Integrating Search Marketing and My Experience at MORCon 2013

It looks like distance is not a hindrance when it comes to sharing my expertise and insights to people, and at the same time learning back from them. From Tacloban City, I was fortunate to fly to Manila to speak at Mastering Online Ranking Conference (MORCon) 2013. MORCon 2013 was held at Tanza Oasis Hotel and Resort, Cavite from October 26 to 27. It’s an annual event of intense SEO and online marketing learning organized by SEO Organization Philippines.

 

Integrating search marketing

My topic was “Integrated SEO: Combining Different SEO Strategies, Tactics, Techniques and Styles”. I chose this topic because I believe it can’t be searched in Google or found anywhere else on the Internet, otherwise, I should have shared links or videos for home reading or viewing.

My primary aim for choosing my topic is to guide SEOs and online marketers in the Philippines to evolve in to entrepreneurs, masterminds, and globally competitive business owners and professionals. Particularly, I wanted Filipino SEOs to become not only tacticians but also strategists, not only technically advanced but also fundamentally mature, and not only followers but also leaders.

SEOs should never be employees forever, doing all the routine tasks of link building, generating reports and other procedures assigned to them by their bosses. Some of them are even doing those tasks without even understanding what they are meant for – that’s the common role of employees. With my presentation, I wanted them to give the whole picture of SEO and marketing to learn how it is to be a master mind SEO who knows how to integrate different marketing strategies, tactics, techniques and styles.

As we know it, search engine results, particularly Google, are already showing integrated search results, such as links from social media (e.g., Facebook pages showing number of likes and people talking about it), communities (e.g., reviews and ratings from community sites), Google Authorship Markup (which shows an author’s picture and number of Google+ followers), in-depth articles, and other results that have not been displayed before. In other words, search marketers should already learn how to integrate various online and offline strategies and tactics, like social media marketing, content marketing, paid search marketing, and relationship marketing.

To learn more about my talk, you can find, view, and download it below. I made it something that can talk itself so that it would be understood by its readers even without me explaining and elaborating it.

My personal experience

Okay, I must admit I joined MORCon, not to listen and read to presentations, but to observe people, especially my online friends that I have not met personally before. I was there, not to learn from their tools, tactics and techniques, but to learn from their strategies and personal styles. In other words, I was there to dig important lessons that I won’t find online or search on Google. I was there to discover things that I will only find by being physically present there.  And I got those things! They are priceless, and the registration fee of Php 3,000, which already included transportation, food and accommodation, is nothing compared to their true worth.

Speaking of presentations, I was actually hooked up with the different styles the speakers have shown to us. They also shared various tips and actual experiences which I believe are very useful in revolutionizing the search and marketing industry in the Philippines.

Speaking of my own speech and presentation, I honestly say that I have many areas to improve. This was my 7th public speaking and my 2nd speaking engagement in a national conference. I have no excuses for not making my talk perfect, but the following are some of the important lessons in public speaking that I want to share to other aspiring speakers.

1. Try not to accept several speaking engagements in a short span of time or the quality of your talk and presentation might be compromised, especially if you don’t have a team to help you. I actually had 3 speaking engagements from October 19-27, and the cramming scenarios are pushing me too much beyond my limit (well, it was actually challenging but I won’t do it again J).

2. Invest time and effort to study your audience. We have to deliver what they are expecting to eat and digest. For a hardcore SEO audience, softcore discussions might not be their cup of tea. I think I did not share either a hardcore or a softcore topic – I shared a mind-blowing topic! lol

3. If it’s your first time, try to plead to the organizers to not make you the first speaker. I was the first speaker. Perhaps it’s because my surname starts with “A”. I should have begged to let the non-first-timers speak first so that I can observe them and the reaction of the audience. J

4. If you have 30-45 minutes allotted time to talk, create a presentation that will fit to it. My deck was about 90 slides. I was just in my 20th slide when I got a warning that I already had 5 minutes left. That made me to fast forward my talk and forgot to elaborate some of the slides with my own experiences.

5. Practice practice practice. Have confidence but don’t be too confident. Practice makes perfect. Do I need to explain it further?

 

The people I met and the things that stayed in my brain

The thing is… I already had a memory gap. I am poor in memorizing people’s name that I met. I can only remember the extraordinary or the crazy things that they did that also affected me. J I have to search their names on Facebook so that I don’t get it wrong. Anyway, the following are the people that I met and some of the things that I still remember from them.

Kim Tyrone Agapito – the culprit why I became a resource speaker and perhaps the culprit why I became the first speaker. 🙂

Nikko – the first person I talked to during the event. I had to approach someone at the meeting place so that I don’t get lost. Hehe. I’ve talked too much to him more than anyone else from Chowking Blue Wave to Tanza Oasis and back.

Sheila Dela Pena – Thanks for the note of encouragement. Her hard work was palpable.

Roel Manarang and Jan Manarang – My roommates, who are young yet awesome people who are social media experts from North Social Media.

Glen Dimaandal – My bed mate. Lol! Cool guy and internet marketing expert from Emerson Electric.

Juanito Cell Jacela – The Joker master of ceremonies.

Ricky Refuerzo – The humble Mr. President.

Jayson Bagio and his team – the guest post guru.

Zaldy Dalizay – the Paypal payment recipient. Lol

Jonha Revesencio –  the flirt (just kidding). The sweet and makulet na social media specialist.

Valerie Joy Deveza – the social media girl in her pajamas. Haha

Paul Agabin – the chocolate guy.

Sean Patrick Si – that was a great talk.

Hans A. Koch – the questioning guy at the front. 🙂

Venchito Jun – the one who interviewed me prior to the event

Eduardo Joven – the food master and Internet entrepreneur

Nina Mission Estenzo – Six Sigma – did I spell it right?

Almer Viloria – Thanks for the picture 🙂

My long-time Facebook friends that I just met personally at MORCon, namely, Ron Leyba, Lloyd Herrera, Edwin Pineda, AJ Ferias (Alvin? I was looking for AJ), and Rex Leslie Malvas.

My new friends Myra Rose Ilisan, Carissa Coles, Vier Marqueses, Don Garcia, Zafar Ahmed, Grant Merriel, Mike Catuira.

Friends that I’ve met during the event but I can’t find their names on social media. Hehe.

And of course the projector! If you know what I mean.

If I would have to suggest for the future MORCon, I would suggest it would be held at the heart of the city so that more people can join, talk and write about it.

Kudos to the people behind the SEO Organization for the hard work and great effort they have done just to make this event possible, affordable, fun, and rewarding.

I’m looking forward to MORCon 2014, and I hope I can attend with my own employees on that event.