Online Marketing Blog

Army Golden Knights: SFC Dave Herwig (@gkdave), SGM Steve Young (@gksteve), LTC Joe Martin (gkjoe)

My presentation on how to leverage Social Media SEO to improve the reach and effectiveness of blog content for marketing at OpenCa.mp DFW this weekend ended up being a lot of information in a very short period of time. The use of a video interview I did with Brian Clark as the segue into my presentation ate into some of the 30 minutes I had to present plus I simply had too many slides.

(Thanks to Lt Colonel Joe Martin for the photo taken right after the presentation. His team were literally sponges for information at the event.)

At the OpenCa.mp conference in Dallas this weekend I was able to re-connect with Chris Pirillo of Lockergnome and the Gnomedex conference (We’ve interviewed each other in the past). We both jumped out of the same airplane with the Army Golden Knights last week and are also speaking today about blogs at OpenCa.mp.

I caught up with Chris to talk about his take on SEO and social media.  He had pretty strong opinions about people who are too aggressive and not always relevant in the social connections they’re making.  This is what he had to say:

You can find Chris online by Googling “chris“. How’s that for the effect of links on search engine visibility?

Dave Roth works as Director of Search Marketing at Yahoo. That means Dave is a Search Engine Marketer that works for a search engine. I’ve known Dave for several years and we finally decided to do a video interview. Watch the interview below to learn what a search marketer that works for a search engine does, especially the challenges and opportunities in communications on search marketing performance in a large company.

Of course, we couldn’t talk to someone like Dave at Yahoo without mentioning the transition of search results to Bing over on the Yahoo site. What does this mean for SEO? What does it mean for Paid Search?  What’s the fate of Site Explorer and where does it fit within Bing Webmaster Tools? Is SEO good or bad for search engines? How much of a signal does social media provide search engines? We discuss these topics and more.

Thanks to Ray ‘Catfish’ Comstock for providing the title of this post with his opening remarks during the session.  Joining Comstock on this panel, moderated by Seth Besmertnik, CEO, Conductor, Inc.:

• Crispin Sheridan, SES Advisory Board & Sr Director of Search Marketing Strategy, SAP
• Bill Hunt,  SES Advisory Board & President, Back Azimuth Consulting
• Guillaume Bouchard, Co-founder and CEO, NVI

As a good writer and analyst, I have to ask ‘why’ for even the most obvious problem posed.  So why is enterprise level Search Engine Optimization (SEO) not for the weak? The obvious answer: a lot of people, a lot of content.  Enterprise is difficult because management of a lot of content and people is difficult to scale.

Ultimately, to measure Search Engine Optimization (SEO) success, you aren’t necessarily looking at individual metrics – you are looking for a connection between the metrics – and the resulting affect on revenue.

If my lead seems to negate the name validity of the SES San Francisco session, ‘Meaningful SEO Metrics,’  it is completely unintentional.

Moderated by John Marshall, CTO of Market Motive and SES Advisory Board Member, this excellent session featured on its panel:

• Richard Zwicky, Founder & CEO, Enquisite
• Ray “Catfish” Comstock, Director of SEO, BusinessOnLine
• Jon Glick, VP of SEO and GM European Web Properties, Become.com

“Infinitely measureable means adjustable,” opens Zwicky.  “And online marketing is completely measureable.”

Take a deep breath if you feel one step behind in terms of mobile Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  If the crowd size for the session Getting Mobilized! Mobile Marketing Strategies at SES San Francisco is any indication, you are in quite good company.

The session, moderated by Paul Cushman, Senior Director, Mobile Sales Strategy, Yahoo!, featured on its panel:

• Cindy Krum, Chief Executive Officer, Rank-Mobile, LLC
• Sandeep Aggarwal, Managing Director, Internet & Software, Caris & Company
• Michael Martin, Owner, Mobile Martin

“Mobile is a channel, not a strategy,” states Kushman. “Channels may change, but marketing strategy is marketing strategy.”

Creation of a mobile app (whether for iPhone or Android) for no other reason than to launch something ‘really cool’ carries roughly the same weight as creating something viral just to create something viral.  Both are fun, both are consumed, and both are easily forgotten.

It’s been several years since I have seen TopRank CEO Lee Odden contribute to the panel ‘SEO Through Blogs & Feeds,’ so I was eager to sit in on this session to close out my first day at this year’s SES San Francisco.

Joining Odden on his panel, moderated by Craig Macdonald, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, Covario, was PRESSfeed President Sally Falkow.

As Odden states, creation and promotion of a successful business blog is just as simple and just as complex as planning a friendly dinner party. How, exactly? More on that shortly.

While Odden opened the session, let’s begin with insight from Falkow as her remarks help expand the notion of traditional blogging.

“According to Google,” Falkow states, “a blog is simply a webpage with a feed.”

TopRank Online Marketing CEO Lee Odden gave a solo presentation at Search Engine Strategies 2010 on content marketing optimization.  Following is a summary of Lee’s comprehensive presentation including 10 essential steps for your organization to achieve success.

The core of any search or social media marketing program focuses on content.  But what exactly is content marketing?  It’s creating and distributing relevant content to attract, acquire and engage customers which you know detailed information about.

It’s different than search – where you’re seeking in-demand phrases and creating content.  In content marketing, which grew out of the B2B marketing space, you’re developing personas.  In addition to this you should activate the intersection of search and content marketing.

Here we are just past the halfway mark in 2010 and we’ve tapped into the stream of future marketing planning with our readers for 2011 with a poll. Our question? What 3 online marketing channels & tactics will you emphasize in 2011? The number one answer? Not social media, not email marketing.

The top digital marketing tactic for OMB readers in 2011 is Search Engine Optimization

Our poll this year provided 44 different answers to choose from ranging from display advertising to no holds barred spam. Over 200 readers took the poll and made their choices. While there are many signs of marketing budgets making a recovery, the vast majority of marketers are still focused on planning the most efficient and effective online marketing mix they can for the new year.

There’s a game of telephone going on about a hundred different theories of Search Engine Optimization and the influences or signals that affect search visibility. One that I continue to hear revolves around the notion that search engines like fresh content. I’m sure the genesis was something like:  Someone told someone else at a conference and they posted it to a forum where someone read and blogged it and then someone else Tweeted it whereupon someone else blasted it via Ping.fm and Hootsuite. This sort of cycle repeats over and over again.

The point is, with telephone game advice on SEO or any other topic, the message gets diluted. Fresh content apparently means different things to different people and the version I continue to hear from SEO “experts” (agency, independent and in-house) is that search engines like websites that change their content often. The logic is that changing content on a page will attract search engine crawlers more frequently and somehow improve search visibility for the page.

Companies today have a virtual smörgåsbord of options when it comes to marketing their products and services online. Lack of expertise, numerous tactical options, pressure for sales in a down economy and the tendency to chase shiny objects cause many online marketing efforts to be fragmented. I really doubt that a significant waste of effort and disconnect with customers is part of any company’s online marketing strategy. But it’s happening. A lot.

Marketers must prioritize what will work best and in the mix of online marketing tactics. According to eMarketer, SEO and PPC have been rated the most effective for conversions and ROI and while some companies are using software like PPC management tools to make things easier, there’s a lot more to consider for better segmentation.

Lee Odden, TopRank Online Marketing CEO gave the opening keynote of Online Marketing Summit Minneapolis.  Lee spoke on the intersection of SEO and social media and provided key takeaways for companies on achieving success.

As the social web and search engines integrate and innovate tighter, the intersection between search and social is growing more meaningful daily.  Following is a summation of this info-packed presentation:

What would happen if your Google traffic disappeared tomorrow?  What impact would that have on your marketing and your business?  For many, this could be disastrous.  This highlights the importance of diversifying your brand’s referring sources and share of voice around the web.

Search and social are intersecting in many ways:  when you look at a comparison of the top search engines, more and more of the engines themselves are on social platforms, and more of the results on the big engines are social.