I am so excited that BlueGlass announced a conference in September because I had just been told by my doctors I couldn’t attend SMX in New York. It has been no secret that I love BlueGlass conferences. I went to (what was the) Search and Social Summit last year and had a blast. I also attended the November 2010 conference, learned a lot and had so much fun.

Smaller Crowd Means More Learning

BlueGlass conferences are different because there are a limited number of seats. At each conference the majority of attendees are what I consider die hards in the the industry. So you learn from speakers that live this industry everyday and you learn from the attendees.

The Speakers Rock

• Dennis Goedegebuure -In-house SEO manager for eBay and one funny dude!
• Brian Clark – CEO of Copyblogger Media and very cool guy.
• Simon Heseltine – Director in charge of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) at AOL Inc
• Greg Boser – Coolest guy ever and a genius.
• Jon Henshaw – Co-Founder and Director of Product Innovation at Raven Internet Marketing Tools (will be buying him drinks)
• Lee Odden – I am most excited about meeting Lee in person. A great guy and someone I can’t wait to learn more from.
• Tim Mayer – Chief Strategy Officer at Trada – looking forward to meeting him
• Melanie Mitchell – Melanie Mitchell is the SVP of Search Strategy at Digitas – looking forward to meeting her
• Ben Cook – A nice guy that delivers sweatshirts in conferences when you are cold and a nice guy!
• Chris Winfield – Chris rocks and you should write down everything he says in conferences and in the bar
• Ross Hudgens – SOOO excited to meet him in person! SEO Manager at Full Beaker, Inc
• David Snyder – Dave looks big and tough, but he really is just a nice guy.

Blue Glass Understands the Importance of Non-Session Discussions

I am not sure how the conference will work this year, but last May we had breaks between sessions where we could just sit around the pool, drink a little [:-)] and talk. I learned a lot sitting in the pool and sitting around the pool. At the November conference I learned some valuable info in the bar…info I have used all year.

A Tight Network of Friendships

The entire BlueGlass crew is amazing. They treat everyone well and they are kind people. That kindness and their willingness to welcome everyone creates a unique feel. The smaller conference allows you to be in smaller crowd and you will have a better opportunity to get to know people better, learn and create a bond. If you follow the BlueGlass crowd on Twitter you will see that there is a great amount of respect and many friendships that go beyond a “net” relationship. Many of these friendships formed or strengthened at BlueGlass.

This year there are even fewer seats so you better get your ticket now.

Register Now to Learn, Hang with Fellow Geeks and Meet Great People

The conference dates – September 26th & 27th, 2011 in Tampa, FL

Location - Doubletree Guest Suites Tampa Bay

Link to register - http://www.blueglass.com/conferences/tpa/

Hashtag - #blueglasstpa

I look forward to seeing you there. Come and say. I am on the shorter side of the SEO spectrum according to Joshua Titsworth

Melissa - geek extraordinaire

Bing has teamed up with Facebook to help you get better search results which are personalized with the help of the “likes” by your friends on Facebook. I am not sure I am too thrilled about this idea. My friends on Facebook don’t all think like me…

You can turn this off. Learn more here –> http://www.discoverbing.com/facebook/

We were thrilled to be in the Wikio top SEO  list back in May and we were thrilled to have the #14 spot. I guess we have retained that spot because they emailed us yesterday and said the top 2o would be published today and we are still #14. I am thrilled with that Here are the other top 19 SEO blogs according to Wikio:

SEO Aware Blog Wikio Rankings

• Search Engine Land
• Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO
• SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog
• SEO Book.com
• SEO by the SEA
• Graywolf’s SEO Blog
• Local SEO Guide
• SEO Igloo Blog
• Seo Smarty
• Clickfire SEO Blog
• Internet Marketing Blog
• ISEdb.COM – Blogs
• SEO Scoops
• SEO Aware
• SEO Blog PageTraffic
• Daily SEO Tip
• Search Engine Optimization, Google Optimization – RSS Feeds
• Cre8pc Usability & Holistic SEO
• SEO BlackHat
• Search Marketing Wisdom

Ranking made by Wikio

Just got back from the Search and Social Summit in Tampa. It was a ton of fun, was full of great people and was a fantastic conference I will make sure to attend every year.

Samir Balwani, a very cool dude!

Todd (Stuntduble), Michael Gray, Chris Boggs and Rae Hoffman

Neal is a funny guy! Brent was really nice and Chris is always nice!

Dave Szetela, Ryan Sammy, Janel Landis Laravie

An elevator full of SEO’s – Skitzzo is smiling!

Michael and Rae!

See Tony Adam and Todd…

Michael and Samir with apple juice by the pool!

Todd with some apple juice

Szetela on Guitar!!

See video below of Tony singing…

This is Jordan Kasteler dancing with his beautiful wife!

AskBoth.com lets you look at both Google and Bing Results at the same time. I like it, but I love to compare all kinds of data. I have tested it  and I enjoy that I do not get behavior-based results with AskBoth.com. It is a nice little tool, but perhaps has a bit too many Google ads for my taste.

Melissa – SEO Aware

123People.com

I really like this site. This site lets you find information about people. I have been able to find some places I have been discussed that I was not aware of. I also like being able to find so much information one place. Some things you can find at 123People.com.

• Weblinks
• Images
• Videos
• Social Network Profiles
• Emails
• Phone Numbers
• Blog Posts
• Documents
• IMs
• News

WhosTalkin.com

Whostalkin.com looks for anything and everything related to your search query. Keyword phrases, business names or anything else. Where this site looks to find information is broken is down below:

BLOGS
Backtype, Blogdigger, FriendFeed, Google Blog Search, IceRocket, identi.ca, Indianpad, Myspace Blogs, Plazoo, Plurk Social Mention, Technorati, Twitter, WordPress.com

NEWS
Ask News, BBC Google News, ITN, Microsoft Live News, Newspad PRWeb, Techmeme, Topix, Yahoo News

NETWORKS
bebo, Facebook, Friendster, hi5, Last.fm, LinkedIn, Myspace, Netlog, Ning, xanga

VIDEOS
Blinkx, Blip.tv, Dailymotion, Metacafe, Revver, Viddler, Vimeo, Yahoo Video, YouTube

IMAGES
DeviantART, Flickr, Fotki, PhotoBucket, Picasa, SmugMug, Yahoo Image Search

FORUMS
BoardReader, BoardTracker, Omgili

TAGS
Blinklist, Blogmarks, del.icio.us, Faves instablogs, Jumptags, Metafilter, MyWeb, Newsvines, Reddit, WordPress.com

Why Should I Take the Time to See What People Are Saying About Me or My Business?

Lots of reasons!

• You need to find out what people are saying about you/your business. Think Online Reputation Management.
• You can see if your online marketing strategies are working or not working.
• You can find backlinks you didn’t know about.
• Determine if your online presence is positive or negative.
• Determine if your online presence is strong or weak.
• Use the data to help you determine what you need to do to either create an effective online marketing campaign or create a reputation management plan that will push negative information back in the SERPs.

Melissa – SEO Aware

You Might Be a Twitter Addict

If you Twitter on the toilet, you might be a Twitter Addict

I love the Internet and I don’t think I would be any good at my job if I wasn’t a “net junkie”. Constantly educating oneself is important in this industry and social media helps us do that. However, are we crossing the line of effectiveness and moving into addiction?

Watching You

I have a ton of work to do, but I do watch Twitter and Facebook when I have time. Both are great and can be educational and advertising tools, but I have to say some of you out there just can’t not be on Twitter or Facebook. I wonder, when do these people eat, sleep, see their loved ones or work? So they question is, is everyone talking about Twitter because it really is that great or is it because they are addicted to it?

I have a friend, Scott, who had a great Facebook account and one day it was just gone. I called and was like, “Where are you?” and he said he realized that when he was planning parts of his day around what to do on Facebook it was time to delete the account and get back to work. I agree. Facebook is great and I have fun with it. I have made good money off of it too, but it shouldn’t replace the time I need to work or to spend real time with my family.

Isolation

My background is in Psychology, so I look at things from a different perspective sometimes. Working on the net is a great thing; I love it, but it can and does cause isolation. We are dealing with code on a screen, not real people. How healthy is it if all you do is deal with your computer? People need to interact with other people in real life to really be happy. Ever hear about the healing power of touch? People can’t touch your through a computer.

I have a 17 year old and of course I have friends with kids the same age and what I see is a lot of kids living in their bedrooms talking with friends on MySpace and Facebook and other sites, but they aren’t going out much and they aren’t real happy. Sometimes you just have to walk away and go hang with a human…enjoy human touch (no jokes here people!).

Information Overload

When I was working towards my masters in counseling I had a class where we discussed information overload. The professor said something I will never forget…He said if someone from the time of Jesus came to live in this time they would be dead in two weeks. Why? Information overload. He said that driving a car and dealing with traffic alone is very stressful on the body, then add the radio, cell phones, kids talking…we are overstressed. Then we stop and perhaps we go in the house where the TV is on non-stop and the phone never stops ringing and we have emails to check, families to take care and we have to get dinner ready and the kids homework done…our brains never get to stop. We wonder why there is so much depression, anxiety and cancer.

We have all learned to live and work under such stress and we don’t even realize it. You have phones, radios, TVs, iPods, email, Twitter, FriendFeed, cell phones and caffeine. (BTW, caffeine throws your body into the fight-or-flight response. Did you know that? If you drink it non-stop your body never gets to return to homeostasis)

When does your body return to homeostasis?

It doesn’t. I understand how critically important the Web is if a business wants to do well, but we have to keep things in check. We have to make sure we are not isolating ourselves and we aren’t putting our brains through more than it can handle. We also have to make sure that the social media we are involving ourselves in has a purpose and a good result and isn’t just an addiction because of loneliness, a desire to be the best or whatever else.

For those of use that are involved in SEO, Internet Marketing and Social Media it is vitally important that we make sure we can walk away from the computer and live happily without (and even without your BlackBerrys, iPhones etc.) As of 3 PM every Saturday my computer goes off and I spend time with humans until Monday morning. Sometimes I do login to Facebook, but not often. I enjoy my time away and I rejuvenate myself.

So there is another one of my thoughts I had in the shower…I am late for dinner now. GO relax and speak to a human.

Melissa Fach – SEO Aware

Well, I can’t comment much, yet, on the sessions. Today will be a much more exciting day. I have met a lot of people and I have to say the nicest people so far have to be Chris Winfield and his wife. They are down to earth, welcoming people. His wife is as beautiful as everyone says.

I will be writing more about SMX soon.

Melissa

Well, the first thing I noticed this morning is a lot of proxy scrapers instead of domains for many well-established Web sites and/or blogs. As a result I noticed that many sites that have been around for the last year or more are not in the index which is interesting because I read on CNN that Cuil’s index is at least three times larger than Googles. Well, it may be larger, but here is something Cuil may want to think about…

Google has not been sitting around just taking in money and playing the Wii all day. They have been working to provide quality results for their users. Do we all agree how they go about it? Not always, but no one can deny that a Web user can typically find what they are looking for. Are there those that cheat the system? Yes! is Google perfect? No. BUT they are the big dog and I would not have come out doing interviews and rivaling Google unless my product could provide quality and relevant results that at least equaled Google’s.

Terms I Played With

I searched for local services and guess what? The results sucked!

• Sarasota Marketing= Nothing
• Sarasota Advertising = a lot of sites that don’t offer advertising services
• Sarasota Marketing Services = a lot of PR sites and only one local result
• vSphinn = Well, Sphinn comes up with a lot of there pages, some from Search Engine Round Table and then one from SEOmoz…I guess it is relevant, but the set up is a bit irritating 
• McCain = The results loaded very slow (could be from all of us testing it out). McCain’s site was first, but #2 was www.k-state.edu/mccain/ about a McCain Auditorium. However, there was a tab for “John McCain” that narrowed the results down. This was kind of nice, but honestly the results are too difficult to read. Maybe I am too use to Google…
• SEO = Well, I was not expecting all the results i received. Cuil has a little gray side box with topics that have a drop down with related terms. I clicked on Search Engine Optimization and Vanessa Fox was one of the terms. I am sure she will love that. HOWEVER, when I looked at Google Employees Vanessa Fox was also listed and technically she is no longer and employee, So, I think it is time to update the index.

I played with many terms, but you get the point…

Domain and Appearance

When clients are asking me about which domain name to choose I always tell them to pick something that is easy to remember and rolls off the tongue. Well, Cuil does, but the spelling is won’t be easy for everyone (older generation).

When I was going through the Web design process with the new SEOAware.com site my Web designer really wanted me to go all dark, because it looked cool and complimented the design, but I always wanted a lighter background because I feel the text is easier to read. Cuil’s results pages are white, but the home page is like a slap in the face too me. Just too dark.

The Almighty Google

I remember when my husband came home one night and said I needed to try this new search engine “Google” and we should buy stock in it too. Well, we didn’t have money, but I tried it and I have never turned away from Google. I like it. I am use to it and I am one of those that doesn’t like change. I have to say that I will not be walking away from Google or my iGoogle until someone creates a product 100 times better and I really don’t believe that will ever happen.

Google runs the world in my opinion and I will tell you what I tell all my clients, if Google tells you to jump through firey hoops with bells on I suggest you do it. Cuil is a nice idea and all….Surch.com was too, but who can compete with Google’s outstanding search engine with the easy to remember name and easy user interface? I don’t know. Maybe someone will. I wish all the luck to Cuil, but there is some major work that needs to be done.

Many people hate Google because they have “rules” and “guidelines” that they feel are unfair and a pain in the butt, Well, I won’t comment on that, I will just say that it is obvious to me that Google is trying to provide quality and relevant results because for awhile we were just getting junk. They have done a good job the last few years cleaning things up and providing results I need and want. So, I applaud Google in their efforts.

Melissa

Aaron has decided to move away from selling SEO Book and move “toward selling a web based information product backed by a community forum that helped turn it into a service more than a product….On February 20th at midnight I am going to shift the default affiliate traffic location to pointing at the new landing page instead of the old landing page, as we have no further plans to sell the SEO Book ebook“.

I asked Aaron how this would affect those that have invested in SEO Book…

…and he said, “The people who bought the book and subscribed to updates got a free 3 month trial to the site membership service.”

Melissa- SEOAware.com