aimClear Search Marketing Blog

Should direct marketers place Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and/or other buttons as part of the template for every email blast?   What about PPC landing pages? Should Twitter and Facebook be exit-options for every PPC landing page impression? How should advertisers think about socialization as either primary or secondary KPIs (key performance indicators A.K. A “goals.”)?

At first gape, these questions seem easy, yes?  “Of course, yes, socialize everything” you shout!”  “After all, isn’t the ‘net  all about social media these days?” How could it be wrong to ever consider omitting the all-powerful and ubiquitous social media click-me-now badges? Read the rest of this entry »

credit: rahady
We’ve reviewed many sites where supposed search engine optimization “experts” damaged a business with archaic techniques and/or outmoded business practices.  While it’s easy to spot most scumbags, it can be much harder for laypersons to sift out previously germane SEO dinosaurs– now dangerously out of step.

To fill the void, this post offers wary small business owners, CMOs and marketing managers a 30,000 guerrilla vendor gut-check litmus test. Use these 20 procedures as first-line-of-defense screenings to evaluate whether your experts have kept current or are messing with your livelihood.  You may be surprised by the results. Read the rest of this entry »

Read it and weep. Google seems to be testing even deeper integration of real-time search in SERPs (search engine results pages). Either that or maybe it’s a bug.  Check out these suggestion results (found at the bottom of the SERP) for our KnowEm friend, Michael Streko.

Obviously, Google is now cruising real-time search and Twitter for SERPs suggestions. Here’s where that suggestion is derived from: Read the rest of this entry »

Search moves at the speed of light, so staying current is crucial.  This list of over 1,500 search industry articles, ideas, tweets, tool reviews, notes, snippets and snark is our 2009 internal agency-training library of  content. The aimClear team has embraced systemic review of this “Daily Training List” and it’s a cool part of the routine.

This mutual commitment to reading helps our shop keep a fresh awareness of current developments and is an important component of our training. We often discuss these posts as a group informally, and refer back to them as resources. I personally revisit the archive, send links to clients,  tweet, etc… It takes hours every day to read this much and we’ve found a lot of value in keeping discoveries in the link roundup format. Try searching this page for anything that happened in search last year and chances are you’ll find a useful resource.

We’ve decided to publish last year’s daily training notes for two reasons: First we want to gratefully acknowledge the bloggers and publications we depend on each day.  I’d like send special thanks to Barry Schwartz, the DailySearchCap,  SEOmoz, SearchEngineWatch & AllTop. Second, skimming the list of over 1,500 bulleted entries provides a sweet overview of our industry’s evolution in 2009. Read the rest of this entry »

To begin, this post is not a black hat tutorial teaching how to build spam-scraper-copyright-infringing websites. Rather we’ll highlight simple white hat techniques to successfully republish and rank “duplicate” content, all the while creating new value for users.  Please don’t use these methods for evil. Read the rest of this entry »

We invite SES Chicago attendees to  join us today at 12:45PM. I’ll have the pleasure of moderating the Facebook Rockstars RoundTable: Marketing For the Other Internet session.  350 million fanatically engaged users in one place means understanding Facebook’s no-search-engines-allowed community walled garden system of “organic” and paid visibility is now essential. Shell-shocked brand managers unite! We’ll share how to plan, pilot and ramp successful Facebook programs.

Join kick-ass  social marketers Addie Conner, Director of Interactive Marketing, Avenue 100 Media Solutions, Melissa Mackey, Search Marketing Manager, Fluency Media and Muhammed Saleem, Director of Social Media Strategy, ChicagoNow. Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to Search Engine Strategies Chicago 2009! The sun has not yet risen but excitement is palpable here at the ornate and venerable  Hilton hotel.

If you’re reading this post you should definitely be here. Nothing is as effective as mining first hand information from the best online marketers in the biz’ along with an incredible helping of camaraderie and business bonding. That said we’re stunned at the array of talent embodied in the correspondents conference organizers have assembled to document the proceedings. A hat-tip goes out to the SES crew for its forward-journalistic-thinking and substantial investment to bring in the writers.  Here’s comprehensive SES Chicago 2009 coverage publication list. Read the rest of this entry »

Since the onset of personalized search, frustrated SEO sharpshooters have sought tactics to somehow get a grip on the ensuing chaos.  Now that most users  get uniquely-customized search results (SERPs), the days of search engine optimization measurable in the SERPs are long gone.

This post offers a useful method to optimize for micro-demographics in a way that, not only neutralizes, but also assertively exploits personalized search to the SEO’s benefit, one user at a time. Even better: there is no way Google or any other engine will ever defeat this tactic.  Got ya’ interested? Read on for an accidental antidote: SEO for personalized search. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s our privilege to share this Thanksgiving gift of song with our community. To download “Not giving Up” and “Miracles” right away, scroll straight to the bottom.

If there is justice my friend Pamela McNeill will experience fame and fortune to match years of critical acclaim for her music from media and fans.  The story of how her latest album, “Heartaches and Miracles,” came to be is truly the stuff of  Thanksgiving and inspiration.

Pamela’s credits range from stadium performances with Rick Astley and gigging London’s storied underground to writing movie soundtrack songs with Yanni…and lots in between. Well known by music industry insiders from New York to Nashville,  she effortlessly alternates velvet-sweet introspective ballads with kick-ass Janis Joplin-esque rock-out gravel-rants and anthems reminiscent of Grammy Winners. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been watching TweetDeck all morning  for the real-time search “thankful.” Feeling extremely grateful, I asked a couple a’  thousand of our closest friends what exactly they were thankful for. Some of the answers from tweeps were warm and touching. We found some  snarky-ass results in Twitter search segment SERPs, which we grabbed to RT-share here. Read the rest of this entry »