aimClear Search Marketing Blog

Good morning New York! The sun has not risen outside my Herald Square Mid-Town hotel, though the city’s morning energy radiates  outside for miles.  It’s autumn in New York and that means SMX East,  one of our favorite annual search marketing conferences.

Freshly recovered from last night’s Clix/aimClear SchmoozeFest (thanks to Dave & Buster’s),  this morning it’s time for serious business…2 speaking assignments on the Social Media Track.  Here’s my speaking schedule today: Read the rest of this entry »

In an wild-west environment replete with social media carpetbaggers, content theft and predatory jerks, qualifying search consultants can be challenging for clients.  Amongst other means, we’ve settled on a holistic strategy to prove advice we offer.

As part of our services we proactively lead clients to search marketing conferences and thought leaders. Think how much confidence this empowering ethic requires.

SEM customers tend to be hands-on kind of folks. They ask great questions, get excited, wish they knew more and are afraid of what they don’t understand. Read the rest of this entry »

Greetings from late afternoon @ SMX East. It struck me covering the Ad Agencies & Search Marketing panel for SEORoundTable, that this conference crowd is a bit different. Yeah, the groovy old school search community-of-origin I love is here–pioneers, bloggers, the very roots of our industry. They’re crawling all over the place speaking, hanging out, blogging for trade pubs and meeting clients.

Still, the crowd at Jacob K. Javits Convention Center on West 34th Street center is different Read the rest of this entry »

By dawns early light the first handful of die-hards, coffee in hand, boarded. Official statistics haven’t been released yet but rumor has it that there are 2,000+ attendees here at SMX East. This is an awesome accomplishment for such a relatively young series. Congratulations to the whole Third Door Crew. Read the rest of this entry »

David Szetala (Clix Marketing) and I invite you to the semi-regular aimClear/Clix SchmoozeFest, an intimate gathering next week during SMX East in New York City.

The timing is perfect (TUESDAY, OCTOBER 7TH 5 P.M. UNTIL 7:30 PM) as we’ll hang right across the street and immediately before the spectacular (and significantly higher-budget) Webmasterradio.fm Search Bash. Read the rest of this entry »

A quick scan of SMX East’s “Conference Agenda At A Glance offers an exciting preview of what’s to come. Search Marketing Expo East New York City will take place October 6-8, 2008 at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center on West 34th Street.

We have to say the agenda, organized by Danny Sullivan, Chris Sherman and the whole Third Door crew, looks awesome. This is truly one of the “shouldn’t-miss” gatherings of the year for critical up-to-date industry information, best practices and  insight. SMX East is for serious professionals.  Register here: Read the rest of this entry »

This week I’ll have the distinct pleasure of speaking at SMX Local/Mobile San Francisco 2008. With an estimated half a trillion dollars in sales tallied offline in 2007, the holidays are coming up fast.

Why quote offline conversion metrics? Well, with America teetering on recession, understanding the local/mobile space is crucial for any business because search is often utilized by customers for research followed by offline purchase. If you can be in the Bay area July 24th and 25th, we highly recommend you attend. Read the rest of this entry »

SEM industry writers, conference organizers and attendees are passionately defending, disparaging and debating ethics surrounding so-called “gray/black hat tactics” presented @ SMX Advanced Seattle. I was surprised to find such virulent threads in BruceClay Blog and Sphinn. The contrast of post-show buzz caught me off guard and now over initial reactions, I have a few reflections. Read the rest of this entry »

The midnight SeaTac passenger lounge seems strangely romantic to this bleary eyed writer, awaiting the 12:40AM flight to Minneapolis and then Duluth, Minnesota. I’m positive the excitement of SMX Advanced 2008 will not wear off before we all get together for Advanced again next year. This was one hell of a conference. Read the rest of this entry »

Aromatic Starbucks coffee (of course) fills my hotel room as first light, obscured by coastal fog, peeks through lace curtains here at the lovely Seattle Marriott Waterfront.

It’s exciting to think that dozens of true search industry luminaries are cloistered within one city block here in the heart of downtown Seattle’s famed waterfront district.

Search executives, consultants, clients, vendors, agencies and technicians handling billions of dollars in marketing-spend and commerce are about to lace up their casual business best and get down to some powerful discussion. SMX Advanced surely is the place to be this classic rainy Seattle morning. Read the rest of this entry »