Public Services
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SEMPO 2008 Board of Directors
Dana Todd is considered one of the pioneers of the search marketing industry, but her expertise includes all forms of online marketing and interactive visibility. With 13 years of experience in exploring marketing methods in the Internet space, she can happily count herself amongst the “old-timers” who survived and thrived in the Internet new economy. Recently, Ms. Todd helped launch startup Newsforce, which aims to introduce the tactics, technologies and opportunities of online promotion to a whole new audience: corporate communications and PR professionals. Prior, she led SiteLab for 10 years, developing a deep expertise in search engine marketing and highly effective online media. Press, industry analysts and technology leaders frequently tap Ms. Todd for her knowledge of the search engine marketplace. She reports on the widely-varied and frequently changing industry that allows advertisers to "buy their way to the top" of the search engines. Ms. Todd regularly appears as a top-ranked speaker at AD:TECH and Jupiter Media's Search Engine Strategies national conferences. Dana Todd talks candidly about the pros and cons of leading search engine marketing programs, and speaks from experience. Her passion for helping clients understand and dominate the search space, while still upholding core branding principles. Ms. Todd worked as a journalist, news editor and advertising professional prior to joining SiteLab, and holds a Bachelors in Advertising from University of Georgia.
Serving as Executive Vice President, Search, Jeffrey Pruitt focuses on iCrossing's strategic relationships, including those with leading search engines, technology partners, advertising agencies, and Fortune 500 accounts. In addition, Jeffrey provides leadership to all of iCrossing's business groups to ensure high quality service and delivery to their valued customer base. Jeffrey joined iCrossing in 1999 and served in executive roles as Chief Financial Officer and Director of Business Development. Prior to iCrossing, he served as CPA with the Arthur Andersen Auditing Division in Arizona. He was promoted to the Arthur Andersen Investment Consulting Division, where he advised on asset allocation decisions for a $2.5 billion fund, and serviced multiple large and small cap clients. Jeffrey is an active member of the search marketing community, having served as a Board member and officer of the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) for several years. Jeffrey is a CPA and NASD Series 65 certified. He is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and the Arizona Society of Certified Public Accountants. He graduated from Arizona State University with a Bachelor's degree in Accountancy.
Dave has been with DoubleClick since January 1999. During that time, Dave has worked with DoubleClick's Adserving, email, and search technology in sales engineering, support, professional services, and product management capacities. Dave has also been the project leader for many of DoubleClick's internal reorganization projects, including the Executive Project Manager for the sale of DoubleClick to Hellman and Friedman, as well as the wind down and disposal of two of DoubleClick's product offerings. Prior to joining DoubleClick, Dave was a Consultant at Andersen Consulting (Accenture). He developed and designed applications, as well as managed teams of developers at engagements with United Parcel Service, Reader's Digest, and Time, Inc. The latter two engagements involved the development of systems to expand the flexibility to insert dynamic direct mail promotions in hard cover magazines. Dave graduated with a degree in Industrial Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA. Following college, Dave was a Management Engineer at a large hospital in New Jersey. There, he was responsible for turnover studies in operating rooms, the emergency room, and patient administration. While working at the hospital Dave completed his MBA in Operations Management at Rutgers University, Newark, NJ. Dave's most challenging job was prior to his work at the hospital. He was a supervisor at a juvenile work center in Orange, NJ. The center served men and women who committed crimes as juveniles. Dave lives with his wife and three children in suburban New Jersey.
Ron is an Internet marketing consultant, trainer, and owner of Symetri Internet Marketing, which has provided strategic consulting and Internet marketing solutions for mid- to large-size companies since 1998. Ron is actively involved in the SEM community and speaks at conferences and seminars, as well as hosting regional SEM events where he provides participants SEM training and education best practices. Ron is an Expert Columnist for Search Engine Watch, and writes the SEM.edu column. Prior to signing on as a Board member, Ron served on the SEMPO Institute Committee where he was one of the authors of Fundamentals and Advanced courses. He also served on the Marketing Committee and chaired the Event Subcommittee.
Chris Boggs of eMergent Marketing, the search arm of Brulant, Inc., is a specialist in search engine optimization and paid search advertising. Chris joined Brulant in 2007 as the Manager of the SEO team. Chris has worked in Search Engine Marketing since 2000, starting in-house and moving into a consulting role in 2002. Chris has worked with organizations ranging in size from small businesses to Fortune 500. Chris is experienced in performing "hands-on" SEO from keyword research to content development and link development strategizing, as well as pay-per-click (PPC) campaign creation and management. Chris is actively involved in the SEM Community. He speaks regularly at major search marketing conferences, is a Moderator and Expert columnist for Incisive Media':s Search Engine Watch Forum and Blog, and is Associate Editor for the Search Engine Roundtable blog. Chris also writes frequent articles related to SEM, and has been published in a variety of online and print journals.
Jessica Bowman is an in-house SEO expert who knows how to start up a successful in-house SEO Program, get people on board, move forward and improve the bottom line. She is an evangelist for companies doing SEO in-house, and specializes in making in-house programs reach their maximum potential. Jessica has managed search engine optimization for up to seven different divisions across North America and Europe, in five different languages. Her diverse experience in project management, website usability, and process analysis has given her unique insight into how to get and keep SEO changes top of mind, in scope and live on the site – the biggest challenges for in-house search marketers. Identified as one of the industry's top in-house SEOs, Jessica has built in-house SEO programs at Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Business.com, and Yahoo! Inc., and has a rock solid approach to building an in-house SEO program from ground zero. With multi-million dollar successes in search engine marketing and website design, Jessica is an international speaker, a columnist for Search Engine Land, Search Engine Journal, and Search Engine Watch, and is featured in Jerri Ledford's SEO Bible. Jessica has a BA in International Economics & Management from Hiram College and graduated Magna Cum Laude with a BS in Information Systems Management from Washington University. Jessica travels frequently, kicks butt at the board game Connect Four, volunteers to work with refugees, and plans to move to Europe…one day.
Massimo Burgio is a well-known expert on international online business topics, and a frequent speaker at search and online marketing conferences worldwide. Massimo is a proud founding member of SEMPO, where he Co-Chairs the Global Committee and the SEMPO Latino Working Group, and he volunteers within the SEMPO Europe Working Group. Massimo is also an active member of the Internet Marketing Group at WebGuild, the Silicon Valley-based Forum for Internet Professionals, and dedicates some of his volunteer time to WOMMA, the Word-Of-Mouth Marketing Association. Coming from a mixed background of copywriting for advertising, Massimo's first post-graduate jobs were in direct marketing, and IT security/data protection consulting. He joined the Internet and interactive industry during its early steps in Italy, back in 1996. He contributed to the start-up and launch of some of Italy's biggest Internet portals such as Kataweb, Wind, and RAI Net before moving to the agency side, where he covered Business/Marketing Director positions for two of Italy's top creative interactive agencies, Deepend Rome and Xister. Today Massimo is still part of the Xister Advisory Board, and has an ongoing strong partnership with the award-winning Roman agency. Massimo moved from Rome to San Francisco in 2003 to launch the US branch of Ad Maiora, an Italian search marketing firm. In 2005 he joined the search marketing agency Zunch Communications to help launch and lead the agency's local branch in San Francisco. In June 2006, Massimo set up Global Search Interactive - a start-up that focuses on the integration of search/interactive channels with the potential for international targeting - which serves worldwide brands such as Barilla and University of Rome, alongside with small and medium business from Europe and the United States. Massimo received a Degree in Marketing Communications from the University of Rome (Italy) La Sapienza, with further studies at the University of Hertfordshire (Hatfield, UK) and at the Universidad de Oviedo (Oviedo, Spain), recently integrated by post-graduate courses on Integrated Marketing Communications within the Berkeley Extension Program (California, USA).
Bruce has operated as an executive with several high-technology businesses, and comes from a long career as a technical executive with leading Silicon Valley firms, and since 1996 in the Internet Business Consulting arena. Bruce holds a BS in Math and Computer Science and also has his MBA from Pepperdine University, has had many articles published, has been a speaker at over 100 sessions including Search Engine Strategies, WebmasterWorld, ad:Tech, Search Marketing Expo Advanced, and many more, and has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, PC Week, Wired Magazine, Smart Money, several books, and many other publications. He has also been featured on many podcasts and WebmasterRadio shows, as well as appearing on the NHK TV special "Google's Deep Impact." He has personally authored many advanced search engine optimization tools that are available from his company web sites.
Duane has worked for the last seven+ years in online marketing. Prior to that, it was six years in marketing for casinos owned by Caesars Palace. A history in direct mail and onsite event planning and marketing led to online media buying, pay-per-click advertising, e-mail advertising and, you guessed it, search engine optimization. Today Duane's focus is on in-house SEO efforts for the MSN properties, with a bit of time left over to help SEMPO scope career development ideas in the search world. Duane's book, “How To Make Money With Your Blog” was published by McGraw-Hill in December 2007. Throughout the day you'll find Duane posting at www.sphinn.com, www.searchengineforums.com, http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/,and http://www.smallbusinessbrief.com/forum/index.php? as SportsGuy. He writes monthly for Search Engine Land and Search Engine Watch from time to time on In-House SEM topics. Duane is currently the Co-Chairman for SEMPO's In-House Committee. He also speaks at conferences on in-house topics and search career planning.
Sara Holoubek is a free agent consultant, advising growth firms
and investors in the interactive technology and advertising sector. She is also
contributing editor of the DM News'
SearchBuzz column. In 2008 Ms. Holoubek was elected to the Search Engine
Marketing Professionals Organization (SEMPO) Board of Directors for a
third term where she co-chairs the Marketing Committee. From
2003-2005, Ms. Holoubek served as iCrossing's Chief Strategy Officer, building
the firm's New York office, repositioning the iCrossing brand and critical to
raising a VC round of $13 million. Prior to this experience, Ms. Holoubek held
posts in client strategy with interactive agencies Organic and Blue Dingo. Her
vertical expertise covers over 10 sectors and includes names such as Levi
Strauss & Co, Bloomingdales, Compaq, Century 21 Real Estate, Martha Stewart
Omnimedia, Symantec, and Genworth Financial. Sara
has contributed to and/or been quoted in publications such as Adweek, DM News,
Mediapost's Search Insider, WSJ, The Madison Avenue Journal, ClickZ, and
Internet Retailer. She also serves as a frequent guest lecturer at venues such
as Harvard, NYU,
Gord has been working in the search marketing industry since 1996. His company, Enquiro, has grown to become Canada's largest search marketing company. Gord believes that a strong, clear, and focused strategy is the essential foundation for any business activity, whether it's a search marketing campaign, the building of a business, or the running of an organization. Alignment, clarity, and communication allows the strategy to be executed fully. Gord has been a leading voice in search calling for true strategic thinking based on a deeper understanding of consumer behavior. He has freely shared results of previous research with SEMPO membership and has posted as many articles as he's been allowed about the strategy of search to the SEMPO website. While opinions always run rampant through our industry, Gord has been regarded as a respected voice. Through the research and thought leadership undertaken over the past years, Gord has built an interesting network of contacts both within the search industry and in other fields including academia, publishing, technology, and advertising. He believes the future of search lies in maintaining a wide field of vision to spot emerging trends over all these areas, but always bringing it back to be ultimately seen through the eyes of the user.
Bill is responsible a team of brilliant Search Engine Marketing Strategists who spend most of their time helping Fortune 200 companies manage their enterprise Search Engine Marketing programs with a global perspective. Bill is currently regarded as the leading expert in both Enterprise and International Search Engine Marketing Strategy. Bill is an internationally recognized Internet marketing speaker and co-author of the best selling book "Search Engine Marketing, Inc." Driving Search Traffic to Your Company's Web Site, published by IBM Press. Bill is also a current Board member of SEMPO and Co-Chair of the Global Committee. Bill earned a B.A. in Asian Studies/Japanese, from the University of Maryland, Tokyo Campus, and a B.S. in International Business, from California State University, Los Angeles. Bill is also a veteran of the Marine Corps.
Kevin has been an acknowledged Search Engine Marketing expert since 1995. Kevin':s years of SEM expertise provide the foundation for Didit':s proprietary Maestro search campaign technology used by major marketers and agencies. Didit':s unparalleled results and client growth have earned Didit recognition not only among marketers but also as part of the 2007 Inc 500 (#137) as well as a #12 position on Deloitte':s Fast 500. Kevin':s “Paid Search Strategies” column for ClickZ is read by thousands, and his book, “The Eyes Have It: How to Market in an Age of Divergent Consumers, Media Chaos and Advertising Anarchy” has been widely praised. A founding Board member of SEMPO and its first elected Chairman, Kevin is also active on DMA and IAB Committees. The Wall St. Journal, Business Week, The New York Times, Bloomberg, CNET, USA Today, San Jose Mercury News, and other press quote Kevin regularly. Kevin lectures at leading industry conferences plus: NYU, Columbia, Fordham, and Pace Universities. Kevin':s expertise is also valued by Wall Street he has briefed analysts and clients of JP Morgan, RBC, UBS, Piper Jaffray, Bear Sterns, Citicorp, and others. Kevin earned his MBA from Yale School of Management in 1992 and lives in Manhattan with his wife and daughter. |