Jon Sobel of Technorati has published the latest State of the Blogosphere Report for 2010 including stats from 7,200 blogger respondents world-wide. Started in 2004 by Dave Sifry, this annual report has provided insight into the growth of the blogging community and helps answer questions like: who is blogging, why, what are they blogging about, how often and where are they blogging from.

A fine looking audience at PRSA International 2010. There are several roles to be played at successful industry conferences. Most of my experience is specific to Search, PR and Direct Marketing events - assuming social media and interactive fit in there somewhere as well. What roles? There's the conference organizer and all that comes with the logistics of running the event, programming content and facilitating sponsors and advertisers.

MarketingSherpa has done it again with their SEM report for 2011 . With the help of Lead Author, Research Analyst Jen Doyle, they've put together an excellent resource for marketers looking for strategic guidance as well as real data about search engine marketing. This particular report focuses on Search Engine Optimization with an emphasis on the interplay of search and social media,

As companies test and deploy social media marketing efforts, the organizational structures for effective social media teams begin to evolve. On the client side, Public Relations often leads social media but that doesn't mean other functional areas of the business aren't involved as well, especially Marketing and Customer Service. Being more social and by proxy, engaged in social media, is new territory for most organizations and hiring outside expertise is pretty common.

Being the good content marketers that we are, you may have noticed that TopRank Marketing has recently been publishing a monthly Online Marketing Newsletter called "Tips from the Top". While we haven't done a lot to promote, thousands of subscribers have joined in a pretty short period of time. I've started newsletters several times in the 10 or so years we've had this agency but it's the most recent effort that has really resonated with readers.

I've been attending WebmasterWorld's Pubcon conference in Las Vegas for at least 6 years although I didn't liveblog that first one for some reason. In fact I first interviewed Pubcon founder, Brett Tabke , in 2005. By no means am I an "old timer" since the show has been running for a lot longer than I've been attending but I do have some history with it. When people ask me about great conference options to learn practical SEO and PPC,

While putting together a presentation recently, I assembled a simple check list of considerations for a social media marketing effort. We've written quite a bit about developing a social media roadmap, strategy and measurement in the past, but there are some important questions to answer when it comes to realizing what's involved. Companies can test and run tactics in silos but eventually,

My final liveblogg session of SES Chicago is all about SEO for Blogs and Feeds aka blog optimization . This is a session I know a little something about, having presented on it at SES 4-5 times over the years. Moderated by Adam Audette, the speakers included Sally Falkow and Michael Gray. Sally opened things up to talk about Feeds. All blog platforms come with Feeds but there are many other things you can do with feeds.

The second session on my liveblogging hitllist for SES Chicago is the "Duplicate Content and Multiple Sites" moderated by Adam Audette. Unfortunatley, Michael Gray was not able to be there, so things started up with Susan Moskwa from Google and Shari Thurow was added on the fly. What is duplicate content ? Identical or substantially similar content. Also multiple URLs with the same content. Google realizes that duplication can be deliberate or accidental. Basically,

My first liveblog for SES Chicago didn't happen until day three. The lucky topic? Advanced Keyword Research presented by Ron Jones CEO of Symetri Internet Marketing. Ron and I are mutual retweet friends and while I've read many of his articles on ClickZ, I hadn't seen him speak before. Ron started things out by taking a poll to qualify the audience )smart( to see how many have done keyword research before. Most have.

Many companies develop products and services relying on their networks and various types of "do it yourself" marketing to get the word out. As companies grow, especially in the software and tech business, subject matter expertise in technology can only go so far when it comes to building a brand, creating influence and inspiring the kind of word of mouth that boosts sales. While the founders might be great at developing their product and evangelizing it,

In order for companies to realize the maximum benefit and impact from social media marketing, the pre requisite for goal setting must be a certain level of understanding about the nature of online communities, social media sharing web sites and applications. Unrealistic expectations based on a lack of knowledge about the social web is far too expensive to ignore. At Search Marketing conferences,

I'm here at the PRSA International conference in Washington D.C. and the conversations about social media are to be found everywhere. The halls, the exhibit floor, sessions and even at the fantastic dinner hosted by Shonali Burke last night. Yesterday I gave a 4 hour workshop or "SEO Bootcamp for Communicators" as it was titled.

Content marketing is essential for B2B businesses providing both qualitative and quantitative returns. And while 6 in 10 marketers are planning to increase content marketing spends this year, success-rates still vary greatly as it's a new concept for most. Maria Pergolino, director of marketing for Marketo )a TopRank Online Marketing client( shared a presentation at the Marketo User Summit on getting the message out, focused on social media and content marketing tips/tricks.

Todd Forsyth, Vice President of Global Campaigns, Salesforce.com gave an energetic presentation at the Marketo 2010 User Summit )Marketo is a TopRank Online Marketing client( on how Salesforce aligns marketing and sales. Following is a summary of the highlights of his presentation - which includes key takeaways for B2B marketing and sales teams: Sales and marketing alignment are second nature at Salesforce. Today, we'll explore how as a brand,

A few months ago, the PR folks working with IBM Press sent me a copy of "Audience, Relevance and Search: Targeting Web Audiences with Relevant Content" by a trio of authors: James Mathewson, Frank Donatone and Cynthia Fishel. I have somewhat of a connection with IBM Press because of editing the Social Media Marketing chapter of Mike Moran and Bill Hunt's Search Engine Marketing Inc., 2nd Edition.

Our digital marketing agency, TopRank Marketing, gets to work with some very smart client marketers. We extend an invitation to those clients who have important contributions to make in the form of tips, insights and perspective to write guest posts and I'm happy to share the following from Jon Miller, VP Marketing and co-founder of Marketo, and author of Modern B2B Marketing blog.

While companies are hiring consultants, internal community managers, testing social media marketing management software and making other kinds of investments in social media marketing, there are a number of things, despite making those investments, many businesses are doing to sabotage their social media success. We could probably list a lot more than seven of these social media sins, but I'll focus on some of the most important things I've been observing. 1.

With our roots in the public relations and media relations world, TopRank Online Marketing has a deep appreciation for the strategy, storytelling and networking skills that are essential for successful PR campaigns. We've also talked a lot here about the intersection of both SEO for PR and Social Media with PR . It's an incredible combination that increases reach, engagement and delivers even more value to business than Media Relations alone. On October 17th ,

Checking out new tools is part of what we do to stay current and find ways to be more efficient with Search Engine Optimization and Social Media Marketing. Sometimes a few tools offer interesting features or stand out for some reason and rather than keep those goodies to ourselves, share them with you. Reinvigorate - Real-time web analytics with heat maps. Ooh, the colors are so pretty - all the way to the bank. This service is A-M-A-Z-ing. Monthly, daily,