Internet Business Blog

PubCon Vegas 2007

Earlier in the month Danielle and I headed out to Las Vegas, NV for my very first PubCon convention. During our five day stay, I was able to sit in on nearly twenty five hours worth of sessions, network with some really cool people, and attend two of the best shows that Vegas had to offer. On this blog, I’ll be posting a rundown of each day. This is Day #2.

PubCon - Day 2

I’m not going to lie, I missed Richard Rosenblatt’s keynote speech on this day because we were out too late the night before. Since it was our first time in Vegas, we took advantage of the situation by staying up as late as possible :).

To kick things off, I skipped the first round of sessions to check out the Exhibit Hall where I picked up some really cool swag. I actually went in with an empty backpack in anticipation of this, and came out with it being completely full. I was a little dissapointed though that there were no vouchers this year beyond Joe Bucks. I was really hoping to score some Google, Yahoo, or MSN Adcenter PPC discounts. Oh well. Either way, it was a fun experience and I had a chance to meet with some of my current software venders, and have a good chat about PPC with both Google and Yahoo employees.

The first session of the day that I attended was called SEO Design and Organic Site Structure. Overall, the session was a good one and many tips were straight and to the point.

*Some* SEO D&OS Session Notes:

• Use CSS whenever possible!
• Design for your visitors first.
• Try to use Div’s instead of Tables.
• Get free follow links from Flickr picture descriptions.
• Anchor text internally to distribute link juice.

Next I sat in on an Alternate Discovery session which explained how to optimize documents such as PDFs and RSS for the major search engines. It also covered Podcasting and Blog SEO. It was an interesting session, where I learned some new material - especially concerning the PDF files and RSS feeds.

*Some* Alternate Discovery Session Notes:

• Google DOES NOT index RSS feeds.
• (pod) Some social networks encourage feeds (think Facebook).
• (pod) Use “Full Text” when configuring Feedburner feeds.
• (pod) If you post a podcast, post the transcript as well.
• (blog) Don’t pass link juice to Archives or Contact pages.
• (blog) Make use of Tag Clouds.
• (pdf) Good Structure is essential.
• (pdf) Avoid duplicate content issues. Don’t make PDF exactly like website.
• (pdf) These files *probably* pass link juice and PR.

This session was really cool. I thought that Stephan Spencer in particular did a really good job.

Final Thoughts

Admittedly, I was extremely tired after having only a couple hours of sleep, and still trying to deal with the two hour time difference. I headed out around 3PM that day to go get ready for Monty Python: Spamalot - which was awesome!

Caption: Danielle and I next to a Tony Award.

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So we’ll be leaving for PubCon Vegas tomorrow morning. It should be a great time. Beyond what will be an amazing networking event for myself, Danielle and I will be attending both Monty Python: Spamalot and Cirque du Soleil.

I’ll be reading “The Dip” by Seth Godin on the flight. I’ve heard great things about this book and now is the perfect time for a short read.

When I’m back in town I plan on uploading most of my conference notes to this blog so stay tuned!

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One month ago I did a favor for a friend who was working in sales for a company that we’ll call call ACME for the purposes of this blog entry. This was a non-paid favor (the real kind of favor) for a guy who was in a bind. His boss, ACME’s VP of Sales, wanted two web pages done FAST - and apparently my friend somehow got this task dumped onto him.

Because he didn’t know HTML, Image, or Video editing I decided to help him out. I was extremely busy, but he was in a pretty tight spot. Overall It was an easy decision to make. He needed my help, so I did what friends do and helped him. Little did I know how it would splash back in my face later on.

The Web Pages

Both web pages had their own domain names associated with them. To make things easier, I had them log into their domain registrar and redirect the domains to two separate folders on my test server. The streaming video’s were already on ACME’s server so I wasn’t too concerned with the tiny bit of bandwidth that these two pages would eventually take.

Both web pages were extremely easy to produce and literally only took maybe two or three hours of actual work. We took a few images, sliced them up, and embedded the streaming videos in the middle. We then made the pages blend with visuals and that was good enough for him.

My friend was happy, his boss was happy, so I was happy. My good deed was done. Now I could get back to consulting with my paid clients.

The Calm Before The Storm

… Everything was quiet for about a month …

The Aftermath

Yesterday my friend was let go from ACME, and they seem very concerned about these two web pages sitting on my test server. The ACME webmaster sends me a friendly email asking for the login credentials. I give them a polite “No” (to MY server, are you kidding me?). I still decide to take the high road though and zip up all of the files used for both web pages and email them across.

Here’s where things get really screwy…

Later that evening I receive an email from the VP of ACME DEMANDING login credentials. I again (though a bit sarcastically) take the high road. I email him step by step instructions on how to resolve the issue. I also tell his webmaster how to complete the job. I outline to him that I shouldn’t have had to do any of this, and want no future involvement for three key reasons:

1) They own the domain name. If they are missing the username/password - contact the registrar. I no longer have it.
2) They own the website’s files. They don’t need me anymore.
3) My friend, who I did this favor for, is no longer employed by them.

The VP who so carelessly registered both domain names, is the technical contact. His registrar emailed him the login credentials when he set up the domains. He could also retrieve them any time he wanted by hitting the “forgot password” link right on their front page. Recovering a password isn’t rocket science.

Wouldn’t you know it, I receive another email from the ACME Webmaster earlier this morning. Like the VP’s, this one is nasty and uncalled for. I have yet to respond via email, because I’m not sure if a pissing match will solve anything. I haven’t been this heated in a long time.

Lesson Learned: Be careful when doing favors, they may come back to bite.

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