Welcome to Day 1 of #SESNY! Whether your company’s goal is to make a trillion friends or a trillion dollars, a solid SEM strategy is a serious cornerstone of success. Consider it the well-balanced breakfast of champion marketers. A healthy blend of organic, paid, contextual, and conversion optimization (plus, of course, two scoops of raisins and a strawberry toaster pastry) can help pave the way for an effective, measurable search marketing campaign. Day 1 of Search Engine Strategies New York kicked off with an array of rad panels, but for attendees hungry for super-actionable takeaways, the 6 Strategies For Superior SEM Results session was a supreme choice.

Wpromote’s Michael Mothner and Michael Stone took the stage to share client case studies and specific examples that demonstrated the 6 strategies. The #1 goal? Dish out piping hot brain-chow that can be “immediately implemented to improve the results of your online marketing efforts.” (The special bonus surprise? Gummi Hamburgers for everyone in the audience. Pretty sweet menu.) aimClear live-tweeted this session. Full coverage lives after the jump.

6 Strategies for Superior SEM Results
Michael Mothner was up first, introducing himself, his co-presenter, and their company, Wpromote. After a quick get-to-know-ya, it was time to dive into the goods. So let’s follow suit, and do the same.

#1 Always Test Everything
The first part of this step actually isn’t testing everything; it’s understanding what you should test. Understanding the elements of your site, the variables, and what can be easily changed for effective results is key.

Things to test:

• headline
• buttons
• images
• sub-headlines
• forms

Within each of these elements, there exist, like, seventeen sub-elements. For example, when you’re testing the buttons, test the color, shape, size, placement on the button… the font-type on the text of the button… the alignment of the text on the button… you get the picture. Test. EVERYTHING.

Mothner ran through some testing examples, to show how tweaking one seems-subtle element can yield ridiculously large results:

• Headline Testing. Say you’ve got a car website, and you want to test different headlines. Headline option #1: “Life is short. Just Drive.” Headline option #2:  ”Drive 5 Super Cars. The US Super Car Tour.” Very different headlines. Which do you think did better? I guessed the 1st. But the second headline got more conversions… 34% more.
• Button Testing. You’ve got a gaming website. A conversion for you means downloads of your free game. Which button text do you think would get more clicks? Option #1: “Sign Up Now” or Option #2: “Instant Demo.” Well, we are a generation of instant-gratification. Option 2 had an 84% more sign ups than option #1. Yow.
• Image Testing. The headline of  your web page is “World Class Hosting.” Two options for the image next to your page text. Option #1: A padlock. Option #2. A globe. Which do you think did better? The padlock. By 200%. Two hundred percent! That’s 200% more sign ups or form submissions you wouldn’t have gotten (or even been aware of, perhaps) without this simple testing.
• Sub-Headline Testing. Think of your sub-headline as a very, very literal space to express your call-to-action. Option #1: ”30 Day Free Trial on All Accounts” vs. option #2: “Sign up, takes less than 60 seconds!” Which converted higher? Option #2. By 30%. Man, oh man.
• Form Testing. This one was a little different. The objective with this testing was to identify how much info you need for a lead… name, email address, etc. These fields should be in a “required step 1″ of your form. Everything else is secondary… add it to an “optional step 2″ form. More likely than not, users will willingly share the follow up info with you.
• Site Testing Tools. Mothner recommended Optimizely, Google Website Optimizer, and ADOBE Test & Target, among others.

#2 Facebook Advertising
Facebook PPC is, in some ways, pretty darn different from search PPC. Some of the major challenges Mothner pointed out referred back where the would-be clickers are.

• They’re not performing a search.
• There is no intent.
• They’re content looking at friends’ vacation pictures.
• They may not want to leave the Facebook experience.

All of these factors are, in a way, working against you as you’re trying to get a user to click on your ad. You have to accept these challenges and strive to overcome them. How? Use headlines, images, & ad copy that speak to the users, keeping in mind they’re on Facebook.

• Images of people (it’s not called Facebook for no reason)
• Headlines that speak to tightly focused segments
  • If you’re targeting a very specific age group, for example, people who are exactly 23 years old, test a generic headline (“Hey, you!”) vs. a specific headline (“Hey, 23 year old!”)
• In general, the more specific the message, the better

An awesome-interesting aside: Mothner noted that he, too, has seen keywords in status updates be factors in what ads folks are served. Creepy/cool.

Test, Test, & Test Again. Then, Tweak.
Testing your Facebook ads is absolutely essential. Swap out headlines, thumbnails, creative. Track the success / failures. Tweak accordingly.

Chart your ad CTR (click through rate) on a line graph. If you don’t rotate and refresh your ads, chances are you’ll see a dramatic drop off in CTR over time (like, maybe even a few days). This is as blatant an indicator as any– you must refresh your ads.

Discovering a Happy Medium for Destination URLs
Facebook ad campaigns can have very different goals. 1) Drive traffic to FB page & gain likes. 2) Drive traffic to site & boost sales. But consider a happy medium. If your goal is sales, it’s not always easy to get people to convert on your Faceobok Page. But not everyone is ready to immediately leave their safe, cozy FB experience. Consider pointing ad-clickers to another area within Facebook– such as a tab dedicated to getting people prepared (and excited!) about moving forward to your site.

#3 Infographics
Ahhh, infographics. Great, glorious, eye-candy for the neurons. For those of you who haven’t already been seduced by their splendor, infographics are graphical visualizations of data or interesting information. Put another way, they are a creative, interesting, genuine,white hat way to garner links from other sites. Goooo, SEO! But infographics are more than just,well, great, glorious eye-candy for your neurons. They carry huge benefits. Such as…

• Link building benefits. Infographics can spark interest from a variety of sites that could link back to your page. Such as… Mashable… TechCrunch… the Huffington Post… yeah, tell me you wouldn’t want a link from one of them. Other forms of link building include retweets, Facebook shares, being featured in blogs, etc. It’s a win-win situation, because you’re getting link-love, & the linker doesn’t need to create any new content – they’re just regurgitating your material.

Infographics might seem casual, fun, & effortlessly viral, but the actual process of creating one can be daunting. Try this streamlined approach when embarking upon infographic creation:

• Brainstorm with your crew. What do you want to convey? Tips: make sure it’s (at least one of the following:) educational, humorous, controversial, newsworthy.
• Design the infographic. Keep is eye-catching. Colors. Images. Big, bold headlines that point to supplementary text.
• Devise how you’ll spread the word. “If you build it, they will come” is B.S. For infographic distribution, you’ve got to do serious, researched outreach. Leverage email blasts, blog about it on your own, release a PR — but don’t forget the power of 1 on 1 outreach. Make a list of the bloggers or news aggregators you want to touch. Touch them. (Get your mind out of the gutter.) This is no different then traditional (or even digital) PR outreach.

#4 Quality Score
In terms of SEM, paid search, Google AdWords, etc.– understanding your Quality Score (QS) can really help maximize every dollar you spend in Google AdWords.

What is Quality Score? In terms of AdWords, it’s Google’s measure of your relevance between your keyword, ad copy, & landing page. Basically, Google wants what’s best for themselves, & what’s best for the user. A relevant KW, ad, & LP is the best. Ergo, Quality Score.

Factors for QS

• Keyword CTR
• Ad CTR
• Overall account CTR
• Historical CTR of Display URLs in the AdGroup
• Quality of your landing page (does your LP have a call to action? Good form? Contact info? Credibility?)

How Do You Increase Your QS?

• Make sure your page has depth, that is, unique content, ample content, trust (in the form of badges… doesn’t hurt!)
• Make your AdGroups super tightly focused. Have copy that reflects what’s on the landing page. Have a display URL that reflects the AdGroup.

Ultimate takeaway for QS: don’t worry too much about your QS! Instead, focus on the results.

#5 Making Pages for SEO vs. Making Pages for Sales (aka: The Battle of Content)
An SEO page has great content, it’s all crawlable, it’s constantly updated (fresh) and it’s keyword rich. Basically, a spider’s fantasy. A sales page is informative, pretty-lookin’, displays a clear call-to-action, and welcomes users / potential customers.

The good news is… you don’t have tho choose between creating one page over the other. Newsflash: Harmony can exist between SEO & Sales pages! Here’s how:

• Implement a blog. Blogs are great for SEO, because they mean fresh content that’s keyword rich. They’re great for sales, too, because if users happen upon them, they’ll be happening upon awesomely informative content.
  • Tips: try to create a new blog post each day, that’s at least 300+ words, and includes your goal KWs in title of the post.
• Incorporate an expandable text box. These features allow you to feature SEO-friendly content on your page without overwhelming the layout with text. If people happen upon it and are interested, they can expand the box to read the goods.
  • Tips: use at least 300+ words per tab, use primary KWs on tab title, have a KW every 100 words (good KW density)
• Add content pages to your site like Resources, FAQs, Industry Glossaries. Again– great for SEO, great for users.
• Encourage UGC (user generated content) in the form of ratings, reviews, customer feedback, etc. Offer incentives for power users to provide feedback. Encourage your sales force to get involved as well (sort of a Q&A platform).

Mike Stone was up to wrap up the session, & feed us Strategy #6 for Real SEM Results.

#6 How to Craft the Right Messages
In a perfect world, we’d all have power outlets, flawless WiFi, and cups of coffee that never ran dry. Uhrmmm, I digress. In a perfect world as Mike described it, we would be able to tailor our sales pitches to be customized for each visitor who to our website. Unfortunately, that’s not possible (…yet). BUT, by segmenting, or bucketing users into very tightly focused groups, we can dramatically increase our result & conversions. It all comes down to this very simple formula:

(Most often) when the User Query threads through to the PPC Text and then to the Landing Page Headline, the result is a Satisfied Customer.

Some Tips:

• Keep messaging consistent. If you’re targeting people in FB who “like” the keyword “mp3,” serve them ads that use the KW “mp3″ in the headline; regurgitate the KW “mp3″ on the landing page… even if that’s NOT what you sell! If you sell subscription-based music listening services, use the KW “mp3″ in a way that teaches people they don’t really want mp3s… they want your service
• Respect & use what the user  has volunteered to give you, by way of self-disclosed FB interests, as far as how they think about your product. Nine times out of 10, users are providing more information than you’re using when it comes to the experience on the website.

• Give them what they want... because then, you’ll get what you want (the sale).
• Be timely, seasonal, and hip! 1800Flowers.com, for example, changes their whole site layout when a season changes, or a new holiday rolls around. This makes incoming users feel like someone’s listening – that the site is in touch with why they came there (V-Day themes for February, etc.)
• Tap into the Usually Ignored Factor. WPromote sells services that are not seasonal (a la 1800Flowers.com). Yet, when winter rolled around, they tested two layouts for their lead-gen form page: one with snowflakes & snowmen, one without. Guess which one had a higher rate of conversions? Yep. The snowflakey one. Even though no one visited the site for seasonal purposes. Now that’s food for thought.

… and with that, the two Mikes wrapped things up and sent us session attendees out into the wilderness of the Expo Hall. The takeaways from this session, both edible and educational, were a great way to kick off #SESNY. Stay tuned here in aimClear Blog for more full-session write-ups as the conference unfolds.

Greetings readers! Search Engine Strategies New York 2011 looms large and straight-ahead, kicking off on Tuesday in the Big Apple. This will be my 5^th straight SES NY and it never grows old.  There are a hundred reasons why this annual online marketing conclave is classic. Here are 6 of them:

1-The sessions are highly informative, stuffed with crucial information and thought leadership. For instance on Day One from 3PM-4PM there will be a solo presentation by Jeffrey Eisenberg, Partner, Eisenberg Brothers & Associates entitled, “Social Media & Conversion: The Yellow Brick Road.”  The author of the foundational book, “Waiting for Your Cat to Bark will share his newest theories about choosing social media, “Voices,” intent and social media conversion and how social advertising fits into the contextual puzzle…or doesn’t it? Anyway, I’ll be there wearing bells to see one of the best in the biz.  “Channel Surfing: Measuring Profit & ROI Across Channels” at 9:30AM on Day Two and, “Conversion Tools of the Master Craftsman” at 12:45PM Day Three look awesome as well.  See you there.

2-The collection of speakers is definitive, featuring some of the finest panelists in the online marketing industry.  For anyone new to SES, it’s a great strategy to choose sessions to attend based on who’s speaking.  These are my favorite speakers amongst this year’s #SESNY team: Duane Forrester, Matthew Bailey, Greg Jarboe, Chris Boggs, Rebecca Lieb, Debra Mastaler, David Szetela. Matt Van Wagner, Andrew Goodman, Motoko Hunt, Bill Hunt, Adam Goldberg, Bruce Clay, Jim Boykin, Guillaume Bouchard, Anne F. Kennedy, Alex Cohen, Mike Grehan, Jonathan Allen, Frank Watson, Hollis Thomases, Michael Gray, Lisa Buyer, Rhea Drysdale, Liana Evans, Richard Zwicky, Tim Ash and Eric Enge.

3-New York City, New York:  Let’s face it, there’s only one New York. The Hilton New York, SES conference venue, is strategically located between Times Square and Rockefeller Plaza. It’s just a short walk to Central Park, Museum of Modern Art, Lindy’s Cheesecake, and the Stage Deli. Chinatown, Little Italy, The East Village Soho, Noho, and Harlem are all awesome pilgrimages to undertake.

My favorite jaunt is to escape to the Lower East Side to Eat at Katz’s Deli, Russ and Daughters and Yonah Schimmels Knishes Gourmet Knishes and Blintzes. Do you get the picture? I’m in it for the food baby. From Jazz to punk, the music in NYC rocks. The city really never sleeps.

4-The SES Exposition Hall is fantastic! From analytics to agencies, conversion tools to colleges, the SES New York Expo hall is one stop shopping.  Head from booth to booth, meet, greet and collect fistfuls of righteous swag.

photo credit: SESConferenceSeries

Here’s a list of sponsors and exhibitors from A-Z: 15miles, 7Search.com, Acquisio, Adlucent , American Express OPEN, Analytics SEO, Atrinsic, AuroIN LLC, Best of the Web, Bing, blekko, Blogsvertise, Brafton, CustomNews, Breeze Social, BrightEdge, Bruce Clay Inc.,  ClickEquations, Clickworker, Compete, Conductor, Direct Agents, Inc.,  Dozier Internet Law, P.C.,  Emailvision, eZanga.com, Full Sail University, Google, gShift Labs, iContact, iCrossing , ideaLaunch, Inceptor, Indus Net Technologies, iProspect, Kenshoo, LinkWorth, LivePerson, Local.com, LocalSplash.com, LocationInsight, LookSmart, Majestic SEO, Marchex, Marin Software, Market Motive Training Institute, MarkMonitor, Mongoose Metrics LLC, MycroBurst.com, Online Marketing Institute, Onward Search, OrangeSoda,  Digital, PRWeb, Raven Internet Marketing Tools, Refined Labs GmbH, Rimm-Kaufman Group (RKG),  Searchmetrics, GmbH, Sedo, SEMPO, seoClarity, Sitecore, SiteWit, SubmitEdge, Superpages.com, Symantec – VeriSign Authentication Division, teliad Internetmarketing, GmbH, topseos.com, Trada Inc.,  The Trade Desk, TrafficShaping, Trellian, Visibility Magazine, Visual IQ, WebAward, WebmasterRadio.FM, Website Magazine, We Build Pages, WordWatch, Wpromote Inc., and Yahoo! Search. WOW, what a list!

5-aimClear Will Be There in Force. Traditionally aimClear sends legions of bloggers to cover SearchEngineStrategies conferences in aimClear Blog. It’s one of our favorite things to do. This installment of SESNY is no different. Lauren (@beebow), Kathy Jalivay, and Matt Peterson will on site blogging and tweeting up a storm.  Look for Lauren’s blog post on Monday morning highlighting our conference coverage schedule.

I’ll be speaking Day Two, from 2:30PM – 3:30PM on the Killer Facebook Targeting Tactics session, joined by Harry J. Gold, CEO, Overdrive Interactive and our good friend Lisa Buyer, President & CEO, The Buyer Group. We’ll discuss advanced tactics surrounding marketing with Facebook Ads, Pages and Groups.

6- The Community is comprised by some of the most delightful tweople I’ve ever known.  There is camaraderie among SES attendees, rarely seen in other quarters. Simply put, these folks just get it.   Replete with early adopters and timeless values, just walk around the halls for a rainbow of vital personalities, new friends, and thought leaders ready and willing to share.

So, we hope to see you there. There is walk in registration available on site and online registration. Everybody travel safely and we’ll see you in New York next week.

Welcome to aimClear’s coverage of #SMX West 2011! Day 1 is officially over and just like the warm, friendly 60-degree weather here in sunny San Jose, it did not disappoint– brimming with great panel discussions & tip-top presentations– among them, Location Services: The New Local Search.

Gib Olander, director of business development with Localeze; Rodney Hess, account associate with Search Influence; Jason Rupp, director of product management at Ask.com; Chris Travers, president and co-founder of UniversalBusinessListing.org and Ken Norton, senior product manager for Google were at the helm for this one. Each took turns exploring  how location services like Foursquare, Gowalla, Yelp and/or mobile apps are changing the local search space indefinitely. aimClear live tweeted this session (via MoCR521)… read on for a full write-up.

Business Identity & Discovery
Gib Olander was the first to take the stage, diving right into how search has evolved over the years and continues to change with the world wide web and new tools like location services.

• Today, we use Google to look for what we want now, as opposed to where we used to look for information (you know, a library… remember those?).
• Finding the what & where yesterday (hard copy of a map) vs. finding the what & where today (Google Maps).
• Finding the what & where with the help of people who are/were (social) there vs. finding the what & where with the context of who.

Now more than ever, the emphasis is on WHEN. Why? Because it can change the relevancy, heightening our search to the what & where with the context of who and when.

Gib defined business identity today as having a Name, Address, Phone (NAP) plus a Category (C). A searchable business identity used to be as simple as having your information in a hard copy of the Yellow Pages. But now, because of online capabilities, consumers are increasingly using more and more sources to find local information & content.

Check out these sources of local business information, and the percentage increase of usage from 2009 to 2010. The state are pretty darn telling, to say the least…

• Search Engines (+19%)  
• Print YP or WP Directory (+8%) 
• IYP Sites (+9%)
• Local Search Sites (+15%)
• Local Newspapers/Magazines (-9%)
• Directory assistance (phone) (-6%)
• Cell Phone/Wireless Device (+40%)
• Social Networking Sites (+28%)

Gib then asked, “Are you discoverable?” It is vital to establish your online identity because it will anchor your customer’s experience:

• People are expected to buy within 1 hour using mobile Internet and 7 days using PC Search
• By 2011, 80% of mobile devices will have GPS
• 60% of mobile Internet is spent on social networking

Location check-ins are growing rapidly with outlets like Foursquare and Facebook. Foursquare currently has 6.5 million users, 2 million daily check-ins, 420 million check-ins all together and a 3,400% growth in 2010. With statistics like this it is not surprising that brands (both big & small) are starting to take advantage of location services.

Social and mobile and local are colliding in your customers’ hands!

• 32% of SMBs said they used Facebook Places to promote their business
• 12% said they plan to use Facebook Places in the coming months
• 70% said they used Facebook for promotions, which is up 50% compared to last year and beats Google, which is being used by 66%

Gib’s key takeaways:

• Mobile, Local and Social are happening NOW!
• If your identity isn’t established, you do not exist.
• Enable your client to create and share great discovery content.
• Have one consistent and pervasive NAP.
• Recognize your spatial network and be aware of time as a relevancy factor.

Barnacle SEO
Rodney Hess was up next. In a casual-cool manner, he touched on how location services can benefit SEO. “Barnacle SEO”, he explained, was the act of attaching oneself to a large fixed object and waiting for the customers to float by in the current. Attaching your URL and addresses to a strong, trusted site takes very little effort, and can help you rank well for long-tail phrases. Examples of trusted location sites include Yelp, Foursquare, Yahoo! Local, etc.

Two things to keep in mind when thinking about location services: (1) Google and Bing both index venues from Foursquare and Yelp in organic search results, and (2) Google crawls Facebook, Yelp and Foursquare for local citations.

Key findings from an advertiser sentiment survey Rodney conducted include:

Concerning the breakdown of service usage:

• 61% of advertisers are using Facebook Places
• 55% use Foursquare
• 50% use Yelp
• 3% use Gowalla

When asked why users are leveraging location services:

• 50% said just another social networking addiction
• 28% said for business promotions
• 21% want their friends to know about their whereabouts.
• A mighty 95% said they check in using a mobile device.

When asked if business promotions on these sites inspire them to be a return customer:

• 70 percent said…”NO”

To sum up, location-based services serve more practical purposes than free advertising and check-in services are still in their infancy. Rodney’s survey findings prove that these services need to show users more value that will make it worth their time. Only then can check-in services can become the new local search.

Mobile = A More Engaged User
Jason Rupp took the stage next, with a presentation that concentrated on engagement. The concept of searching has dramatically changed in regards to mobile; the behavior/expectations of users has changed.

• 81% of mobile users need info ASAP
• 66% of mobile users say they are more likely to need info when they are not in front of their computers
• 40% of mobile users trust peer content more when it is 24 hours old versus one month old

Jason encouraged the audience to seek new “signals” on mobile devices by…

• firing up an app
• checking in
• selecting a location or place of interest
• sharing locations and/or asking/answering questions about a place.

The Q&A model offers marketers an intent-based signal, which is similar to search.  Location-based questions allow marketers to respond to real user needs that can eventually build brands and drive leads.

Key points from Jason’s presentation:

• Think about testing location-aware real time offers
• Provide incentives for checking-in, sharing locations, inviting friends to a location
• Be creative about branding the check-in experience where possible.
• Align your mobile marketing strategy with your social media strategy
• Consistent messaging/branding across multiple touch points
• Cross platform offers to drive engagement

Businesses: Identification to Reputation
Chris Travers was up next, to take us through a look at the change in location search from identification to reputation. People are going from an address toa map to figuring out what’s nearby, to learning how good the place is, to who is nearby and how worthy is that person and their opinion.

Chris stressed that business profiles can be a vulnerability and you should only create or claim profiles you are prepared to manage long-term or populate the profile with data that is not likely to change. For this, Chris recommended using specialized services that manage listing carefully.

Businesses are being challenged because the key elements of concern are being fragmented over multiple platforms. It’s a delicate and necessary balancing act between managing listings and profiles, monitoring reviews, mentions, ratings, competitors, diligently making updates to postings, keeping up with advertising, offering coupons and tracking related analytics.

First steps…

• Syndicate listing across the Digital Search Landscape
• Claim business listings in Google, Bing, Yahoo to protect your identity
• Add credibility with verification
• Distribute video profiles
• Visible analysis and presence reports
• Monitor listings, reviews and social mentions – remember to react quickly to any negative comments or reviews
• Claim your brand on social networks – ensure brand consistency, gain broad exposure for your business and protect trademarks

Final Thoughts From the Google
Ken Norton from Google was the last to step up to the podium to briefly share a few comments that succinctly summed up the session and hammer home thoughts that marketers need to keep top of mind… most notably:

“Think about location as a layer that enhances everything users are trying to do online. Everyone has a location… Be sure to think about and not forget the mobile experience.”

The audience walked away with some amazing tips and insight into location services and other factors to be aware of when managing a business’s online presence. Stay tuned for more coverage of #SMX & live-tweet coverage coming atcha from the aimClear team!

Greetings from #SMX West, 2011. The sun has not yet risen over the Mountains, but there is an air of excitement here at the Marriott San Jose McEnery Convention Center. Today kicks off this years edition of West and aimClear is here in force.

Today, I’ll be speaking at 3:45PM PT on the “YouTube Ads for Fun and Profit” panel, moderated by conference Co-Chair Chris Sherman, Executive Editor, Search Engine Land. I’ll have the pleasure of sharing the podium with John Weyand, Managing Director, iProspect New York, iProspect/Range Online Media.  I talked with John last night and his material is awesome, not to be missed. I’ll be giving away (that’s right, giving away) a Mozenda extraction agent that powers two utilities aimClear created: “YouTube Promoted Video Squatter Detection” and “YouTube Promoted Video Uncontested Inventory” tools.  I’ll also demo radical Ajax suggest box research for YouTube using ScrapeBox.  This will be a live tools demo and it’s going to rock.

The  Q&A Moderator for my session today will be our own Manny Rivas, who is also scheduled to speak tomorrow on the “New Tools & Techniques For YouTube Success” panel. He’ll join Aparna Chennapragada, Product Manager for Google Video Search, Google, Grant Crowell, Senior Analyst, ReelSEO, Jeff Martin, Dir Search Marketing, TouchStorm and Eric Papczun, VP SEO & Feeds, Performics.

Facebook & More Facebook!
Tomorrow, I’ll take the mic again at 3:30PM PT on the “Facebook Ad Tactics For Search Marketers” panel. The Moderator will be our pal Disa Johnson, CEO, SearchReturn. The lineup of speakers is super cool, including Matt Lawson, VP of marketing, Marin Software, Justin Merickel, VP, Marketing and New Product Development, Efficient Frontier and John Yi, Strategic Program Manager, Marketing APIs, Facebook (Q&A Speaker).

Then, of course, on Friday we’ll present the inaugural  “Facebook Marketing Intensive” to a full class of information hungry marketers. aimClear’s Merry, Manny, Matt, Lauren, and I will lead 5 cool Facebook workshop sessions. We’ll be joined by Lisa Buyer internationally known interactive PR, social media and branding diva and Will Scott, President of Search Influence, a specialized New Orleans SEO agency.

Hope to see you there!

photo credit: ta-graphy | SMX YouTube Tool

As the techno-dance music faded away, an epic thundering voice welcomed us to Search Engine Strategies Chicago 2010, and Avinash took the stage. aimClear live-tweeted the opening keynote this go-ground– read on for full coverage of the tasty food for thought.

“What the heck is search marketing?”
Avinash is surprised by how many people have little, lame, or no understanding of what search marketing is. The consumer-centric & the tool-centric views that can pervade marketing communities are sub-optimal at best, and can lead to disastrous (& avoidable) self-sabotage.

“When I see two divisions of the same company outbidding each other in the search space, it makes me want to shoot myself.” -Avinash

Clever & complete marketers move beyond these views and are able to behold the big picture of search marketing & translate that understanding into business success.

5 Main Components of Search Marketing

• Keyword Discovery
• Keyword Management & Analtyics
• Keyword Bidding & Optimization
• Website & Landing Pages
• Business Outcomes

“So… you made love to the search engines. What came out of it?”
You’ve hit these 5 components & made sweet, sweet love to the search engines. But within the 5 main components of search marketing lie sub-components that must also be seriously considered.

• Keyword Discovery
  • Web analytics
  • Competitive intelligence
  • (“If you’re not good at that first bucket, you will JUST SUCK at everything else.” -Avinash)
• Keyword Management & Analytics
  • Who bids on what, when?
  • Audits
  • Historical performance
• Keyword Bidding & Optimization
  • Adgroups
  • Keywords & phrases
  • Text & creative
  • Bids
  • Match types
• Websites & Landing Page Optimization
  • Landing page mgmt
  • Testing & experimenting
  • Behavior targeting
  • SEM analytics
• Business Outcomes
  • Direct revenue
  • Profit & margin
  • Net profit
  • Online impact
  • Offline impact

“It is astonishing to realize the *offline* impact of search marketing.” -Avinash

It’s Time To Diagnose: “How YOU Doin’?”
Invest time in some deep self-reflection of your own SEM efforts.

• What are you doing really well?
• What are you missing?
• Prioritize accordingly.

“Sometimes you may find you do the basics well, but you stink at evolving.” -Avinash

Super Awesome SEM Tips from Avinash

• Don’t obsess about tools.
• Understand the true landscape.
• Identify your gaps & opportunities.
• Execute like crazy.

“Good only comes from Jesus & Allah & God if you execute like crazy.” -Avinash

Show That Hot Tail Some Love
The magic in search & analytics lies not within obsessing over the head of the keywords that drive traffic to a site… it comes from obsessing about the tail of keywords. The tail comes in the tens of thousands– in the head, there are only a handful of keywords to work with. Many marketers underestimate the amount of data at their disposal- they focus on top 10 rows– the top 10 keywords that drive traffic. But there’s so much more… sometimes, like, 20,000 more.

Finding Your Analytics Zen
With thousands upon thousands of lines of data in analytics, where do you focus? How can you physically view the data in a digestible way? Avinash tells us that the solution is so easy it will make us cry: Create Logical Filters! If you’re working in Google Analytics, scroll down… past the top 10 rows of keywords that drive traffic to your site. Apply logical filters that automatically sort all of your data by factors that matter in the big picture.”You can solve anything with a good algorithm,” Avinash says. These filters will allow you to discover the KWs that are doing exceptionally well for you. Then, make love to them.

Various Filters, What They Reveal, & The Magic of “Weighted Sort”
There are a ridiculous number of combinations you can apply to your data. Avinash suggests filtering & sorting by bounce rate.

• Sort by highest to lowest bounce rate.
  • This will help you understand how many people come to your landing page & immediately throw up in their mouths.
  • These places suck. Fix these places!
• Reverse sort to show where you’re NOT sucking.
  • Get an understanding of what you’re doing right.
  • Apply what you’re doing right to the places you suck.

When you sort, a “magic button” appears – click it & it applies a “weighted sort” to the data. As Avinash so eloquently stated, this feature sorts data by level of  ”interestinglyness.” In other words, the algorithm helps you understand where, if you focus time & effort, you can expect the highest ROI.

For example, sort by conversion rate & click that magic “weighted sort” button. .The algorithm reveals the “most interesting keywords” you should focus on… if you do, you can expect the highest ROI.

“#omg” -Avinash

Expanding The Landscape: Tag Clouds & Keyword Trees

• Tag Clouds are another useful way to help you visualize tens of thousands of lines of data. They can give a basic understanding of how your brand name is doing vs. the generic types of products / services you provide. Wordle.net – check it out. What do you do with the data? Avinash’s happy medium: leverage quantitative data & mash it up with qualitative analysis.
• Keyword “Trees” are similar to tag clouds. Check out the plug-in offered by juice analytics. Enter a keyword & feast your eyes on the colorful crazy awesome “tree” of phrases connected to that keyword.

Tragically for Avinash, the keyword “metrics” doesn’t have a KW tree – it has a tiny bush, a shrub. “I write books about metrics!” cried Avinash. The silver lining in this grim discovery was that it encouraged Avinash to rethink his organic search strategy, rethink the way people went about finding information on “metrics.”

Moving Beyond The Top 10
“The top 10 rows of anything never changes,” says Avinash. In other words, the top ten data results for keywords, landing pages, products, referral sites, etc. are not a reliable sample of site performance on a day-to-day, month-to-month basis. ”You’ve got to figure out how to live life beyond the top 10 rows.”

Getting a Green Light From the Boss
One of the first & most obnoxious social media obstacles marketers may face is actually getting the C-Suite on board.

In Avinash’s case, the C-Suite was (and still is) his wife.

By the time he comes home at from work at 6pm, spends time talking, reading & playing with his children, spends some *ehem* quality time with his wife, the only time Avinash has to blog is late at night. But when he pulls out his laptop to begin working, his wife turns to him & says, “Go to bed. If you don’t sleep, you’ll die.” To this he responds, “You should let me blog because… I’m kind of a big deal.”

But that isn’t reason enough for his boss wife to OK the investment in social media. The fact that Avinash is a “big deal” means nothing to her. The assertion has to be backed up by concrete data.

So, he grabs some basic data from Google Analtyics, goes to his wife and says, “You should let me blog because last month I had 73,000+ visits from 176 countries.”

Here, he provides actual data that proves the statement he made a few minutes ago is valid. Still, none of that data really translates in value to his boss wife. “You can’t just puke up data,” says Avinash, and expect people to understand the monetary benefits. You have to correlate this data to conversions, into something that matters.

Cultivating RSS Subscribers
To Avinash, RSS represents the ultimate form of “permission marketing.” It’s difficult to ever be accused of spamming folks when they go out of their way to subscribe to your feed. That level of willingness & commitment  is what makes those subscribers positively invaluable compared to the fleeting traffic attributed to mere “visits.” Put another way, “Eighty thousand visits to my blog are like one-night-stands,” explained Avinash. “But RSS subscribers are long term relationships… the ones worth having.”

Quantifying  the Quality Data
When you quantify the economic value of the data gathered from Analtyics, you’re attributing monetary figures to otherwise ambiguous figures. By doing this, Avinash can finally go to his boss wife and say, “You should let me blog because last month I made 26k fake dollars.” To this, his boss wife does not say, “Go to bed” (aka: Give it up). She says, “Work harder.” Et voilà- the C-Suite is on board .

Setting Macro & Micro Site Goals
It is key to have one main goal for your site that is supported by a bunch of smaller goals. These macro & micro goals will help you quantify your data economically, help you put a $ amount to your data & ultimately help achieve the green-light from your boss. Echoing his advice from earlier, Avinash stresses that you should not obsess about fancy analytics tools, bur rather about economic value. “Breathe magic into your search campaigns,” he advises, “by putting numbers to analytics”– quantify the economic value, which is the goods you take to your boss. Speaking of goods… Avinash likes to say that “Revenue = Good. Economic Value = God.”

Intelligent Attribution
Arguably the most bleeding edge of analytics is intelligent attribution. Say people come to your site via Google- logic says you should spend $ on organic SEO. But life’s not that simple. Not only are there a lot of channels, there are a lot of touch points through which people arrive at your site. How can you decide where to allot your credit and divvy out marketing dollars? For many, this can be a big problem.

“Should we freak out and cry like a little girl?” Avinash asks. No. Be calm & be smart about how you approach a problem.

A tip on getting started: generate an analytics report illustrating how many visits to your site does it take for someone to convert. This report will show you A) If you have a problem and B) Where the problem is. Now you can deal with the problem, if it exists, intelligently.

4 Touchpoint Credit Models

• The First Come, First Serve Model- “Giving most credit to the first touch point is like giving credit to my first girlfriend for me marrying my wife.” -Avinash
• The Berkley Kumbaya Model –  Giving every touch point credit is not an effective use of your marketing $s.
• The MCU (Make Crap Up) Model – Assigning credit / marketing dollars arbitrarily is just as ineffective.
• Avinash’s Model- Assigns significant % of credit to last touchpoint, & distributes the rest of credit based on a sophisticated algorithm contingent upon the amount of money they spent in a transaction.

And with that, Avinash wrapped up the session and in doing so, set the bar to “awesome” at #SESCHI 2010. Stay tuned for more coverage here in aimClear Blog, and of course, follow the aimClear team’s live-tweets from @aengleson (Alyssa), @lindsaylorraine (Lindsay) & @beebow (yours truly).

Focused on search and social media marketing, Chris’s long time company, 10e20, recently rebranded as BlueGlass. BlueGlass has been busy forging partnership deals, described as acquisitions, with respected small agencies and individuals.   Marketers involved in the BlueGlass deal are a veritable who’s who of mainstream social media conference circuit mainstays and big brand practitioners.

Recently, in preparation for BlueGlass’s upcoming search and social marketing conference, I had the opportunity to interview Chris about BlueGlass Florida and newly evolved agency.  Industry insiders and cool business attendees will likely ignite the Hard Rock Hotel in Ft. Lauderdale November 2nd & 3rd for the event. For you folks inspired to trek down to FL for BlueGlass, Chris has been kind enough to share a discount code for aimClearblog readers: “aimclear.”

This author will have the pleasure of speaking on the “Advanced PPC Tactics: Styling & Profiling” Manny Rivas and our new pal Michelle Ross, will cover conference for aimClearblog. We’ll live-tweet sessions using the official hashtag: #blueglassfl.

[aimClear] What makes BlueGlass conferences special, substantially different from other mainstream offerings from SMX, SES, PubCon, etc…?

I am a huge fan of the SMX, SES, Pubcon and a bunch of other conferences series – they have helped me out in so many ways and I like to think that I have been able to do the same for them.  Our goal with the BlueGlass conferences was to try to condense all of the best things that you get from a big conference and put it into 1 single track and in 2 days.  So we hand-pick the best speakers, have new sessions each time and also focus heavily on the networking aspect.  At BlueGlass LA, I learned as much from the attendees as I did from the speakers.  I also had people come up to me after the show and tell me that they couldn’t believe how many business relationships they had formed in 2 days!  That’s what makes it all worthwhile to me.

[aimClear] BlueGlass is an online marketing agency. What’s the motivation for BlueGlass in staging a conference series?

As I mentioned above, I wouldn’t be where I am today without the support of lots of people in our industry.  BlueGlass Interactive was able to come together based on relationships that had been formed, in large part, due to getting to know each other at conferences.  We look at our conferences as ways to give back and to also meet lots of great new people.

We aren’t in the conference business.  We don’t want to be.  If we were, we’d be in trouble because we lose money on every event we do.  But to us, it’s worth it.

[aimClear]  Who’s the ideal attendee? What do you want them to take away from Fort Lauderdale? What’s in it for them at #BlueGlassFL

The ideal attendee is anyone who is serious about taking their business to the next level on the Internet.  We specifically hand-craft each session and day to cover everything that we think someone needs to succeed online.  We’re really big believers that you need to have a diverse marketing strategy to succeed and that you also need to understand the business side of the web as well.  That’s why we have everything from community building to domaining to buying & selling web businesses to PPC tactics.  Every person that attends will leave with a better understanding of what they need to do to dominate online.

[aimClear] As a marketer, what’s your background, specialties and what you love to do the most?

My background started in SEO then shifted to Social Media Marketing but was always deeply rooted in PR (Public Relations not PageRank and driving buzz.  I’m a firm believer that you should always let people do what they do best.  That’s what I love about BlueGlass, there are so many people that are so much better than I am at their specialties (whether it’s SEO, SMM, etc).  So it allows me to do what I’m good at and not have to worry about everything.

[aimClear] What do you personally see as the success metrics for BlueGlass?

As a company, I personally have a few success metrics that I strive for: On the services side, I want us to keep delivering high levels of ROI for our clients and show them why their investments in online marketing are not only an important part of their marketing budgets but also crucial.  I know this is also something that you and your team at aimClear are passionate about!

On the products side, I want to empower agencies, in-house teams and all businesses with the tools to help them REALLY succeed online.  Our platforms aren’t just built around telling someone what they should be doing but also about connecting them with people who can help them do it better (i.e. content creation, link building and much more).  We want to empower people.  When we open this up to everyone and they see how it will change things forever, that will make it all worthwhile…

As a conference, it’s simple.  I want every person to leave with: (1) A better understanding of what they need to do to make their business better online (2) Partnerships/business relationships/friendships that will transform their lives (3) The thought that they got so much more than they paid for.  As I said, we’re not in the conference business so we can make that happen by going above and beyond.

[aimClear] What’s your favorite Seafood, Asian and Italian restaurants in New York?

Seafood:  Esca

Asian:  Shun Lee

Italian: Babbo

[aimClear] Which is your favorite football team?

I bleed blue.  NY Giants….

Tim Ash is a man who’s not afraid to tell you your baby is ugly. Author of ”Landing Page Optimization,” a resource Mike Grehan says should live on the bookshelf of anyone who owns a website, as well as super-master salsa dancer extraordinaire, he was a tip-top choice for the morning keynote speaker on the final day of SES San Fran 2010.

Leveraging takeaways from first 2 keynotes, namely (1) use profanity and (2) use self-deprecating unflattering pictures, Tim hit the stage in a swank yet self-described “monkey suit” to take us through the 4 Pillars of Building Instant Trust Online, something any marketer will tell you is no easy feat.

First of all, Tim stresses that what we’re about to learn about marketing has NOTHING to do with technology. We’re humans, and humans are the same as ever. Inside here (*points to skull*) we’re the same- our job as marketers is to do is figure out how to adapt latest technology to these perpetual human psyches.

Trusting in Trust
In our day to day lives, we rely on trust– we’re able to function as a result of trust. We cross the street because we trust the car will obey traffic laws and halt at the red light; we divulge secrets because we trust friends will maintain confidence. Trust is like a concentric ripple: within the closest ring are the closest people in our lives, family, then friends, then work associates – we trust they will all behave a certain way.

Newsflash! We, humans, weren’t designed to be in mobs. Think back to our ancestors, back to cavemen – they relied on the trust within their small tribes (10-20 people)… so do we (see, not much has changed!). Once we get into big groups of 100, 200, 300 people, the trust begins to dwindle. Think of a crowded stadium. Do you trust everyone there? Tim doesn’t. How do you know some drunken fool won’t bean you in the head with a beer can? You don’t.

What we have to do as marketers is take age-old human things and apply them to online marketing. So, how do you build trust [online]?

Building Trust Has (at least) 2 Obstacles
(1) Trust has to be built instantly. If you expect people to click on your ads, your links, fill out a form, register, buy something… you have to build trust, and you have to build it instantly.  But what does “instantly” really mean? Well, Tim ties a disturbing time-restraint to this: one twentieth of a second. Yes, you have 1/20 of a second to build trust through your landing page. The design of your landing page significantly carries over to people actually wanting to navigate further on your site.

(2) Trust has to be built in spite of anonymity. Face it: you don’t know sh*t about your site visitors, and unless you’re an enormously popular brand, they don’t know sh*t about you. The good news is you can change this dynamic by socializing with consumers and putting out informative content about your brand.

The 4 Pillars of Trust
Pillar #1: Appearance. This factor is very important. Good appearance enhances trust. There are uses & misuses of “appearance.” Tim shares screenshots from some truly hideous landing pages. We’re talking CAPSLOCK TYPEFONT, blinding background colors, and although its a static image, Tim insists there’s enough Flash animation to make us vomit (even without the post-SchmoozeFest hangovers some attendees were sporting). Appearance really matters. It can totally negate your customers’ perception of of professionalism and reputation, even if you have both in spades.

The 5 Person 2 Second Landing Page Test: Have 5 people look at your landing page. Give them two seconds to respond, yes or no: Does this look cheesy?

Focal Points For Fixing Your Landing Page

• professionalism of design
• sparseness & neatness
• organizational & clarity

And to wrap up the 1st pillar, some gem quotes from Tim:

• “Stop screaming at people and having things compete to get their attention once they get to your page.
• “Your landing page should not be like a Turkish bazaar. It should be zen. Like, ‘Welcome, this is a bullshit-free zone.’”

Pillar #2: Transactional Assurances. Pretend I’m your customer. I don’t know who you are. You don’t know who I am. I’m scared. Your job is to help me not be scared and want to buy something from you.

Did you know 70% of people abandon shopping carts online, mostly because of lack of trust?

“Trust symbols are powerful. They work.” If you have trust badges, display them prominently on your site (not just your checkout page) above the fold, where people can see them and feel reassured. Also, make your payment methods visible everywhere on your site.

Newsflash! People read 400-500x slower than the speed at which they process images. Images work. So use them!

Pillar #3: Authority. Tim showed a photo of a doctor. “Do you trust him?” he asked. Most people said yes. Some foreign dude said no. I also said no, but mostly because the doc looks like an iStock photo . (I was right!)

So, how do you transfer authority?

• Implement buttons and badges for places you’ve been featured. “As seen on….” logos from major media sources. People find comfort in these.
• Implement badges for the logos of major clients you’ve worked with.
• If you don’t have marquee B2B clients, consider emphasizing your trust badges (context over content).
• Borrow trust from better-known brands
  • reviews & awards
  • marquee clients
  • media mentions
  • trade associations

Bottom line: the sense of safety & trust has to precede the call-to-action / transactional part of the visit.

Pillar #4: Consensus of Peers. Do you have teenagers? (I jokingly raised my hand. Matt called me out, on Twitter, no less.) Do they give a crap what you think? Face it, you can’t care what everyone thinks. Impossible. Focus instead on what your peers think (your customers, your contemporaries). Peer pressure still matters. Nope, you didn’t leave it behind in high school.

Examples & Tactics

• Firefox has a ticker (small) on its homepage that says how many times its been downloaded (543 mi…. in 2 mo.)
• Follow suit. How many clients / downloads / transactions has your company had?
  • That # is the # of your peers. Show that figure off!
• You can still feature testimonials on your site, but use them as a back up on a different page. Have them as info that supplements the big shiny number of how many happy customers you have.
• Support automatic compliance by demonstrating “social proof” – show big numbers, but also show likeness, similarity, personalization, etc.

Wrapping up his keynote, Tim asks us to do two things:

1. Take off the rose-colored glasses. “Your baby is ugly! The good news is you can make it more beautiful.”
2. Get to work! Go back to the office next week and implement these simple ideas.

The sun has barely risen over downtown Seattle and, uncharacteristically, there’s not a single cloud in the 5:30 AM sky. Elliott Bay and Mount Rainer are just visible, peeking between architecturally diverse city buildings, highlighted in contrast by Northwest Pacific morning sun.

The view from my 31st floor downtown Westin hotel room is nothing short of stunning. Good morning, Seattle. It’s great to be back for SMX Advanced 2010.  In a few short hours I’ll have the pleasure of speaking here for the third year in row and then again tomorrow.  Man I love my job!

‘Advanced Seattle is truly one of my favorite search marketing conferences of the year. Brainchild of Danny Sullivan, Chris Sherman and the whole Third Door Media crew, this annual conclave of thought leaders is special, steeped in deep information and fantastic perspective for these rapidly changing times.

Industry insiders will easily recognize notable thought-leaders including Duane Forrester, Matt Cutts, Janet Driscoll Miller, Rand Fishkin, Sasi Parthasarathy, Matt Van Wagner, Benny Blum, Craig Danuloff, Todd Friesen, Chris Silver Smith, Greg Sterling, Christine Churchill, Gordon Hotchkiss, Chris Winfield, Vanessa Fox, Debra Mastaler, Richard Zwicky and literally dozens others.  Really folks, this conference is like kid-in-a-candy-shop sort of stuff, a one-stop-shop for catching up on what’s current and coming.

Served up on four tracks over the course of two (long and) stimulating days, SMX Advanced takes place right on the scenic Seattle waterfront at the Bell Harbor International Conference Center. Today’s agenda is structured on SEO & Social, Paid Search, Business Issues & Sponsored Tracks.

The first session I’ll speak on at 9 AM this morning is aptly titled Opening The Contracts Kimono: Translating Your Pricing Model To Legal Agreement Moderated by  Chris Elwell, President, Third Door Media, the program will also feature my friends Will Scott, President, Search Influence and Lisa Williams, President, MEDIA forte marketing. Adam Audette, President, AudetteMedia, Inc will be the Q&A moderator.

Conversations about online marketing “pricing models” are usually a bunch of  theoretical banter. Putting deals together based on the realities of our industry requires building contracts, which can be a challange and expensive to perfect. Agencies and solo practitionares are highly protective of their contracts, priceless written instruments that embody actual execution of  business models. Well… that ends this morning.

When I pitched this session to SMX, it was my intent to organize a session to cut through mystical veil of how these contracts are built. Attendees will be provided with print-outs of contract clause examples for their own use as applicable.  IMHO, this information is incredibly valuable for fledgling or even upstart online marketing agencies. (The lawyers made me say that the materials are in no way are intended to constitute legal advice, only reference materials regarding how other firms have accomplished various business model objectives.) Tomorrow I’ll speak again regarding Facebook SEO, a session our aimClear team in Duluth has been researching for some time.

Good morning, Seattle! It’s a pleasure to walk your streets and ride the ferries again.  Thanks for the this amazing sunlit day and for the beautiful harbor air. SMX Advanced is one of my annual favorites, a nice addition to this year’s London, Sydney, Portland, ‘Vegas, San Francisco and New York conference appearances.  I hope to see you in our session later this morning.

Wow, Day 1 was a Whriling Dervish at SearchEngineStrategies New York 2010!  The content struck me as seriously next gen’. We heard plenty of new terms today like “attention frontier” and “sliding window.”  Our good friend Simon Heseltine won the engraved iPod while Lee Odden and Chris Boggs rocked the house with their well-honed approach to leveraging digital assets.

It was great to run into friends and industry associations like Chris Elwell, John Marshall, PubCon’s Brett Tabke and (of course) our aimClear blogger-crew: @merryMorud, @mannyRivas and @beebow (lauren Litwinka). The Exposition hall was jam packed to the hilt as SEM vendors displayed their wares.  Of course, the Hilton New York Hotel is always a grand host for SES, one of the original industry conferences, a venerable mainstay. Here are a few images by which to remember the depth of Day One this year.

Looks like that furry little so-and-so Punxsutawney Phil was wrong. Things are warming up here on the East coast just in time for search marketers to crawl out of their winter cocoons and into the session halls for Search Engine Strategies New York 2010.

SES means many things to us here at aimClear-  it’s an opportunity to learn from seasoned thought-leaders as well as share a few tricks, tidbits and techniques of our own… a chance to talk shop in a dynamic, geektastic environment, to meet new folks and reconnect with old friends. It also means one very special event is on the agenda: The semi-annual aimClear/Clix Marketing SchmoozeFest.

We’ve noted from previous industry events including SES San Jose, SMX West and SMX East that end of Day 2 is the best time to nurture attendees’ fried brains with snacks and adult beverages. That’s why for one magical evening, aimClear’s Marty Weintraub and PPC Expert David Szetela (Clix Marketing) join forces to host SchmoozeFest, the can’t-miss social event on the SES NY calendar.  This year’s edition is co-sponsored by our friends at Apogee Results, an Austin, TX search marketing firm. Special thanks to Bill Leake.

This exclusive networking shin-dig is a fabulous excuse for Marty and David to charm industry friends with lovely camaraderie, hilariously disturbing tales of yesteryear, “forgettable finger foods” and tasty, tasty cocktails. But we weren’t kidding about the exclusivity – only those sporting the coveted orange wristband are able to partake in the festivities (and any impending hangovers thereafter).

Already have your invitation? We’ll see you Wednesday, March 24^th 7-9 PM, orange wristband at the ready. Feel you were unjustly left off the guest list? Ping Marty via Facebook or Twitter (@aimClear), or reach out to me (@beebow), Merry (@MerryMorud) or Manny (@MannyRivas).

Oh, and before then- check out our SES NY iPod giveaway page where you can enter to win one of three iPod Nanos with the swank inscription: #SESNY Search Engine Strategies 2010. Only KPIs are fun and friendship .

photo credit: joiseyshowaa on Flickr
photo credit: toprankonlinemarketing on Flickr
photo credit: josh.liba on Flickr