No, this isn’t a post about how SEO needs its own TV show or anything like that (although that would be pretty cool, and I’m sure it will happen in the future).

Instead, this my humble attempt to predict the future of the SEO industry while debunking any and all “SEO is dead” posts floating around out there (or currently in the works).

Last week, Barry Adams wrote an interesting post over at Huomah.com. In it, he explained why he believes that the future of SEO is tied to optimizing applications as opposed to websites (not that websites are going away or anything, just that apps will take center stage). I couldn’t agree more, but I’ll take it a step further.

Not only will apps become the primary vehicle for the SEO industry, but those apps will replace today’s “channels” as the main vehicle for television programming. Therefore, just as SEO evened the playing field in today’s internet, allowing the independent “little guy” (or girl) to compete with big brands and publishers, tomorrow’s SEO will allow independent television shows and networks to compete with big broadcast and big cable.

Now at this point, you might be scratching your head and wondering if old Hugo had one too many walks down the yellow brick road in college.

That’s where Google steps into the picture.

See, unlike Apple, which released a relatively tame and non-innovative Apple TV product this week (it’s essentially just another set-top device like Roku) Big G’s  “Google TV” product is looking to completely revolutionize television by essentially turning your TV into a computer that runs primarily on the Android operating system.

And you already know that Android = Apps.

So if Barry is right and the future of SEO is app-driven, and Google has it’s way by killing the TV channel and replacing it with the TV app, then you know what that means for us SEOs…

A solid chunk of the most lucrative of all marketing channels (TV).

Tony Verre wrote an interesting piece last week that focused on the state of  SEO as a service. What really caught my attention was his assertion that, “SEO isn’t enough anymore,” and that it must be combined with social media and paid search in order to be a viable solution for today’s client.

I think that Tony is spot on, but I also think that there are a few other key spokes that need to be added to this burgeoning marketing wheel.

For example, take email marketing. At the small business level, most prospective clients either don’t use email at all or have extremely small and unsophisticated campaigns in place. At the medium to enterprise-level company, email is often a heavy hitter but is completely siloed from search and social marketing campaigns.

And of course, we can’t leave out design and development, particularly as it relates to conversion optimization. After all, what’s the point of paying big bucks on things like paid search and email marketing if the design and UI elements fail to influence and convince visitors to act.

You also have a plethora of niche and emerging marketing disciplines that can pay huge dividends. Things like:

• email/mobile list acquisition and rental
• outbound/inbound SMS text marketing
• mobile and social application development
• mobile bar coding  and couponing (for brick-and-mortar businesses)
• postal record appending (for older businesses that use direct mail heavily but want to transition those prospects to email marketing)
• Display media buying (including things like Facebook Ads and Google TV placements)
• Advanced analytics implementation and reporting (the backbone of virtually all online marketing channels)

The truth is that while yesterday’s SEO provider didn’t need to bother with almost any of this stuff, today’s SEO provider had better get up to speed on these channels, many of which run in parallel with SEO.

Tomorrow’s SEO provider might find that expertise in many if not all of these disciplines might mean the difference between living the dream and watching it die an agonizing death.

I often tell people that enterprise-level SEO if often more about sales than it is about technical implementation. Why? Because when dealing with large corporations, you must often convince one or more non-technical, executive-level decision makers to make the SEO-related changes you’re recommending. And often times, those changes require significant resource allocation (both in terms of money and employee/contractor hours).

This becomes a particularly daunting task when trying to explain how a particular coding methodology (Javascript, Flash, etc) is preventing Google from spidering page content and those all-important internal links.

There are a variety of different ways to “sell” this type of concept to an executive decision maker. You can paint an ROI picture, by showing how the implementation will lead to increased traffic/conversion and how that increase translates into incremental revenue. You can provide a detailed audit filled with technical specifications and recommendations explaining what the issue is.

Or, you can just bust out the old Google Text Cache.

I find that Google’s text cache option is one of the most powerful tools for “selling” SEO recommendations because it’s a great example of a “picture being worth a thousand words.” When coupled with a snapshot of Google’s standard cache snapshot, the text cache snapshot will give even the most technically unsavvy executive a clear and concise point of view on what’s wrong. It’s basically a window into the soul of Googlebot.

Here’s a simple example:

I have an image-based call-to-action on the top-right corner of this blog, which is used to refer potential clients to lead forms that I’ve created for the purpose of generating sales leads for my agency. The links contained within the images in that area of my site are not spidered Google. If I were trying to convince a decision-maker of the need to provide a secondary navigation element that is spiderable, I could go the ROI route or provide an in-depth technical explanation, or I could just show them this…

Google Standard Cache Snapshot (Notice the “Need Social Media Help…” box below)

Google Text Cache Snapshot (box is gone, links are gone)

I’m only showing a snippet of the full snapshots for the sake of brevity, but trust me when I tell you (or go check it out for yourself) the contrast is obvious. The links within that call-to-action are nowhere to be found.

And mind you, this is a very subtle example. I’ve performed this type of “flash audit” for prospective clients, showing them how their fancy Flash-based site – filled with detailed copy and a variety of navigation links – is actually a blank page in Google’s eyes.

This is powerful and persuasive stuff.

Try it the next time you’re in a position to convince someone of the need for a change to an existing site/page (particularly when dealing with coding conventions like Javascript and Flash). I think you’ll be happy with the results.

And just in case you’re not sure how to find the Google text cache, here are some simple instructions:

1. Perform a search for the website/page in question (ex: hugoguzman.com) in Google.com
2. Click on the little blue “Cached” link at the bottom right of the site/page result
3. When the standard cache snapshot appears, look for the little blue “Text-only version” link at the far right of the screen (you can see it in my first screenshot above)

P.S. Special thanks to Jill Whalen from High Rankings for turning me onto this many years ago.

P.P.S. Google text cache does not differentiate between do-follow and no-follow links.

Let’s face it. Most of us in this online marketing thing of ours are in it for the…

Why do we blog, tweet, retweet, stumble, email, analyze, monitor, link-build, like, share, digg, etc?

To get new clients or keep existing ones happy and growing.

To increase the size of our company pay checks.

To increase the revenue generated by our website(s).

To increase the revenue generated by our brick-and-mortar business(s).

Etc, and so forth.

And guess what? There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s the American (and increasingly the world’s) way. It’s how we fund our personal, family, friendly, and business pursuits. Nothing to be ashamed of…

Or is there?

My buddy Dennis (aka @thenextcorner) wrote an interesting piece about just how far some marketers will go to generate incremental revenue. His basic premise is pretty simple; some people/entities go too far in pursuit of the old mighty dollar (or whatever currency floats their boat).

Of course, this is a rather small-time example of greed gone to far. Anyone who reads Aaron Wall’s blog is well aware of the enterprise-level greed (and the resulting foul-play and deception that it breeds) going on at the Fortune 500 level. Incidentally, I keep telling Aaron to break away from the marketing niche and focus on things that really matter in this brave new world of ours, but he won’t listen ; )

Fortunately, I am constantly reminded that Aaron is not alone in terms of fighting for the good in marketing. In just the last few days David Harry’s (aka @thegypsy) ongoing efforts to educate folks on the true meaning and context of PageRank and Alan Bleiweiss’ classic post on how provide clients with brutally honest perspective (for their own sake and yours) made me feel a little better about the state of the marketing industry.

But in my opinion we need a heck of a lot more of that marketing goodness.

• If you have a blog (or a twitter account, etc) use it like Dennis did to call out and criticize greedy and generally uncool practices you see in the industry
• Also, follow Dennis’ lead by linking out to charities and other good causes. Non-profits need link juice too.
• Think long and hard about the clients you take on and/or the company you work for. Do they temper their capitalistic tendencies with some semblance of humanity or are they BP-like in their efforts to cut corners and screw humanity for short-term profit? If they’re the latter, consider dropping them as a client or finding a new employer
• Have a cause that you’re passionate about but isn’t part of your job duties or career path? So what? Blog about it. Offer to give them pro bono marketing to help them grow. Do something.

Because while it’s true that the bottom line is the bottom line for all of us marketers, I believe that there’s a unique and untapped potential that the marketing community possesses.

A potential to help change market the world for the better.

When it comes right down to it, this is the ultimate question that a marketer faces when figuring out his/her plan of action on the search engine optimization front. Whether looking to hire an in-house specialist or outsource to an agency, the cost of SEO is usually the focal point of the decision-making process.

But how does one go about figuring out what fair SEO pricing might be? The answer is a lot simpler than you might think (or be willing to accept):

dollar value of a conversion X estimated number of incremental conversions derived from SEO efforts

Yep, that about covers it. Still a little hazy on the concept? Let me give you a concrete example:

If you sell widgets (i.e. anything) and your average profit from a conversion (i.e. a sale, a lead generated, an email collected, etc…) is $100, then the dollar value of a conversion for your business is $100. And if after performing an analysis of your market segment (identifying the various keyword variations that are relevant to your business model and then figuring out the volume of annual traffic those keywords could generate for your site if you achieved top positioning) you figure out that you can generate roughly 1,000 incremental conversions per year, then the maximum amount of money you can pay for SEO services would be $100 x 1,000 annual incremental conversions, or simply put, $100,000 per year.

At this point, you’re probably reading this and saying to yourself, “of course this guy would assert something like this; he works for frickin’ agency!”

But hold on a second. Before moving into the agency world, I used this exact same calculation for my own business ventures. Moreover, this is the basis for the ROI projection spreadsheet that I prepare for each and every one of my prospective clients. It’s also the ROI calculation that we use with existing clients, and the primary reason why they typically renew with us year after year.

Why? Because the only true way to justify SEO services is by comparing the cost to incremental revenue created.

Unlike “production” work – website design for example – SEO is an extremely fluid and dynamic discipline that requires extreme amount of flexibility and nimbleness. Therefore, if you try to justify pricing by number of hours or worked or number of deliverables (page recommendations, links, etc) you will more than likely end up with SEO providers that are great hitting their hours or deliverables goals, but not so great doing the little things that will actually result in the type of rankings, traffic, and conversion that lead to positive ROI.

Note: Hopefully, this a given to many of you reading this, but just in case, SEO IS AN ONGOING DISCIPLINE! You can’t just hire someone to “SEO” your site for a one-time flat fee and expect to get any kind of long-term ROI or marketing equity.

Ok, so at this point you might be saying to yourself, “I kind of get what this Hugo guy is saying, but why hasn’t anyone ever brought this to my attention before (and by “anyone” I mean my existing SEO provider)?”

Frankly, the reason you haven’t heard this before is because most providers either aren’t aware of this model or simply don’t use it because they figure that it’s easier to sell SEO on traditional models like hourly or deliverable-based pricing.

So do yourself a favor and try this calculation out for yourself. It’s by far the best way to figure out your price ceiling for SEO.

And by the way, it doesn’t mean that you have to spend this amount ($100,000 per year in my example) but it does give a frame of reference for hiring an in-house provider or securing the services of an SEO agency. Also, it helps ensure that you don’t use lowball pricing estimates that eliminate legitimate SEO providers from contention.

P.S. If you need help figuring out the dollar value of a conversion or figuring out the estimated number of incremental conversions available via SEO, don’t hesitate to reach out to me via the comments sections of this blog post or by contacting me via the contact form on this site.

P.P.S. In case any of you are wondering, yes, I have had to turn away potential clients after performing this calculation for them, because their max ROI potential was less than the cost of our services. Thankfully, that’s a fairly rare occurrence, and besides, it saves me a lot of work because there’s no point in investing a lot of time and resource into a client whose business model will simply result in a lose/lose situation.

When I first moved to the agency scene, I was really surprised to see the kind of keyword research that was being performed on behalf of enterprise SEO clients. More specifically, I was shocked by the fact that virtually all client SEO programs were based on what I call “top down” or “site-centric” keyword research.

In other words, the powers that be at the agency where I was working believed that the first and fundamental step in keyword research was to take a look at the entire client site(s) as a whole and then pull one large “master” keyword list, which would then be used as source of keyword selections at the individual page level. In addition, this master list of keywords would be used to create a baseline ranking report for the program, which would then be compared to monthly ranking report updates in an effort to track the progress of SEO efforts. In some cases, this master keyword list might also be used as guide for tracking traffic and conversion fluctuations via analytics data.

Frankly, I found this to be appalling. Here’s why:

• Even when using sophisticated spidering and algorithm techniques to try and ascertain all of the possible keyword combinations that are related to a specific website (and all of the pages therein) you typically end up with labrynth-like list of keywords that are relatively difficult to map back to individual pages of the site
• You also end up overlooking certain long-tail, niche (and potentially high converting) keywords due to the fact that these mammoth “master” keyword lists require a cutoff point of some sort in terms of the number of estimated searches per month. Therefore, you end up missing diamond-in-the-rough keywords that are potentially the most relevant to a specific page of content as well potentially the best converting.
• From an analytics standpoint, using a “master” list of keywords to setup a baseline is a recipe for disaster. Why? Because more often than not, many of the keywords that make it to that initial “master” list are never actually the subject of optimization efforts. Therefore, any ranking movement (up or down) or fluctuations in traffic/conversion will be erroneously attributed to the SEO program.

Mind you, I’m not saying that the pulling of an initial “master” keyword list is a complete waste of time. Only that it cannot serve as the foundation of keyword research or rankings/analytics measurement.

If you’re currently using this type of methodology, or some variation thereof, and you agree with my premise but aren’t sure how to go about improving your approach, here are some ideas that focus on what I call “page-centric” keyword research:

• Perform keyword research at the individual page level – some of you are reading this and saying “duh.” If that’s the case, good for you, feel free to move onto the next bullet point.If that’s not the case, then here’s what you do. Start with the homepage, then move onto the category pages and then finally down to the deeper content/product pages of your site. Make sure to take the copy and general theme of each page into account and then use one of the many keyword research tools available to identify the absolute best fit for the page you’re working on.
  
  
  Also, make sure to take volume, competition, and specificity into account. In layman’s terms, think about the whether the keyword phrase is best suited for a high-level page like a category page or even homepage, or if it perhaps belongs on a deeper content page. And if you come across a keyword that doesn’t quite fit on any existing page, then you know that it’s time to make a new page of content!




• Perform analytics based keyword research – in order to do this, you’ll need ranking and traffic/click-thru data. I personally use a combination of Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Tools. What you’re looking to do is identify keywords that have already referred traffic to your site (I use Google Analytics for this) and/or keywords that are receiving impressions via Google (I use Google Webmaster tools for this) and then gauging the impressions/traffic being received compared to the respective ranking for that keyword.
  
  
  Google Webmaster Tools makes that easy because they provide you with both the impression/click-thru data as well as the average ranking position for every keyword that fits the criteria (how sweet is that!) but you can also use Google Analytics keyword referral data combined with ranking report data in order come up with similar conclusion. Once you identify keywords that hit a certain sweet spot (e.g. they’re close to ranking above the fold and/or already deliver significant traffic/impression despite non-first page rankings) you can then work on identifying which page is showing up for said keyword and work on optimizing tweaks (an update to the title tag, and new internal link with anchor text, and external inbound link, etc).
  
  
  The great part about this technique is that it helps you find keywords that your traditional keyword research methods might have missed. It also helps spot “money” or “on the cusp” keywords that are on the verge becoming big ROI contributors.

I hope you’ve found this little 101 tutorial helpful. As always, if you have questions or feedback feel free to leave me a comment or contact me via the “contact” form on this site.

P.S. For those of you that use the Google Adwords Keyword Estimator tool, it might be worthwhile to read this post over at Dave Naylor’s blog. I’m not saying to ditch the Google tool altogether. It’s just that this kind of anecdotal evidence is important and will help you frame the way you describe traffic estimates to clients and colleagues.

Just for fun, I went over Netflix to check and see if there were any movies or documentaries related to search in general or search engine optimization/advertising in particular.

After performing a few different searches, all I could come up with was one film, entitled Search Engine Optimization (very witty, I know) which touts itself as a tutorial that is “Ideal for anyone who’s looking to improve their business or organization’s Web presence — even the most fearful technophobes…”

That fact that Lycos and Altavista are sharing the cover art marquee is not exactly inspiring confidence in me, though. Neither is the fact that the director also does tutorials on non-search related topics like guitar playing.

I know that Netflix is not the end all be all in terms of a movie archive. So I figured I would check out the internet movie data base to see what they had to offer, and once again, I was disappointed.

I’m well aware of the fact that there are sites like seomoz.org that offer up weekly video white board sessions on SEO, and YouTube is littered with search videos of all shapes, sizes, and quality levels, but I think it’s time that we as an industry stepped up to produce more high-quality, feature-length films on the topic of search.

Heck, I’m one of those frustrated former film school students. Maybe I should give it a whirl…

Last week, I spent some time talking about how to find a social media influencer. This week, let’s spend some time talking about what to do once you’ve found them.

In my opinion, engaging with a social media influencer hinges on three key factors:

• the social media platform in question
• the relative level of influence/popularity that the influencer exerts compared to your own level of influence
• your willingness to give without expecting/demanding anything in return

Let me explain each with a bit more detail.

The social media platform often dictates the methodology that you should use to engage with your influencer. Here are three examples:

• If you’re trying to connect with an influencer on Twitter (e.g. get them to follow you and/or retweet your content) you should start by simply following them, then move onto retweeting their posts (when you really feel that their posts are worthy of retweeting) and then attempt to directly @ reply them when you think you have something to add to their conversation (example: the influencer asks a question and you reply with a well-thought-out and/or humorous response).
• If you’re trying to connect with an influencer that is a blogger (e.g. get them to read your site, link to your site, partner with your site in some way, etc) you start by simply subscribing to their site (via RSS or email) then move onto mentioning/linking to their blog posts within your site/blog/twitter feed/Facebook feed as well as commenting on their individual blog posts. Finally, after you’ve spent some time (at least a few weeks) contributing to their site in this manner, you can attempt to reach out directly (via email, contact us form, etc).
• If you’re trying to connect with an influencer that is a forum or group admin (e.g. get them to allow you to create threads that link to your site, reach out directly to members of the forum, create signatures with links/mentions of your site, etc) you would start by simply replying to existing forum/group discussion threads and also starting relevant threads of your own. After you’ve spent some time (at least a few weeks) contributing to the forum/group in this manner, you can attempt to reach out directly (via email, PM, contact us form, etc)

Now here’s where the relative level of influence/popularity comes in. The more popular/influential the individual/site in question (compared to your own level of influence) the longer you’ll likely have to spend contributing before getting any sort of return on your effort. So for example, if you’re working in the online marketing niche and to engage with an upper-echelon social media influencer like Lisa Barone from Outspoken Media be prepared to spend a long time (think weeks, months, or maybe even years) contributing to her content (comments on her blog posts, retweets, links to her content) before getting any sort of return on that effort.

Why?

Frankly, because Lisa has more important things on her plate and because you’re competing with dozens if not hundreds of other entities that are vying for her attention. So don’t take offense if the influencer(s) you’re targeting don’t initially acknowledge your efforts to contribute. Just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, building your network of niche influencers will take time (regardless of what your particular niche might be).

Note: There is one well-known short cut, which is to buy to buy these mega influencers a drink at a conference that they are attending (that’s how I got the opportunity to meet and learn from Lisa’s mega SEO-influencer buddy, Sugarrae).

That brings me to my final point regarding a willingness to give without expecting anything in return. In my experience, social media engagement is one of the ultimate manifestations of karma. What I mean is that people who are truly out to help and contribute to the community (and the influencers within that community) are often the ones that receive the most in return.

This bears itself out most in the realm of SEO link building (which some might argue is the original form of social media engagement). Simply sending out an email asking for a link without giving anything in return typically has an extremely low success rate. On the other hand, a carefully planned out campaign to connect with a webmaster, blogger, etc and propose a mutually beneficial partnership will often result in not just a single inbound link, but a series of contextual, anchor-text friendly inbound links on an ongoing basis.

Granted, these types of holistic engagement efforts take time, which is something that C-level executives don’t want to hear (which is why it’s so hard to get corporate buy-in and budgeting for these types of holistic, grass-roots social media efforts). Moreover, sometimes these types of grass-roots efforts generate absolutely no return on investment (there’s no guarantee that every influencer will ever engage with you, no matter what you do) but the long-term marketing equity that the successful attempts provide will far outweigh cookie-cutter email campaigns.

Now I’m not suggesting that you abandon email outreach efforts for SEO link building or social media engagements. In fact, it’s a core aspect of our SEO programs. What I am suggesting, however, is that you infuse some of the techniques mentioned above to help improve the success rate of those emails you’re sending. For example, one thing I’ve found successful is to email any site that links to us for the first time and simply thank them for the effort. I find that just acknowledging a webmaster can break the ice and lead to a deeper connection.

P.S. One last thing worth mentioning is that, as usual, big brands have an inherent advantage when it comes to engaging with influencers. Since their own level of influence is high up on the scale, it’s usually easier for them to make an immediate connection with minimal effort. That’s why sites like the American Express OPEN forum for small to medium businesses are able to recruit some of the most influential bloggers in the world to write for them. It’s also why SEO link-building outreach (even the cookie-cutter email variety) is usually wildly more successful when done on behalf of a Fortune 500 company then when done for a small company or start-up.

In response to readers that have asked me to elaborate on the idea of social media influencers and how to find them, I figured I would offer up a simple how-to post on the subject.

Note: There a likely dozens of other techniques that can be used, but this one works pretty well in my experience.
Before you can learn how identify social media influencers, you have to actually define what they are. Here’s a layman’s definition:

• An individual or web entity that has a strong following and/or readership within one or more social media channels.

Still a bit unsure? Here’s an example:

mashable.com

Now that’s a lot of followers.

Clearly, this is an extreme example of one of those upper echelon influencers I made mention of in the past, but you get the idea. An influencer has a lot of influence.

Now I know what some of you are saying. You’re saying, “Come on, Hugo, that one was easy. Everyone knows that Mashable is an influential site. Besides, I need influencers in my particular market niche.”

Don’t worry. I’ve got you covered. Let’s take it step by step:

1. Figure out what your market niche is and what keyword phrases are associated with it. So for example, if your company sells tires and other assorted auto parts then your keywords would be things like “tires”, “brakes”, auto parts”, “car parts”, etc (as well as things like “mechanic” since you’re also in the service business).
2. Use Google, Twitter search, and Facebook search as well as social monitoring tools to identify influencers that show up under keywords you identified in step 1 as well as variations related of those core keywords. (example keyword variations could be things like “tire blog”, “car parts forum”, “mechanic discussion”, etc)
3. Take a look for evidence of influence; things like multiple comments on blog posts, high follower/subscriber counts, multiple active discussion threads or responses, frequent posts or updates.
4. If you have a strong understanding of the subject matter in question, read the content and make sure that it’s legit and timely. So for example, if you know a lot about tires and car parts, read the blogs, Twitter feeds, etc that you come across to make sure that the content is good on a human level.
5. Check to see if they rank well in Google for the keywords associated with their content (Note: this is not always a make or break factor, because there are infuencers that for one reason or another do not dominate Google’s search results)

There are a lot of variations to this general methodology, but in a nutshell, this is how you figure out whether or not someone is a social media influencer. This is just the beginning, though. Now you have to figure out how properly engage with a social media influencer.

P.S. There’s an interesting article over at readwriteweb.com today, which talks about the difference between popularity and influence. It’s definitely worth a read.

Regardless of whether you’re at an agency or working in-house for a company, at one point or another, most of us have considered using recent college grads or even college-aged interns to support some aspect of an online marketing program. This is particularly common when it comes to social media marketing or SEO link building.

But how young is too young?

In my experience, age is not a legitimate pre-requisite (disclosure: No, I don’t ask my five-month old to help me with my work, but he does appear to be obsessed with laptops).

Granted, you should make sure to only employ people old enough to legally work in the United States, but in terms of setting a hard and fast rule on age, I think that would be a mistake.

I’ve personally hired folks as young as 22-years of age to help support Fortune 500 campaigns, and the results have been magnificent. On the flip-side, I’ve had college educated thirty-somethings struggle and fail when put into the same scenario.

In my opinion, here are the real factors to consider when bringing in folks to support your marketing efforts:

• Punctuality – being on time and not taking to many “sick” days etc is key. Even if your prospective employee’s work history is made up entirely of part-time jobs at retail outlets or restaurants, call and find out if they were on time and came into work when they were supposed to.
• Good grades – Is your perspective employee maintaining an “A” average in college? This is a good sign that you’re dealing with someone that knows how to learn and is focused on hitting objectives, and this translates well into the world of online marketing
• Entrepreneurial spirit – does your employee to be maintain his/her own small sites or blogs? If they do, this is a great sign, because it means that they have some real-world experience with the web and are likely to absorb everything they see, hear, and read once they come on-board.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills – I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; in my experience, the No. 1 common denominator in the “Rock Star” online marketers I’ve hired over the years is their ability to communicate impeccably well with the written word as well as verbally. Why? Because so much of what we do deals with crafting emails, creating supporting documentation, pitching executive decision makers, etc. In other words, the great communicators often become the great marketers.

So if the opportunity to hire a young rock star in the making comes along, don’t make the mistake of dismissing them just because they’re 22 or 21, or 20, or 19, 0r 18, etc..

Instead, focus in on determining if they display some of the skill sets that could make them the key to both your short-term and long-term marketing success.