• by Rob Garner , April 11, 2007

Yesterday marked the first day of the Search Engines Strategies conference in New York City, which continues until Friday morning. In the midst of crowded halls and rooms filled with attendees decked out in (cold-weather) spring attire, here are a few things I was able to capture in what turned out to be a fast-paced day of sessions, meetings and speed mingling:

Danny has not left the building. It is noteworthy to mention that this is not Danny Sullivan's last show at Search Engine Strategies, though it is his last as full conference chair. He will be splitting the conference chair with Chris Sherman for San Jose, as well as programming the entire San Jose event. He will also be present at SES Chicago in December as a speaker and moderator.

As for his new venture, SMX, he said he is excited to be continuing to produce conferences. "One nice thing about SMX is that starting a new series has gotten me revitalized and eager to do everything people have liked, plus doing new twists and content that I think they'll also enjoy."

Morning video optimization panel - Google video search currently dominates; it's all about links; and for the most part, video optimization utilizes stock SEO techniques.

In-house - A lot of the information in this panel applied not just to in-house SEM managers, but to agencies and independents as well. Bill Hunt, CEO of Global Strategies International, talked a lot about the imperative to build business cases for search, even if it required "using crayons" to make stakeholders and executives understand. Marshall Simmonds, chief search strategist for The New York Times, also underscored the difficulty in quantifying search marketing components by asking, "How do you determine ROI on blogs?"

Hunt also said that trust has been a major factor in corporate search success, and the marketing executives that he has worked with rely on their traditional agencies to lay out what is important in overall marketing strategy. So if the traditional agency isn't touting the importance of search, for whatever the reason, it's off the radar in the enterprise scenario, making the agency -- and in-house SEM job and campaign -- much less effective.

More suits and newbies - Maybe the traditional agencies are sending the message to execs. One veteran attendee/panelist said that he observed more executive attendance at this event, and estimated that approximately 50% of all attendees were first-timers, representing a slight increase in first-timer attendance.

Search is mobilizing - I attended two of the mobile panels, one on mobile search optimization, and the other on mobile search engines. This is such an exciting area of search and interactive. The irony is that while there is a lot of interest in mobile (there were collectively about 400 to 500 attendees in both sessions), most marketing executives are still just getting on board with search. Marketers are now asking "Do I need a mobile website?" and "Do I need to be concerned about mobile advertising?" in the same way they asked about the need for a Website in 1995, and the need for search in 2002.

SEMPO Members Meeting - This meeting was the first gathering of the new board, and approximately 200 were in attendance. New SEMPO president (and executive vice president for iCrossing) Jeff Pruitt, gave the introduction, and was followed by SEMPO board member Fionn Downhill, CEO of Elixir Systems, who announced the new SEMPO Institute SEM training program. Its purpose is to teach standardized strategies and best practices, and provide courses to establish a benchmark for SEM expertise worldwide.

The courses and testing consist of basic SEM, and advanced SEO / SEM tracks, and was developed by an extensive list of SEM professionals worldwide. The course is priced at $499 for the basics, $1,750 for advanced SEO, and $2,250 for the SEA program.

SEMPO has also expanded internationally, with global committee representation in India, Japan, Canada, Spain, the United Kingdom, and Scandinavia.

SEMPO chairman Gord Hotchkiss also recapped the Annual State of Search 2006 report, highlighting the following:

- $9.45 billion dollar search spend in 2006, which will rise to $18.6 billion in 2011.

- SEM is poaching offline budgets.

- For the first time, marketing executives consider search a marketing priority.

- SEO strategy and paid search / SEO implementation are the most common agency services utilized by advertisers.

- SEO is the most popular form of SEM, used by 75% of marketers.

Hotchkiss also noted that the engines and media outlets are now looking to SEMPO as the official source of search engine marketing statistics worldwide, which is quite a notable feat for an organization that is only four years old. All of the folks who have contributed to the development of SEMPO over the years deserve a pat on the back, because it is clear the organization was standing strong on Tuesday.