Many brands are wary of exposing themselves on social media sites, but as anyone who’s been involved in social media for more than five minutes knows, they’re too late. In today’s SearchDay, "The Role of the Brand in Social Media Marketing," Userplane's Mike Jones shares seven social marketing tactics to help your brand "get social" and join the conversation:
1. Boost the Fun Factor 2. See the Forest and the Trees 3. Widgets are Welcome 4. Conversation is King 5. Engage 6. Research and Listen 7. Don’t Go It Alone
The Internet is a speeding freight train. If newspapers, and for that matter all traditional media, don’t begin immediately to think drastically different, the train will pass them by. In today’s Link Love column, “Google is an Optimist. Newspapers are Pessimists.,” Sage Lewis explains why today’s newspapers have to stop making incremental moves while expecting gigantic results. They simply must become the center of innovation, courage and change.
The biggest Search Engine Strategies conference of the year will be held the week of March 17 in New York City. Whether this will be your first SES New York, or the fifth one in a row that youve attended since 2004, you might appreciate some free advice on schedule optimization.
One look at the conference at a glance will tell you why. There are more than 70 workshops, keynotes, panels and sessions over the four-day Search Engine Strategies conference. And, on the fifth day, there are an additional six SEM training classes following SES New York.
Since there are five concurrent tracks during the four-day Search Engine Strategies conference and three concurrent workshops during the fifth day of SEM training, no one can attend everything. This is not daunting to the first-time attendee. It is also a challenge to someone like me, who attended SES New York in 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007. Im looking at last years conference handbook and this years conference at a glance and more than 70% of the sessions are new!
Now, Danny Sullivan programmed last years show and Kevin Ryan organized this years agenda. But, thats only one of the factors driving the dramatic changes in the content at the event.
On the last day of last years Search Engine Strategies conference in New York City, Google announced its $3.1 billion acquisition of DoubleClick, which is still pending. A couple of weeks later, Yahoo! acquired the remaining 80% of Right Media for $680 million. Then, last May, Microsoft acquired aQuantive for $6 billion. Last July, Microsoft acquired AdECN for an undisclosed amount of money and in September, Yahoo! acquired BlueLithium for $300 million in cash. Then, on Feb. 1 of this year, Microsoft proposed to acquire Yahoo! for $44.6 billion.
Thats a lot of M&A news for the industry to digest and our search engine marketing definition needs to be rewritten this year.
And our search engine optimization definition needs to be totally rewritten, too.
About a month after last years SES New York, Google announced its critical first steps toward a universal search model that offers users a more integrated and comprehensive way to search for and view information online. It was the biggest thing to hit the search engine marketing industry since Googles Florida Update in November 2003.
In June 2007, Ask3D was launched. In September 2007, Microsoft launched its biggest update to Live Search since its debut in January 2005. And in October 2007, an all new Yahoo! Search experience was launched.
Meanwhile, comScore reports that YouTube, Google Image Search, Google Maps and Google News are approaching 1.6 billion searches a month, which is more than Live Search. In other words, Google (6.2 billion searches a month) is the #1 search engine, Yahoo! (2.4 billion) is #2, YouTube and all other Google expanded search sites (1.6 billion) would be #3, and Microsofts Live Search (1 billion) is #4.
So, is it any wonder that even SES alumni are heading back to New York?
So, to help industry veterans as well as search newbies, Ive put together the optimized schedule below for the Search Engine Strategies conference that starts on Saint Patricks Day in the Big Apple.
Now, when you get to SES New York, youll make adjustments on the fly. As Bob Shirilla of Keepsakes Etc. told me at SES Chicago back in December, I had a detailed game plan when I came to SES, but Im calling a lot of audibles.
Nevertheless, schedule optimization will help you get the return on marketing investment that youre looking for. Here are the workshops, keynotes, panels and sessions that Id recommend:
Day 1 – Monday, March 17, 2008
9:30-10:45am Creating Compelling Ads Organic Listings Forum
11:15am-12:30pm Analytics: Data Into Action Igniting Viral Campaigns
2:00-3:15pm Web Analytics: Measuring Success Auditing Paid Listings and Click Fraud Issues
3:45-5:00pm Orion Panel: Getting Vertical Search Right
Day 2 – Tuesday, March 18, 2008
9:00-10:00am Conference Welcome and Opening Keynote Nick Carr, author of The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google
Nick Carr, SES New York 2008, The Big Switch
11:00am-12:15pm Introduction to Search Engine Marketing Ads in a Quality Score World
1:30-2:45pm Orion Panel: Universal Search
3:15-4:30pm (Sponsored Sessions) Hitwise: Know about Your Competitors’ Paid and Organic Traffic Google: What’s new with Google Analytics and Website Optimizer?
12:45-1:45pm Meet the Crawlers Video Search Optimization
But wait! Theres more!
On Friday, March 21, there are six half-day SEM training classes, which can be taken in addition to the SES New York conference or independently at an additional cost.
Again, look over the descriptions of each workshop to see which ones are for you. But, here are the SEM training classes that Id recommend:
8:00am-12:00pm Link and Reputation Workshop Optimizing for Universal Search
1:00-5:00pm Search & Analytics Workshop: Using Analytics to Increase Search Effectiveness The 7 Step RSS/Content Syndication/SEO Strategy
If you register for the Search Engine Strategies conference by tomorrow, Friday, Feb. 29, you can save $150. Conference attendees get free access to Market Motive training and Bruce Clay tools. And, if you attend SES New York, you could win a Scion xB! A free drawing will take place on Wednesday, March 19, in the Expo Hall.
I should disclose that Search Engine Strategies is now a client, but Ive been writing about SES since 2002, when the March event was still held in Boston.
The search engine marketing industry has been totally transformed since then. For example, the keynote speaker at my first Search Engine Strategies conference was from Terra Lycos.
Remember them?
Thats why both industry veterans as well as search newbies will be heading to SES New York in a couple of weeks. The newbies will want to learn everything they can. And the veterans need to relearn most of what was being taught just a few years ago.
Greg Jarboe of SEO-PR and Amanda Watlington of Searching for Profit at SES London 2008
Want a snapshot of the day’s search marketing news? Here we’ve collected today’s top news stories posted to the Search Engine Watch Blog, along with search-related headlines from around the Web:
From the SEW Blog:
7 Ways Brands Can “Get Social” Many brands are wary of exposing themselves on social media sites, but as anyone who’s been involved in social media for more than five minutes knows, they’re too late.
Yahoo this week changed the way it will set minimum bids on some keywords in Sponsored Search ads in the U.S., bringing it closer in line with Google’s policy. Instead of setting all minimum bids at $0.10, Yahoo will now allow the market to set a variable minimum bid. That means that in some cases, the minimum will be above $0.10, and in other cases it could be lower.
The minimum bids will be set based on the relevance of ads to a keyword, the number of bidders and their bid amounts. It will not be based on advertiser conversions. These kinds of factors are already used by Yahoo to rank ads based on a quality score, but the difference now applies to the minimum bid, or reserve price.
Google changed its minimum bid structure in July 2005. Many advertisers were not happy with the move at the time, but so far there does not seem to be much outcry in blogs or search marketing forums.
A key difference between Yahoo’s new method and Google’s is the institution of alerts and a grace period when the bid on a given keyword is about to fall below the minimum. Yahoo will notify advertisers in their Account Dashboard if a bid is about to drop below the minimum, and will offer a grace period of up to a few days to allow the advertiser to raise their bid to keep the keyword active.
The first batch of keywords goes live in the U.S. with the new reserve pricing model over the next few weeks, with more keywords to be added internationally in the future.
