So far this morning, I've sat in on You & A with Matt Cutts, Duplicate Content Summit, and a Social Media Marketing panel that included Rand. Rebecca and I will provide some comprehensive coverage of all the sessions later, with the requisite embarrassing photographs, so I'll just give you a feel for what SMX is all about and how it's different to SES and Pubcon.
Firstly, there are way less people here. Way less. It's like leaving a city's biggest public high school and enrolling in a tiny private college. However, aside from the smaller size, a main point of SMX was to provide more advanced tracks and sessions for people who'd heard the SES spiels before. There is no Link Building 101 here. Above and beyond this, though, I'm noticing that the speakers' demeanor is a lot less formal than at the bigger shows (Lisa, Tamar and I have been publicly called upon and made fun of
So, is the information more advanced? So far (and it's not even the end of the first day), it depends on the speaker. One or two speakers I've heard today delivered speeches that were no more in-depth than those that I listening to in Las Vegas or New York. However, I'd say the majority of the presentations and virtually all of the questions in the Q&A section highlight the type of people in the crowd who've gathered here in Seattle this week.
If you're on-the-fence as to what you should spend your travel or conference budget on and you're hearing some of the same things over and over again at the other shows, I don't think you'll find that SMX Advanced is the graduate program to SES's grade school. The difference is not extreme, but it is noticeable. Therefore, I would recommend checking out the SMX shows. I like that they're shorter than SES and Pubcon (back to the college analogies, have you ever partied for five nights in a row and tried to go to class all day at the same time? Yeah, it's great.) and I feel that the general knowledge of the audience has as much to do with the quality of the conference as does the formal presentations of the speakers.
On a more SEOmoz-centric note, it's great to see so many of our members out here in Seattle. There's a big difference between exchanging comments with people on the blog and chatting with them in the Expo hall! I'll let you know if I change my mind about anything I've written here; it's early going in the world of SMX. All of you in Seattle - I'll see you this evening. To those of you who've stayed home, keep SMX in mind.
I agree that some of the speakers are still geared into the SES, more basic mindset, but there have been some extraordinary Q+A sessions and some very advanced presentations.
The biggest difference is in the saviness of the audience, and the benefits that affords speakers. One of the things I find shocking is that very experienced SEOs, who would normally completely skip out on the sessions, will actually hang against the back wall and pick up some good tips. That's a big change.
The conference venue rocks, too. The fresh sliced roast beef and sole in lemon and capers for lunch was awesome. I went into the men's room and there were about 4 guys talking about how much they loved the lunch. :)
I'm sure I'll have a lot to blog from here as well.
Oh wow, did I forget to mention lunch? That was some awesome food! I agree that the Q&A is one of the best features. And seeing some of these SEOs who you usually only see at parties in a conference hall is a new experience for everyone.
Although Chris Hooley is still nowhere to be found, of course.
You and Rebecca missed Scarey-Vietnamese for lunch today. The owner lady was extra grumpy.
You need to visit that place when Rebecca is out of the office ;)
Based on the looks of hatred she kept giving me, and the looks of dread she kept giving my food, I was quite certain I would be dead by 3pm of some creepy Vietnamese jungle poison.
Find the beer keg, and you'll find the Hooley
Also forgot to mention the removal of Danny's clothes to kick off the You&A session with Matt Cutts on the morning of the first day.
That was a great way to start things off for the Keynote session. I think it eluded to the fact that things were going to be more informal at SMX that at other similar events.
I think that opener did a wonderful job of foreshadowing how much fun and laid back it was going to be and that we should not be expecting a typical "run-of-the-mill" event.
I am definitely going to attend more SMX conferences on the schedule.
Yeah, the lunch was fantastic! Soooo much better than the lame-o sandwiches they served us at PubCon in Vegas..
and, Rand, you have no idea how close you guys got to being clubbed like baby seals at the back of the session on Personalized Search...
Sorry about that - I noticed that there were some glares and pulled that group into a private room so we wouldn't keep disturbing folks. Bad form there. But, Michael Gray's presentation during personalization was incredible. I hope he puts that on the web.
heh...I know how it is. I overheard some of the conversation, and honestly, it sounded more interesting than what the speakers were saying. When you get a group of guys together who are all interested in the same topic it gets "heated" fairly quickly.
I know you guys were trying to be quiet and respectful, but some of the attendees didn't seem to agree....
And it was great watching Michael Grey stand up for the "little guy" against the big engines! Even if he does put it on the web, the back and forth between him and Matt Cuts/Tim Mayer would still be missing to put it in the right context.
I way all the way up the front... what were they doing?!
They weren't doing anything too improper. Just discussing various topics - nothing really stands out in memory. I think it was just that the audio in the room wasn't the greatest when you were sitting in the back row, and considering the room divider was a curtain, and not a wall, voices tended to carry easily.
First of all, great job on this Jane.
For my part the entire event was an awesome success, including all the things Jane and everyone here commented on. The icing on the cake was the incredible great time had at the seomoz party. I especially took great joy beating Matt Cutts at bowling though in true Matt Cutts fashion he noted my quality score significantly dropped later on.
I must say Danny Sullivan's lofting the ball into the air 1/2 down the alley was extremely interesting if not all that successful or Lisa's banking the ball off the wall and knocking down all the pins was the true bowling "moment" of the evening.
Thanks to all for the great event - Rand you rock dude.
Curtis
Had fun reading! Thanks! i can use this in my business Cash for Gold.
Thanks Jane. I'm someone who's yet to make it to a conference, but hoping to before too much more time passes. While I haven't been to a conference I'm not sure how much I'd enjoy a lot of SEO 101 discussions. Do you think SMX might be a better match or would SES still be fine?
Is one easier to socialize and meet everyone or does it not matter so much? I would think the more infomal and smaller group at SMX would lend itself more to getting to know people better and I'm usually one to like smaller gorups, but having never been I don't really know.
It is far easier to meet people at SMX, and as long as the quality of speakers and subjects remains high, I can see a lot of people migrating to SMX. However, it's hard to know what the SES series will be like in 12 or 18 months...
Sounds great, wish I was there. Hopefully now that I've joined the "agency" world, maybe a future reality.
I would imagine that after this first show, especially with more intensive Q&A's, that will be a further signal to the presenters that more advanced topics are not only encouraged but expected by the attendees.
Would be pretty exciting being to attend a show where everyone brought their A game. Maybe you'd even see inverted sessions, where it is 25% presentation, 75% Q&A instead of the reverse.
Jane, I hope you don't mind me using "kiwi" as an example. I wasn't trying to startle you. I just didn't want to go for the classic-but-tired "jaguar" example of how the same word means different things to different people. No harm was intended, but I hope you didn't mind.
I believe it was on Jane's second day in the office when we formally asked her if the nickname we had given her during the interview process, "the kiwi," was acceptable. Luckily, her response was quite positive :)
Also, check out the graphic at the top of her profile page. :)
That was all Matt's work, but I was delighted with it.
"We" = Rand, who was going overboard in trying not to "offend" our new hire. I don't think he knew that native New Zealanders are actually called "kiwis."
I think it seemed like a terrific, topical observation + clearly meant in good fun to most of us in the audience (at least judging by the accompanying laughter). I hope Jane didn't take it the wrong way either!
Haha, I thought it was funny! Lisa, Tamar, Rhea and I were having a fantastic time being called upon up in the front row :) However, you must also pick on Rebecca today as well.
I've definitely been more impressed with the Q&A's than the actual sessions so far here. This was particularly true with the Duplicate Content forum this morning, when I felt that the presentations could have been skipped entirely & just gone right to the questions from the audience. It was a much more lively and informative debate, and I think Danny realized that when he asked a question at the end as to the level of targeting by the speakers.
The highlight for me so far has been the by-play (or was it just a little more than that?) between Tim Mayer and Matt Cutts in the Personalized Search session...some really revealing things about both engines' perspectives on personalized search in that one, I thought.
The Q&A is usually the better part of any conference. However in this instance the questions are much more intelligent and high-level than simple questions on Meta tags that one usually sees at PubCon.
It's great to finally be at a conference that seems to have some value.
And I think Tim Mayer sumarized it best when he said, "Yahoo started as a media company, Google started as a search company" in trying to distinguish their ideologies.
Exactly my impression, Kwyjibo. I also thought Tim implied that Yahoo sought to be more transparent wrt what the user data was being used for & also a bit less invasive than was Google. -- I.e. Del.icio.us bookmarks and the like, rather than a "web history" for every page the Google toolbar returns PR for, not just what users look at while doing a Google search...
I'm looking foward to reading your coverage of the sessions.
A less formal Q&A conference setting sounds perfect to me. Cant wait to go to the next SMX. Nice work DS.
Agreed: Danny has done a wonderful job. I like this format and style more and more.
Keep the live posts coming for those of us too cheap or too busy (or both) to attend.
I'll try and write one more "live" post today and then Rebecca and I will compile our notes and create an in-depth write-up.