Dan Perry

Twitter Trivia is a game I thought of while riding home from work. I was listening to the radio, and heard a song, and could not think of the artist. I thought “I wish I could Twitter the lyrics to my friends”, and the light bulb went off.

Why not use Twitter as a platform for a trivia game? Most everyone loves trivia right? For example: In Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody, what philosopher is mentioned? (Answer below)

So I’m giving it a shot. I’ll even throw in some prizes to get it off the ground. (Amazon gift certificates? Any input here?) Here are the rules.

1. Follow funtrivia on Twitter

2. Twitter all your friends to follow funtrivia (OK, not officially a rule, but you might as well; the more the merrier.)

3. Starting Monday, March 3rd, I’ll begin twittering trivia questions (although I’ll lob a few practice questions this week, to work out the wrinkles.) They can range from movies to sports, music to geography, and everything in between.

4. The first three people that reply with the correct answer will be given points (3 points for being first, 2 for second, 1 point for third). At the end of March, I’ll tally up the results, report the winners, and hand out the prizes.
That’s it. If it takes off (like I hope it does), we’ll continue the game, build a leaderboard (already built it), a champion’s page, badges for the winners, get better prizes, etc. If it doesn’t, you can go back to reading my Twitters about the cat hair on my couch.

So tell all your friends, and let’s try something new with Twitter. Any questions (or suggestions), ask them in the comments, and I’ll respond.

Oh,and the answer is Galileo. You remember, just after they sing “Thunderbolt and lightning - very, very frightening me! Galileo, Galileo” And don’t even tell me you’re not seeing the four Wayne’s World dudes in that fresh 1976 Pacer when you read that.

How can this not be fun? Start following funtrivia today!

Search Engine Journal launched their job board today. I’ve always been a “collector” of sorts, and every time I come across a job board for the search industry, I’ll add it to my list.

Well, here it is, in no particular order. There aren’t any of the usual suspects (Monster, CB, HotJobs, etc.); these are all industry-specific. If you’re looking for a job in the search marketing space, and can’t find it here, you may not find it. Then again, check back in a day. The market is hot, period.

• Marketing Pilgrim Job board
• Search Engine Journal board
• SEMPO job board
• Indeed - I heart Indeed. Favorite trick: Search for “online marketing”, “web marketing”, and “internet marketing” within your geo. Most companies pick one, and never use the other key-terms. You’ll be surprised by the different results.
• Simply Hired - Close to Indeed. Search for all three terms above for best results.
• CIMA job board (Chicago specific)
• Talent Zoo - Click on Marketing Jobs link on left
• Marketing Sherpa
• OnlineMarketingJobs.com - Pretty much UK specific
• ReadWriteWeb
• Lynn Hazan Recruiter - Jobs are in a Word doc, but worth looking.
• SEO job search engine - Good aggregator, using Google search tool
• Stuntdubl - Just offering to help. May not still be valid, but he’s a good guy, so it probably is.
• Marketing Profs job bank
• MarketingHire.com - Not online specific, but worth a look
• OASEO - Good aggregator, but seems to be down once in awhile. Great for searching by state.
• Jobs in Search
• Search Engine Watch forums
• Crunchboard
• Numeric Jobs - Recruiting firm specific to marketing.
• Search Engine Watch official job section
• SEO Consultants - Kind of thin, but worth inclusion
• Online Retail Jobs
• SEOmoz - You can also submit resumes
• SEM Recruiter - from LinkedIn; guy’s pretty wired. There are also a lot of other SEO/SEM Recruiters on LinkedIn. Feel free to check my profile; I’m connected to at least 10 (and add me as a connection while you’re there.)
• Web Strategy Jobs - Jeremiah Owyang of Forrester has a list of jobs.
• SEMNE - New England search jobs.
• Search Engine College
• Guy Kawasaki
• MLB Associates - Recruiter site specializing in Direct, Database, and Interactive Marketing.
• Guru.com - Specific to freelance work.
• Elance - Also for freelancers.
• ProBlogger job board - Jobs for bloggers.
• Onward Search - not specifically a job board. Looks like an agency for search marketers. If anyone uses this, let me know.
• WebGuild - Northern California; includes technical jobs too.
• Jobs in Social Media - For posting and for seeking.
• International Internet Marketing Association
• Starcom Worldwide - An agency that often has a number of internet marketing positions open.
• And Lee Odden of TopRankBlog has a great list of Regional Online Marketing web sites that are probably worth a check too.

Hope this helps. Now let me know what I forgot.

As I was riding into work today, I was trying to figure out why mobile hasn’t caught on in the US. It seems at the beginning of every year we hear the same old line: “This will be the year for mobile”, but it never really seems to happen. Why not? It just doesn’t make sense to me.

I think part of the reason (for me specifically) is because I’ve created an awesome mobile environment for myself, and thought it worth sharing, in the hopes of moving the mobile ball forward.

Without further adieu, here’s a look at my main mobile homepage(s), with some tips to help you build your own.

This is the main page for my mobile phone. I built it in Dreamweaver. It’s a very basic, flat HTML page with a little CSS. I originally had everything on one page, but realized it was more efficient to have the items I truly use on a regular basis on the homepage, and unload everything else on other pages, to aid in faster load times. For reference, this page is only 3k in size.

The other good thing about this is that I don’t have to go online to retrieve my homepage. I keep a copy on the memory card, so when I open the browser on my mobile phone, it loads this page very quickly, instead of trying to go online to load the default mobile homepage of my carrier. The time saved by doing this trumps the time it took to build it, hands down.

As you can see, there’s a lot of stuff on this main page. On a normal commute, I’ll check Twitter, MSNBC, BBC, and 3-4 pages on the Wall Street Journal.

Also, remember that all links on my mobile pages are to the mobile versions of the site. If they don’t have a mobile version, it isn’t going on this page.

At the bottom of the page, I have a link to the train schedule and to Page 2.

I copied the schedule for my train line into a simple table, and color-coded the lines for easier readability. If I scroll down, I can also see the weekend schedules. This comes in really handy when I stay in the city for dinner, or when attending a Cubs game on a weekend.

On Page 2, I have a collection of mobile links that I check from time to time. Nothing out of the ordinary here; remember that they are all to the mobile versions of the applicable site.

At the bottom of Page 2, I have search boxes for Google and Yahoo. I originally had these on the homepage, but they took too long to render and load, so they got demoted to page 2. Also, I really don’t search that much; almost everything I need is available via a link.

Finally, for those not aware, when searching Google from a mobile phone, if the result is a mobile site, they add a small image of a phone next to the listing, so you know it’s going to be easy to view, and not crash your phone, causing a reboot. This little touch is awesome; it really helps out in the mobile environment.

It didn’t take very long to generate these pages, but the value they add is immeasurable. Being able to find the current movies with two clicks, current weather is one click, PGA Leader board is one click; easily worth the effort, and I suggest everyone with a mobile phone follow my lead. It really increases the value of the phone.

If anyone would like a copy of the HTML, just let me know via email or Twitter. Thanks for reading, and I hope it motivates you to personalize your mobile start page.

I’ve noticed that a lot of “amazon.com/tag” URL’s are appearing in the SERP’s for some brand-specific terms. From an SEO standpoint, it’s a heck of an idea. Maximizing the strength of your domain is always good.

Specifically, if you do a site:www.amazon.com/tag/ search in Google, you end up with 3,730,000 results. Basically, every term that anyone has ever tagged a product with is given its own URL. Here’s where the problem lies.

Some of the tags are brand names (like chanel, powerbar, etc.). Of course, Amazon sells some of their products, so I can understand it. But what about URL’s like the following:

http://www.amazon.com/tag/clearchannel

What is Amazon selling that has to do with Clear Channel? Currently, there are two items that are tagged “clearchannel”.

Is this a step backwards, sort of like the META Keyword tags of long ago? Couldn’t I tag my product with my competitor’s name, which is happening right now for the PowerBar tag, by multiple competitors?

Let’s look at an example of what I would consider an over-zealous use of the tags.

The product titled “Juicy Inspired Gold Plated Heart & Charms Couture Necklace” has three tags. They are:

Juicy – This makes sense
Couture – Kind of
Chanel – WTF?

Also, there aren’t any tags for “necklace”, “jewelry”, or “charms”.

Doesn’t this lower the value of the Chanel and PowerBar brands? What kind of recourse do they have?

Finally, what’s the answer? I think tagging has a lot of legs (blogs, de.licio.us, etc.), but what can be done in instances like this?

A month ago, I wrote an article titled “How to Keep An SEO Conference from Clipping the Iceberg”. The post was specific to the Pubcon event in December, 2007. I posted it on Gooruze, and Brett Tabke was kind enough to respond with some great insight, and with something I was hoping for. He ended the reply by asking “Any suggestions for getting quality moderators?” Well… Since you asked, here goes.

It is tough finding good moderators. Kevin Ryan told me the same thing about SES, so don’t feel like it’s only Pubcon. Speakers are a dime a dozen, good speakers are a lot more, but it seems like good moderators are even harder to come by (my thoughts, not Kevin’s).

I think that my “rant” was also caused by a previous situation that I didn’t mention in the original post. I spoke at ad:tech Chicago over the summer (6 months prior to Pubcon), and was lucky enough to experience the best moderator I’ve ever met (Teresa Caro, this is all because of you!) For reference, I’ve spoken over a dozen times, which is nothing compared to a lot of industry folks, but enough where I know a good moderator when I see one. Here’s what differentiated her.

• She emailed the speakers (three including me) about 6 weeks prior to the conference; it may have been 2 months. She asked what specifically each of us would be speaking on, and to “Reply to All”, so everyone could see it. We all picked a time to meet on a conference call about 3-4 weeks in advance, so everyone had room on their calendar.
• Before the conference call, she called me (I’m guessing she called the other speakers as well) to personally discuss my topic, and mold it into something the audience would not only learn from, but enjoy.
• During our conference call, we all discussed what we were going to talk about, and ensured that nobody would be covering the same material, to avoid overlap. She also asked each of us to share one thing about us that few people knew, as a point of introduction. She asked for specific takeaways that we planned on presenting to the audience. Finally, she asked us to provide one question we’d like her to ask us, to “prime the pump” if you will.
• After the call, she sent out the notes she took, to ensure we were all on the same page, and to provide a reference point. This was key for me; it kept me focused, rather than wandering off the path, which I’m prone to do, and I think other speaker are as well.
• As the decks rolled in, she reviewed them, and passed them on to the other speakers, to ensure we all understood what each other was covering.
• Just before ad:tech, she sent an email to all of us, asking us to meet prior to the session, so at least we all knew what everyone looked like. She also stated where she’d be, and what she’d be wearing. Talk about attention to details; very nice.
• Just before the conference, she emailed us to let us know that the presentations would be on her computer, but to feel free to bring in a copy on a USB. Also, she sent all of us the softball questions she’d be asking, just as a reminder to be prepared for them.
• When we finally met, we already knew a little about each other, so it wasn’t nearly as awkward as usual.

Now, I realize this is at the opposite end of the spectrum than my blog post, and I realize the level of effort needed from a moderator, but I’m telling you, I’ve never felt more confident stepping up on stage as I did for this one. The Ben Franklin quote “By failing to prepare, you’re preparing to fail” comes to mind. I’ve never felt more prepared, and I think the audience got the most bang for their buck from our session.

So, back to your question. Here are some thoughts:

• Create a step-by-step guide for moderator’s. Even if they only follow half of the points mentioned above, a lot of panels would benefit from it.
• Moderator’s can’t be speakers; one or the other. Having to prepare decks AND be a moderator would be extremely tough, and if you have to focus on one, I can almost guarantee it’s not going to be the latter.
• Don’t overload the moderators. I’ve seen conferences where the same person moderated many, many panels. This has to be tough (make’s me feel sorry for you and D. Sullivan). You can only be spread so thin, and the quality is bound to suffer.
• Choose moderator’s early, and have them assist with speaking pitches. If you have 20 speaking proposals, have the moderator narrow the applicants down to the top 5 (or so), and then forward to you for the final decision. Ask them to put the presentations in order of which ones they feel would be most beneficial to the audience and more importantly, why. This will give you insight into their thought process in choosing speakers.
• Incentivize them. I’m not saying foot their bar bill, but offer them something. Free conference pass, ½ off for a friend or coworker, invitations to invite-only parties, high-end conference-specific swag for speakers/moderators (ad:tech does this), etc. There are lots of things you could do here.
• Have the potential moderators pitch. Way in advance have them send you an email as to why they’d make a good moderator. Even better, you could post a list of 5-10 questions for them to answer. With the right questions, I’ll bet it wouldn’t be too hard to find some great moderators.
• Build a moderator’s wiki, to share best practices. After the conference, ask each of them to post what they did right, what the audience seemed to respond to the most, and what they would do differently if asked to moderate again. (You could also do this for speakers). Imagine the value of the wiki 2-3 years out in getting new moderator’s up to speed.
• Have the audience rate moderator’s. This may already be happening, but if not, I’d be sure to add it.

Finally, since I’ll definitely be attending Pubcon this year (to defend my poker crown), I’d be happy to assist, if needed.

Now… what did I forget to add to the list for moderator’s?

Easily the best YouTube video I’ve seen from a candidate to date. Almost 3.5 Million views in less than a week. I’m still not impressed with any of the candidates overall online marketing efforts, but imagine what political online marketing will become in 4, 8, or 12 years.

The NY Times put it very succinctly:

The song is a prime example of how the Web’s user-generated content sites are undeniably affecting voter engagement this election cycle. Purchasing four and a half minutes of national TV airtime would have been near impossible, but the Internet can reach that highly sought youth audience gratis.

Gratis. And the targeting is much better than most TV advertising could ever reach. If you haven’t seen it, here it is:

Whether Obama wins or not, he has clearly raised the bar, and we’ll all benefit from that.

I have TwitterFox installed on my computer, so when someone I’m following sends a tweet, I get an (almost) instant update. Steve Rubel tweeted (or is it twitted?) about his love of Instapaper.com.

Within minutes, venemouskate tweeted the following:

@steverubel Sweet site. Thanks! Firefox has an addon that does the same thing http://tinyurl.com/2hwb4y

which leads to Idea Shower’s website. On this page is the perfect Firefox add-on called “Read It Later”. By the title, you can figure out what it’s for, but definitely check it out. (The Video example says it all.)

I’ve since installed the addon, and am already using it! I’ve actually been thinking about the need for something like this for awhile, but haven’t had the time to go digging.

With Twitter, you get all sorts of little, helpful tidbits like this, all throughout the day. Does it have its drawbacks? Sure. It’s been called a time-waster, and I can understand why some may think that, but for me, and the value of little “bonus” tips like this, I’m hooked.

I’ve read many experts say that when you first get get into blogging, you should spend time on other blogs leaving comments. Although this is very labor-intensive, it’s already paid off for me. Here’s a perfect example of the value of commenting on blogs.

Recently at Small Business Trends, they had a post titled “Top Experts Dish with their Best Kept Marketing Secrets“. I knew some of the experts mentioned in the post, but at the end, they specifically asked for tips from readers. So I added my .02, and basically forgot about it.

Today I got a message from Google Alerts (where I track my name) that showed a mention at the site. I clicked on the link, and low and behold, guess what I found! My comment was highlighted, commented on, mentioned in a podcast/radio interview, and I was given a link back to my site!

All this from a simple, one sentence comment. If you’ve ever needed a reason to start commenting more on blogs, this is as good as it gets.

P.S. I can’t wait to tell my Dad, who worked in radio for 25 years before the whole Internet thing. He’ll be so proud (after I explain what a podcast is). 

Was watching the news this morning, and saw an ad for the Arizona Office of Tourism, and the domain was ChicagoToArizona.com. What a great idea; think of the possibilities:

• Local TV buys, with the ad tailored to the Chicago market (Get out of the Windy City, and come to the Grand Canyon State, etc.)
• Local PPC buys, done within a radius of the city.
• Print buys (Newspaper, Magazine) that are tailored to the city.
• Opportunity to roll this idea out to more and more locations (LA, NY, etc.)

Looking over the site, I see a lot of opportunities to tie it in with its’ target market (Chicago natives). Currently, the copy looks pretty boilerplate, but throw a few “Michigan Avenues” and “Millennium Parks” in there, and you could really draw in the audience.

Great idea AZ Office of Tourism. Now maximize the heck out of it!

I was rifling through some fliers I collected at a conference recently, and ran across one that reminded me just how far we have to go as an industry. The company in question is Max Benjamin (maxbenjamin.com), who manufactures a “Mini Cigar Bar”, which holds a bottle of booze and a humidor, and all necessary accoutrement’s.

They must’ve had a little extra room on the flyer, and weren’t in the mood to write anymore copy about the Cigar Bar, so they decided to do what so many other small companies have done in the past. Here are a couple pictures:

and a close-up of the bottom-right:

(I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out the spelling error above “Visit our webbiest…” Classic.)

So what are they saying? “Well, if the people aren’t interested in our product, maybe they’ll be interested in our online marketing skillz. Heck, anyone can do that, so let’s just add it to the end of the flyer, and see if we get any takers.”

What does it say about an industry when it can be added on as an afterthought to a flier? I’ve never seen a flier for a dentist have an extra sentence that reads “Ask us about our top-quality lawn-care services”, or a flier for a new car that reads “Don’t forget to ask us about our exceptional dry-cleaning services too!”

When your service industry can be added on to a product flier, and even remotely taken seriously, you’re in trouble. What does the manufacturer of this product think of this industry, to even attempt this? Forget about the suckers who may bite and not cut the line; what about the guys paying to print this?

More importantly, what can we do, as an industry, to alter this perception? I wish I had a good answer, but I don’t. Do you?