Online Marketing Blog

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.  

TopRank Online Marketing will have two speakers presenting on two panels at SES Chicago this week.  

On Tuesday, Senior Account Manager Jolina Pettice (who recently spoke on a panel with Yahoo’s Ron Belanger and Anne Kennedy at DPAC) will be speaking on a session about how to use Public Relations tactics to improve SEO results.  On Wednesday I will be speaking on a panel about Blog SEO.

Here are the session details. We look forward to seeing you there!

Tuesday, December 9, 2008 - 2:45pm-3:45pm 
“Turning PR Efforts into SEO Results”

(Rob Key, Peter Himler, David Bradfield, Lee Odden)

Prior to being engaged to someone with far more social tact and less complete obliviousness towards social etiquette than myself, it would have never once occurred to me to bring a “host gift” to a party or get together.

As I mature and meet more and more people, however, I’m glad to have someone around who actually realizes that most social groups will adhere to often unwritten social rules (including “host gifts”), and will be unlikely to truly welcome someone into their group unless they follow them.

When looking at the changing PR landscape, particularly the presence of new forms of social media, what can PR professionals learn from this example?

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

The initial submissions of session suggestions for the Interactive portion of SXSW that made the first cut have been published. Now it’s up to the voting public to decide which sessions make it next. I’ve heard a bit of feedback from last year’s attendees on the quality of content in the search engine optimization sessions, so it will be nice to see what makes it this year. Tony Adam from Yahoo submitted a proposal, “SEO for Startups” and now it’s up for votes.

The panel looks pretty good with: Todd Friesen a.k.a. Oilman VP at Visible Technologies; Rebecca Kelley, Internet Marketing Consultant from SEOmoz; Carolyn Shelby SEO Consultant and Host of SEO101; Tony Adam, a SEO Manager for Yahoo! and myself.

Lee and Rob at PRSA International 2007

On the marketing conference circuit, online reputation management is a hot topic now more then ever. Whether it’s search marketing, public relations or direct marketing, companies are trying to make sense of how to monitor and manage the brand impact of online conversations and their visibility in search results.

Last Thursday I did a national PRSA teleseminar with Kami Watson Huyse, “Reputation Management in a Google World” and tomorrow in Orlando, Florida the DMA’s ACCM conference is hosting: “Reputation Management: Protecting Your Brand in the Search Engines“, a session with myself and Rob Key of Converseon presenting. Moderater duties will be handled by Heather Lloyd Martin of SuccessWorks.

Wiley recently announced the launch of a new book, “Online Marketing Heroes: Interviews with 25 Successful Online Marketing Gurus”, in which TopRank has an entire chapter on the subject of social media marketing for SEO and PR.

The list of internet marketing experts interviewed for the book include consultants, agencies, CEOs, PR professionals, client side bloggers and marketers. Topics range from paid search to online copywriting to online PR and social media marketing. The list of marketing experts includes:

Joan Holman, Greg Hartnett, Jacob Hawkins, Mark Oldani, Jeffrey Glueck, Lauren Freedman, Tamara Adlin, Steve Rubel, Greg Jarboe, Eric Ward, Jordan Gold, Heather Lloyd-Martin, Chris Baggott, Ed Shull, Brian Lusk, Lee Odden, Jill Whalen, Liana Evans, Perry Marshall, Kevin Lee, Paul O’Brien, Ron Belanger, David Fischer, Phil Terry and Patrick Duparcq.

Tomorrow the PRSA is conducting a teleseminar “PR and Social Media - What every practitioner needs to know“.

Take a first-hand look at the phenomena that are redefining the practice of public relations.  Hear from three digital PR pioneers about the array of new tools, strategies and channels available to today’s practitioner from Facebook and Second Life to blogger relations, digital video and search engine reputation management.

As has been the case with a number of public relations industry events, I am tasked with bringing a search marketing perspective to a PR and social media focused panel. A similar session was held at the PRSA International Conference last year, “Social Media for PR Practitioners“, so the seminar tomorrow will be a nice update.

It’s pretty hard to compete with news like Microsoft offering to buy Yahoo for $44 billion or Amazon to buy Audible for $300 million, but there’s plenty to read on those topics and more on this week’s BIGLIST SEO blogs update.

• SEO Design Solutions Blog - You don’t see too many practical tips blogs these days and that’s why it’s nice to see Jeffrey Smith blogging all manner of tips on SEO from WordPress optimization to organic vs PPC.

• Smackdown! - Michael VanDeMar is full of piss and vinegar especially when it comes to Matt Cutts. What this blog lacks in subscriber numbers it makes up for in good humor.

• Learning SEO Basics - SEO student and fan of Kalena Jordan’s Search Engine College, Kimberly Bock (aka spostareduro) writes about all the basics of search engine optimization.

The last session of the day for me was “Press and Public Relations Campaigns” with Robin Liss of Reviewed.com and Joe Beaulaurier from PRWeb. Moderation duties were scheduled to be handled by Brett Tabke but were switched at the last minute to Melanie Mitchell, VP of SEO/SEM at AOL. Sorry Brett, but I don’t think anyone had a problem with the switch.

Robin presented a case study for a promotion on the iPhone her site wirelessinfo.com did using multiple channels including Digg and a YouTube video that went viral. Joe presented the multiple media format press release options offered by PRWeb.

If someone has a better photo, please link in the comments

On day three, the last day of sessions at WebmasterWorld Pubcon here in Vegas, I participated on a panel called, “Search and Blogging Reporters Forum” with Rand Fishkin and Andy Beal.

Moderation duties handled by Mike McDonald. Basically, it was a round table-style discussion about blogging in the SEO industry as well as blogging as a marketing tool. There were some good points about using blogs as a public relations tool as well as some debate about hosting team blogs separately or all under the company domain name.

There was some nice back and forth with Andy and Rand plus great questions from Mike and the audience.

Since I arrived on the tail end of the DMA07 show, I haven’t taken as many photos as I’d like, but here are a few so far.

Welcome to DMA07

Matt Bailey, Heather Lloyd Martin, Detlev Johnson

Wrestling a microphone on the Link Building Panel

Daron Babin Glamour Shot

Exhibit Hall - Where are all the SEM vendors?

The DMA ECHO Awards included a search marketing category for the first time and I was a judge.

Upgraded room view at the W Hotel. Nice!

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