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Speaking at SES San Jose on Creating Compelling Ads
SES San Jose is always one of my favorite conferences of the year. The proximity to Google, Yahoo, and Silicon Valley always make it quite the event (and everyone wants to attend the Google Dance).
If you’ve only been to the NYC or Chicago Search Engine Strategies show, it’s a completely different conference.
SES NYC = Madison Avenue
SES San Jose = Silicon Valley
SES Chicago = Die hards (it’s in December in Chicago)
I’ll be in San Jose speaking at the Creating Compelling Ads panel on August 21st.
You can see some of my older presentaions here.
If you’d like to register, or find out more info, here’s the home of SES San Jose.
RHD acquires Business.com
I’m very excited about this acquisition, however, I’ll just link to the most appropriate news for right now:
All About Microsoft adCenter’s adExcellence Program
Microsoft’s adExcellence program is similiar to the Yahoo Ambassador or the Google AdWords Professional program.
The program is still in beta, however, to quality for the program one must pass a test and have a minimum amount of spend (which is pretty low) in an account to quality for the program.
The original test wasn’t extremely difficult, and I’ve already talked to Microsoft about some of the questions and changing them up a bit. Many of the items were around PPC best practices; which is good to see as I don’t think everything on the test should be centered around just one product; but around how a good PPC campaign is setup and managed.
One item Microsoft is set on doing (and the other engines need to follow suit) is creating a directory of it’s members.
These certifications don’t mean much (nor does any certification) without awareness. While I applaud the engines for creating programs that lets consumers know if one is qualified, the consumer awareness about these programs is exceptionally low. Hence, consumers don’t actually seek out these professionals to run their campaigns.
Engines should showcase these programs to raise awareness. Once their is awareness, then there is also an additional benefit for one to learn any of the PPC programs to the satisfaction of the engine to earn one’s qualification.
The second items the engines need to follow up with is support for the individuals who pass these programs. People who take (and pass) these programs are the most likely candidates for being product evangelists.
At present, there is no special contact phone number, email address, or skywriting for one who has any of the search engine qualifications. If one happens to be on another team, then one can get support through the normal channels. However, if one does not have an account rep, then one still has to go through the normal channels for support. These programs and qualifiers should be embraced by the engines.
Yahoo is currently in the process of restructuring their ambassador program; and Microsoft is still in beta, so maybe there is hope that some of these support channels will begin to emerge.
Google AdWords Seminar Coming to Vancouver
The AdWords Seminar for Success series is coming to Vancouver, Canada
When:
Thursday, August 30th, 2007
Where:
Hilton Vancouver Metrotown
6083 McKay Avenue
Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada V5H 2W7
Phone 604.438.1200
Driving Directions
Registration: 7:30 - 8:00 AM
Morning Session: 8:00 - 12:00 PM
Lunch Break: 12:00 - 1:00 PM
Afternoon Session: 1:00 - 5:00 PM
Breakfast and Refreshments Served
Agenda:
Morning:
- The Search Process
- Best Practices
- Keywords
- Generating Keywords
- Creating Keyword Lists
- Match Type
- Negative Keywords
- AdWords Keyword Tool
- Effective Search Ads
- Landing Pages
- Optimizing AdWords Accounts
- Optimizing For Traffic
- Optimizing For Conversions
- Optimizing For Quality Score
- Optimizing For the Content Network
- Conversion Tracking
- AdWords Tools
- Traffic Estimator
- Copy/Move Keywords/Ad Text
- Advanced Search and Editing
- Ad Diagnostic Tool
- Disapproved Ads Tool
- Change History
- Reporting Options
Afternoon:
- Advanced Ad Types
- Local Business Ads
- Image Ads
- Video Ads
- Mobile Ads
- IP Targeting & Geo Keywords
- Local Targeting Options
- Advanced Ad Display
- Ad Scheduling
- Position Preference
- Ad Serving
- Budget Settings
- Ad Delivery
- Bidding Options
- Calculate Your Maximum Bid
- AdWords Editor
- Google Analytics
- Split Testing
- Invalid Clicks
- My Client Center
- AdWords API
- Resources
Hope to see you there.
Information on Google’s website
Registration Page
Local Search: An Intro Seminar in Chicago
Are you still trying to figure out the internet?
Is your company still evaluating if you need to be on the web?
Do the words SEO, PPC, and Data Distribution confuse you?
Are you determining if you need a website, profile, or internet presence?
Do your customers know how to find you on search engines?
What about IYPs?
Or other local properties?
Can you measure the effectiveness of online advertising?
LocalLaunch is conducting a half day seminar in Chicago that will answer those questions and more.
This seminar is for individuals who are still struggling to get their business online, and then learn how to drive traffic to your website. If you want your business online, and you don’t know where to start - this will be a valuable day for you.
This seminar will cover:
- Why your business should be online
- Best practices for creating websites
- Overview of search
- An intro to search engine advertising (PPC)
- An intro into ranking in the search engines (SEO)
- How to get your business information into local search properties
- How to measure the effectiveness of your website
- Case studies
Agenda
- 9:30 – 10:00 Registration
- 10:00 – 2:00 Seminar
- 2:00 – 2:30 RHD Product Demonstration (optional)
- 2:30 – 5:00 Networking Reception (optional)
Cost: $249
Lunch and refreshments will be served during the seminar. The networking reception will allow you to meet other local businesses and have a drink on us.
A representative from Yahoo will also be attending and will be ending the day with a fun contest about the day’s materials.
For more information, please see Marketing Your Chicago Business Online: Meet the Experts.
AdWords Seminar Heading to Philly
The next AdWords Seminar is coming to Philadelphia is August.
When:
Tuesday, August 14th, 2007
Where:
The Inn at Penn, A Hilton Hotel
3600 Sansom Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Phone 215.222.0200
Driving Directions
Registration: 7:30 - 8:00 AM
Morning Session: 8:00 - 12:00 PM
Lunch Break: 12:00 - 1:00 PM
Afternoon Session: 1:00 - 5:00 PM
Breakfast and Refreshments Served
Agenda:
Morning:
- The Search Process
- Best Practices
- Keywords
- Generating Keywords
- Creating Keyword Lists
- Match Type
- Negative Keywords
- AdWords Keyword Tool
- Effective Search Ads
- Landing Pages
- Optimizing AdWords Accounts
- Optimizing For Traffic
- Optimizing For Conversions
- Optimizing For Quality Score
- Optimizing For the Content Network
- Conversion Tracking
- AdWords Tools
- Traffic Estimator
- Copy/Move Keywords/Ad Text
- Advanced Search and Editing
- Ad Diagnostic Tool
- Disapproved Ads Tool
- Change History
- Reporting Options
Afternoon:
- Advanced Ad Types
- Local Business Ads
- Image Ads
- Video Ads
- Mobile Ads
- IP Targeting & Geo Keywords
- Local Targeting Options
- Advanced Ad Display
- Ad Scheduling
- Position Preference
- Ad Serving
- Budget Settings
- Ad Delivery
- Bidding Options
- Calculate Your Maximum Bid
- AdWords Editor
- Google Analytics
- Split Testing
- Invalid Clicks
- My Client Center
- AdWords API
- Resources
Hope to see you there.
Information on Google’s website
Registration Page
I Caved & Joined Facebook
After much prodding, invites, and complaints that I wasn’t on Facebook - I finally joined.
The main reason I joined? It wasn’t to stop the invites (those are easy to delete) - it was to see if it helps catch up with people as I travel.
I’ve already spent time this year in:
- NYC (4x)
- Washington DC (3x)
- Upstate NY (2x)
- Seattle (3x)
- Charlotte
- San Jose (2x)
- San Francisco
- Detrioit
- Minneapolis
- Toronto
- Las Vegas
- Phoenix
- St. Louis
- Little Rock
- New Orleans
- Miami
- Denver (2x)
- Dallas
- Boston
That I can remember. With that much traveling, it’s always good to try and have dinner, drinks, coffee, and just catch up/meet people as I travel.
Now, will social networking actually work for this purpose? I guess I’ll find out.
If you haven’t joined, or don’t know the rules, Rae has an excellent post on the Unofficial Guide to Using Facebook.
links for 2007-07-14
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Nice article on copywriting laws and some guidelines.
How to Optimize a Contextual Advertising Campaign
My latest article on Search Engine Land is now out that goes into depth about contextual optimization:
The major pay per click engines, such as Google and Yahoo, include two different types of distribution: On their own search engine result pages, and on content pages elsewhere on the web. These two types of advertising, while often lumped together under the pay-per-click (PPC) label, are very different. Advertiser’s ability to control these networks and consumer’s interaction with these networks are completely different. Hence, they should be treated as completely separate types of distribution.
Often contextual advertising gets a (sometimes undeserved) bad rap. There are techniques that you can use to have a very effective contextual ad campaign.
Google AdWords
Seminars for Success
Learn about Google AdWords from experts hand selected by Google.
These seminars will educate advertisers on the creation and management of successful AdWords campaigns.
Upcoming Seminars:
Phoenix AdWords Seminars January 22nd & 23rd
Austin AdWords Seminars January 28th & 29th
Learn More about the Seminars:
Seminar Information
Official Google Seminar Page
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Brad Geddes
Leslie Clark
Other Memberships
