Why Social Media Still Matters for Small Businesses at SearchFest 2015

April 7, 2015

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Will Scott, CEO and co-founder of Search Influence, the largest online marketing company on the Gulf Coast, will prove why social media is still a powerful sales tool for small businesses. Scott is a featured speaker for SearchFest 2015—a digital marketing conference held Friday, Feb. 27 in Portland, Oregon, organized by nonprofit association SEMpdx. At the conference, Scott will detail strategies and techniques small businesses can use to realize a tangible return on investment from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and other social media.

Scott is speaking in the panel session, “How to Make (Piles of) Money with Social Media in 8 (Absolutely) Attainable Steps,” which is set for 2:45 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the SearchFest 2015 conference. The session takes place at the Sentinel Hotel, 614 SW 11th Ave. in Portland.

“Believe it or not, there are still some small business owners who think social media is a passing fad. They’ve got plenty to do in their business that doesn’t include tweeting the day away. We know, through experience though, that those businesses who do engage make money,” Scott said. Scott, who has been helping small businesses get online since 1994, leads a team of dedicated professionals at Search Influence who offer search engine optimization, online advertising, social media services, reputation management, analytics and lead tracking services.

Other speakers in the session include moderator Kent Lewis, president and founder of Anvil Media Inc., and panelist Marty Weintraub, founder and evangelist at aimClear. The session will also cover:

• Separating social media for businesses reality from myth;
• Using new (and intensely focused) social psychographic targeting—the process of targeting users’ personalities, values, attitudes, interests and lifestyles—to determine hungry customers and -drive them to your website on a budget;
• Using social pay per click today to make sales now;
• Dramatically amplifying content marketing programs for influencer distribution, public relations, search engine optimization and attributable sales;
• Filtering social retargeting as a “second targeting hop,” to qualify traffic even further for other websites;
• Leveraging the blurred lines between organic (free) and paid social media distribution for cost-effective lead generation and sales;
• Merging search and social media marketing to build a truly integrated marketing program; and
• Deploying social media marketing for B2B & B2C.

SearchFest presents multiple informative learning tracks, workshops and panel sessions designed to provide direct insight into the most up-to-date strategies and technological advancements in online search marketing and social marketing. Industry experts and thought leaders from around the country deliver in-depth presentations ranging from basic search engine marketing and social media fundamentals to specific advanced techniques.

About Search Influence

Search Influence is a national, full-service online marketing company based in New Orleans, La. The only New Orleans firm on the 2011 Inc. 500 list of America’s fastest-growing private companies, Search Influence is the largest online marketing company on the Gulf Coast. It has hundreds of direct and partner customers, including local merchants and clients in the law, plastic surgery, cosmetic dentistry and dermatology industries as well as publishers and Yellow Pages companies who provide SEO and other online marketing products for their advertisers