Yannick Gaultier isn't an SEO consultant, but it's an area he loves and he's one of the most knowledgeable people in the Joomla world.

His career path reflects this passion for the field, and for Joomla of course.

As well as promoting his tools, Yannick is known for not hesitating to give SEO advice to his clients and Joomla users on forums and at Joomladays.

Let's find out what drove a man who met Mambo 20 years ago to create useful and popular extensions, and to make a living from his passion.

Hello Yannick, many Joomla users are familiar with your extensions, but we don't really know much about you. Can you give us a quick introduction?

Well, I've been around - and across - the Joomla world for quite some time now. Initially, like others at that time, I was not working in the web or event computer industry at all. I always had a keen interest in computers and programming ever since I bumped into a Commodore PET many years ago. I added a final year of industrial computers and automation after graduating as a mechanical engineer, but in fact essentially never worked as a developer for the next 20 years or so.

I live in Bordeaux, France but have been lucky to travel around a fair bit throughout the years, both in my past jobs and to attend Joomla events.

What was your first encounter with Joomla?

In fact, my first encounter was with Mambo, not Joomla. Mambo was the CMS from which Joomla 1.0 evolved. 

Like many, at this time, I had to build a website for a family member and so I set out to understand how a website was built in 2003-2004. I learned that PHP and MYSQL replaced writing HTML files, and that CMSes were all the rage.

I tried a lot of them - not sure many remember or use e107, PHP Nuke and its successors, MODX, Xoops or Spip. And then I came across Mambo and it clicked, it would allow me to do what I wanted with reasonable ease and performance. In 2005, I moved to Joomla when it was created and have been using and developing for Joomla ever since.

When did you start developing? At the same period before or later?

Nothing unusual here: I already had an interest in SEO, and there were things that Mambo/Joomla did not do well, or rather like I wanted them. So I was using an extension to try and solve some issues. That extension:

• did not not do exactly what I wanted
• was not maintained anymore by its developer

So around 2004 I jumped in, learned PHP and MYSQL as I went, and started modifying that extension for my own purpose. Soon after that, I also made a few other small plugins to display a slideshow, a menu, etc.

It's worth mentioning again that all this was only possible because... Joomla is open-source.  Without that, I'd likely still be walking around some big factory somewhere!

What led you to create your Joomla extension in particular?

Like I said, one particular extension I was using was not doing what I wanted. Namely, an (abandoned) SEF URL extension would not work on multilingual websites. And as my friend needed a multilingual website, I could not accept having to choose between SEF URLs and multilingual.

So I started adding multilingual support into this extension, and then after a few months, also started to share these changes publicly. This is what later would lead to changing my life entirely!

What challenges did you face? How did you overcome them?

There were many, mostly linked to doing several things at the same time:

• Learning and then becoming proficient in PHP, MYSQL, as well as HTML and some bits of javascript
• Having a very busy, unrelated, full-time job
• And maybe something that we still see to this day: a lack of detailed and up to date developer documentation. The truth is in the source code, yes, but sometimes a good bit of doc gets you there faster and without wasting so much energy :)

Being fully honest, things were much simpler then than they are today. Both the features, complexity and level of details that I have to deal with today are several orders of magnitude higher than at these 'good old times'. What I mean is that it was much easier then for "regular people" to get into development as technology and tooling were easier to get started with.

As for how one would overcome these challenges, that has not changed that much I think: you'd go to the Joomla forum, ask questions, answer some, research yourself and share. Admittingly, although the level of enthusiasm has not changed, the sheer size of the community during all these years certainly helped much.

Did you start earning a living quickly or was it complicated?

It was very complicated and then very quick. In June 2007, I started a website to host my extensions, provide some documentation and host a forum where users could discuss and I would reply to questions. 

I was developing half a dozen extensions but the big one was sh404SEF. After the initial start as a SEF URL manager, I quickly added many SEO features and it was part of only a very small number of extensions dealing with SEO. It was all fun and good, the most excellent hobby I could think of.

A lot of people started using it, and therefore asked questions, submitted ideas, etc. But aside from translations there was no real coding help and just a couple of years later, early 2009, I was totally burned out, spending more than 30 hours a week on sh404SEF itself. On top of my day job, this meant nights without sleep and you can only do that up to a point. Most of the fun was gone...

So during the summer of 2009, I quit, announcing that I'd stop developing sh404SEF, or at least release it and support it.
And then it happened: some guy from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA, sent me an email: "if you are quitting for lack of time, do you have any interest in trying and selling it? that may allow you to keep working on it!".

The guy in question was Victor Drover (now the owner of Watchful) and he was running AnythingDigital.com. His site motto was "Sustainable Open Source", something that resonated very much with me as I strongly believe there can only be open-source software if it's sustainable.

So off we went: started selling sh40SEF subscriptions mid-September and in December I quit my day job for good.

I was so lucky that Victor showed up with a working website, a working business model and pair of helping hands. Let's not forget to mention Valentin, who provided support at Anything Digital and became the de facto sh404SEF expert for the following half-decade or so.

Is this still the case?

Yes, developing Joomla extensions has been my sole activity (with a little stint towards WordPress in 2016-2017, with little success to be honest) since 2009.
In early 2015, I moved all my extensions under the umbrella of my own company, Weeblr, without changing the "business model" and the way I operate.

Being a single-developer company, I have always tried to focus on specific, important topics where things are complicated and there's room for improvement. In my case, this is SEO and everything related to it.

Although I don't do business as an SEO consultant, I track every piece of SEO news, data report and documentation that happens every day, study and try to distill all this knowledge and information into my extensions. 

4 years ago, this has lead to starting the process of replacing the aging sh404SEF with a series of modern extensions: 4SEO and 4SEF covers all aspects of modern SEO.

But SEO is not just "technical SEO", it's very much content: what content you include in your website, and how you do that.

And so I also started working in this direction, with 4AI, an AI-powered all-around assistant fully integrated into Joomla but also 4Podcast to run your own podcast inside your site or 4Video to embed videos into your site in a way that will please Google performance requirements.

Are you in contact with other (independent) developers? How can this kind of collaboration work?

Honestly, not that much . The main reason, I believe, is simply time. Once you have an established user-base around the world, there's not much time available outside of support and development.

I do keep in touch with a few, especially the French ones such as my friends at JoomUnited, Nicolas at Hikashop and a few others. 

I would not say we collaborate per se, mostly we meet during Joomla events and of course this has essentially stopped during the pandemic but I'm incredibly grateful that JoomlaDays have picked up pace again, and I was lucky to speak, in person or remotely, to several of them over the last couple of years.
But knowing personally all these people sure helps when 2 extensions are conflicting for instance.

What are the most common misconceptions about your extension?

Most certainly that to "do SEO", you can install an extension and be done with it. I don't know if Joomla users actually believe that, or it's because website developers are not able to sell to their customers actual SEO services but, no, installing an extension does not complete the SEO part of a website project.

SEO is an ongoing project, something you do everyday, each time you add or remove something to your site.

An extension like 4SEO automates pretty much anything that can be automated in terms of SEO, but that's just the start, not the end.

And to be more specific maybe about the top common modern SEO misconceptions or mistakes, I'd probably mention:

Spending time on writing meta description

Meta description are not used for SEO, and are rarely used by Search engines when displaying search results, they prefer adapting the description based on whatever their user searched for.
Spending lots of time on this is hard to justify in 2024 and this will likely be more and more so as AI responses are added to Google and Bing search results.

With AI, descriptions are just not there any more.

Insisting on having a sitemap

It used to be that sitemaps would help discover pages on your site, but that's not the case anymore. Sitemaps are there to tell search engines which pages you'd prefer them to crawl and analyze.

Sitemaps start to become useful when you have large sites, with a few thousands pages or more Google documentation says you don't need a sitemap at all under 500 pages.

Redirecting 404 errors

I have seen lots of websites where admins insist on redirecting each and every 404 error to... something - usually the home page.
Just don't do that. 404s are fine, that's how search engines update their index quickly. It's not a sign of low quality and does not hurt your rankings. 

You should fix the ones coming from your site but most are from random robots and redirecting them is just a waste of your time and your server CPU.

There's only one case where a 404 needs redirecting: when you moved some content from one URL to another. And in that case you should add the redirect before you get any 404 anyway.

What is the one thing people don't know about your extension?

Being a developer at heart, I wish more people knew that all my extensions are developed with modern technologies, as Single Page Applications (SPA), using the Svelte javascript framework, Vite and Tailwind CSS :)

But that won't speak to many people so maybe I'd like to mention that:

• All extensions are fully translated to 22 languages
• They all work exactly the same under Joomla 3 / 4 and 5 (without compatibility plugin)
• And being SPA, they are easy and super-fast to use, with a strong focus on accessibility as well

I very much value backward and forward compatibility so either my extensions will work on upcoming Joomla versions (6,7, 8...) or they will be a migration path similar to moving from sh404SEF to 4SEF/4SEO.

What are the topics people always ask for support?

I would say that many of the questions I get asked are not so much about HOW to do something with my extensions but rather about WHAT to do with them.
Of course, this relates to what I was saying earlier, about SEO being an ongoing process rather than just installing one extension.

Do you get a lot out of the Joomla community?

I do, and considering this is essentially an online community, it's still somewhat surprising to me that what I enjoy the most is participating in live event.
Joomladays are such a joy and while I know online meetings have replaced many in person events during and after the pandemic, it's still amazes me how different going some places and talking with Joomlers for real is different from "just" being online.

That does not lessen the impact being online has on the community though. Remember that Victor guy from Wisconsin? No way we would have ever met without Joomla and the internet ;)

What is your involvement in the Joomla community?

Again, for lack of time, this is certainly less than what I'd want it to be. I try to participate in as many live and online events as I can, mostly focusing on SEO and similar topics. I occasionally respond to questions on Facebook.

And a few months back, I subscribed to be notified of any new topic or response in the SEO categories on the main Joomla.org forum, in order to provide SEO information to Joomlers from around the world.

I am of course on the Joomla Mattermost chat (at https://chat.joom.la) where many active community members are present, and that's a simple and very direct communication path.

Finally, as a developer, I contributed a little bit of code to the Joomla 3.x codebase itself, most notably the JLayout system that's been continued and expanded upon in newer Joomla versions.

What do you think of Joomla's ecosystem?

It's not getting any bigger, although it's not disappearing either. Like others, I can see some suppliers going away. I also can see some new extensions being developed by experienced developers, so that tells me there's still strength and confidence in Joomla.

The migrations that Joomla 4 and then 5 imposed to the community caused trouble for many and the consequences are certainly visible now. And so while I'm confident a sustainable Joomla ecosystem can happen, I also believe that it won't survive many more migrations and backward compatibility changes in future Joomla versions.

How do you see your future with Joomla? Do you have any surprises up your sleeve?

Well, I'd say that I see my future with Joomla, so there's that already. 

That's why I recently created a new extension called 4Command, a different way to navigate the Joomla administration, and that's shows my commitment to the Joomla community and ecosystem.

And yes, I have a surprise: I have another entirely new extension coming up, to complement the SEO line up I already have. Will be ready in a month or 6 weeks I think!

Anything else you’d like to say to our Joomler friends?

Come and meet each other at meetups and JoomlaDays. There are many online events easy to attend and it's an incredible energy boost each time! 

---

Yannick's main website is https://weeblr.com and you can also find his extensions in the Joomla Extension Directory.
His main extensions are:

• 4SEO: https://weeblr.com/4seo
• 4AI: https://weeblr.com/4ai
• 4Command: https://weeblr.com/4command
• 4Podcast: https://weeblr.com/4podcast
• 4SEF: https://weeblr.com/4sef

The site has all his extensions product pages, the support helpdesk and the blog - which is also a podcast, using 4Podcast of course - at https://weeblr.com/blog/