Sara, SEMPO, San Francisco…

Just before SES, New York the SEMPO New York, local working group had its first meeting at Yahoo’s midtown offices. Of course, I was there for the splendid snacks and free drinks. And just last week, I attended the second meeting at the same location (me being a bit of local myself now). Mike Grehan+SEMPO, I hear you shriek!

Well, it can get lonely living on your own in New York and I really do have to get out more 🙂

Seriously, I have a renewed interest totally inspired by my friend, a little force of nature known as Sara Holoubek.

Sara’s totally passionate and quite simply swoops into the building and takes over the room. In order to get more attention to myself I went to the first meeting disguised as Matt Cutts. Turns out lots of people are aware that Matt is not a little, old, fat guy with a British accent. So that kind of blew it. Last week I used my stealth technique again and attended as Adam Lasnik… Turns out that, lots of people are aware that Adam is not a little, old, fat guy with a British accent. Damn, failed again!

I’ve been rethinking my strategy. Yesterday, I had lunch in San Francisco with Vanessa Fox. I’m just not sure I can fit into that dress size. But hey, let’s give it a try 🙂

And so it was, I left New York last Friday with the Village People top-tune, San Francisco (You got me) playing in my head. I checked into the Westin (formerly the Argent) with its pleasant views of the city (so entirely different to New York)

To the right I have the striking building that is the Marriott hotel (AKA the jukebox).

And to the left, the sea a little way in the distance. I had a deja vu moment when I looked out of the window and remembered I’d stayed in the very same room when I was speaking at ad:tech a couple of years back.

Saturday I had a quick beer at lunch time with my great pal Jim Sterne. And later we met up for the traditional pre-conference dinner. We were recommended a wonderful little Italian restaurant (the name of which I completely forget). And pretty soon, the shampoo was flowing.

Not sure if was the shampoo that went to Matt Finlay’s head. But for some reason he felt it was necessary to poke poor Fanny (his assistant) in the eye. Talk about a totally different style of management 🙂

After dinner, it was back to the hotel bar where, again traditionally, Belgian analytics superstar Rene Dechamps Otamendi arrives with the delicious Belgian chocolates.

This is a shot which occurs at every eMetrics event at some point… Me taking a pic of Jim Sterne… Taking a pic of me!

One of my favorite places to visit in San Francisco is in the touristy area of Fisherman’s Wharf. Here, proudly standing for more than 50 years is the Franciscan restaurant.

You can tell by the wine glass they make a big deal about being 50 (and yes, I can seriously recommend the Shrimp Pescatore – delicious).

No less than once a year, I find myself sitting in the high booths facing the huge windows that look out over Alcatraz Island. Here you can see everything go by. From tourist ferry boats…

to cargo ships…

to little sail boats…

On Sunday I had a fabtastic (yes, that was fabtastic) day with lovely Lisa Barone. Not many people know that, Lisa is actually my long lost daughter who was abducted and sold into… What? What?? Okay, so you’ve heard it before…

Anyway, we took ourselves to the top of the Hyatt hotel and its Grandviews restaurant for Sunday brunch.

And then we headed to the Franciscan where Lisa got involved in her new spectator sport: watching her old pop type thing get fashionably drunk in the afternoon. Of course, like any good pop type thing, I didn’t let the day go by without taking her to see the famous California sea lions, sunning, stinking and barking on the bay!

Some of the other residents have no idea what the whole sea-lion-fuss-thing is all about…

And so the event got into full swing, Monday. In between my sessions, I took a walk around the exhibit hall. Here I bump into a lot of my pals. Tim Ash (great book) as you can see was doing a book signing. His colleague next to him is obviously saying: “But let’s make the next one at least this thick, okay?”

Talking about bumping into people, after the SEMPO bash in New York, last week I walked out into the street and bumped into Marshall Sponder who just happened to be outside the Yahoo! Building. “I heard you were living in New York, now” sez he. Yes, I reply. “Going to eMetrics next week” sez me. “Absolutely” sez he. “Should be good” sez me, “I haven’t seen Eric Peterson for a while.” “He’s standing right behind you” sez Marshal! And so he was… So he and I and Marshall and Kevin Ryan and Rhian and Kevin Heisler and Bill & Motoko Hunt and more, had a spontaneous SEM/Analytics get-together in the restaurant across the street.

Sure enough, one of the first people I bumped into at the conference was none other than Eric himself!

Monday was cinco de Mayo, and Lisa (Mike-shut-up-about-the-stick-and-semi-clad-girls-in Universal-results-or-I’ll-never- blog-your-sessions-again) Barone, decided that Mexican food was the order of the day. And so, complete with recommendations from the concierge, myself, “The Lisa”, Matt Bailey and Dave Rohrer headed for a restaurant… which served food about as Mexican as a full English breakfast (saved only by the Chips and guacamole!)

Later that evening, my newest and bestest friend and colleague, Acronym’s very own Tami Dally, flew in from New York to join the throng at the bar. In no time at all, I had the shampoo flowing and the very artistic Marshall Sponder (obviously not being a Dom Perignon sort of guy) decided to draw it instead of drink it as Tami looked on 🙂

As usual, the conference was excellent for networking.

And, as ever, the food and drinks at the sponsor sessions in the exhibit hall were first class (one of the reasons I love this conference).

And lunch, of course, is always a truly excellent networking (birds of a feather) event.

Industry supertars really do abound. And here, in one of my sessions, Vanessa Fox tells Avinash Kaushik, “of course, the last algorithm I wrote at Google before leaving was this big!”

“Being analytics guru at Google, I’m always measuring things” says Avinash. And then reaching into his pocket “I have this fab new analytics tool called… a tape measure, with me. Let’s just see how big that mother really is…”

And with the conference over, I sneaked back to the Franciscan for a little chill on my own. And then I started the long journey back to Newcastle to see if my wife remembers who I am.

Cheers!

Joe’s little adventure…

I feel like I’ve been in New York for so long now, I’ll lose my English accent and start sounding like my pal Andy Beal 🙂

So, it was great to have my boy Joe come over and see me for the weekend. He may not have been able to find the razor blades in my apartment, and he may have been wearing the most provocative soccer shirt in town (as we bumped into every Manchester United supporter in New York) but we had a blast!

On Friday night we took in a stroll around Times Square (make that shuffled backwards and forwards in no apparent direction with the other half million people there).

And then, it was Joe’s dream dinner… A steak as big as a football (and that was the small one!). Ben Benson’s is one of my favourite steak houses in New York. And once again, he didn’t let down.

On the way back to the apartment we walked up to Columbus Circle. Here, Joe learned some of the local lingo, as a taxi turned left on a red light and nearly hit a guy walking his dog.

Man with dog: Fuck you!

Taxi driver: Fuck you!

This is how the dialogue and brief encounter went. Then it was swiftly followed by man with dog concluding by peering through taxi windscreen: “It’s a red light you dickhead!”

It made me feel so at home in New York, I almost cried.

Saturday morning, Joe donned the shirt which would be glared at in so many strange ways by people who think soccer shirts should only come in red and white. And into Central park we ventured.

No time later, seemingly, we were atop the Empire State Building.

After which, we jumped into a taxi and headed to South Street Seaport area, Pier 17 and a pint of Newcastle to go with the shirt!

And yes, dad had one too!

Just one more tourist attraction to fit in here, before heading to Macys to be cleaned out… Joe and the Brooklyn Bridge.

Saturday night, what’s a pop and his boy to do in New York… Go to the Stone Rose Lounge on Columbus Circle, of course.

Mojitos were the order of the day.

And here, Joe showed how mighty he was by pushing an entire burger into his mouth in one go!

Sunday was chill-out day after squeezing so much in on Saturday. So we took another stroll through the park.

I bumped into an old friend and we chatted a little while about his nuts.

Swiftly we hit Fifth Ave where we both imagined how good it would be if we robbed a bank and could then afford to buy one earring in Tiffany’s for his girlfriend, Paula.

And that was it. A whirlwind adventure for Joe and a plane back to dear old Newcastle on Monday. While I slipped back into my SEO Superman costume and flew up to the 55th floor of the Empire State Building… To do super Acronym SEO stuff 🙂

BE THERE!!!!
http://www.emetrics.org/2008/sanfrancisco

Living in New York.

Currently I’m living in New York. I have a small apartment on West 73rd (that’s my street in the pic above) and I’m relearning lots of things I’d forgotten. Things like, how to cook; how to operate a washing machine; making the bed; using a vacuum cleaner and how to work the DVD… Fortunately, my wife is only at the end of a telephone connection 😉

One area I have no problem with is shopping. I’m generally a bit of a shopaholic (usually gadgets). And I’m very fortunate to have this wonderful market called Fairway just round the corner from me.

The subway is just 100 yards away. Every morning I get on the wrong train. And every night I do it again. Practice, they say, makes perfect.

And as you can see, I get to hang all the time with my SEW/SES pals. Last Friday, it being a day when I was desperately missing my wife, my thoughtful pal Kevin Ryan decided we should have a Russian night out. So, he and I, Matt McGowan, Kevin Heisler, my new Russian buddy Alexei and a bunch of others from ClickZ/SEW/SES rolled down to Brighton Beach.

Following the most sumptuous meal of traditional Russian favorites in a cozy restaurant… It was everybody back to Alexei’s place.

What you’re looking at above is part of his collection of Russian pilot’s helmets! And he has plenty of them. And of course, he has plenty of Vodka!

And as you’d expect at home… Plenty of other Russian stuff!

I have a vague recollection of ending up in a Manhattan night club with Matt McGowan… After which, everything went black… Until I woke up on my bed next morning still fully clothed!

Robert Burns: Scottish Bard.

As my family and friends know, my wife is a bit of a culture vulture. She’s a real, Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy kind of person. As a linguist, she absorbs literature like a sponge (a lot like I absorb Merlot 😉

Some time ago, she mentioned that she had studied the work of Scottish Bard, Robert Burns. This is interesting because, living on the borders of Scotland as I do, I can pretty much understand my Edinburgh and Glasgow cousins. But each time I hear someone recite Robert “Rabbie” Burns (every annual Burns night) I have to ask for a translation!

No, of course, it’s not that bad, he was certainly a prolific and extraordinarily talented writer. Anyway, having been away from home for a long time, I thought I’d give my wife a little treat of some pure Scottish culture. Robert Burns, I remembered was born in the small coastal town of Ayr. So, I booked the hotel. And off we went.

Not the world’s greatest hotel, but the only one I could get that gave us a view of the Scottish island of Arran. If you look carefully at the picture above, you can see the snow capped mountains on the island (to the right of the picture).

Ayr is a quite a nice little coastal resort. I imagine it’s very pretty during the summer. There are new developments in the town. But it still carries an age old, distinguished look in many places.

As you’d expect, in the centre of the town there’s a statue of the great man himself (Robert Burns).

And also, as you’d expect, an inn complete with thatched roof called Tam O’Shanter ( a Burns classic).

But the place we really came to see was the actual birthplace of Burns which is a little out of town in Alloway.

Imagine the huge impact this guy had on literature and the huge amount of respect his work gets, and yet he was dead at only 37 years old. The cottage where he was born has a small museum with many original manuscripts of his work. And there are statues of him inside the museum.

And outside of the museum

The cottage itself is typical of the time. Small as it is, it had a barn, a stable and house all in this one building!

Inside the cottage is very quaint. It has been preserved in a way that depicts exactly how life would have been for the young Rabbie Burns. Lifesize waxworks are complemented by audio in the various scenes as you walk through the cottage. Here, his father is reading from the bible to the family, as the young Rabbie (standing next to him) fires question after question.

“For auld lang syne, We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet, For auld lang syne…”

Google expanding sitelinks with sitesearch?

This may have been mentioned elsewhere, but I spotted something very different in a Google results set at the weekend. I was planning a trip to Scotland and had been checking trough suitable hotels in the town of Ayr on the west coast.

My first search brought back a list of ten local results at the top of the pile which was quite helpful. I then went off at a tangent doing something else and only later realized that I still hadn’t booked the hotel.

Lazy, as I am, I simply searched on the name of the hotel group at Google, to click through to the main site and then search for the Ayr hotel. What I saw really surprised me. Take a look.

I’ve seen results with up to eight sitelinks before. But I’ve never seen sitelinks with a sitesearch box combined. It’s certainly new to me.

Of course, I simply typed – scotland – in the search box and was presented with this.

It’s a list of all of their Scottish properties. I then simply clicked on the link to the Ayr property and booked a room.

Pretty neat, I think.

Staying on the subject of unusual results at Google. From time-to-time I’ve seen the error shown below on certain queries. I laughed this time though. I queried the name of a certain high profile search marketing person and got this:

The SES crew do.

Forgot to drop this pic into the last post. It was taken at a special event in New York which was thrown by Incisive and hosted by Kevin Ryan. A little get-together of the Search Engine Strategies advisory board, crew and luminaries.

James Handbury of Incisive media (mentioned in the post below this one) came along to say a special thanks to Kevin before he jetted off again.

There are too many people to mention in this post, so I’ll leave it for you to pick out the ones you recognize. And once again, I’ll just say another “well done” to Kevin and everyone in the picture for keeping SES such a powerful force in the industry.

SES, New York 2008

He did it again!

My pal Kevin Ryan and the SES crew pulled together yet another hugely successful show. SES, New York last week had such a great atmosphere. The sessions and speakers were great. And, as ever, the networking and nightlife just added to the buzz.

I thoroughly enjoyed my sessions. In particular, I had great fun (and lively debate) with Kevin when we co-moderated the Orion Panel on Universal search. The panellist included Lyndsay Menzies, John Battelle, Jack Menzel and James Lamberti, In the picture below, you can see I have their undivided attention as I put forward the case for more images of scantily clad and naked ladies in Universal search results 🙂

I also thoroughly enjoyed the meet the crawlers session I moderated. Great questions from the audience. Tons of information from the search engine representatives. And my usual pic of the audience to give them some quality content to link to 😉

And I was thrilled to have the absolute queen of the blogging scene, Lisa Barone as my date for Alan Dick’s VIP do at the Manhattan Penthouse. She didn’t leave my arm for a second… In the elevator. But then she spotted the handsome and debonair James Hanbury (founding member and CEO of Incisive media – owners of SES/SEW/CZ) at the table. And also at the same table, the no less handsome or debonair Rory Brown (Managing Director of Incisive’s Interactive division, active Newcastle United supporter and generally very canny lad). That’s when I was left at the bar with a flat beer and half empty bowl of peanuts…

Only kidding! That was actually the first time that Lisa had met the “bosses” from Incisive Media. And after a splendid dinner and excellent company, she and I swooped out on to the town to a general piss-up somewhere else. I remember arriving and bumping into the wonderfully warm and huggy Kim Krause (yes, the very same Kim Krause spotted on stage singing in a New York nightclub last week!). There were drinks… And more drinks…And then some shots with Matt McGowan and then… Some more drinks. So, please don’t ask me what was going in the picture below… I have no recollection whatsoever!

I managed to spend some time at our booth with my new buddies at Acronym Media. I have to say, I love every single one of them (even if I can’t remember any names yet 🙂

Well, there are some I do remember. Here’s the wonderful force of nature, otherwise known as Farah Sadiq (runs our Singapore office). And with her, our own analytics guru (and bonzer Sheila), Tami Dalley.

And here’s my buddy (and Acronym CEO) the very suave and sophisticated Anton Konikoff with my new pal (and Director, Business Development ) Brad Neelan. Brad’s a sure-shot when it comes to hurling coffee! Only joking Brad. It was a pure accident, I know. I know.

Love ’em all as I do, there’s one special person at Acronym who I actually knew before I joined. It’s a very small world thing which is quite the secret… Okay, she’s Kevin Ryan’s partner… Well… It was bound to come out sooner or later!

And here she is, the one and only Rhian Aidala helping me prop up the bar at the Acronym staff party last week.

And let’s throw in some more staffers from the party

And finally…

Back at the conference I bumped into my buddy Mel Carson from Microsoft. They have some very cool new stuff going on over at http://www.adcentercommunity.com/ It’s well worth checking out.

Okay, time to start planning for the tenth anniversary SES in San Jose this August. Now that, I guarantee, is going to be the show of the year!

My new book.

Well, it’s been a long time coming, but now the time is right. This week I signed a publishing deal with Wordware Publishing based in Texas for my new book.

With the very vague and mysterious title of: Search Marketing… I’ll leave you to guess what it’s about 🙂

Wordware are the publishers of Fredrick Marckini’s groundbreaking book Search Engine Positioning. That’s a hard act to follow. But as he’s a close friend I’ll be tapping into his genius from time-to-time anyway 😉

Got to go and write… It’s due to launch with the 10th anniversary of SES in San Jose this August.

Very exciting!!!!!

Greetings from the Empire State Building!

Well, you have no idea how totally thrilled I am to have joined the Acronym Media team. CEO, Anton Konikoff and I have been friends for a number of years. And the opportunity to work with him at the most happening agency in the business is fantastic.

And no less fantastic is the view from my office on the 55th floor of the Empire State Building!

As Global KDM Officer, this is a very exciting opportunity and I’m so looking forward to working with the global team… Guess I’ll be spending lots of time on aeroplanes again…

That’ll be different 🙂