I have been doing SEO for the past 5 years, so I am entering my 6th year in SEO. The beginning of this awesome endeavor started at a real estate website design and hosting company called Advanced Access. Then, I was lucky enough to be hired on to the in-house SEO team at Bisnar | Chase Personal Injury Attorneys, LLP in December of 2010 and have been doing that ever since. First a very short back story: I have been building websites since 1998, shortly after I graduated high school. In 2008 I finally started seriously considering what I wanted to accomplish in college, so I finished all of the classes that resulted in a website design certificate upon completion in early 2010. Little did I realize the opportunities that would present themselves before me as a result of this accomplishment. I couldn’t imagine the opportunities that would eventually come my way.
The SEO Industry Almost Randomly Found Me
While I had been doing website design since 1998, I was only generally aware of SEO and its importance. When I started learning all of the technical and creative aspects of online marketing, I was hooked. I realized that I was already doing many of the things that resulted in higher rankings – image optimization, proper website structure, proper coding (for the time period), and other aspects of website design and development. How I fell into this industry is really not that remarkable of a story. I had been working in the New Accounts department of Advanced Access for a year and a half at that point. Due to company restructure it was decided that I would be one of the people moving into their outstanding marketing department. I was ecstatic. I could get further experience getting my hands dirty with building website marketing campaigns from scratch and seeing their results rocket up the SERPs. That to me was (and still is) the most addicting part of doing SEO.
The Journey Has Only Just Begun
It’s been quite a journey since then. As a result of being part of the outstanding Bisnar | Chase law firm, I was able to take advantage of going to conferences. I attended my first conference, Conversion Conference in San Francisco. Then the SMX West conference, and I was hooked.
Me & Matt Cutts – head of the Search
Spam Team at Google
Then came SMX Advanced. After following many of the top SEOs and industry regulars on Twitter, it was mind-blowing finally meeting them in person. I couldn’t believe it when I was able to meet Matt Cutts (head of the spam team at Google) himself in person and he shook my hand and said “Oh, yeah Brian Harnish on twitter!” I almost didn’t wash my hands for the rest of the day (well…until dinner at least). I was able to get my picture taken with Danny Sullivan. Danny Sullivan! Can you believe it! I met Rhea Drysdale for the first time at SMX West I believe. At SMX this past year I was able to meet Rae Hoffman, a super advanced SEO who has been in the industry since the beginning. As it turns out, I ended up having lunch with Rae and getting to pick her super smart SEO brain on some SEO issues. I also got to meet the super intelligent brains behind Third Door Media, like Chris Elwell and Akvile Harlow, marketing & ad operations manager of SMX/Third Door Media. I also had the pleasure of meeting the awesome Zane DeFazio, Michelle Robbins, and others on the Third Door Media and Search Engine Land team.
Rand Fishkin – CEO of SEOmoz, & me
In no particular order at many of these conferences I had the pleasure of meeting Jennifer Lopez and Joanna Lord of SEOmoz, Alan Bleiweiss, Ross Hudgens, Justin Briggs, Rachael Gerson of SEER Interactive, Annie Cushing of SEER Interactive, Michael King of iAcquire, and yes at SMX Advanced I got the opportunity to…wait for it…I got to meet Rand Fishkin. Rand Fishkin!!! The CEO (wizard) of SEOmoz!!!!! I could not believe it. One event of the past year had me reeling when it started – I couldn’t believe it either. This past year in 2012 I was lucky enough to be able to attend the SEOmoz 2012 SMX Advanced office tour. Rhea Drysdale and her employees of Outspoken Media just happened to walk in off the elevator and were part of the tour. Awesome! A friend I already knew was on the tour! I had the pleasure of meeting the mozzers and getting the opportunity to see the inner workings of a company like SEOmoz – one of the outstanding standout software companies in the SEO field. Another truly outstanding presenter I was able to meet was Marty Weintraub of aimClear. Whew! Of course, it really would be impossible to mention everyone – if I have forgotten your name please don’t feel it’s out of malice. I can assure you it’s not!
SEOmoz main lobby |
SEOmoz main office floor |
Ruth Burr of SEOmoz
discussing how they manage
daily tasks and goals. |
I started thinking what if I could speak at a conference? Could I become a speaker? Could I be like many of those I had witnessed give powerful presentations and generate exciting audience feedback? Would I be able to deliver a presentation that communicates everything that I want to communicate – like Rand Fishkin? It was a challenging undertaking, to say the least, but I felt like I had been to enough conferences to see how things were conducted. How quality presentations were put together, and other important aspects of conference presentations.
Getting the Chance
Me Speaking at SMX Toronto
Finally I had my chance. I got the notification that I was chosen to speak at SMX Toronto earlier this year. I couldn’t believe it. My first speaking gig!! The panel I was a part of was “Beyond Rankings – Actionable Reports Your Boss Will Love”. I didn’t realize it at first at the time, but part of my panel was the famous Ian Lurie. The founder and CEO of Portent. I couldn’t believe it – I was part of a panel with Ian Lurie! I tried to keep my excitement to myself and acted as professional as I could. Being my first speaking gig I was pretty nervous and anxious, but I’d like to think I had delivered a presentation that was well received. However, I still want to improve on my speaking skills, which will be a part of my goals for 2013.
Speaking at my first conference was a rush – a great natural high that only comes from feelings of a huge accomplishment. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. I wanted to speak again. I got my second chance at SMX East in New York City in October. I couldn’t believe it happened to me again. This time I knew I should be more in-depth with my presentation. I know there are general rules about bullet points – that you shouldn’t have too many on your slides. But, I have been to many presentations where there’s really just a bullet point or two and the person doesn’t provide much in the way of detail even when they talk about what is on their slides. I wanted to provide significant value for those attendees after the conference as well, so I wanted to provide more detail than average in my presentation slides.
For my second presentation at SMX (I still can’t believe I’m an SMX speaker), I was speaking on Finding & Succeeding with a Search Marketing Agency. What I couldn’t believe was that Jessica Bowman, of SEOinhouse.com, was the moderator for my session. Not only was I speaking, I was also moderating 2 Q&As and a birds of a feather lunch table. I was truly ecstatic! Could I believe that I was moderating 2 Q&As and a lunch table at one of the world’s largest search conferences put together by Danny Sullivan and his team at Third Door Media? Not really. I had to pinch myself several times to make sure that it wasn’t a dream.
Since I have been in SEO it has been a wild ride, but especially during 2012. I love this industry and see myself continuing to improve on my skills. It combines the best of what I enjoy about website design and interweaves all of that into the glorious symphony that is online marketing. From analytics, to building sites from the ground up, to keyword research, and final launch and constant pounding the pavement of the search engines to gain higher and higher rankings, it’s an awesome profession.
I can’t wait to see what else the next several years have in store for me. It will be quite a wild ride for sure.
