The Liquor Store is just down the road from the Red Hot Buffet on Blackfriars Street. They have a 555 offer between 5pm and 8pm where you can get 2 beers, 2 glasses of wine, any cocktail, any deli board/nachos or 2 Jager bombs (a SEO favourite!) for £5. They serve sandwiches, salads and deli boards so you can fill your boots in there as well.

We will be meeting on Thursday 28th February from 6:00pm (I will no doubt be in there from 5 so feel free to join me earlier if you so wish!). We have a small area reserved for us so there should be somewhere for everybody to plonk when you arrive.

Looking forward to seeing you all there!

Last month it was great to see many students who are taking part in the MMU Agency Life Programme, so this month, we’re taking the meetup a little closer to you!

We will be meeting in Odder Bar on Oxford Road. Close to the station and not too far from the St. Peter’s Square Metrolink Stop, Odder Bar serves a range of Pizzas, Burgers as well as a wide selection of drinks, including Odder Lager at a bargain of £2.50 a pint. I am aiming to book the table at the top at the back so it will be easy for us to be found.

We will aim to be there from about 6:30pm on Thursday the 25th October. Coming? Join the facebook event here, and if you aren’t yet a member, join the Mancsas Facebook Group to be notified of updates.

Looking forward to see you all!

MancSAS are meeting for a few beers and a chat about all things Search & Social at The Knott Bar, on Deansgate. Located near both the Deansgate Railway Sation & Deansgate-Castleford Metrolink, it should be accessible to most of Manchester’s digital community.

We will be meeting at 6:30pm on Thursday 27th September. The bar serves a traditional pub menu, though I highly recommend the pulled pork. I hope to see you there!

It doesn’t seem that long ago that Vincent Kompany lifted the Premier League Title (and – more importantly for me – Colwyn Bay ran riot in the first half against Gloucester City to secure their Blue Square North status for another season), but already with transfer dealings being made, and preseason friendlies being played around the world, the football season is once again coming to life, which means one thing:-

The launch of the #mancsas Fantasy Premier League 2012-13!

Previously occupying the #mancseo hashtag, the #mancsas league is a brand new league ran on the official Premier League Website. You have 100 million to assemble a team of 15 players, which you need to pick a starting 11, and appoint a captain (who will score you double points) and a vice captain (who will become the captain should the captain be out for a game).

To play, please create a team at Fantasy Premier League, and then click on “Join League”. Click on “Join Private League”, and enter the following code to join the league:-

136043-40751

Please note: this is a brand new league this year, the previous one I had trouble in changing the name. So you’ll have to join again.

This competition – whilst run by us – is not exclusively for Manchester based Social & Search Marketers. Similar marketers from all over the country can enter, as well as designers, developers, and anybody who works in the digital sector. Heck I think a few of Manual Link Building’s dedicated outsourcing team entered last year!

Who have you picked? Have you any fighting words for this year? Feel free to bait your league rivals in the comments!

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Ok, so Manchester may not be as exotic and warm as other entries but by Jove we do have fun up north! It pretty much rains here 90% of the time and our summer lasts approximately one week and then we have winter for the other 51 weeks of the year but that doesn’t stop our SEO lot meeting up every month…we are a hardy bunch!

Mozcation Manchester FTW

Roger mozBot needs to visit Manchester!

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Not only do we have a great and dedicated group that get together to discuss all things digital marketing (whilst drinking large volumes of alcohol, because we do that in Manchester) our great city holds a whole host of SEO and digital conferences and get togethers. From the amazing SAScon which has had speakers such as Bruce Daisley (sales director of Twitter) attracting over 200 attendees to the Big Chip Awards which takes place every year and recognises industry wins. We don’t stop there, oh no, our northern city is all about fun and we even have MancDigiBowl where everyone joins in for a fun (aka competitive) game of bowling.

Manchester has some Key Influencers in Search

Didn’t you know that Manchester is home to some some really influencial players in Search, Analytics and Social. Here are just a few:

• Peter Young (Regional Head of SEO, Mediacom)
• Alex Moss (Co-Founder and Technical Director, 3 Door Digital)
• Shane Jones (Head of Social Tech, mycleveragency)
• Rhys Wynne (SEO Consultant, Manual Link Building)
• Martin Bryant (Managing Editor, The Next Web)
• Gareth Hoyle (CEO, Manual Link Building)
• Neil Walker (Founder, Quaero Media)
• Simon Wharton (MD, PushON)
• Richard Gregory (COO, Latitude)
• Guy Levine (MD, Return on Digital)
• Phil MacKechnie (Head of SEO, Carat)
• Ben McKay (Head of SEO, MoneySupermarket)

Footy, Beer & Community FTW! RT @alexmoss I nominate Manchester, UK mz.cm/NCcEx3 for an @seomoz #MozCation

— SEOmoz (@SEOmoz) July 19, 2012

What Manchester Has To Offer

Manchester has been twinned with a number of famous cities such as Cordoba in Spain, Saint Petersburg in Russia and Los Angeles in the US. Yes, LA has the weather, scantily clad women rollerblading and long sandy beaches but we have Manchester City and Manchester United and who doesn’t love a bit of footy?

Contrary to belief from many, including our capital of London, we are not hillbillies, we do have electricity and we don’t all live in houses like those on Coronation Street. In fact, Manchester has been a city of some amazing firsts! Did you know that the atom was first split here? We are home to the first railway station in England and more importantly, none of us would be in a job without Manchester (well…kind of). In 1948 the first stored computer was built at the Victoria University here which contained all the necessary components which were essential to the modern computer we all know, love and use today! So if that isn’t reason enough for you to come here (although it should be) here are some more just to persuade you that little bit extra.

Manchester is the second most visited city in England after London, but London is the capital and would obviously get visitors so we are technically the most visited city in England if you look at it with a slightly warped reasoning. Musical greats have been born and bred in these rainy parts such as Oasis, The Smiths, Joy Division and the Stone Roses and so using song titles from these four influential bands we give you the following final push to get SEOmoz to come to us: “Please, please, please let me get what I want” so I “Don’t look back in anger”, Manchester is like “Breaking into heaven” it will be your “One Love” and we are definitely “What the world is waiting for” (well the digital marketing world at least!)

P.S. If that still wasn’t enough, Henry Royce met Charles Rolls in the Midland Hotel  and went on to make some of the most amazing cars ever…just saying.

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1. More all inclusive. A criticism of many of the events recently are that these have been just drinks and nothing else. As the Manchester SEO organising committee we have taken much of this on board and will be announcing some very exciting tweaks moving forward
2. More extensive – SEO is so much more broad than when the community first kicked off. The requirement for SEO’s to understand other aspects such as Social and Analytics means that as SEO’s we really need to be multi-skilled to maximise the organic search opportunity
3. More valuable – The original framework for Manchester SEO was to make this something that the community could learn from each other. This ethos still stands however we are keen to ensure that we as a community continue to be seen at the forefront of the UK SEO scene.

THe final event will take place at Dukes on the 28th of June kicking off at 6pm. A formal announcement of the new framework will be announced then

More news can be found on our Facebook page here - https://www.facebook.com/events/311588242261450/

Looking forward to seeing you all then

We are looking for ideas on where to go, however rather than a poll on here, we have recently switched to a facebook group to arrange meetups.

If you are in the group, feel free to click here to vote on the poll on where to go this month.

Not a member of the MancSEO Facebook Group? request to join and I’ll add you. If you are having problems in being added, speak to me on Facebook or twitter and I’ll see what I can do .

Hope to see you on the 29th!

Rhys

People usually arrive after 18:30. There is good food available at Dukes, and if you want a “proper sit-down” meal, Albert’s Shed is next door.

• Taps bar after work for pre-eating drinky-poos (http://www.tapsbar.co.uk/)
• Tai Wu for a Chinese (£10.50 per person - http://goo.gl/qCGQ8)
• Potential karaoke aftwerwards. If not there’ll definitely be more drinking!

Hop over to our Facebook group and tell us if you’re coming as soon as you can. See you then!

October’s #mancseo meetup will be held on 20th October at Pin Up in Spinningfields. If anyone opposes please say so on twitter using the #mancseo hashtag!

See you there!