Which is why we thought it would be great to have Google’s Amit Singhal sit down with Search Engine Land editors Danny Sullivan and Chris Sherman at SMX London for a keynote conversation to talk about the recent changes, and perhaps even more importantly, what’s on Google’s internal radar that’s guiding its future direction.

Amit is a Google Fellow, an honorary title reserved for Google’s most accomplished engineers, and he has spearheaded Google’s core ranking team since 2000. He’s also a key influencer of Search plus Your World, Google’s search experience centered around people, that lets you find personal results from your world — your photos, your friends, your stuff — in search.

We plan to talk with Amit about the Panda and Penguin updates, Google’s increasing use of structured data like microformats and social signals, personalization and how all of these factors will impact SEO efforts going forward. We plan to ask him to peer into his crystal ball and discuss Google’s efforts at moving beyond the link graph to the “knowledge graph” where Google takes the next step forward in truly understanding searcher intent.

We’re quite excited about this keynote conversation, and think it’s going to be a great kickoff for an exceptional two days of content from some of the best speakers in the industry.

Don’t delay – register for SMX London 2012 today!

Keynote Address – Google’s Amit Singhal

You can thank Amit Singhal if you’ve ever been pleased with a Google search result. Amit is a Google Fellow, an honorary title reserved for Google’s most accomplished engineers, and he has spearheaded Google’s core ranking team since 2000. He’s also a key influencer of Search plus Your World, Google’s search experience centered around people, that lets you find personal results from your world — your photos, your friends, your stuff — in search. Join us for an engaging keynote conversation with Amit, with Search Engine Land editors Danny Sullivan and Chris Sherman.

New This Year: SMX Boot Camp

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) can be overwhelming when you are just starting out. That’s why we created SMX Boot Camp — a one day conference experience featuring:

• Solid introductions to the key fundamentals of successful search engine marketing techniques
• Sessions that will prepare you to implement traffic- and revenue-boosting SEM techniques, right away
• Networking opportunities that will introduce you to others in the industry who will prove to be professional resources and personal friends

The SMX Boot Camp sessions include:

• Keyword Research & Copy Writing For Search Success
• Link Building Fundamentals
• Paid Search Fundamentals
• Search Engine Friendly Web Design

SMX Boot Camp sessions are taught by seasoned, highly-respected professionals who share the best practices and tactics for success they’ve honed over years of experience. And now, you can attend SMX Boot Camp for an incredible low price!

Something for Everyone

Whether you’re a beginner, intermediate or an advanced search marketer; whether your interests are specific to PPC, SEO, mobile or social media — there’s plenty of sessions to choose from. The search landscape is broad and deep, so we’ve brought together the most important topics featuring the strategies and tactics impacting search marketing success today.

Here’s a high-level overview of what you can expect.

SEO & Social Media

The world of search and social is both changing rapidly and converging. Traditional SEOs have to worry about how Google’s new emphasis on content quality will impact them, with ongoing Panda and Penguin updates. Social media keeps growing and becoming more important – both to people and search engines. At SMX London, you’ll learn about:

Why You Must Google+ify Or Die
Real Answers For Technical SEO Problems
King Content Vs. Panda: How To Survive & Thrive With The New Content Rules
SEO & Social Media Power Tools
Hardcore Local SEO Tactics

You’ll also have the opportunity to ask your own questions with our “search veterans take all questions” session where anything goes!

Paid Search & Analytics

It’s not just the world of organic search that’s changing – if you’re involved with paid search, or understanding how visitors interact with your site, your world is going through its own turbulence. That’s why these sessions will prove invaluable to you:

Maximizing Paid Search Campaigns With Google
Winning The Click: Creating Great Paid Search Ads
Winning The Conversion: Creating “Can’t Say No” Paid Search Landing Pages
Overlooked, Underloved & Unknown Analytics

Advanced Search Marketing Tactics

As said, SMX London has something for everyone, including experienced veterans. For those of you who’ve been around for years, you won’t want to miss these sessions:

Real Answers For Technical SEO Problems
Complying And Coping In The New World Of Regulated Global Marketing Environment
Mobile Trends: Search, Apps & Landing Pages
Life In A [Not Provided] World
Schema & Authorship: 1 Year Later
Retargeting & Remarketing: The New Behavioral Ads

Superior Knowledge, Great Networking

All of our speakers have proven track records, and are expected to share case studies, best practices and the knowledge and experience gained from working in the trenches and managing successful campaigns. So feel free to jump between tracks to attend those sessions that meet your own specific needs.

And be sure to take advantage of the networking opportunities between sessions, at lunch and at the networking reception. Networking is a hallmark of SMX and you’ll meet some fascinating and engaging people over the next two days. Most of all, enjoy the show!

Presentations from speakers who provided them will be posted to the conference web site. We will send you an email with a link and a password as soon as they are posted. This will be about a week after the show.

At SMX London, we encourage you to submit questions online. Simply use the online form we provide on site, select the session you’re attending from the dropdown menu, and type your question. Your question will then be entered into the queue for the Q&A session at the end of formal presentations.

Don’t delay – register now for SMX London,

Enjoy the show!

• Hardcore Local SEO Tactics
• Life In A [Not Provided] World
• Mobile Trends: Search, Apps & Landing Pages
• Winning The Conversion: Creating “Can’t Say No” Paid Search Landing Pages

If you’re accepted to speak, you’ll receive a pass to the entire SMX event. Ready to pitch? Head over to our SMX speaker pitch form and submit your proposal. We’re closing the pitch form early next week, so don’t delay! ]]> http://searchmarketingexpo.com/blog/20120323-101812.php/feed 0 http://searchmarketingexpo.com/blog/20120222-010032.php http://searchmarketingexpo.com/blog/20120222-010032.php#comments Wed, 22 Feb 2012 08:00:32 +0000 Kendra Jaros http://searchmarketingexpo.com/?p=18506 Amit Singhal, Google Fellow and the Head of Google’s core ranking team, will be opening keynote speaker for SMX London, 15-16 May at Chelsea Football Club. Lowest Super Early Bird Rates for the conference are available until 30th March – register now and save!

Amit is internationally recognised as the man responsible for Google web search. His algorithm has become the foundation for Google’s search platform and Fortune named him one of the smartest people in tech. A Google Fellow, Amit was recently elected as one of the members of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE).

SMX London is programmed by search authorities Chris Sherman and Danny Sullivan, editors of Search Engine Land, the leading news blog for search engine marketers.

Cutting-edge content on search engine optimization (SEO), paid search advertising (PPC), social media marketing, local and mobile search marketing, landing page conversions and more will be featured. SMX London also provides a forum for delegates to communicate with the search engines themselves. Check out the agenda.

As you might guess, interest is high in speaking at SMX conferences. Danny, Chris and the session coordinators sift through thousands of speaker submissions to make their selections. Here are some tips that will increase your chances of being selected.

Pitch early: Submitting your pitch early gives you a better chance of being selected. Coordinators accept speakers as soon as they identify a pitch that they think best fits the session, just like colleges that use a rolling admissions policy. So pitching early increases the likelihood you’ll be chosen.

Use the form: The speaker pitch form (http://searchmarketingexpo.com/speaker-form) is the way to ask to speak. There’s helpful information there about how your pitch should be written and what it should contain.

Write it yourself and be specific: Lots of pitches come in that are obviously written by staff or not specific to the session. These are two of the most effective ways to ensure that your pitch is ignored. If you’re a thought leader, write the pitch yourself… and make certain that it is 100% focused on the session topic.

“Throw your best pitch:” We’re limiting the number of pitches to three per person, so please pitch for the session(s) where you really feel you’ll offer SMX attendees your best.

If you want to know what we aren’t looking for, see our The Best (Worst) Practices For NOT Being Invited To Speak At SMX.

The speaking pitch form will close on March 5, and we’ll notify everyone whether you’ve been selected or not by March 12.

Super Early Bird rates for SMX London expire tomorrow, 3rd February. Make sure to register today for the lowest pricing available.

Returning for its 5th year, SMX London is programmed by search authorities Chris Sherman and Danny Sullivan, editors of Search Engine Land, the leading news blog for search engine marketers. The event will be held on 15-16 May at Chelsea Football Club and hosted by Sherman and Sullivan.

Delegates fluent in search marketing will learn advanced skills to help them maximize the results of marketing campaigns and optimize web site visibility. SMX London also provides a forum for delegates to communicate with the search engines themselves. Click here for a sneak peek agenda.

Cutting-edge content on search engine optimization (SEO), paid search advertising (PPC), social media marketing, local and mobile search marketing, landing page conversions and more will be featured. Structured networking opportunities, including the SMX online social networking tool, enable delegates to meet each other both before the conference and in-person.

SMX Boot Camp

For those less experienced in search marketing, SMX will be running an additional one-day conference on 14th May – SMX Boot Camp. This popular addition to the SMX program comes to London for the first time this year. SMX Boot Camp will feature sessions designed to help delegates implement traffic and revenue boosting SEM techniques.

International Search Summit

The International Search Summit will also run as part of SMX on 14th May. Programmed by WebCertain, the one- day summit will complement the advanced content of SMX, focusing on the complexities, challenges and opportunities of international search and social media marketing. Marketers targeting multiple languages, countries and cultures will learn ideas, techniques and solutions to implement in their campaigns.

Register Now for Lowest Rates Available

Register before 3rd February to take advantage of the lowest-available super early bird rates. Two-day All Access, SMX Boot Camp, International Search Summit and combination passes available – check the registration page for a full list of options.

Now in its 5th year, SMX London is programmed by search authorities Chris Sherman and Danny Sullivan, editors of Search Engine Land, the leading news blog for search engine marketers. The event will be held on 15-16 May at Chelsea Football Club and hosted by Sherman and Sullivan.

Delegates fluent in search marketing will learn advanced skills to help them maximize the results of marketing campaigns and optimize web site visibility. SMX London also provides a forum for delegates to communicate with the search engines themselves. Click here for a sneak peek agenda.

Cutting-edge content on search engine optimization (SEO), paid search advertising (PPC), social media marketing, local and mobile search marketing, landing page conversions and more will be featured. Structured networking opportunities, including the SMX online social networking tool, enable delegates to meet each other both before the conference and in-person.

SMX Boot Camp

For those less experienced in search marketing, SMX will be running an additional one-day conference on 14th May – SMX Boot Camp. This popular addition to the SMX program comes to London for the first time this year. SMX Boot Camp will feature sessions designed to help delegates implement traffic and revenue boosting SEM techniques.

International Search Summit

The International Search Summit will also run as part of SMX on 14th May. Programmed by WebCertain, the one- day summit will complement the advanced content of SMX, focusing on the complexities, challenges and opportunities of international search and social media marketing. Marketers targeting multiple languages, countries and cultures will learn ideas, techniques and solutions to implement in their campaigns.

Register Now for Lowest Rates Available

Register before 3rd February to take advantage of the lowest-available super early bird rates. Two-day All Access, SMX Boot Camp, International Search Summit and combination passes available – check the registration page for a full list of options.

Attend SMX Advanced London for:

• Keynote by Search Engine Land Executive Editor and conference chair Chris Sherman. Find out what he plans to talk about, and other insights into the show, in this recent interview with State of Search.
• An agenda packed with expert-level tips to drive traffic and increase conversions using SEO, paid search, social media marketing and vertical search tactics. Check out the agenda-at-a-glance.
• Opportunity to connect with leading solution providers in the SMX Expo Hall – including expo hall workshops which are open to all pass holders.
• New to the program! International Search Summit workshop – focusing on search at a global level – runs 18 May. Combo and workshop only passes available – see the full agenda here.

At SMX Advanced London, opportunities abound to get your questions answered and share your own ideas with the best in the industry. We’ve purposely kept this an intimate conference so you’ll be sure to meet the people you want to meet. Time is running out – register today!

Remember: SMX London is now SMX Advanced London, taking place on May 16 & 17 at a new venue, the Millennium Gloucester Hotel & Conference Centre. For those of you who weren’t aware that we changed the focus of SMX Advanced London, a brief recap:

Why an advanced focus?

While most of our SMX events have had a mixture of basic through advanced content, we’ve only run one conference that was totally dedicated to the needs of experienced professionals: SMX Advanced, held in June in Seattle each year. We host that show in a medium-size event center rather than a large convention facility, and work hard to make sure that there’s a strong community connection among the real pros of the industry. The “problem” is that the show is consistently so popular that it sells out weeks in advance, and we’ve also heard from many search marketers in the U.K. and Europe that they’d like their “own” advanced SMX. We listened: SMX Advanced London.

As my partner Danny Sullivan describes it:

“SMX Advanced is for vets. It gives them the unique opportunity to learn and discuss search marketing topics in a group setting without any time lost bringing others up to speed. As I’ve said before, one of the best metaphors is that the show is a place where everyone can speak their native language without slowing down. Everyone at the event speaks search marketing fluently. You can have rapid-fire and high-level conversations about SEM.”

Are the two Advanced SMX conferences the same?

SMX Advanced London is modeled on our always-sold-out SMX Advanced Seattle show, but with a distinct UK and European focus. For example, the majority of speakers hail from the UK or Europe, and some of the sessions deal with specific issues unique to the region, such as country specific search engine features and legal and compliance issues. All of our speakers have proven track records, and are expected to share case studies, best practices and the knowledge and experience gained from working in the trenches and managing successful campaigns.

What can you expect at SMX Advanced London?

SMX Advanced London covers all of the search engine marketing topics – SEO, paid search advertising, analytics, social media marketing, local, mobile, and much more – again, with each session taking a deep dive into a topic, covering aspects of search marketing that many may not have considered or even known existed. Our goal is to “wow” an audience full of people who themselves are qualified to speak.

And don’t forget – many of our speakers are representatives of the search engines themselves, allowing you to get “inside information” and ask questions directly to the people who know best how to answer.

Serious SEO

On the search engine optimization side of the equation, we’re covering:

SEO In 2011: What’s Working, What’s Not – While the fundamentals of effective SEO remain relatively constant, algorithm updates, new features and other changes made by the search engines can have a dramatic impact on search rankings (did any of you get impacted by Google’s Panda update?). Come hear our panel of experts discuss what’s currently working for SEO, what’s old hat, and what to look for going forward to keep your SEO edge.

SEO For Google Vs. Bing: How Different Are They? Back in the old days, some SEOs walked through the snow for eight miles and made different versions of their sites for Infoseek, AltaVista, Excite, Lycos and others. Each search engine liked different things, and so the effort was deemed worth it, by some. Then came Google, which grew and grew to the degree that for many, it was the only search engine to care about. You built a site for Google and didn’t worry about the rest. Now, with the search alliance between Microsoft and Yahoo in place, things have changed. Suddenly, a second player with an estimated 25-35% marketshare has emerged. Does it make sense to build a Bing-specific site? Is there that much of a difference between ranking factors for Bing versus Google to justify the effort? This panel explores the issues.

Link Alchemy: Creative Ways Of Conjuring SEO Gold Despite all the recent changes in search engine algorithms, links remain the single most important part of an effective search marketing campaign. And to successfully compete, you need to go beyond traditional link building techniques to create natural but scalable campaigns. What tools are available to analyse competitor links? What non-traditional channels, such as .edu links and retweets can be used? Our speakers show you how to reinvigorate your link building campaigns and take them to the next level.

What’s Really Important for Technical SEO? How do you prioritise improvements to technical architecture? What will make the biggest impact? Is it really all that important to speed up client-side page load times? Server side load times? Change your IIS configuration to stop generating those default.aspx pages and case-insensitive URLs? What technical SEO advice is just the latest fad and what’s really going to make the difference in improved customer acquisition from search.

Powering up paid search

Paid search has also changed considerably in the past year, and we’ve got some great sessions lined up to show you how to supercharge your PPC campaigns.

Best Practises With Google’s New Ad Features Google has breathed new life into the text-based AdWords format, introducing an entire new lineup of ad formats. These include AdWords video ads, AdWords sitelinks, local AdWords, product AdWords, comparison ads and more. They’ve also added modifiers, extensions and other features that aren’t always easy to use or understand. This session explores how to take advantage of these new features, integrating them into your existing AdWords campaigns.

Best Practises With adCenter For Bing & Yahoo Now that Yahoo and Bing have a combined estimated 30% market share, you know you can’t ignore this appealingly large source of traffic – but you’ve also heard that you can’t just clone your AdWords campaign and expect to get good results. What are the key differences between AdWords and adCenter? What adCenter features are unique and powerful? What kinds of features should you be taking advantage of to maximise your ad campaigns on Bing and Yahoo? How does your campaign on Bing differ from what appears on Yahoo? Come to this session to find out.

Remarketing For Fun And Profit Some call it remarketing; others call it retargeting, but if you aren’t doing it you’re squandering both money and opportunity to build stronger relationships with your customers. Remarketing involves understanding user intent via search, and then subsequently advertising to each individual with a combination of search, display or other online ads beyond search, reinforcing your messaging and increasing the likelihood of conversion. Sounds complicated, but recent developments have made it relatively easy to launch and run remarketing campaigns. Our panelists show you how.

Essential Paid Search Power Tools You’ve mastered pivot tables in Excel, and know your AdWords dashboard backward and forward. As good as these tools are, they’re limited. To really scale or take advantage of bid inefficiencies, you need to get automated. In this session, advertisers (not tool providers!) discuss their favorite tools, and how they can be leveraged to save time, improve performance and profits, and generally ratchet up the quality of life for a paid search marketer.

Keeping current with critical issues & tactics

Search marketing has evolved, and most people agree you need to have a serious toolkit to keep up with your competitors. How?

Search Analytics & Competitive Intelligence Your competitors are smart and aggressive. Knowing their search marketing strategy allows you to validate your own, and to outflank them with innovative tactics. Search analytics is the answer. This session shows you how to implement and profit from a comprehensive competitive intelligence campaign.

Refriending Google: Dealing With Penalties & Suspensions Although Google says only 12% of all websites were affected by its recent “Farmer” update, many legitimate websites felt the sting of new ranking algorithms. And it’s not always easy to understand why Google suspends paid search campaigns. But fear not—If your site or ad campaign has had a setback you can get back into Google’s good graces by following the tips and tactics our panelists present during this session.

Keyword Research Ninja Tactics Keyword research tools are powerful and plentiful—and your competitors are using them for the same reasons you are. This session explores keyword research “outside of the box,” mining unique or unusual sources of data for insights and opportunities that others overlook.

Social Signals & Search It’s no longer theoretical. Both Google and Bing say that they factor social signals into their ranking algorithms for “regular” search results. Who you are socially, your authority, the authority of those who talk about you (or your company) all play a role. This session looks at how social signals are currently being used with search.

Legal Update: ASA Compliance, Click Fraud, Privacy & More As if managing the complexities of search optimisation or a paid search campaign weren’t enough, online marketers face increasing challenges on another front: compliance with regulations and policy guidelines. In this session, search marketers and legal experts discuss recent developments you need to be aware of to avoid running afoul of regulators with increasing power to derail your marketing efforts.

Going vertical

It’s no longer just Google, Google, Google… here are some of the other key areas online marketers should be focusing on:

Beyond Search: Leveraging Ads On Facebook, Twitter & LinkedIn Not advertising on Facebook? You’re missing out on potential traffic from the second largest internet website, with more than 600 million unique users. And if you’re familiar with Google AdWords or Microsoft’s adCenter you’ll love Facebook’s self-serve image and text-based ads that let you advertise your own web page or even your own Facebook page or event. Twitter and LinkedIn offer similar programs. You really should make time to friend these programs at SMX.

Credit Where Credit Is Due – Demystifying Online Attribution Measuring ROI is key to effective online acquisition efforts. When you know what’s working (and what isn’t), you can react quickly. Just as important are the insights online data can give you about your customers: what were they searching for that caused them to buy? Did that display ad make all the difference? Unfortunately, attributing all conversions to the last click is easy to do with current analytics products, yet doing so obscures real customer data and effectiveness measurements. This panel will provide real answers on how to track a customer’s searches through all phases of the buying cycle, how to measure cross channel “assists”, and how to avoid the dangers of last click attribution.

Speaking In Tongues: Mastering Multinational Search Setting up and running multinational campaigns is the new frontier for search marketers. But it’s not enough just to translate a website and expect good results. Cultural localisation, hosting issues, working with different currencies, tariffs and payment systems all need careful work. This session shows you how to master the lingua franca of the international marketplace without making costly mistakes.

What’s New In Local & Mobile According to Google, as many as 30% of all search queries have local intent. And according to IDC, more internet-capable mobile devices will be sold this year than computers. In short, local and mobile are both here and huge, and will continue to be an important part of many search marketer’s activities. This session looks at new developments in local search, location services, mobile apps and ads.

Extreme Makeover, The SEO Edition Is it really possible to take a site from nowhere to top rankings in 3 months? That’s the challenge we issued to each intrepid speaker on this panel, who volunteered to work on a small business or charity website, each in a different niche, that was ranking on page 5 (or worse) on Google for the site’s main search term. The speaker had 3 months prior to SMX Advanced London to work with website and improve SEO rankings, traffic and revenue. Our speakers will reveal what advice was offered, the changes made—and most importantly, the end result.

Keynote address: The state of search in 2011

Search has seen more change over the past year than any time since the very early days. While the fundamentals of core search marketing remain constant, new innovations and features such as Google Instant and the incorporation of social signals into relevance algorithms have been significant. Updates like the recent “Farmer/Panda” tsunami impacted the rankings of thousands of web sites. And new features and changes to ad programs have presented both opportunities and challenges for marketers. In this keynote, Search Engine Land executive editor Chris Sherman looks at recent changes and talks about where things may be going as search evolves into the 2010s.

International Search Summit

Want even more? This year for the first time the International Search Summit will be running as part of SMX, on 18th May. If you run international search campaigns you need to attend ISS too! Sign up for both SMX Advanced and ISS for the special combo price.

Sponsors, networking & parties

Of course, our sponsors & exhibitors do have great information to share with SMX attendees. The exposition hall runs for both days of the show. In it, you can get information from exhibitors and sponsors about many products and services available to search marketers.

Beyond the conference sessions, there’s networking — and at SMX Advanced London, we don’t leave networking to chance, where you hope to randomly encounter the right people. We’re organized!

In the evening of the first day, we have a reception in the exposition hall.

So don’t be worried about meeting people. You’re going to meet plenty – all of whom share your passion for and knowledge about search marketing.

Good food, WiFi & fabulous venue

There’s no sense providing great sessions, great networking and letting the conference experience be ruined by a terrible box lunch. That’s why with SMX, boxes lunches are a no-no. You’ll get a great meal, on a real plate, and you’ll want seconds. No joke, people take pictures of the food at our events, it’s so good. You’ll also get refreshments during the day.

We’ll also keep you connected, providing free WiFi in the conference rooms. Tweet, and Facebook, and Foursquare and email to your heart’s content — though consider shutting that laptop or turning off that iPad, lest you miss a great point one of our speakers is going to make.

And with glass-domed atriums, the Millennium Gloucester Hotel & Conference Centre is an open, inviting venue.

Don’t Delay! Early Bird Rates Expire Soon!

Want the best deal for attending? Take advantage of our early bird rate, which expires on Friday, April 15. After that, rates increase, so now’s the time to act for your best value.

Go. Now. Register today!

See you in London!

For more about the show, be sure to visit the SMX Advanced London web site, including the Agenda Overview. See you there!

• Essential Paid Search Power Tools
• Legal Update: ASA Compliance, Click Fraud, Privacy & More
• Refriending Google: Dealing With Penalties & Suspensions
• Remarketing For Fun And Profit
• SEO For Google Vs. Bing: How Different Are They?
• Remarketing For Fun And Profit

If you’re accepted to speak, you’ll receive a pass to the entire SMX event. Ready to pitch? Head over to our SMX speaker pitch form and submit your proposal. We’re closing the pitch form late Wednesday, so don’t delay! ]]> http://searchmarketingexpo.com/blog/20110327-111438.php/feed 0