Social media is becoming an increasingly potent marketing influence and it’s the theme of today’s show. Bruce, Susan and Virginia kick things off by considering if and how a social media user’s sphere of influence should be considered as part of their lifetime customer value. On a blog post titled Companies Should Factor ‘Social Influence’ Into Total Customer Value, Web strategist Jeremiah Owyang outlines the benefits and risks of accounting for a users social influence.

Shannon Poole then talks to Virginia about her social media strategy for developing business, especially at conferences like the upcoming SMX West. Shannon will be involved in business development for Bruce Clay, Inc., and while at conferences like SMX and SES, she plans to use every tool available to her advantage. Speed of interaction, picking up on cues of interest, and attendance at educational events will all play a part in her business development strategy at search marketing shows. The Bruce Clay, Inc. booth at SMX West is #307. To receive a 10 percent discount on conference registration, use the discount code smx10bruceclay.

Then Susan, Virginia and Bradley examine Internet giant Google’s latest foray into the social space, Google Buzz. Reactions to the new social networking features of Google Gmail have run the gamut from privacy related outrage to the instant acceptance that was never granted to Google Wave. Bradley wants to know what Google Buzz does that other social networks don’t already do. Susan believes that because Buzz has a built-in user base, it will be a well-adopted success for Google.

Twitter marketing is the topic du jour on today’s SEM Synergy podcast. Bruce Clay, Susan Esparza and Virginia Nussey consider the effect and efficiency of in-stream Twitter advertising. While some vocal users find in-stream advertising to be intrusive and off-putting, it may be a matter of time until Twitter users accept advertising within the format. After all, businesses have been using Twitter to promote products and services since early in the site’s history. See Dell for a shining example of community-welcomed marketing on Twitter.


Internet marketer Michael Gray then talks to Virginia about recommendations for marketing on Twitter. Michael says that in-stream Twitter advertising is a worthwhile platform for brands to explore. Twitter Lists comes with risks to online reputation management. And a number of Twitter content distribution tactics that Michael describes can be applied by businesses. For more Twitter marketing and SEO recommendations, follow Michael on Twitter at @graywolf.

Then Virginia, Susan and Michael Terry share some tips and statistics to optimize content distribution on the microblogging platform. Tracking clicks through URL shorteners is one of the key steps of knowing what content is most well received by the audience. They look at which URL shorteners receive the most retweets and have the best tracking features. They also look at statistics for time of day and day of week that retweets occur most often to help marketers leverage user behavior for content distribution goals.

People are spending more time on their social networks and going to them for suggestions and review. And the search engines have taken notice of the power of social media, and recently, some big announcements have been made about partnerships between social media platforms and search engines. Bruce Clay, Susan Esparza and Virginia Nussey are critical and cautious in light of the potential implications of Bing’s Twitter and Facebook status update integration and Google’s experimental Social Search feature.



While content from social media and social networks has become increasingly integrated within traditional search engines, a new search engine and aggregator, LeapFish, seeks to gather and display real-time, social and multi-media results in a way fitting of the evolved Web environment. Ben Behrouzi, CEO of LeapFish, talks to Virginia about the need for far-reaching, relevant and customizable aggregation of data, including rich media, social and real-time content.

Finally, analysts are taking note of social media’s role in consumer behavior and influence as the holiday season approaches. Businesses and shoppers alike are turning to social media. Consumers are looking for deals, customer reviews and contextual information about products and services. And businesses are taking advantage of the opportunity to reach an audience through a platform that accentuates sincerity, reliability and openness.

News moves fast in the search marketing industry so today’s show is all about recent Internet marketing headlines. Bruce, Robert and Virginia look at the expansion of local results for non-geo queries and what it means for SEOs and small businesses. The fact that local results are listed for relevant non-local queries will benefit small businesses and may change searcher behavior.

Jordan Kasteler, co-founder of Internet marketing company Search & Social and co-host of the WebmasterRadio program Mobile Presence, shares his thoughts on a number of social media news stories. Virginia and Jordan talk about Digg’s PageRank-passing ad links, if Twitter will be acquired in the next year, and how important it is to target social media sites in your link building campaign.

Jordan Kasteler

Rounding out the show, Virginia, Susan and Michael explore a few more recent industry news stories. Bruce Clay, Inc. has released two new SEO tools: a Firefox version of the SEMToolBar as well as a new tool that gives you one convenient place to see how many pages of a domain are indexed in the three biggest search engines. They also discuss Google Me profiles and the new Google Analytics API.

Trends are a useful gauge which help observant businesses adjust their strategies to the current times. Bruce, Robert and Virginia look at a report by Efficient Frontier that analyzed Q1 2009 for changes in consumer search behavior and the performance of key metrics, such as click-through-rates, cost-per-click and return on investment. While not disputing the underlying data, Bruce and Robert are suspicious that the analysis is based on a false assumption of cause and effect.

Tim Kendall

Another trend Internet marketers can’t ignore is the growth of social networks. Virginia talked to Tim Kendall, director of monetization at Facebook, about Facebook Advertising. Tim explains the benefits of a demand generation ad platform compared to the demand fulfillment model of search advertising. He also talks about Facebook’s ad serve algorithm, how the quality of ads mean both advertisers and users are winners, and how the company is working to scale the ad platform in the coming year.

We’d be remiss if no mention was made of the current economic trends and the effect they have on our industry. Consumers are paying close attention to the value they receive through their purchases and partnerships. It’s worth considering how you can add value to your services so that you stand apart from competition and keep customers happy. Be proactive in getting client feedback and consider additional services you may be able to provide that would add value to your relationship.