This is my second time in Vegas, but first time out to an SEO convention. Being a developer, I am often a bit clueless about who most of the people in this industry actually are. Getting out here has kind of set off a light bulb and allowed me a chance to meet some really cool folks.
Monday
Everything started out very early Monday morning in Seattle. The city had seen a patch of bad weather over the weekend, so the idea of getting some desert sunshine helped with getting me out of bed and into a cold car. After a long commute over and around some closed streets, I arrived and promptly inhaled a pot of coffee.
After a quick hop through some gray clouds and into some blue skies, we touched down into an oasis of flashing lights. Arriving at the hotel with a group of Mozzers was almost dreamlike. Everything was such an assault on the senses that I was left with a kind of numbed buzzing feeling and a dumb grin hanging off my face.
Until I saw this…
We unpacked our bags and headed downstairs to unwind at the bar and survey who else had arrived.
We took a seat and were almost immediately greeted by both Tamar Weinberg and Rhea Drysdale. Anytime I meet somebody in real life that I’ve only spoken with online, I am filled with a sense of relief that they are in fact not a giant cartoon emoticon. It was very nice to finally meet Tamar and be introduced to Rhea.
After a brief round of hand shaking and jokes about my wardrobe, in walks David Mihn alongside Dr. Peter J. Meyers. More hand shaking ensues (this happens A LOT at conferences) and everyone has a chance to do some catching up and chit chat about projects.
It was at this point that waves of hunger began rolling over us all and that a meal was in order before high tide.
So we whistled for a cab and when it came near the license plate said ‘fresh’ and it had a dice in the mirror. If anything, we knew that this cab was rare, but we said, “Ya know what? Forget it. Let’s go to the Monte Carlo and get some burgers with beer.”
After a nice meal it was off to the Venetian to catch the Blue Man Group.
This show rocked. If you find yourself in Vegas or they are touring near your town, GO.
I don’t want to get too off track and lead anyone to believe that SEO conventions are all flashing lights and ambiguously blue men playing renditions of “Crazy Train” on PVC pipes, so let’s cut to the chase and jump right into the following day.
Tuesday
It begins!
After getting up and having a nice stretch, I notice that my phone is awash with a number of new text messages. Sliding through each of the messages I am able to gather a wealth of info on the where abouts and plans of fellow Mozzers.
Important information like “Jane is in room 123” and “Everybody will be at the courtesy shuttle in 15 minutes.”
This is something very important at conferences. Constant mobile communication and scheduling is a must.
The hotel had 2,716 rooms and covered 215 acres. That’s 9,365,400 square feet of crazy carpet, flashing lights, loud noises, and pushy tourists. Finding 8 people in that mess without the use of cell phones would be impossible.
Staying in touch is key. Being able to confirm that all of your party will indeed be meeting by the elevators in 10 minutes to make it to registration is invaluable.
The Moz team is still relatively small, so keeping tabs on where everyone is and where they are going to be is not too difficult. Organizing a larger group would prove to be much more complicated. There are existing services out there (such as twitter) that, when used in a utilitarian fashion (rather than a purely ‘social’ one), could prove quite useful when trying to manage large groups.
The Conference
The morning starts off with a breakfast of coffee and apples with Jeff & Matt Inman. We make some small talk about how wild the city is and then began planning out our day.
We decide that it would first be a good idea to register and obtain our passes. However, while on our coffee break, the registration line had grown quite long. Lucky for us, the registration was being handled very well, so the line moved fairly quickly. Unlucky for me, I ran into some problems obtaining my pass. Everything eventually got sorted out thanks to the great guys at Web Master World.
The setback did cost me the first session. 
This was another lesson learned: Early is everything at conferences. Getting up early, getting out early, and getting registered early is key.
I did manage to hop into Salon B to catch the second session:
Perl – PHP – Databases – What Every Webmaster Should Know
The panel did a fine job of presenting general webmaster info about open source software. One thing that became obvious during Q&A is that most members of the audience were more Windows oriented, and generally interested in best practice and turnkey solutions.
Reputation Monitoring and Management
Before filing into this session, I ran a few folks I had met from the night before, so unfortunately had missed the beginning of Cameron Olthuis’s talk. I felt that Andy Beal and Geoff Livingston had some interesting things to say, especially Geoff’s notions on meeting someone on their turf, keeping your ego in check, and the power of the underdog.
Landing Page Optimization
This was a session I dropped in on with Jeff & Rebecca, because they had both been underwent a project involving the optimization of landing pages. Curious as to what they had been up to, I sat in for a listen. I was particularly impressed with Lily Chiu’s presentation and Offermatica’s test cases.
Large Scale Bid Management
Surprisingly, I felt that this was one of the most useful sessions I had attended this day. It was definitely very business-oriented in nature, which is something I generally tend to stay away from because I develop code. However, business guys have a direct relationship to developers because they’re the ones that say “If the code can do X Y Z, I can sell it for 123, you then get some money, and everyone is happy.”
Wednesday
Photos of me practicing reverse Savasana are circulated amongst Moz staffers and are promptly displayed for everyone’s viewing pleasure at the conference (thanks Jane!).
Local and Mobile Search
I’m a big fan of all things mobile. Jeff & I attended this one because it was tech oriented and mobile development is something that is currently outlined on our ‘super secret’ development whiteboard. The gentleman from Quattro had a mobile CMS outlined in his presentation that looked very interesting.
WereWolf Tournament
Being on staff, I had the privilege of moderating a few games of Werewolf. I was a “Werewolfie,” if you will (LOL, see what I did there?)
I feel this photo exemplifies the rules of Werewolf quite well.
Thursday
Interactive Site Reviews
I like these sessions a lot. Anytime a member of the audience can provide a sample of their work to be critiqued by the panel is great. It gives you an idea of not only who the audience is, but how members of the panel think when they see a ‘problem’.
Startup Costs – Getting in the Video Game
I’ll admit that I first walked into this thinking it was the video search session. (Las Vegas Pro Tip: Always remember what day it is, so your schedule can make sense when you read it.) However, I am a big Alfred Hitchcock movie buff and like photography, so I stuck around. I was actually very impressed with Robin Liss’s presentation about video equipment. You can tell that she has a passion for what she does, and that’s something I like to see very much.
That same passion was also seen tearing it up behind the drums at Microsoft’s Rock Band Ghost Bar party.
Friday
We get to go home!
This week was so much fun I can’t even put it into words.
During the course of my outings I managed to not only meet a lot people and learn a lot of cool things from them, but I feel much better oriented about who is who and what is what out there. While I found the sessions to be informative, I feel the real value comes into play by coming out, sitting down, and talking to people. Remove the media layer and REALLY be social.
Anyway, I’d like to say “Cheers” to everyone I met this go around, I hope you all have safe trips home and that I can see you soon. Everybody get some rest, this next year is going to rock!
