Webfest Global Day Two – Recap

Day two at Webfest Global started with a race to Santa Monica to get a glimpse of the Keynote fireside chat with Kim Kardashian. A few streets were blocked off for a farmer’s market which caused me to run a little later than expected. I stepped into the fireside chat with about fifteen minutes to go and enjoyed the brief experience. While I was there Kim talked about a few things that her mother taught her.

One of the points she brought up revolved around dealing with people who say no. Here is the exact quote she was referenceing:

“If somebody says ‘no’, you’re asking the wrong person.” – Kris Jenner

A quote like this can be applied to almost any situation and is one that I will have to remember in my business dealings. Kim did a great job of reflecting on her experiences, but I really wish they could of gotten her mother involved in the fireside chat. Her mother is a true business mind and a major force in creating the Kardashian brand as we know it today.

After the fireside chat it was off to lunch under the fig tree. Although I signed up to dine with an expert for all three days I ended up only dining with Danny Sullivan, Editor-in-Chief of SearchEngineLand.com. Danny provided an exponential amount of information on SEO and was very helpful in answering the questions of attendees sitting at his table. I asked a few questions in reference to search engine optimization for my product driven affiliate sites. My goal this year is to take one of the sites and really focus my efforts on ranking for solid keywords. I had a concern about some of the product information coming from Amazon potentially penalizing me because of redundant content.

Danny ended up saying that I should start filling in the gaps with original content. In other words, look at what Amazon doesn’t provide  in their product descriptions / reviews and make an effort to provide this information for both the search engines and visitors. It’s something I had thought about doing in the past, but my conversation with Danny made me realize that I should get it done now. Those words have sparked me to look at my product driven affiliate sites in a different manner and I can’t wait to get started on adding some fresh content.

After lunch I caught up with a few old friends that I hadn’t seen for three years. Then, I headed over to the Starlight Ballroom to catch the last few minutes of the panel on PPC, Retargeting, Affiliate, Social. PPC retargeting is something I can see myself using after building a real brand, but until I do that I’d rather focus my efforts on development. This panel consisted of Jay Weintraub, Peter Hamilton, Merry Morud, Adam Epstein and Raj Beri as the moderator.

Here is a description of what the panel was about taken from the WebfestGlobal website:

This session will provide you with the pros and cons of acquiring traffic via each of these channels. You will also learn about the latest tips, techniques and tools for getting the best performance out of your investment in each channel. Q&A to follow.

After this session I waited around in the Starlight Ballroom for the Moniker Live Premium Domain Name Auction to start. I debated on signing up for the auction and decided that it was best just to enjoy the bidding taking place around me. The only domain on the list that I was interested in and fit my budget was GunPermits.com. The domain ended up selling for $5,500. You can read more about the auction results on DomainNameWire.com.

The day ended with all attendees being treated to dinner and drinks under the space shuttle Endeavour. Live music played in the background as I and several other conference attendees enjoyed dinner, drinks, networking and stories from astronaut Garrett Reisman.