc to something client- facing that isn't manual ?

Put on a series tonight to de-stress after a long week. Completely forgot how intense it actually was, there was way more chaos than I remembered. And somehow I felt calmer after than I usually do after watching something 'peaceful.'

Anyone else relate? What's your go-to 'this shouldn't be relaxing but it is' watch?"

Yep, three slides. One was a calendar with the coverage gap highlighted. one listed my deliverables in that window. The third said next steps and had two bullets , one of which was Confirm dates.

I was asking for four days off, he is fine with it, it's that every interaction now arrives pre-formatted. The team standup has a deck, someone's leaving-do had a deck with a photo montage. He sent a deck explaining why we're moving to a different deck template lol.

He uses claude or gamma or idk what ai tool, which i know because he told me, proudly, as though the speed were the point and not the entire problem.

Did I do anything wrong or is this peak corporate lol?

There's a thread on this from a year ago where someone asked whether you have to fly to the city your university is in, and nobody ever answered it. From what u can work out: the discount is around 10% off base fare plus extra baggage, it's on IndiGo, SpiceJet, Akasa and Air India, and the verification is at check-in rather that at booking. You show an orginal college ID.

What I can't find is what happens if you turn up without it. Denied boarding? Pay the difference? Or what?

There are some things people can tell your over and over, but they don't really sink in until you've experienced them yourself. It could be about work , relationship, health, money or just life.

What's one lesson you only understood after living through it ?

First proper conference talk next month, my time is 30 minutes plus 10 min Q&A. I have asked two people i trust about how many slides i should do, one said no more than 10, one slide per big idea, let the talking carry it. The other said 25 to 30, one chain of thought can carry over 2-3 slides, click through fast, keeps the audience's eye moving. Both of them speak regularly and both were completely confident. I've since watched talks in both styles, and honestly the good ones were good either way.

Before I start making my deck, should I restrict to 10-12 or go crazy with this?

SEO is dead.

That's the narrative everywhere.

But while auditing a D2C brand recently, I realized the conversation has changed.

Their Google SEO wasn't the problem. They ranked well for commercial and informational keywords, and organic traffic was healthy.

The question from the team wasn't:

"How do we rank higher on Google?"

It was:

"Why isn't our brand showing up when people ask ChatGPT, Gemini, or Perplexity for recommendations?"

That completely shifted the way I think about search.

Traditional SEO was doing its job, but the brand had done almost nothing to improve its visibility in AI-generated answers.

It feels like search has evolved:

• SEO helps people find you on search engines.

• AEO helps your content become the answer.

• GEO helps AI assistants recognize and recommend your brand.

SEO isn't dead.

The definition of "search visibility" is just getting bigger.

Has anyone else noticed clients asking more about AI visibility than Google rankings? How are you approaching AEO/GEO today?

Keep noticing more of these roles at startups lately. you basically become the founder's extra hands, ops one week, marketing the next, whatever fire needs putting out.

sounds great for learning fast, but i'm not sure what it actually converts into down the line. does it lead to chief of staff, gm roles, vp track, starting your own thing eventually? or does it just make you hard to pitch in interviews because you don't have one clear specialty.

what are the realistic next steps people actually end up taking after a year or two in this kind of role?

Anyone done this or hired someone coming out of one?

Been seeing "founder's office" roles pop up a lot more lately, mostly at startups. sounds interesting on paper, you get exposure to basically everything, ops, marketing, strategy, whatever the founder needs that week.

but i keep wondering what it actually leads to after a year or two. like is it a stepping stone to something specific, Project manager , chief of staff, gm track, your own startup eventually? or does it kind of leave you "skilled at everything, specialist in nothing" when you're trying to explain it in your next interview.

Curious if anyone here has done one of these roles or hired someone out of one. did it help you move up faster, or did you end up having to pick a lane afterward anyway?

keep running into this. client wants top 3 rankings in a month, organic preferred but "do whatever works."

problem is seo just doesn't move that fast. on-page takes time, technical depends on dev, backlinks need months either way.

so half the job is managing that gap between what they want and what's actually realistic.

if seo's not even your main role but you still handle it, what's the hardest part for you around 3-6 months in?

How do you explain timelines without clients losing patience?

***You're posting. You're consistent. The content is good. Engagement is decent.***

And yet. Nothing is converting. Nothing is growing. You start questioning everything.

This is the plateau. And it's not a sign you're failing — it's actually a sign you're close.

Here's what took me too long to understand: growth is a lagging indicator. The work you do today shows up in your numbers 3, 6, sometimes 9 months later.

You're not planting and harvesting in the same season.

Most people quit right before the compounding kicks in. They switch strategies, start over, blame the algorithm.

***The algorithm didn't fail you. You just couldn't see the delay.***

You're posting. You're consistent. The content is good. Engagement is decent.

And yet. Nothing is converting. Nothing is growing. You start questioning everything.

This is the plateau. And it's not a sign you're failing — it's actually a sign you're close.

Here's what took me too long to understand: growth is a lagging indicator. The work you do today shows up in your numbers 3, 6, sometimes 9 months later.

You're not planting and harvesting in the same season.

Most people quit right before the compounding kicks in. They switch strategies, start over, blame the algorithm.

The algorithm didn't fail you. You just couldn't see the delay.

First the appeal to reduce fuel usage.

Then avoid buying gold for a year.

Now more WFH suggestions and cutting unnecessary travel.

It’s obviously not a lockdown situation, but the overall messaging feels very “consume less, save resources, protect the economy.”

Especially the gold part feels impossible in India.

Do you think people will actually change habits because of this?

Or will everyone forget this in a week and continue normally?

Been working on ads recently and noticed everyone has a different take.

Some say creative matters most

Some say it’s all about the pain point

Some say none of it works without a strong offer

From what I’ve seen, it feels more like it depends on audience awareness:

Cold → pain point

Warm → creative

Hot → offer

Still figuring it out though.

Curious what has actually worked in campaigns you’ve run?

I keep seeing the same pattern:

People complain about low reach, low impressions, bad algorithms.

But when you actually look deeper: the traffic is there… it just doesn’t convert.

• Weak landing pages

• Confusing offers

• No clear next step

We blame distribution because it’s easier than fixing what happens after the click.

Curious how others see this.

Do you think most marketing problems are actually traffic problems or conversion problems?