SES 2010: Search Engine Marketing and Entrepreneurs

Samantha Strauss Aug 14, 2010 Tweet

Here at TECH cocktail we cover a wide range of topics related to entrepreneurism and technology industry trends. As social media has taken over the web, several important digital marketing tools have taken a back seat. So, in this post we’d like to highlight the importance of search engine marketing to your businesses.

Recently we spoke with Matt McGowan, Publisher of Incisive Media. Incisive Media is a leading global B2Bpublishing company and the organization behind the upcoming SES: Search Engine Strategies Conference & Expo 2010 in San Francisco. The conference is known as one of the best places to hone your skills and discuss search engine marketing (SEM), search engine optimization (SEO), and various social media marketing tactics.

Matt shared with us the importance of SEM and what entrepreneurs should be focusing on within the industry.

TC: Why should an entrepreneur focus on search engine marketing?

MM: It can be one of the most effective customer acquisition channels in the marketing spectrum.

TC: Why should entrepreneurs focus on SEO?

MM: It’s a cost effective way to be found and to find potential customers (there is a distinction, all our alumnus know what I am talking about).

TC: What must entrepreneurs remember when working with SEO?

MM: Success is not found overnight and there is more than one way to optimize a site. It’s a bit of an art.

TC: Where is the search engine industry going today?

MM: It is growing, big time.  Even more interesting is that other media such as display is starting to trade like Search has traded for years. Instead of buying on a CPM basis advertisers can now buy in an auction-based environment.

TC: With the increase in social media, how has the search engine industry changed?

MM: Social media has begun to absorb Search Engine Marketing providing many new opportunities for online marketers.  For instance, social assets (video’s on YouTube, pictures on Flickr, Facebook profiles, Tweets,…) are all more or less crawl-able by the search engine’s and therefore will rank within your SERPs.

TC: What are the current search industry trends?

MM: Yahoo/Microsoft Search Alliance, Real-time, Mobile, Local, Social Media.

TC: Which top panels should not be missed at SES SF?

MM: Intro to Search Engine Marketing for all the beginners and the SEW Labs for all the more seasoned practitioners out there (the discussions and case studies should be out of this world). That said, I am moderating the Introduction to Remarketing session and the Twitter Nation and Automation session –> both of course will be fantastic

You can still register to join over 6,000 attendees for SES San Francisco 2010 here. Be sure to follow SES’s official twitter handle @SESConf and the hashtag #sessf this week for industry tips and important points from the sessions and keynotes which could help your business.