Ranking and Visibility

Clicks from local search results to business websites are on the decline. For local businesses, it's no longer enough to rank. Your presence in the SERPs has to stand out in order to attract new customers. So how do you set your business apart from the competition? Reviews! Reviews can help your rankings, but more importantly, positive reviews drive more leads and conversions. In this talk, Darren Shaw will teach you the latest strategies and tactics to level-up your review game on Google and other important sites, so that consumers will choose your business over the competition.

Or maybe, "SEO you don't know you don't know." We've all heard people throw jargon around in an effort to sound smart when they clearly don't know what it means, and our industry of SEO is no exception. There are aspects of search that are acknowledged as important, but seldom actually understood. Michael King will save us from awkward moments, taking complex topics like the esoteric components of information retrieval and log-file analysis, pairing them with a detailed understanding of technical implementation of common SEO recommendations, and transforming them into tools and insights we wish we'd never neglected.

Google's improvements in understanding language and search intent have changed how and why content ranks. As a result, many SEOs are chasing rankings that Google has already decided are hopeless. Stephanie Briggs will cover how this should impact the way you write and optimize content for search, and will help you identify the right content opportunities. She'll teach you how to persuade organizations to invest in content, and will share examples of strategies and tactics she has used to grow content programs by millions of visits.

People generally react to machine learning in one of two ways: either with a combination of fascination and terror brought on by the possibilities that lie ahead, or with looks of utter confusion and slight embarrassment at not really knowing much about it. With the advent of RankBrain, not even higher-ups at Google can tell us exactly how some things rank above others, and the impact of machine learning on SEO is only going to increase from here. Fear not: Moz's own senior SEO scientist, Britney Muller, will talk you through what you need to know.

SEO requires a delicate balance of working for the humans you're hoping to reach, and the machines that'll help you reach them. To make a difference in today's SERPs, you need to understand the engines, site configurations, and even some machine learning, in addition to the emotional, raw, authentic connections with people and their experiences. In this talk, Alexis Sanders will help marketers of all stripes walk that line.

When everyone else zags, the winners zig. As winners, while your 101+ competitors are trying to automate 'til the cows come home and split test their way to greatness‚ you're zigging. Whether you're B2B or B2C, you're marketing to humans. Real people. Homo sapiens. But where is the human element in the game plan? Quite simply, it has gone missing, which provides a window of opportunity for the smartest marketers. In this talk, Ashley Greene will provide a framework of simple user interview and survey techniques to build customer empathy and your "voice of customer" playbook. Using real examples from companies like Slack, Pinterest, Intercom, and Airbnb, this talk will help you uncover your customers' biggest problems and pain points; know what, when, and how your customers research (and Google!) a need you solve; and find new sources of information and influencers so you can unearth distribution channels and partnerships.

Answer boxes, voice search and a reduction in the number of results displayed sometimes all result in users spending more time in the SERPs, and less on our websites. But does that mean we should stop investing in SEO? Hannah Thorpe will cover what metrics we should now care about, and how strategies need to change.

Capturing and keeping attention is one of the hardest parts of our job today. Fact: It's just going to get harder with the advent of new technology and conversational interfaces. In the brave new world we're stepping into, the key questions are: How do we get discovered? How can we delight our audiences? And how can we grow revenue for our clients? Watch this session to learn how to make your marketing and advertising efforts something people are going to want to consume.

Ego and assumptions led me to choose the wrong keywords for my own site. How did I spend three years optimizing my site and building links to finally crack the top three for six critical keywords, only to find out that I wasted all that time? However, in spite of targeting the wrong words, Seer grew the business. In this presentation, Will shows you the mistakes made and share with you the approaches that can help you build content that gets you thanked.