AltCMO is proud to announce that Perryn Olson, FSMPS, CPSM and Ryan Kovach will be speakers at the 2026 SMPS Southern Regional Conference (SRC), to be held January 28–30 at the InterContinental San Antonio Riverwalk in San Antonio, Texas.
They will both present on Thursday, January 29, in sessions tailored for A/E/C marketers, business developers, and principals navigating the evolving digital and talent landscapes.
Perryn’s Session: Outrank the Giants: Data-Backed A/E/C SEO & AI Strategie
In this session, Perryn will dive into how search visibility has evolved beyond Google into a Search-Everything landscape that includes answer boxes, generative AI, voice interfaces, social feeds, and local SEO. Drawing from AltCMO’s audits of ENR Top 400 Contractors and ENR Top 500 Design Firms, he’ll highlight where industry leaders succeed, where they leak traffic, and how under-resourced teams can punch above their weight.
Perryn will translate technical concepts like Domain Authority, Core Web Vitals, backlink equity, page speed, and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) into actionable, plain-language steps. Attendees will leave with clear strategies, free and paid tools, and a script for earning executive buy-in, even in firms with limited marketing bandwidth.
Key Takeaways:
- A unified, plain-English framework aligning SEO strategy with firm growth and talent goals
- A tiered toolkit of resources matched to different capacity levels
- A proven executive-buy-in script to secure budgets and support for strategic SEO
Ryan’s Session: Digital Talent Acquisition in 2025: Beyond Job Boards and Trendy TikToks
Recruiting is no longer about filling open positions; it’s about being discovered. In this session, Ryan will explore how top candidates now find firms through AI-curated results, content, and brand storytelling, rather than through traditional job boards or viral TikTok stunts.
He’ll show how large-language models (LLMs) crawl culture pages and extract employer signals before recruiters even engage. He’ll also compare the ROI of one-time recruiter fees to the compounding value of digital recruiting funnels, and outline how HR and Marketing can collaborate to craft authentic narratives that attract “right-fit” talent.
Ryan will cover how to feed AI engines with your firm’s differentiators, DE&I commitments, growth paths, and more, so your organization becomes a magnet for talent across roles, from retiring road foremen to next-gen BIM specialists.
Key Takeaways:
- A step-by-step framework for optimizing your digital presence so AI and search engines highlight your firm
- A cost-per-hire comparison showing how evergreen content and micro-targeted campaigns can cut recruiting costs by 50–70%
- A playbook for aligning HR and Marketing to attract and convert skilled candidates via narrative, not gimmicks
About SMPS SRC 2026
The SMPS Southern Regional Conference, also known as SRC, is the marquee regional gathering for A/E/C marketing and business development professionals in the Southern U.S. This year’s 2026 SRC will take place January 28–30 in San Antonio, Texas, at the InterContinental San Antonio Riverwalk.
Called “UNIFY”, the 2026 program is designed to bring together marketers, BD professionals, and firm leaders to explore integrated strategies, shared challenges, and collaborative growth in the built environment.
Learn more and view the full schedule at the SMPS SRC website: smps-src.org