Another ThinkVisibility has come and gone and yet again it was a conference packed with excellent speakers and contacts from the SEO world. I thought I learnt a lot last time, but I came away with 20 pages of notes and a head bursting with plans and ideas yesterday which to me was worth every penny of the ticket price and then some. There were some truly outstanding presentations and I’m only sorry that I couldn’t attend each one of the afternoon sessions. Luckily, David Towers did an excellent job of live blogging the events I wasn’t able to attend so I’ve been catching up with those too.

The morning kicked off with a goodie bag, tea and coffee and two superb presentations from Tom Critchow & Judith Lewis.

Tom talked us through the value and importance of optimising Google Local with some brilliant tips including citations. Talking of which – I hope this helps…..;-)

Distilled Limited
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Takeaway Tip: Verify, verify, verify!

Judith asked us not to blog about her presentation so she could be a little bit more open with the information she was going to share. However, I will say she was as entertaining as ever and if you get the chance to see her speak then do it.

Takeaway Tip: Chocolate makes everything better.

Lunchtime was a chance to catch up with old and new colleagues and put faces to Twitter names as well as fill up on the refreshments provided. The legendary ThinkVis Quiz was back on the agenda and was as entertaining as ever. The afternoon was split into 9 different sessions across three rooms so I chose the three that I thought I would get the very most out of (which isn’t to say I wouldn’t have liked to have attended all of them).

Being a super organised person, I knew I was going to enjoy Sarah Carling‘s session on SEO Project Management and it didn’t disappoint. Administration, strategy and planning may be a tedious part of an SEO’s life but without it you will inevitably end up doing more work in the long run. I’m always fascinated about how others organise their workloads (especially in marketing) so it was good to get an insight into how she runs her department and the tools she uses (how did I ever do without Intervals before? – it’s a Godsend)

Takeaway Tip: Everything is billable – make sure you are very clear about this with the client so there are less misunderstandings and time isn’t being wasted.

Patrick Moogan‘s session on link building was absolutely packed and full of exceptional advice regarding techniques and tips to make this hideously difficult part of SEO slightly easier. I think it was probably my favourite presentation of the day and kudos to Paddy on making it so entertaining.

Takeaway Tip: Outsource content writing, it will make your life so much easier.

Next up was Bronco‘s very own Paul Carpenter who took us through the process of leveraging the news for links and traffic. Using some nifty graphics, he explained how to best get your site ranked for a current news story and then how to continue to benefit from that early exposure. He rocked (literally, see photo) and we are all very, very proud of him

Takeaway Tip: Understand the lifecycle of a news story and how to benefit from it at the beginning and for months or years after.

I know that the ThinkVis team worked exceptionally hard to make sure the conference was going to be a success and I definitely think they pulled it off yet again. It was really well organised and from the feedback I’ve heard and seen it was a day not to be missed.

OK, so what about those 5 reasons it rocked?

• It’s in the North – we can’t all attend SXSW or SMXWest so to have something like this on the doorstep is a joy.
• It’s relevant
• The lanyards
• There’s a free bar and it’s held in a casino!
• DrinkVisibility

Roll on the next one – I might even pluck up the courage to give a presentation myself one of these days……