Keynote Q&A: Yusuf Mehdi, Senior Vice President, Online Audience Business, Microsoft
Yusuf Mehdi has been instrumental in leading both web search and search advertising initiatives at Microsoft. He currently has revenue and market share responsibility for the Bing and MSN businesses, and before that served as Microsoft’s chief advertising strategist and led an 1,800-person engineering team to develop and launch Microsoft’s initial web search platform and Microsoft adCenter. In this keynote Q&A with Search Engine Land editor-in-chief Danny Sullivan, he discusses the evolution of search at Microsoft, the alliance with Yahoo and future initiatives Microsoft has planned as it competes with the global goliath, Google.

SEO & Social Media Track

So You Want To Test SEO? – Trying to figure out that search algorithm, to decide which of those 200+ factors really make a difference? You might be tempted to do some experimenting — and you might end up making the wrong conclusions. Are you correcting for personalization? How are blended results having an impact? Is there a different algorithmic blend used for informational queries versus transactional ones? Are you interpreting the results correctly? Do you have control groups? These are only some of the many challenges to running a valid experiment. If you’re going to test, this session aims to help you do it right. It also aims to help you judge the validity of tests run by others. Topics covered include:

• Using the scientific method in SEO: what is a scientific method, why is it important and what parts of it are relevant to the world of SEO testing
• Setting up a valid SEO experiment: testing keyword choice, testing site choice, experiment length, etc.
• Identifying common errors in SEO experiments: interpreting results, statistical analysis, control groups, irrelevant data elimination, lack of parameter isolation, etc.
• What to look for during experimentation
• What are the benefits of testing? Examples of tests and how they affected our SEO strategy
• How to make discoveries part of your SEO work

Paid Search Track

The Mad Scientists Of Paid Search – It’s alive! Mwah ha ha ha! OK, our mad scientists on this panel are far less frightening that those scary ones from B-movies. These scientists have run various paid search experiments aimed at boosting performance of their campaigns. Come see and learn from their creations!

SEO & Vertical Search Track

Location Services: The New Local Search? – Is checking in on Foursquare search? Yes, indeed! That’s because by checking in, people are also often also looking around, checking for tips, advice and information. How are location services like Foursquare, Google Latitude, Gowalla or mobile apps from established local search players like Yelp changing the local search space? This session looks at this dynamic new area and the opportunities for search marketers. Check-in and check it out!

Bing Webmaster Tools At A Glance – Wondering what’s the latest with Bing’s webmaster tools? In this session we’ll discuss how to get better results through site design, optimizing your content, and driving traffic on Bing while learning about the latest and greatest tools. Ample Q&A time provided at end.

Speakers:
Sasi Parthasarathy, Senior Program Manager, Bing
Eric Gilmore, Group Product Manager, Bing

This session is sponsored and produced by Bing. It is open to all SMX Advanced attendees.

SEO & Social Media Track

Search Marketing In The Facebook Zone – You’re traveling through another dimension. A dimension not of web pages and links but of fan pages and sharing. A journey into a mysterious land where none of the PageRank rules apply. That’s a signpost up ahead: your next stop, the Facebook Zone! Think there’s no need to go into the zone as a search marketer? Think again. Facebook generates enough internal searches to be classed as a major search engine in its own right. How’s your content ranking there? How are your ads doing? Facebook also spills out into the "real" web, with content showing up at Google and Bing. In this session, hear from advanced search marketers about their explorations of the strange new and important world of Facebook and what you should be doing there.

Paid Search Track

Ads On The Move: Mobile Paid Search – The mobile search space continues to grow — and mobile ad opportunities keep growing alongside. This session reviews some of the latest tips, techniques and strategies for paid search marketers when it comes to mobile search ads in results and in search applications.

SEO & Vertical Search Track

Build It Better: Site Architecture For The Advanced SEO – Think you’ve covered all the on-the-page factors to ensure better rankings? Think again. This session reviews beyond-the-basics areas you should be considering, including one of the hottest new factors to come along — speeding up your site.

De-mystifying Search Data – Some marketers cower and hide when faced with number crunching but there is a great deal of valuable knowledge and information that can be extracted from search marketing data. Efficient Frontier has analyzed more client data than any other search firm. In this presentation Tom Shin and Dr. Sid Shah will bring to life some intriguing data snapshots on topics such as bidding on your brand, the path to purchase, Google sitelinks for brand traffic and display as a performance channel.

Speakers:
Tom Shin, VP Sales, Efficient Frontier
Siddharth Shah, PhD, Director, Business Analytics, Efficient Frontier

This session is sponsored and produced by Efficient Frontier. It is open to all SMX Advanced attendees.

SEO & Social Media Track

Mega Session: SEO Vets Take All Comers – This PowerPoint-free panel is made up of veteran search engine optimization experts taking questions on SEO issues. Put your biggest challenges to them and come away with solutions.

Paid Search Track

Amazing PPC Tactics – What’s hot and happening with paid search? This session will wow you with some new ideas for your PPC campaigns!

SEO & Vertical Search Track

What You Don’t Know About You Tube – What’s one of the biggest search engines on the web? YouTube. What feeds much video content directly into the top results of the web’s largest search engine, Google? YouTube. Already feel you’re rocking along just fine with YouTube? Our panel seeks to shake you up and surprise you with video search marketing tips for the service.