Come on now, you didn't think I'd spill beans just like that did you? Before I give you the goods, let me refresh your memory in case this is the first time you're hearing about MozCation. A few weeks ago, we asked people to create some sort of unique content and tell us why we should have an SEOmoz Meetup (aka MozCation) in their city.
Overwhelming Response
The nominations started in rather slowly and at first we thought that perhaps MozCation would be a complete failure! Soon a number of nominations started trickling in, however people weren't creating new content. They were simply linking to city government websites and wikipedia pages... which wasn't what we were looking for. There was an email thread going around internally about how we needed to write another post explaining better what we were looking for.
But then, the first "real" nomination came in from Peru. We were delighted and quite surprised, we were unaware we had a following in Peru (little did we know), and the retweets started rolling in. Soon after, Portsmouth, NH was nominated and then Calgary. By this time, we were excited that we were getting some unique submissions and figured we'd have a handful of cities to pick from. What we didn't realize was that the next nomination would be for Spain, and it would change the whole game. Gianluca had bought the domain mozcation.com and built an entire site! Holy game changer. Soon after, people started creating Twitter and Facebook accounts, building websites and rallying their local communities. Check out all the submissions below. :)
Picking A City
Whew. Now, how on earth do we pick one city out of all the great nominations we received? Well, we decided we didn't have to. We're the keeper of the rules, and in true TAGFEE fashion, we decided to pick four cities instead. :) I don't want to ruin all the fun, so I'll just let Rand spill the beans:
(Be sure to watch the entire video!)
The Nominees
Take a look at all 15 nominated cities in no particular order. Everyone worked really hard on these sites, pages, videos, etc. I know they'd love for you to take a peek at all their hard work.
Title: Why SEOmoz Should Come To Denver For Mozcation: A Love Story
Nominated by: @Location3
Title: The MozCation should definitely add Houston, TX to its list of stops
Nominated by: @CarterCole
Other Nominations: MozCation:Houston from @juliaalaniz and Mozcation in Houston from @googleismybf
Title: MozCation - Salt Lake City
Nominated by: @Sams_Antics
Other Nominations: 1,276 Reasons #Mozcation is Coming to SLC from @shuey03 and Come To Salt Lake City, Mozcation! from @davidscoville and This Is The Place...For a MozCation from @iamadrianlazo
Title: Hey Roger! Visit Your Filipino Fans, SEOmoz Buddies in Manila
Nominated by: @seoteky
Title: Roger... STOP... Save Indianapolis....STOP!
Nominated by: @flea_spano
Now What?
Yes we chose four cities, but we will still be holding at least one more round of nominations for another MozCation later in the year. So if you missed out this time, or if your city wasn't chosen, keep a watch on the blog! We'll be announcing open nominations again in a couple months. So stay tuned! We'll also keep you up-to-date on dates/times for all the MozCation events coming up.
Thank You
Never did we imagine that we'd get so many nominations. The sheer number of tweets that came in for #MozCation was enough to humble us. Thank you to everyone who worked hard to nominate their city. You've made is so proud to be a part of this amazing community. We look forward to seeing you all!
Wow... You know how to make happy the SEO community!!!
And now, let me write something I've always dreamt to write: a sort of "Oscar speech" :D
I thank... my mom ... no no no (well, yes, why not?)
Ok... I thank SEOmoz for this great opportunity and thank the fantastic Spanish SEO community that helps me with promoting the Spanish nomination.
It has been a great contest, that helped reaffiirm the strong connection and bonds the community already have and it was a real fun to partecipate.
I want to congratulate also the other winners: honestly they were tough competitors, and I am so glad SEOmoz finally decided to choose 4 destinations.
We SEO all over the world are friends, and you would have to read all the funny/teasing tweets we shared along the weeks the contest was open (maybe a Storify will come).
Again, thank you thank you thank you.
P.S.: Spain is in November, so... reserve a spot that month. The invitation is extended to all the Euro SEOs.
Apart from the cheesy speech...well played Gianluca!! Spent 10 days in Valenica last month and loved it. Now have a very good reason to visit again this year! Great choice SEOmoz.
You can easily also do all 3 cities Barcelona, Valencia and Madrid in a short time period if you plan it well and use the amazing fast new trains.
Hey... I advised it was going to be an Academy Awards kind of speech :)
P.S.: were you in Valencia and did not call me for a beer? bad boy.
SOOOO stoked to have SEOmoz visiting SLC! You guys are going to love the SEO energy here - it's unreal! Go SLC!
I'm excitied for all the cities we are going to visit! I can't wait to meet all the mozzers around the world!
Congrats to all the winners!!! Another hard knock for Cleveland, LOL! Although we are bummed Cleveland wasn't picked as an official destination, we are excited SEOmoz will be making a stop sometime during the year. We promise we won't let you down and perhaps you'll reconsider us for 2012! We'd love to help you pick a meet-up location in our city when you make it here, take you out to a Tribe game, or perhaps arrange a quick visit to the Fathom headquarters to meet our team and give a training session on the Pro toolset.
We had a blast putting together our Cleveland nomination video and sharing it across the Twitterverse. Thanks to everyone that helped tweet and retweet the nomination.
We love you CLEveland and always will!
Kurt Krejny
Hurrah! Your coming to Barcelona, looking forward to it!
On a side note, in the mozcation graphic it looks like you have shot Roger Mozbot and strapped him to the roof like a moose.
Thank you SEOmoz
We are really happy at Lima, Perú for been one of the four cities that win.This will be so important for SEO development at Perú and it was really fun and great time work with the community for win Mozcation. We keep in contact and be sure we will make something really great when you will be here! Daniel Falcón
This is fantastic. We are very excited about the winners! We supported Peru and it's great to see that it lot's of Latinamerican Destinations supported Lima! Can't wait t get the exact dates to start organizing our trip to Lima! Greetings from Medellin, Colombia!
Thank you for the support, today at Lima is a party at SEO and Internet Community Te esperamos en Lima de hecho será muy bueno intercambiar experiencias y conocer más con tods nuestros amigos de LATAM
So exciting for all the winners and for YOU guys!! I volunteer to be the token Seattle resident tag-along should you need it. I'll carry luggage and clean white boards I promise!!! :)
Haha, Kristy beat me. Can I then offer to be the Distiller to come along? You need one of us right? *crosses fingers and shuts eyes wishing*
It was a great competition for all the cities. From Ecuador we supported the Lima nomination as it is close to us. Great we see you in September in Lima and perhaps in November in Spain.
Thank you!!De hecho la comunidad de SEO e Internet en Lima los esperamos para celebrar y agradecerles el apoyo
Hoping that MozCation unofficially swings by Dallas!
A mozcation to Spain or Brazil would be a nice treat. Looking forward to more info about what will be going on at each of the events. A neat idea :-)
I can tell you... Vancouver and Spain is a loooong flight (did it once in the past).
But if you are convinced, we would be happy to welcome you :)
Yes! That's awesome. I was really hoping you'd end up visiting Salt Lake City and I was disappointed that I'd missed the nominations. I look forward to meeting you all on June 29th.
I'm also getting married on the 2nd of July (that Saturday)... Best. Week. Ever.
Coincidentally, it'll also be the nerdiest bachelor party ever.
Well, congratulations to my friends living in Spain & Lima! I will try to join some of those events for sure….
Next year I will suggest my country: Costa Rica! It´s so close from North and South America J Rand, Jennita: take your sun glasses and enjoy some vacations here!
Great Charlie. We see you in one of them maybe both. I will star planning the travels. #seopro it is also again in November in Spain.
Very nice! So stoked for the meet up in SLC and then off to mozcon a month later!
I am so coming to the SLC event. Good work Slickers!!!
This sounds suspiciously like an excuse to travel to Spain!
I mean, it's an excuse for me.
And for you, of course.
But mostly for me.
Of course.
:-)
Mozcation in Salt Lake City!? Am I dreaming? You know why it REALLY happened though, right? It's because I told Jen I'd bake her a pie... https://twitter.com/#!/scottcowley/status/70980196089610242 Time to get my bake on.
Can't wait for the 29th!
Congratulations for all the winners!
My tactic was to await the first run for the first mozcation and then participate as nomenee for the next dates. I guess I have to wait for next year.
Well, I still can try to head over to Spain in November ....
We'll still be having one more round of submissions in a couple months. :)
Maybe that time I will do something for my Italian friends... you know I'm italian...
Awwww - No love for Indy! Don't you guys wanna see the Speedway and kiss the bricks? Well maybe I can make it up to Cleveland. Would love for you to stop by Indy. There's a few big inbound companies out here I thought you guys might like to visit, Exacttarget being one of them.
Congrats to all the winners! Amazingly executed contest BTW guys. This thing is feeding on itself.
Sweeeeeet! Can't wait to see you guys here in SLC!! It's gonna be a party!
Now...to get my company to fund a business trip to Spain for something called a MozCation....lol.
Grats to all the cities. Wish there was one closer to the midwest!
I´m so happy to hear Lima as a #winning city, it's amazing for us. I hope that you bring all the seomoz team and see all our hospitality, kindness and SEO knowledge!!
Oh, you gotta be kidding me. I was all ready to come out of retirement (you know, for a day) if you picked SLC. Alas, I am busy.
Oh no! :( :(
Sad to hear that Dallas isn't on the MozCation tour, but glad to hear we will get an 'unofficial' Moz visit!
Do you have to be a Pro member to attend this?
No... just an SEO enthusiast :)
Hooray!!...thanks
Hooray!!...thanks
Congrats to the winning cities! I am so jealous of all the exotic places Roger is going to visit. But don't rule out San Luis Obispo, Mozcation Team. SLO is an awesome city, truly one of the best places in America. Wine + beach + mountains + SEO = an awesome Mozcation!
When does the registration begin? I've been waiting for the announcement for SLC mozcation since the first day
So sorry I didn't update this post earlier! But the registration for Salt Lake City is up here: https://mozcationslc.eventbrite.com/ plus information about the location and line up can be found there. Unfortunately there's already a waitlist, but get your name on the list and we're doing everything possible to get everyone in. You'll get an email from eventbrite when we open up the waitlist.
If you guys really stop by Cleveland, let me know... ;)
I so want to try to make it to the Spanish one, please keep us all updated.
We had a great time making our video submission. The push us SEOs made here in Salt Lake was stunning. Can't wait to see you all in June!
Looking forward to the unnoficial visit to Houston!
Woohoo! And just so you know, if y'all stay for a weekend, we have so much snow that Snowbird is planning on being open for the 4th of July weekend. Just a thought.
I guess I will have to wait till November then, well, better late than never... I hope I will see you all in Spain :)
Woooohooo!!! See you at São Paulo! \o/
This is really good news. You are going for second round and wait for some more nomination. I am from Ahmedabad, India. May I nominate for MozCation or not? There are too many SEOmoz fans in Ahmedabad.
I think it is too late now.
Ohhh!! Why should I am not in US? I am also late to reach at visa office. :) No worry. Better luck next time.
Congrats all winners!
AWESOME! We're so excited to have y'all here!! June 29th is on the calendar :)
Now that everyone sees that SEOmoz might link to their neato content I bet you will get twice as many nominations next time ;)
thank u for sharing. I'm excited about the visit to Lima, and hope you'll try some guinea pig in Peru!
Congratulations for winer
Congrats to all nominated cities, will missed these MOZcations :-/
Can't believe SLC won! VERY excited! When and where can you buy tickets to the event?
The event will be free. :) We'll have all the details ready in a little over a week. Be sure to watch our Twitter stream for info about how to register. :)
Goodluck to all nominations. I hope they will visit Philippines. Good job seoteky.
Hey, is it just me or does the video not work?
Are you still having issues with the video, I've tested it in a few different browsers and it's working for me. Let me know.
Great competition - so many awesome entries. Congrats to the winning cities!
Spain... Brazil... Peru... Sounds like some people are going to be having a few lovely vacations coming up... ;)
AND Orlando will get a visit! Sweet. You guys even taught me today that Full Sail University here in Orlando actually has a group of students interested in SEO, which I never before realized.
I loved watching Mozcation play out. All we need is a heartwarming short film after Spain in November for everyone :)
That's a great idea! I'll make sure we get lots of good video at all the meetups. And perhaps a group hug at the end too? ;)