Keynote Day 2 of Search Engine Strategies with Danny Sullivan
Danny says keynotes should be inspiring.
How are we (search marketers) viewed? Shows photo of guy wearing spam shirt and drinking a beer.
Shows quotes from various sources characterizing SEOs as: Worthless, shady, criminals, cockroaches
Who to blame?
Blach Hats:
Blog spamming, keyword stuffing, content thieves, cloaking
But consider some contradictions:
- Some news sources are allowed to cloak
- Large respected pubs selling links
- Web site of respected blog software maker hosting spam pages
White Hats:
Algorithm ingnorant, simple tips overselling, industry best practices
Consider:
- Simple tips aren’t simple to people who don’t know
- Working with designers and others to do content SEO is a skill
Organics
Black arts dabbling, unldear line waslking, low margin grubbing, non paid search practitioners
Consider:
- Paid search is boring with no creativity
- There’s something other than search such as WOMMA
- Successful organic puts people in the prime position that money can;’t buy
Search Advertisers
Machine driven, money rules all thinkging, getting all the search engine attention, new to the market,
Consider:
- Paid search isn’t fickle about algorithm changes
- Without paid search, search engines might not be able to offer organic for free
- Paid search is so measurable
United by Search:
Gives example, movie "Stripes" – audience doesn’t get it
We’re all very different people:
Search is made up of black hats, white hats, organic, paid, and subsets of that
It’s a good time to be in search
- Search in all forms is high in demand
- Search marketers are having difficulty in hiring search marketing staff
- Search marketing popularity now is not a bubble:
- Search is a fundamental advertising medium like TV, radio, print and outdoors
- Search will continue to evolve and become more and more pervasive – which means
Increasing opportunies for search marketers
Search is not going away, it’s just going to get bigger and bigger
Communities:
- Mailing lists: I-Search (dead now), SEM 2.0, Search Return
- Conferences: SES, Pubcon, Ad:tech
- Forums, WMW, Digital Point, SEW, HighRankings
- Blogs: SE Roundtable, SEO Book, Threadwatch
- Organizations: SEMPO, SMA, Dallas, Atlanta
Cites Ian Turner who went missing at an Atlanta Pubcon. People responded en masse to act. Cross community effort.
Who else is part of our community: Yahoo, Google
Shows example of Barry Schwartz who asked his giflfriend to marry him via Ask Jeeves.
Community Rewards:
- Weather reports are getting more regular
- Things like nofollow to give more control over our pages
- Google sitemaps
- Yahoo site explorer
- Google sitemaps stats
- Google base
Danny loves all this, but he wants more:
Blogging community can monitor new links in Google blog search – why isn’t that possible in regular web search?
- Yahoo Site Explorer should allow export of more urls
- URL feeds are fine, but expand into content feeds
- Ad reps should be friends, not foes – Ad Reps taking accounts away.
How Outsiders Recognize the Community
Shows example of Bruce Clay – looks like a mug shot. Article "hawking" seo
Another example of Lucas Morea as a successful entreprenuer. SEO different, but unusual
Search Engine Ad Rep Problems Remain:
Despite gains, some will still see search marketers as "used car salespeople"
Two challenges:
- Scummy companies
- Trespassing content
End to comment and link spam – not just blogs, but anywhere adding a link does not add value. Say no to FFA, guest books, etc
– Google page rank lunacy article by Mike Grehan
Shows example: memorial guestbook viagra
Search Marketers are the Foot Soldiers of Search
You are search marketers, hear you roar, in numbers too big to ignore
Conclusion:
- Put yourself "on the map"
- 2006 is promising
- Pick a day for "Search Marketing Day"
- NYC SES is "Search Week"
Danny thinks there should be a "SEM Apprentice" – names Frederick Markini as the "Donald Trump of
Search" Need to raise the reputation of search.
Tags: SES, SES Chicago 2005, SES Keynote, Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Strategies
