Because I recently found myself going through the resume-building/job searching process myself, I thought it would be great to interview a guy that deals with this stuff all the time. If you don’t know Todd…

Todd Mintz is the Director of Internet Marketing / Search Engine Optimization for S.R. Clarke and is on the Board of Directors at SEMpdx. He will admit that:

I’ve been doing SEO since 2000 and I will gladly admit that my earliest SEO education consisted of primitive spam techniques. As those techniques ceased to work and as I matured as an individual and a marketer, I now play it straight

Can you tell us a bit more about S.R. Clarke, Inc. and your role there?

With S.R. Clarke, I do all facets of Internet Marketing with end game of bringing job candidates and prospective employers to our company via the web. I also do Database Marketing, Webmastering, Email Marketing, and act as the first point of contact for all the web leads that my online efforts have brought to our company.

And a bit about SEMPDX and its blog?

SEMpdx is a non-profit organization that was developed to increase the visibility of Search Marketing in the Portland Metropolitan area. I was one of the 9 original board members and I still am on the board.

The blog is a platform for our members and others in our community to get informed about what our organization is doing. Also, board members have the opportunity to post their SEM articles there and hopefully get a large amount of visibility for doing so. I tend to post more articles than others…at the time SEMpdx was born, I didn’t have a personal blog (and still don’t…just a website where I’ve posted a few non-SEO stories).

As a college student, I was taught that a resume should be thought of as your foot-in-the-door. The idea is to get an interview, so make the resume shine. As an SEO, I found myself creating a resume that focused more specifically on my past experiences, accomplishments, etc. I ended up with 2 resumes. Can you tell us your opinion on a resume overall? Should it shine with pretty “I’m the best” speak, or should it be short and to the point. What do you like to see?

I definitely think that many resumes are far too long and wordy. You don’t need to list 30 tasks and accomplishments for a job you were only at for a year. Just go with the strongest ones. Use action words and keep each point as succinct as possible. White space is your friend.

Quantify (to the best of your ability) the results of your actions (e.g. Organic Traffic increased 400% in the past year since I commenced the SEO effort). Pull charts from places like Compete (overall traffic) or SEODigger (keyword rankings) that supports your efforts and include those in your materials.

Your resume should exude confidence without being arrogant. If you put enough supporting material in it that shows you got SEO game, any boasting is redundant.

For SEO’s, I would like to see examples of your online footprint (which I talked about in this article). Also, you should remember that care should be taken with Your Google Resume because you must assume that anybody seriously considering hiring you will Google your name.

In said article, you mention that “If you aren’t on LinkedIn, I’d probably disqualify your immediately for you clearly have no interest in networking.” This was, of course, in reference to finding more information about a potential SEO/SEM candidate that didn’t have a resume; but would you say that we are moving to this form of consideration? More specifically, do you feel it important to work on your own online presence, even if you have a resume? Do you think this will hold more importance as time goes on?

It is extremely important to work on your online presence not only if you are looking for a job but for when you are employed as well. A powerful online presence will serve your career well in so many different ways. In all likelihood, somebody interested in talking to you has already Googled your name and done some level of “investigating” of your background prior to making contact.

Sigh. I don’t think I will ever get used to “Google” being a verb.

In the end, what would you prefer: I email you my resume in reference to a job, or that I email you my name and some pertinent information, and direct you to find my Google footprint? Do you think there is a future for resumes at all? I mean for Internet related jobs.

Unless you have a prior personal / professional relationship with your prospective employer, a resume is an absolutely necessary tool for your job search even for Internet Jobs. However, your Google footprint is very important and will grow even more important over time.

Following you on Twitter, it is quite apparent that you see a lot of resumes. More obvious is the large amount of resume no-no’s you share. What would you say should be the top three ‘DO NOT’s’ of resume creation?

Clearly, the biggest mistakes are in proofreading. If you aren’t a good writer, find somebody who is and have them do your resume. And, frequently, the resume might be professional (and likely done professionally) but the body of the email is illiterate (which ruins the professional effect).

I definitely recommend getting a separate email address just for your job search. I receive many professional resumes from people using unprofessional sounding email addresses.

Also, due to a setting in Outlook that adds all email recipients to the applicant’s address book, I end up getting spammed with a wide range of unprofessional chain emails that the applicant is blindly sending to everyone in their address book (which have included inappropriate humor, political messages, Indian Tribal Meetings, and even invitations to poker night).

Finally, I think that people frequently FUBAR their job search technique. I told a friend of mine who recently lost his job that his goal should be to send out 50 resumes a day. Job search is a numbers game and the more resumes you send out, the better you chances of landing an interview. Realize that only 10-15% of jobs are advertised, but when you send your resume to a company, you are applying not only for that posted job but all their hidden job opportunities that they aren’t advertising. That’s why I stress the value of sending out as many resumes as you can, even if the job that is advertised isn’t quite what you’re looking for. As long as you believe the company could potentially use your services, go ahead and send in your resume.

“Spam your resume.” Got it.

But the company just doesn’t know that they need your services until they let you know that you exist :.)

You’ve also shared some pretty funny resume failures. Can you think of the worst of the worst?

I received a resume that I guarantee would get 5,000 Diggs. However, because of confidentiality, I have to keep it to myself.

One guy did email me his resume and cc’ed a few of his co-workers on the email. Oops…

Quick! Last Words!

Within reason, if anyone wishes to use me as a job search resource, feel free to email me.

You can also connect at: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn.

I would like to thank Todd. This is a topic that I don’t get to deal with all the time, but always seemed to be asked about. Listen to the man with experience.

As much as we would like to rid ourselves of the resume hassle, we just aren’t to that point yet. And if you are in the search industry, or any industry that could even be remotely related, you really should be showing your knowledge by examples. If an employer Googles your name, shouldn’t they find you?

If you’re looking for a job, these surely are words by which to live.

Thanks again, Todd. You rock!

I’ve discussed my workings with The Company before in passing, but never by name. I’ve never written their company name in a blog post or article. I’ve actually only spoken about them either in person, or written about them in very vague terms. Why do I not mention their name? Because soon, they will be in direct competition, and the last thing I need is their better lawyers coming at me (we can play like that later).

Also, this is the only warning I’m giving that this post may rant off or become incoherent. I don’t get to vent about The Company, and when I do speak of them, I have to do so in a positive manner (I am a professional, you know).

My First Days as an SEO
Take a step back in time with me, will you? My younger career was that of a call center jockey. Outbound sales, customer care, tech support; I’ve done it all. That was my job, wherever I went, and in the days of little to no responsibility, it paid enough and kept up with my laziness.

One day, I start a customer service job for a “website design” company. Being a computer guy, I had played with HTML before, so nothing was out of sorts with this job. This company (from no on known as “The Company”) also offered Internet marketing. That’s interesting, how do market on the Internet? With SEO, that’s how. What a really neat concept. Gaining rankings in Google, and on purpose!

Because this concept of gaining rankings on purpose was so intriguing to me, it was merely months before I was THE SEO for the company. But let’s take just one more step back before I get into the mushroom cloud rant I’m about to get into.

My job was simple. Customer calls in, we talk about their website, I tell them what to do to gain rankings. Neat. After about a month of talking a bunch of lines that had been given to me by The Company, I started to wonder if it was really that easy to rank in Google. Surely its a bit more difficult than adding a few keywords, but that’s what I was telling my customers.

I started learning. I started to read forums (that was the thing back then) and a few blogs (that was new back then). I started to take part in discussions about rankings. I even started a site of my own. Oh how reality bit me in the ass (first time I’ve ever cussed on this site, mark it down).

I realized that you can’t just change a few keywords and call it a day. There’s more to it. And where the hell (that’s 2, I think) were these keywords coming from? We never did any research.

I diplomatically voiced my “hey, I think there’s more to it” concerns, and I became the SEO for The Company. Soon, it was my job to return the calls of the customers that either weren’t happy with the answers they received from customer care, or of the websites that just didn’t rank. Wanna take a quick stab at guessing how quickly and to what degree my work piled up? Alas, I was the guy saving the day. I would call these people, and advise on things they should be doing to rank better. And it was working. I had done enough research to get some decent results (decent at best. Not as good now as they seemed then). But there was a piece to this puzzle that bugged me. The service The Company was selling didn’t make any sense.

400
That’s how many search engines The Company submitted your site to. Yup, it was one of those companies. In reality, that was the best part of their service. Sure, they had a ton of marketing speak, but there was nothing to it. If you were a customer, you paid your monthly bill and had no idea that you were being ripped off. You could call customer support, and they would answer your question (with extremely low integrity), and you would think all was well.

The Fights
I think I still hold the record for “most time spent in the VPs office” at The Company. I would collect a bunch of cases, fight with management on the crap we were telling people, spend a few hours making reports, then repeat. It never ended. I was almost fired for sending an email to the entire customer care team stating that “if any customer calls for SEO advice, tell them I will call them back. Do not under any circumstance discuss SEO with our clients.” Well, it was their job to discuss SEO with our clients, and management was upset, to say the least (the email came from me, so everyone listened, and it was funny to see the calls pile up). These fights were useless.

My Part
“Single handedly I would make this company a better place. I swear it.” That’s what I thought. I honestly thought I could take all comers, educate them and get them something that would resemble SEO success. This actually had a chance at working. Customer care even took to my rule as best as they could. However, this just wasn’t logistically sound. The calls piled up and the appointments were missed. It didn’t work.

You Get The Idea
I think you understand enough about The Company. Plainly put, they were the crap company that sold a nice, big helping of snake oil.

SEO Factor
While working for The Company, I decided to start my own service. I would offer an affordable solution with a real return. This turned out very well for me (you’re reading my blog, aren’t you?). I pulled in a few clients, and was on my way to becoming a real company. Unfortunately, The Company was not happy about this. The things I preached on my blog were not something they could risk their clients seeing (it didn’t help that I directed customers to specific posts to answer questions). I was asked several times to close this site (that didn’t site well with me).

The Guilt
I would like to say that as soon as I realized what type of company I worked for, I got up from my desk, flicked the owner off, and walked away. The truth is, it was a long time before I left. I knew fully to what extent we were lying to people, and I had seen too many extreme cases in which our actions certainly ruined businesses. I had even lied to some small business owner myself; “sure you can cancel, but your rankings are going to drop.”

I know this sounds cheesy, but I feel incredibly guilty when I think about my work at The Company. I know I’m supposed to be more business-minded, but at the end of the day, I’m still young and idealistic. I remember all the good people I had spoken to and convinced to keep the service because it was good for the online visibility. Eventually, this did indeed lead to my leaving. And I’m happy I did.

Why Am I Writing This Post
Well, I got tired of specifically writing myself in circles when I spoke about The Company. This post will serve as a reference when I speak about them. Also, I would like to let people know where I’m coming from when I speak with such passion about these crap services. And finally, I am in the middle of starting a company that will be in direct competition with The Company. It’s been a couple of years since I left The Company, and they have had plenty of time to change things (at least that can be their rebuttal if it ever comes up). I think its fair game now.

Also, believe it or not, people from the company still call me. They still want to offer me a job. I really don’t know why, but they do. So, when I get emails from them, I think it would be a simpler to just link to this post.

I’m going to release more information on the new company soon, but for now, just know that we plan to offer affordable services to small business owners, that coincidently isn’t a complete ripoff. This is going to be difficult. The Company has access to a lot of money, and every time I turn around they buy another company. Difficult to compete with that. However, I have something they don’t. As destructive as passion and ideals can be if you let them, I use my ideals and passion to push me. I guess that’s one good thing that came from The Company. A desire to go at them.

In Closing
I highly doubt I will ever speak directly about The Company. Like I said, they have a lot of money, and it wouldn’t take much of it for them and their lawyers to shut me down; regardless of what is right or wrong. And in the end, any negative comments from me would be viewed as those of a disgruntled employee. So, instead, I’ll be a bit more constructive.

I’m coming for you, The Company. And I’ve got fire in my eyes.

A few minutes later, I turn my complete attention to my notes so that I may convey the points to my buddy. I start a sentence “it seems that there wasn’t any really keyword research performed as I can see…” when he interrupts. “Yeah, because of the title tag and the content, right?” I reply “well, yeah, that’s right.” This theme is repeated for about 10 minutes when I realize, we have this same conversation a lot.

You see, when you work for an agency, you get to take note of a lot of sites that have never even given SEO a thought. Not in the slightest. And this is a big problem. Not because these sites do not have an online marketing strategy (though that is a problem), but because it creates a habit that can become self-destructive.

When you see so many new sites with a vast number of similar problems, you fall into the habit of always pointing at those problems. After a while, sites come in and you wave your magic “it is all these things, just like the others” wand at it, and you are likely to miss something else. This can become even more of a problem when you start to optimize mass quantities of sites with the same outlook. There’s a really good chance you are going to miss some glaring issues. So what do we do about all this?

Check That List
I find it best to run the sites I’m about to optimize through a checklist. This is a list of all of the most common problems we see, and the most common steps to resolving them. This way, I don’t give much of my brain attention to getting to those. Just run down the list, and get them done.

Get Out of Your Box
At the end of my checklist, there is a step to “use your noggin now.” This means that “hey, all the common stuff has been taken care of now, Josh. Put the list down without thinking about it, and do what you do best.” This way I can concentrate on finding all those little weird things that may be holding the site back.

Take A Break
This is one of those old tricks that your college professor would advise when studying; or writing that huge paper on how incredibly ridiculous the military strategies of the civil war really were. Take a moment to get your mind off of the project, and come back with a fresh outlook. This will keep you from falling into a rut, and from burning out too quickly.

The Buddy System
Have a colleague or peer take a look at things when you’re all done. Give them what you already have. Share ideas. Some of the most successful campaigns I’ve ever been involved with were the direct result of a casual (as casual as SEO can be) conversation with another SEO. A new set of eyes are more likely to see something differently than the pair you’ve been using to lull over the site for hours on end.

At the end, just remember that sure, there are a lot of common mistakes made by website creators but do your best to look at each case as a different one. When we starting lumping all these sites into one view, we end up offering the same package to everyone where different levels of service are needed.

If this sounds familiar, you aren’t alone. People are “wasting” tons of hours a week on social sites, sharing videos and stories or bumping, nudging, tweeting or sayin’ hi. We know that social networking is an important aspect of an online presence, but do we have to spend every waking hour keeping up with all of our social profiles? Not really.

Let’s talk about a few things that you can do to keep your time spent socializing in check, while making the most of the benefits social networking has to offer.

Set Aside Some Time
Google has the right idea with their 80/20 perk. 80% of your time must be spent working, the other 20% is yours to do with what you wish (as long as it is appropriate). Consider setting aside specific time to read Digg or Sphinn. Personally, I start the day strong checking my pertinent social profiles early in the morning, and leave softly with a few checkups. This works great for me, but you might find something that meets your needs a bit better.

Resist The Urge
I know it can be difficult, but that email in reference to a message about a shout in regard to that event can probably wait until your designated time. The people that need to contact you asap, usually know how. Otherwise, the message can probably wait just a bit. Of course, there are exceptions, but you can usually tell these from the “I just bit you with my vampire, please bite me” requests.

Cut The Fat
There are so many social sites out there. There are communities for just about any topic you can think of. I find it best to stick to the communities I know I can be most active in. That being said, I’m all to happy to start playing with a new site as it comes along to give it a chance. If I find I like to make use of it regularly, I re-evaluate all of my communities, and cut back on the sites I don’t get the most out of. Remember, you don’t have to delete your account, just back off of it for a bit.

You Get What You Give
In normal “everything has 2 sides” fashion, I’m also going to warn against ignoring a profile that you find to be useful. If you are going to take part in a community, really take part. If you have a profile that says “last logged in 40 days ago” or you don’t speak much, when it comes time to share what you have, nobody will be there to listen. You will only get out of social media what you are willing to give it.

The Right Tool For The Job
There are a ton of tools to help you consolidate your efforts. Just about every social site has a badge or widget or bit of code for you to make use of. Figure out what you need from what site in order to maximize your efforts. You can find a Twitter tool to work with your browser, eliminating the need to visit the site all together (this only works for cool browsers like Firefox).

Like all things fun and productive, you have to set a few rules to keep it so. If you let your social profiles get out of control, you will find it a difficult task to get things back in order. Try to find the times that work best for you, and attempt to make that a schedule. Evaluate the sites you are using most often, and consider cutting the rest.

Interview with Greg Hartnett
David Mihm conducted an interview with president of ‘Best of The Web,’ Greg Hartnett about the advent of their local platform. It should be noted that, with a little promotion, your local profile can gain some rankings. This is a really good thing for brand visibility and rep management.

YouTube For SEOs
IMBroadcast started this week, allowing us SEO/SEM/Internet marketing guys and gals an avenue to promote videos specifically in our field. There were a few problems at launch as noted here, but the idea and site is incredible.

ScarySEO Kicked Off
Scary SEO started this week. It’s a conference unlike any other in that the attendees were capped. You would think that a small conference wouldn’t compete with their bigger counterparts, but the speakers there are some of the same ones you would see at SES or SMX. So, good on ya Scary SEO. I really wanted to be there, but I haven’t slept in days, and don’t plan to for weeks.

Learn To Build Links
I actually found this site last week, but neglected to comment on it. I was turned onto this link building blog and immediately became a loyal reader. Some of the articles and ideas on here are just incredible. Good reading. Also, there is a little slide in the upper right of the blog with link building tips. Seriously, follow this blog.

Google Wants to Play ‘Top Gun’
The New York Times ran a story on Google getting a fighter jet. The details of the story reveal that Google may not actually be the owner of the jet, but there are strong connections between the founders of Google, and the company that actually leased the jet. Seriously, I think the fight against spam and link sellers/buyers is getting out of control.

And, For The Personal Stuff
I released pictures of my newest child in a post here.

I have also been working, almost non-stop mind you, on a new company. We are going to offer a viable, conservative SEO solution for small businesses. The neat thing is, these small business owners will get to speak directly with me, and a few other professional SEOs as a part of the service. I hope to get more information on it out there soon. Very exciting. Again, I want to thank the people that are involved in this with me. A man is nothing without the people that support him.

I was reminded of this today when I had a short conversation on Twitter:

seofactor @PearlyWrites HoJo Microsite is getting there! We are almost done, or at least that is what we keep saying…

seofactor @PearlyWrites Hey, you’re doing a HoJo site?

PearlyWrites @seofactor Yes, we have been working on Organic SEO w/ their internal department & they asked us if we can develop a site&database.

PearlyWrites @seofactor So we have been as well as finished up Organic SEO for all the Wyndham Hotel brands&doing final proofs on 160 pages.

seofactor @PearlyWrites Cool. I work for a hotel Internet marketing agency. Nice to know someone else out there gets to feel the pain of hotel seo.

PearlyWrites @seofactor haha I find it fun but I am known for being a little odd

seofactor @PearlyWrites Fun, yes. Easy, no. Requires sleep deprivation when you manage 90+ hotels, certainly. I like it too though. Especially the

seofactor @PearlyWrites hard ones. Like Orlando. It is difficult to shine when your job is too easy.

PearlyWrites @seofactor YES I totally agree with you! Lots of travel sites tend to take over the rankings vs the true hotels. Challenges are fun…

seofactor @PearlyWrites Ah yes…stupid TripAdvisor. Let me know if you ever hit a stump. I might have some ammo for you.

PearlyWrites @seofactor Def. and the same for you!

What does all this mean? At first glance, not much for a big company. However, for the independent SEO, conversations like this mean the difference between steak and Ramen noodles. At it’s core, these few short sentences have created a connection that may prove valuable one day.

You see, I work for an agency that deals primarily in the hospitality industry. It turns out that my Twitter friend is working in this segment currently. Without this conversation, we were not likely to ever meet or speak. But, now we are fully aware of each other.

Perhaps one day she needs an SEO. Maybe one day she has a question about hotel SEO (a segment in which I am very comfortable calling myself an expert), and I will be there to answer it. Maybe vice versa. Maybe she will post a job opening, and I am in need. Well, she will at the very least know that I’m a hotel SEO genius (maybe that’s a bit much).

Either way. I can directly attribute Twitter for 6 job offers (one of which sounds incredibly nice), and 3 of my current clients. what if I had ignored it all together? I might very well be eating Ramen noodles tonight (I’m having steak, by the way).

What can I do with IMBroadcast.com?

• Share video tutorials
• Ask the community Internet Marketing questions via webcam, and receive responses
• Share news on search engines and social networks
• Share video from conferences and meetups
• Network with the Internet Marketing community

I’m a personal fan of the second one. How cool is that?!

As is the norm, you can also imbed video on your own site, like so. Wait, you can’t. The embed code is coming up partial for me. I’ve only looked through Firefox, but I don’t think that should be a factor.

There are a few bugs in the system (like that one, and the friend requests contain verbiage that you would send to someone not already a member of the community), but believe me, they are so minor, and will probably be rectified before you read this, that they don’t even come close to keeping any smart SEO from wanting to take part.

Oh, and in true Internet marketing fashion, here’s my IMBroadcast profile. Go ahead and send me that goofy friend request.

Before you get too excited like our young friend pictured here, you need to have a plan. I don’t know why, but I think of giddy kids when people come to me with the great ideas they have. Great idea or not, we too often jump the gun on those ideas.

To set the tone for this article, let me share with you a short conversation I recently had.

Me: So I hear you’re going to do a video.
Guy: Yeah, I want it to go viral.

Me: Well good on ya. You have goals I’m assuming?
Guy: Yeah, I want it to be everywhere, perhaps lead to some interviews.

Me: Umm, fair enough. That’s a meaty goal for your first campaign. But possible.
Guy: Yeah, I want it to be on CNN, YouTube, various other sites. I want it to be everywhere, and I want a ton of attention within a week.

Me: Wow! Ok, well, let’s talk about your plans to promote such a video.
Guy: I already told you, I’m going to put it on YouTube.

Me: Excuse me?
Guy: You know, YouTube.
Me: Sigh. I see.

Can you identify where this conversation took a turn for the unsuccessful in my mind? Let’s set aside the fact that this is going to be the first attempt at a viral campaign for a moment. It has been done, however accidental, so even the fantastic goals aren’t out of reach. Instead, let’s focus on the lack of strategy to achieve such a goal.

Does The Campaign Have Merit
This doesn’t apply in my example above, as the video idea was actually quite impressive. It was timely, it had a great idea behind it and the implementation of the video itself impressed even my very scrutinous mind. However, I think it wise to note how many times I’ve had the conversation with an executive that wants to move forward with a video marketing campaign, only to find out they wanted to make a video about their products. This isn’t a bad video idea, but the marketing of such a video is very different from that of a viral video.

A Sprint commercial on T.V. starring their new CEO (or owner, or whatever he is) in a diner that would normally be frequented by us regular folk, containing a soft-spoken sales pitch for Sprint as a company was nice in my opinion. I think Sprint’s ad campaign will do some good for them (as much as I really hate Sprint). However, this isn’t the type of video that goes viral. It doesn’t get Digg attention by itself, and it isn’t likely to gain a lot of traction on YouTube. But, do you remember the “Leave Brittany Alone” video? That went viral. It even ended up in one of those parody movies.

Now, I’m not saying that you have to get the owner of the company to start crying in order get a video to go viral, but I hope you get the idea. Sales pitches don’t work as well in social media.

Identify Goals vs. Strategy
Here is where the problem in my example above comes in. My friend that wants his video to go viral has a goal, but there is a very blurry line between his goal and his strategy. The closer you get to anything that could be considered a strategy, the fuzzier the picture.

Because you are likely to be educated on promoting a website, let’s change a few words in my example above to make this a bit clearer.

Me: So, I hear you want to promote your business online.
Guy: Yeah, I’m going to start a website.

Me: That’s great. I’m happy to hear you take this step.
Guy: Yeah. I saw the design, it looks incredible. It’s very clean and I feel it shines a favorable light on my company and the products we offer.

Me: Awesome. So, I’m sure you’ve also got a strategy to promote your website?
Guy: Yeah, the site will be up next Wednesday.

Me: Yeah…but…how to promote it.
Guy: I just told you, the site will be up Wednesday.

Does that seem a little more familiar? This was the problem SEOs had yesteryear, when putting a website up and promoting it were one in the same to most people. This isn’t such the case anymore, but its a very common issue when we talk about social media marketing.

Getting people to see your video in hopes of viral success, that’s a goal. Putting said video on YouTube is a small beginning piece of the strategy. But understand, you can’t leave it there. There’s a level of preparation.

Before You Go Viral
I think the problem most people have with social media marketing is very similar they had when they put their first website up. They thought it to be a silver bullet that would rocket their business to new heights. Now we understand that we need to optimize the site. We need to ensure our copy is relevant and enticing. We need to have a strategy for link-building. There are a ton of parts we need to put into motion before we will see hit number one. This is the same for social media.

Do you have an active Digg account that will be used to promote your YouTube channel that houses your new video? How about a ton of Twitter friends that you can call upon to help push the link to your video? Do you have an active account in a social community that is relevant to your video’s content? Have you built any relationships with bloggers in the same vertical as your video? Do you have an active Facebook account with friends that may be interested in your video in the first place? These are all pieces of the puzzle that will help to promote your new campaign, and increase the potential for its success.

If you need some help getting started on this part. Consider my old post on 7 Considerations For Social Media Marketing. If you keep the right mindset, you can prevent yourself from looking like a company that doesn’t actually care about the community, but just wants to sell.

Let Me Close
Because this article is more about theory than implementation or detailed strategy, I get a little long winded. I hope that this helps you to understand though, that simply making a video and uploading it to YouTube will not bring you fame or fortune. There is always that ‘X’ factor where its a possibility, but you don’t see that so much anymore. In the end, to increase your chances of exposure, you need to have a solid foundation. You need to plan things out as best you can. You won’t tell the future, and you aren’t likely to plan your way to the top but you should at least get an idea of how you are going to get things moving.

I know this isn’t normal SEO talk, but hey, blogs are supposed to be personal, right? My wife says she looks like me; what with the bald head and all.

I know you’re all thinking “Josh, you have anger issues as it is. How are you going to handle a 16 year old girl in the future?” To that I have set aside a few rules early on.

No razors are allowed in the house. Boys don’t like hairy legs, and that’s a good deterrent. Also, I have just become an NRA member, and will be purchasing several firearms of varying sizes and calibers.

Joking aside, we are very excited to have the addition. I guess mommy was getting tired of having all boys in the house. I still think she will want to play XBox and work on motorcycles with me, but Mrs. Garner thinks it will be all tea parties. I guess we’ll see.

I get somewhat emotional about this topic, perhaps because I know what it is like to be a scared child with no parents, or perhaps because I am a father myself. So instead of discussing the story itself, I want to concentrate on the motivation Rae gave me to do what little I can about it; and hopefully motivate some others.

Rae has a pretty strong presence, so her mention likely got some eyes, but shouldn’t we get some more? As online marketers/SEO/whatever you are doing, you are at least reading this. That means you probably have some sort of online presence. Be it Stumble, Digg, whatever, why not do something to get some eyes on this story?

So far, I’ve retwitted the story, and thumbed it up myself. However, I don’t have a lot of power in either of those communities, but I know some of you do. I would ask that some of you do the same. It seems a little too light-hearted to quote a Spider-Man line, but with power comes responsibility. A lot of us out there have a lot of online power (hell, Google will soon be capitalizing on it, it must be true).

So, Rae, and myself simply ask that you help to put some eyes on this. Here’s the story again.