Mozcon 2017 wrap up
Daniel and I just got back to our pilgrimage to what is becoming our favourite SEO conference of the year. Mozcon, held annually run Seattle, USA is one of the leading SEO conferences in the world and brings together the best minds on the topic to discuss our changing industry.
Conferences like this can often be information overload, and Mozcon is no exception. We were blown away and amazed by the speakers this year and have plenty of actionable things we can’t wait to start rolling out in our client campaigns, and also our own business.
Some of the big highlights that stood out to Daniel and I were the below presentations:
“You have to be willing to come up with SH*T ideas in order to come up with GREAT ideas!”
Lisa Myers - Verve Search [Download presentation]
Content marketing for link building is a great way to get more impact from the work you do.
You need to think big and utilise data to make impact:
- Interactive games
- Graphs
- Videos
- Interactive tools
The most important part of content marketing is not just creating the content, its making sure that content is SEEN!
“You are not your customer, stop trying to think for them”
Joel Klettke [Download presentation]
If you are redoing copy on your website, its important to remember:
- Conduct customer research: how can you decide what a customer wants if you don’t ask?- Shift your focus from product features to instead highlighting consumer benefits and customer testimonials.- Structure your landing page based on customer focus.
“Be the content you wished you found”
Wil Reynolds - Seer Interactive [Download presentation]
Wil had a really interesting topic that not many SEO's are thinking about yet, the impact that machine learning will have on the way we do SEO (Google is using machine learning to drive the SERPS now in a big way).
His main advice to stay ahead of this was:
- Listen and learn from search behaviours
- Ask questions and give guidance
- Look at competitor reviews and related keywords
- Be brave enough to send your customers to a better answer (Even if that is another website)
Other cool stuff
These things by themselves are not ground breaking, or will change what we do in any significant way, but still some cool little titbits:
- Bing Business bot: Microsoft using AI directly in its SERPs
- Inside Google’s Numbers in 2017: Great presentation by Rand Fishkin (And maybe one of his last!)
- Do a Google search for “What sound does a cow make?” Thank me later…
- Do a Google search for ‘type 2 diabetes” and look at the unique design of the knowledge panel
We can't wait to be back at Mozcon 2018, and have already secured our tickets.
James Richardson
Co-Founder
James is Co-Founder of Optimising who’s worked with everyone from national retailers and franchise groups to fast-growing eCommerce brands. He’s as interested in how AI engines send traffic as he is in old-fashioned rankings, and spends a lot of time testing how brands show up across search.
He started out running sports fan sites and early eCommerce stores, picked up a few senior sales and marketing roles at ASX-listed companies, then decided to build the kind of SEO agency he actually wanted to work at. Outside work, James is usually being out-negotiated by his three daughters, hosting very serious pretend tea parties, or supervising yet another cubby house build in the lounge room.
