Claire McEachern, the recipient of the of the PSU Digital Marketing Strategies scholarship, writes about her experience and learnings during the Spring 2013 course.

I think my head might still spinning from everything I learned during the Search Engine Marketing Scholarship Course offered by SEMPDX & Portland State this spring. And that’s coming from someone who has a *decent grounding in the web and digital field. (*being a relative term)

Sure, there was mention of buzz terms, currently flying around today’s blogosphere, like “big data”, “content is king”, and the usual avalanche of industry acronyms. But what stood out as the biggest takeaways from the 3-class course were the details of fundamental skills and tools as well as an understanding of the big picture of SEO & SEM efforts.  Yes, you can go in and set up an Adwords account and make some ads or fiddle around with Facebooks advertising but you can very quickly waste a lot of money and time trying to just “figure it out”.

Industry veteran, Kent Lewis, and several outstanding guest lecturers led the classes over the 3 week session. The team mixed up the course with practical assignments, real world case studies, lectures, and in-context reviews of student’s current application of digital marketing strategies.  Topics included:

• Industry resources for analyzing websites and campaigns
• Metrics, history, and trends for SEO & SEM
• The should & should-nots of website navigation and layout
• Why speed and content are crucial
• The importance of social activity as a ranking factor
• Drill down on PPC and CPM campaigns and the systems that run them
• Local search, why it matters, and how to do it
• Keywords and ad copy development
• Components of a quality landing page
• Content Marketing & Link Development
• Online Reputation Management

The scholarship was a great opportunity to refine my skills and learn just how much I have to learn in this area. Fortunately for the Portland area, we’ve got great resources like SEMPDX and Portland State to bolster our growing community of tech-savvy weirdos. For me, I’ve got my work cut out for me implementing all that big data and creating content for the apparel and accessories brand I work for, LOOPTWORKS.

- Claire McEachern

May 13, 2013 – It was a full house Tuesday night at this year’s Members Only event.  Local Search expert David Mihm, SEOmoz, gave a comprehensive session on the local landscape, including the latest changes and strategies to maximize results.

Among the top 7 changes that have occurred in local is the importance of Google+.  It’s amazing to consider that Google+ Local is just under a year old.  Aggressive changes continue to roll out and now more than ever, brand plus location is paramount regardless of your company size.  Help Google help you by implementing rel=publisher and rel=author tags and imbedding your map from My Places.

Another big change in Local Search is with Google’s backend.  Google Map Maker has decreased the amount of time it takes to review and it’s also improved the quality.  And believe it or not, reporting a problem to Google actually works now.  In all, it’s much easier to clean up data problems.

David closed the evening by sharing two process suggestions for improving time management: assign fundamental tasks to the agency and high return projects to the client.

If you’re not an SEMpdx member, join now and benefit all year!

April 9, 2013 – ISITE Design’s Ryan Summers and Amanda Bernard joined us Tuesday night to share their analytics expertise.  It was an event jam-packed with tips on accurately measuring SEM and effectively interpreting analytics to surface key insights.

Ryan began by quickly reviewing several important elements for ROI including tracking codes, CRM, custom data source and universal analytics.  From there, he dived in to some of the latest measurement strategies and tactics you can use to understand the results of your SEM efforts.  One integral strategy is personalizing the site experience.  Keywords, landing pages and other data will show you visitors who were interested in your product or service but didn’t buy anything.  Based on the data you collect, you can then re-target to these visitors.

Three key areas where inaccuracy can come back to bite you are self referrals, non-qualified visitors (e.g. jobs, investors, internal) and conversions on 3^rd party channels.  The data is there, so take advantage of your analytics to prevent these mistakes.

Amanda walked us through a quantitative approach to building personas.  The 3-phase process – research, consideration and decision – taps in to the expectations of your customers so you can determine the types of people coming to your site.  Tools such as Yahoo Clues and Google Trends provide insights on how to keep site visitors more engaged.

Once you’ve built your personas, design your website accordingly.  Implement, test and analyze for PPC landing pages and ad copy, home page re-design, and blog and social content.  You should also review your persona-based site paths and evaluate specific content pieces by persona type.

Cat Adoption Team’s 30,000th Adoptee!

SearchFest 2013 drew hundreds of attendees from near and not-so-near to absorb tips & expertise on a wide range of search marketing topics from a distinguished cluster of expert speakers.

But there were a couple of other special attendees, as you might have noticed – ones with fur and claws and cute little faces that seemed to say “adopt me, adopt me!”

They were a little nervous due to the crowds (I’ve been known to be a bit shy among strangers too) but they were a big hit with attendees, many of whom stopped by to visit with Chomper (pictured at the top of this post with Theresa Brown who adopted him recently) or Candy Cane who was also recently adopted.

In fact, Chomper was Cat Adoption Team’s 30,000th adoption!

So why were there cat’s at SearchFest 2013? – I forget to mention that Cat Adoption Team (C.A.T., get it?) is our Charity of Choice this year.

Kathy Covey

Kathy Covey is currently the PR Manager for C.A.T. and she recently sent me this update on how things went at SearchFest & after:

“Monte Cristo was the first to be adopted, even before SearchFest – quite literally just a few days prior but after I built the SearchFest cat web page and we started talking about him.

“That is what happens and why social media can be so powerful for adoption of pets. I firmly believe that when you start talking about a pet for adoption, getting others involved in the conversation, something goes out into the ethers if you will and the person destined to adopt that pet is drawn in.

“Chomper was one of the kitties who made a short appearance at SearchFest with Candy Cane. He was the very nervous black cat who was very startled with all the clapping. Chomper became our 30,000^th adoption on Friday! (March 15, 2013)

“Candy Cane went home pretty quick after SearchFest (again that magic). He was very outgoing and we just knew it was finding the right person who would accept that he was FIV+ (feline immunodeficiency virus). Candy was the one we brought on stage. He too was terrified of the clapping but otherwise is a super confident kitty.

“Curry, a 13 year old cat with a huge attitude, found her special person as well. We were concerned for Curry. Being 13 years old and not liking cats meant that she really did not put her best “paw” forward here in the shelter. She was cranky and stressed (being around other cats).  Jennifer saw past that and took her home. Here’s the e-Tails article I did on Curry prior to her adoption.

“The two who are still waiting are Scion and Simba. They are buds/sisters in fact and it would be terrific if they could go to a home together.

Scion

“Scion is shy and will need a gentle hand to gain confidence. Perhaps that’s why having her stay with Simba, who is a very outgoing gal, will be best if possible. They are “sisters” who lived together prior to coming to CAT.

“This pair was given up to us by their owner and have been waiting for over a year to find a new home. They are not very old (just a little over 2 years) and are quite affectionate. If I had to guess why they were still here at CAT….. it would be because we really would like them to go to a home together.

Simba 

“Every Tweet or social post about these cats will put them one step closer to the person who will adopt either or both of them.

“Of course, if SEMpdx members and fans prefer black cats, or white cats, or tortie cats, visit our cat & kitten adoption list and pick your favorite to promote, we won’t mind.

“The more folks who see what great cats we have available and how wonderful a pet cat is, the better.”

As our Charity of Choice for 2013, SEMpdx will be contributing 10% of our organization’s proceeds to C.A.T. as well as some of our Board Members donating time to do PPC, SEO and Social.

Adopt me. Now.

And, we’re also covering the cost of adoption during the month of March – so if you’ve been thinking about having a furry feline friend around the house, there’s never been a better time.

And how can you resist a face like this?

Cat Adoption Team
14175 SW Galbreath Drive
Sherwood, OR 97140

503-925-8903
contactus@catadoptionteam.org

March 12, 2013 – This month’s event zeroed in on conversion rate optimization.  Click Advisors’ Theresa Baiocco joined us for the evening to share her tips on CRO, including a 7-step process that will convert more traffic and ultimately, improve profits.

Before diving in, always begin by looking at the big picture and decide where conversion rate optimization fits in.  Calculate the revenue equation (Revenue = Traffic  x  Conversion Rate  x  Value of Conversion).  It’s important to focus on each component equally.

Once you’ve looked at the big picture, work through the following seven steps to increase your site’s conversion rate:

1)      Who are our site’s visitors?  Build customer personas, focusing on psychographics rather than demographics.

2)      What are they trying to do?  Continue building customer personas in this step.  Differentiate between primary and secondary personas.

3)      What do we want them to do?  Define KPIs based on your business objectives.  Configure both macro and micro conversions in analytics.

4)      What’s preventing them from doing it?  Look at analytics and user feedback.  In analytics, ensure goals are configured and the correct tracking is installed.  Figure out which page is the problem.  When gathering user feedback, continue to focus on the data.  Tools such as FiveSecondTest, UserTesting.com and Lucky Orange provide great insights into users.

5)      Develop a hypothesis to fix it.

6)      Test.  Don’t get hung up on the tools.

7)      Repeat steps 4 – 6.  What else can we do?

After working through these steps, go back to the big picture.  Calculate the revenue equation with your new numbers and reinvest the extra revenue in traffic.

As an attendee of literally dozens of search conferences, I’ve often found that the best information isn’t always found in  presentations, but in the hallways, in the bars, and at the parties, where people tend to speak more freely.

When I was asked last summer to give the link building presentation at SearchFest this year, I was initially excited, and my plan was to share some really juicy stuff, and we were going to have an interactive session where people would actually leave with some links that day.

In the ensuing months though, after continually getting the cr*p kicked out of my own affiliate sites by the Penguin algorithm,  I’ve had to seriously reexamine my whole philosophy.

At the link building panel this year, there will be no presentations, and instead, we’ll have an honest discussion about what has become of link building in 2013 and where it’s going in the future.

The panelists for this session have done their share of ‘pushing the envelope” over the years, and in some cases they’ve pushed too hard too, and all have agreed to openly share their experiences and opinions.

Got Questions?

Have you got questions about certain tactics? Do you need sound and reliable advice? Are you baffled trying to figure out how to make things rank now that anchor text is a no-no?  If so, this interactive session is where you’ll get the answers you need.

The panelists:

Michael King -
is a software and web developer turned SEO since 2006. He is currently the Director of Inbound Marketing at iAcquire. He’s also a international touring rapper.

Follow him on twitter @ipullrank or at his new blog – The Best Practice

Will Scott -
is the founder and President of Search Influence. Will Scott has been helping small businesses get online since 1994 – that’s right, 1994 – before most people even knew there was an Internet. Since then, Will has been focused on making information more accessible online.

… and I’ll be asking the questions you submit, throwing in some of my own, calling on the audience, and  sticking my own two cents in as usual!

Scott Hendison -
is the CEO of Search Commander, Inc. and the founder of SEO Automatic, a set of white label internet marketing tools for WordPress.

As a founding board member of SEMpdx, Scott has been working in some aspects of the search industry since as early as 1999.

Put these three on the hot seat and submit your questions  now so they’ll be the first ones addressed before we go to the microphones.

(Yes, anonymous questions WILL be answered)

The form has been removed as of 7:30 am 2/22 – Show up to ask your questions!

While some search engine marketers may have a fundamental understanding of public relations (PR) tools and tactics like press release optimization, many lack the sophistication or experience to truly leverage the power of PR to generate quality inbound links and authority that results in enhanced visibility, traffic and ultimately, revenue. On the other side of the spectrum, PR professionals struggle to keep up with the rapidly evolving world of search engine optimization (SEO) and how it can vastly improve the impact of their efforts. As a PR pro-turned-SEO pro, I’d like to take this opportunity to combine the “SEO peanut butter” with “PR chocolate” to make a delicious marketing treat everyone can enjoy.

Building A Foundation
The first step in developing an effective SEO+PR strategy is to create a dedicated News Room – a dedicated resource for the media and analyst community. Typically consisting of FAQs, backgrounders, press releases, event calendars, awards & recognition and links to coverage, the online News Room is a one-stop shop for the press, yet it also provides value to prospects, customers, partners and peers. The 3.0 News Room may include “socialized” elements including a dedicated PR-focused blog, social profiles and even rich media content like webinars, images, audio, video and a Google News Sitemap. Don’t forget to enable your News Room with social “share” buttons for all relevant content, since social signals are a key factor in rankings (and certainly improve viral shareability). Over time, it’s also advantageous to develop a library of blog posts, articles, presentations and even books that validate your commitment and industry credentials. Those truly interested in building “pundit” or “guru” status should understand and maximize Google’s AuthorRank.

Developing A Story
Without complete synergy between the SEO and PR teams, creating and promoting compelling content can be challenging. Google news & trends are the natural places to initiate story research and development, as both offer insights into keywords and concepts essential to any successful search and PR campaign. Once an idea is formulated, the next step is to conduct detailed research to identify industry influencers across publications, blogs and the social graph. While keyword and directory research may create an initial list of candidates, thorough vetting of individual and organizational credibility (PageRank, Klout, etc.) is recommended to help refine and tier your list. Once you’ve finalized your list, leverage knowledge of their personalities, areas of interests (or beats) and previous writings (which may include competitor mentions) to formulate a compelling “pitch.” If direct outreach may not be ideal or effective, consider leveraging your network or the community by seeding forums or blogs with key messages and supporting content to foster a groundswell of support. Continue to facilitate conversation even after the initial goal is achieved (i.e. coverage, link or citation), as long-term relationships are the backbone of effective PR programs.

Building Authoritative Content
Beyond building a well-designed News Room and conducting regular outreach to your targeted media list – a truly successful SEO+PR campaign includes regular development of foundational content including press releases, articles and speaking engagements. To ensure proper momentum with PR activities, create, optimize and syndicate press releases on a monthly (or otherwise appropriate) basis. Press releases can still be effective at generating visibility in news search engines and social media, which in turn helps fuel inbound links, even if they do not directly result in coverage. For maximum visibility, consider utilizing a paid service like PRWeb to distribute the press release, and include rich media elements like photos, audio or video. Paid services offer more advanced reporting beyond basic distribution, including views and clicks. To maximize visibility on industry publications and blogs, become a regular guest contributor. If you’re internal team lacks the bandwidth or skills to regularly produce timely articles, consider hiring a freelancer or even an industry pundit (budget and regulatory issues aside). Lastly, submit for relevant speaking opportunities, as they not only build industry visibility and credibility, but also generate high-quality inbound links from bios and session abstracts on event sites. The same is true for industry awards and certification opportunities.

Securing Authoritative Links
Regardless of the level of diligence surrounding initial research and message crafting, at the end of the day, a SEO/PR campaign’s success ultimately relies on the quality of the “offer” which may vary based on the topic, business, objective and messenger. More than a decade ago, I worked for a consumer electronics e-retailer and quickly realized I could not compete with Best Buy’s marketing muscle. In order to compete for awareness, links and traffic, I sent sample product to key influencers for review and promotional purposes. In one case, I sent two digital cameras to Chris Pirillo – one to give away to as a partner promotion and another to “review” (which we did not ask him to return). The result was exposure to hundreds of thousands of potential buyers through the review and giveaway, and ultimately tens of thousands of dollars in sales (tracked through affiliate links). Alternative offers that have a similar ability to gain attention include limited trials, product demos, special contests or promotions. Companies lacking the ability to discount or give away product are relegated to creating compelling, unique content the target influencer would be happy to share (think Red Bull Stratos). When the “earned media” approach fails to produce a desirable link, consider securing strategic sponsorships that offer inbound link opportunities (often with a greater level of control over anchor text and link destination).

Measuring Success
The traditional PR measurement model, which I learned about early in my career, focused on the equivalent advertising value of coverage (usually in column inches of ink). Conversely, traditional SEO measurement models focused on rankings for targeted terms and resulting traffic to a website. Both fall short of more compelling goals like an ability to effectively generate qualified leads or sales. Somewhere in between, consider measuring the quality of links (PageRank) and direct traffic from those links (via analytics and marketing automation). To maximize the impact of all your hard work, do not forget the critical last mile: syndicate all optimized PR content (press releases, articles, rich media, etc.) via social and other marketing channels, including any resulting coverage. Remember to “vote” for your SEO/PR content on third party websites via social share buttons. For bonus points, also track citations/mentions and analyze sentiment to truly understand the overall impact of your SEO+PR efforts.

By following the five steps outlined above, you will see a meaningful increase in quality inbound links, resulting in greater industry visibility, authority and ultimately revenue. As an SEO+PR professional who’s built an entire digital marketing career including 4 businesses and 2 organizations with this approach, I can tell you it works quite well.

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SEM PR – When Search Engine Marketing Meets Public Relations Part 1 and Part 2
Online Reputation Management: Seven Strategies to Build Your Brand

SEMpdx and Portland State have teamed up to offer a scholarship twice per year to students who wish to take the Search Engine Marketing course in the 
PSU Digital Marketing Strategies certificate program.   The current scholarship covers the course fee ($650) for the Search Engine Marketing course taught on 3 Fridays: April 12, 19, and 26.  Click on the scholarship link to complete an application. All applications are due by 5:00 p.m. on Friday, March 22nd.   The winner will be selected and contacted on or before April 3rd.

April 3rd UPDATE: Congratulations to Claire McEachern! She is the recipient of the PSU Digital Marketing Strategies scholarship. Best of luck Claire!

Portland State’s Winter term of digital learning has already kicked off, with some Spring term classes to start shortly.  Three certificates, Digital Marketing Strategies, Designing and Developing for Mobile
and Introduction to Web Development, are designed for working professionals and career changers updating traditional media skills in print design, content development, marketing/PR and related fields.  Explore the Winter and Spring digital media courses.

These programs are offered through the Professional Development Center at Portland State University, with classes taught by top Portland interactive developers, designers, and executives.  Classes are structured to meet the needs of current business professionals and may be taken as individual courses or as part of a certificate. Day and evening classes are held at the Market Square Building, located on 5th Avenue, between SW Market St. and SW Clay St.

Complete Scholarship Application Now

SEMpdx Announces SearchFest Sponsor: G5

We are proud to announce Bend, Ore.-based company, G5, as sponsor of the Members Only Mixer held the night before SearchFest. The event is exclusively for SEMpdx members that are attending SearchFest the next day. Members will mingle with their digital marketing peers, including the SEMpdx board and SearchFest speakers, in an informal setting. The full-day digital marketing conference will offer attendees rare insight on Friday, February 22, 2013 at the Governor Hotel in Portland, Ore.

“G5 is one of the fastest growing companies in Oregon, but we’re known nationwide as search engine marketing experts in the property management sector,” said Dave Beltramini, Director of Online Marketing Strategy & Performance at G5. “SEMpdx’s line-up of speakers and content is stellar, and we’re thrilled to be part of the event.”

SearchFest is currently the only search and social media conference organized by a nonprofit business organization (SEMpdx) in the Northwest — allowing tickets to be one-third of the cost of other conferences featuring the same caliber of speakers. Lower ticket prices paired with national experts has led to tremendous growth of the event.

Keynoting SearchFest this year will be Duane Forrester of Bing (the search engine based in Seattle, Wash.) and Marty Weintraub of aimClear (an INC. 500-honored digital agency based in Minnesota). Additional companies represented at SearchFest include: Disney Interactive, REI, Rosetta and a variety of local, regional and national marketing firms.

ABOUT G5
G5 is the leading provider of Digital Experience Management (DXM) software and services in the property management sector. The G5 DXM Platform enables owners and operators of multifamily, senior living and self-storage properties to put the right renter in the right property to maximize profitability. G5 helps thousands of properties turn renters into brand advocates by delivering amazing experiences at every digital touch-point. As brand advocacy grows, so does demand — allowing properties to raise rents and revenue without adversely affecting occupancy.

Founded in 2005, G5 was recently named one of the fastest growing private US companies by Inc. Magazine (fourth consecutive year), one of North America’s fastest growing technology companies by Deloitte (second consecutive year), and one of Oregon’s fastest growing private companies by Portland Business Journal (third consecutive year). The Bend, Ore.-based company is backed by private equity investor Volition Capital.

Greg Sterling will be speaking at the “Mobile” session at SearchFest 2013 which will be taking place on February 22, 2013 at the Governor Hotel in Portland, Oregon. For more information or to purchase tickets, please click the following link.

1) Please give us your background and let us know what you do for a living.

I’m an editor at Search Engine Land and Marketing Land. I also work as a senior analyst for Opus Research in San Francisco and I have my own consulting practice. I cover a lot of stuff but it all ties into online to offline consumer behavior and digital advertising.

For purposes of this interview I have to say that I’m not a designer or usability expert.

2) You recently wrote that 2013 is the year of the tablet. We’ve always talked about “getting your site ready for mobile”…how can a business make their site “tablet friendly”?

You can use responsive web design or create a tablet (iPad) app. There are also companies such as Pressly, Onswipe and others that will convert your site into a tablet-friendly design.

But more fundamentally you should consider your site from the user perspective. Use it on a tablet. What works, what doesn’t?

There should be no Flash, first and foremost, otherwise you’ll have a big blank square on your homepage. Also consider that your site will be used in landscape and portrait modes. Also imagine the site being used with fingers and thumbs. There’s more imprecision than with a mouse. Lots of dense text with lots of links could be a problem accordingly — or buttons too close together.

Make it so your site will operate easily without heavy pinching and zooming.

Images are very important to tablet users as well. They want rich, interactive environments. Make the navigation simple and obvious. There shouldn’t be too many fields and forms.

I hate to say it but most US tablet traffic is coming from iPads. So right now you should design for the iPad and the iPad Mini. Over time there will be more Android tablets that drive traffic.

3) When should a business consider creating an app and should they always make a version for both Android and iTunes?

Something like 80% of all US tablet traffic is coming from iPads. So Apple is still the most important app platform for tablets right now. Over time Android will become more important. But build an iPad first if you’re going to build one. Then take what you’ve learned and put that into the 2.0 version plus Android.

If you’re an e-commerce site you probably should consider creating an app for a fully optimized tablet experience. Tablet users convert at higher levels than PC users.

Having said that it may not be easy to get people to download your tablet app so you’ve got to have a tablet-friendly site. Which brings us back to question #2.