The Toronto Marketing and Technology Blog

Monday Morning Marketing Edition 10 | What causes people to search for you in a search engine?

This post is inspired by people searching my name in Google and arriving at my blog.

Some popular terms that people have searched for to arrive at my blog are:

1. "ragobeer" - my last name
2. "chris ragobeer" - my full name
3. "ragobeer is king" - not sure about this one, but I'll take it.

I like to keep a low profile, so I find it amusing that people would actually search for me in Google. Am I that interesting that people would actually search for me? I would like to think not.

I bet if you're a popular blogger you could always compare yourself to your competition using www.compete.com .

What drives people to search for you? More specifically, content creators.

1. They want to know more about you because you were mentioned in an article.
2. They want to keep tabs on you and your latest initiatives.
3. They're bored and what you write amuses them.
4. They want to get in contact with you because you seem like an interesting person.
5. They view your content as learning material. Each post allows them to view things in a different light.

Excuse me while I go search for some people in Google. By the way, thank you everyone for searching my name!

Monday Morning Marketing Edition 9 | Fat Belly

Everyone has a fat belly. They've been here since the beginning of time.

I have a fat belly when I eat too much junk food.

I have a fat belly when I drink too much beer.

I have a fat belly when I watch 10 more minutes of television than I know I should.

I have a fat belly when I stay out too late when I have work the next morning.

I'm starting to see a pattern here.

Fat bellies have become like an out of style outfit : it's something you will never give up and and will always be in your closet. It's time to do some spring cleaning.

Bye bye fat belly.

I'm on a diet

No junk food.

No alcohol.

More exercise.

Less time for blogging.

Maybe I'm just living a healthy lifestyle.

My interview with Matt McGowan, VP of Marketing - Incisive Media

I had the opportunity and privilege to interview Matt McGowan of Incisive media. Here is the Q&A dialogue that I had with him. He is a very accomplished person and I hope you enjoy the answers to the questions I asked him:

1. You have an impressive set of credentials from working at companies such as Charles Schwab, Pearson Plc and PropertyRoom.com in a variety of senior level roles. To what do you owe your level of success to?

I gave a quick run down on my career to Lee Odden of TopRankBlog.com in February and elaborated a bit more to Stephen DiMarco of Compete.com in March, neither asked however, what it was I owe my success to, interesting question though not an easy one.

 

1. I am told often that I “get it” – I understand how to leverage the opportunities that the internet presents.
2. I am approachable and I treat people the way I would like to be treated – I am surrounded by internet/digital marketers and the majority of my clients run successful businesses… I listen to them and ask them for advice. You could say I have a multi-billion dollar support network at my      finger tips.
3. My mom and dad – gotta give love where love is due, I am what I am primarily because they decided to invest in me.
   

2. What is your role at Incisive Media and why is it important to the overall strategy of the firm?

I run global marketing and business development for a few of Incisive Media’s major digital properties, specifically ClickZ, Search Engine Watch and the conference and expo series Search Engine Strategies (SES).

Incisive has made a massive investment digitizing its core businesses both through organic development and the acquisition of new businesses; in part to harness their technologies and IT infrastructure and in part to realize their revenues and profits.  Employees and executives with my understanding and experience help facilitate this process and guarantee synergies are found in the merging of these properties.

The knowledge base that is Search Engine Strategies, including the Toronto, Hamburg and San Jose events coming this summer 2008, facilitates many of the discussions around Search and Digital.

3. What type of industries do Incisive Media's clients come from? Is their a specific niche that your firm is attracting?

Incisive Media is one of the worlds, if not the, fastest growing B2B information provider disseminating award winning, original content across a range industries including, but not limited to, Alternative Assets, Business and Consumer Technology, Finance, Investments, Insurance, Legal, Real Estate, Photography and last but not least Interactive or Digital Marketing (that’s primarily where I and our SES, ClickZ.com and SearchEngineWatch.com brands come into play).

4. Have you attended a SES event before? What excites you about these types of events and what are you looking to specifically to get out of it?

I have attended more SES events than I can count, that said each one is so very different that I never get board. Because we have the opportunity to put events on monthly in many corners of the globe I find that each one presents me (and the other attendees) with new and cutting edge information – many times information that I can not find anywhere else as it sits within the minds of our many expert speakers and is only released to the public during their original presentations.

 
Why do I get excited about attending SES conference and expos? Well because, Search Engine Strategies (SES) is the leading global conference & expo series that educates delegates on search engine marketing (SEM), including optimization (SEO) and advertising strategies, tactics and best practices. SES Search Marketing Events provide instruction from the industry's top Search experts, including representatives of the Search Engines themselves. Thousands upon thousands of companies sent representatives to a SES event last year, being there to meet and network with these stars is an added bonus.

5. Are there some hot new trends that you and your firm have been noticing? Do you think this will be a hot topic at SES?

 At SES Toronto, which takes place 16-18 June 2008 in  Toronto,Canada, there are a load of new sessions covering some very hot topics. One I am particularly interested in is Twitter: Ultimate Time Waster, of Great Tool?

 

6. What types of wisdom would you offer to people thinking of attending but don't know if it's the right event for them?

Search Engine Watch published a nice piece on why executive decision makers, marketers, web developers and alike should attend SES Toronto, check it out here (same logic applies to SES events in other parts of the world).

In short, the internet is the present and the future. As we as a society move more and more online, business will one, need representation on the web and two, need to know how to get their business found on the web by customers. 95% of all online transactions start at the Search Engines with customers searching for a product, service, information… do the math, it adds up quite nicely!

Thanks alot Matt. I appreciate you taking the time to answer the questions, and I look forward to meeting you in person in the near future!

 

Monday Morning Marketing Edition 9 | Everybody has their favourite song | What is your brands song?

Everybody has their favourite song; sang in a specific way.

One of my favourite songs is by Boyz II men entitled  End of the road. I like it in Acappella, here is the video:

In addition to melodies,tones, and vibrant acapella's, people are attracted to soothing sounds that please the soul. The next time you want to use sounds to promote your business, think of something that resonates well with your target market and is memorable enough to let them remember that the popular song they like has now been associated to your company.

If you had to pick a song that best describes your company/brand, what would you pick?

If you liked this post, please feel free to subscribe to my rss feed here or visit another post  at www.ragobeer.com

Monday Morning Marketing Edition 8 | Is Corporate Lingo really necessary? | I don't buy it, I don't like it, wait maybe I do

This post is inspired by my experience in working in the Corporate world.

There seems to be an expectation of using certain types of words at certain times. You will see the corporate jargon tossed around like fruitcake on Christmas day.

Here are some common words and phrases that are used in the work place:

1. "expectation"
2. "perspective" <---I hate this one incredibly,
3. I need to to “champion” this (spearhead)
4. It’s great to finally “touch base” with you
5. I’d like to revise an “addendum” to that piece
6. Align with our strategic imperatives.
7. That's a question for...

You can argue that using these words are a result of great communication skills, and I  can agree to that.  I guess I'm saying that too much of something can be bad. Try to mix it up and say different words, synonyms can be peoples best friends.

You don't want to be labelled as the person who has a limited vocabulary and you don't want to be labelled as predictable.  I find myself backed into a corner sometimes and utter words that are overused. We are all guilty of it. Learn some new words. It never hurt anyone.

If you liked this post, please feel free to subscribe to my rss feed here or visit another post  at www.ragobeer.com

Monday Morning Marketing Edition 7 | What happend to the mkting postings on mondays...i read them -=)

Disclaimer: For many of the readers of this blog, you probably noticed that my Monday Morning Marketing post vanished out of thin air. With the busy life I live, I just couldn't seem to write the column and everything else I wrote about. It was also due to the fact that I didn't really know if anyone was reading it.  In other words, if no one was reading it, no one would miss it. It's kind of like the tree falling in the woods kind of ordeal.

I'm all about managing expectations. I will only post on this blog on Monday's for my column. If you're looking for other randomness, you're probably not going to get it here, unless it's important. :)

This week's column is about short texting.

I decided to write another Marketing post because of a short text I received from an old friend and it read "What happend to the mkting postings on mondays...i read them -=)".

Normally I frown upon people who don't take the time to use their spell checker or simply can't spell,but when you short text people, I think it is an exception. The problem is determining who to short text and in what situations. You never know when a person will forward your email to someone and the roaming eye balls that will be reading it. I can count numerous times when I had to forward messages that were short texted and I ended up having to edit them so they looked presentable.

I really only have two rules about short texting:

1) Short texting between friends is appropriate.
2) In a non-friend environment, if you don't expect a message back in short-text format, don't  short-text the person.

I would also like to mention that short texting would make for a good advertising campaign as long as it's not over used. If you implement a good sequence of short text words it can become pretty viral. Think of a new lexicon in short text for your company and if it's catchy enough, who knows what people will do with it.

Hopefully I will find enough time to write another post. See you next Monday.

If you liked this post, please feel free to subscribe to my rss feed here or visit another post  at www.ragobeer.com

Life wouldn't be the same without the Gmail Spam filter....

Life wouldn't be the same without the Gmail Spam filter. If I had to literally look at every e-mail that was sent to me, I would stop using e-mail. Wonderful invention. Thank you Google.

How much do you waste on business cards a year? | Know who to give your business card to

Business cards are an excellent tool to network with people in any social atmosphere. If you're at a professional event and want to meet that investment banker to get a deal done with your company, or maybe you want to meet that highly attractive young lady in the shadows of the club but can't croak up enough energy to say anything, or quite frankly to give to the window washer guy to maybe form a partnership in your new window business. You name it, a business card can do wonders.

There is, however, a downside to business cards: so many people have them and so many people get them. I myself have a pile of 100 business cards just from the past 2 weeks. I'm flipping through the people who sound interesting and would like to have them in my network or at least creep them on facebook.

When networking with people you need to try to read them. Are they worth following up with? If you don't follow up with them, do you think they will follow up with you? Depending on what business you're in the answers to these questions will differ. I'm more consciously  thinking of who I give my business card to these days. You should too.

Twitter Twitter Twitter Twitter Twitter

Everyone is on the Twitter bandwagon. I had to join it because everyone else did. I feel bullied for joining it. I log in maybe once a day, not an addict by any means. I see it as more of a time waster than anything. I'm the type of person that I don't have to be in constant contact with someone. It does have its benefits in certain occasions, but it's not a tool that I need to be using on a daily basis.

I wonder when the Twitter bandwagon is going to stop.