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So much for taking time off from the conference and speaking drill. February was a sweet reprise from a whirlwhind tour of speaking events in 4th quarter 2008. Now February is over and March starts the conference schedule for TopRank Online Marketing once again. Here are the conferences I’ll be speaking at or just attending over the next few weeks. If you’re attending any of these, please follow @leeodden and let’s connect.

Pubcon South - Austin, Texas.  March 11 - 13, 2009

On March 12, 2009 I will be presenting on two regular sessions covering Twitter and PR SEO as well as a Super Session on social media marketing.  Here are the details:

The Twitter and Micro Blogging Revolution: Someone can promote or criticize and maybe even make/break your brand in just 140 characters. This panel will look at real world microblogging through Twitter and other outlets to drive website traffic and branding campaigns. 

Moderated by Joe Laratro, the speakers for this session include:  Dan Zarrella, Social Viral marketing Consultant - David Snyder, Search and Social - Jon Henshaw, Product Manager, Raven Internet Marketing Tools and Lee Odden, CEO at TopRank Online Marketing..

Intersection of SEO and PR Agencies:  PR Agencies, SEO, and where the two meet. This panel of PR experts will look at using SEO within the PR space from simple release optimization to advanced techniques.  Anyone with PR responsibilities would do well to attend this session. Your job may depend on it.

Moderated by Mark Jackson, this session includes Sean Jackson, CEO/Creator, Lead Maverick and Lee Odden, CEO at TopRank Online Marketing..  I would expect there would be at least one more speaker posted before the event. 

Super Session : Social Media & Business:  This new social critter is tough for a business to come to terms with. Good reviews, bad reviews, mega traffic, reputation management - wow, what in the world are we getting ourselves into here?   This panel of esteemed social media stars will discuss the current state of social and how business are using and can use it in the future. 

Moderated by conference owner and chair, Brett Tabke, this session includes speakers:  Chris Brogan, President of New Marketing Labs - Reem Abeidoh, Social Media Strategist at Outrider - Wayne Sutton, Social Media Strategist & Technology Evangelist and Lee Odden, CEO at TopRank Online Marketing.

SXSW Interactive - Austin, Texas. March 13-17, 2009

This will be my first time attending a South by South West event and to be honest, unless I am speaking I don’t usually attend a conference like this. However, with Pubcon blending into the SXSW Interactive event, it just made sense to stay a few extra days. I’m looking forward to keynotes from Guy Kawasaki, Tony Hseih from Zappos and Chris Anderson from Wired as well as a ton of panels ranging from ”Lessons in Community Management” to “Are PR Agencies a Dying Breed?” to “Curating the Crowd-Sourced World” and the infamous SXSW nightlife. I may or may not attend “Social Engineering: Scam Your Way Into Anything or From Anybody”.

PRSA Workshop:  SEO for Public Relations - New York, NY. March 20, 2009

I’ll be doing a one day workshop on SEO and PR to help in-house and agency public relations professionals gain a foundation for how Search Engine Optimization (SEO) works for news content. We’ll discuss the key challenges and new opportunities for producing, optimizing, promoting and tracking results for digital PR.

Specifically, attendees  will learn how to:

• Understand the new opportunities of search and SEO
• Plan and organize search engine optimization efforts for news
• Conduct keyword research
• Optimize press releases, online news room and blogs
• Identify and implement opportunities for digital asset optimization
• Implement link building tactics
• Measure and report results

Search Engine Strategies NY - New York, NY. March 23-27, 2009

Search Engine Strategies New York is one of, if not THE, largest Search Marketing Conference on the East Coast. I will be presenting on 3 panels during the conference March 23-27 which has keynotes from Guy Kawasaki and author John Gerzema.  All 3 of the panels I’m speaking on happen on March 26th.  Here are the details:

SEO Through Blogs & Feeds:  Not yet running a blog? Not syndicating your content through web feeds? Then you’re missing out on an important area that can help your overall SEO efforts. Learn more about the unique advantages blogs and feeds offer to search engine optimization.

Moderated by Rebecca Lieb from VP, U.S. Operations, Econsultancy and author of the recently published, “The Truth About Search Engine Optimization”, this panel includes a motley crew of blogging marketers: Michael Gray, Owner of Atlas Web Service, Sally Falkow, President of, PRESSfeed and Lee Odden, CEO at TopRank Online Marketing.

Brand & Reputation Management - Can you use a competitor’s trademark in your own search advertising? Or what if a competitor has an ad running on your trademarked brand name? Should you engage professional legal help or are there other options? What if bloggers are posting negative or false claims about your brands and these are spreading with viral speed through other blogs? Are there ways to get these damaging messages out of the search engines? This session will provide an exploration of these and other brand protection issues.

VP of Marketing at ExactTarget Jeffrey Rohrs will be moderating this session that includes a variety of perspectives on reputation management including: Kristjan Mar Hauksson, Dir. Search & Online Comm./ Managing Partner at Nordic eMarketing, Mark J. Rosenberg, Of Counsel, Sills Cummis & Gross P.C., Lela Phommasouvanh, Senior Search Marketing Consultant at FindLaw and Lee Odden, CEO at TopRank Online Marketing.

Blogging for Business - With more than 71 million blogs currently being tracked by Technorati, the opportunities for businesses to speak with their customers is nearly unlimited. That’s why more and more companies are turning to the blogosphere to connect with consumers. Never before have businesses had such effective access to the frustrations and desires of their target audience. Learn more about harnessing the power of blogs to build buzz about a business online.

Moderator duties will be conducted by none other than Matt McGowan, VP & Publisher of Incisive Media and an esteemed mix of blogger speakers: Jennifer Evans Laycock, Dir. of Social Media, SiteLogic, Editor-in-Chief, Search Engine Guide, Michael Gray, Owner of Atlas Web Service, Lee Odden, CEO of TopRank Online Marketing and Paul Woodhouse, Director of Organic Web Strategies at Direct Online Marketing.

Be sure to stop by and say hello or feel free to Tweet me - I’d love to meet up with people in person that I’ve connected with virutally.

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Note from Lee:  GasPedal and the blog council have partnered to deliver another BlogWell event (this time in Chicago) focusing on case studies from large companies on the topics of blogging, social media and online community building. I am pleased to introduce a guest blog post from Tonja Deegan, winner of a free pass from TopRank, who was a media sponsor of the event. Enjoy! 

A common thread that wove through the case study presentations at BlogWell was that the majority of the time, someone within a company took a chance, started something small online to make a connection and watched it grow.

For Allstate, Lizzie Schreier went to the company leadership with the idea to communicate with customers online, possibly through a forum. The leadership ended up placing bets that she wouldn’t be able to get approval from legal. She started small - the forum didn’t even focus on insurance - but eventually built the site into an active forum and now has help from another employee and an agency.

The Mayo Clinic also encountered naysayers. When Lee Aase proposed a YouTube channel with videos from the clinic and patients, people said, “Isn’t that where people put videos of squirrels skateboarding?” The company began first by offering mp3 files to media, moved to a corporate-branded space on YouTube and now has Flip recorders and a new sharing site just announced at the conference.

When H&R Block began experimenting with social media, they created a fictional character, Truman Greene, with several videos as the online fanatic for H&R Block. They quickly found that it did not generate the interest they were looking for compared to when they did what people expected them to do: answer tax questions.

In addition, all of the companies that I listened to also have corporate Twitter profiles (@mayoclinic, @hrblock, @allstate, @uscoastguard). The willingness to test and adopt new technologies to further connect with customers and others is a common trait with those that really understand the power of the consumer.

Large and small brands in the audience asked questions that brands everywhere continue to ask: What if something goes wrong, what if it’s not approved, what if we get sued, what if we get made fun of, what if …  And the secret answer to those questions is to do what each company at BlogWell did when they tested online engagement, found out that it works and continue to spread it into more networks and technologies.

As Paula Drum at H&R Block said, ROI is “Risk of Ignoring” social media. When you nurture and communicate with your online community, your company will reap the rewards of brand recognition and increased brand awareness.

Tonja Deegan is the digital and social media director at Airfoil Public Relations and writes at:  http://cleartheair.airfoilpr.com.

Thanks for the great coverage Tonja!

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Note from Lee:  GasPedal and the blog council have partnered to deliver another BlogWell event (this time in Chicago) focusing on case studies from large companies on the topics of blogging, social media and online community building. I am pleased to introduce a guest blog post from Tonja Deegan, winner of a free pass from TopRank, who was a media sponsor of the event. Enjoy! 

A common thread that wove through the case study presentations at BlogWell was that the majority of the time, someone within a company took a chance, started something small online to make a connection and watched it grow.

For Allstate, Lizzie Schreier went to the company leadership with the idea to communicate with customers online, possibly through a forum. The leadership ended up placing bets that she wouldn’t be able to get approval from legal. She started small - the forum didn’t even focus on insurance - but eventually built the site into an active forum and now has help from another employee and an agency.

The Mayo Clinic also encountered naysayers. When Lee Aase proposed a YouTube channel with videos from the clinic and patients, people said, “Isn’t that where people put videos of squirrels skateboarding?” The company began first by offering mp3 files to media, moved to a corporate-branded space on YouTube and now has Flip recorders and a new sharing site just announced at the conference.

When H&R Block began experimenting with social media, they created a fictional character, Truman Greene, with several videos as the online fanatic for H&R Block. They quickly found that it did not generate the interest they were looking for compared to when they did what people expected them to do: answer tax questions.

In addition, all of the companies that I listened to also have corporate Twitter profiles (@mayoclinic, @hrblock, @allstate, @uscoastguard). The willingness to test and adopt new technologies to further connect with customers and others is a common trait with those that really understand the power of the consumer.

Large and small brands in the audience asked questions that brands everywhere continue to ask: What if something goes wrong, what if it’s not approved, what if we get sued, what if we get made fun of, what if …  And the secret answer to those questions is to do what each company at BlogWell did when they tested online engagement, found out that it works and continue to spread it into more networks and technologies.

As Paula Drum at H&R Block said, ROI is “Risk of Ignoring” social media. When you nurture and communicate with your online community, your company will reap the rewards of brand recognition and increased brand awareness.

Tonja Deegan is the digital and social media director at Airfoil Public Relations and writes at:  http://cleartheair.airfoilpr.com.

Thanks for the great coverage Tonja!

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BlogWell - Growing an Online Community originally appeared on the Online Marketing Blog. © 2009. http://www.toprankblog.com

I am happy to say that this weekend, December 28th  marks 5 years of blogging at Online Marketing Blog. From the infamous “Florida Update” of December 2003 to current, practical advice on social media strategy December 2008, TopRank has been a trusted source of information for thousands of readers.

The entire TopRank Blogging team wishes a sincere Thank You to everyone that has commented, subscribed and linked to us over the years.  TopRank’s blogging efforts have been recognized in many ways including being one of the top 50 favorited blogs on Technorati, ranked a top marketing blog on Advertising Age and endorsed by fans from The DMA, PRSA, Microsoft, IBM, Yahoo and many others.

We hope readers will continue to enjoy the mix of current insights, tactics, interviews and conference coverage on the topics of search, social and online PR content that we’ve been providing during the past 5 years of blogging. 

A big thank you goes to Thomas aka TwisterMC who helps keep the blog back end and design running smoothly as well as making periodic contributions.  A big thanks also goes to TopRank team members that have endured gruelling liveblogging schedules including: Dana Larson, Jolina Pettice, Mike Yanke, Julie Brue, Ashley Bruce  and Jessica Cameron Ruud. 

One of the benefits of blogging for the past 5 years has been to use our own blog as a way to test a variety of content types, usability and blog software features, analytics and promotion tactics. We’ve been able to share some of these insights in our posts but more specifically with our corporate blogging clients. 

Some of our Most Popular Blog Posts Include Resources:

• RSS and Blog Directory Submissions List
• RSS Buttons tool
• Social Bookmarks tool
• BIGLIST of SEO Blogs
• Online Marketing Blog Recommended Resources

Most Popular Tips Posts:

• 25 Tips for Marketing Your Blog (June 2006)
• SEO Tools: Firefox Addons for Search Engine Optimization (January 2008)
• 5 Lesser Known Google Analytics Features (Feb 2008)
• Lowdown on Press Release Optimization (Oct 2005)
• Guide to Twitter as a Tool for Marketing and PR (November 2007)

Most Popular Interviews:

• Guy Kawasaki Interview on Alltop, Blogging and SEO
• Dell Social Media Interview with Richard Binhammer
• Video: Interview with Adam Lasnik of Google
• Enterprise Social Media Interview with Jim Cuene and Douglas Pollei
• Interview with Danny Sullivan & Neil Patel on SMX Social Media

Most Popular Polls:

• Best Internet Marketing Tactics 2008
• Best SEO Podcasts
• Best Keyword Research Tools
• Best Search Engine Marketing Email Newsletters
• Best Social Media Marketing Analytics Tools

Most Popular  Conference Liveblogging Posts:

• Pubcon: Top Secret SEO Tools (November 2008)
• Pubcon Images: Microsoft Party at ghostbar - (December 2007) 
• SMX West Google’s 5 Tips to Succeed in Universal Search (February 2008)
• 15 Things Not to Miss at SES San Jose 2008 (July 2008)
• SES London: Beyond Linkbait Getting Authoritative Online Mentions (February 2008)

There were many insipiratoins for the interviews, live conference blogging, SEO blog reviews, lists, polls, tips, news and commentary posted in the 2,000 plus entries at Online Marketing Blog.  I thought it would be interesting to take a look down memory lane and see what other search engine and search marketing blogs were on the scene late 2003. Keep in mind, these are true early adopters and pioneers. Google started their main blog late Spring 2004 and Yahoo in Fall of 2004:

ABAKUS - Blog born on our about February 07, 2003.  Initially written in English, this German blog from Alan Webb and friends  is now all German SEO all the time. At least as far as I can tell. Spreken ze deutsch? Alan was another pioneer in SEO blogging that I met early on.

Google Blogscoped - Blog born on our about April 28, 2003.  Phillip Lessen started this blog emphasizing information about Google  ”Contains 80% Google” (news, products, tips/tactics) as well as many posts about search engine optimization and marketing. 

Searchblog - Blog born on or about October 20, 2003. John Battelle is the author of “The Search - How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture”, co-founding editor of Wired Magazine and CEO of Federated Media.  With over 140 thousand subscribers, Searchblog is by far the most popular blog on search engines not run by a search engine itself.

Search Engine Blog - Blog born on or about April 15, 2002. Started and owned by Peter Da Vanzo, Search Engine Blog was a pioneer in the world of blogging and blogs about search engines. It isn’t really updated any more since Peter now writes at seobook.com.  

Search Engine Journal - Blog born on or about June 11, 2003, Loren Baker Search Engine Journal has fluctuated in it’s focus over the years from news to tips to news to a hybrid and in the past few years bringing on advertising and more staff bloggers.  SEJ is now a thriving search marketing blog and continues to grow subscribers and offer useful tips and industry news. 

Search Engine Lowdown - Blog born on or about July 15, 2003 Started by Marketing Pilgrim’s Andy Beal when he was with a company called Websourced and when people spelled blogg with two g’s.  Andy paved the way towards respectable blogging of industry news and grew a tremendous following at SEL. After he left, Garrett French took the reins doing a great job of writing, but the blog never quite recovered. It’s now been dormant for over a year.

Search Engine Roundtable - Blog born on or about December 2, 2003.  One of the most unique  formats and comprehensive in it’s coverage, Search Engine Rountable is run by Barry Schwartz and includes a number of contributors and guest bloggers. Barry and his team of bloggers were the first I know of to aggregate search marketing industry forum threads of interest and provide extensive liveblogging of conferences. I have the utmost respect for the pioneering work Barry has done over the years and will always appreciate the guest blogging opportunity he offerred, which inspired me to liveblog conferences here at OMB.

SEOBook - Blog born on or about December 1, 2003. Aaron wall decided to document his quest to learn SEO and wrote a 24 page e-book online about SEO which has grown much larger and to be one of the most popular books online about search engine optimization. Aaron started out writing commentary about industry news as well as his own observsations. He’s gone in, out and back into consulting and continues to write provacative, original content. Peter Da Vanzo mentioned above now writes for SEO Book as well.

Traffick - Blog born on or about July 03, 2002 and called “Threads and Needles”. However, the Traffick.com site has been posting savvy and insighful industry observations since 1998. Cory Kleinschmidt and Andrew Goodman were two of the first pioneers of commentary on the search marketing industry.

Besides the pioneering search engine and and marketing blogs above, there were a number of other informative resources on search engines and search marketing available in late 2003 (and before) that eventually added or moved entirely to a blog platform later on including: Search Engine Guide, Pandia & ResearchBuzz and Search Engine Watch.  Sites like SEO Today and Li’l Engine also focused on articles about search marketing in 2003 and are now blogs.

What other search marketing blogs were popular in the latter part of 2003 that I missed?

 Photo adapted from Rev Dan Catt

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As is tradition at Online Marketing Blog, we take quite a few photos at conferences. I’ve never come back from an event thinking that I took too many.  Here are a few photos from day one of the WebmasterWorld Pubcon conference in Las Vegas, which for me, was interrupted by a trip over to the Zappos headquarters where I took a tour. Afternoon sessions were well attended as was the Zappos Tweetup at Hard Rock Cafe. 

Joe (here flanked by Vanessa Zamora and Melanie Mitchell) is always the luckiest guy in the room - especially in Vegas

Michael Dorausch and Reem Abeidoh

Zack at Zappos Headquarters

Zappos, Elvis Style (including music)

6 SEOs Can’t be Wrong: Marcus, Bob, Chris, Greg, Neil, Cameron

Dan Perry and Ethan Giffin are pretty happy about Pubcon

Another packed session room at Pubcon

Microsoft with big smiles and plenty of visibility as an underwriting sponsor at Pubcon

There’s plenty to talk about in between sessions

Jeff Randall from WebmasterWorld making sure registration runs smoothly

Jessica and Ashley from TopRank who are blogging Pubcon

Andrew Beckman & Cindy Turrietta

Brian Chappell, Brian Carter, Jordan Kastaler and Jeremy Luebke chumming it up at the Zappos party

The Man of Pubcon: Brett Tabke

Check out all of TopRank’s photos on the Pubcon 2008 Flickr set.

Sponsored By: Follow TopRank on Twitter

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