I don’t know about you, but I want a project management tool that makes my work easier, and I want it to be natural! I’m sure you’ve heard about Trello before–Will Critchlow at Distilled has been singing its praises for the better part of 2012. Internally, Amanda championed the tool and it didn’t take long for us to try it out.

When I first started at Outspoken Media, everyone in the office was using Basecamp, but it wasn’t doing exactly what we needed it to do (details below). With the goal of making our processes more streamlined, and our work more efficient, we began transitioning to Trello, and I helped to spearhead that transition. Had I already been a Trello enthusiast, I could have created a Trello board dedicated to setting up the Outspoken Media Trello account, but sadly hindsight is 20/20.
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Stop making assumptions! As an SEO, I have to remind myself of this–question data, question the client, question past and current link development. One assumption I see many companies and website owners make is that Google Analytics gives them everything they need to properly analyze their site. This simply isn’t true.

For many, Google Analytics is constant background noise in their browser. Unfortunately, not all of us are Google Analytics pros, number crunchers, or programmers–sometimes we avoid the more complex applications of Google Analytics code.

I know there are times when I’ve been afraid of breaking something on a site so I’ll hesitate to implement the code I hoped to. Without mistakes we can’t grow and this is why there are “undo” features, local backups, lots of online tutorials, and professionals you can consult with like analytics evangelist, Avinash Kaushik.
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Due to Google’s Penguin and Panda updates, SEOs shifted their focus from traditional link-building schemes to more robust content-based search strategies. While there was a bit of industry turmoil directly following those major updates, the industry pulled through as strong as ever due to the insight, creativity, and resourcefulness of its members. Wil Reynolds was one of these notable SEOs who, at Mozcon 2012, coined and shared his brainchild “#RCS” which has sinced gained massive popularity across Twitter and the blogosphere. Paul May of BuzzStream described RCS or Real Company Stuff best as being,

“bundle into three things: Community, Content and Campaigns, all pointed towards a well thought out content strategy.”

I believe it is a great philosophy and way of approaching SEO strategies, but as a long time forum and Twitter lurker, I think there is a bit TOO much RCS being thrown around. This leads me to the conclusion that not everyone realizes either what RCS really means, or how hard it is to achieve. While the effort and consideration to create better, astonishing ideas that convert for SEO efforts are leading the industry in a positive direction, there are a few things to keep in mind.
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Hi! I’m Sean, Director of Client Services for Outspoken Media. I like skateboarding, snowboarding, sneakers, and search marketing. In the three months since joining Outspoken Media we have been entirely focused on our clients, conference travel, the re-brand, writing proposals, training a new team, moving offices and evaluating new hires who can help us grow the company. So, while we still have a few boxes to unpack around the office, we decided it was as good a time as any to talk about how I got here, literally and figuratively.

It happened over Facebook, coffee, and early morning conversations.

After spending my first four years in SEO at another local SEO company and six years at a large digital agency in NYC managing and directing a group of highly talented SEO’s, I decided to look for a change. I just didn’t know what that change was going to involve.

What I did know:
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Perhaps the newest buzzword in SEO is “relationship building.” It’s not about link building anymore-it’s about the relationship. And while I don’t disagree, it is very easy to start tab jumping or fall into Twitter and not accomplish what you wanted to in the first place: getting this person’s attention.

While there are numerous industry experts who have covered
the topic extensively before, one of the most overriding statements is that relationship building “takes time.” Yes, it does, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t break it up into smaller chunks of time that don’t inadvertently consume your entire morning, or day, or week.
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Recently, I joined my first Board of Directors at Vanderheyden, a New York family services organization, and I was faced with the massive question of–what’s my role?! I knew that the organization needed help with social media and their web presence, but while pouring over meeting minutes on compliance, new client intake, real estate, budgets and more, I realized that the Board of Directors had a much larger responsibility–the care and well-being of the entire organization. (more…)

More and more, it’s becoming imperative for companies to provide a unified experience between their website and their social media outlets. With the never ending changes in Google’s algorithms and the mass exodus from building links to earning links, internet marketing is moving in full force toward a value packed experience for the customer, and social media is at the heart of it.

Social media is an enormous component to getting the full experience of any company’s brand. That’s why it’s so imperative that it is effectively integrated so that customers can be captivated and engaged no matter where they are or where they come from.

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Well this is it everyone. We hope that if you were here, you enjoyed PubCon as much as we did, and if you weren’t, we hope that you enjoyed living vicariously through our coverage. In case you are just tuning in now, we’ve got coverage for the first day, and the second day up too, with great tips and takeaways from industry pros. (more…)

It’s the home stretch folks, and in case you missed it, we had some great coverage up last night. Those of you on the East Coast may have already turned in for the night, so catch up on yesterday afternoon’s sessions, and then join us for Doc Searls, ROI, and a great competitive intelligence session. (more…)

Hello again. This morning we had some great sessions on content and sustainable-SEO that we hope you caught up on.  After a quick trip around the exhibition hall, this afternoon we’re on to Bing, E-Commerce, and Post Mortems.  If you’re attending, and were in a different session, or if you couldn’t make it to Vegas at all, we’ve got you covered. (more…)