8:00am-4:00pm

Registration

8:00am-9:00am

Morning Coffee

9:00am-10:00am

Morning Keynote: Dan Heath

10:00am-10:15am

Session Interval

10:15am-11:15am

Attendees may choose to attend one of the five sessions offered during this time.

Track: Just the Basics
The Business Case for SEO Content Development: Turning Words Into Action!
This session will focus on free and low-cost tools that can help beginners get started with their search and online marketing campaigns. The speakers will all reveal their site content, resulting in sluggish search engine rankings, low conversion rates, and lost opportunities. Learn how your company can strategize and create value-added content that dovetails with your lead generation, sales, and readership goals. This session will discuss:

• The business case for SEO content development
• In-house or outsource: things to consider
• SEO copywriting fundamentals
• SEO content development through the sales cycle
• The value of optimized content for publisher sites

Track: Insider Intelligence
How to Speak Geek: Working Collaboratively With Your IT Department to Get Stuff Done
Are you in charge of marketing the website, yet have to deal with unfamiliar IT issues? How do you handle a mean IT department? Do you want to improve your relationship with your IT staff? This session provides clear advice and translates the geek-speak into real-life examples. Learn specific steps to analyze your website for potential search engine road blocks such as duplicate content penalties, canonicalization, circular navigation, and other technical horrors. We'll help you identify potential problems and provide clear advice on how to approach your IT department with your request and an olive branch of peace.

Advanced Advertising Track
Effective Contextual Search Management
This session looks at the way publishers can generate revenue by carrying contextual ads offered by major networks and effective tactics for managing paid search in the contextual advertising arena. You'll hear from publishers delivering ads and those who manage contextual campaigns.

Clinic Track
Site Clinic
This interactive session takes volunteers from the audience and examines their websites live to provide general feedback about improving them to gain more traffic from search engines.

Local & More
Special Kelsey Group Presentation: Local 2.0: The Evolution of Local Search
What percentage of online searches are local? If you consider searches that end up having some influence on local buying activity, the opportunity is put into perspective. But there are still large gaps between the point of search and the point of purchase. How are online mapping, shopping engines, and directories starting to fill these gaps with user-generated content, video, or inventory data that funnel searchers towards local businesses? And how can marketers utilize these tools to get local searchers to pick up the phone, schedule appointments, or show up at their stores?

11:15am-11:30am

11:30am-12:30pm

Attendees may choose to attend one of the five sessions offered during this time.

Track: Just the Basics
Fast, Free and Easy Tools to Get You Going
This session will focus on free and low-cost tools that can help beginners get started with their search and online marketing campaigns. The speakers will all reveal their favorite "tools on a budget." This session is geared for beginners to help them to understand the areas they need to tackle first and which tools are available to help them increase rankings and drive sales, so they can afford to move to higher-level tools that require subscriptions or hefty investments.

Inside Intelligence Track
Trademark Issues: What SEMs Should Know
In 2008, U.S. paid search advertisement revenue is expected to reach 15.52 billion. This represents a 31.9% increase over 2007. Despite this tremendous growth, uncertainty in recent court developments may discourage search engine marketers from purchasing keywords that are trademarked by others for fear of being found liable for trademark infringement. The presentation will include a discussion of the state of the law as well as legal ways to use another's trademark to enhance your visibility on the web.

Advanced Advertising Track
Creating a Cohesive Search Strategy Across Multiple Business Units
Recent research reports report that since 2004, paid search comprises a substantial 40 percent of total U.S. Internet ad spending. Thus, it is no surprise that big brands such as Yahoo use paid search as a key component of the marketing mix, although operating multiple sub-brands can present complicated marketing challenges.

David Roth will explain how Yahoo defines, measures, and manages online marketing success across a variety of online business models. He will also describe how SEM plays an integral role in meeting marketing objectives, and share strategies for defining and leveraging lifetime value metrics to drive standardization and results across a broad scope of marketing challenges. Eduardo Llach will present search strategies and campaign optimization techniques that brands like Yahoo use to meet their online marketing objectives, including how SEM campaigns can be most cost-effective and deliver the highest ROI.

Clinic Track
Site Clinic
This interactive session takes volunteers from the audience and examines their websites live to provide general feedback about improving them to gain more traffic from search engines.

Local & More
Special Kelsey Group Presentation: The 3G iPhone: Local Search Demos
By the time SES San Jose rolls around, we will have seen a torrent of application development for the 3G iPhone. Mobile local search will finally get its due, with built-in GPS functionality, combined with a feature set and price point that are mainstream-friendly. This session will get a first-hand look at how companies in the local search space are making good use of the iPhone's open development standards. Whether the search is for a restaurant, a flat screen television, or a crescent wrench, we'll see the applications that will lead the way for the next generation of local search on the mobile device.

12:30pm-1:30pm

1:30pm-2:30pm

Attendees may choose to attend one of the five sessions offered during this time.

Track: Just the Basics
Organic Listings Forum
Pose questions to our panel of experts about free "organic" listing issues, plus participate in this session that allows the audience to share tips, tools, and techniques. There's no set agenda, so this is an ideal session to discuss any major recent changes with organic listings.

Inside Intelligence Track
The Best Kept Secrets to Search
Secrets of paid and organic search? Sure, they're out there. Join us for a no-holds-barred interactive session in which veteran search engine marketers disclose some of their favorite search engine optimization and marketing tips, tricks, and secrets. While there's no replacement for old-fashioned hard work, getting the inside scoop and shortcuts to search success never hurt.

Advanced Advertising Track
Post-Click Marketing: Converting Search Engine Traffic
Traffic alone doesn't make money — taking advantage of what happens after the click is a key component to making money online. Take better advantage of visitors you're already receiving and increase conversion rates without paying for additional traffic. Driving traffic, rankings, social media mentions, paid advertising clicks, and ultimately conversions and ROI is quite dependent upon the content you put on your site. Good content alone has the potential to drive vast amounts of links and traffic via higher rankings, but ignoring what that traffic sees when they hit your website and just concentrating on driving traffic cuts conversion and ROI out of the equation. That can be a costly mistake.

This session will cover:

• Keyword Research and segmentation of organic and paid traffic
• Organization and structure of a site to facilitate click-paths
• Creating content that pleases each segment of visitor - and the search engines.
• Testing (A/B - Heat-mapping, Analytics) content to determine what works and what isn't working.
• Making sure you're showing each segment of users the content that is most likely to entice them to convert.

Clinic Track
How to Choose a Search Vendor
Marketers face a bewildering number of options in selecting their search marketing campaign tools and vendors, and making a decision will only become more difficult as the variety of players in the industry grows. Likewise, instead of just settling for the usual functionality, features, and pricing, search marketers are clamoring for more integrated tools and innovative solutions when they survey the various vendors. Join us for an enlightening discussion as industry veterans share insight into matching the best product offering to your company's individual search goals.

Local & More
Affiliate & Search Marketing Square Off
Join in on a no-holds-barred debate where performance marketing's top contenders square off. As SEM evolves, marketers find themselves competing head-on with affiliates. Marketers want more leads/sales, increased affiliate-generated leads/sales, and less cannibalization of search campaigns. How can this be achieved in a world filled with increasingly hostile rhetoric on both sides? Join a panel of experts as they break silence on taboo issues and work through the finer points. You'll walk away with fresh, new perspective and the ability to collaborate profitably.

2:30pm-2:45pm

2:45pm-3:45pm

Attendees may choose to attend one of the five sessions offered during this time.

Track: Just the Basics
Network Neutrality is for Online Marketers too!
If Internet access providers, such as telephone and cable companies, begin preferring certain websites or content types over others, it will be harder for the marketing community to determine whether observed online behavior is due to customer choice or provider choice. In addition, the threat of extra charges for "preferred" delivery is likely to saddle online marketers with extra charges or degraded service. Two network neutrality experts analyze the ins and outs of the debate, project the next moves by FCC and Congress, and discuss potential ways that the online marketing community can respond.

Inside Intelligence Track
In House SEO: Lessons Learned & Victories Won
As Search Engine Marketing (SEM) grows in popularity, many companies are attempting to handle the SEM function in-house despite the inherent complexity and challenges. Join us for a spirited discussion and get a chance to meet some of these intrepid do-it-yourselfers behind the in-house movement, as we debate the pros and cons of developing and training a dedicated in-house team. Laying the foundation for in-house SEO success, long-term cost savings, gaining project support at the executive level, leveraging innate knowledge and creating accountability are just some of the topics to be discussed.

Advanced Advertising Track
Search Advertising Tools
In order to get a leg up on the competition, successful Search Engine Marketers need to be armed with the latest tools of the trade. Join us as we explore a range of popular search engine advertising tools along with some important features you should be aware of. Whether you are looking for a free basic tool that will help you get started or a more advanced paid offering, our panel of experts will provide you with the insight and experience to zero in on the right solution.

Clinic Track
Site Clinic
This interactive session takes volunteers from the audience and examines their websites live to provide general feedback about improving them to gain more traffic from search engines.

Local & More
Searching For Jobs in Search: Starting and Advancing Your Career in the Industry
This panel of experts will discuss the qualities they look for in candidates, as well as strategies for career advancement in the search industry. The discussion will include:

• How have the criteria for a strong candidate evolved over the years? Are the sources that were relied on in the past different than they are today?
• How can you break into the search industry as a marketer who doesn't have direct experience with the medium?
• Can specific training jumpstart the experience necessary to enter into the search industry? What particular types of training are recommended?
• How important is training and continuing education to career advancement? What are other recommendations for career advancement?