I am flat out like a lizard drinking with discovering time doesn’t stand still, choosing my retirement village, just generally being the life of the party to the bodyguards of the blogger I am stalking, my day drifts aimlessly from beach break to reef break. I am putting money aside so I can run away. deal with it.

I won’t promise anything to you but I will update you with my nefarious activities as soon as I get a chance. Well, I’ll try. Unless of course the pool with the cocktail bar is heated!

Thanks to Aussie Bloggers for aiding and abetting my laziness. They’ll do the same for you Good day mate!

Back in 2006 I entered the initial contest with my article “Shhhh!….the dirty little secret about sem seo certification“ and even though I didn’t win it was an excellent way to get noticed by the judges. I also considered myself and everyone involved with the contest a winner but of course that’s usual banter from a loser. Here’s more about the real winners.

The winner of that first contest was Ben Wills with his article “The Five Pillars of Social Media Marketing“.If you haven’t read it I encourage you to go check it out. I had a chance to meet him at SES Chicago. Ben’s a really bright young man and I knew he would go on to bigger and better things. He’s recently started his new enterprise ontolo and I encourage you to check it out if you are interested in large scale link prospecting services or a keyword landscape and competition analysis tool.

The winner of the second contest was Jeff Horsager, a copywriter who specializes in online and direct marketing, with the article “Increase Conversion Rates with the Google Website Optimizer“. Interestingly enough there was a tie in the second sem scholarship contest with CK Chung aka KidDisco’s article “Have Your Top Competitors Do Some Of Your SEO For You“ also getting 4 votes. The tie breaker was the fact that Jeff had 3,385 visitors compared to CK’s 1,094.

I think Marketing Pilgrims’ SEM Scholarship is one of the best sem/seo contests available, creating a win-win-win situation for the contestants, Marketing Pilgrim and the readers. Make sure you get in on next year’s contest, as a contestant or at least read the submissions. If you haven’t read them yet then go ahead, you may learn a thing or two.

Online reputation management is a growing field which was born out of negative results found in the search engine results page and further enhanced by social media sites where discussions frequently revolve around brands. Online reputation management is defined by Anvil Media as “The act of monitoring, addressing or mitigating undesirable search engine results or mentions in online media for a company or product“.

Listen to Andy’s interview with Susan Bratton of DishyMix about his book, she writes

“Few books can scale for absolute beginners and crusty stalwarts like Radically Transparent. No matter what level your skills, you’ll learn tips and new constructs about managing your reputation online.”

The workshop costs $1197 per person and you can register here.

This blog does not endorse any training programs for several reasons. The first reason is that there are just too many sem training programs out there to really evaluate each one. Secondly, what may be right for one person doesn’t work for another. One training class may meet an individuals needs but not meet anothers even though it may be a high quality program. Additionally, I just simply don’t have the time.

I have repeated on several occasions that one way to determine the “value” of a program or course is to see who is inolved, who are the instructors or program designers. And I do not typically list a training program unless I know the reputation of at least some the people involved. (In this case one of the instructors is Sally Falkow) So I leave it up to you, my dear readers, to determine which course is best for you.

So with that lengthy explanation, I introduce the New Social Media Training Workshop for PR and Communications Professionals from Bulldog Reporter. These one day workshops provide reviews of “social media techniques such as SEO, corporate blogs, YouTube, RSS, Twitter, online newsrooms, Technorati and other emerging tools.” Instructors are Sally Falkow of Falkow, Inc. and Doug Hay of Expansion Plus.

The New Social Media Training Workshop for PR and Communications Professionals will take place in four locations nationwide:
Chicago, IL - Monday, August 4
Washington, DC - Wednesday, August 6
New York, NY - Friday, August 8
Los Angeles, CA - Monday, August 11

Registration for this workshop costs $995 for the first participant, $895 for the second participant, and $795 for the third and subsequent participants with $100 discount for those that sign up before July 15, 2008.

Singapore, Singapore — With an appeal to his search marketing friends to “transform search engine marketing,” David Temple said Saturday that he’s running for the president of the United States.

Temple made his announcement on twitter, plurk, facebook, and ping.fm to a fragmented audience. His hero Abraham Lincoln said in 1858 that “a house divided against itself cannot stand” and Temple added “neither can a search engine.”

It was here during his tenure as a a regional head of search marketing, Temple said, “that I was reminded of the essential decency of the American people — where I came to believe that through this decency, we can build a more hopeful America. An America where spam is eliminated, we don’t see the color of hats and search engines know what we’re looking for before we even type it.”

Temple will begin his campaign grass roots movement online and won’t travel in order to save gas. Temple said “Other candidates are spending millions of dollars, dollars that could go toward organic search or usability studies for websites. I will devote all my campaign dollars to making search results more relevant.”

Temple, 53, who has been a search marketing consultant for ten years and served one year in Singapore, acknowledged his political inexperience. “I recognize there is a certain presumptuousness in this, a certain audacity to this announcement,” he said. “I know I haven’t spent a lot of time learning the ways of Washington. In fact I’ve never been to Washington but I know that the ways of Washington must change if the search engines are to change. If there’s anything I do know, it’s change.”

This is purely satire and the views here do not reflect my views or any views of any person real or fictional. A shoutout to my friend Emory Rowland who is also running and let me in on the secret.

One of the things I always recommend in deciding which search marketing training class, seo or sem, to attend is to see who the instructors are and consider their background and depth of knowledge. That’s why I’ve included the background on the instructors, Greg Jarboe, Amanda Watlington and Matt Bailey, as listed on the website.

Greg Jarboe is the president and co-founder of SEO-PR, a search engine optimization firm and public relations agency with offices in San Francisco and Boston. He is also a partner in Newsforce, developer of an integrated suite of press release SEO tools.

SEO-PR is one of 10 companies that Larry Chase’s Web Digest for Marketers named to its Who’s Who in SEO Experts. SEOmoz.org has put SEO-PR on its Recommended List of SEO Consultants, Experts, Firms and Service Providers.

Greg is a frequent speaker at Search Engine Strategies, WebmasterWorld’s PubCon, and public relations conferences. He is also the news search, blog search and PR correspondent for the Search Engine Watch Blog.

Gord Hotchkiss, who writes the Out of My Gord blog, has called Greg “the guru of cranking up web visibility through effective optimization of press releases and leveraging news search.” Lee Odden, who writes the Online Marketing Blog, has called Greg “a pioneer in the field of using search engine optimization in combination with press releases.” And Matt McGowan, Vice President of Marketing for Incisive Media, has called Greg, “the industry’s top expert in press release SEO and social media relations.”

Greg has more than 25 years of experience in public relations, marketing, and search engine optimization at Lotus Development Corp., Ziff-Davis, and other companies. He graduated from the University of Michigan, attended the University of Edinburgh, and worked on his Masters at Lesley College.

Amanda Watlington Ph.D., A.P.R. Before setting up Searching for Profit, Amanda was director of research for a leading Search Engine Optimization firm. Her consultancy focuses on how businesses can leverage search engines and new media such as blogging, RSS and podcasting to achieve marketing objectives. She has over twenty years of experience as a communications, sales and business strategy consultant, and ten years as a Web marketer.

Amanda has developed award-winning print, web, training and presentation media. She has developed patent-pending language-based analytic tools and methodologies to support search engine marketing campaigns. She is a renowned expert on blogs, podcasting, and the language and psychology of search. The clients she has worked with include Fortune 500 companies, search engines, publishers and e-commerce merchants.

Amanda is the author of two books. Her most recent book is Business Blogs: A Practical Guide. Amanda is a sought-after presenter and a recognized industry thought leader. She appears regularly as a speaker at Search Engine Strategies and DMA’s Annual and Multi-Channel Marketing conferences. She serves on DMA’s Search Engine Marketing Council, of which she is the past co-chair. She is the chair of the Web Analytics Association’s research committee and has served on the search and research committees of IAB.

Her education includes a Bachelors Degree in Classical Civilization from Douglass College in New Jersey, a Ph.D. in Classics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and an M.B.A. in Marketing from Eastern Michigan University. She is a member of the Direct Marketing Association (DMA), the Web Analytics Association (WAA), the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) and has an APR accreditation.

Matt Bailey is president and founder of SiteLogic Marketing and an internationally-recognized authority on search engine marketing, website analytics, usability, and accessibility. As a consulting and training company, SiteLogic focuses on helping organizations take control of their websites and their web marketing plans. Sought after worldwide as a seminar presenter and teacher; Matt speaks regularly for The Direct Marketing Association, Search Engine Strategies conferences and training, the American Advertising Federation, and many private training seminars. Matt is known for his conversational, entertaining speaking style and his ability to make technical topics both understandable and practical. Matt oversees The Direct Marketing Association’s SEO training program and is the trainer for the DMA’s web marketing seminar. He has consulted with hundreds of companies, including Goodyear, Hilton International, JCrew, Gradall, Moen Faucets, American Greetings, and Samsonite.

In the latest interview Andy discusses how the typical press release has used the same distribution format for 100 years but with social media there are so many channels. The question is how does that format change. Some ideas he puts forward are social bookmarking links, rss feeds, tagging, etc.

In the interview about his book, “Radically Transparent”, Andy talks about building a personal brand, using social media and tracking your efforts among other things. One tool for tracking, built by Andy, is called Trackur.com which scours millions of blogs, news sites, images, and videos and let’s you know how your brand is being discussed on social media sites. A great piece of advice was to make sure you secure your “brand” or name on all the social media sites so if they take off you can protect your brand. This podcast is well worth a listen or a read if you prefer. A transcript is provided for all the podcasts. (Great move Susan)

but wait, there’s more…

I met Susan, by email, a couple of years back when she was reaching out to speakers for ad:tech Shanghai. She is Chair Emeritus of ad:tech Expositions and from 2001-2006 she selected nearly 1,000 speakers each year as “she programmed each ad:tech uniquely”. So you can imagine the size and influence of her contact list. I also spoke with her by phone and asked some advice on organizing the China Search Marketing Tour and she took the time to give me some great ideas.

The thing I like about Personal Life Media is that Susan and her husband Tim don’t just have business related podcasts and blogs, they think big and have a shows on art, education, health, music and more. This is a true “media” company or as she puts it a “media empire”.

So if you want to read some good blogs or hear some great podcasts then go to Personal Life Media and look around, you’re sure to find something interesting.

Susan is no slouch at social media herself and can be found here;

Twitter http://twitter.com/susanbratton

Friend Feed http://friendfeed.com/susanbratton

Facebook http://profile.to/susanbratton/

Linked In http://www.linkedin.com/in/susanbratton

DishyMix Facebook Fan Club

July 25, 2008 SEO Class - No seats available
August 15, 2008 SEO Class - seats available
September 12, 2008 SEO Class - seats available

Here’s what the website says regarding these classes;

What you will learn as it pertains to your website:

SEO Myths Dispelled
Diagnosing Technical Website Problems
Creating Your SEO Strategy
Keyword Research
Site Architecture Makeover
How to Map Your Keywords to Your Website
Title Tags and Meta Descriptions
Killer SEO Copywriting

Links, Publicity and Social Media
Web Analytics for Measuring Success

Register here for the High Rankings SEO Class.

UPDATE: See the original post on the launch announcement of these classes

The Twitter: Ultimate Time Waster or Great Tool? post is what I described in the comments as the Best.Post.Ever! Why? Well not only is it an excellent post about Twitter and I’ve read dozens of them believe me, Chris managed to do in real time what few would ever attempt in order to engage the audience. He actually used Twitter to present in the session about twitter at Search Engine Strategies conference in Toronto. Here’s what Chris wrote about his post on the 10e20 blog;

Yesterday I presented at SES Toronto along with Lee Odden and Dave Snyder on a panel called ‘Twitter: Ultimate Time Waster, or Great Tool?’ I figured that in order to show how Twitter actually works - it would be best to use Twitter to do it. Here’s the results of the experiment and an extended version of my presentation. Also if you’re on Twitter and would like to follow me - here’s my profile: http://twitter.com/chriswinfield

When it comes to blogging I can only count on my fingers the number of posts that I’ve read that have been so engaging. Unfortunately none of them have come from yours truly but I read search marketing blogs like kids read comic books. (Okay so I read comic books too ;).

The difference here, the best post ever comment difference, is that Chris hit all my buttons when it comes to reading a blog post. I read blogs to learn something new, discover something interesting, hear things from a different point of view (these came from a variety of twitters) and mostly, to be entertained. Well done Chris, keep ‘em coming.
By the way you can follow me on twitter at http://twitter.com/semscholar

Chris thanks all the people that participated;
graywolf, JenniferLaycock, LLCobb, jenstar, oilman, rabeidoh, tonyadam, stuntdubl, zaknicola, lyndseo, jonkelly, jdevalk, eddings, meshugavi, DavidWallace, martinbowling, JeremyLuebke, audrajackson, joegerstandt, zaknicola, seanmaguire, chiropractic, doshdosh, longhornkate, TheMadHat, benrabicoff, SexySEO, ciaranj, lynnterry, Marifer, toddmintz, StuartL, LaurenV, dotrage, kid_disco, aviw, adriansoare, wilreynolds, BrentCsutoras, Frozen2Late, gar8, pratt, AmberCadabra, mwilton13, stephenparker, genemccubbin, khawe, footinmouth, DesireeSanchez, ColinCochrane, TheOtherJeff, gsicotte, averre, audette, Blakovitch, talespinner, tamera, kelly_gaia, MichelleRobbins, SearchBuzz, jonathanfields, markus941, SearchBuzz, travishines, saadkamal, dhudiburg, SearchStudent, yojspew, portentint, lisarokusek, TwisterMc, baldeagle, charlyjl, onstartups, kimbercook. If you’re looking for folks to follow on Twitter this would be a good starting point as each of these people are what make Twitter should an effective (and fun) tool.

First, we’re running the two days before Gnomedex and have been working with Chris Pirillo and his crew to offer discounted Gnomedex attendance to PRO Training attendees. Second, I’m getting married in September, so pushing the seminar to the same time as last year wasn’t possible. Third, and certainly not least, it was our intention to offer an alternative to San Jose. While that show is always very good, it’s extremely expensive to attend, and much of the material is more focused to a beginner/intermediate audience.

Speakers include; Rand Fishkin, Stephan Spencer, Danny Sullivan, Rebecca Kelley, Jeff Pollard, Jane Copland, Nick Gerner, and Sarah Bird.

I agree there is a need for more advanced search marketing seminars like this and SMX Advanced. Pricing is $749.00 per person which includes a 6 month SEOMoz PRO Membership and $499.00 for current PRO Members.