Online Marketing Blog

Picturesque view of Lake Minnetonka from the TopRank Online Marketing office

Today marks my 4 month anniversary at TopRank Online Marketing and almost 5 years in the online marketing industry.  It has been a goal of mine to learn as much as I possibly can from those who know the industry best.  In this seemingly short amount of time I have received, and continue to receive a top notch education at an unbeatable price.

I would like to share some of my experience to give other marketers interested in breaking into Internet marketing or continuing their online marketing education an idea of what it looks like from one person’s perspective.

Here we are near the end of 2009 and at the last Search Engine Strategies conference of the year.  While many conferences are down in attendance, SES Chicago actually beat last year’s numbers by about 100, according to Matt McGowan, VP, Publisher & Head of US at Incisive Media, the company that owns SES.

There are many ways to get value from attending a conference but one that is especially important, and often overlooked, is the ability to connect with industry thought leaders and ask important questions.

While roaming the sessions, exhibit hall and networking events at SES Chicago, I did just that and decided to use my trusty iPhone 3GS to capture some insights on what marketers should be focusing on or considering in 2010.

Let’s face it, we’re experiencing more than “interesting” economic times, especially those with a marketing responsibility in-house and at agencies.

To tap in to the stream of marketing-savvy collective wisdom online, we reached out to our network with a top internet marketing tactics poll for the next 6 months. Over 400 business marketers responded, making this the most popular poll Online Marketing Blog has run to-date. Readers were asked: What 3 internet marketing tactics will you emphasize most in the next 6 months?

Here are the results of the poll:

• Search engine optimization (36%, 149 Votes)
• Blogging (33%, 134 Votes)
• Pay per click (26%, 107 Votes)
• Email marketing (22%, 89 Votes)
• Social networking (Facebook, LinkedIn) (21%, 86 Votes)

Wow, what a conference! Search Engine Strategies is near it’s end and what better way to wrap up our series on internet marketing conference tips than with the following super-tips from super smart Michael Brito, Social Media Program Manager at Intel.

Michael worked with HP then moved on to Yahoo and is now with Intel practicing his adept social media stylings. Be sure to check out Britopian and the social media practitioner blog, Conversations Matter, for more of his insights.

Not all marketing conferences are created equal and from a content perspective, some are much better than others. Last month I attended SMX Social in Long Beach, California; and the content seemed to be more aligned with SEO than Social Media. Nonetheless, there were plenty of really good takeaways from the conference, but the true value for me was networking and meeting others who work in the same space as I do. Here are some other things to consider to prepare for conferences:

SES San Jose week is nearly over one might say we’ve saved some of the best internet marketing conference tips for last with the ever enthusiastic and insightful Heather Lloyd-Martin.

Heather is Chair, DMA’s Search Engine Marketing Council and President of SuccessWorks. She also blogs about copywriting at SEO Copywriting.

Attend all the “search marketing site labs” or “search marketing clinics” you can find. During a site lab, a panel of experts review Web sites on the fly and discuss how to improve them for search positioning and conversions.

Here’s why they are so cool:

It’s hump day during SES San Jose week and it reminds us there are many avenues for interacting with marketing conferences. It’s one thing to focus on programming events like our last few tipsters, it’s another thing to have spent numerous conference hours in the shoes of an attendee, speaker and conference programmer.

David Berkowitz is Director of Emerging Media & Client Strategy at 360i and Programming Chair of MediaPost’s Search Insider Summit with a short but very important tip:

Make time for the activities and dinners. The [SIS] Summit has far more shmooze time than time in sessions, and that’s for a reason. As excited as I am about the program and the speakers, the lasting relationships come during the downtime, as do the most meaningful conversations.

Figuring out how to get the most out of internet marketing conferences takes experience with plenty of conferences, including events like Search Engine Strategies happening in San Jose this week. So it seems fitting to follow up on Danny Sullivan’s advice with the insight of fellow Minnesotan, Chris Sherman.

Chris is co-founder of Third Door Media as well as the SMX conferences, has a search marketing consulting business and has been as involved with the details of conference programming, moderating and speaking as anyone you can find.

When torn between going to one session over another, go to the one that has fewest attendees. With so many people live blogging conferences these days, the odds are good that someone (or many) will be covering the popular session, so you’ll effectively get a two-fer even without personally attending both.

What better follow up to our impressive list of internet marketing conference tipsters during SES San Jose than sage advice from one of the most visible people in the search marketing industry, Danny Sullivan. As co-founder of Third Door Media, parent to Search Engine Land, Search Marketing Now and the Search Marketing Expo series of conferences, Danny Sullivan is one of the most often quoted experts in the search engine industry.

Online marketing Blog readers may remember this interview with Danny Sullivan and Neil Patel before a SMX Social Media Conference. You can also find him on Twitter and his personal blog, Daggle

We’re really picking up steam with our tips on Iternet Marketing Conferences, appropriately enough, during SES San Jose. Our next tip comes from Robert Scoble, Managing Director of FastCompany.TV and blogger extraordinaire.

I caught up with Robert at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco and he agreed to play along and answer a few conference tip questions. The insights below are transcribed from the video interview I did with him during the event.

It’s tough because I’m the guy who likes to hang out in the hallways. I hate being stuck in a conference session unless I know I’ll learn something. To me the hallways are great because that’s where I do my networking and find out what’s really going on.

We’re on a roll this week during SES San Jose 2008 with our next tip in a series of how to “Get the Most Out of Internet Marketing Conferences“. Previously a Vice President and Editor in Chief at ClickZ for 7 years, Rebecca Lieb serves as an Editorial Consultant to the ClickZ network as well as a public speaker on interactive marketing and advertising.

She’ll be keynoting the Minnesota Interactive Marketing Association (MIMA) Summit this October. She can be found many places online including Twitter.

Get organized. Plan in advance. Make a conference calendar grid with all the sessions you want to attend, as well as the parties you’re going to. Set up meeting around all that stuff. Color code it, if you’re anal. Now that you have a perfectly framed agenda, rest assured portions of it will go straight to hell. Relax. Accept it. Spontaneity’s good. Go with the flow!

Our third set of internet marketing conference tips come on day one of the Search Engine Strategies conference in San Jose and are appropriately from Kevin M. Ryan, Vice President, Global Content Director, Search Engine Strategies and Search Engine Watch.

Kevin Ryan has been involved with numerous conferences over the years working for various interactive and internet marketing agencies before starting his own and now as head of the SES conferences in the U.S. and abroad for Incisive Media.

1. Events are a great place to meet with clients, vendors and potential partners.

a. If you have a relationship with who you’re meeting with, begin scheduling meetings about a month prior to the event. Less time than that and your choices will be limited. More time than that, and they are going to forget you.

Here’s our second tip in a series of posts during the Search Engine Strategies conference in San Jose on “Getting the Most Out of Internet Marketing Conferences“. This one is from Brad Berens, Global Content Director for the esteemed ad:tech conferences and iMedia Connection.

Brad also blogs about culture, new media, marketing and community over at Mediavorous.

First, accept that you can’t do everything– believe me I’ve tried! I’ve gone to events where I’m speaking, networking AND covering things up for a publication. That’s a 20 hour day and it shortens your life in a hurry. It’s important to think — before you get on that plane – about why you’re going and why you aren’t and make choices accordingly.