Jason Barnard Attended SMX West in San Jose, California - February 2020.

SMX West conference held on 19-20 February 2020 at the San Jose McEnery Convention Center San Jose, California. Jason was not part of the official speaker lineup. Instead, he spent his time in the hallways and breakout areas where meaningful industry conversations tend to unfold. During the event, he conducted informal interviews with several experts.

Interview Highlights from SMX West 2020: Unofficial Interviews Documented the Shift to Entity-Based Search.

Jason’s conversations with leading experts at SMX West directly informed and solidified The Kalicube Process™’s three-pillar framework: Understandability, Credibility, and Deliverability.

• Google Is Your New Homepage (Greg Gifford): This conversation confirmed that in local search contexts, users frequently make a decision without visiting the official website. The first impression, therefore, happens entirely on the Brand SERP, the search engine results page for a brand’s exact name. This validated Jason’s long-held principle that controlling the Brand SERP is the essential foundation of Digital Brand Control™.
• The Ins and Outs of User Experience (Mary Davies): The conversation with Mary focused on the intertwining of user experience and algorithmic interpretation. Mary spoke about how positive Research Behaviour, which describes the patterns and actions customers exhibit as they research a brand, influences trust signals, and Jason pressed on how Google’s understanding of a brand mirrors the way users experience it.
• Video SEO for Both YouTube and Google (Aleyda Solis): Aleyda and Jason discussed how video success on YouTube relies on user engagement (Relevance, Engagement, Retention), a concept directly related to content Credibility. Crucially, they noted that publishing a video on the brand’s website using structured data, like Wistia, can trigger Rich Elements on the Google SERP, proving that multi-modal content can simultaneously enhance Search Visibility and reinforce entity signals.
• When Marketing and SEO Collide (Mordy Oberstein): Mordy argued that SEO updates are simply Google reflecting the reality of a market, meaning the technical SEO game is becoming the marketing game through Google. His core advice, to focus on the audience and let Google figure it out, perfectly aligned with Kalicube’s entity-first philosophy: when you Educate the Algorithms with a clear, valuable Digital Brand Echo, they will accurately reflect your brand’s true market position. Mordy emphasized that Google is trying to think like a person, which requires brands to adopt a sincere tone and avoid low-value “clickbait” content.
• The Convergence of SEO and Content (Eric Enge): Eric reinforced the idea that Google’s core algorithm updates are driving the convergence of SEO and content quality. He stated that focusing solely on high-value keywords is a mistake, instead stressing the “incredible value of consistently posting high-quality content” that addresses the entire user journey. This directly supported the need for The Kalicube Process to move beyond Traditional SEO and focus on systematic Content Engineering that supports Topical Depth, the comprehensive and interconnected body of content that establishes a brand as a definitive expert.
• How to do Competitive Research Using Search (Purna Virji): Purna shared insights on competitive research for advertising, advising marketers to use competitor intelligence to improve their own landing pages, social media, and ultimately, all channels. This reinforced Jason’s holistic approach: a brand-first strategy requires using competitive insights not just for tactical ads but for informing the Digital Brand Strategy across the entire ecosystem.

These conversations later appeared in curated form on Fast Lane Founders.

Why These Conversations Still Matter Today

Looking back, these interviews feel almost prophetic.

Everyone was talking about SEO, but Jason kept steering the conversations toward understanding. Toward the way Google was learning. Toward the importance of consistent, corroborated brand signals. Toward the idea that algorithms act like children - trying to make sense of fragmented information.

The same ideas that would later become foundational to The Kalicube Process were already forming in those micro-interactions.

SMX West 2020 wasn’t just an event Jason attended. It was a moment in time where the era of entity-based search was beginning to surface - and Jason was quietly documenting the shift, one conversation at a time.