SearchFest 2013 drew hundreds of attendees from near and not-so-near to absorb tips & expertise on a wide range of search marketing topics from a distinguished cluster of expert speakers.

But there were a couple of other special attendees, as you might have noticed – ones with fur and claws and cute little faces that seemed to say “adopt me, adopt me!”

They were a little nervous due to the crowds (I’ve been known to be a bit shy among strangers too) but they were a big hit with attendees, many of whom stopped by to visit with Chomper (pictured at the top of this post with Theresa Brown who adopted him recently) or Candy Cane who was also recently adopted.

In fact, Chomper was Cat Adoption Team’s 30,000th adoption!

So why were there cat’s at SearchFest 2013? – I forget to mention that Cat Adoption Team (C.A.T., get it?) is our Charity of Choice this year.

Kathy Covey is currently the PR Manager for C.A.T. and she recently sent me this update on how things went at SearchFest & after:

“Monte Cristo was the first to be adopted, even before SearchFest – quite literally just a few days prior but after I built the SearchFest cat web page and we started talking about him.

“That is what happens and why social media can be so powerful for adoption of pets. I firmly believe that when you start talking about a pet for adoption, getting others involved in the conversation, something goes out into the ethers if you will and the person destined to adopt that pet is drawn in.

“Chomper was one of the kitties who made a short appearance at SearchFest with Candy Cane. He was the very nervous black cat who was very startled with all the clapping. Chomper became our 30,000^th adoption on Friday! (March 15, 2013)

“Candy Cane went home pretty quick after SearchFest (again that magic). He was very outgoing and we just knew it was finding the right person who would accept that he was FIV+ (feline immunodeficiency virus). Candy was the one we brought on stage. He too was terrified of the clapping but otherwise is a super confident kitty.

“Curry, a 13 year old cat with a huge attitude, found her special person as well. We were concerned for Curry. Being 13 years old and not liking cats meant that she really did not put her best “paw” forward here in the shelter. She was cranky and stressed (being around other cats).  Jennifer saw past that and took her home. Here’s the e-Tails article I did on Curry prior to her adoption.

“The two who are still waiting are Scion and Simba. They are buds/sisters in fact and it would be terrific if they could go to a home together.

“Scion is shy and will need a gentle hand to gain confidence. Perhaps that’s why having her stay with Simba, who is a very outgoing gal, will be best if possible. They are “sisters” who lived together prior to coming to CAT.

“This pair was given up to us by their owner and have been waiting for over a year to find a new home. They are not very old (just a little over 2 years) and are quite affectionate. If I had to guess why they were still here at CAT….. it would be because we really would like them to go to a home together.

“Every Tweet or social post about these cats will put them one step closer to the person who will adopt either or both of them.

“Of course, if SEMpdx members and fans prefer black cats, or white cats, or tortie cats, visit our cat & kitten adoption list and pick your favorite to promote, we won’t mind.

“The more folks who see what great cats we have available and how wonderful a pet cat is, the better.”

As our Charity of Choice for 2013, SEMpdx will be contributing 10% of our organization’s proceeds to C.A.T. as well as some of our Board Members donating time to do PPC, SEO and Social.

And, we’re also covering the cost of adoption during the month of March – so if you’ve been thinking about having a furry feline friend around the house, there’s never been a better time.

And how can you resist a face like this?

Cat Adoption Team
14175 SW Galbreath Drive
Sherwood, OR 97140

503-925-8903
contactus@catadoptionteam.org

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When I was asked last summer to give the link building presentation at SearchFest this year, I was initially excited, and my plan was to share some really juicy stuff, and we were going to have an interactive session where people would actually leave with some links that day.

In the ensuing months though, after continually getting the cr*p kicked out of my own affiliate sites by the Penguin algorithm,  I’ve had to seriously reexamine my whole philosophy.

At the link building panel this year, there will be no presentations, and instead, we’ll have an honest discussion about what has become of link building in 2013 and where it’s going in the future.

The panelists for this session have done their share of ‘pushing the envelope” over the years, and in some cases they’ve pushed too hard too, and all have agreed to openly share their experiences and opinions.

Got Questions?

Have you got questions about certain tactics? Do you need sound and reliable advice? Are you baffled trying to figure out how to make things rank now that anchor text is a no-no?  If so, this interactive session is where you’ll get the answers you need.

The panelists:

Michael King –
is a software and web developer turned SEO since 2006. He is currently the Director of Inbound Marketing at iAcquire. He’s also a international touring rapper.

Follow him on twitter @ipullrank or at his new blog – The Best Practice

Will Scott –
is the founder and President of Search Influence. Will Scott has been helping small businesses get online since 1994 – that’s right, 1994 – before most people even knew there was an Internet. Since then, Will has been focused on making information more accessible online.

… and I’ll be asking the questions you submit, throwing in some of my own, calling on the audience, and  sticking my own two cents in as usual!

Scott Hendison –
is the CEO of Search Commander, Inc. and the founder of SEO Automatic, a set of white label internet marketing tools for WordPress.

As a founding board member of SEMpdx, Scott has been working in some aspects of the search industry since as early as 1999.

Put these three on the hot seat and submit your questions  now so they’ll be the first ones addressed before we go to the microphones.

(Yes, anonymous questions WILL be answered)

The form has been removed as of 7:30 am 2/22 – Show up to ask your questions!

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We are proud to announce Bend, Ore.-based company, G5, as sponsor of the Members Only Mixer held the night before SearchFest. The event is exclusively for SEMpdx members that are attending SearchFest the next day. Members will mingle with their digital marketing peers, including the SEMpdx board and SearchFest speakers, in an informal setting. The full-day digital marketing conference will offer attendees rare insight on Friday, February 22, 2013 at the Governor Hotel in Portland, Ore.

“G5 is one of the fastest growing companies in Oregon, but we’re known nationwide as search engine marketing experts in the property management sector,” said Dave Beltramini, Director of Online Marketing Strategy & Performance at G5. “SEMpdx’s line-up of speakers and content is stellar, and we’re thrilled to be part of the event.”

SearchFest is currently the only search and social media conference organized by a nonprofit business organization (SEMpdx) in the Northwest — allowing tickets to be one-third of the cost of other conferences featuring the same caliber of speakers. Lower ticket prices paired with national experts has led to tremendous growth of the event.

Keynoting SearchFest this year will be Duane Forrester of Bing (the search engine based in Seattle, Wash.) and Marty Weintraub of aimClear (an INC. 500-honored digital agency based in Minnesota). Additional companies represented at SearchFest include: Disney Interactive, REI, Rosetta and a variety of local, regional and national marketing firms.

ABOUT G5
G5 is the leading provider of Digital Experience Management (DXM) software and services in the property management sector. The G5 DXM Platform enables owners and operators of multifamily, senior living and self-storage properties to put the right renter in the right property to maximize profitability. G5 helps thousands of properties turn renters into brand advocates by delivering amazing experiences at every digital touch-point. As brand advocacy grows, so does demand — allowing properties to raise rents and revenue without adversely affecting occupancy.

Founded in 2005, G5 was recently named one of the fastest growing private US companies by Inc. Magazine (fourth consecutive year), one of North America’s fastest growing technology companies by Deloitte (second consecutive year), and one of Oregon’s fastest growing private companies by Portland Business Journal (third consecutive year). The Bend, Ore.-based company is backed by private equity investor Volition Capital.

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1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.

I’m an editor at Search Engine Land and Marketing Land. I also work as a senior analyst for Opus Research in San Francisco and I have my own consulting practice. I cover a lot of stuff but it all ties into online to offline consumer behavior and digital advertising.

For purposes of this interview I have to say that I’m not a designer or usability expert.

2) You recently wrote that 2013 is the year of the tablet. We’ve always talked about “getting your site ready for mobile”…how can a business make their site “tablet friendly”?

You can use responsive web design or create a tablet (iPad) app. There are also companies such as Pressly, Onswipe and others that will convert your site into a tablet-friendly design.

But more fundamentally you should consider your site from the user perspective. Use it on a tablet. What works, what doesn’t?

There should be no Flash, first and foremost, otherwise you’ll have a big blank square on your homepage. Also consider that your site will be used in landscape and portrait modes. Also imagine the site being used with fingers and thumbs. There’s more imprecision than with a mouse. Lots of dense text with lots of links could be a problem accordingly — or buttons too close together.

Make it so your site will operate easily without heavy pinching and zooming.

Images are very important to tablet users as well. They want rich, interactive environments. Make the navigation simple and obvious. There shouldn’t be too many fields and forms.

I hate to say it but most US tablet traffic is coming from iPads. So right now you should design for the iPad and the iPad Mini. Over time there will be more Android tablets that drive traffic.

3) When should a business consider creating an app and should they always make a version for both Android and iTunes?

Something like 80% of all US tablet traffic is coming from iPads. So Apple is still the most important app platform for tablets right now. Over time Android will become more important. But build an iPad first if you’re going to build one. Then take what you’ve learned and put that into the 2.0 version plus Android.

If you’re an e-commerce site you probably should consider creating an app for a fully optimized tablet experience. Tablet users convert at higher levels than PC users.

Having said that it may not be easy to get people to download your tablet app so you’ve got to have a tablet-friendly site. Which brings us back to question #2.

The post SEMpdx SearchFest 2013 Mini-Interview: Greg Sterling appeared first on SEMpdx.

1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.
I’m VP of Growth Marketing at SEOmoz, which means I spend my day working with amazing marketers helping drive customer acquisition, engagement and retention for SEOmoz. I also work to build our brand, grow our community and evangelize a better way to do marketing.

My background is acquisition driven with a focus in paid marketing. I kicked off my time in the search industry consumed by all things PPC, and have since dabbled in SEO, community, social media marketing, analytics, and brand marketing. I have found as the years swing by I am constantly jumping into areas outside my wheelhouse. This industry breeds curious cats, and I love how supportive SEOmoz is of me trying my hand at something new.

These days I spend my time supporting a stellar team, and looking forward. How can we do things better? How can we be more efficient? How can we improve revenues? How can we help the community and our customers succeed? It’s a ton of fun. I feel super lucky.

2) What are some effective techniques for marketing to internal stakeholders?
I think internal evangelism of both mission and data have become critical to success for any organization. The last few years have shown me that it can literally make or break a quarter. As companies grow the number one risk that comes up is “a disconnect of purpose.” How can you get legacy employees to stay passionate about your goal and how can you get new employees on board and grooving fast? So much of this comes down to how you market your team and their purpose internally.

At SEOmoz we test a lot of different methods — we do digests, all hands meetings, internal documents, etc. We put top level metrics up on a huge screen in the middle of the pit. We consistently talk about how things are doing, and how we could have improved. Transparency is a great way to keep awareness of both success and challenges alive across the company.

While every company might be set up a little differently, the challenge to keep a cross-company conversation going is common. For us, it has always been about over-communicating, and then finding the best way to efficiently scale it back to be digestible. You find the data evangelizes for you. Roadblocks become clear, successes get shared, and so on. It’s a network effect to be honest. The most people you get excited about one project or result, the more people they pull in and BAM — company wide excitement and awareness euphoria!

3) How do you evaluate prospective channels for growth marketing?
This is a good one. At SEOmoz, we try not to assume too much when a new channel comes our way. The more open we can be the more chance the channel has to succeed. We do keep a piece of our budget open for testing new channels — explorative budget is key. We aren’t held to ROI for this budget so we can get creative on how best to approach a new channel – maybe its direct spend, maybe its commissioning a great piece of content for it, maybe its resourcing or staffing creative for it (designers, dev, etc.).

Evaluating a channel is as simple as running a test campaign, checking out return (which runs the gauntlet from revenue to engagement to brand awareness) and then deciding whether we have the resources to push another a test based on that first return. We are super lucky to have a culture that supports both intuition and data, because its the combination that usually guides us to either double down on a new channel or postpone investment.

I think the key piece for us is to not swim the current too often. Teams can get caught up in “the next big thing” syndrome. We continue to optimize what is working and allocate only a portion of resources and investment to new channels. As they prove worthy we throw another chip in and then another and BOOM…a new channel is born.
You have to be okay with failing at times too. Sometimes we put a channel on the docket for a quarter and it’s a wash, but you learn a lot and you get better…and that’s all you can do. That’s how great intuitions are built.

The post SEMpdx SearchFest 2013 Mini-Interview: Joanna Lord appeared first on SEMpdx.

1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.

I work with companies to help them develop measurable, high-ROI online marketing programs. The most rewarding part of my what I do is partnering with my customers to concept a conversion optimization program with them from end-to-end. Hearing their business success stories, and their personal success stories makes, me proud of what I do because I know they’re business changing results. I’m blessed to work with an incredible team at ion, and have equally as incredible clients.

2) Can you give me several characteristics that well-converting landing pages possess?

There really isn’t a one-size fits all approach for high-converting landing pages. What works for some, might not work for others and conversely. If you have a culture of experimentation and testing, then you’ll likely have a high-converting landing page program. There are some best practices that should be followed, like ensuring your pages are message matched and that the creative or brand is cohesive from the click source. If you want more than what I can cover in a mini-interview, you can get 50 landing pages best practices here. Or come to my session. : )

Landing Pages Best Practices

3) At what point should a business consider a third party solution for landing page creation / testing?

If you aren’t using a third party solution to grow or increase the sophistication of your landing page program, then it’s probably time to start considering one. Users are smart and they have expectations. They want to be served experiences that are relevant to them by their geo-graphic location. They want you to remember them when they are a return visitor. They want to be served pages that are specific to the device they are using. And so much more. A few years ago, using a 3rd party solution might not have been a necessity. Today, creating a landing page optimization program that is flexible and agile, with the sophistication your users expect is near impossible without a dedicated solution.

The post SEMpdx SearchFest 2013 Mini-Interview: Susan Delz appeared first on SEMpdx.

1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.

Academically, I have a BA in English literature, with a specialization in post-structuralist literary theory. After obtaining that extremely useful (cough) degree, I worked for a decade or so as a technical librarian, then for another decade as a web designer.

(Those three biographical details – that is, sizeable stints working on semiotics, document classification and web development – basically summarizes why I’m now talking to you about search and the semantic web.)

In 2005 I turned my attention to organic search and have never looked back. Since then I’ve worked as an in-house SEO for enterprise online gaming, ecommerce and content sites. As with many SEOs, my areas of interest and responsibility have gradually morphed into other, related realms, with analytics, conversion optimization, email marketing, social media and advertising increasingly occupying my time.

At present, I head up Internet marketing efforts at InfoMine, Inc., which serves the international mining industry (“mining” as in “rocks,” not “data”). Their portfolio includes dedicated information, news and education sites in multiple languages, so the work is varied, interesting and challenging.

While it touches on my professional activities only indirectly, I am also engrossed by the drama of digital disruption in the news and publishing businesses. My interest in Italian cuisine is equally obsessive but less perverse.

2) What would you tell somebody who won’t do structured data because “Google Will Figure It Out”.

Strictly on logical grounds, I find it perplexing that any SEO should take this position. Optimizing for search entails – among other things – making on-page changes directed at improving a site’s visibility in search results. The addition of semantic markup is just another optimization activity.

To use a relevant analogy, Google can “figure out” the subject matter of a page if the page title tag is suboptimal, or even blank. Yet, of course, few search marketers would push back against making changes to a title tag on this account. Structured data is simply another mechanism that an optimization specialist can, and should, use to help sites perform better in search.

Can Google “figure out” information without having it provided specifically in machine-readable format (because, at a fundamental level, semantic markup is about adding a data layer for machine consumption that is separate from the presentation layer provided for humans)? Sure. Kind of. Sort of. Maybe.

But by providing structured data to Google, one decreases the ambiguity that may be present in unstructured data: you’re making Google guess less. Google might figure out that in a recipe the phrase “the whole thing takes about an hour to cook” means “preparation time is equal to one hour” but it might not. Modifying the code to tell Google explicitly that “preparation time is equal to one hour” vastly improves the chances that Google indexes the recipe’s preparation time and assigns the correct value to that time. This, in turn, of course improves the chances the recipe will appear in queries that include or are filtered for preparation time.

“Helping Google figure things out” is particularly important when it comes to named entities: people, places, organizations and the like. If a web document makes a reference to “London” is this London, England or London, Ontario? You can trust Google to “figure it out” or – without being required to change the text – you can eliminate that ambiguity for the search engine, and be confident that the page has a better chance of showing up in relevant “London” queries, without marring results (and your engagement metrics) by turning up in the queries for the other London.

3) How do you see semantic markup evolving in the next 1-2 years?

Strictly on the markup side, I don’t think we’ll see any radical changes to the vocabularies and markup protocols in broad use today.

schema.org will almost certainly be extended further, but I don’t expect any radical changes to that or the Open Graph protocol in the next couple of years (if anything major does happen with schema.org I think it will revolve around better mechanisms to meaningfuly link other vocabularies, rather than big growth in the core vocabulary).

On the syntax side, it will be interesting to see if the balance tilts decisively in favor of RDFa or microdata. RDFa is certainly the more robust markup protocol and clearly better loved by semantic web developers, but less technical webmasters continue to favor microdata (and it is anything but absent in the enterprise). So long as Google continues to promote it, I think we’ll probably see microdata become more ubiquitous.

Depending on the success of the Data Highlighter program for event markup, we might see Google extend the Highlighter to other data types. And it’s possible that Bing might follow suit with a code-free data structuring mechanism of its own. In general, I think the search engines will continue to work on tools and mechanisms that make it easier for website owners to provide structured data information to them.

I’m hopeful we’ll see more – and more useful – semantic markup tools being developed in support of the search engines’ structured data initiatives. Tool development has certainly lagged behind vocabulary and syntax evolution: for example, there’s still no WordPress plugin that allows marketers to markup schema.org types inline.

I think any really big changes that we’ll see in the next one to two years won’t come in the form of changes to semantic markup, but the uses that the search engines make of it.

Expect further enhancements to Google’s Knowledge Graph and Bing’s Snapshots. The most exciting prospect here (of which we’ve already seen some signs) is site-level data starting to inform the Knowledge Graph, and even links being generated from Knowledge Graph results to the sites that contribute to it. That is, Wikipedia and Freebase-derived information may increasingly be augmented with other qualified structured data sources.

And the $64,000 question (give or take a few zeros) still hovering in the air is “whither Facebook?” Graph Search is all fine and well, but at this point its utility still seems limited to the walled garden that is Facebook, and Bing results have been only nominally enhanced in the process. But there’s a veritable gold mine of structured data available via the Graph API if Facebook and its partners can figure out how to profitably leverage it.

The post SEMpdx SearchFest 2013 Mini-Interview: Aaron Bradley appeared first on SEMpdx.

1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.
I am the SEO Manager for Disney Interactive Entertainment. We cover most of the entertainment sites for The Walt Disney Company, including Disney Channel and Disney Studios.

2) What is Facebook Open Graph and why should we care?
Open Graph allows you to manage how your webpages look when shared in Facebook. It is also used by other social media platforms, including Twitter and Google Plus. The launch of Graph Search suggests tagging your content in Facebook friendly way will become even more important.

3) In 2013, how well can one correlate proper semantic structuring with increases in web traffic?
It depends. A couple of things we have seen.

If your site has recipes, products, and/or reviews, you can see an improved click through rate with rich snippets in the SERPs.

The pages that have proper semantic structure also seem to show up for the correct query. We used to see Flash games show up in Video results. Once we marked those pages up with the correct Schema.org markup, the SERPs suddenly looked a lot better.

The post SEMpdx SearchFest 2013 Mini-Interview: Jeff Preston appeared first on SEMpdx.

1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.

I’m the Founder and CEO of Define Media Group, specializing in enterprise search marketing and strategic audience development. I’ve been involved in search since 1997, was the Chief Search Strategist for About.com from 1999-2011 of which the last five were spent quarterbacking all search strategy initiatives for the New York Times Company portfolio. Define Media Group started in 2005 and officially broke off from the NYTCo in January of 2011. Define works with many of the most influential brands and networks in the world.

2) How does somebody learn SEO in 2013?

Read, execute, learn.

There are exceptional sources of information covering these topics too (and as always some not so good) to learn intro and advanced techniques. For example, intro info from SEOMoz.org is some of the best out there but as best practice strategies evolve, fracture, and re-focus, seeking out specialists in the industry is critical for advanced learning and industry networking. AJ Kohn’s site https://blindfiveyearold.com/ is an incredible repository for all things G+/Authorship/SEO related. If your travels take you to the land of Structured Data, Aaron Bradley and https://www.seoskeptic.com/ is the best in the space. John Doherty is really becoming a great technical SEO and Phil Nottingham is the person to follow for video SEO, Annie Cushing for data analysis and all things Excel. If mobile strategy is important, Cindy Krum at https://www.mobilemoxie.com/ is a must-read. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention our blog at Define’s site that focuses on our extensive expertise with big data and enterprise SEO. The point is no one site can address every need, agenda or strategy so seek out the vertical experts.

3) People say that SEO has evolved from more of a technical pursuit to a marketing pursuit. What’s your opinion about this?

All SEO roads lead through tech and metrics, so it has been, so it shall be. You need a change site wide? You have to navigate the technical landscape which entails understanding how a particular team manages and prioritizes their roadmap. Once changes are implemented it has to be quantified and that means data analysis through metrics. However marketing, learning how to reach, engage and retain a particular audience, is obviously very important and no way inferior to technical pursuits. I see these all as equally important pieces of the greater SEO and Audience Development pie and more an exercise in campaign management, risk assessment and resource allocation.

The post SEMpdx SearchFest 2013 Mini-Interview: Marshall Simmonds appeared first on SEMpdx.

1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.
I’ve spent last 12 years connecting consumers and businesses through search engine marketing, digital advertising and social media. During 7 of those years I travelled the world as Microsoft’s Digital Marketing Evangelist talking about the industry, dissecting the issues and providing a platform for thought leaders to discuss trends and offer their advice on what’s coming next. I left Microsoft in 2012 to start Delightful Communications, a social media integration, digital PR and personal branding consultancy based in Seattle. I love doing digital for a living.

2) How did you evangelize AdCenter to the hordes of people who saw AdWords as the only valid PPC platform?
Back in 2006 when adCenter (now Bing Ads) launched, Microsoft had a tiny market share, but many in the industry relished a new player who would try and push the envelope and provide some kind of complimentary platform. We started with a blog on Windows Live Spaces (remember that?!) and a forum, and made it our mission to “help advertisers help themselves”. Customer service, engagement and timely responses were hugely important to that mission. We really saw the opportunity to differentiate through really listening to customers and building trust. I then got invited to speak at more conferences and worked on building my personal brand on MelCarson.com. Customers and potential customers valued having a “face” they could identify with and approach instead of just a logo. It was a long few years of chipping away before Bing caught up and the Yahoo! Search Alliance was struck, but the rest, as they say, is history.

3) How is social media a platform for brand evangelism?
Social media provides a mechanism for both a one-to-one and one-to-many dialogue. My mantra has always been to make helpful and relevant content and messaging discoverable and sharable through digital means. Don’t make the mistake of setting up your channels, crossing your fingers and hoping for it all to go viral. Integrating your social channels into your other marketing channels will help amplify the essence behind your products and services beyond others who don’t, simply because you’re giving them a chance to be found more easily and shared for longer. Social media is a fantastic tool for building relationships with potential brand advocates and ambassadors. With the right chemistry, these advocates can help you propel your brand into the consciousness of customers and potential customers you’d never even thought of.

BTW, for those who don’t know…Mel was the dashing young gentleman in this Joe Cocker video:

The post SEMpdx SearchFest 2013 Mini-Interview: Mel Carson appeared first on SEMpdx.