I'm sitting ten feet from the imposing Todd Friesen and Greg Boser, who are rocking out with their links out on the Better Ways panel at SMX. Joining them are Christine Churchill, Alex Bennert, Aaron Wall, Jim Boykin, a mustachey Cameron Olthuis, and Danny Sullivan at the moderating helm. Danny is doing his usual adorable ranty banter schtick, Cameron looks confused, Jim and Aaron look shaggy, Alex looks very prim and proper, Christine is looking stunning, and Todd and Greg look like they're going to administer some wedgies to various SEO nerds after the session wraps up. The audience is giggly and the panelists are looking pretty goofy, so this should be a fun 1 hour and 15 minutes.
As Jane mentioned in her post yesterday, the conference has been interesting so far, with the session Q&As being the best part of each session. Usually at SES shows, the Q&As are sort of stuffy (with the exception of last day clinics and workshops), but at SMX all of the Q&As are lively and engaging. Though there has been mixed reaction about whether this conference is advanced enough for attendees, the general buzz I've been hearing is that, so far, SMX is shaping up to be a formidable conference series.
(Okay, hold on, Greg's trying to sound important...)
Now Danny's refusing to give the microphone to someone. What a bastard.
Anyway, I have 52 minutes of battery life left on my laptop, and Michael McDonald is sitting next to me being a pest, so I'll have to wrap up my thoughts here. I like what SMX has offered so far, but also think that they could stand to go a little more "advanced" in some of their tracks (even though I've heard some basic questions from various audience members). Jane and I will provide a more comprehensive conference wrap up later this week, and I'll try to do my standard silly conference series blog posts (comics, quotes), but I may have to superset them with SES Toronto coverage because I'm not sure I'll have time to get to it before leaving again.
Speaking of SES, I thought I'd state the following:
Dear SES,
I'm sorry I cheated on you. As you may have suspected, I've been spending a lot of time lately talking about SMX and getting to know it, and I'm ashamed to say it, but SMX is just so sexy and alluring, and I couldn't help myself. I mean come on, they have actual food during lunch. And free wi-fi. And a swanky speaker/press room. And curves in all the right places. And SMX laughs at all my jokes. So, I'm sorry SES. No hard feelings?
By: Rebecca Kelley
Observing Better Ways
Events
The author's views are entirely his or her own (excluding the unlikely event of hypnosis) and may not always reflect the views of Moz.
It's not two timing, more like having an open relationship.
I guess that's fair.
Besides, I've heard rumors that SES is playing the field anyway. There even seem to be photos floating around the net, seen partying it up from city to city with different partners every night.
Hi Chick, Just got back from meeting the SEOmoz crew in their offices. Such a cool office guys!
I agree that the SMX conference was super sexy, and content was good, but what made the conference Advanced was more the questions asked by the people and not so much the presentation. It was more advanced than previous SES conferences I've been too, but maybe not as advanced as I would have liked it to be.
The speakers that actually had valuable advanced presentations just spoke so fast you didn't get time to comprehend it, never mind writing it down! Was that like a trick? Speak fast, that will teach them...lol
All in all though it's been a really good conference. The votes from the Norwegian jury says: SMX 10 points (ok only Europeans will get that..)
Norwegians give everyone 10s....
Rebecca, you two-timing conferencee!
Does this mean you have to give back all the swag?
Perhaps you can just be friends. ;)
I have to agree that the sessions weren't nearly as advanced as I had hoped, though they were leaps and bounds better than the PubCon series.
and of all the parites attended, the mozzers threw the best! thanks guys!
Just wanted to clarify here because on a second reading that "sounded" kinda mean:
The PubCon series does hold value, through not for the type of person who would attend SMX Advanced.
Kwyjibo, were you the guy I stood next to at the back of the room during the keynote?
Dude - it's Raffi! He was at the party last night - cool goatee thing, big smile, bald...
(Rand prays that he's remembering the right guy)
Yep - balding is part of the Kwyjibo definition, though every rule has an exception ;)
That and being AWESOME.
aww...now you got me blushing ;)
The Moz party was definitely a fun way to wrap up SMX, it was great meeting everyone.
You two timers....
Also how can you call Greg imposng after did the Paris trip with him... he is a teddy bear....
Hey, I noticed a lot of Mozzers got recognition from the panelists or called upon as "examples" during QandA sessions. Nice job of branding and getting yourselves out there, it's great to see everyone having so much fun during the sessions.
Is anyone going to talk about that last session... the one that you are off-limits to talk about for a month?I think you can tells us if it "met" or "exceeded" you expectations… or if you got anything good from it.
Well, that probably depends on the person listening - to me it didn't seem like it was worth making such a fuss over.
Sorry..left this reply in a bit of haste and it's an unfinished thought.
I didn't necissarily think the "secrecy" was worth making such a fuss over. We were all a room full of adults who I think are more reponsible than that.
However, I hope I can say that it was a peek into how some of their minds work in thinking about search.
I'll second that. Some of the speakers had a few good points, some of them would have been laughed at in a 101 session.
Well - 1 of them anyway (no names - I'm not a gossip!)
I'm thinking of enrolling in some classes at my local community college.
Mate you are enrolling in college during the summer purely for the female eye candy walking around campus...
mozzers are generally know for their honesty... so fess up mate!
All I can say is..."Doorway pages are back!" Yeah!
Did they ever go away?
I'd say that 95% of the material from that panel was not new to me, but 5% new material for a guy like me is a treasure trove and worth attending the conference all by itself.
For others, there was (I hope) more like 20-30% of material that is totally new and truly valuable.
Now you have my curiousity!!!
Super sexy SMX! I wish I was in the Organic track with you right now, though... I am in Paid and it's not quite as much fun... we don't have blackhats on the panel over here, after all.
There are words made popular by SNL that come to mind right now!!!
Wow - after all of Danny's jokes about the Paid track having a better room, better chairs, better views, better speakers, etc... I was actually starting to believe that I missed out on something. Thanks for the clarification Jane.
Oh, and as for the Blackhats on the panel, don't worry. They've both come clean and said that was "in a past life". Which we all believed.
The paid advertising world always tells you it has a more posh environment. How else do you expect they pay for that corner office?
Natural/Organic has the real deal edgy hipster SEO's. All content, little fluff :)