We at SEMpdx had the great fortune to host two industry luminaries at this past Hotseat event on Web Analytics. Eric T. Peterson of Web Analytics Demystified book and blog and Ian Lurie of Portent Interactive agency in Seattle and Conversation Marketing blog spoke at our monthly Hotseat group of 40 SEMpdx members and friends. For those of you not familiar with our monthly Hotseat events, we host an industry expert where they spend 30 minutes talking about a specific subject within SEM, web site optimization, social media, or web analytics and then they, along with a panel of 3 other industry specialists review 2-3 sites from the audience. Hotseats are a great way to learn about a topic in great detail, have your site reviewed by industry experts, or learn about what to do and not do on your own site. And of course, it’s a great way to network with SEM professionals in the greater Portland area.

It’s cold, dirty, smelly, and cramped under this bridge; and people are so rude.  Yesterday I was like “No, I won’t share my fire-grilled possum with you!  I caught it fair and square – so go get your own!”  It worked out alright though; my wife eventually did catch her own.

There was rumor today that we might be moving out from under the bridge.  We’ll see, but hopes are high, and morale is good.  I’ll miss all my new neighbors and campfire sing-along pals – but I suspect we’ll get over it.

About a couple months ago, I read Peter Guralnick’s incredible 2 volume biography of Elvis Presley (Last Train To Memphis and Careless Love).   Comparing Guralnick’s work to Matt McGee’s “U2:  A Diary” (which I read this weekend) offers an interesting contrast in style and narrative.

Reading Guralnick’s prose feels like reading a good novel.  Furthermore, Peter is never shy about interjecting his opinion into the work (and he even inserts himself as a character in the book since he started covering Elvis as a journalist early in his career). 

It’s been a cold, but dry, weekend under the bridge.  We did some hunting for small rodents Friday night, and found quite a few.  My son liked them, but my daughter said they’re too crunchy.  We’ve kept the kids running on the people-wheel to power the laptop and a small radio we found.  They seem to enjoy their time on the wheel, but without showers the smell is beginning to offend our bridge-dwelling neighbors.  We’ll need to address cleanliness before we invite the in-laws over for dinner.       

It was a wet, windy day under the Hawthorne Bridge.  We tried to keep warm by the radiation of the laptop screen, but it just wasn’t enough and battery power was running low.  Then an idea struck.  Using many abandoned shopping carts for parts, I built a rather clunky mouse…er, people-wheel, just big enough for my wife and kids to run on – and to power the laptop.  Ahhhh, now we are all warm and I can keep looking for work…

Damn, it’s getting cold under here, but things are looking up.  I may move to a bridge with fewer leaks today, as the rain is affecting my ability to work…

I came home from PDX Mindshare last night in a bit of a quandary. 

In my Living under a bridge post, I mentioned that the great thing about Facebook was that your connections are more likely your real connections; people you know.  People you want to share your personal and professional life with.

Okay, not really – but it could happen.  Here we go - my very own social marketing test in action…

It’s strange to have been in search marketing and professional business consulting for 10 years, and currently work in a market (search) that is practically untouchable – yet be laid off.

Online Marketing Summit is one of the the premier events for online marketing professionals, delivering  more than 25 sessions and workshops presented by an esteemed roster of online  marketing authors and practitioners.

The 2009 event will include case studies from some of the world’s leading brands, with three NEW Tracks  - Foundational, Best Practice, and  Advanced Strategies. All marketing professionals will have a track to suit their individiual educational needs.

Jessica Bowman: Selling To The C Suite.

By keeping SEO top of mind for everyone in the company

Getting C-Suite buy-in is easy. Numbers, Demeanor. The numbers speak for themselves. C-Suite will love the ROI and buy-in.

The problem: Everyone under the C-Suite. Middle management complains and the complaints get escalated, people get agitated.

Your search requests add to project man hours, are inconsistent with other goals, go against existing programming standards, weren’t technically feasible, added to the project time line and cost—typical objections.

John Lessnau: Link Buying not Link Building

Why buy links? You get the anchor text you want; you get on the page you want; you get the location on the page you want; you get the links that help you rank better.

Why people don’t buy links: Fear of Google, Don’t Understand it; Upfront cost; Hoping for a wave of natural links miracle; Takes time, salesmanship and effort.

5 Simple Things: There’s Still Time (Jimmy Duvall)

1)On every page of site, make sure there is a “View Shopping Cart” on every site page
2)Phone number) on every page.
3)Make sure you’re answering all core questions on Shopping Cart page.
4)Ensure where your buyers know where they are at in the buying process.
5)Make the shipping cost very obvious in the buying process.

Ecommerce Site Optimization (Ethan Griffin)

Louise Rijk: Integrating Word of Mouth Marketing into the Advertising Mix.

Word of Mouth is the act of consumers providing honest information to honest consumers. It’s driven by influencers with large social networks who are inspired to talk positively about a brand, product or service. Organic WOM – Occurs naturally when people become advocates because they are happy with a product or service. Amplified WOM – When marketers launch campaigns to accelerate organic WOM (WOMM).

SEO Design & Organic Site Structure (Mark Jackson)

7 habits of highly effective web design:

Be Proactive: Keyword research, competitive analysis, creating a search engine friendly information architecture, search engine friendly web design, content.

Begin with the End in Mind: What are the goals? More sales / leads. Higher rankings / More SE Traffic, More registrations for newsletters, Better Branding (Better Looking Website). Incorporate keyword research, refer to competitive analysis, develop a strategy for information architecture.

Content Creation: Winning Tactics for the Real World (Ted Uhle)

Don’t build a Frankensite. Business process & workflow must support SEO.

Training for SEO. Locate and educate everyone in the workflow. Dedicated analytics for each person. Hold regular team meetings.

War Story #1 – Management MUST Buy In. Major Enterprise – Silicon Valley. Great Identification of Players (IT Dept., Marketing, Web Design, Writers, Analytics). Strong Education Kick-Off (High Enthusiasm), ½ the team reassigned 4 weeks later. \

Common Excuses Why Companies Have Yet To Embrace Social Media (David Wallace)

Twitter Revolution (Warren Whitlock)

3 stages of acceptance: Denial, Reluctant Acceptance, Meaningful Connections (If there is a meaningful conversation, comment about it).

Your customers are on Twitter. Twittinsecrets.com Twitterhandbook.com

Brian Carter: The Social Media Trifecta: Three-Pronged Strategy: Achieving Online Awesomnity.

Trifecta: Blog + Bookmarking + Twitter.

Optimization = Getting the results you want faster. Identify your goal, establish a measurement, where are you at, plan route to goal, let results guide progress.

Tips For Making More Money With Social Media (Michael Gray)

Monetizing social media traffic is harder to monetize than most types of traffic. Only try to monetize it after you have a really solid grasp of how it works.

Don’t break the rules: Understand the written and unwritten rules of the community. Know the communities tolerance for sales promotions.

Create a knowledge resource. Create valuable content that is helpful and solves a problem. Offer free solutions (directly or through links). Up-sell to premium products or services.

Rand Fishkin: Social Site Verticals Walkthrough

Democratized Social News Sites (e.g. Digg, Reddit). What to do: Create Profiles, Connect with other users, Vote on content, comment, submit own content. High quality traffic from a linkability perspective.

Editor Power Social News Sites (e.g. Yahoo Buzz, Techmeme). Learn what editors like / use, submit relevant content, connect with other users, vote on content, comment.

Social Networking Site s (e.g. LinkedIn, Facebook). Create profiles, connect with other users, share links, news, photos & info.

Read More Here.

Pubcon attendees: Ya don’t wanna miss it!

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When you have a client that just won’t act on your advice and recommendations, how do you handle it?

in this case, I’m not talking about a debate over ideas or tactics, I’m talking about a simple failure to follow through with recommendations which know to be correct.

Obviously they have other priorities, right? As long as they pay their bill every month, then who should care, right?