Joe Abraham, Vice President of Web Marketing, SageRock
Joe Abraham has been with SageRock.com since 2004. Recently rated the Top Search Engine Marketing firm by NEOSA, SageRock is dedicated to finding customized solutions to meet its clients' current and ever-changing needs.

During his first three years at SageRock, Abraham has had the honor of working with a core group of clients. His main projects have been working in the realm of Fortune 500 clients and understanding the unique needs of big brands. This work has allowed Abraham to stay on the forefront of search technologies. Of these new technologies, he has found particular interest in maps. He feels maps are a "unique opportunity to present relevant data to searchers in a more interactive format."

Apart from mapping, Abraham also has a passion for local search, image search and Web analytics. The latter has intrigued him enough to start a new Web site dedicated to the exploration of issues in analytics, AnalyticalNews.org.

Benu Aggarwal, Founder and President, Milestone Internet Marketing, Inc.
Benu Aggarwal, founder and president of Milestone Internet Marketing, is a recognized expert in internet marketing strategies for the lodging industry. A hospitality management veteran, Benu has vast experience in conceptualizing and implementing comprehensive internet marketing programs. As a leader of internet marketing solutions and education, Benu has written several articles focused on hotel industry online marketing, which have appeared in industry-wide trade magazines, journals and websites.

Her clients include Choice Hotels, Best Western International, Sheraton Hotels, Hilton Hotels, Cendant Corporation, US Franchise Systems, plus several high-tech companies and hotels located throughout the United States. Benu has lectured at several trade associations such as AAHOA, CLIA, Western Lodging Show, Eye For Travel, HFTP, Best Western International and many more. She is also the author of the well-known internet marketing handbook - Hotels to HTMLs™.

Bob Armour, CMO, ShopLocal
Bob brings more than 15 years of experience in retail, integrated marketing, and marketing services as an operator and industry consultant to his position as ShopLocal's CMO.  Before joining ShopLocal, Bob served as a Client Executive at Acxiom Corporation, where he specialized in Internet-related data products. Before that, he served as Vice President of Business Development at MarketOnDemand, where he focused on building partnerships with data providers and developing relationships with strategic partners. Bob also worked as a consumer products and retail industry consultant for A.T. Kearney.  Bob graduated from the University of Notre Dame with a bachelor's degree in economics and received his MBA from Northwestern University 's J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management.

Robertson Barrett, VP, Interactive, Los Angeles Times and General Ganager, latimes.com
Roberton Barrett is responsible for the development and growth of The Times interactive brands and products, a $75 million portfolio that includes latimes.com, theguide.latimes.com, TheEnvelope.com and the regional franchises of Careerbuilder.com, Cars.com and other classifieds properties. Barrett has been a new media executive managing online ventures for more than 10 years, including senior positions at Primedia Inc.'s Channel One Network, ABCNEWS.com and TIME.com. As vice president and general manager of TheFeedRoom, Barrett managed the day-to-day operations for the NBC- and Tribune-backed broadband venture that became the number one source for streaming video news on the Web. Barrett was also vice president and general manager for interactive at Primedia Inc.'s Channel One Network, managing Internet operations and new platform product development, and he served as managing producer at ABCNEWS.com and deputy editor at TIME Online. Barrett began his career as a staff writer for The News & Observer in Raleigh, NC. After earning a B.A. degree in Ancient Greek from Duke University in Durham, NC in 1988, Barrett received a masters degree in public policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University in 1994.

Donna Bogatin, Founder & Chief Analyst, InsiderChatter.com
Donna Bogatin, Founder & Chief Analyst, InsiderChatter.com, has been probing the business heart of the Internet for more than ten years. Donna advises Internet companies on business planning and development and is the founder of her own Web venture, directional media property UrbanSavings.com.

As Adjunct Professor of Information Systems, Donna has instructed at the New York University Stern Graduate School of Business Administration on how companies of all sizes can best use the Web to gain strategic advantage. Prior to becoming an Internet entrepreneur, Donna was an international investment banker and served as Director of M & A for Societe Generale Securities Corp.

Donna holds an M.B.A., an M.A. and B.A. from New York University and is fluent in the French language.

Nico Brooks, VP, Search Engine Marketing, Local Matters, Inc.
Nico Brooks is the Vice President of Search Strategy for Local Matters, a technology solutions company that empowers local media publishers and service providers to maximize their success in the local search market.  Nico is a recognized authority in the fields of search engine management and advertising optimization with numerous published articles, research papers and conference speaking engagements.  He has extensive hands-on experience working with marketers and advertising agencies and was involved in the development of automated tools for search marketing campaign management at Atlas/aQuantive/Microsoft for the four years prior to joining Local Matters.  Nico has worked in online marketing and ecommerce since 1997. He has a B.A. in Mathematics from Earlham College, Indiana.

Court Cunningham, CEO, Yodle
Court Cunningham joined Yodle in April 2007 as CEO. Prior to Yodle, Cunningham was COO at Community Connect, a niche social networking company, with responsibility for leading its consumer marketing, product management and development efforts.

Prior to Community Connect, Cunningham worked for five years as senior vice president and general manager of marketing automation at DoubleClick. In this role, he was responsible for the sales, product management, operations and the P&L of DoubleClick’s suite of hosted technology products for direct marketers.

Cunningham was instrumental in building out DoubleClick’s e-mail marketing product, DARTmail, and led the acquisitions of FloNetwork and MessageMedia. In four years, he built DARTmail into the industry leader where DoubleClick had more revenues, customers and e-mail delivery volume than any other player in the market. Before joining DoubleClick, he worked as a case team leader at Bain&Co., a Boston-based consulting firm.

Cunningham received a B.A. in English from Princeton University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School. 

Bill Day, Chief Media Officer, Marchex
Bill Day has served as Marchex's chief media officer since August 2007. Prior to joining Marchex, Day was the cofounder and CEO of About.com, a pioneer in providing vertically focused original consumer information and advice. He grew About.com to one of the most highly trafficked content destinations on the Internet, a top 20 global online media network covering more than 700 topics and 50,000 subjects used by tens of millions of monthly users to find highly targeted, useful information. While at About.com, he also pioneered contextual pay-per-click advertising through the launch of the Sprinks Network.

Following Primedia's acquisition of About.com in 2000, Day continued as CEO of About.com, running the division within Primedia through 2003. More recently, from 2004 to 2007, he served as CEO of MeMedia, a privately held behavioral advertising network.

Day received his B.S. in mechanical engineering from Yale University and his M.B.A. from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Ali Diab, Cofounder and President, Products and Technology, RippleTV
As cofounder and president, products and technology, at Ripple, Ali Diab has overall responsibility for engineering, marketing, operations and product management at the company. Before cofounding Ripple, Diab was vice president at Yahoo!, where he managed Yahoo!'s Web Search, Image Search, Video Search, Local Search, Maps and Yellow Pages product groups. Previously, he was general manager at Microsoft, where he managed the MSN Mobile and Broadband product groups. Before Microsoft, he was cofounder and president of BuildPoint.com, the world's first online commerce site for the construction and real estate industries.

Diab is a graduate of Stanford University and Oxford University.

Liana Evans, Director of Internet Marketing, KeyRelevance
Li is famous for her energy and creativity. Li specializes in social media marketing, blog optimization, link building and viral marketing. To make things more interesting, Li has a background in both Public Relations and information technology. Li is a regular speaker at industry conferences including Search Engine Strategies, WebmasterWorld's PubCon, and Search Marketing Expo. Liana is the creator and main contributor to Search Marketing Gurus and has assembled a well rounded group of professional search marketing professionals to contribute to the blog.

Emad Fanous, Chief Technology Officer, YellowBot
Emad Fanous is a founder of YellowBot.com, a local search site with well over a million unique users per month.  He has more than eight years of local search experience and 10 years of search and computer networking experience.

Brad Geddes, Director of SEM, LocalLaunch
Brad Geddes is the director of search for LocalLaunch. He works closely with product development to increase efficiencies in LocalLaunch's pay-per-call, pay-per-click, SEO and RegisterLocal programs.

Before coming to LocalLaunch, Geddes provided PPC, usability and SEO consulting services to companies and marketing agencies. He has been involved in online advertising since 1999 and has written extensive articles on Internet marketing.

One of his trademarks has been demystifying many of the more complicated aspects of SEO, PPC and Internet advertising. Not one to hold secrets, Geddes prefers to educate his readers, clients and resellers on the various aspects of crafting successful marketing campaigns to ensure the success for all parties involved.

Laurel E. Gilbert, Director of Business Development, Emerging Technologies, Atlas (Microsoft)
Laurel Gilbert is director of business development for emerging media at Atlas, where she is responsible for business and partner development for Atlas’s efforts to extend its advertising technologies into emerging media platforms, particularly digital television.

Gilbert has been entrenched in digital video marketing, content, and technology for over 10 years.  Prior to her current position at Atlas, she founded and was CEO of Left Bank Consulting, a digital video strategy consultancy specializing in the broadband and cable television industries.  Prior to founding Left Bank Consulting, she was vice president of sales, national accounts for Digeo, Inc., and held various sales leadership positions at Starz Entertainment.

Gilbert has a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of Virginia, and an Associate’s Degree from the London School of Economics.

Zorik Gordon, President and CEO, ReachLocal
Zorik Gordon is one of the original founders of ReachLocal and serves as president and chief executive officer. Prior to ReachLocal, Gordon served as CEO and vice president corporate development for WorldWinner, the leading provider of prize-based tournaments in online games of skill. At WorldWinner, he signed major partnerships with Yahoo!, Pogo, Lycos and Shockwave that positioned WorldWinner as the No. 1 provider of cash tournaments on the Internet, with more than 5 million gamers registered as part of the service. Prior to WorldWinner, Gordon founded Jackpot.com — an Idealab company, a business that has grown to become the Vendare Group, one of the leading online direct marketing and database management companies.

Mark Gorenberg, Partner, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Mark Gorenberg, Managing Director, joined Hummer Winblad Venture Partners in 1990. Mark has served as a board member for start-up and public software companies, including AdForce, HomeGrocer, NetDynamics and Scopus Technologies. Currently, he serves as a Director of Aria, Cenzic, Infopia, kwiry, Lathian Systems, ontheFRONTIER, Omniture(NASDAQ: OMTR), Replay Solutions and Tizor Systems. Mark is also a member of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Corporation (Board of Trustees).

Prior to joining Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, Mark managed a number of new media areas and was a member of the original SparcStation I team at Sun Microsystems. Mark received a BSEE from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an MSEE from the University of Minnesota, and an MS in Engineering Management from Stanford University.

Kevin Heisler, Executive Editor, Search Engine Watch
Kevin Heisler is Search Engine Watch's executive editor and a search industry veteran. Prior to joining this publication, he was an analyst with Jupiter Research covering the search engine industry. Before Jupiter Research, he was vice president, strategic accounts, for 360i, an integrated digital marketing firm with its roots in search marketing. His experience in paid search marketing began with Did-it.com, where he launched the business development department, built the sales team and negotiated search marketing partnerships. His clients ranged from online pure plays such as StubHub, Bluefly, SmartBargains and Match.com, to major brands such as Coach, D&B, Sierra Trading Post, and Starwood Hotels & Resorts. Heisler began his career at Fortune 500 companies Liberty Mutual, USAirways and American Airlines.

Simon Heseltine, Director of Search, RedBoots; Serengeti Communications
Simon is the Director of Search at RedBoots, a digital marketing consultancy with a broad range of commercial and non-profit clients.  Prior to RedBoots, Simon worked for Innovectra, a local search company, for over 7 years, where he worked on a dozen small to medium size IYP sites, as well as over 700 small business sites. Simon writes for the In House column of SearchEngineLand, as well as for SearchEngineGuide, RBDRodeo, and his own blog SearchEngineTigers on a variety of Search Marketing topics. In his spare time, he is VP of Public Relations for the Manassas Community Toastmasters.

Simon will continue to lead search for RedBoots in 2008 under a new company name and brand, Serengeti Communications (www.serengeticom.com).  Serengeti will provide a full suite of digital marketing services, including design and development, conversion consulting, search, email, social media, banners, video, word of mouth, reputation management and Analytics.

Collin Holmes, VP, Product Management, V-Enable
Collin joins V-ENABLE to oversee and manage the development of products and features required by V-ENABLE and our partners and customers. His responsibilities include developing product roadmaps, business development and managing the process of bringing applications to market.

Mr. Holmes previously worked at Cingular Wireless as a business-to-business key account manager and Akamai as a product marketing manager.

He is a graduate of the University of California, Riverside and recently graduated with an MBA from San Diego State University.

Russell Horowitz, Chairman and CEO, Marchex
Russell Horowitz is a founding officer of Marchex and has served as chairman of the board of directors, chief executive officer and treasurer since the company's inception in January 2003. From January 2001 to December 2002, Horowitz and Marchex's founding officers jointly reviewed new business opportunities in the retail, media, finance and technology industries. Horowitz was previously a founder of Go2Net, a provider of online services to merchants and consumers, including merchant Web hosting, online payment authorization technology, and Web search and directory services. He served as its chairman and CEO from its inception in February 1996 until its merger with InfoSpace, a provider of online services focused on Web search, online payment solutions for merchants, mobile infrastructure applications and content for wireless carriers, in October 2000. He then served as vice chairman and president of the combined company through the merger integration process until January 2001. Additionally, Horowitz was chief financial officer of Go2Net from its inception until May 2000. Prior to Go2Net, he served as CEO and a director of Xanthus Management, the general partner of Xanthus Capital, a merchant bank focused on investments in early-stage companies, and was a founder and CFO of Active Apparel Group, now Everlast Worldwide.

Horowitz received a B.A. in economics from Columbia College of Columbia University.

Jeff Hughes, Media Director, GM Planworks
Jeff Hughes has been in the media industry for more than 12 years, all within the SMG family of companies. He has worked across a number of both buying and planning disciplines on clients such as Motorola, Oldsmobile, Pillsbury, United Airlines and the Beef Industry. In 2004, Jeff was named one of Media Magazine’s “Rising Stars” in the industry. He currently oversees operations for the GM Planworks local investment group, a unit dedicated to placing television and radio advertising on behalf of General Motors and its local dealer groups. Most recently he has been charged with the creation of a local digital activation team that integrates GM’s local digital buying within the broadcast and print buying units.

Brian Jurutka, Senior Director, comScore
As director of marketing solutions at comScore Networks, Brian Jurutka is responsible for helping clients better understand the online activity of U.S. consumers to inform strategic marketing, product development and competitive intelligence efforts. Previously, Jurutka was with Capital One’s Direct Banking organization where he helped expand Capital One’s online marketing in addition to overseeing various strategic partnerships.  Prior to Capital One Savings, he served in Capital One’s credit card group, managing multi-channel credit card acquisition and account management campaigns.

Jurutka holds an M.B.A from Brenau University and a B.S. from the United States Naval Academy in aerospace engineering.

Aaron Kahlow, Managing Partner, Business Online, Online Marketing Summit
Aaron Kahlow serves as Managing Partner of BusinessOnLine a complete User-Driven Web Site optimization company and as Interactive Chair on the International Business Marketers Association Board of Directors.  With over a decade of Internet success stories under his belt, Kahlow has worked with some of the world’s premiere brands to improve online effectiveness, including: Chevron, Tyco, Cisco, NEC, and Thomas Publishing. He is noted for his ability to translate Internet Marketing industry jargon into business terms that are easy for the marketer and decision maker to digest and act upon.

Having delivered over 170 seminars nationwide and frequently quoted in such publications as Industry Week, BtoBOnline, and BusinessWeek, Aaron is a recognized authority on the subjects of Social Media (Web 2.0) Web Site Usability, Search Engine Optimization, Web Analytics and overall Web Strategy. He frequently keynotes at industry events such as Online Marketing Summit (Conference Chair), DMDays (Direct Marketing Association), ad:tech, InfoCommerce, Active Insights, High Tech Marketers Conference and National Manufacturing Week to name a few.

Most recently, Kahlow was named as one of the “Top 40 entrepreneurs under the age of 40” by Metropolitan Magazine. He serves on the International Board of Directors for the Business Marketers Association (BMA) as Chair of Interactive Community Education, and active in many other associations such as: Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO), High Tech Marketers Association (HTMA), Web Analytics Association (WAA), Ad-Club and the Advertising Association for Agencies – LA.

A native of Washington D.C., and graduate of James Madison University, Kahlow currently resides in San Diego, CA.

Jon Kelly, President, SureHits
As president of SureHits, Jon Kelly is responsible for all sales, marketing, legal and finance functions within the company. He joined the SureHits team in July 2004 when the company acquired his independent consulting business.

Before joining SureHits, Kelly was an independent Internet marketing strategist and media consultant. His clients included GMAC Insurance and CNA Insurance. Previously, Kelly was the cofounder and vice president of marketing for eCoverage, the first venture-backed online insurance company. He worked in various executive management roles at eCoverage, focusing on marketing, product development and corporate strategy. He also served on the board of directors of eCoverage Reinsurance.

Before joining eCoverage, Kelly worked in strategic marketing at Oracle Corp. Here he was responsible for developing and implementing methods to increase Oracle's software license revenue. Prior to joining Oracle, Kelly worked as a strategy consultant with Mercer Management Consulting, providing counsel to clients in strategic planning and relationship marketing.

Kelly earned a B.A. in economics and political science from Stanford University.

Anne Kennedy, Managing Partner, Beyond Ink
With more than 35 years of experience in marketing and public relations, Anne Kennedy founded Beyond Ink in 1997 to bring the fundamental principles of marketing communications to online media. She is a thought leader and sought after speaker throughout the search marketing industry and has been developing and implementing search marketing strategies for 10 years.

One of the first companies to focus on search engine optimization and online marketing, Beyond Ink's network of professional relationships has flourished over the years and its reputation for providing high-level, quality consulting to businesses, both small and large, has remained steadfast.

Doug Kilponen, VP Business Development, MerchantCircle

Elaine Kunda, President and CEO, ZipLocal
An experienced senior executive with an extensive leadership background and specialized skills involving the Internet, sales and marketing sectors, Elaine Kunda held key positions with several leading Canadian companies before joining ZipLocal in 2006. For a seven-year period starting in 1999, Kunda held a series of senior executive roles within the Torstar Corp., including managing director of Toronto.com and director of new media within the company’s Business Ventures division. She also worked as business development manager for Grey Interactive, a division of Grey Advertising.

Malcolm Lewis, VP and GM, Private Label, Local.com
Malcolm Lewis is currently Vice President & General Manager, Private Label Local Search, for Local.com Corp. Prior to Local.com Corp, Malcolm was Founder and CEO of PremierGuide, a company he built from scratch into the leading provider of private-label local search solutions to newspaper publishers and TV stations. PremierGuide was acquired by Local.com Corp. in July, 2007. Prior to PremierGuide, Malcolm was Vice President of Marketing for Vayusphere, a corporate IM startup, and a strategic marketing consultant for Silicon Valley venture capital firms. Previously, Malcolm was Vice President of Industry Communications for Vitria Technology, where he helped grow the company from an early-stage startup to a public company with annual sales of $150 million. Prior to Vitria, Malcolm was Director of Marketing for Interweave Software, an Internet-based business intelligence software startup. Interweave was acquired by Cognos Corp. in 1997. Prior to Interweave, he held product marketing and product development positions at Oracle Corp. Malcolm holds a masters degree in Computer Science from Sheffield Hallam University in England, and a bachelors degree in Sport Science from Liverpool John Moores University in England.

Sage Lewis, Founder and President, SageRock
Sage Lewis started SageRock.com in 1999 during a time when most Internet companies were failing. SageRock, however, has thrived under Lewis' direction — growing an average of 30 percent every year, while also being recognized as one of the top rated search engine optimization firms in the United States.

Regarded as a Web marketing expert, Lewis speaks regularly to business organizations like NEOSA and COSE, serves as a resource for press about industry trends, teaches a recurring class on search engine optimization at Cleveland State University and is also a founding member of ClevelandSEO.com, an organization dedicated to highlighting the world-class search engine marketing talent in Northeastern Ohio. He is also an expert columnist at SearchEngineWatch.com in the Link Love area.

Ian McAnerin, CEO, McAnerin Networks
Ian McAnerin is the "SEM Resources and Advice" moderator for the High Rankings Forum, the "Search and Legal Issues" moderator for the Search Engine Watch forum, a DMOZ editor, and has been vetted by the strict standards watchdogs SEOConsultants.com and SEOPros.com directories.

He is also the president and founder of the Search Marketing Association of North America (SMA-NA) and has been an election committee member and legal issues advisor to the Search Engine Marketing Professionals Association (Sempo).

He is a returning speaker and moderator at the Search Engine Strategies Conference in Toronto, Canada, and his articles on SEO related subjects have been published in many newsletters, magazines and Web site news reports. He is a known "white hat" SEO who does not spam or attempt to obtain rankings in an unethical manner.

Recently, he co-hosted the China Search Marketing Tour and was made a member of the Board of Advisors for the first Search Engine Strategies conference in China, where he also spoke and moderated.

McAnerin has lived and worked in both the United States and Canada, and has significant business and travel experience in China, Korea and the Caribbean. He specializes in international (cross-border) Web site promotion.

Danny Moon, Cofounder, UpNext
Danny Moon is CEO of UpNext, a company that creates online 3-D cityscape for local search and exploration. UpNext 3-D maps are dynamic and interactive, providing users with greater depth of information, visually and contextually. UpNext combines local recovery and discovery, making it a complete local search solution.   

Prior to founding UpNext, Moon worked as a business consultant in San Francisco and as a research associate on Wall Street.

Moon received a B.A. from UC Berkeley and an M.B.A. from Columbia University.

Alicia Morga, Chairman and CEO, Consorte Media
Alicia Morga is CEO of Consorte Media, the leading provider of online marketing solutions targeting the Hispanic market. Through its media network of premium content sites, its extended advertising network of third-party sites and its targeted lead generation services, Consorte Media provides brands with multiple ways to connect with Hispanic consumers online.

Prior to founding Consorte Media, Morga was an investment professional focused on venture opportunities in the technology sector for The Carlyle Group's U.S. Venture Fund. She also worked at Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, where she focused on early-stage software investments. While at Hummer Winblad, Morga served as VP of operations for Napster and CEO of venture fund Zero Gravity Internet Group. She has served on the boards of technology companies such as Ingenio, Ventaso, Secure Elements, Archetype-Solutions, Applied Semantics, Menerva Technologies and Discovercast. Morga has also been a corporate attorney for Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. She started her career as an investment banker at Goldman, Sachs & Co.

Morga holds a J.D. from Stanford Law School and a B.A. from Stanford University.

Ted Morgan, President & CEO, Skyhook Wireless
Mr. Morgan founded Skyhook Wireless with Michael Shean in 2003 to capitalize on the explosive growth of Wi-Fi usage and the emerging demand for location-based services. Prior to founding Skyhook, Morgan was the Vice President of Marketing for edocs Inc., a provider of Customer Self-Service solutions that was sold to Siebel Systems in January 2005. At edocs, Morgan ran marketing communications, inside sales, product marketing and product management. Prior to edocs Morgan was Group Product Manager for Open Market, one of the early leaders of the e-commerce revolution Before edocs, Morgan was a Product Manager for Harbinger Net Services in Atlanta. Prior to the technology industry Morgan spent four years in the financial services industry as part of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, Alliance Capital and Allen & Company.

Mr. Morgan has an undergraduate degree in mathematics from Georgetown University and an MBA from the University of Chicago.

Kevin Newcomb, News Editor, Search Engine Watch
Kevin Newcomb is the news editor for Search Engine Watch, a search industry news site covering search engine marketing, search engine optimization, and social media marketing, and analysis of the search engine industry.

Kevin has been covering the interactive marketing space since 2004, and has been reporting news about web-based businesses since 2000. With a combination of real-world marketing experience and years of business journalism, Kevin brings to Search Engine Watch a unique ability to explain complex technical concepts and marketing-speak into understandable, actionable news stories.

Kara Nortman, VP, M&A, IAC/InterActiveCorp
Kara Nortman is vice president of mergers and acquisitions for IAC/InterActiveCorp. In this role, she is responsible for identifying, recommending and executing corporate mergers, acquisitions, investments and divestitures. Previously, Nortman worked for Battery Ventures from 1999 to 2002 and again from 2004 to 2006. During that time, she focused on investments in the Internet, communications and new media sectors. She remains actively involved with The NewsMarket and was previous involved with Spot Runner, The Loan Page (acquired by HouseValues), EnvoyWorldWide (acquired by PAR3 Communications), Kashya (acquired by EMC) and Cbeyond Communications (Nasdaq: CBEY).

Nortman has held a position in Microsoft’s corporate development group, where she evaluated product strategies in the healthcare and mobile markets. She has also worked in the Private Equity Group at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter where she analyzed investment opportunities in telecommunications for a $1.9 billion private equity fund.

Nortman holds an A.B. in political science from Princeton University and an M.B.A. from Stanford University.

Gib Olander, Director of Business Development, Localeze
Gib Olander currently serves as director of business development for Localeze, the leading provider of merchant content management services, which includes collection, organization, validation and distribution of merchant content. Localeze has more than 100,000 merchant contributors, whose business content is stored in a merchant repository of more than 16 million business records and distributed to more than 50 local search properties and Internet Yellow Pages directories.

Prior to Localeze, Olander was a business development director with iCrossing (named search marketing agency of the year in 2005), where he educated Fortune 500 companies on the positive results that can be achieved by creating smart content, strategic linking and a clean platform to improve organic and paid search visibility.

Living in Chicago for the past 13 years, Olander was involved in the launch of Chicago.Citysearch.com when Citysearch began its push for nationwide coverage following the purchase of MSN’s Sidewalk property. Early in his career, he witnessed the power of the local advertising market and its impact on local and regional businesses when he developed advertising campaigns as well as direct mail marketing programs with The Ameritech Yellow Pages and Advo.

Mike Orren, President, Pegasus News
Mike Orren is the president and founder of Pegasus News, a multimedia local digital information service.  Pegasus' chief innovation is "The Daily You": a data-driven individually customized version of both hyperlocal and metro news, information and advertising. Pegasus launched on a shoestring in 2006 and without any marketing budget grew to more than 280,000 monthly unique visitors. In July of 2007, Pegasus News was purchased by Fisher Communications (NASDAQ: FSCI), a Seattle-based communications and media company focused on creating, aggregating, and distributing information and entertainment to a broad range of audiences.

Prior to launching Pegasus News, Mike was the publisher of Texas Lawyer, a multimedia regional operation of American Lawyer Media. He was also the associate publisher and general manager on the relaunch of D Magazine in Dallas.. He is a member of Young Presidents Organization and was named one of Dallas top young business leaders by the Dallas Business Journal.

Dorab Patel, Founder and Chief Technology Officer, Matchcraft
Dorab Patel has more than 15 years of experience in the software industry, both in technology and management. He was formerly a vice president at Twin Sun, an international network integrator, developing new markets for network solutions and providing technology direction. At Twin Sun, he led a group that designed and implemented a large-scale Internet-based entertainment network for set-top boxes.

Patel holds a doctorate in computer science from UCLA.

Claudia Poepperl, Chief Marketing Officer, mobilePeople
Claudia Poepperl is Chief Marketing Officer at mobilePeople, the global leader in local mobile search and advertising solutions for directory publishers. In her role she overlooks worldwide marketing activities and takes responsibility for further developing mobilePeople’s position and business partnerships worldwide.

Prior to mobilePeople, Poepperl has been behind the launch and success of uboot.com, Germany’s largest social online/ mobile network site targeted towards young users. She has also led business development efforts at mobile content delivery firm Ucp Morgen and marketing activities at digital commerce software firm Qpass which was acquired by Amdocs in 2006. During a stint at T-Mobile she was instrumental in preparing the launch of T-Motion, the predecessor of today’s t-zones. Poepperl also developed the first mobile premium content portfolio at T-Mobile Austria. 

Shawn Riegsecker, Chairman and CEO, Centro
Shawn Riegsecker is the founder of Centro and currently leads the company's strategic vision as its chairman and CEO. Having worked his entire career in the confluence of publishing, advertising and technology, Riegsecker saw the need to help national clients and agencies more effectively and efficiently buy online media at the local level. He formed Centro in 2001 to develop systems, process and technologies to help facilitate an efficient one-to-one transaction between thousands of clients and publishers.

Riegsecker began his career in 1992 selling print advertising for the Akron Beacon Journal. In 1996, he saw the potential the Internet held for both newspapers and advertisers and became the Internet advertising director for Ohio.com, the first online newspaper in Ohio (Web site of the Akron Beacon Journal). Riegsecker left in 1997 to run the sales and marketing divisions for Cleveland.com, the Web site of The Cleveland Plain Dealer. In 2000, he helped in the formation of Everstream, a streaming media and advertising technologies provider to the local online publishing industry.

Riegsecker then joined Real Media in late 2000 to help lead its advertising sales division. At Real Media, Riegsecker had the opportunity to study the inherent complexities involved in helping national clients purchase advertising at the local level. Believing there was a significant opportunity to develop systems and technologies to make this process more efficient, he left and formed Intégrent in 2001.

Riegsecker graduated from Bowling Green State University with a B.S. in business administration.

Robyn Rose, Vice President of Marketing, Superpages.com
Robyn Rose is responsible for the marketing of the company's advanced Internet products and online advertising solutions. Rose oversees the Internet marketing relationships with all sales channels, directs efforts to increase retention and acquisition of advertisers, and executes the marketing communications and advertising for Superpages.com. In addition, Rose manages both the new and existing advertiser products, along with creating a robust user experience for Superpages.com.

Rose is an active member of the upcoming CMO Council for the Interactive Advertising Bureau and the Local Search Advisory Board for the Yellow Pages Association. Rose holds an M.B.A. from The University of Texas at Austin in marketing and a B.B.A. from Emory University in business management and political science.

Superpages.com, a service of Idearc Media Corp., is the expert in local search. In 2006, Superpages.com had more than 2.8 billion network searches and more than 18 million small to medium-sized business listings in the United States, 11 million of which feature enhanced content.

Gary Roshak, VP, Mobile Advertisers & Publishers, Yahoo!
Gary Roshak is the vice president, mobile advertisers and publishers for Yahoo!, Inc., where he has global responsibility for the company’s mobile advertising and publishing strategy. Yahoo! is an early and aggressive leader in mobile advertising with clear leadership in both search marketing and display advertising.

Gary brings more than 20 years of experience in mobile, digital media and interactive advertising to this position. Previously, he was vice president and general manager at Marchex, where we was responsible for Marchex’s local advertising business, connecting tens of thousands of local advertisers to consumers as a leading search-and call-based marketing platform provider for large local advertiser aggregators.

Prior to Marchex, Gary was a founding member of the executive team that built MFORMA, a leading provider of wireless entertainment content and services to mobile operators worldwide. His career highlights also include senior executive positions with Unity Wireless, Wildfire Communications and REALOGIC, as well as leading global project teams for AirTouch where he secured international cellular and paging licenses and launched the resulting wireless operators. Earlier in his career, Gary held management roles in several leading consulting organizations, including Arthur Young & Co. and PRTM.

Gary is a Phi Kappa Phi graduate of the Rochester Institute of Technology.

Niki Scevak, President and Founder, Homethinking
Niki Scevak is the founder and chief executive officer of Homethinking. Prior to Homethinking, he was an analyst with JupiterResearch, advising some of the world's largest media firms on strategy and planning issues related to online advertising and media. Previously, he cofounded The BookmarkBox, a Web-based bookmark manager and community search provider that was acquired in January 2000 by Blink.com.

Scevak was awarded a co-operative scholarship to study business information technology at the University of New South Wales, graduating with distinction.

Dave Schwartz, Local Category Director, Yahoo!
David is Local Category Director at Yahoo!, tasked with driving adoption of Yahoo’s online marketing solutions among local small businesses and large national advertisers seeking to advertise locally.  Previously he led development of Yahoo! Search Marketing’s Automotive Category on the West Coast.  Prior to Yahoo!, David was an Engagement Manager in J.D. Power and Associates’ Automotive Consulting Practice, working to improve the retail and overall brand experience at a number of major OEMs, including Toyota and Acura. He joined J.D. Power and Associates after completing his MBA at The Anderson School at UCLA.  Prior to business school, David did consulting work for a number of leading e-businesses in the retail, publishing, automotive, and financial services industries as an Account Manager at CRM software provider Personify.  He holds an A.B. in Economics and an M.S. in Engineering Economic Systems from Stanford University.

Andrew Shotland, Proprietor, Local SEO Guide
Andrew Shotland is the proprietor of www.localseoguide.com, the local search engine optimization and local search marketing blog that provides simple tips, trends, how-to’s and strategies for small businesses and marketers in the local search industry. Shotland also offers full-service SEO, Web site strategy and local search consulting. He has provided his services to numerous large media and e-commerce companies, including the Los Angeles Times, Cox Communications and Ingenio, and to start-ups such as Friendster, MOG.com, Yardbarker.com, MagicYellow and others.

Shotland has more than 15 years of experience in the Internet. He was a founding member of NBC’s Internet group and a former GM of NBC.com. While at NBC, he created NBC-IN, the first national network of local TV station Web sites. Most recently he was vice president business and product development at Insider Pages, a pioneering local social search engine, which was recently acquired by Citysearch. At Insider Pages, he developed local SEO strategies and techniques that helped attract more than 3 million monthly unique visitors and more than 600,000 reviews of local businesses almost entirely via search engine referrals.

Eric Stein, Director, Local Markets, Google
As director of local markets, Eric Stein is responsible for Google’s efforts to bring solutions to small-business advertisers and generate revenues from national advertisers in a Local context.

Stein is a former entrepreneur-in-residence at Bessemer Ventures, where he led an effort to build a hedge fund using a new strategy relying on fundamental data from a variety of new sources. He began focusing on the usefulness of new data sources for investment research as a cofounder of Majestic Research, a private research firm that provides unique fundamental insight into key performance metrics. Prior to Majestic Research, he was an early employee at DoubleClick and led several key initiatives, including the Abacus division and the International Media division.

Stein is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Business School.  He is on the board of advisors of Collective Intellect, a new media business intelligence company, and the awards committee of the Empowerment Schools in New York City.

Ethan Stock, Founder and CEO, Zvents
Ethan Stock cofounded Zvents in early 2005 with funding from NetService Ventures Group, where he has served as a partner since 2002. He brings a diverse background in scholarship and technology to the pursuit of entrepreneurial ventures. In 1996, while in graduate school at UC Berkeley on an NSF fellowship, he founded Bamboo Systems, an early entrant in the CRM market. In 2000, he served as COO of eBusinessMedia, the B2B Internet arm of U.K. publisher United News & Media, where he oversaw the launch of multiple industry-focused Internet content and commerce properties, including the first deployment of CommerceOne in Europe. A programmer since he was 10 years old, he worked as a systems engineer at EDS and was a principal consultant at strategy firm The McKenna Group in the late 1990s.

Stock holds a B.A. in history from The Ohio State University.

Matt Stoddart, Executive VP Sales, LinkWorth
Matt Stoddart has been with LinkWorth since it began in 2003. He has helped LinkWorth grow from a text link advertising brokerage into a full-service SEO/SEM firm.  As executive vice president of Sales, Stoddart's primary responsibilities are business development, client strategies and leading the sales force. He’s also a regular contributor on the LinkWorth blog, as well as others, and prides himself on making the best coffee in the office.

Prior to joining LinkWorth, Stoddart served almost five years as an account executive for a multibillion-dollar IT consulting company and serviced major accounts such as Frito-Lay, JC Penney, MCI Worldcom, McAfee and EDS.

Joel Toledano, Cofounder and CEO, Krillion
Joel is Chief Executive Officer of Krillion. Prior to founding Krillion, Joel was the Director of Business Development and chief negotiator for the Yahoo! Search business unit, where he was responsible for establishing and managing strategic partnerships and executing new revenue-producing channels and business initiatives including Yahoo!'s Search, Access and subscription services businesses. In addition, he previously managed day-to-day aspects of the company's sponsored search relationship with Overture Services prior to Yahoo!'s acquisition of the company.

Prior to his work for Yahoo! Search, Joel worked in business development for Yahoo! Consumer Services, where he was responsible for development and implementation of Yahoo!-branded Internet access services including services offered through alliances with SBC and other broadband and narrowband providers.

Before joining Yahoo!, Joel ran business development for Rentals.com until it was acquired by Primedia in 2001. Joel started his career as an attorney with Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati, where he represented and advised public and private companies, successfully navigating companies through a series of high-profile IPOs and acquisitions.

Chris Tolles, CEO, Topix
Chris Tolles came to Topix from Spoke Software, a business social networking company, where he was a cofounder and vice president of marketing. Before Spoke, Tolles was a director of marketing at AOL/Netscape for AOL Music, Netscape Search and Directory Products. He was a cofounder and vice president of marketing at NewHoo, and led the sale of the company to Netscape. After the acquisition, NewHoo was relaunched as the Open Directory Project at Netscape and became the world's largest human edited directory of the Web, and is still used by companies like Google, Alexa and AOL. Previous to NewHoo, he held a variety of sales, marketing and management positions at Sun Microsystems.

Tolles graduated from the University of California at San Diego with degrees in computer science and economics and was awarded the Michael J. Addison award for his senior thesis about the online information industry.

Jeff Torgerson, Manager - Product Management, Idearc Media Corp.
Jeff Torgerson, Manager - Product Management, is responsible for driving Idearc's mobile strategy and products. Prior to Idearc's acquisition of InfoSpace's online directory assets, Torgerson was a senior product manger for mobile local search at InfoSpace. During his time with InfoSpace, Torgerson managed the mobile local search application releases in J2ME, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile and Web 2.0. Torgerson also defined and launched the first ad-supported iPhone Web 2.0 application, which has since been widely received by the industry.

Torgerson has more than 12 years of engineering experience as a developer and product manager. Prior to joining InfoSpace, Torgerson owned and operated a private Web development company. He also spent two years at Boeing where he worked as part of the Web Management team for the company's main facility in Washington.

Torgerson graduated from the United States Air Force Technical College.

Matt Van Wagner, President, Find Me Faster
Matt Van Wagner is a seasoned sales and marketing professional specializing in search engine marketing strategies for small and medium-sized companies in New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts and Vermont. An award-winning speaker whose presentations are usually as entertaining as they are informative, Van Wagner is the president and founder of Find Me Faster, a search engine marketing firm based in Nashua, New Hampshire, and an early member of the Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization (SEMPO). He writes on Internet, search engines and technology topics for the New Hampshire Business Review.

Van Wagner is a graduate of St. Lawrence University, Canton, New York (B.S. economics), with an M.B.A. from Rivier College, Nashua.

Nick Veronis, Managing Director, Veronis Suhler Stevenson

Joshua Walker, CEO, CityVoter
Throughout his career, Josh Walker has helped people take advantage of technology innovation to improve their businesses. Prior to founding CityVoter, he was an entrepreneur-in-residence at General Catalyst, an early-stage venture capital firm in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He joined General Catalyst after more than seven years at Forrester Research, a leading technology market research firm. At Forrester, Walker held several management positions and launched one of the fastest growing products in Forrester's history. When he left Forrester, he was vice president and director of the Consumer Markets research group.

Walker graduated from Middlebury College.

Jonathan Weber, Founder, Publisher and CEO, NewWest.Net
Jonathan Weber is the founder, publisher and CEO of NewWest.Net, a local and regional online publication about the Rocky Mountain West. Based in Missoula, Montana, NewWest.Net combines traditional reporting and writing with various forms of participatory journalism and community information services, and has local sites in 7 communities around the region. Prior to launching New West, Weber was the co-founder and editor in chief of the Industry Standard, the award-winning newsweekly that chronicled the dot-com boom. He also served eight years as a writer and editor at the Los Angeles Times, and before that was a European correspondent for Fairshild Publications. Weber holds a B.A. in Philosophy from Wesleyan University. He lives in Missoula with his wife Karen and family.

Josh Wetzel, Director of Business Development, Shopping.com

Ian White, CEO, Urban Mapping
Ian White is CEO of Urban Mapping, a company that produces wayfinding tools and solutions across the tactile and interactive domains. The company’s products include the multiple award-winning Panamap print map and Urbanware geospatial database products, all focusing around urban place. White has 15 years of experience in marketing strategy and product development. He has been published in academic journals and the business press.

Prior to founding Urban Mapping in 2003, White worked as a business consultant at and held various roles in business development and marketing. He also served as adjunct professor of design and management at Parsons School of Design in New York.

White received a B.A. from McGill University in Montreal and an M.B.A. from Babson College and completed postgraduate studies in France.