Online Marketing Blog

While I am not native to Chicago (regular readers are well aware that TopRank Online Marketing is native to one of the 50 toughest states in the union - Minnesota) - it is a far more local journey than my last two excursions, to SES San Jose and the Bulldog Reporter Media Relations Conference in DC.

My objective at SES Chicago next week will be to both cover sessions for the benefit of our valued readers here at Online Marketing Blog and to learn as much as is possible in a short week about topics such as universal search and marketing with social media - what are best practices, what are the most powerful tactics?

In my role as an Account Manager at TopRank, I am constantly striving to ensure content related to our clients and their campaigns are found by the right prospects, at the right time, for the right reasons. The array of search options available to consumers ranging from Universal search to image to news to blog and social search widens this scope seemingly by the minute - and we proudly can attest that our clients are some of the first on the cusp.

The sessions that I plan to attend and cover speak directly to the need to be found for more than just a blue text link.

Here are a few examples:

• Actionable Social Media: Each day it seems, there is a new social media site where people converge. (And why not? It keeps them out of trouble…) So how do we as search marketers tap into these groups and what strategies are at our disposal to tap into the ensuing traffic? I’ll report back after attending this session moderated by Beyond Ink’s Anne Kennedy.

• Podcast & Audio Search: Now included in search results - audio. From a PR side, we’ll often recommend attaching a podcast to enhance a press release, while from an SEO side - we’ll recommend leveraging the recording as link bait and a qualified traffic driver. How will these tactics evolve? I look forward to learning soon from Danny Sullivan and his panel.

• Images & Search Engines: In today’s world, an image result is worth a thousand text results, as search results for my vacation destination later this month can attest. How do we ensure our clients, whose services we know to be far more photogenic than some silly island, appear within every relevant search result - and what can we ascertain the impact to be for either appearing or not appearing? Anne Kennedy will again be filling us in.

For those of you I’ve met at past events, friends in the Chicago area who found this post by Googling my name, etc and so forth - I look forward to seeing you next week!