SEO Mentor

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In this post you will find a recap of the Scary SEO conference held October 24-25, 2008 with myself and Dana Lookadoo. Listen to the podcast above or read the transcript below!

Garrett: Hello everyone, it’ Garrett Pierson, Your SEO Mentor. I’m here with Dana Lookadoo. How are you?

Dana: Hi Garrett, I’m doing great. Thank you for having me. How are you doing?

Garrett: I’m great. Did I say your last name correctly?

Dana: You did. Lookadoo. I’m impressed. Very good.

Garrett: Dana, what we’re going to do today; I want to go back and forth with you on the awesome event that we just got back from recently, Scary SEO. I want to go back and forth on what we learned, the fun we had, and what everybody missed out on.

Dana: They really did miss out. It’s amazing that such a small conference could have such a large effect. It really did. I’m excited to talk about it.

Garrett: That’s great. All of you that missed out on Scary SEO, it just happened October 24th and 25th, in Ft. Lauderdale. Dave Snyder and Jordan Kasteler put that on from SearchandSocial.com. You can also find out a lot more about the event at ScarySEO.com.

Anyway, it just started out as a nice day, Friday. The fun thing about this conference was it was very small. There were fifty people invited to come. It was small and very personal. That’s what I really liked about this conference.

It started out with Jeff Quipp from Search Engine People. He started out with the opening keynote. He talked about where search came from, what search is, and the future of search. I loved Jeff Quipp’s keynote. It really started the conference off with a bang. It was very fun. Jeff is a smart guy and such a nice guy. I was able to talk with him quite a bit throughout the conference. That was what was so cool about this conference. In any other conference, I probably would never have had the opportunity to get with him unless I would have made a huge effort. I got to sit with him through lunch. I got to sit with him through the dinners and parties afterward and really speak with him and pick his brain about search and social media. That’s what was really fun about this conference.

I was also able to meet you, Dana. We’ve talked on Twitter and I’ve talked with a lot of people that were there, on Twitter, but it was fun to put a face with a name and business. Dana, what was your favorite part of the first day, and essentially the whole conference there in Florida?

Dana: Starting at the bird’s eye where you started. For instance, getting to meet Jeff and Loren Baker, Lisa Barone, Dave Snyder, Jordan Kasteler and Utah SEO Pro now has a face, a body, and a personality. You get to meet them in person, to talk, and to share. It really was one of the highlights of the conference. As you mentioned, going to SES or even an SMX, being at SMX Advance with a smaller venue, I thought that was great. Attending SEOmoz in August, which was even a smaller venue; I thought that was great. Now, attending Scary SEO, that’s the pinnacle. I can’t wait until April when they do their next one. I definitely want to be there because of the intimacy and the quality of what was shared.

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Rhea Drysdale was willing to spend some time with me even during her busy week with her big announcement that you will hear or read about within the interview. Rhea has had a ton of experience in the SEO industry in such a short amount of time and is very willing to share some great tips about how to stay organized and where to go for great information. Thanks for your time Rhea!

Check out the interview by listening above or reading the transcript below.

Garrett: Hello everyone, this is Garrett Pierson here. Today I have the wonderful opportunity of interviewing Rhea Drysdale. How are you, Rhea?

Rhea: I’m very well, thank you. How are you doing?

Garrett: I’m doing great. It’s good to have you here. Today is Monday, September 22, 2008. I’m just going to give a ‘quick Rhea’ in twenty seconds that I found from her blog. I’ll give a little overview of who she is. She says, “I’ve worked with some of the best Ruby on Rails developers in the world, managed internet marketing for a Fortune 1000, and SEO for a top 200 internet retailer. I’ve also chaired a local non-profit, blogged at Search Engine Journal, and I love SEO.” Is that all true, Rhea?

Rhea: That certainly is. I’ve had a lot experiences in a very short period.

Garrett: That’s great. Everybody can check out more about Rhea at RheaDrysdale.com. I’ll have a link to that so you can check her “About Me” page at /blog/about. Rhea, why don’t you just tell us a little bit about yourself, your background? I know you have an announcement that you announced last Friday. Why don’t you tell us about your background in the SEO and online marketing industry, or anything about your family, your hobbies or anything else you want to talk about?

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So this last Monday I booked my flights and hotel heading to sunny Fort Lauderdale Florida (ok I don’t know if it is sunny but hey it is Florida). “Why am I going to Florida in October,” you may ask yourself? I would then reply and say well, “Why Not?” If you could spend a couple of days learning about SEO, SEM, Social Media and much more from a group of stand up people in the industry, then I think you would as well, not to mention the conference is in Florida. Ok, Ok, so what is this conference you might ask, well to find out all the details I would head over to ScarySEO.com to get the low down.

You might have your reasons why your are going or not, but here are the Top 10 Reasons why I am going to the Scary SEO conference on October 24-25, 2008:

1. Dave Snyder (Why is this my number 1 reason? Cause have never met this big huge gorrilla)
2. Speakers – Jordan Kasteler, Jeff Quipp, Rhea Drysdale, Martin Bowling, Loren Baker, Brandy Eddings, Pamela Lund, Brian Chappell, John Carcutt, Ross Dunn, Brian Carter, Chris Hart, Eric Lander (get each speakers bio here scaryseo.com/speakers/)
3. Mini-conference! With this being a mini-conference the networking is going to be amazing, not to mention the close up training with more manageable debates.
4. Agenda – with the above great speakers we will be learning and debating; The Code of SEO, Link Building, Online Reputation Management, SEO Tools, SEM strategies, Analytics, SEO Project Management, Content Creation, Social Media Optimization and much more!
5. Florida! Who doesn’t want to go to Florida and it has been years since I have been out there.
6. I get to meet my buddy Joshua Sciarrino (formerly known as the flying monkey)
7. Zima Contest. If you haven’t heard of Martin Bowling and his love for Zima then you need to check out his Zima Contest and see how you can win a trip to Scary SEO.
   
8. SEOmoz sponsored night on the town with a Limo Bus excursion to the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino.
9. Learning and Fun, and a couple days away from work!
10. For being the first year of Scary SEO their prices are outstanding with total admission to the conference and parties being a great value at $200 per person.

These just happen to be my top ten reasons why I am going to the Scary SEO conference and I could go on and on but I think you get the point. As you can see I am quite excited about going and you should be too. Not to use the fear of loss marketing tactic, but there are only 50 seats available and time is running out so register now.

nuf said!

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I find that sometimes the Online Marketing and SEO industries can be a bore and that is the very reason why Chuck Lewis the SEO Rapper has had so much success. If you haven’t heard Chuck’s raps then you have missed out on some serious entertainment and also some great content. I had a wonderful opportunity to find out more about The SEO Rapper in my interview and he even let me add one of his raps within the interview so listen to the interview above or check it out below. Thanks Chuck!

Garrett: Hello everyone, this is Garrett Pierson, Your SEO Mentor here. I have the opportunity to interview Chuck Lewis, also known as The SEO Rapper of TheSEORapper.com. How are you, Chuck?

Chuck: I’m good. I can’t complain at all.

Garrett: Good! I just want to ask you my first introduction question. Tell us a little bit more about yourself, for people that might not know you. Tell us about your background, the music, and the online marketing industries, family hobbies, or something we might not know about you.

Chuck: Okay, about me, it can be found online. I’ve been in the music business for a while. I’ve been writing rap since middle school and high school, doing gospel hip-hop, marketing hip-hop where the name “poetic prophet” came from, as some people refer to me. I released a couple of albums doing this and they did pretty well. My Mo Serious Entertainment record label, mostly entertainment, that’s where that album premiered. I have a couple of other artists that I manage for the most part. For about the five or six years I’ve been doing online marketing at an agency called Pop Labs. I do search engine marketing there. I’m doing keyword research, optimization, and managing pay-per-clicks and everything else there, all day every day.

I have three children, Jordan, Akilah, and Brianna. They are my Charlie’s Angels, as I call them. I play basketball, play pool, and watch sports. Those are my hobbies if I’m not on some social media site creating a profile or something.

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I had a blast interviewing James Duthie from Down Under! With his amazing Australian accent and wonderful online marketing tips and content, James is the epitome of a up and rising online star. James is famous for his powerful guest posts that rock the industry every time a new one is posted. Listen above to my interview with James or read the transcript below!

Garrett: Hello everyone, Garrett Pierson, Your SEO Mentor here with James Duthie. How are you, buddy?

James: Very good, Garrett, how are you?

Garrett: I’m great. I hear that Australian accent there, is that right?

James: Yes, that is correct. I’m from Melbourne, Australia, sunny Australia. It’s a beautiful spring morning where I am, at the moment. It’s a good time of year to be in Australia. It’s just coming into summer in the next few months.

Garrett: That’s awesome. I’m going to ask you a couple of questions throughout the interview, and it sounds like there’s a slight delay. We’ll work through that. James, tell us a little bit more about yourself. For those who may not know you, what is your background in the online-marketing industry, your family, your hobbies, or whatever you want?

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I had the wonderful honor of spending some time with Lee Odden of Top Rank. He gave great insight on the changing SEO Industry and the up and coming Social Media industry. Also Within the interview that you can listen to above or read the transcript below you will find that Lee is not only smart but a really great guy and down to earth. So take a listen or check out & read the transcript below:

Garrett: Hello, it’s Garrett Pierson, Your SEO Mentor, here today with Lee Odden. Lee is known for his TopRankBlog.com and TopRankMarketing.com sites. How are you, Lee?

Lee: I’m very good Garrett. How are you?

Garrett: I’m good. It’s good to have you. I really appreciate you taking time to spend some time with me and my listeners. It’s a great honor to talk with you. I’ve been following your stuff for a long time now and I really appreciate your wonderful content for the industry that we’re in.

Lee: That’s very kind of you to say that. I appreciate the opportunity. I also appreciate that you’re one of the few people who actually says my last name is “Oh-den”. Most people say “Aw-den” or some other variation of that. They are kind of like key word permutations or something. I don’t know.

Garrett: That’s a big reason why I do these short and to the point interviews. A lot of us follow you, or follow some great authorities within the industry, but we don’t know a lot about you. That brings me to my first, introduction question. What could you tell us about yourself that we might not know about you your background in the SEO, social media industry, your family, and your hobbies, anything you want to talk about?

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