Online Marketing Blog

With Search Engine Strategies San Jose just around the corner, I thought it timely and appropriate to share insights on how you can get the most out of marketing conferences.

TopRank is very active attending, speaking and blogging a variety of internet marketing events, conferences and workshops. These aren’t the only reasons to attend a marketing conference though and the next 9 posts will offer some excellent insights from TopRank as well as a incredible mix of industry thought leaders that may just compound the value of your staff already attending plus motivate you to send more.

Recession or not, look no further than the headlines in any business publication and you’ll see increasing numbers of articles offering advice on how companies can best deal with tighter marketing budgets.

I promised myself I’d slow down on conference speaking last year and while I’ve turned down more offers this year than ever before, (and been turned down myself the one time I formally pitched) some really great opportunities have popped up.

Here are the upcoming conferences I’ll be speaking at for pretty much the rest of this year not including private company engagements:

Aug 20, 2008 - Search Engine Strategies, San Jose
Presenting: “SEO Through Blogs and Feeds”
Presenting: “News Search SEO”
Media Sponsor
TopRank is sending 4 bloggers to cover the event (Thomas, Jessica, Dana and Ashley)

Sep 18, 2008 - OMMA Global, NYC
Panel: “Digital Asset Optimization”

Sep 20, 2008 - Blog World Expo, Las Vegas
Moderating a Panel: “SEO and New Media”
Media Sponsor

With the changes last year in the search marketing conference industry there has been disappointing side-taking and rumor mongering but also a healthy dose of optimism about what more competition will do for attendees. I would think the sustainability and success of any conference is in large part dependent upon attendees needs being met. Whether your primary business is interactive marketing, public relations, advertising or SEM, online marketing and PR oriented conferences offer a variety of benefits.

Because of Online Marketing Blog readers’ varied marketing and PR related interests, this week’s Poll aims to identify the top motivations for readers to attend marketing industry conferences:

There are an increasing number of conferences that are available for those wishing to expand their knowledge of search marketing, web 2.0, online advertising and interactive marketing. Conferences are not only great for gaining knowledge, but especially for networking, recruiting, business development and lead generation.

With so many conferences available, how can you choose the right one? There are a number of considerations ranging from topics to location to cost and even venue. Referrals and word of mouth recommendations are a great source of information as well. To stimulate some conversation on the best conferences to attend and the different reasons why, please vote below for your favorite conference and we’d love to hear why in the comments.

This Friday starts an exciting journey for the next 10 days or so. I will be leaving for San Francisco on Friday to the DMA06 conference in San Francisco until the 18th. I was just in San Francisco a few weeks ago for a SEO video shoot with AllBusiness.com.

On Saturday I’ll be doing one of the four modules for the DMA’s new Search Engine Marketing certification program. Then on Monday I’m doing a “Blogs, RSS and Podcasting” panel with Amanda Watlington and Stephan Spencer. My presentation will be about using blogs for public relations. On Tuesday I’ll be doing a search marketing lab where a panel reviews web sites from the auduience and that evening I’ll be participating on a panel on using RSS for marketing.

If you’re looking for sources of information on search marketing, conferences can be a great resource. Or. if you’re a conference junkie like me, then you’ll find the SEOBook “Must See SEO Events” calendar exceptionally useful.¬† Some disclosure here, I am editing the calendar along with Aaron.

Some of the conferences listed include:

• Search Engine Strategies
• WebmasterWorld Pubcon
• ad:tech
• DMA conferences
• MIMA
• eMetrics Summit
• eTail
• Shop.org Summit
• Search Insider Summit
• OMMA
• Affiliate Summit
• SEO Roadshow
• SEO Bash
• And more

If you know of a conference that deals in some way with search marketing (SEO or SEM) then drop a comment. Regional events are welcome as well.

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