Continental Breakfast

Link Building Tactics, Tools & Techniques

Debra Mastaler, Alliance-Link.com

SEO Tools

Todd Malicoat, Stuntdubl

Lunch Break

Search Engine Marketing Metrics and Myths

Adam Goldberg, ClearSaleing

How to Effectively Use Social Media for Search Marketing Campaigns

Liana Evans, KeyRelevance

Link Building Tactics, Tools & Techniques

Link Building Workshop

Monday, June 16, 2008

Spaces Limited

8:00am-12:00pm

Need links? In order to rank well and successfully promote your online business, you need an effective link building program as part of your over-all SEO strategy.

This link building workshop will help you to better understand and manage your link building campaigns by providing you with the knowledge to create proven, practical and creative link marketing campaigns. You'll walk away understanding why you need certain links, how to find them, and how to effectively use links to promote your brand and your search engines rankings.

This workshop is for anyone responsible for website promotion... SEO's, SEM's, bloggers, web designers, and/or business owners. This workshop will provide information on the most successful and current link building "tips and tricks" out there.

After attending this workshop, you will be able to:

• Understand why search engines value links and
• How link popularity and Page Rank works
• Weather shifts in the search engine algorithms
• Learn which linking schemes the search engines frown on and
• Which linking tactics provide the most relevant one-way links
• Learn how to attract links through content generation and
• How to Use the new social media sites to gather links
• Leave with clear link building methodologies and online resources to help you in your future marketing endeavors.

Why Links are valuable

• Definitions and concepts
• Why the search engines value them
• Page Rank facts and fiction
• Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI), Trust Rank and other link analysis papers

Engine Buzz

• What they're saying and how to use it

Link Spam and What To Avoid

How to Conduct a Link Analysis

• What to look for
• Free and paid tools to help
• Finding those authority sites

Optimizing Your Internal Links

Linking Tactics

• Reclaiming Links
• Competitive Linking
• Understanding RSS
• Authority Linking
• Finding authority sites
• Becoming one
• Content Generation
• Using Blogs and Wiki's
• Writing articles
• Directories & DMOZ
• Reciprocals
• Working the Media/Press Releases
• Trust Links
• Social Networking Sites
• Digg, Delicious
• The Answer Sites, etc.

Paid Links

• Text ads
  
• Hosted content

Debra Mastaler is President of Alliance-Link, an interactive marketing agency based in Williamsburg, Virginia and focused on providing custom link building campaigns and link training. In business since 2000, Debra offers a common sense approach to link building by combining traditional sales and promotional strategies with effective online search engine marketing tactics.

Debra is a featured guest speaker at the Search Engine Strategies Conference (SES), is a guest columnist for Search Engine Land and Search Engine Guide, has written widely on link marketing for publications including her link building blog The Link Spiel and is the link building moderator on the Small Business Ideas Forum.

In addition to client projects and link training for Fortune 500 companies as well as a number of top international SEO firms, Debra has provided link training sessions for the Direct Marketing Association, High Ranking Seminars and Search Engine Strategies.

In October 2005 Debra was elected to the Board of Directors of the Search Engine Marketing Association of North America as Secretary/Treasurer where she served until August 2006.

SEO Tools

SEO Workshop

Monday, June 16, 2008

Spaces Limited

8:00am-12:00pm

Anyone involved with search engine optimization needs a toolbox filled with tools to extract the necessary information about a website to diagnose and remedy problems. The SEO toolbox is filled with a variety of different tools to give information about the elements necessary to help a site rank better. During this session, you will learn about the different types of information that are most important to a site's ranking, and how to identify them with a set of tools. We will look at tools for competitive analysis, on-page optimization, page level information, site level information, indexing information, and off-page information.

Anyone who needs to better understand search engine optimization. More specifically, this workshop is for developers, brand managers, and marketers that have any involvement with natural search optimization. It will even be beneficial for those who are not directly responsible for SEO, but work with others in their division who are in charge of organic search marketing.

You will leave with a strong understanding of which tools will help you to find answers to important SEO questions. You will have a better understanding of some of the most important elements of SEO and how to look out for mistakes on your website. You will learn to identify many of the common problems that can hinder your SEO efforts, and potential solutions to them. Anyone involved indirectly with SEO will benefit by learning skills that will make the entire SEO team stronger. You'll learn more about a set of tools that can be given to an entire in-house team to better understand organic search rankings.

We'll take a look at the best tools (both paid and free) to accomplish a variety of common SEO tasks including link development tools, keyword and content generation tools, competitive analysis tools and much more. You can expect to learn to optimize the time you spend on common SEO tasks in addition to your website:

• You will learn how to check for improper redirects with header check tools
• You will understand different types of tools to perform link development
• You will learn about running simulated spiders on your website to find 404's and identify spider traps
• You will learn checking on hosting and domain level details of a site
• You will learn to view a site with various features turned on and off to view it as a search spider does

Todd Malicoat is an independent marketing and business consultant from the SEO school of thought. He's done strategic consulting for companies large and small, and built and sold several sites of his own. An active conference speaker at Search Engine Strategies, Webmaster World Pubcon, and other industry conferences for several years, he is considered a leading authority on search and social marketing. He has been cited by Inc. Magazine, The Sydney Herald, Website Magazine, The New York Post, Infoworld, and many other media outlets on search, reputation management, social media, and other web related issues. Todd also runs a blog that covers all areas of web traffic acquisition called Stuntdubl.com - that echoes his mantra of "Getting hit by traffic... not cars http://www.stuntdubl.com."

Todd began creating websites in 1997, and started doing SEO and Internet marketing in early 2001. Todd completed a dual-bachelors degree program in Computer Information Management/Business Administration from Northwood University in the summer of '03 after completing his thesis on Planning, Developing, and Promoting a Successful Website for Small Business, while simultaneously running a web design and consulting firm Meta4creations, LLC. Todd formerly held a Vice President position with the Great Lakes Web Professionals, while an Internet marketing consultant with System And Market Services of America (SAMSA) in Saginaw, MI, and has done project management and internet marketing for several dozen small to medium size businesses and a handful of larger corporations. He was also previously the VP of Sales and Marketing for We Build Pages in upstate NY, before entering full-time consultancy.

Search Engine Marketing Metrics and Myths

Search Engine Marketing

Monday, June 16, 2008

Spaces limited

1:00pm-5:00pm

The metrics that marketers are using today to make decisions regarding how their budgets are allocated to online advertising vehicles are flawed. If you do not understand how metrics can produce false positives, you can be led into believing you are making smart decisions, while the reality is that your decisions are completely wrong.

This workshop is for anyone that has the responsibility of deciding how and where to allocate their marketing budget towards online advertising vehicles, most notably paid search, banners, comparison shopping engines, and affiliates.

At the end of this training, each participant will have a clear understanding of how to properly assess online advertising performance.

• You will understand how using metrics like cost-per-acquisition (CPA), conversion rate, revenue, orders, leads, cost per lead (CPL), return on ad spend (ROAS), and click through rates (CTR) are flawed metrics that can mislead organizations into believing they are making profitable decisions
• You will learn how the current model of assigning sales credit to the last ad that was clicked is a completely flawed method
• You will learn how to tie offline orders that happen over the phone to online ad campaigns
• You will learn to connect back office systems to your online advertising, so those that do not sell their products online can still measure their ads effectiveness in terms of ROI vs. judging ad performance on the cost of leads
• You will learn techniques for measuring the lifetime value (LTV) of customers and how to allocate the LTV to online advertising
• You will learn the proper technique for measuring the performance of your ad text

The bullet points above will provide each participant with new insight into how to assess their ad campaigns more accurately. This information will make each participant a better marketer and will give them a competitive advantage over their peers and companies that compete in their space.

1. The Metric - What is the best metric to use to measure online advertising performance?
2. The Measure - What are the proper ways to measure online ad performance?
3. The Method - What is a proven method for the continuous improvement of online ad campaigns?
4. The Tools - How to select the proper tools, agencies, and personnel to ensure optimal performance with online advertising

Adam Goldberg is an ex-Google Insider who started Google's Inside Sales team in NYC in 2003. His team was responsible for selling AdWords and other Google products to small to medium sized businesses, and managing and optimizing their campaigns. While at Google, Adam learned about the overwhelming challenges that advertisers face in terms of managing, analyzing, and optimizing their online ad campaigns. Adam realized that technology could solve a lot of the challenges online marketers had to deal with. Adam put together several technical solutions that Google could offer to help their clients. Unfortunately, several of his ideas were unable to be executed upon by Google. Therefore, he looked outside Google's walls to see if his ideas had enough merit to start a business of his own. In 2006, he left Google to start ClearSaleing. Adam, along with his partners, raised several million dollars and developed a technology that is used by several Fortune 500 companies, as well as over a dozen members of the Internet Retailer 500. This technology is based on a unique methodology he developed to best assess online advertising performance, so that marketers can properly allocate their limited ad dollars. ClearSaleing, in addition to being an advertising analytics provider, is also a full-service interactive agency that manages campaigns for several Fortune 500 and Internet Retailer 500 companies, such as American Greetings, BMW, and Nationwide. Prior to working for Google, Adam lived in San Francisco where he was the Eastern Region Sales Manager for Actuate Corp, the leader in Enterprise Reporting and Performance Management applications and, prior to that, Adam was a Major Account Executive with Oracle Corp. in Redwood Shores, California.

How to Effectively Use Social Media for Search Marketing Campaigns

Social Media Training

Monday, June 16, 2008

Spaces limited

1:00pm-5:00pm

Over the past year, social media has experienced a virtual explosion and has become a major piece of the search marketing puzzle. Companies are amazed by the influence that social media is having upon the industry and and want to understand how to use it effectively. From capturing traffic and links, to effectively converting the traffic, there are many aspects of social media that need to be considered. Figuring out which type of social media is right for your business is another factor in the search marketing mix. Do you sacrifice your steady customer base for a 1-day hit of traffic from Digg or do you focus on a more targeted blog or forum audience and educate them about your services and/or products? How do you combine this with your PPC and SEO efforts? All of this and more is covered in this course.

Beginners in Search Marketing to experienced Search Marketers looking to understand more about social media and how to use it effectively.

This session will show you the entire realm of social media and how to use it effectively as part of a holistic marketing campaign. Most people think of "Digg" as the big player in social media that they need to be working with. Digg is just one of many facets of Social Media, from social communities to social photo sharing, blogging to forums there's a world of opportunity out in the internet waiting to be explored. You'll come away with great ideas how to effectively leverage your brand, services and products in different social media environments.

Attendees will:

• Understand the "Rules of Engagement"
• Learn the difference that participation in social media will make
• Gain understanding as to why keyword research is important in social media
• Gain understanding as to why not every form of social media is the "right one"
• Gain insight into the different types of social media such as
  • Social News
  • Social SharingSocial Bookmarking
  • Social Networking
  • Stumbling, Wikipedia, etc.
  • Forums & Message Boards
  • Ratings & Reviews
  • Blogging

Social Media Agenda:

• Overview of What Social Media is
• What are the different types of Social Media
• Why Use It
• What does it take to be successful
• It's not a flash in the pan
• Overview of Social News
• What is Social News
• Who uses Social News
• How do I Use It?
• Overview of What Social Sharing
• What is Social Sharing
• Who uses Social Sharing sites
• How do I use social sharing sites effectively
• Overview of Social Networking Sites
• What are Social Networking sites
• Who uses Social Networking sites
• How do I use social networking effectively
• Overview of Social Bookmarking Sites
• What are Social Bookmarking sites
• Who uses Social Bookmarking sites
• How do I use social Bookmarking effectively
• Overview of Forums & Message Boards
• What are Forums & Message Boards
• Who uses Forums & Message Boards
• How do I use Forums & Message Boards effectively
• Overview of Rating & Review Sites
• What are Rating & Review Sites
• Who uses Forums Rating & Review Sites
• How do I use Rating & Review Sites effectively
• Overview of Other Social Media Sites (StumbleUpon, Wikipedia, Yahoo! Answers, LinkedIn, etc.)
• What are Other Social Media Sites
• Who uses these Other Social Media Sites
• How do I use these Other Social Media Sites effectively
• Overview of Blogging
• What is Blogging
• Who is Blogging
• Should I be blogging
• How to effectively interact with Bloggers

Liana "Li" Evans is the Director of Internet Marketing at KeyRelevance. Since 1999 Liana has been active in the search marketing arena, becoming well-versed in all avenues of search marketing, but having a particular focus on natural search optimization, vertical search, social media and word of mouth marketing. She has also become well-versed in areas of the retail industry that are regulated by the FTC. Liana helped to design, plan & implement an Internet Retailer 500 company's efforts into natural search optimization, totally revamping out of date navigation and site architecture, with very successful results. Since 1992 Liana has been active in the technology fields being both a well-versed programmer and database programmer/designer, which lends well to her technical expertise in dealing with large scale retail sites and their dynamic nature.