About Chris Silver Smith

Chris “Silver” Smith is a noted Search Engine Optimization Expert (a.k.a. “SEO”) and internet technologist who has been widely cited for his work in industry trade and national news, such as USAToday. Smith is a frequent speaker at various internet conferences, such as SMX, and he writes on internet marketing topics for Search Engine Land and other news and information services.

Smith is also known for past publications that he authored while serving as Manager of Administration for Cartographics at his alma mater, Texas A&M University, including the TAMU Clip Art Disk^© and the Texas A&M University Map With Points of Interest published by the TAMU Press. While working as professional support staff at A&M, Smith also designed the 12th Man Foundation’s shield logo, which may be seen most frequently on the vehicle decals of hundreds of thousands of Foundation members. Smith is a practicing fine artist and has sold numerous print reproductions of his work, particularly the prints of his painting of Lawrence Sullivan Ross, or “Sully” — a well-known icon amongst Aggies.

Chris Silver Smith grew up in College Station, Texas, and after high school, attended Texas A&M University, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Design from the College of Architecture in 1992. Smith has always maintained an interest and involvement in artistic work. As a student at the university, he was awarded A&M’s highest artistic honors at Artfest, TAMU’s annual student art competition, in 1991, garnering not only Best of Show and 1st Place in Painting but also a 2nd in Drawing and a 3rd in Mixed Media.

Later in his professional career, Smith was appointed Head of the Technology & Advanced Development Department of Verizon (NYSE:VZ) Superpages.com, where he managed a team of programmers and designers who handled the overall design, maintenance, and application development of Superpages. His department’s responsibilities included oversight of cobranded yellow pages services and data feeds for MSN, InfoSpace, Lycos, BigFoot, Google, and more. The Technology Department sub-teams he oversaw were: Taxonomy Development, Advertisement Publishing Liaison, Content Integration, User-Interface Development, Usability Research & Testing, and New & Emerging Technology Research.

Smith was awarded the prestigious individual Verizon Excellence Award for his research and development of Superpages.com’s Search Engine Optimization projects, from 2003-04, based on his pioneering research in SEO dating as far back as 1997. Smith also was awarded the team Verizon Excellence Award for the Superpages.com Traffic Growth Team projects. During his work for Verizon, Smith’s work resulted in the filing of five patents in local search and GUI technologies which are pending.

Smith later worked at nationally-recognized search marketing firm, Netconcepts with another noted Search Engine Optimization expert, Stephan Spencer. While at Netconcepts, Smith served as Lead Search Strategist for their GravityStream product, a near-turnkey optimization software service. As Lead Search Strategist, Smith provided consulting with Internet Retailer 500 and Fortune 500 companies for the GravityStream implementations on their sites and ongoing search marketing needs. Smith also provided product development recommendations and management for the expansion of the software services through dotted-line reporting management of development teams and client account management teams.

Chris Silver Smith also served as Director of Optimization Strategies for KeyRelevance, an exclusive bespoke search marketing agency headquartered out of Dallas, Texas. Chris Silver Smith joined Key Relevance in late 2008. At KeyRelevance, he provided clientele with expert advice on increasing internet business referrals and associated sales through numerous search engine marketing techniques.

In 2012, Chris founded Argent Media, a search marketing agency located in Dallas, Texas. Argent Media provides exclusive SEO consulting, local search optimization, Social Media management, and online reputation repair. Argent Media is a corporate member of the Dallas Fort Worth Search Engine Marketing Association (DFWSEM). Argent Media serves both local Dallas-area clientele as well as nationwide businesses.

Smith has frequently served as an SEO Expert Witness, and in that capacity, he has testified at dozens of depositions, state and federal trials, and international courts. Smith’s expert witness clientele have included GoDaddy, Versace, Adidas, Starbucks, and Carnival Corporation.

For more details on Smith’s commercial work history, view his more comprehensive Curriculum Vitae.