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Justin Seibert: They Said What? Protect Your Reputation With Search Engine Marketing

Published by
Paul Woodhouse
at August 16, 2007 in Live Blogging, Search Marketing and Speakers. 0 Comments

Justin Seibert

Justin is the President of Direct Online Marketing™ a full-service internet marketing firm specializing in results-based internet marketing. Read Justin’s full bio here.
And here we have the highlight of the whole day/afternoon/year. Well I have to say that considering Justin is my boss. And what a great guy he is to boot. No, really.

Two distinct elements of search results – Natural or Organic Listings vs Paid Listings.

Reputation management is an interesting angle to explain how search engine results work. And don’t think reputation management isn’t something you don’t need to bother with. If you’re online you have an online reputation.

http://www.providianfinancialsucks.com/

Consider your online footprint on places such as Facebook and Myspace etc. Beware befriending big green frogs.

How to combat bad press in a Michael Vick stylee:

Setup an SEM campaign – buy your name/company employee names.

Comment on blogs etc.

Optimized Online Press Releases.

Ensure your site is updated – there are no rocks to hise under online.

Track online conversations such as Technorati and Google Alerts.

http://www.vickletthedogsout.com/ Push other sites out of the listings by creating positive sites to compete with them.

AFTER THE EVENT:

Buy certain keywords such as dog fighting in Vick’s case. Specialized landing pages. Check DMCA.

QUESTIONS:

How do you optimize Press Releases?

Can be used to increase natural search listings. Use keywords in press release and link back to the press release. FOLLOW UP – concentrate optimization efforts in top part of press release including title. Put it on Web site and distribute through newswires such as www.pr.com. Always worth it to pay a little more for links back.

What is local searching and how does it work?

Geo targetting. Choose where you want your ads to show in PPC. Can be done geographically or by points on a map. Natural search use geographical terms in site to be picked up by engines.

And don’t forget to take your free subscription to Search Marketing Standard.

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Elton John: Irrelevant

Published by
Paul Woodhouse
at August 6, 2007 in Internet and Search Marketing. 0 Comments

Elton John

Well we might as well just go ahead and cancel our conference as Sir Elton of the John has decreed that the Internet should be closed down.

According to an article in The Sun:

He claims it is destroying good music, saying: “The internet has stopped people from going out and being with each other, creating stuff.”

“Instead they sit at home and make their own records, which is sometimes OK but it doesn’t bode well for long-term artistic vision.”

“It’s just a means to an end.”

“We’re talking about things that are going to change the world and change the way people listen to music and that’s not going to happen with people blogging on the internet.”

“I mean, get out there — communicate.”

“Hopefully the next movement in music will tear down the internet.”

“Let’s get out in the streets and march and protest instead of sitting at home and blogging.”

“I do think it would be an incredible experiment to shut down the whole internet for five years and see what sort of art is produced over that span.”

“There’s too much technology available.”

“I’m sure, as far as music goes, it would be much more interesting than it is today.”

Elton, Elton, Elton. I’ve never particularly held you up as an ambassador of musical or hair-piece decency, but it always comes across as a little bit sad when somebody dismisses everything related to the Internet wholesale.

The fact that people can now control their own means of musical distribution, marketing and production bypassing the big recording conglomerates is the best thing that has ever happened to music. Was artistic musical vision always supposed to be measured by the yardstick of some grumpy old tart who churned out Crocodile Rock?

Elton, you probably have a place somewhere in the vast musical cannon, and it’s most probably as its damp gunpowder, but I wouldn’t dream of wishing music to be closed down for a period of five years just to see what we’d come up with instead of Elton John.

It wouldn’t be so bad if you practiced what you preached. Your whole back catalog is available for download online and you also streamed your gig at Madison Square Gardens over the Internet. This is akin to you espousing vegetarianism and calling for meat to be banned then being seen pigging out on pork chops.

So you don’t like blogging, you think modern music sucks, and your last album wasn’t exactly a hot cake. Perhaps the latter explains your bitterness towards the Internet?

I come across people like Sir Elton quite often. I don’t mean chubby, be-wigged rock behemoths whose star is fading, but people who regard the Internet as being a complete and utter waste of time, effort and space.

For example, the number of people I’ve spoken to who’ve had a Website built only for them to subsequently dismiss the Internet out of hand when they receive no leads or hits is quite a few. The debate as to who is at fault can be left for another day. Imagine writing-off cars as a mode of transport because you failed to put in any gas.

Now, you can be forgiven if you didn’t know you had to put gas in the thing, but not if it’s been well and truly explained in advance that gas was a functional prerequisite.

The whole idea behind Online Marketing: Innovations that Work is to help you not only understand you need gas, but to show you what kinds of gas there are available and how each one can impact the running of your car differently.

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Spurious and Curious Reasons to Attend SEM Conferences

Published by
Paul Woodhouse
at August 2, 2007 in Conference News and Search Marketing. 0 Comments

So what are the obvious benefits of attending conferences? Other than rubbing shoulders with the good and the great, a spot of networking and a free feed that is.

Thankfully, Lee Odden has saved me the time and effort of taxing myself with any flickers of free original thought by already discussing his ten secret benefits of attending SEM conferences.

It’s geared more to people inside the industry so I shall cherry-pick just a few points.

Competitive intelligence – As you play the meet and greet game, you’ll undoubtedly run into employees from competing firms. Be sure to ask lots of questions. Smile, be friendly and engaging. Remember how important it is to be a great listener and remember: Loose lips sink ships! Also be sure to get PPTs from direct competitors, especially from their “new” speakers, who tend to want to impress and often include more information than they should. Also, some speakers don’t provide the conference organizer with copies of their PPTs. Don’t let that stop you! What do you think that pocket camera is for?

So it’s obviously quite easy for those of you not in the industry to tell those who are by their inane grins and furtive expressions. It’s similar to those sales folks at trade shows, armed with barcode scanners, whose first line of eye contact is to your nametag. I know that’s what nametags are for, but look me in the eye when you start talking to me. You’re not there just to prove to your head of sales that you’ve got some prospects.

Sales Training – Not really, but sorta. If you’re breaking into an aspect of search marketing that is somewhat new to you, pay attention to how your better versed competition explains themselves, their company and services, I mean advice, during presentations. The fact is, metaphors, analogies and a good story can go a long way towards explaining complex or unique SEM topics when you’re selling. Why bother making up your own when you can steal (argh, I mean borrow) them from the competition? (Reworked with your own information of course.)

Now you’d like to think you’re going to come away from a conference knowing slightly more than you did on arrival. And that goes for everyone. But I know how important it is to use stories and metaphors when talking about to the uninitiated about all that stuff that flies over their heads. Remember – your clients aren’t stupid because they don’t understand your gobbledygook. It’s our job to translate this stuff into understandable palatable chunks.

It’s a Vacation! – Convincing your boss that the next Search Marketing conference will infuse your brain with super secret SEO ninja knowledge might just get you closer to that partially all expenses paid mini-vacation to New York, Seattle, San Jose, Stockholm (don’t you have clients with Swedish sounding names?), Bejing or even London. Pull that off and you’re famous. At least until you get fired because you went to too many parties and didn’t pay attention during sessions.

I would never be so unkind as to ask where exactly Pittsburgh ranks on the vacate-ometer, but the Hilton Garden Inn looked mighty fine as I drove past on my way to Ikea last weekend. Personally, I’m more excited about this type of knowledge reaching slightly different areas. This kind of thing isn’t just for those coast-dwellers y’know.

If there are any other secret benefits you can come up with, please feel free to share them in the comments.

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How to take over the world by keeping schtum

Published by
Paul Woodhouse
at July 5, 2007 in Mobile Marketing and Search Marketing. 0 Comments

Looking at the iPhone as an alpha, it’s a heck of a feat. Gorgeous. Groundbreaking. Full of promise and a lot of delivery. Unfortunately, we’re paying for a full-release version.

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Obviously Google gets on with Apple a whole lot better than it does with Ebay, unless their last attempt at crashing a party left them smarting like a roundly spanked buttock. It seems everybody has managed to do everything with the iPhone this weekend apart from marry it or eat it. There’s also been an inordinate amount of mindless guff spouted about it; and all the while Google has been quietly going about its business building the mother of all telecommunications infrastructures.

As Apple changes the world one slogan at a time, Google does it in a state of denial. Here’s a few interesting snippets from an even more interesting article relating to what they’re putting together:

“They have enough potential capacity to compete in wholesale telecommunications or as an Internet service provider,” says Eric Schoonover, senior analyst at Washington, D.C.-based TeleGeography Research, a consultancy that tracks fibre holdings.

The company [Google] is estimated to have between 40 and 70 data centres filled to the brim with computing and storage power, with at least five new facilities under construction in the United States alone. By comparison, Canada’s second-largest telephone company Telus Corp., has eight.

The search company is building its data centres next to hydroelectric facilities in order to feed their huge power needs, he said. All that capability will soon be turned against telephone and cable companies, which is why firms such as Telus and Bell need to merge — they’ll need the extra girth to mount a defence against Google.

“They’re looking to come in and completely usurp the telcos at both the business level and the consumer level,” Mr. Entwistle said.

It’s quite obvious that Google are up to something and I’m presuming they aren’t acquiring all this infrastructure just to do a spot of telco-squatting. And have Google just bought out GrandCentral, a voice communications management solutions company, because they had a bit of spare cash lying about?

It could be said that if Apple is trying to change the world then Google is trying to take it over. I’m not averse to a universe dependent on all things Google and I’m sure they might even make quite a decent fist of being a telecommunications behemoth. I know that I’d rather sign with them than AT&T or Time Warner.

You must, however, question what is going on in principal.

We got a bit of a taste of the bitter pill that could be Google world domination over the Sicko debacle this week. They started by offering to counter Sicko searches with health industry ads, then they got called on it, then they went into full retraction mode sending employees off to watch Michael Moore’s film – I sincerely hope during work hours.

But, thinking on, Google world domination would have none of the three elements above. They’d simply be doing it all in secret and manipulating results to show the highest bidder. Google has every right to have somebody make a mistake on one of their blogs and retract it after other forces on the internet kick up a bit of a stink. So long as we have an internet along those lines then I think we’re going to be just fine.

I bet Google just wished they could hire somebody with a Phd in common sense.

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Internet Marketing Terms Glossary

Published by
Paul Woodhouse
at July 3, 2007 in Coordinating Marketing Efforts and Search Marketing. 0 Comments

Internet marketing terms glossary

 

 

Everything you ever wanted to know about internet marketing but you were way too afraid to ask (or just couldn’t be bothered) can be found lurking in this complete A-Z of internet marketing terms glossary.

Honestly, it really does have everything in there; and anything it doesn’t you can ask about in the comments.

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