The search engine marketing world literally came together this week in Chicago. The Search Engine Strategies (SES) 2006 Conference and Expo ran from December 4-7, with all the major players in attendance.
The Whoast team worked overtime at SES, learning about new developments at the many show conferences and building relationships with key advertising and SEO alliance partners.
Today, Whoast Vice President Ian Stevenson shared a few of his impressions of SES with me.
TWF--What did you learn at SES that really stands out in your mind?
IAN--I learned that there seems to be an overwhelming grudge against Yahoo! and even more praise for Google than I thought. In almost every seminar someone on the panel had something negative to say about Yahoo!'s services and strategies.
Secondly, I heard a lot of discussion about marketing/ad firms bringing SEM services in-house that seemed to rattle the SEM firms. I don't think that this should be feared in our space, since SEM is so much different and the skill sets that these firms would need to hire are way beyond their comfort levels.
Fear not, I see SEM firms standing on their own for a long time. Also, these SEM firms will have the clients and processes that make them very valuable for a buyout--which isn't so bad, either.
TWF--What's going to change in SEO in 2007?
IAN--I think SEO will remain much the same, with the importance of vertical search engines rising to more power than previously expected--for example business.com and knowledgestorm.com.
TWF--How about SEO? What's coming in 2007?
IAN--The whole mobile search engine marketing space is set to take off in a big way. Mobile Web sites and mobile search are in their infancy, and there will soon be a ton of opportunity for advertisers and agencies.
Thank you, Ian!
