Qwest Internet service here in Portland Oregon has apparently begun to randomly block port 25 for its customers, just like Comcast did last year. This renders users helpless to send email using their own domain from their web host’s email server like most businesses do.

Also just like Comcast, they are not doing it to all users yet, and they have provided no notice to users for whom they have done this. It’s only due to spending several hours on the phone last summer that I can offer this solution.

If this has happened to you, simply open your mail client, go to the advanced properties of the mail account, and change your outgoing mail server (SMTP) from Port 25, to port 587, then save configuration, and restart your Outlook or Outlook express.

Port 587 is another port that many web hosts provide for exactly this situation. While I can attest to its success on the majority of hosted mail servers (including our web hosting servers in Portland), it may not work for everyone.

In the event changing to port 587 does not solve your problem, rather than calling Qwest, call your web host, and explain that “you suspect that your ISP has blocked port 25 for outgoing mail. What other port do they recommend you try?”

At that point, they will either open another port, or tell you the existing passport to use for their Web hosting.

The reasons Qwest (and Comcast) have done this to people with no notice escape me, but there ya go!

There are approximately 72 hours remaining for you to obtain a ticket to SearchFest ’08 at more than half off of the non-member door price.

Here are the steps…

1. Join SEMpdx
2. Register for the conference. (Price goes up slightly March 1st)
3. Before checkout – apply this additional $40 discount code – SEMBD

For those of you search marketers that have been living under a rock here in the Pacific Northwest, SEMpdx is holding its second annual search marketing event on Monday, March 10 at the Oregon zoo.

Representatives are coming to Potrtland from from Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft, along with some of the brightest minds in the Internet marketing industry. This one-of-a-kind local event is fast becoming the most popular local search shows in the nation due to the high profile speakers we’ve brought in.

In fact there are so many good speakers, but none of us on the board even get a speaking session this year (but we will be moderating).

Interviews with nearly all of the SearchFest ’08 presenters are here

Here’s the full agenda of all the speakers and sessions

Tickets at the door will be $299 for member, and $349 for non-members.

While advance tickets are less, here’s how you can get the absolute best price available right now, knocking it down to just $159.00…

First go to SEMpdx and sign up to be a member. You really should be a member anyway. For the fee, you’ll find no local search engine marketing group to be more educational, with monthly meetings and events.

Then, once you’re a member go to register for the event and choose the $199 early registration admission, which saves you $150 on the non-member door price.

But wait, don’t pay yet…

Since I’m a board member, and you’re a loyal reader of my blog, I can give you a discount code that will save you another $40, bringing the total to just $159. Use this code to get that last $40

Be sure to hit the ADD button before you enter your CC info, and remember, you do have to register no later than March first to save the full $190, but the $40 code works for all the price level except student.

SEMpdx and SAO IPSIG are teaming up to bring a joint internet marketing event to Portland, next Tuesday,February 5, 2008.

Similar to other SEMpdx hot seat events, there will be up to five websites reviewed, and site owners may address any questions the wish, from search engine optimization, to linking strategy, to pay per click management, or anything else they desire.

No stone may be left unturned in this rare opportunity to share world class knowledge and information. I’ll be one of the panelists, and if you attend, please don’t hesitate to introduce yourself.

Click here to register a site for review at SEMpdx
Click here to register for general attendance
Click here to learn more about the IPSIG

5:00pm-7:00pm Tuesday February 5th

Location: US BankTower -20th Floor Broadway Conference Room
111 SW 5th Ave, Portland, OR 97204

General Attendance $20 for members of SAO or SEMpdx
General Attendance $35 for non members
Hot Seat Site Review $99
Dinner is included

SAO IPSIG and SEMpdx invite you to take part in SAO/SEMpdx Hot Seat, an intimate panel event where you’ll get real, specific search engine marketing advice tailored to your site at a bargain price. Five of the best search marketing professionals in the Portland Metro area will critique 5 actual sites submitted for review. Specializing in different areas, the panelists will address SEM campaign strategy, search engine optimization, pay for click advertising, blogging, article syndication and more.

Whether your site is launched, in development, or being planned, you can gain invaluable insight and actionable suggestions to improve your search marketing results.

This Hot Seat is brought to you at special promotional prices thanks to SearchFest 08.

What You’ll Get:
• Hot Seat participants get SEM recommendations specific to their site / campaign
• Others learn from the event – Much of the advise will apply to you
• Tips on search engine optimization, paid advertising, blogging, article syndication
• Insight into common search marketing problems, questions, and issues
• Suggestions for overhauling your search marketing strategy
• Knowledge of panel of experts with years of SEM experience

Moderator
Kent Lewis, President, Anvil Media, Inc. & President, SEMpdx

Presenters

• Stanford M. Davis, Owner, Straight-On Internet Consulting
• Scott Hendison, CEO, Search Commander, Inc.
• Todd Mintz, staff writer for Search Engine Guide & Search Engine Land, and the Director of Internet Marketing & Information Systems for S.R.Clarke
• Tracy Chapman, Owner, Ignite Web Marketing Services

Program Agenda:
5:00pm-5:30pm – Registration/Dinner
5:30pm-6:45pm – Presentation
6:45pm-7:00pm – Questions & Answers

Parking Information: Metered parking is available on the street on 4th St. There is a parking garage in the building for a cost of $5.00 per hour or there is one across the street on 4th St. and Pine St. for $4.50 per hour.
Click here to register a site for review at SEMpdx

Click here to register for general attendance

Click here to learn more about the IPSIG

Searchfest 2008, Oregon’s annual search marketing conference will be held on Monday, March 10, 2008, at the Oregon Zoo’s Cascade Crest Banquet Center.

We’ve now got the prices posted, the sign-up form live, and I’m sorry, but it’s already too late for you to be the first person to sign up…

That’s okay thougfh, because it’s not too late to save some money, and if you’re already a member of SEMpdx you can save 50% compared to the door price for non-members!

These early bird discount prices will only be good through the first of February, because we’re budgeting now for headcount, catering etc. and so the sooner you get in, the more money you can save.

Here are the confirmed speakers so far, and Rand Fishkin, from SEOmoz will be giving the keynote presentation -

* Paul Colligan
* Jeff Pruitt, SEMPO, iCrossing
* Stoney deGeyter
* Matt McGee
* John Andrews
* Kevin Wilk – Yahoo
* Marshall Simmonds, New York Times
* Dan Harbison, Portland Trailblazers
* Ben Hanna, VP Marketing, Business.com
* LinkShare
* Brian Schmidt – Google

Sign up today with the early bird discount and don’t miss this rare Portland opportunity…

Somehow, there are still some slots available for site reviews at next Mondays SEMpdx Search Engine Marketing Hot Seat event.

For those who don’t know, Vanessa is a top speaker on the conference circuit. Formerly head of Google’s Webmaster Central team and more recently Zillow.com, Vanessa has transitioned to features editor at Search Engine Land and to helping startups at Ignition Partners.

I won’t be in attendance this month, and will instead be affiliate hunting at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas,  but it promises to be another great Portland search marketing event.

The January Hot Seat event will feature a presentation from Vanessa Fox, who will then participate as one of our Hot Seat panelists and dole out advice for your site!

SEM Hot Seat is a chance to get real search marketing advice from a panel of experts. Our panelists will critique actual sites and address specific SEM questions / issues.

Whether it’s advice on how to improve your site optimization (SEO) or how to fine-tune your pay per click (PPC) campaign for better results. Even if you don’t have a site for our panel to critique, you will still be able to gain valuable insight and answers for common search marketing problems and questions. We limit the number of sites critiqued in order to provide the best possible value – so submit yours ASAP!

At the upcoming SEMpdx sixpack event*, I was supposed to give a 15 minute talk about Blogs and RSS in a generic sort of way that might appeal to the broadest variety of users… Pardon me while I yawn for a minute.

Do you really need to be told again that user generated content and RSS is an effective form of marketing and driving traffic to your website? Wouldn’t you rather have specifics about the best platform on earth?

So, instead of just giving generic information, I’m going to turbocharge my portion of the event by explaining and demonstrating methods that we’ve deployed on our WordPress blog to make it as effective as possible.

• How do we ensure that we are adhering to the Top 10 SEO factors?
• How do we use the most up-to-date open source WordPress plug-ins available?
• How do we maximize our visibility and crawlability for great SERPS?
• How do we include news service pings, site map creation, tag generation, and user participation inside the WordPress environment?

For those that don’t use WordPress, all of the principles we discuss will still apply, and generic info will still be given, but making it all work in your own archaic system will be your problem.

This is one Porland search marketing event* you don’t want to miss…

*If you are viewing this past November 13th 2007, please see the SEMpdx events page for our next event, because that link will fail, giving a 404 error.

I’m going to be attending the Search Engine Strategies Local show in Los Angeles on November 28, 29th, and 30th, and you have a chance to go too with a free ticket worth nearly $1600!  Or, you could win an $1800 pass to SES Chicago to be held December 3 – 7th.

Next Wednesday, October 10, 2007, we will be giving away two passes, one to each event, at the SEMpdx Hot Seat event, being held downtown at the Hotel de Luxe.

To read more about the event or to register for attendance, visit the SEMpdx site today

When I first wanted to take classes in search engine optimization, my options were pretty limited, and there were no Oregon search engine marketing classes offered anywhere that I was aware of.

After narrowing it down to just a couple of choices, I settled on attending John Alexander and Robin Nobles’ Search Engine Workshop, in Las Vegas in 2004.

I attended both their three day beginner session, and their two day advanced session not only to ensure I hadn’t missed anything in my self-education, (I had) but also because I wanted to understand the process of teaching the subject, and evaluate their program.

Over the ensuing two years, I traveled out of state to attend five separate SEW sessions taught by Robin, John, and their associates Jerry West, Ginette Degner, Mike Marshall and others.

Each time throughout the entire curriculum, I learned more than I thought I possibly could, and was able to return to work and apply that knowledge immediately for both client sites and my own websites. I feel I owe a large part of my success to their education and teaching methods.

In 2006, Search Engine Workshops began offering franchises to accommodate the budding growth of our industry, and I briefly considered going into the teaching field, because I loved the subject.

However, things were not to be, and my career took a different path. Oregon would have to wait for a qualified and capable curriculum for search engine marketing to come along for a while longer.

Now in 2007, the day is finally here where you can learn world-class SEO skills in Oregon, without having to buy a plane ticket, and I’m happy to announce my own affiliation with the Search Engine Academy of Oregon

The owner, Colleen Wright, has agreed to offer my readers a 10% discount for all of their class offerings, beginning in October 2007.

Check out their website, and give them a look -

To get 10% off be sure to enter this coupon code “commander”

This is valid ONLY through their online SEO Class registration and will not be honored otherwise, or after the fact. 

This month’s Oregon Computer Consultant Association meeting is tomorrow night, and were having a presentation about reducing e-mail clutter that promises to be enlightening. The subjects are e-mail reduction in Outlook, and a second part about using the new Windows Home Server product.

Excluding spam, I am personally plagued by nearly 800 e-mails a day, only a small fraction of which I actually need a reply. Many require only Outlook auto-filing for future reference, and many just require a quick review, and manual placement into a folder.

The vast majority just need a simple read and delete, and I’ve really thinned out what I have to look at, but in the end, there are still over 200 e-mails a day that I have to open.

Last week I discovered another e-mail in my inbox that should have garnered an immediate response, and by the time I got back to them, even though they expected up to three business days, the issue was no longer relevant, and my reply was no longer needed. This wastes their time as well as my own.

This isn’t the first time it’s happened, and likely won’t be the last, and that’s why I’m excited to hear a presentation tomorrow night at the Oregon Computer Consultants Association by an independent consultant named Scott Hanselman.

I’ve never met him, and he’s not a member, but he does operate a popular website, called HanselMinutes and hosts a weekly Internet radio show there, as well as having a popular blog at ComputerZen.com

Date:
Tuesday, August 28
7:00-8:30pm (no-host dinner at 6:00)

Location:
Rheinlander German Restaurant
5035 NE Sandy Blvd
Portland OR 97213

He’s giving a two-part presentation:

First – “Let go of the psychic weight of the 10000 emails in your Inbox and enjoy the bliss you can get with “zero email bounce.” We’ll talk about what that is, and how you can implement it in your daily email workflow, in Outlook, or in Gmail and other clients.”

Second – We’ll talk about Windows Home Server. Scott has been beta testing WHS for the last 6 months and living with it day to day. We’ll see what it offers, if you should build or buy and what it provides over one of the off-the-shelf NAS solutions.

His bio is below, and I hope to see you there:

Scott Hanselman was the Chief Archiect for Corillian Corporation and a Principal Consultant at STEP Technology and has been in technology for the last 15 years. He’s written a number of books on .NET and Microsoft technlogies and has a popular blog at http://www.hanselman.com and a weekly podcast on iTunes and at http://www.hanselminutes.com. He’ll be starting a new job at Microsoft as a Program Manager in the Developer Division this fall.

The August meeting of Portland Oregons premier search marketing group will be a return of everyone’s favorite event, the SEO Hot Seat, by SEMpdx.

We will also be returning to the Hotel Deluxe, and like always, it promises to be educational as well as entertaining.

This month, the panelists are:

• Leo Chung – Overland Agency
• Gary Pool – White Rose Productions
• Kent Schnepp – EngineWorks
• Ben Lloyd – Amplify-Interactive
• SPECIAL GUEST PANELIST: Alex Bennert – BeyondInk

SPECIAL GUEST MODERATORÂ – Anne Kennedy – BeyondInk
Time and Location
Tuesday, August 14 2007
Registration & Networking: 6:00 PM
Program: 6:30 – 8:00 PM
Location: Hotel DeLuxe (729 SW 15th Ave. Portland, OR 97205)

Details and Signup

Tomorrow in downtown Portland, there is a great web seminar going from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. As a member of SEMpdx, you can save 20% on registration too.

A $50 investment in the future of your website is well worth your time, and if you are attending, please look me up while you’re there.

Want to learn the secrets of building lasting online relationships? The third annual Love@First Website event will reveal how online visionaries engage, inspire and most importantly, convert their web traffic into customers, participants and repeat visitors.

Join ISITE Design, Wednesday, June 27, 2007 at the Tiffany Center for a half-day event that will provide attendees a unique view into leveraging the power of the web to improve customer relationships online.

The all-star line-up of web professionals includes Michael Brill, founder of Crushpad; Kara Imai, Director of Online Marketing for GoHawaii.com; and multiple team members who will unveil how Farm Aid tackled social networking

OCCA Monthly Meeting (free and open to the public)
Title: Lets Talk Time and Money
Date: Tuesday June 26, 2007
Time: 7:00-8:30PM (No-host dinner at 6:00PM)
Speaker: Steve Shank
Place: Rheinlander German Restaurant
5035 NE Sandy Blvd
Portland OR 97213-1941

We will be talking about how we bill and make money as consultants.  We will discuss time and billing, tracking hours and time we spend with clients, invoicing clients and collecting payment, collections issues and adding interest and late fees.   We will also talk about contracts such as payment arrangements, disclaimers, cancellation fees, and length of contract.

Steve Shank of the OCCA will present his Time and Billing solution before we have our mediated discussion.  Bring your collections horror stories, and ideas to be more organized in the way we make our money.