• by Shankar Gupta , January 10, 2005

A new trade group of search engine marketers is in the works and will be launched within the next few months, Ian McAnerin, a member of the organization's working group, said Monday.

The Search Marketing Association North America (SMA-NA) will join its continental European and British counterparts--SMA-EU and SMA-UK, respectively--as an alternative to the U.S.-based Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization (SEMPO).

McAnerin, who heads an Internet promotion company, and previously owned a search engine optimization business, criticized SEMPO for being focused on "representing the big names." Until recently, McAnerin was a member of SEMPO. "One of the problems that I saw with SEMPO is that although they state that they have the goal of representing the industry as a whole, in reality it turned out to be representing the big names," McAnerin said. "Quite honestly, the vast majority of SEOs and SEMs in the industry are the little guy."

SEMPO spokesman Greg Jarboe responded to these criticisms, saying that his organization does in fact represent the entire spectrum of search engine professionals, from the largest marketing companies to the smallest one-man operations.

McAnerin further alleged that the upper echelons of the organization's membership--which is divided into tiers based on monthly dues--gets the lion's share of the benefits, like client referrals. Jarboe denied this allegation, citing his own personal experience. "I've been a SEMPO member since March of 2003 and I'm not at the 5,000 [dollars a year] level, and I don't think I have any more or less access to the leads that are generated than anyone else," Jarboe said. "There may be some imagined benefit, but I don't think that's actually translated into reality."

McAnerin also said that SEMPO violates its status as a non-profit organization by acting to benefit its top members, but Jarboe said that SEMPO had contacted legal counsel to make sure the organization was in compliance. "SEMPO has a lawyer who recommended that we make some changes to our bylaws so we can provide the range of services that we've been providing," he said. "That criticism may have been accurate six to nine months ago, but it's not accurate today."

SMA-NA will represent search engine marketers in Canada, the United States, and Mexico, and the working group hopes to launch before the Search Engine Strategies conference in New York City, which runs from Feb. 28 through March 3. The group does not yet have any official members, and is still in the working group phase of development.

SMA-NA will operate with both non-profit and for-profit arms, with the non-profit focusing on industry advocacy, research and events, and the for-profit section providing services for members.

Jarboe said that SEMPO is eager to have more advocacy groups in the industry. "People are free to criticize. We're an open organization who are trying to promote growth in the industry," he said. "We hope this new organization can help us promote the industry as well."