My purpose for the post was because I’ve made noise about this topic off and on with local SEMs to gauge interest and then moved on without really pursuing it. However, recently I’ve heard comments about the idea and thought it would be good to get some public dialogue going to see if there is a market and interest or not. I agree, it would not be something that’s competitive with MIMA.

The thing is, I know with certainty I could never drum up the time to start such an organization myself, at least from scratch. I am spread too thin for the next year or so. It would seem an extension of SEMPO or even MIMA if it was well supported, would be the most practical route unless there are other ideas.

If there’s only a smattering of interest in such an endeavor, I think it might do well do operate informally in “meetup” mode such as Jeff suggests above and that have already happened a few times.

Am looking forward to discussing with you further at the end of the month.

You hit the nail on the head – because of our wider “interactive marketing” focus, MIMA needs to offer diverse, quality programming to a number of audiences across the interactive marketing spectrum. There’s just no way our programming can dive as deep into SEO/SEM – or as often – as we’d need to in order to stay ahead of the curve.

I wouldn’t see a local search organization as being competitive with MIMA. In fact, I’d be happy to talk about how you might go about getting one started.

That said, we definitely want to continue to include search programming in our roster. And we’ve managed to build some good name recognition nationally, so people want to speak. Who do you want to hear from?

With regard to your question about starting from scratch or not – I think you can learn from others’ successes without “piggyback”ing. In June, we helped facilitate a national gathering of IMA leadership from other state associations. We were able to learn from others’ successes and share our own without any kind of formal association. It was great.

That said, MIMA has no intention of creating (or endorsing) a national IMA organization (like AIGA). But we definitely want to share best practices, swap speaker and sponsor contacts, and generally hang out with other IMAs around the country.

How can MIMA help/support you?

Sure, piggybacking on the movement at large is attractive, but why rely on it? Why not start from scratch? What are the options? Is there a Minneapolis/St.Paul based meetup/eventful group that meets consistently to discuss SEO?

I’m from St.Paul myself which is why this article caught my eye, but here in San Diego where I live now, there are numerous meetups and grassroots initatives aimed at creating a more formal and open SEO organization. I see this as a fundamental and spontaneous initiative vs. waiting around for an official “Your State Search Marketing Association’. The industry is hot and people are eager- start from the ground up and the assocation you speak of will naturally form and merge with the appropriate parties when the time is right. My 2 cents

Thanks

I’m also willing to put some rubber where the road is to help organize it. That’s always the sticky wicket for these initiatives — buzz doesn’t get stuff done.