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With six weeks to go before SES London 2009, it’s time to build a business case for going to the definitive event for UK and European marketers, corporate decision makers, webmasters and search engine marketing (SEM) specialists, including pay per click (PPC) advertisers and search engine optimization (SEO) consultants.

Yes, yes, I know there’s a recession on both sides of the pond. I read The Economist. (I loved the article in the print edition on December 30, 2008, which reminded us that Alfred Kahn, one of President Jimmy Carter’s economic advisers, was chided in 1978 for using the “R” word. So, Mr Kahn, in his next speech, replaced the offending word, saying, “We’re in danger of having the worst banana in 45 years.”)

So, how do you make the business case that you need to go to an SEM conference during the worst banana since 1978?

I would argue that it is penny wise and pound foolish to miss SES London 2009 just because we’re in a recession. In fact, it’s probably more important to go now than ever before.

So, what makes Search Engine Strategies London a not-to-be-missed industry event? And what makes it particularly important for people who have attended in the past to make a return visit this year?

First, SES London 2009 is the place where the search industry gathers to chart the year ahead. The pace of change in this industry hasn’t slowed down. This search industry keeps reinventing itself at an amazing pace and last year’s cutting-edge program already is dated in some areas. You can’t afford to be left behind.

Second, it’s where you can learn how to calculate the ROI of your search marketing efforts from top search experts. Now, I’m just one of the 48 conference speakers who will be making presentations at SES London 2009. And I plan to share some case studies of how optimized press releases generated:
• $200 million in B2B leads for Symmetricom’s chip-scale atomic clocks,
• More than $2.5 million in ticket sales for Southwest Airlines, and
• Almost 1.3 million searches for “florists” on SuperPages.com.

I’ll also explain how combining blog outreach with press release optimization generated:
• A record 450,000 unique visitors to The Christian Science Monitor in 24 hours,
• A record 88,000 entries into Parents magazine’s cover kid photo contest, and
• A record 1,100 attendees to the Wharton Economic Summit.

Now, I think I’m supposed to say, “Past performance is no indicator of future success.” And I should disclose that SES became a client about 14 months ago.

But check out the list of speakers who will be presenting at SES London 2009. I know most of them. I’ve heard many of them speak at previous Search Engine Strategies conferences. And I know they have similar success stories to tell.

If you want to hear more than 200 of their success stories from 2008, just go to SESConferenceExpo’s Channel on YouTube. Or watch the three SES London 2008 Roundup Reels below.

So, can your organization really afford to skip SES London 2009 just because there’s a recession? Missing a not-to-be-missed industry event would be penny wise and pound foolish. Skipping the event because you went last year would be “bananas.”

Now, you could simply cut your print magazine, print newspaper and other offline advertising budgets. But that isn’t going to grow your business online and it isn’t going to help you weather the storm any better than your competitors.

The only way you can do this is by learning the SEM strategies, PPC tactics and SEO tips that generate a measurable marketing ROI. And then you need to keep learning what’s coming next in the constantly evolving world of search, and how you can profit from those changes.

And where can you do that? You already know where I’m headed. You can learn all this by going to SES London 2009.

Motley Fool has reported that holiday spending at eBay this year is lower than last year, despite the fact that one would expect them to be a good source of lower priced gifts in these hard economic times.

Meanwhile Amazon has reported higher sales numbers over last year.

Are people forgoing secondhand for discounted new items? Or is there another reason eBay is being bypassed?

To truly see what is happening I would like to be able to track the number of sales being done through Craigslist. Given you have to generally pay for shipping when buying through eBay, is it possible people are going through Craigslist to save the shipping and increase the buying power of their total dollar spend?

If we had these numbers maybe they would give eBay a way to continue their growth potential.

Online spending did have a spurt for the last weekend before Christmas as we reported the other day.

Could eBay have another growth spurt if they made localization easier to organize? Right now they have hit a wall, but it could be one they can move by making the interface a little more intuitive for new users and add better access to local auctions.

If you guys over at eBay use these ideas don’t forget to drop a few bucks in my Paypal account.

You didn’t read that wrong. Online spending increased by 98% last weekend, compared to last year’s last weekend before Christmas.

A winter weather event in the Northeast likely caused the surge, which may have come at the expense of brick and mortar stores. But let’s take the good news where we can get it.

Even better news if you look at a historical context is that 2007 was an unusually high spending year compared to the years around it. It kind of bucked the trend. If the growth had been more steady, a lot of the nervousness about the online economy may not exist.

Here are the stats:

Related Reading:
Holiday E-Commerce Sales Flat Overall According to Latest comScore Data
Holiday E-Commerce Update: Spending Flat Last Week
Holiday E-Commerce Spending Up 7% Year-Over-Year Last Week
Cyber Monday Spending Up 15% to $846 Million
Online Black Friday Sales Up 1% Over Last Year
Preparing for the Worst: Bad Online Economic Data Just in Time for Black Friday

With the economy in the pooper and 5 fewer holiday shopping days than last year, the latest data from comScore will show whether you’re a half glass full or half glass empty kind of person.

As the 2008 holiday shopping season draws to a close, online sales are trending flat for the year.

If you look at just Thanksgiving through December 19th, and remember, there were five fewer days in 2008, sales were up 5%. I’m half glass full, so I’m loving that number:

Cyber Monday wasn’t the top online shopping day of the year, either. It came in third:

Here’s our journey up to this point:
Holiday E-Commerce Update: Spending Flat Last Week (12/15/08)
Holiday E-Commerce Spending Up 7% Year-Over-Year Last Week (12/10/08)
Online Black Friday Sales Up 1% Over Last Year (12/1/08)
Preparing for the Worst: Bad Online Economic Data Just in Time for Black Friday (11/26/08)

Brad J. Ward is an online communciations coordinator at Butler University. Though he hails from a small academic institution, he’s unveiled a whale of a problem going on at Facebook (read, don’t skim, for the exciting conclusion).

As high school seniors across the country are being accepted into Universities for the Fall 2009 semester, groups for 2013 grads are popping up on the popular social network. There’s just one problem. It seems that one Patrick Kelly of Plano Senior High School is planning on attending a bunch of colleges - 500 to be exact. For that is how many 2013 groups he has created.

Ward rightly points out that the big problem here is that Patrick Kelly likely represents a data collection company that could end up being lifelong “friends” of millions of incoming freshman each year.

They also control the administrative privileges for each group.

But Brad Ward didn’t stop at just blogging about this problem. He’s got people talking on Twitter, organizing via Google Docs, and submitting Flickr pics regarding the problem.

The effort has identified other names associated with the group squatting including Ron Tressler and Justin Gaither, and he even has a company suspect: College Prowler. What a fitting name!

He even found an ad by College Prowler seeking unpaid interns to set up all this, as Ward rightly deems it, “dirty work.”

But get this: College Prowler responded by pulling the fake names that are associated with their company (Patrick Kelly was not, as it turns out) and pulling the administrative privileges. That is quite impressive. College Prowler says that they see social media as essential to their college guides business, but I think most of us would agree that they could go about social media in a different way.

Here’s a solution: College Prowler could create a community around its brand of college guides by identifying their Facebook groups with their brand. The group could be “College Prowler’s Guide to Butler University Class of 2013.”

So, College Prowler, and others interested in using social media, check out these posts from Search Engine Watch and sister site ClickZ to learn how to truly leverage social media to maximize those marketing dollars (and time!):

Facebook: Get Educated on the Hottest Social Media Platform
Understanding and Aligning the Value of Social Media
SocialTwist’s Tell-A-Friend Button Enables Word-of-Mouth and Social Media Marketing
A Social Media Marketing Primer
Social Media Link Building: From Fantasy to Reality
18-34 Year Old Responds to Email Marketing Over Social Network Marketing
How Blogs Drive More Sales Than Social Media Sites
93% of Americans Expect Companies to Have Social Media Presence
Using Twitter as an Education Tool
Less is More: What Social Media and Electronics Can Teach the Establishment
Go Slow With Video Ads in Social Media

comScore’s November 2008 search engine rankings are out and Google remains at the top, gaining on its share while AOL is the only other one to make gains, albeit slight, month-over-month.

November’s searches were down 3% from October, likely due to the elections being held at the beginning of the month. But unfortunately, the decline corresponds with online retail sales for the month.

By the way, YouTube is still giving Yahoo a run for its money:

The sad news for the book publishing industry is that book store sales are down. One of the biggest book publishers have recently reported that their book store sales are down by a whopping 10%! This …
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there has never been a better time to self publish your own books

If you are looking for corporate Christmas gift ideas (or Hanukkah gift ideas), let me recommend 10 business books, search engine marketing books and search engine optimization books (that you may also want to give yourself as a present).

And unlike the typical book reviews, you can decide which business, SEM or SEO books are worth buying and wrapping up for the holidays by checking out the video interviews with the authors below, who have all spoken at the Search Engine Strategies conference and expo series this year. I spoke with him after his keynote

Winning Results with Google AdWords by Andrew Goodman: This is at the top of my list because 97% of search engine marketers use Google AdWords, according to SEMPO’s most recent State of the Market survey. Andrew is also the world’s leading authority on Google AdWords. (He will be speaking about Ads in a Quality Score World at SES London on Feb. 18, 2009.) The forward was written by Danny Sullivan, Editor-in-Chief of Search Engine Land. Matt Cutts, head of Google’s Webspam team, likes Andrew’s book: “Review: Winning Results with Google AdWords.” (Plus, Andrew gave me an autographed copy at SES Chicago.) But, you can also make up your own mind by watching the video interview below, where Andrew talks about his book (and gives a sneak preview of what you can expect at SES Toronto 2009, which he will be organizing and hosting.)

Andrew Goodman on Google Adwords

Click: What Millions of People are Doing Online and Why it Matters by Bill Tancer: This is the book that I want to buy for myself for Christmas. Bill is General Manager of Hitwise, which reports on how more than 25 million Internet users (10 million in the U.S.) interact with over 1 million websites across more than 160 industries. I interviewed Bill after his keynote speech at SES Chicago 2008, which was entitled, “We Are What We Click.”

Bill Tancer on Search Patterns in 2008

Search Engine Marketing, Inc.: Driving Search Traffic to Your Company’s Web Site by Mike Moran and Bill Hunt: If this isn’t the bible of SEM, it is at least the new testament. I just recommended it yesterday to one of my brand name clients. The forward was written by David Meerman Scott, bestselling author of “The Rules of Marketing and PR.” I interviewed Bill following one of his presentations at SES San Jose 2008.

Greg Jarboe interviews Bill Hunt about his new book

Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy by Lawrence Lessig: A Stanford Law School Professor and Wired columist, Lawrence was also another one of the keynote speakers at SES Chicago 2008. Byron Gordon of SEO-PR interviewed him last week at the show.

Lawrence Lessig on Copyright laws at SES Chicago 2008

Web Analytics: An Hour a Day by Avinash Kaushik: Okay, so Avinash is a Buckeye from The Ohio State University (and I’m a Wolverine from the University of Michigan). Nevertheless, he’s also the author of the highly rated web analytics blog Occam’s Razor and the Analytics Evangelist for Google. So, I can overlook his alma mater and focus on his expertise in web analytics strategy. I interviewed Avinash after his presentation at SES New York 2008.

Web Analytics Recap with Avinash Kaushik at SES NY 2008

The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google by Nicholas Carr: Nick was one of the keynote speakers at SES London 2008 and SES New York 2008. He is also a neighbor of mine — the next town over. I interviewed him back in February.

The Big Switch by Nicholas Carr

Always Be Testing: The Complete Guide to Google Website Optimizer by Bryan Eisenberg and John Quarto-von Tivadar: Bryan is a New York Times bestselling author and John is his chief scientist at FutureNow. They show you how to test and tune your site to get more leads, sales, and profit by using Google’s free A/B and multivariate website testing tool, Google Website Optimizer. Bryan will also be speaking at SES London 2009 at the Measuring Success in a 2.0 World session. Mitch Joel, President of Twist Image, interviewed Bryan following his keynote presentation at SES Toronto 2008.

Bryan Eisenberg Always be Testing: Google Website Optimizer

Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob by Lee Siegel: After his keynote speech at SES San Jose 2008, I interviewed Lee. Actually, to be more precise, I attempted to interview Lee, who was more interested in beating up on Gawker.

Lee Siegel Punches the Internet

Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions by Tim Ash: Before I interviewed Tim at SES New York 2008, I extracted a promise that he’d show me his best salsa dance steps. Hey, I don’t shill just anybody’s book.

Optimizing Landing Pages — Tim Ash’s Tips and… Footwork

Six Pixels of Separation by Mitch Joel: Okay, so you can’t buy Mitch’s new book until next year. But I only had nine Christmas gift ideas so far and most lists have either the top 10 books or top 10 Christmas gifts. And it doesn’t hurt to get a sneak preview, right? Mona Elesseily of Page Zero Media interviewed Mitch at SES Totonto 2008 about his upcoming book.

Six Pixels of Separation and Universal Search by Mitch Joel

comScore has been providing weekly updates on holiday e-commerce spending and the reports have been like a roller coaster.

First, we started down, with November spending down 4% over last year. Then we took a gentle climb on Black Friday (1% increase) followed by a steeper incline on Cyber Monday, which saw sales rise 15% over last year. The week that started with Cyber Monday had an overall lift of 7%.

But what goes up must come down, with last week’s sales falling flat year-over-year.

Looking at the glass half full, considering last week’s downright awful economic news, it’s almost a miracle the sales were flat instead of down. Unemployment increased and a $50 billion ponzi scheme was exposed. (Those unemployment numbers didn’t even include the thousands of layoffs announced/performed last week.)

It’s starting to get a bit late to have anything ordered online delivered to your door, so if you’re looking to stay in the game, you might want to consider expedited shipping offers. Or if you have brick and mortar stores, drive foot traffic through the doors with printable coupons or mobile coupons if you’re especially awesome.

E-consultancy has just issued an Online PR Industry Benchmarking Report, based on a survey of 300 UK marketers and PR professionals who work for both in-house company teams and for agencies.

Among the key findings: A surprisingly large percentage of retained PR budgets are being spent on Online PR. Company respondents report that 39% of their PR activity is online whilst agencies report that 47% of their clients’ retained fees come from online PR.

The results also show that when companies outsource Online PR to agencies or specialists, 51% of companies are using PR agencies but a significant percentage are using search marketing agencies (29%) and web development agencies (22%) to develop and deliver Online PR strategy.

Deeper in the report was another interesting news nugget: “Agencies and specialists should note that levels of client satisfaction are not encouraging and they may need to improve their Online PR knowledge and offering. A fifth of clients (20%) are very satisfied with their agency?s level of Online PR knowledge, 28% are moderately satisfied, 19% are neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, 15% are mildly dissatisfied and 13% are very dissatisfied. Equally, clients recognize that their own knowledge could be improved with 49% saying that their Online PR knowledge is good and 12% poor.”

So, where can PR agencies and clients go to improve their online PR knowledge?

As I mentioned a week ago in my post, “Half of British and Irish Marketers Use SEO for PR Purposes,” all marketers need to do is attend Search Engine Strategies London, February 17-19, 2009.

Since then, some of the speakers at SES London 2009 have been posted to the site. And, yes, I should disclose that I’ll be speaking at the “Online Video Update - The Next Wave” session on Tuesday, Feb. 17, the “News Search SEO” session on Wednesday, Feb. 18, and the “Beyond Linkbait: Getting Authoritative Mentions Online” session on Thursday, Feb. 19.

But there are a number of other sessions at SES London 2009 that PR agencies and clients should attend to improve their online PR knowledge. This includes:

– Universal & Blended Search
– SEO Through Blogs & Feeds
– Video & Podcast SEO
– Link Building Basics
– Keywords & Content: Search Marketing Foundations
– Brand & Reputation Management
– Search Term Research & Targeting
– Duplicate Content & Multiple Site Issues

Now, if some of these terms aren’t familiar to PR people yet, well that’s why they need go to the conference. I’ve been combining SEO and PR for almost six years. And during one of my presentations at SES Chicago 2008, I shared five case studies of press releases that generated a measurable ROI:
– $200 million in B2B leads for Symmetricom,
– $2.5 million in ticket sales for Southwest Airlines,
– 1.3 million searches for “florists” on SuperPages.com,
– 450,000 unique visitors to The Christian Science Monitor,
– 88,000 entries into a photo contest for Parents magazine.

So, I think that SES London 2009 is exactly the right conference to attend to improve your Online PR knowledge and offering. And who am I to make such a bold claim? I’m the guy in the photo above with the sock puppet on his hand at SES London 2008. The one on the left. (Have I disclosed that SES London is a client?)