James Richardson in a green shirt, arms crossed, smiling

James is figuring out what comes next in search.

I'm James Richardson. 20+ years in SEO, founder of Optimising, a B Corp agency in Melbourne.

Say hello

Hi, I'm James.

I've spent 20+ years helping brands win in search. The rules just changed.

I started Optimising in 2009 because the agencies I kept seeing treated SEO as a dark art. It isn't. Done well, it's a durable, compounding marketing channel built on genuinely useful work.

That hasn't changed. What has changed is that Google is no longer the only place people search. ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and AI Overviews are rewriting how discovery works and how brands get cited.

Today my focus is split three ways: running Optimising, advising larger ecommerce and purpose-driven businesses on the shift to AI-era search, and building a few tools I'd want to use myself.

I write about most of it on LinkedIn, most days.

Founder, Optimising
B Corp & 1% for the Planet
Dad & sneakers

James at his laptop in an Optimising t-shirt, looking out the window

What I'm building, and what I've built.

20+ years in search, and running Optimising since 2009.

Optimising
2009 to now
B Corp certified SEO agency helping ethical, values-led businesses grow through sustainable strategy and rigorous technical work.
SEO.com.au
Launching 2026
A new venture. More soon. Think: what a modern, AI-native SEO practice should look like from the ground up.
Digital Sport Summit
2010 to 2012
A conference exploring the collision of sport, tech and digital media. Early days, but a formative one.

Little sites I've built for the fun of it.

Weekend builds and local guides. No clients, no brief, just things I wanted to exist. All designed, built and hosted by me.

james.auFamous JamesesA directory of the world's most notable living Jameses, built mostly so I could be listed first for my own name.

The Montmorency 3094 local guide homepage

montmorency.auMontmorency (Monty) 3094A local guide to my leafy corner of Melbourne's north-east: cafes, shops, schools, parks, history and how to get around.

swan.stThe Swan Street GuideEvery restaurant, bar, pub and cafe on Swan Street, Richmond. Written by locals, with no ads and no pay-to-play.

James in a black Optimising hoodie, leaning on a chair in the office

Things I've written lately.

Chart: what a broken migration actually cost, 38% of Google visits lost and $800k spent on emergency advertising

Written by me3 Sep 2026

Maggie Beer's $9.5m loss wasn't a Google blunder, and it wasn't $9.5m

Both halves of that headline are wrong. What the numbers actually show about a Shopify replatform run into Christmas, and the one they'd already botched eight months earlier.

Lately on the Optimising blog, loaded live from its RSS feed so this list keeps itself current.

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Where I've been quoted, profiled and published.

Talks, panels and classrooms.

Shopify Plus Partner Events Series2022 to nowOrganiser and MC across Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. A recurring series for Australian Shopify merchants and partners.
AWIA Offline2024Moderator, Melbourne edition
Sydney SEO Conference2024, 2025On scaling ethical agencies in an AI-first market
Freedom Business Summit, Bali2023Building a location-independent services business
Victorian Small Business Festival2019 to 2022SEO fundamentals for founders
Swinburne UniversityOngoingGuest lecturer, digital marketing