Online Marketing Blog

Clay Shirky, Author of Here Comes Everybody, kicks off SES San Jose 2009 as today’s keynote speaker.

He dives right in and shares a story about HSBC, which  launched a program to acquire new accounts from college students. In doing so,  some less-than-great details about the program like extra fees started to enraged those who had signed up.

Instead of students being upset, but having no way to congregate, an upset student decided to rally other students via Facebook starting a group called ‘Stop the Great HSBC Graduate Rip-off!!!’.

Before the offline rally could happen, HSBC stepped in and tried to right the wrong specifically because – as Shirky says  – “Their customers had become organized. Facebook has become not only a social network, but a site of organization.”

Can’t make it to Search Engine Strategies (SES) San Jose 2009, yet want to stay on top of the largest and longest running conference dedicated to Search Marketing?  Never fear, Online Marketing Blog readers won’t miss a thing.  Jolina Pettice and Adam Singer from TopRank Online Marketing will be putting the pieces together for you throughout the event through liveblogging, photos and videos.

The skill set necessary to be an effective SEM/SEO is analogous to having all the pieces of a puzzle.  Learning search engine marketing can seem complex when you’re starting, but getting each new bit of knowledge brings you that much closer to having all the pieces in place, providing greater clarity as you go.  Sessions, workshops, networking, exhibitors and sponsors at SES San Jose 2009 can each provide a different portion of that puzzle.  Jolina and Adam will bring you the essential information from several must-see panels including:

If you’ve exhibited, presented or moderated a Search Engine Strategies conference, it’s more than likely that you’ve had the opportunity to meet Stewart Quealy, VP, Content Development at Incisive Media, parent company to Search Engine Strategies, Search Engine Watch and ClickZ. Stewart (L), along with Mike Grehan (R) were recently named co-chairs of the SES Advisory Board, which is charged with shaping the future direction and ongoing growth of the SES conference.

The SEM legend, Mike Grehan, is global KDM officer with New York based Acronym Media. He’s been involved with online marketing since 1995 and is recognized in the industry as an expert in the search marketing field. He’s programmed many SES London events and has written multiple books and white papers on search marketing.

At Online Marketing Summit held in Minneapolis and hosted by ClickZ, Caitlin McCabe of Sway Inc spoke to the audience about Social Media and had these insights:

1. For people who think Facebook is just for kids, go search for groups relevant to you and you will find them!  Facebook offers many targeted marketing opportunities.

While there are hoards of people, both professional and not, look for niche social sites where you can reach 100% of your target audience as well as an audience that is more engaged than perhaps the average Facebook user.

People with more friends aren’t necessarily more valuable. Do they know all their friends and who are they? However, on a niche social network like BakeSpace.com, the friends are much more targeted than a big brand like Sara Lee.

Over the next 2 weeks several staff from TopRank be hitting the road for multiple SEO/Social Media/PR speaking and training events. We invite you to attend and would love to meet up with readers of Online Marketing Blog.  

Topics during these events will emphasize the practice areas of our agency: Search Marketing, Online Public Relations and Social Media Marketing. Locations will range from New York to San Francisco to Minneapolis.

May 19: Media Relations Summit, Crowne Plaze Hotel in NYC (event info)

4:30 pm: Mastering SEO, Google AdWords and Other Search Tools to Increase Visibility
If you’re ready to vault your website, landing pages, corporate videos, blogs, press releases, and online newsroom into the top of the search rankings, take in this one-hour bootcamp. You’ll learn all the latest tools, tips and tricks for making Google and Yahoo love you.

 April has been a relatively quiet month for TopRank speaking events but May will rev things up a bit with the following Public Relations and Direct Marketing industry events focusing on Search Engine Optimization and Social Media Marketing topics.

I’ll also be presenting on SEO for publishers locally this week at a private event for MSP Communications, publishers of Mpls St. Paul Magazine and Twin Cities Business. 

PRSA Digital Impact Social Media: April 30 – May 1, 2009 New York, NY
This event covers how public relations practitioners are effectively using technology for public and media relations.  That means social media, online PR, mobile PR and topics like data visualization. The keynote will be delivered by social media and PR guru, Brian Solis of FutureWorks. 

Thinking about social media? Or are you waist deep and need some help? A session today at SES NY highlights different approaches to social media, its purpose and how and why you should get involved.

Li Evans, of Key Relevance, hammers home the need for social media strategy within her presentation.

Social Media – done for the sole purpose of traffic or links – probably isn’t social media you should be doing. Social media is not about your marketing message, it’s about what the customer has to say good or bad. It’s about them talking about you.

Whatever you do socially, remember that the end user has control of your message and sometimes your brand. Li goes on to explain that these conversations are happening any way, online and offline, so would you rather be part of it or continue to ignore it?

Do you have a blog? If so, a panel today at SES NY shared how to improve SEO results with your blog and its RSS Feed.

Michael Gray, Owner of Atlas Web Service, shared the following tips to increasing SEO value with your blog.

1. Don’t write blog titles that suck
Bad titles lack keyword focus, are often clever or amusing and therefore not intuitive to a reader or search engine.

Good titles include keywords and are focused on topics covered within the post.

2. Partial feeds are like being half dressed at a party
Why do you want to use full feeds or be fully dressed?
Full feeds allow you to benefit from web scrapers and build links for you. Make sure you put keyword optimized hyperlinks within your post, specifically to pages that are more difficult to build Links to.

In the last session of the day, attendees were rewarded with 8 awesome tips to boost Search Engine Marketing (SEM) Results in a sponsored session  ”Wpromote Workshop: 8 Things You Aren’t Doing That Will Boost Your SEM Results”.  

Using real-life examples, this session promises to teach attendees the secrets top online marketers are using to beat the competition and squeeze the greatest results possible from their SEM efforts.   Topics include: PPC, SEO, landing page optimization and social media. 

Speakers are Michael Mothner, Founder & CEO and Michael Stone, Vice President, Sales & Strategy – both from Wpromote.  Some tips you may know and some you may not, but there is definitely something for everyone.

I love B2B, so a session on how to maximize lead generation within a B2B context is a must-attend.

New or old, a B2B marketer knows that a unique set of marketing challenges awaits them including:

• No single decision maker
• Increased risk for decision makers
• Offline conversions
• Long lead time
• Complex sale
• Ambiguous search terms
• Difficulty to pre-select B2B clickers

Whether you heart B2B or not, who doesn’t want to increase conversions? Find recommendations below to increasing conversion rates.

Scott Brinker, of ion interactive, shared how to increase conversions by segmenting, specifically as it relates to Keywords & Landing Pages.

Keywords & Ad Creative
Give your clickers a very specific, customized landing page about the topic for which they performed the search.

Day 2 at SES NY kicks off with a lesson in Social Media for the little guy.

The purpose of the session is to find out how small companies with small budgets can freely tap the world of social media to improve business and increase sales.

Here’s what we learned from Jennifer Evans Laycock:

Take the ‘marketing’ out of Social Media Marketing because it isn’t about marketing, but rather about conversations.

In addition, there is a reason social media is called the bleeding edge, because it can hurt especially if approached in the wrong way.

Remember, when you are developing marketing plans, that the goal is not to integrate the latest big thing but rather to integrate what works. As a small guy, the people on the leading edge are other marketers and not likely to be your prospect. There’s nothing wrong with leveraging pre-established social tools.

This week Thursday 3/26 I will be presenting on 3 panels during the Search Engine Strategies Conference in New York March as well as an iBreakfast meeting on Wednesday 3/25.  If you’re attending SES New York, please be sure to stop by and say hello. It’s great to meet Online Marketing Blog readers in person. 

As a Media Sponsor, TopRank will also be liveblogging SES New York Tuesday afternoon through Thursday and Tweeting from @leeodden. Watch for posts from TopRank Senior Account Manager, Jolina Pettice.   Here are the details for the sessions I’ll be speaking on:

Search Meets Social Media (Wednesday 7:30am – 10:00am) Located in New York City, CresaPartners Executive Center: 100 Park Ave. 40 – 41st St. (24th Fl.)  The Silicon Alley Breakfast Club (iBreakfast) is a long time networking event in Manhattan and this particular meeting is all about how Social Media is powering businesses forward.