\n\n\n\n
Rand Fishkin on Meeting Ian and Getting into the Game<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
During the interview with WotC<\/a>\u2019s Greg Tito<\/a> and Shelly Mazzanoble<\/a> – which you can watch here<\/a> – Rand talked first about how Ian introduced him to the game many years after he first became interested in it as a kid. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At 12 years old, Rand was drawn to the game, which he bought and took to school, only to get bullied for it. With no one else to play the game with, Rand\u2019s mother played with him for a while – she would go on to become business partners with him and help him found SEO industry juggernaut Moz<\/a>. The bullying pushed him away from the game for many years, though he admits harbouring a secret interest in it the entire time. \u201cYou both run marketing companies here in Seattle, right<\/em>?\u201d Greg asks, and Ian pipes up. \u201cI run a digital agency<\/em>,\u201d he says, playing down how influential Portent<\/a> has been in the marketing space. He goes on to refer to Rand as an SEO rockstar, to which Rand shakes his head – the pair are both enormous fans of each other\u2019s work, but humble to a fault. Rand left his company, Moz, about a year ago, \u201cto play Dungeons & Dragons full time<\/em>,\u201d he jokes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI almost killed him.\u201d <\/strong><\/p> – Ian on his first game he played as Dungeon Master with Rand.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n Nowadays, the pair both speak at a lot of marketing events. Despite living and working in the same city, it wasn\u2019t until Ian gave a talk at an event in Stockholm that the pair officially met. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At the event, Ian Lurie gave a talk on \u201chow everything I learned about marketing, I learned from D&D<\/em>.\u201d The talk isn\u2019t available anywhere online, but Rand says he was sitting at the back, horrified that he understood all of the references and inside jokes even though he\u2019d never really played the game, and worried that others in the audience would notice and judge him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ian\u2019s talk gave rise to this exchange<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.pureseo.co.nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/image-300x153.png\")
<\/p>\n\n\n\n