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July 28, 2005
The SEW Forums & SES San Jose 2005
Our Search Engine Watch Forums just turned a year old last month, and SES along with other search-related events has a home there, the SEM Related Organizations & Events section. That's a great place to visit if you want to see if there are any discussions going on or to comment on the show or things on this blog.
SES San Jose 2005: Who's Going, Where Ya Staying? is an existing thread where people are swapping advice on hotels and just saying that they'll be there. For the recreationally inclined, SES San Jose 2005: Parties, Events & Gatherings is to serve as a central swapping point about activities such as the special events listed here and others.
That general place is also the place to watch if you can't make it out, for some reason. Barry Schwartz, AKA forum moderator rustybrick, will be busy with what's become his traditional live coverage of select sessions.
Categories: San Jose 05: Parties & Networking
Copyright & Trademarks - SES San Jose 2005
I love the legal aspects of search. It's intriguing to see how old laws are applied to this new medium, sometimes usefully, sometimes showing how archaic they are. Jeffrey K. Rohrs of Optiem loves the legal aspect as well. He was one of our earliest SES attendees and a recovering attorney who asked me way back when if I thought our audiences would like a panel on legal issues. Would they ever, I said! I'd done a "hands up" audience poll not too long before this and found that plenty of people wanted to know about search and the law.
Jeffrey's been diligently pulling together panels on various legal issues for years now at the show. Copyright & Trademarks is a new one for SES San Jose 2005. It will revisit some of the common issues that come up about bidding for ads to show up for terms that are also trademarks, something we've explored before. But it will also take a deep look at copyright issues. How can you keep links to infringing material out of search engines and what to do if someone says you're infringing? The panel will explore.
Eric Goldman, Assistant Professor of Law, Marquette University School of Law and Deborah A. Wilcox, Partner, Baker & Hostetler are two great legal experts we've had in the past on our legal panels, bringing their thoughts and experience to this session. Joining them is Jennifer Slegg of JenSense.com, AKA Jenstar who moderates at our SEW Forums, where she recently posted a ton of advice for those who find their content has been stolen.
Spanish Language Search Marketing Tactics - SES San Jose 2005
We've done sessions on targeting the Hispanic and Latino market for some time, to try and help search marketers understand this important audience they may be missing. Now we're trying something different. We're going beyond the opportunity and diving more into the actual tactics of reaching out, in our new Spanish Language Search Marketing Tactics for SES San Jose 2005.
Barbara C. Coll AKA WebMama.com will kick off and moderate the session, with Nacho Hernandez of iHispanic and Lucas Morea of LatinEdge sharing tips and tactics. All three have been part of our previous sessions on targeting Hispanics and have lots of passion and knowledge on the subject.
Check them out! Then check out more next year at our first SES Latino show in Miami, which Nacho -- moderator of our Multilingual Search Markets & Non-US Engines are of the SEW Forums -- is chairing that show.
July 27, 2005
Mobile Search - SES San Jose 2005
The search engines understand how important mobile devices have become, and they've responded with an increasing number of moves to get stake out the search space on our PDAs and phones. New for SES San Jose 2005, Mobile Search will look at what's going on in the space.
America Online, Google and Yahoo are all confirmed to spend up to 10 minutes each explaining what they are doing in the mobile search space. How do they gather content? What are things site owners should be thinking about? These will be addressed.
Nokia will share thoughts on how it see search shaping up as a leading maker of mobile devices. Then our own Gary Price of the Search Engine Watch Blog will conclude the presentations with a rundown on interesting mobile search developments that he's seen. The session will then have a good 40 minutes or so for Q&A and discussion.
July 26, 2005
Site Clinic - SES San Jose 2005
Our Site Clinic session is so popular that we usually repeat it a couple of times during our shows. But for SES San Jose 2005, Site Clinic happens only once, at the very end of the show on the fourth day. What's up with that -- and what's it all about, anyway? Good news, all around.
Site Clinic is a PowerPoint-free zone. Come grab a seat, and veteran clinicians Jake Baillie of TrueLocal and Christine Churchill of KeyRelevance will take volunteers to have their sites reviewed for search engine optimization advice, going live on the web to review and check on things. Put up your hand, and you might be one of the lucky ones.
Jake and Christine have paired up plenty in the past for this session -- and in New York, they pulled our second highest session rating, a 4.8 score with 5.0 being perfect. They won't disappoint you. And moderating things with be the hard-working editor-in-chief of Search Engine Guide, Jennifer Laycock.
So why does this session come last? Because many, many questions get answered in other sessions, some of which have live review components as well. It comes last so that the real stumper questions can get dealt with.
Why no repeats this time? We're trying a new Usability Clinic that I'll tell you more about shortly. We also have the new Pimp My Site! session, which will put a new twist on Site Clinic by seeing how a site can be overhauled in advance. I'll also be coming back with more about that session soon, as well.
Vertical Creep Into Regular Search Results - SES San Jose 2005
The Invisible Tabs are coming! The Invisible Tabs are coming! That's what I was shouting about back in 2003, a term I made up to try and communicate the fact that vertical search was coming fast into "regular" results.
I spoke once in a SES keynote in 2004 about wanting to shake marketers physically by the arms to help them understand the dramatic change that will happen when vertical results usurp the "normal" ones. It came up again at our Evening Forum in SES New York 2005. If a picture will help, then see my recent article on how Yahoo's My Web results are an example of this change.
The battle to help search marketers understand the changes vertical search is bringing continues with at our SES San Jose 2005. The Vertical Creep Into Regular Search Results session features Greg Jarboe of SEO-PR who has long been preaching vertical religion to help further illustrate how things are shifting and what search marketers should do to react.
Gord Hotchkiss of Enquiro, a self-confessed eye-tracking junkie, will follow pushing some of his eye-tracking data to show how searchers are interacting with regular results when vertical listings are integrated into them.
Brian Mark from Toolbarn.com will then share how by going vertical, he also ended up getting better visibility in regular listings.
Yahoo will then share some comments on how they are integrating vertical results into listings, with Google invited to take part and do the same as well.
After this, we've got about a half-hour for Q&A and discussion.
July 25, 2005
Beyond ROI: Getting Creative With Search - SES San Jose 2005
Conversion, conversion, conversion! Are you sick of having to always think about conversions as a search marketer? Wouldn't it be cool if you could just spend, spend, spend and not worry about ROI?
Actually, some people are doing just that. I wrote on our SEW Blog recently about talking at a conference where a brand marketer talked about being willing to spend tons of money without worrying about any particular conversion. Gasp, horror was the reaction from the conversion-oriented folks in attendance.
In reality, even the brand marketer is looking for a conversion, some type of metric to show brand lift. But that's different that the typical conversion of product sales that many search marketers focus on.
Our new Beyond ROI: Getting Creative With Search is designed to let marketers forget that direct ROI for a bit. What fun, cool things can be done with search? Our panelists will discuss things such as tie-ins with buzz generated off of television, tapping into news events, generating public relations impacts and making use of search to create brand lift and offline sales.
Our panelists each have 15 minutes to wow you with tales of moving beyond ROI. They are:
- Stephen Anderson of MSHC/Rock Coast Media
- Cam Balzer of Performics
- James Colborn of Inceptor
- Anne Frisbie of Yahoo Search Marketing
Come check out the stories and after the presentations, the remaining 25 minutes or so will be spent on Q&A and discussion.
Link Building Clinic - SES San Jose 2005
Our "clinic" session are always very popular at our SES shows, and returning among them for SES San Jose 2005 is the Link Building Clinic.
Unlike our four other link-related sessions, Link Building Clinic is completely PowerPoint-free. In it, panelists Eric Ward, Debra Mastaler of Alliance-Link.com and Thomas Bindl of OPTOP will take questions about linking and go live on the web as needed to respond.
This is a good time to mention our session scoring system. We ask attendees to rate sessions on a scale of 1 to 5. We aim for a session to be 4.0 or higher -- meaning it was good (4.0) to excellent (5.0).
At our New York show, 78 percent of our sessions (50 out of 64) rated 4.0 or higher. The median session score of all sessions was 4.2. In other words, the vast majority of our sessions are rated good by attendees.
And Link Building Clinic? It was our top rated session in New York, pulling a 4.9! I'm sure we'll see the audiences loving it again in San Jose.
Meet The Blog Search Engines - SES San Jose 2005
Interest in blog and feed search is probably at an all time high, so our Meet The Blog Search Engines panel comes at a good time for SES San Jose 2005.
As I explained earlier, we've had panels on blogging and search since 2003. But blog and news search reps moved to their own panel at our New York show earlier this year, and now a further split puts news search engines into the Meet The News Search Engines panel and blog search engines into their own. Both are part of the News, PR & Blogs Track on Day 2 of the show.
The change means there's even more time to drill deep. For the blog search engines panel, each of the panelists will do a short 7 minute overview for marketers about how they gather and list content, along with any advertising opportunities that are offered. The confirmed panelists are:
- Mark Fletcher of BlogLines
- Greg Linden of Findory
- Jim Pitkow of Moreover
- Scott Rafer of Feedster
- David Sifry of Technorati
After the presentations, there will be about 40 minutes for Q&A and discussion, so the audience can drive things towards areas of most interest.
Linking Strategies - SES San Jose 2005
Earlier I covered our special Day 3 track on linking. New for SES San Jose 2005 as part of that track is Linking Strategies. This session will focus on things to consider about internal and external linking outside the realm of buying links, which is covered in the separate Buying & Selling Links panel. From the session description:
How far is too far in optimizing your internal link structure? If you operate a network of sites, can natural interlinking be perceived as link spam? How should you handle affiliate links? Advanced linking issues like these and more will be explored during this session.
Greg Boser of WebGuerrilla, Debra Mastaler of Alliance-Link.com and Eric Ward are all popular veterans of the old Advanced Link Building Forum session that this new session replaces. The change of focus means they'll each have more time to explore particular strategies they want to share with the audience.
Chris Boggs of G3 Group (and moderator of our SEW Forums Link Building area) and Mike Grehan of Smart Interactive (and popular veteran of our Link Building Basics session) will also be on the panel to add additional viewpoints for when we shift into the Q&A discussion period, which will last for about 45 minutes.
Converting Visitors Into Buyers - SES San Jose 2005
Converting Visitors Into Buyers is one of our long-standing sessions, running now for at least four years if not longer at the show. It comes back to SES San Jose 2005 and is designed as an introduction to why you need to think beyond just getting the traffic to your site. You can get people through search, but that's only half the battle. Whether you'll win depends on whether you convert your visitors. Bryan Eisenberg of Future Now -- and coauthor of the new book Call To Action -- and Mike Sack of Inceptor are the long-time and highly rated veterans of this panel who will talk about ways to win that conversion, especially for those doing search marketing.
Local Search Ads - SES San Jose 2005
As I wrote before, we've had panels on local search for nearly two years at the show. But Local Search Ads is something new for SES San Jose 2005. It comes at the end of our Local Search Track on Day 3 of the show and provides a close up look at the ad side of local search.
America Online, Verizon SuperPages and Yahoo Search Marketing are all confirmed to lead off the session with short overviews of their local ad products, which range from things like pay-per-click in locally specific results to pay-per-call. Google is also invited to be on the panel, and I think it's fairly likely they'll confirm for this, as well.
After the search engines, Andreas Ramos of Intrapromote, Brad Geddes of LocalLaunch.com and Zorik Gordon of ReachLocal will have short presentations sharing some tactics from their search marketing experiences, ranging from tips on doing local targeting logistically, how to decide the distance to go, writing ads for local players and other advice.
After the presentations, the session will have about a 1/2 hour for Q&A and discussion.
In House Forum & In House Track - SES San Jose 2005
I still get the occasional person who says to me, "Oh, SES, it's full of SEOs." It's not, that is, if you take SEOs to mean only those who do SEO work for others. There are a ton of "in house" SEO people who do work for their own companies at the show, and the numbers are growing all the time. I know, because I talk to them and hear from them directly about wanting more content just for the in house person.
Enter our our new "In House Track" for Day 3 of the show. It kicks off with the Big Site/Big Brand SEM and Working Together sessions that I've mentioned before on the blog, which revolve around in house issues. The track ends with the In House Forum, a PowerPoint-free zone. It's 90 minutes of pure Q&A. I've got a number of panelists, some from the previous sessions and some new. The line-up:
- Mary S. Bettinson, Web Marketing Director, N.A.D.A. Guides
- Bill Hartzer, SEO, Intec Telecom Systems
- Bill Hunt, President/CEO, Global Strategies International
- Martin Laetsch, Manager, Worldwide Search, Intel Corporation
- Mike Moran, Distinguished Engineer and Manager of Site Architecture, IBM
- Marshall D. Simmonds, VP Enterprise Search Marketing, New York Times
- Kathleen Stockham, Marketing Director, Best Buy
- Dustin Woodard, SEO & Web Analytics Manager, allrecipes.com
All of these people deal with search marketing from within their own organizations. They'll be looking forward to your questions on any in house-specific topics you want to raise -- and if they don't have answers, we'll go to the audience to see if there are others who can contribute.
Working Together - SES San Jose 2005
Working Together is a first time out session for SES San Jose 2005 and one that almost deserves the secondary title of "Ego Management" or "Jedi Mind Tricks To Win Search Marketing Buy-In."
If only it were so easy to have Jedi powers to convince your marketing or IT department to do what you know is best, when it comes to search marketing. In lieu of that, we have some speakers with advice to help.
Bill Hunt and Mike Moran from IBM, who I mentioned talking on our Big Site/Big Brand SEM session, get to drill down deeper into how they've won approval for changes. Marshall D. Simmonds from the Big Site panel also returns to this one. Marshall won sign-off ages ago for his SEO work with About.com. Now that he's picked up the new challenge of overseeing changes for the New York Times, he'll share fresh insights on making friends and smoothing the way for search marketing. Kathleen Stockham from Best Buy will also be on the panel will share her experiences building support for search marketing at all levels.
We'll then go into Q&A for about 40 minutes, with Bill Hartzer from Intec Telecom Systems taking part in that. It's not uncommon that I'll have panels where some speakers are only taking part in Q&A. My goal with presentations is to help set up a number of issues and especially provide common answers. But Q&A is also crucial, just as important as presentations, because you never know what an audience is most interested in. I like to have diversity of opinions for that, hence having Q&A-only panelists.
Big Site/Big Brand SEM - SES San Jose 2005
Big Site/Big Brand SEM is one of our popular sessions that is returning to SES San Jose 2005. As the title says, if you have to deal with issues applying to a giant web site or oversee work for a major brand, this is the session for you. It especially looks at what you might call "industrial-strength" or "enterprise" search marketing from the perspective of those who do this work in house.
Bill Hunt and Mike Moran kick things off looking at how a giant brand with multiple big sites, IBM, deals with ensuring it is search engine friendly despite having over 20 languages that it publishes in, not to mention multiple departments with different goals. Both are veterans of this panel who in fact have assembled so much knowledge over the years that they've also got a book coming out soon: Search Engine Marketing, Inc. : Driving Search Traffic to Your Company's Web Site.
Marshall D. Simmonds is another veteran of this panel. He doesn't have a book coming out, but I don't know when he'd find the time. Marshall's long overseen search marketing work for About.com. Now that About.com has become part of the New York Times, Marshall's new role of as vice president of enterprise search marketing is keeping him plenty busy.
Martin Laetsch from Intel oversees search marketing for the company on a worldwide basis. Martin's been on the panel before to take part for Q&A, but now we've got him as a regular speaker to present in particular on the challenges of balancing the issues of paid search. He'll tell you what it's like when you have different parts of the company that all seem to think they should rank number one for "pentium" and how you keep them from outbidding themselves -- and Intel -- out of the market.
After the presentations, there's a good 40 minutes or so for Q&A and discussion.
July 21, 2005
Google, Yahoo & Confirming Their Busloads Of Speakers
It's probably a good time for me to mention why I keep saying Google and Yahoo aren't yet confirmed so often in my posts about individual sessions. Shouldn't they be, at this point?
Both of these companies are giants in the search space, so it makes sense to involve them in a wide range of sessions. It takes me some time to assemble a special list of openings I've set aside for them. For SES San Jose 2005, each company has been invited to participate in about 20 different sessions. It's one giant hunkin' email I send out to them.
That's a lot of sessions for each company to consider. Most of these are things they've done before, but it still takes time for them to churn through everything. Then it takes more time for them to reconfirm all the right people and arrange a bus to put them on.
OK, I'm joking about the bus part. But the process is moving along, and you'll see speakers from both companies begin to appear on the agenda in the coming week or so.
By the way, over at Google, it's Barry Schnitt who is doing the heavy lifting to assemble the Googlers who will be taking part in panels, helped as needed in particular by Nate Tyler.
At Yahoo, Aaron Ferstman ropes up the Yahooligans on the editorial side of things, while Dina Freeman assembles those from the service formerly known as Overture, Yahoo Search Marketing.
You won't see Barry, Nate, Aaron or Dina on any of the panels, but they play a huge role in making getting the people you do see from their companies there -- as do their counterparts at MSN, Ask Jeeves and AOL who have their own smaller groups of speakers they assemble for the show.
The next time you see a group of people surrounding a Yahoo, Google or other search engine speaker after a session ends, look a bit on the edge of the crowd and you may spot Dina, Nate, Aaron, Barry or their colleagues doing their jobs in getting their people to the right places. The clipboards they hold are a dead giveaway :)
PR folks can take a lot of flak, and I deal with plenty that make me want to shoot out that flak. But this group is golden, PR folks who make life easier. That's not suck up talk, just reality and thanks. And if you spot one of them, give them your thanks as well. Then hit them up for some swag!
Categories: San Jose 05: Sessions, Categories: Speaking at SES
Search Engine Advertising Forum - SES San Jose 2005
I mentioned our Buying Search Engine Advertising session earlier as a type of Search Ads 101 session. In contrast, the Search Engine Advertising Forum session is designed for those experienced with search ads to hear about what's new and to have a lot of time to ask about things that are on their mind.
We have two search marketers, Dana Todd of SiteLab and Ron Belanger of Carat Interactive, who give 10 minute rundowns each on stuff they like recently, dislike or any trends they think other marketers need to be aware of in the search ads space.
Sandwiched between them are Yahoo and Google, with the same amount of time to share in particular anything new that will be of interest to advanced search marketers. Then nearly an hour of Q&A and discussion follows.
By the way, neither Google or Yahoo are yet confirmed, but they've always taken part in the past, and I'm sure they will for this event.
Writing For Search Engines - SES San Jose 2005
One of our oldest session is Writing For Search Engines, which returns to SES San Jose 2005. Honestly, so many sites could do so well if they thought about search engines from the very beginning and wrote content to reflect the terms they wanted be found for! No, I'm not talking about something like:
We are the best store for shoes. If you want to buy shoes, try shoes, own shoes or wear shoes, there is no better shoe store than our shoe store. Some come visit our shoe store today!
But if you do want to be found for shoes, actually using that word occasionally and appropriately can be helpful!
Jill Whalen of High Rankings and Heather Lloyd-Martin of WebSourced are the dynamic team that have done this session for years, and they'll teach you in San Jose the difference between annoying repetition and copy that can sing to visitors and search engine spiders alike.
July 20, 2005
Ask Jeeves CEO Steve Berkowitz In Keynote Conversation - SES San Jose 2005
It's not on the agenda yet, but we've just confirmed that Ask Jeeves CEO and director Steve Berkowitz will be doing the keynote for our SES San Jose 2005 show. This will be in our keynote slot on August 9, the second day of the show. It's actually going to be a "keynote conversation," rather than the traditional keynotes that some shows have.
A keynote conversation? Google kicked this off with us back at SES San Jose 2003. Cofounder Sergey Brin was in the spot but preferred the idea of doing a Q&A format rather a formal keynote. So we had a Conversation With Google's Sergey Brin, complete with a plasma screen fireplace to make for a fireside chat, as covered in this past SearchDay article.
In New York this year, we had another search engine cofounder for the keynote, Yahoo's Jerry Yang. Like Sergey, Jerry preferred to be PowerPoint-free and instead do a Q&A. We didn't have a return of the fireplace, but as it was Yahoo's 10th birthday, we did present him with a cake. You can read about the conversation via SearchViews or in our SEW Forums.
With Ask Jeeves, perhaps the trend of keynote conversations is becoming a tradition. There will certainly be plenty to talk about. The acquisition of Ask by IAC just completed, and I'll be talking with Steve about how he plans to continue building Ask as the "fourth network" of search beside the larger "channels" of Google, Yahoo and MSN. And what about ideas for a new name or an Ask Jeeves ad network? Lots to discuss!
STOP! READ THIS SESSION PLANNING ADVICE!
Did the headline grab your attention? We do something similar with the conference handbook we give out to all of our attendees. The first page in the book is full of session planning advice and starts out saying:
STOP!
If you read nothing else, READ THIS!
Do they read it? No. I know, because I often survey the audiences to see who read the key information on that page. Few put their hands up.
OK, so we need to figure out some better way of grabbing attention and spreading the news on how to plan to get the most out of SES. We're working on it, and this blog is part of that.
Here's the thing. SES has over 60 -- SIXTY! -- sessions happening. One person can't attend them all. You need some type of -- pardon the pun -- strategy for Search Engine Strategies.
We do have more and more companies taking a "divide and conquer" approach, where they send a couple of people who split up among sessions. The group discount plan helps companies wishing to do this. But remember, that strategy doesn't work if you don't say goodbye to your colleagues and actually split up for a short period of time! Andrew Goodman who moderates the SEM 2.0 mailing list recently noted (free registration required to view) the "I can stand to be alone factor" as cropping up.
Whether you divide and conquer or not, a good starting place for your attendance strategy is our Conference At A Glance guide. It shows everything at, um, a glance. The online version gives you session titles, links to descriptions, whether a session is new, rated well and particular interest areas it appeals to.
The print version we give out is a small 8-10 page booklet that you can easily tuck away in a pocket for ready reference. It also contains something else you'll find online right now, the Session Planner. That planner gives you a guide to sessions by these interest types:
- BASIC
- ADVANCED
- ORGANIC LISTINGS
- AD LISTINGS (AD/MARKETING INTEREST)
- BEEN BEFORE
- OTHER SPECIAL INTERESTS
Check it out. Each interest type is defined, and I've done my best to guide you in the right direction.
Still uncertain over what you should attend? Feel free to ask me at the show. Honest. I live and breathe the sessions. They're like my children, and I love to be matchmaker for them. As long as I'm not setting up for a session or running for the bathroom (I drink a lot of Diet Coke to keep going but caffeine, well...), I'm more than happy to help as best I can. Many of the speakers are also good resources to ask, as they've often see other sessions, as well.
RSS, Blogs & Search Marketing - SES San Jose 2005
We did our first session on blogging and search back at our SES San Jose 2003 show, and it was a lonely affair. The audience was keen, but they were also sparse -- maybe 30 or 40 people in all. The next year, we couldn't find enough seats for the hundreds who turned up. Blogs had finally popped in the minds of more people as something to pay attention to from a search marketing perspective.
RSS, Blogs & Search Marketing is the second run of a session we tried first with our New York show, where it rated well. We used to combine reps from blog search engines with search marketers who were savvy on blogs. Then we split the two up. That gives the search marketers much more space to spread out while Meet The Blog Search Engines lets those from blog search engines have more time in their own panel.
Search is key, here. This isn't a session about blogging. It's a session on the intersection of blogs and search. Amanda Watlington of Searching for Profit does provide an introduction to the world of blogs and feeds for those marketers who need it. But then Greg Jarboe from SEO-PR jumps in to do some case study looks at the impact of blogs on search results and the benefit of getting into blog search-specific services for marketers.
Stephan Spencer of Netconcepts follows up with issues such as tracking traffic but how to do that tracking in a way that doesn't spoil any search engine benefits you gain from blog links. Nan Dawkins of RedBoots Consulting will share briefly a few informal tips, then participate in the Q&A and discussion period that closes off the session.
Buying & Selling Links - SES San Jose 2005
I mentioned our special Day 3 track on linking earlier. New for SES San Jose 2005 as part of that track is Buying & Selling Links. In this session, we'll roll up our sleeves and look at issues to consider if you're thinking of purchasing links.
Patrick Gavin of Text Link Ads will kick things off, giving a link broker's perspective on what he looks for when making purchases, things to look out for and so on. Eric Ward will come up next, sharing his thoughts on things in particular to beware of, when considering a purchase. Thomas Bindl of OPTOP will also be taking a "beware of" type of approach, particularly looking at some technical "gotchas" you may want to look out for.
That will be it on the formal presentation front. But our two extremely popular veterans of past linking sessions, Greg Boser of WebGuerrilla and Debra Mastaler of Alliance-Link.com, will share some additional informal remarks before we dive into Q&A and discussion.
There nearly an hour of time reserved for Q&A, and you can expect it will be lively and informative.
Search Algorithms: The Patent Files - SES San Jose 2005
Search Algorithms: The Patent Files is new for SES San Jose 2005. Search patents have always offered interesting information on how search engines index and rank the web, but there's been an explosion of interest recently as more patents have come to light and been discussed.
In this session, Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz.org will kick things off looking in particular at a Google patent that's received plenty of attention. Dr. E. Garcia of Mi Islita -- AKA Search Engine Watch Forums moderator Orion -- will look at what patents on duplicate detection reveal. Ani Kortikar of Netramind will then do a compare and contrast of what various patents show and how marketers might make use of the information. Finally, Jon Glick of Become.com will tap into his past experience in being involved with search for AltaVista, Overture and Yahoo to do a "red herring" style alert of things that even though they are in patents may not actually be put to use in practice.
Link Building Basics - SES San Jose 2005
We've long had sessions on linking at SES, but for SES San Jose 2005, we've blown out the topic big time. On Day 3, we have an entire track that takes in such areas as Linking Strategies, Buying & Selling Links and Search Engine Q&A On Links. I'll tell you more about those -- and the Link Building Clinic on Day 4 -- in the future. But for now, it's the Link Building Basics session I want to focus on.
Designed for those new to link building, it focuses on how to establish links to your site in an appropriate manner that will bring you traffic directly from the links, plus which may help search engines understand you are valuable.
Mike Grehan of Smart Interactive is a veteran of this session and kicks things off with his usual entertaining and informative overview on how search engines make use of links, the type of links he feels are good, links you might think are good but really are useless and other issues.
Eric Ward I've known for ages. He was a pioneer in building links way back before many people even thought of them as important. He was our very first Search Engine Watch member! With over a decade's worth of link building experience, Eric will cover how to convince people that your site is "linkworthy" and other issues.
Debra Mastaler of Alliance-Link.com comes onto this session for the first time in San Jose. A veteran of our advanced link building session, she's going to touch in this one on myths and mistakes people have when it comes to linking.
Search Term Research & Targeting - SES San Jose 2005
What's the first step in search marketing? Knowing your audience -- and that means knowing how they are searching. Our Search Term Research & Targeting session is designed to help those new to the space understand the skills and tools to help you search. Christine Churchill from KeyRelevance will provide an overview of such things, while other speakers such as Dan Thies from SEO Research Labs, Tor Crockatt from MIVA and John Slade from Yahoo Search Marketing will explore some specific facets of research and targeting.
July 19, 2005
Buying Search Engine Advertising - SES San Jose 2005
Our Buying Search Engine Advertising session dates back to the very first SES show in 1999, though obviously the content keeps getting updated to take into account the constantly changing search advertising marketplace. It's designed as a Search Ads 101 session, something to bring those new to the world of search ads up to speed.
What you won't get is a lot of stats on why you should do search advertising. That's generally a waste of time for our audiences. They're already "believers" in search advertising that don't need convincing. So, we skip the trend charts, stats snapshots and jump instead right into actual tactics and strategies to consider.
Dana Todd of SiteLab does the heavy lifting in this session, taking the audience on a 20 minute overview of who takes ads and how they work. I said this session dates back to the first SES show. So does Dana's participation on it.
In particular, Dana's renowned not just for her flamboyant hair color but for the quality of her presentation, especially her no holds barred approach. She'll tell you what she likes -- and dislikes -- in a forthright and honest fashion. She also doesn't just cover the major ad outlets of Google and Yahoo but other placement options you may not be aware of.
After Dana, both Google and Yahoo have 10 minutes each to cover unique aspects of their programs and anything particularly new or interesting that they want to share with the audience. Neither company has yet confirmed for the session, but they always have in the past for our US shows, so I expect they'll do the same for San Jose.
Chris Churchill of Fathom Online brings up the concluding presentation, sharing for 10 minutes with the audience information gleaned from his company's Keyword Price Index and other tips that come from managing large campaigns for clients.
The remaining half of the session -- a good 40 minutes or so -- is reserved for Q&A. This is especially where the search engine speakers get a chance to shine. Got questions for them? There's lots of time to ask and get responses.
Public Relations & Reputation Management - SES San Jose 2005
I mentioned our Meet The News Search Engines panel earlier. That's part of our News, PR & Blogs Track on Day 2 of the show, August 9. Public Relations & Reputation Management is one of the other sessions in that track, a panel where marketers look at how news listings can drive traffic and the public relations angles of both web search and news search.
It's now a long-standing session and a killer one for anyone who's not attended before to check out. Unfortunately, a lot of people still assume that search marketing is only about that top ranking in free results or buying some keyword-targeted ads, all of which they hope lead to sales. Search marketing is far more diverse than this, and the PR & Reputation Management session is a great illustration.
Press releases? They're no longer a way to reach just the media. They can get you into the news headlines that consumers read. As this session illustrates, they can even drive sales directly for you, as well.
Someone hate your company? They might end up ranking well for your name. What can you do to help mitigate the situation, if so? The session explores this and the flipside, what if you are trying to build a PR case against someone. Can you afford to ignore the impact of web search? No, you cannot -- not when so many millions use it each day as a research tool.
Returning for this great panel are our similarly great veteran speakers, real leaders in this area, Nan Dawkins of RedBoots Consulting, Rob Key of Converseon and Greg Jarboe of SEO-PR.
Meet The News Search Engines - SES San Jose 2005
Meet The News Search Engines is both a new and old session for SES San Jose 2005. It's old in that we've long had a panel involving representatives from news search engines, as well as blog search engines and marketers discussing how to tap into these services. But this time, the blog search engines get their own panel, as do the marketers (here and here). I'll talk more about those sessions later -- but news search also gets more room to stretch out.
The format of our "Meet The" style sessions is simple. Everyone does a short overview to answer some common questions that marketers may have. With news search, that involves around 8 minutes each on how listings are gathered, what's considered "newsy" for inclusion and so on. The remaining time, almost an hour, is left free so the audience can drive discussion through Q&A in areas they are most interested in.
Moreover and Topix.net are confirmed for our session. Both Google News and Yahoo News have been invited. Yahoo has done this type of session before with us, so I expect they'll likely return. As for Google, I always invite them, but they've never yet taken up the offer up to talk about news search. I'm hoping they'll make it this time.
Local Search Marketing Tactics - SES San Jose 2005
We've been doing panels on local search for nearly two years now, to help prepare attendees for this growing and increasingly popular vertical search area. Our Local Search Marketing Tactics session returns for SES San Jose, kicking off one of three local search-oriented sessions of our Local Search Track on Day 3 of the show.
Justin Sanger of LocalLaunch! will start out with an overview of the local search space especially for marketers, outlining the opportunities to get in front of those seeking local information through both editorial and advertising means. Patricia Hursh of SmartSearch Marketing will drill-down a bit sharing some real life experiences in particular in targeting local searchers through Google and Yahoo. Stacy Williams of Prominent Placement -- a veteran of this panel since we began it back in our SES Chicago 2003 show -- also gives marketers a from the trenches look at making local search work.
Did Ya Pick Me To Speak?
Folks are asking me if I'm going to take them up on pitches to speak. Here's the deal:
- My goal is to have all sessions wrapped up by this Friday, July 22. So if I'm going to use you, you'll hear this week.
- Don't ask me this week "how's it going" or "do you think you'll use us" or "just doing a status check." I have nothing to report, and these messages are just
slowing me down.
- But I want to make sure you got my pitch! I did. Remember when you sent it? I responded and said something like "Got your pitch, will consider and review according to the
timeline." I'm still considering, and the timeline posted here is still running along.
- I never got a message like that! OK, then there are only two reasons why. First, some spam filter grabbed it. Second, you were so far off the mark, sent a pitch that was
so absolutely bad and a waste of time that I just deleted it. That happened to maybe two or three pitches in all, so it probably didn't happen to you.
- If you are absolutely certain you didn't get a response, go check and see if the session you pitched for is still open as shown
here. If so, then you can double-check with me this week to see if I have gotten your pitch.
- Any sessions I've blogged about here on the blog are officially wrapped up, all speakers confirmed and ready to go. If you were hoping to be on these sessions and haven't
heard back, you weren't picked. Sorry. And sorry I didn't get in touch directly with you. I try if time allows, and next week I'll also try to send a generic email message to
everyone who asked. But time doesn't always allow.
- As a general reminder, the only openings I have are listed here (don't pitch for any
other session other than those listed on that page). You can still pitch for those sessions this week, if you haven't already. Be sure to read the further pitching guidelines
here and further advice in The SES
Speaking Gauntlet to increase the odds of success.
- Next Monday, if I'm still looking for speakers in any sessions, I'll post a notice on the blog.
Categories: San Jose 05, Categories: Speaking at SES
July 18, 2005
Successful Site Architecture - SES San Jose 2005
If you build it badly, they won't come. That's the general theme of our popular Successful Site Architecture session, which returns for SES San Jose 2005. Build it right the first time, and search traffic will come naturally to you.
Barbara C. Coll of WebMama.com is the long-time veteran of this session who moderates it and kicks it off with her appeal that marketing ought to have control over a web site, but that marketing also ought to make nice with the IT department to achieve the common goal of search engine success.
Derrick Wheeler is another veteran of the panel and does what I call the "heavy-lifting," going over various architectural issues that can have a good -- or bad -- impact on how well a site is indexed or ranked. Derrick covers things that are common to all the search engines, saving the audience from having to hear each of the search engine reps themselves offer the same advice.
The search engine reps are there, of course. Ask Jeeves is confirmed. MSN has just confirmed and will be posted to our agenda shortly. Google and Yahoo have been invited, and as they've generally always confirmed for this panel, I expect we'll see them on it again as well. The reps all have some time to make informal "rebuttal" remarks if they disagree with Derrick or to share any tips and information unique to their services.
After the talk time, it's Q&A and live site review. Got a question relating to something raised? The panel will answer it -- and go live to your site, if that makes sense.
Landing Page Testing & Tuning - SES San Jose 2005
Search marketers spend so much time, effort and money getting people to their web sites that often the quality of landing pages feels like an afterthought. It shouldn't be. A bad landing page is like a bad first impression. If you don't come off well, the visitor may go elsewhere.
New for SES San Jose 2005, the Landing Page Testing & Tuning panel gives landing pages their due, an entire panel just for the topic. Moderator Allan Dick of Vintage Tub & Bath has served as ringleader for the session, pulling together and organizing the other speakers to explore this popular topic.
Tim Ash of Epic Sky will start out discussing landing page "best practices" to consider, theory backed by some case study examples.
Matthew Roche from Offermatica will pick up the case study theme using Allan's site as the example. He'll be getting interactive on the audience, showing them various landing pages that have been tested and letting them vote with handheld controllers on what things they think worked.
The results will probably be surprising. I tried a little card-based version of this game Offermatica handed out at a Shop.org event I spoke at earlier this year. Things I could have sworn helped conversion didn't -- and I wasn't the only one surprised.
Testing, of course, is the only way to know for certain what works -- and for this session, Scott Miller of Vertster will wrap up with testing tips to consider. Then there will be time for Q&A and discussion.
Site ECG - SES San Jose 2005
Site ECG is a new session for Search Engine Strategies San Jose 2005. The idea is to look at ways to measure if your site has a healthy "search heartbeat."
Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz.org is going to kick things off by looking at some unhealthy habits and how to spot them, such as unnatural linking structures and the dreaded OO disease -- over-optimization.
Anne Kennedy of Beyond Ink, a veteran of our past sessions on cleaning up spam problems, will show show ways to check your search engine vital signs, from page counts to backlink lookups. She'll also touch on what to do if you need a cure direct from the search engines.
Jake Baillie from TrueLocal will then cover ways to run competitive intelligence on yourself, to see what you might be revealing to a competitor and how to block such leakage.
After the PowerPoints go away, there's a good 45 minutes or so for Q&A and discussion.
I hear you wondering -- isn't it supposed to be EKG? That's the abbreviation commonly used in the US, coming from the German word "elektrokardiogramm." But when I went to name this session, I got the impression somehow that ECG was now rising in usage. Certainly the MedlinePlus medical encyclopedia prefers that abbreviation. So I went with it, for now.
Ad Management: Do Humans Matter? - SES San Jose 2005
Cue soundtrack from The Terminator. Cue voice over:
With search marketers handling hundreds or thousands of terms, it was only a matter of time until the machines took over. In 2006, following the launch of MSN's new multifaceted search ads system, they made their move. Calculating ROI through ruthless closed loop systems, they eliminated bid gaps, inefficiencies and eventually the search marketers themselves.
The coming reality? I don't think anyone believes we're looking at an entirely machine-run future for search ads, but just how much of a role will humans continue to play? And what happens when you get "irrational" humans going after non-ROI goals? How do the machines compensate?
Our Ad Management: Do Humans Matter? session at SES San Jose 2005 aims to explore these and other issues. Chris Zaharias from Efficient Frontier will kick things off with a more machine-centric view, while David Berkowitz from icrossing will look at the human aspect.
Our other panelists -- Kevin Lee from Did-it.com, Mike Sack from Inceptor and Joshua Stylman from Reprise Media will add their thoughts, then we'll dive into discussion among the panel and involving the audience.
See also my recent Search Marketing Isn't Just Math & Machines post on the SEW Blog if you're looking for some background material on the subject.
Dealing With Contextual & Other Non-Search Ads: SES San Jose 2005
Every session I plan for Search Engine Strategies has to be related to search -- and search marketing in particular -- in some way. So the launch of contextual ads in 2003 by Google posed a quandary to my planning. I don't consider contextual ads to be search, as many of my readers well know. People aren't in "search mode," when they view these ads. Heck, you can even buy image ads through Google that are contextually placed, something you can't do with search targeting. Contextual does NOT equal search.
So if contextual isn't search, what's the deal with a panel on contextual ads at SES! It's a recognition that search marketers are going to have contextual ads thrust at them as an option by the major search players, so they'd better understand how to approach these if they have search-centric minds.
Enter our Dealing With Contextual & Other Non-Search Ads panel, returning once again to the show. The key difference with the panel for SES San Jose 2005 is that this time that our panelists -- Brad Byrd from NewGate, Andrew Goodman from Page Zero Media and Peter Hershberg from Reprise Media -- are freed from the usual rundown on how to get contextual and only contextual from Google, if that's what you want.
Now that contextual can be purchased independently of search ads on Google, the panelists can finally explore some new ways for the search marketer to approach the different -- yet often still valuable -- world of contextual ads offered by Google, Yahoo and others.
FYI, Google and Yahoo have been invited join our confirmed speakers for this panel. Neither company has confirmed yet, but they've always taken part in past sessions, so it's pretty good odds you'll see them at this one.
Perfecting Paid Listings: SES San Jose 2005
Another returning session from SES New York is Perfecting Paid Listings. A couple of years ago, we used to have this overview session that covered things like broad matching, ad creative and click fraud. Then I broke it up into individual sessions, many of which still continue. In New York, we brought the session back as a sort of catch-all for tips on getting more out of ads that aren't covered in all our other ad related sessions. As an added bonus, some session attendees may earn money in an unexpected manner :)
The session will kick off the Advertising Track on Day 2 of the show, followed by sessions on ad creative, landing pages and an open forum on ad issues. Still looking for more just about search ads? This section of our session planner page lists many ad-specific sessions you should consider.
The Search Landscape: SES San Jose 2005
One of our jam-packed sessions from SES New York returns for SES San Jose 2005. It's The Search Landscape, where representatives from three major web ratings services will share data and trends that apply to search, based on data they have on surfing habits. Who is up and down in popularity? What's the news on searcher interaction with search engines. This session aims to get attendees new and interesting details that the panelists from comScore, Hitwise and NetRatings can share. And we'll have a bigger room this time, as well.
Creating Compelling Ads: SES San Jose 2005
I just wrapped-up preparations for our Creating Compelling Ads session at SES San Jose 2005. Although it's not marked "new" on our conference-at-a-glance schedule, there is a big change. Previously, this was called "Creating Compelling Ads & Landing Pages." This time, we're devoting an entire session just to the creative of ads. Landing pages will be covered in a separate session, which I'll describe more in a future post.
When session moderator Andrew Goodman and I were emailing to prepare for this, he compared writing ads for search with being "haiku-like." It's a good analogy. There's so little space -- especially with Google -- to make the pitch and capture a lead with these ads. Yet people do, and with amazing results.
Some day, I hope we'll finally get awards going for the search industry to honor the amazing work that can be done with the creative in search ads. It's something we've discussed at the show before.
In the meantime, Andrew along with panelists Joe Agliozzo from BetterPPC and Harrison Magun from Avenue A | Razorfish Search, will focus on how you can create those haiku-like ads with big payoffs.
July 13, 2005
Competitive Research Session: SES San Jose 2005
I just finished the first of my prep notes, this one for Competitive Research session at SES San Jose 2005. We first started offering this session at our SES New York 2004, and it has continued to be one of those keepers that attendees love. It was the brainchild of Allan Dick, General Manager, Vintage Tub & Bath. He suggested pulling together a panel that looked at how search engines could be used to know what your competitors are doing. The various panelists all take a look at his site plus some of Allan's competitors. It's amazing what you can find out and act upon. If you've not seen it before, consider checking it out on the first day of the show, August 8. Aside from being educational, the panelists are all pretty funny, especially Allan when he does his opening.
Session Prep Note Process
About two or three years ago, I was heading back to the airport after one of our shows in a shuttle with one of our attendees. She had loved the show -- good thing, or it may have been a long van ride! In particular, she said she appreciated that all the speakers seemed to have presentations that flowed together rather than overlapped and that no one was too salesy.
It was cool that she thought it was something that happened naturally, but there's a lot of work behind the scenes to reach that goal of good information, rather than presentations that can sound like commercials or which overlap too much.
For a new session, I ask each speaker to give me a sense of what they'd cover on the session topic. I then sit down and look at all the information and try to assemble a panel where there's little overlap and the presentations complement each other.
All this flows into a session "prep note" that the speakers get. It outlines who will cover what, along with their allocated time. It's proven really useful in keeping everything on target.
It's not always perfect, of course. With some sessions, there can be some inevitable overlap. You also get the occasional speaker that seems to have ignored the prep note entirely. If that happen, evolution kicks in. They don't get asked back.
The prep note also gives speakers a variety of speaking tips, as you can see here. No sales pitches, no planted questions, being forthcoming, showing rather than telling -- these are all things we want speakers to do. And the very vast majority do, making me and the attendees very happy.
I'm working through the prep note process now for the next show. As I finalize many of the sessions in this way, I'll be telling you about them as a preview of what the show will offer.
The SES Blog Feed
Want to keep up on the latest from this blog? Most people know to look for the familiar RSS or XML logos. Just look over there to the left, and you'll see the logos and a link you can use to add us to your feedreader. Still don't see it? Here's the link. If you have autodiscovery, then the feed should be lighting up for you via our home page or any individual entry page.
The SES Speaking Gauntlet
Right now, I'm fully immersed in finishing speaker selection for our SES San Jose 2005 show. It's a giant, all-consuming job because I pretty much pick or approve all the speakers myself. We have around 60 sessions with panels of 2-4 people each. That's 150 or more speakers, at least.
It would be easier if I just handed off sessions right and left to other people to organize. In a few cases, I do have trusted moderators who do the heavy lifting on some panels. I'll be highlighting some of these sessions going forward. But for the most part, I like to do the selection and coordination to ensure I get the quality of of the sessions that I want.
Let me be clear up front. No one speaks because they've paid for a spot, not on the sessions I oversee. Some conferences work that way. People can get speaking slots because they are an exhibitor, sponsor or have literally purchased a seat. That's not how the SES events I organize run, nor do the shows that Chris Sherman operate this way.
Specifically for SES San Jose 2005, I'm organizing all of the panels outside of the JupiterResearch track on the first day (JupiterResearch will be along later to tell you more about their track). People are selected for those panels solely because I think they've got something interesting to say and share with the attendees.
Lots of people want to be on stage. Lots of people send me pitches to speak. I'm hoping this blog will help me better communicate with the many who pitch, so they know how, when and the best way to do so. That's especially important because most pitches are terrible.
For the record, every show now has a How To Speak page. The one for SES San Jose is here. Want to pitch? Read the page, understand the advice and follow it. It advises things like pitching for each session in a separate email and not to send attachments. Despite this, I get pitches violating all the rules from people. I even had one person tell me they read the instructions but decided to ignore them anyway. Don't. Please don't.
That How To Speak page points over to another page listing the actual openings I have. The openings are here. That's all I've got. As that page explains, I have short list candidates and returning speakers for any show. Any openings I have beyond these are listed on that page. So don't pitch for anything other than on that page, EVEN IF a session shows speakers as TBA. There's a delay between when we get some people confirmed and actually posted on the agenda.
Haven't put you off pitching? Then consider pushing your PR firm aside and pitching yourself. Honestly, PR firms can be helpful. But the vast majority of times, their involvement in pitching for SES is a waste of time. The requests I get from them show they aren't familiar with the conference and often haven't read up on the session they're pitching a speaker toward. Then when I reject a pitch as being completely off topic and not suitable, it doesn't surprise me to get the pitch back with virtually no changes other than to aim it at a different session. It's a waste of time all around, and no one has that time to waste.
It's also hard dealing with vendors, people who have some product related to a particular session. Here's an example. There are upteen million measuring tool vendors out there. I can't have them all speak. I don't have a stage big enough for that. In addition, no matter how non-commercial a vendor may promise to be, audiences still feel like they are hearing a commercial. In short, if you're a vendor that has some product that seems perfect for a session, I almost certainly don't want you.
I'm not anti-vendor. Vendors can have great search marketing insight. It's just best when they pitch concepts and technique for panels that are completely independent of their tools or services. A rare few manage to do this, and I love them. If you're a vendor and can't do this, then encourage a customer to share a case study of their experiences with your product for a suitable session. However, if a customer ends up seeming like some puppet you are controlling from behind the scenes, that gets noticed and has an impact on future participation.
What's the very best way to get to speak at the show? Pitch me a new session idea when I ask for new session ideas. This happens long before the show agenda is organized. I love new, original ideas. Give me a new twist on something I find intriguing, and you're likely in.
As said, the blog is meant to help with the communication process. Going forward, we'll make it clear when we're looking for pitches for new session ideas, when actual speaking openings are available and so on. Watch the blog, and if anything should open up or change, we'll tell you.
In the end, if you're hoping to speak, please remember that my job is to produce the best conference I can for attendees, not to put you on stage. I really value having a diverse group of speakers, and I love having new people when they are a fit. But not everyone is a fit, despite best intentions.
A Little History On SES
Search Engine Strategies is now going into its seventh year, with SES San Jose being the 23rd show that I've chaired. Overall, we've had over 30 shows to date, since I'm not the chair of all of them. I thought you might be interested in a little background on how it all got started.
Way back in 1999, Jupitermedia senior vice president and general manager Chris Elwell asked me if I thought there would be any interest in a conference about search engine marketing. Yeah! I thought there would be great interest. Moreover, I was excited about the chance to have an entire show just dedicated to search marketing.
Until SES, there really wasn't anything major devoted to search marketing that I was aware of. I'd spoken on search marketing many times, such as at the Thunder Lizard shows on web design (still happening) and web marketing (no longer). I'd done plenty of turns at Internet World, when that conference was still going. But at these places -- and elsewhere -- search was sideshow. You could barely scrape the surface of issues there were to explore.
An entire show about search marketing? I couldn't wait. And on November 18, 1999, I went nuts with an insane schedule. The first SES show started at 8am, ended at 6pm and breaks? Who needed them? I gave people 10 or 20 minutes here and there.
It was exciting the day before, when people started to arrive. Search forums were just starting to take off, and lots of people still only knew each other through one-way mailing lists or email discussion lists like the former I-Search group. No one had really met in person. People kind of cocked their heads to a side, eyed you up and said, "Are you...," then had lots of big smiles and handshakes as they met for the first time.
More important, the physical contact and greeting for many was a revelation. You weren't alone in doing search marketing. There were others dealing with the same issues, and you could talk about things and commiserate face to face.
I was most nervous about the two sessions at the end of the day, Dealing With Directories and Meet The Search Engines. Fair to say, some see adversarial relations between search marketers and search engines from time to time and on different issues. But until this show, you pretty much never saw the two sides really meet face to face. What would happen?
I joked to the search reps that if worse came to worse, I'd jump across and shield them physically from any attacks out of the audience. I especially worried about how Yahoo would be received.
Remember, the Google obsession many marketers have today was totally on Yahoo back then. Yahoo was a huge traffic source (and still remains so today). Yahoo was also driven off its human-powered directory results, and your ranking depending on whether your key terms were among the 25 or so that a directory editor approved. Many had had serious issues with Yahoo, such as covered in my special report in 1997. An express submission service opened in early 1999 helped, but there were still issues.
Yahoo actually declined to participate when I went through official channels. But I had a personal contact, Andy Gems, a Yahoo surfer who listed one of my own sites. Andy said he'd come out (thank you, Andy).
The presentations happened, including Andy's. Time for Q&A. The first person started out, "I have something I want to say to all the search engines that have come out for this panel today...." Oh, no. Here it comes! "Thank you. It means a lot to have you talking with us."
I probably don't have the quote exactly right, but the sentiment is spot on. Thanks for having a conversation. It was a great thing to hear, especially when the entire audience broke into applause to support the statement.
Since then, SES has grown. There's a lot more break time! Our session attendance in San Jose of 325, which Jupiter thought was amazing, grew to 1,800 at our last New York show. That amazes me. Add a two or three thousand more when you count those who only attend the expo, and the crowds provide one of the biggest indicators of how important search has become.
Single tracks have given way to over 60 different sessions spread across multiple tracks in our next show, as search has diversified. Search engine founders no longer rollerskate on stage as Google's Sergey Brin did at our first show. I guess we've grown up a bit over time. But the conversations still happen, formally in sessions and informally in hallways and in the expo. That's the best thing of all.
Want some more background? Barry Schwartz talked with me back in 2003 about the show and has some history here. Chris Sherman did a write-up of the first show here, back before he was part of Search Engine Watch and chairing shows himself. The first agenda is here, and the first press release here.
Welcome To The Search Engine Strategies Blog!
Welcome to the SES Blog! We're hoping the blog will be a great way to help communicate news and information about the Search Engine Strategies shows. Our SES San Jose show is rapidly approaching, so most of the information in the coming weeks will be about that event. I'll be telling you how I'm planning the show's sessions in my capacity as the chair. Others will tell you about things happening with the expo or special events. Looking forward, we'll also be looking at ways to link out to blog posts that others do from the show, news coverage, photos and more. And after San Jose, you'll hear from Chris Sherman who is chairing our next non-US event, SES Stockholm in October.
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